At six-thirty he called her again. She might be impressed if she knew he was at the office by dawn working diligently. She wasn't. With great pain and fortitude, he sounded cheerful, even hyper. She was not impressed.

"How do you feel?" she insisted.

"Great!" he answered with closed eyes.

"What time did you go to bed?"

What bed, thought Jake. "Right after I called you."

She said nothing.

"I got to the office at three o'clock this morning," he said proudly.

"Three o'clock!"

"Yeah, I couldn't sleep."

"But you didn't sleep any Thursday night." A touch of concern edged through her icy words, and he felt better.

"I'll be okay. I may stay with Lucien some this week and next. It might be safer over there."

"What about the bodyguard?"

"Yeah, Deputy Nesbit. He's parked outside asleep in his car."

She hesitated and Jake could feel the phone lines thawing. "I'm worried about you," she said warmly.

"I'll be fine, dear. I'll call tomorrow. I've got work to do."

He replaced the receiver, ran to the restroom and vomited again.

The knocking persisted at the front door. Jake ignored it for fifteen minutes, but whoever it was knew he was there and kept knocking.

He walked to the balcony. "Who is it?" he yelled at the street.

The woman walked from the sidewalk under the balcony and leaned on a black BMW parked next to the Saab. Her hands were thrust deep into the pockets of faded, starched, well-fitting jeans. The noon sun burned brightly and blinded her as she looked up in his direction. It also illuminated her light, goldish red hair.

"Are you Jake Brigance?" she asked, shielding her eyes with a forearm.

"Yeah. Whatta you want?"

"I need to talk to you."

"I'm very busy."

"It's very important."

"You're not a client, are you?" he asked, focusing his

anu Knowing sne was indeed not a client.

"No. I just need five minutes of your time."

Jake unlocked the door. She walked in casually as if she owned the place. She shook his hand firmly.

"I'm Ellen Roark."

He pointed to a seat by the door. "Nice to meet you. Sit down."

Jake sat on the edge of Ethel's desk. "One syllable or two?"

"I beg your pardon."

She had a quick, cocky Northeast accent, but tempered with some time in the South.

"Is it Rork or Row Ark?"

"R-o-a-r-k. That's Rork in Boston, and Row Ark in Mississippi."

"Mind if I call you Ellen?"

"Please do, with two syllables. Can I call you Jake?"

"Yes, please."

"Good, I hadn't planned to call you Mister."

"Boston, huh?"

"Yeah, I was born there. Went to Boston College. My dad is Sheldon Roark, a notorious criminal lawyer in Boston."

"I guess I've missed him. What brings you to Mississippi?"

"I'm in law school at Ole Miss."

"Ole Miss! How'd you wind up down here?"

"My mother's from Natchez. She was a sweet little sorority girl at Ole Miss, then moved to New York!, where she met my father."

"I married a sweet little sorority girl from Ole Miss."

"They have a great selection."

"Would you like coffee?"

"No thanks."

"Well, now that we know each other, what brings you to Clanton?"

. "Carl Lee Hailey."

"I'm not surprised."

"I'll finish law school in December, and I'm killing time

in Oxford this summer. I'm taking criminal procedure under Guthrie, and I'm bored."

"Crazy George Guthrie."

"Yeah, he's still crazy.

"He flunked me in constitutional law my first year."

"Anyway, I'd like to help you with the trial."

Jake smiled and took a seat in Ethel's heavy-duty, rotating secretarial chair. He studied her carefully. Her black cotton polo shirt was fashionably weathered and neatly pressed. The outlines and subtle shadows revealed a healthy bustline, no bra. The thick, wavy hair fell perfectly on her shoulders.

"What makes you think I need help?"

"I know you practice alone, and I know you don't have a law clerk."

"How do you know all this?"

"Newsweek."

"Ah, yes. A wonderful publication. It was a good picture, wasn't it?"

"You looked a bit stuffy, but it was okay. You look better in person."

"What credentials do you bring with you?"

"Genius runs in my family. I finished summa cum laude at BC, and I'm second in my law class. Last summer I spent three months with the Southern Prisoners Defense League in Birmingham and played gofer in seven capital trials. I watched Elmer Wayne Doss die in the Florida electric chair and I watched Willie Ray Ash get lethally injected in Texas. In my spare time at Ole Miss I write briefs for the ACLU and I'm working on two death penalty appeals for a law firm in Spartanburg, South Carolina. I was raised in my father's law office, and I was proficient in legal research before I could drive. I've watched him defend murderers, rapists, embezzlers, extortionists, terrorists, assassins, child abusers, child fondlers, child killers, and children who killed their parents. I worked forty hours a week in his office when I was in high school and fifty when I was in college. He has eighteen lawyers in his firm, all very bright, very talented. It's a great training ground for criminal lawyers, and I've been there for fourteen years. I'm twenty-five years old, and when I grow up I want to be a radical criminal lawyer like my dad stamping out me death penalty."

"Is that all?"

"My dad's filthy rich, and even though we're Irish Catholic I'm an only child. I've got more money than you do so I'll work for free. No charge. A free law clerk for three weeks. I'll do all the research, typing, answering the phone. I'll even carry your briefcase and make the coffee."

"I was afraid you'd want to be a law partner."

"No. I'm a woman, and I'm in the South. I know my place."

"Why are you so interested in this case?"

"I want to be in the courtroom. I love criminal trials, big trials where there's a life on the line and pressure so thick you can see it in the air. Where the courtroom's packed and security is tight. Where half the people hate the defendant and his lawyers and the other half pray he gets off. I love it. And this is the trial of all trials. I'm not a Southerner and I find this place bewildering most of the time, but I have developed a perverse love for it. It'll never make sense to me, but it is fascinating. The racial implications are enormous. The trial of a black father for killing two white men who raped his daughter-my father said he would take the case for free."

"Tell him to stay in Boston."

"It's a trial lawyer's dream. I just want to be there. I'll stay out of the way, I promise. Just let me work in the background and watch the trial."

"Judge Noose hates women lawyers."

"So does every male lawyer in the South. Besides, I'm not a lawyer, I'm a law student."

"I'll let you explain that to him."

"So I've got the job."

Jake stopped staring at her and breathed deeply. A minor wave of nausea vibrated through his stomach and lungs and took his breath. The jackhammers had returned with a fury and he needed to be near the restroom.

"Yes, you've got the job. I could use some free research. These cases are complicated, as I'm sure you are aware."

She flashed a comely, confident smile. "When do I start?"

"Now."

Jake led her through a quick tour of the office, and assigned her to the war room upstairs. They laid the Hailey file on the conference table and she spent an hour copying it.

At two-thirty Jake awoke from a nap on his couch. He walked downstairs to the conference room. She had removed half the books from the shelves and had them scattered the length of the table with page markers sticking up every fifty or so pages. She was busy taking notes.

"Not a bad library," she said.

"Some of these books haven't been used in twenty years."

"I noticed the dust."

"Are you hungry?"

"Yes. I'm starving."

"There's a little cafe around the corner where the specialty is grease and fried corn meal. My system needs a shot of grease."

"Sounds delicious."

They walked around the square to Claude's, where the crowd was thin for a Saturday afternoon. There were no other whites in the place. Claude was absent and the silence was deafening. Jake ordered a cheeseburger, onion rings, and three headache powders.

"Got a headache?" Ellen asked.

"Massive."

"Stress?"

"Hangover."

"Hangover? I thought you were a teetotaler."

"And where'd you hear that?"

"Newsweek. The article said you were a clean-cut family man, workaholic, devout Presbyterian who drank nothing and smoked cheap cigars. Remember? How could you forget, right?"

"You believe everything you read?"

"No."

"Good, because last night I got plastered, and I've puked all morning."

The law clerk was amused. "What do you drink?"

"I don't-remember. At least I didn't until last night.

_ i, ano i nope it's my last. I'd forgotten how terrible these things are."

"Why do lawyers drink so much?"

"They learn how in law school. Does your dad drink?"

"Are you kidding? We're Catholic. He's careful, though."

"Do you drink?"

"Sure, all the time," she said proudly.

"Then you'll make a great lawyer."

Jake carefully mixed the three powders in a glass of ice water and slugged it down. He grimaced and wiped his mouth. She watched intently with an amused smile.

"What'd your wife say?"

"About what?"

"The hangover, from such a devout and religious family man."

"She doesn't know about it. She left me early yesterday morning."

"I'm sorry."

"She went to stay with her parents until the trial is over. We've had anonymous phone calls and death threats for two months now, and early yesterday morning they planted dynamite outside our bedroom window. The cops found it in time and they caught the men, probably the Klan. Enough dynamite to level the house and kill all of us. That was a good excuse to get drunk."