Funny, smart, identifies well with people.

I see he identified with you.

He didnt even know I was there.

You would have liked him to, though, wouldnt you?

Whats that supposed to mean?

Only that Im not blind. And Ive walked in his shadow all my life.

Youre the boy genius with a limitless future.

And hes a heroic ex-cop who now defends the very people he used to arrest. He also has a martyr quality about him that I never have been able to get around. Hes a good guy who pushes himself unbelievably hard. Michael shook his head. All the time his brother had spent in the hospital. None of them knowing if he was going to make it day to day, minute to minute. He had never known such fear, the thought of losing his brother. But he had lost him anyway, it seemed, and not because of death. Not because of those bullets.

Maybe he feels like hes living in your shadow.

I doubt that.

Did you ever ask him?

Like I said, we dont talk anymore. He paused and then added quietly, Is he the reason you turned me down? He had watched her as she observed his brother. She had been enraptured with John Fiske from the moment she saw him. It had seemed like a fun idea at the time, the two of them going to watch his brother. Now Michael cursed himself for doing it. She flushed. I dont even know him. How could I possibly have any feelings for him?

Are you asking me that, or yourself?

Im not going to answer that. Her voice trembled. What about you? Do you love him?

He abruptly sat up straight and looked at her. I will always love my brother, Sara. Always.

["C7"]CHAPTER SEVEN

Rider wordlessly passed his secretary, fled to his office, opened his briefcase and slipped out the envelope. He withdrew the letter from inside, but barely glanced at it before tossing it in the wastebasket. In the letter Rufus Harms had written his last will and testament, but that was just a dodge, something innocuous for the guard to read. Rider looked at the envelope closely while he punched his intercom.

Sheila, can you bring in the hot plate and the teakettle? Fill it with water.

Mr. Rider, I can make tea for you.

I dont want tea, Sheila, just bring the damned kettle and the hot plate.

Sheila didnt question this odd request or her bosss temper. She brought in the kettle and hot plate, then quietly withdrew. Rider plugged in the hot plate and within a few minutes steam poured out of the kettle. Gingerly grasping the envelope by its edges, Rider held it over the steam and watched as the envelope began to come apart, just as Rufus Harms had told him it would. Rider fussed with the edges, and he soon had it completely laid out. Instead of an envelope, he now held two pieces of paper: one handwritten; the other a copy of the letter Harms had received from the Army. As he turned off the hot plate, Rider marveled at how Rufus had managed to construct this device an envelope that was actually a letter and how he had copied and then concealed the letter from the Army in it as well. Then he recalled that Harmss father had worked at a printing press company. It would have been better for Rufus if he had followed his daddy into the printing business instead of joining the Army, Rider muttered to himself. He let the pieces of paper dry out for a minute and then sat behind his desk while he read what Rufus had written. It didnt take long, the remarks were fairly brief, though many words were oddly formed and misspelled. Rider couldnt have known it, but Harms had scrawled it out in near darkness, stopping every time he heard the steps of the guards draw close. There wasnt a trace of saliva left in Riders throat when he had finished reading. Then he forced himself to read the official notice from the Army. Another body blow.

Good God! He sank back in his chair, rubbed a trembling hand over his bald spot, and then lurched to his feet, rushed over and locked his office door. The fear spread like a mutating virus. He could barely breathe. He staggered back to his desk and hit his intercom button again. Sheila, bring me in some water and some aspirin, please.

A minute later Sheila knocked on the door. Mr. Rider, she said through the door, its locked.

He quickly unlocked the door, took the glass and aspirin from her and was about to shut the door again when Sheila said, Are you okay?

Fine, fine, he replied, hustling her out the door. He looked down at the paper Rufus wanted him to file with the United States Supreme Court. Rider happened to be a member of the largely ceremonial Supreme Court Bar, solely by virtue of the sponsorship of a former colleague in the military who had gone on to the Justice Department. If he did exactly as Rufus asked, he would be the attorney of record in Harmss appeal. Rider could envision only personal catastrophe resulting from such an arrangement. And yet he had promised Rufus. Rider lay down on the leather sofa in one corner of his office, closed his eyes and commenced a silent deliberation. So many things hadnt added up the night Ruth Ann Mosley had been killed. Rufus didnt have a history of violence, only a constant failure to follow orders that had enraged many a superior, and, at first, had bewildered Rider as well. Harmss inability to process even the simplest of commands had been finally explained during Riders representation of him. But his escaping from the stockade never had. Confronted with no defense, factually, Rider had made noises about an insanity plea, which had given him just enough leverage to save his client from possible execution. And that had been the end of it. Justice had been served. At least as much as one could expect in this world. Rider looked once more at the notice from the Army, the stark lie of the past now firmly revealed. This information should have been in Harmss military file at the time of the murder, but it wasnt. It would have constituted a completely plausible defense. Harmss military file had been tampered with, and Rider now understood why. Harms wanted his freedom and his name cleared and he wanted it to come from the highest court in the land. And he refused to entrust the prospect of freedom to the Army. Thats what Harms had said to him while the country-western music had covered his words. And could he blame him? All things good were in Rufuss corner. He should be heard and he should be free. But despite that, Rider remained immobile on his couch of worn leather and burnished nails. It was nothing complex. It was fear a far stronger emotion, it seemed, than any of the others bestowed upon humankind. He planned to retire in a few years to the condo he and his wife had already picked out on the Gulf Coast. Their kids were grown. Rider was weary of the frigid winters that settled into the low pockets of the area and he was tired of always chasing new pieces of business, of diligently recording his professional life in quarter-hour increments. However, as enticing as that retirement was, it wasnt quite enough to prevent Rider from helping his old client. Some things were right and some things were wrong. Rider rose from the couch and settled behind his desk. At first he had thought the simplest way to help Rufus was to mail what he had to one of the newspapers and let the power of the press take over. But for all he knew, the paper would either toss it as a letter from some crazy, or otherwise bungle it such that Rufus might be put in danger. What had really made up Riders mind as to his course of action was simple. Rufus was his client and he had asked his lawyer to file his appeal with the United States Supreme Court. And thats what Rider was going to do. He had failed Rufus once before; he wasnt going to do it again. The man was in dire need of a little justice, and what better place for that than the highest court in the land? If you couldnt get justice there, where the hell could you get it? Rider wondered. As he took out a sheet of paper from his desk drawer, sunlight from the window glanced off his square gold cuff links, sending bright dots around the room helter-skelter. He pulled over his ancient typewriter, kept out of nostalgia. Rider was unfamiliar with the Supreme Courts technical filing requirements, but he assumed he would be running afoul of most of them. That didnt bother him. He just wanted to get the story out away from him. When he had finished typing, he started to place what he had typed, together with Harmss letter and the letter from the Army, into a mailing envelope. Then he stopped. Paranoia, spilling over from thirty years of practice, made him hustle out to the small workroom at the rear of his office suite and make copies of both Harmss handwritten letter and Riders own typewritten one. This same uneasiness made him decide to keep, for now, the letter from the Army. When the story broke he could always produce it, again anonymously. He hid the copies in one of his desk drawers and locked it. He returned the originals to the envelope, looked up the address of the Supreme Court in his legal directory, and next typed up a label. He did not provide a return address on the envelope. That done, he put on his hat and coat and walked down to the post office at the corner. Before he had time to change his mind, he filled out the form to send the envelope by certified mail so he would get a return receipt, handed it to the postal clerk, completed the simple transaction and returned to his office. It was only then that it struck him. The return receipt could be a way for the Court to identify who had sent the package. He sighed. Rufus had been waiting half his life for this. And, in a way, Rider had abandoned him back then. For the rest of the day Rider lay on the couch in his office, in the dark, silently praying that he had done the right thing, and knowing, in his heart, that he had. ["C8"]CHAPTER EIGHT