Two hours later, Richard Walker was in his mother’s home at the Carrington estate. “You’ve got to help me,” he pleaded. “They’ll kill me if I don’t pay. You know they will. This is the last time, I swear it.”

Elaine Carrington looked at her son, fury in her eyes. “Richard, you’ve drained me dry. I get one million dollars a year from the estate. Last year, between your gambling and the expense of the gallery, you got nearly half of it.”

“Mother, I’m begging you.”

She looked away. He knows I have to give it to him, Elaine thought. And he knows where, if I’m desperate, I can get whatever amount I need.

Former ambassador Charles Althorp knocked at the door of his wife’s bedroom. Yesterday, after the funeral, she had come home and gone straight to bed. He did not yet know whether or not she had heard that Maria Valdez, the former maid at the Carrington estate, had recanted the version of events she had given at the time of Susan’s disappearance.

He found her propped up in bed. Even though it was nearly noon, Gladys Althorp had clearly not attempted to get up. Her breakfast tray, virtually untouched, was on the bedside table. The television was on, although the sound was turned down so low it was only a murmur.

Looking at the emaciated woman from whom he had been estranged for years, Althorp felt an unexpected and overwhelming wave of tenderness toward her. At the funeral parlor, the casket had been surrounded by pictures showing moments from Susan’s nearly nineteen years. I traveled so much, he thought. So many of the pictures, especially the later ones, were just of Gladys and Susan.

He pointed to the television. “You’ve obviously heard about Maria Valdez.”

“Nicholas Greco phoned me, and then I saw it on CNN. He said that her testimony could be the key to convict Peter Carrington of Susan’s death. I only wish I could be in court to see him led away in handcuffs.”

“I hope you are there, my dear. And I can assure you that I will be.”

Gladys Althorp shook her head. “You know perfectly well that I am dying, Charles, but it doesn’t matter anymore. Now that I know where Susan is, and that I’ll be with her soon, I have to confess something. I’ve always believed that Peter took Susan’s life, but there’s also been one tiny doubt in my mind. Did you hear her go out that night? Did you follow her? You were very angry with her. Had the two of you quarreled because she learned that you were involved with Elaine? Susan was so protective of me.”

“Elaine was a mistake, and it was over by the time she married Peter’s father,” Charles said bitterly. “When I saw her, she was divorced and unattached, and that is the truth.”

“She may have been unattached, but you weren’t, Charles.”

“Isn’t it a bit late in the game to discuss that, Gladys?”

“You still haven’t answered me. What did you and Susan quarrel about that night?”

“Try to rest, Gladys,” Charles Althorp said as he turned and left his wife’s room.

For the first time, the lawyers were staying for lunch. With skilled fingers, Jane Barr prepared a tray of sandwiches and made fresh coffee. Aghast, she had watched the television reports that Maria Valdez had changed her story. It’s all Elaine’s fault, she thought. If she hadn’t let us go, I’d have been here to pick up the laundry that morning. I would have known exactly what was or wasn’t in the hamper, and what did or didn’t go to the cleaner. How can that Valdez woman dare to change her story now? Who is paying her? she wondered.

It’s too bad that I wasn’t here when that detective, Nicholas Greco, came by and spoke to Gary. He’s been nervous ever since. He thinks he may have done some harm to Peter by telling Greco that Peter was shocked when he learned Susan’s purse wasn’t in his car.

“What harm can that do?” she had asked Gary at the time, but now she wondered. Maybe that bit of information did have significance. But she knew Peter Carrington, and it wasn’t as though he could ever hurt anyone.

She and Gary had attended Susan Althorp’s funeral Mass. Such a sweet, pretty girl she was, Jane thought as she took plates and cups from the cupboard. I used to love to see her dressed up and going out when we would work the dinner parties for Mrs. Althorp.

Outside the church, before the hearse and family limousines left for the private burial, the Althorps had stood in the vestry and accepted the condolences of their friends. Why did Gary duck around behind the crowd instead of speaking to them? Jane wondered. Susan was always so nice to him. At least a half dozen times that last year he chauffeured her to parties when the ambassador didn’t want her or her friends to be driving home late on their own. But she knew her husband was not one to show emotion, and perhaps he felt it wasn’t his place to be talking to the Althorps with all the dignitaries in the church around them.

Gary had been vacuuming the upstairs hallways while Jane was preparing the lunch. He came into the kitchen in time to save her the trouble of getting him. “Good timing,” Jane said. “You can take the plates and cups and silverware inside now. But be sure to knock before you open the door.”

“I think I know enough to do that,” he said sarcastically.

“Of course you do,” she said, sighing. “I’m sorry. I don’t have my wits about me. I keep thinking about yesterday and the funeral. Susan was such a beautiful girl, wasn’t she?”

As she watched, her husband’s face turned a deep shade of red and he turned away. “Yes, she was,” he mumbled as he took the tray and left the kitchen.

The lawyers didn’t leave until three o’clock, following five straight hours of questioning Peter in preparation for what seemed to be the inevitable-a charge of murder in the death of Susan Althorp. We didn’t even take a break for lunch, only pausing to nibble on sandwiches and to sip coffee. All the while, every detail of the dinner party and the brunch all those years ago was dragged out.

Occasionally Vincent Slater contradicted Peter about some detail. One in particular surprised me. “Peter, Susan was sitting next to you at the dinner and Grace was at another table.”

Until then I hadn’t realized that Grace Meredith, the woman Peter married when he was thirty years old, had been at that party. But then, why not? Some twenty of Peter’s friends from Princeton had been there. Peter explained that she had come as someone else’s date.

“Who was that someone else?” Conner Banks asked.

“Gregg Haverly, an eating-club brother at Princeton.”

“Had you met Grace Meredith at any point before that evening?” Banks asked.

I could tell by then that Peter was getting worn down by the constant barrage of questions. “I never met Grace before that evening,” he said, his tone frosty. “In fact, I didn’t see her again for over nine years. I bumped into her at a Princeton-Yale game. We were both with a group of friends, but neither one of us had a specific date and we paired off.”

“Are there other people who know that you hadn’t seen her in all those years?” Banks asked.

I guess that Banks saw the expression on Peter’s face because he added, “Peter, I’m trying to anticipate the prosecutor. This is the kind of question they’ll be asking you. Since your first wife was at the party, they could think that maybe you became interested in her and Susan noticed. Then maybe you and Susan had a fight about it later on and it turned violent.”

That was when Peter pushed his chair back from the table and stood up. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I think it’s time to call it a day.” I noticed that he was deliberately cool to Conner Banks when good-byes were being exchanged.