Chapter 19: Terms

I walked through the gate and out into the lane.

Simon came with me, one step behind my shoulder.

Behind us, on the lawn, forty of my father's friends had gone silent.

Joan lifted her chin.

"That's her," she said to the parish. "That's the girl I told you about. She's poisoned an old man against his own family."

"Mrs. Dunning," I said.

"Hear how she talks. So cold."

"I'd like to talk to the people who came with you."

Joan opened her mouth, and I raised my phone.

"You can have your say afterward," I said. "I'll give you the same four minutes you gave me."

I pressed play, and turned the volume all the way up.

Joan's own voice came out into the lane, calm and unhurried, under the trees.

"I carried you out of that garden, yes."

A woman near the front dropped her candle.

"I told you your mother had sent me to bring you to her."

"You sold me for nine thousand dollars."

"I placed you with people who wanted you."

Nobody breathed.

The recording ran on through the morphine, and the hospital, and the Mackeys' kitchen table.

When it reached, "A mother-in-law who loves you," I let it play out and stopped it myself.

The lane stayed quiet for a long time.

"That's been faked," Joan said.

"Is it?" said a voice at the back.

The old priest pushed through the crowd.

He was in his black coat, with a worn leather book held against his chest, and he looked ten years older than he had in his own sacristy.

"Joan," he said. "I have your placement entry here."

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