Rinky’s eyes are glued to Geraldine. He shakes his head.

“We call her Geraldine the Guillotine.”

Geraldine groans. The Kydd stifles a guffaw. Harry doesn’t bother; he laughs out loud.

Rinky stares at Geraldine the Guillotine a moment longer, then looks back up at the judge and swallows.

“So I suggest, Mr. Snow, that you sit down now and remain quiet. Mr. Madigan is here to speak for you.”

Rinky checks in with Harry. Harry nods. Rinky sits.

“Now,” Judge Long says, looking first at Geraldine, then at Harry, “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do here.”

Harry leaves the defense table, walks up to the bench, and stands beside Geraldine. She steps away as if she’s certain he has leprosy.

“We’re going to continue this matter without a finding,” the judge says, “for six months.”

Harry nods in agreement.

Geraldine shakes her blond head, annoyed. “Did you look at that knife, Judge?”

“I most certainly did, Ms. Schilling. I also looked at the police report. There’s no suggestion here that Mr. Snow intended to harm anyone with that knife.”

She throws her hands in the air, the way a frustrated parent might when dealing with an impossible teenager.

“Mr. Snow,” the judge says.

Rinky stands again. “Do I get my knife back now?”

The Kydd tries to stifle another bout of laughter, but he’s only partially successful this time.

“No, you don’t, sir.” Judge Long leans forward on the bench, rests on his forearms. “You don’t get your knife back now and you don’t get your knife back later.”

Rinky looks perplexed.

“No knives, Mr. Snow. Mr. Madigan will explain what we’ve done here. But the bottom line is: no knives.”

What they’ve done here is humane. Rinky won’t do time on this charge—other than the two nights he’s already served—unless he gets in trouble again. And he will. When he does, he’ll be sentenced on whatever the new offense is as well as this one. But by then, just maybe, it will be winter. And though the Barnstable County House of Correction offers little in the way of creature comforts, it does have heat.

Of course, Rinky could just as easily land back here tonight.

Harry returns to the defense table and chats with Rinky in low tones while Judge Long finishes the paperwork and Geraldine collects her next stack of documents from Clarence Wexler. Rinky nods at Harry, asks loudly if he can go now, and then feigns attention again as Harry keeps talking. Rinky understands that Judge Long just let him off the proverbial hook. As for the rest of it—the continuance without a finding, the likelihood of doing real time in the future—he doesn’t give a damn.

A prison guard shows up at the table and Rinky shoos him away with both hands. The guard looks at Harry and chuckles. Harry tells Rinky he has to return to lockup. He has to change clothes, retrieve noncontraband possessions, and sign off on release forms. Harry points to the guard and tells Rinky to go with him.

Rinky complies, but he’s not happy about it. He glares over his shoulder at all of us as he leaves the courtroom. This is a trick, his eyes say, and he knows every last one of us is in on it.

Harry packs up his old schoolbag, then sends a mock salute in Geraldine’s direction. “Ms. Guillotine,” he says.

She scowls at him. Clarence does too.

Harry laughs and turns to leave. “Wish me luck,” he says, pausing beside the Kydd and me.

Now it’s my turn to laugh. “Wish you luck? We’re the ones staring a first-degree murder charge in the face.”

“I know that,” he says as he heads for the center aisle. “But I have a date with Mrs. DeMateo.”

The Kydd laughs, but I don’t. I turn in my chair to watch Harry’s departure. He looks over his shoulder at me and his worried hazel eyes say it all. He can joke all he wants about Mrs. DeMateo but it’s not her case he’s preoccupied with at the moment. The case he’s concerned about is mine. And he’s not just concerned. He’s worried sick.

CHAPTER 18

The grieving widow is turned out in yellow. She’s shed her hat and trench coat, revealing a long-sleeved, knee-length coat dress, butter yellow with slightly deeper-hued trim. I’m not certain, but I think yellow is one of those colors we’re not supposed to wear after Labor Day. Life’s rules don’t seem to apply to Louisa Rawlings, though. None of them.

A stern-looking matron relieves Louisa of her handcuffs and then delivers her to us. The Kydd stands and pulls the middle chair out from our table as they approach.

“Thank you, Kevin,” Louisa says as she sits between us. He nods at her and turns pink, but says nothing.

“How are you doing?” I ask her. She seems calm, composed, as if she consciously collected herself during her hours in lockup.

“I’m ready to go home,” she says, rubbing her wrists together. “This place is dreadful.”

She’s right, of course. Lockup is no picnic. But compared with the female violent offenders’ ward of the Barnstable County House of Correction—where Louisa will await trial if this case is bound over—it’s a veritable cocktail party. That’s a reality I won’t mention, at least not at the moment. Louisa will hear a lifetime’s worth of awful realities during the next fifteen minutes. No need to start early.

Geraldine leaves her table and saunters toward ours, her three-inch heels sounding like a metronome as they strike evenly against the wooden floor. Without looking at me—her eyes are focused on Louisa—she hands me a stack of documents. She stands still in front of our table, idly fingering a pack of cigarettes in the pocket of her camel-hair suit coat. She plans to stay awhile, it seems.

On top of the stack is a legal memorandum, a thick one, no doubt researched and authored by Clarence. Beneath it are a few preliminary analyses from the state crime lab as well as the Medical Examiner’s report, hot off the presses. I wonder if his signature is dry yet. I pass the stack to the Kydd and he digs in at once.

Geraldine is still planted in front of our table, blond head tilted to one side, thin arms now folded against her chest, green eyes boring into Louisa. She’s preparing for battle, antagonizing the enemy. Geraldine does this to murder defendants. All of them.

Louisa stares back at her, undaunted. I’m impressed. Murder defendants don’t do that to Geraldine. None of them.

Without a word, Geraldine pivots and strides back to her table. She retrieves another package, a duplicate of the one she gave me, no doubt. She walks to the bench and hands it up to Judge Long. He thanks her and dons his half-glasses.

“Who is that woman?” Louisa asks.

“She’s the District Attorney,” I tell her. “Geraldine Schilling.”

“Is she competent?”

I almost laugh out loud. Louisa may as well have asked if Barbra Streisand can carry a tune. “Yes,” I answer. “She’s quite effective.”

“Too bad she couldn’t find day care for her little boy.” Louisa nods toward the prosecutors’ table and I almost laugh out loud again. Our new Assistant DA looks like he just stepped out of an early episode of The Brady Bunch.

“Be careful,” I tell Louisa. “That’s Clarence Wexler. He’s older than he looks.”

“Perky little thing, isn’t he?”

I’d never thought of Clarence as perky before, but I suppose he is. “He’s Geraldine’s latest protégé,” I tell her.

“He’s an attorney?”

I nod.

“He’s licensed?”

“As of last month he is. Fresh out of law school. Just passed the bar.”

Louisa doesn’t seem troubled by the fact that her day-care candidate is just a few years younger than her most recent paramour. She shakes her head as if she knows for sure now that the entire profession has gone to the dogs.

Wanda Morgan reads out a lengthy docket number and then announces The Commonwealth of Massachusetts versus Louisa Coleman Rawlings. Louisa jumps a little beside me. She looks somewhat surprised, hurt even, as if it were terribly impertinent of Wanda to mention Louisa’s name in open court.