Chapter 18: The Charge

I did not take the knife, and I did not stand up.

"Where are we going?" I said.

"To the station, ma'am. Just for some questions."

"About what?"

"We can discuss it outside."

"We'll discuss it here," I said. "There are a lot of people who'd like to hear it."

I said it loudly enough to reach the glass wall.

Two phones came up at the next tables.

The man's jaw moved once.

"Mrs. Brandwell, please."

"What's the charge, Detective?"

"It's a matter of funds taken from a private residence."

"Whose funds?"

He glanced at Gail.

She stood with the silver knife still in her hand and said nothing at all.

"I asked whose," I said.

"Funds belonging to the estate of Dale Brandwell."

The room made a small sound, a single indrawn breath from forty people.

"The estate," I said.

"That's right."

"Of Dale Brandwell."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Who is dead."

"Presumed deceased, yes."

"By whom?"

His eyes slid to Gail again.

"There's a death certificate," Gail said, in her clear church voice. "The county issued it. I have a copy in my purse."

"Issued on what?" I said. "Was there a body?"

"The lake does not give bodies back, Lydia."

"So there isn't one."

"Don't be crude. We buried an empty casket because we had nothing else to bury."

"I stood at that grave," I said. "I know."

Neil's face had gone white.

"Detective," said a quiet voice from table nine.

The gray-haired man in the white shirt had put down his fork.

He stood and walked over unhurriedly with a leather wallet open in one hand.

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