Chapter 20: What Neil Signed

At ten past three in the morning I was still in the hotel lobby in my green dress.

The restaurant had emptied hours ago.

The police had taken Dale out through the front doors, with the whole room watching him, and he had not looked back once.

They had taken Gail out a few minutes later, walking by herself with her pearls on and her chin up.

My father-in-law had gone with Cora, in her car, to sit in a kitchen and drink tea.

I had given two statements and signed both.

Hugh had gone upstairs to put the staff's chairs back, and I had told him I wanted to wait for someone.

He hadn't asked who.

The revolving door turned at last, and Neil came through it.

He wore the same suit, and he carried a manila envelope in one hand.

He looked a year older than he had at dinner.

"They let me go," he said. "For now. I've agreed to tell them everything."

"Everything?"

"The policy. I signed as the witness on the beneficiary form two years ago, with the ink still wet on the boat registration. I knew what it was."

"Dale said it in front of everyone."

"He wanted me to go down with him." Neil sat in the armchair across from me. "I don't mind."

"You should mind."

"I do. I mean I won't fight it."

He put the envelope on the low table between us.

I didn't pick it up.

"There are three things in there," he said. "I had a lawyer draw them up tonight. I woke him at midnight."

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