“Gooney Bud stabbed her with Dr. Collins’s scalpel,” he stated stubbornly. “He found it in the stable and killed her with it.”
“Where is it now?”
“Now? It’s been twenty-five years. You don’t expect it to be lying around in the evidence room, do you?”
“No, but I would expect to have a record of its dispensation. No one ever called the late Dr. Collins or his son, asking if they might want it back, even though it was known to have been a gift from his wife. Doesn’t that strike you as unusual?”
“God knows what happened to it, or to the records concerning it.”
“I think that you disposed of it, Judge. You, not the sheriff’s office, were the last one recorded to have possession of it. I checked this morning before coming here.”
“Why would I dispose of it?”
“Because if someone came along later—an investigator like me—it would be easy and believable to pass off its disappearance as a clerical error. Better to be accused of sloppy bookkeeping than miscarriage of justice.”
“You are obnoxious, Miss Gaither,” he said stiffly. “Like most avengers, you’re reacting emotionally, and have no basis whatsoever for your horrid allegations.”
“Nevertheless, this is what I intend to present to the grand jury. Actually, I’m doing you a favor by telling you what I have. You’ll be able to consult with your attorney ahead of time about the answers you will give. Or will you take the Fifth?”
“I won’t need to do either.”
“Do you want to call your lawyer now? I’ll gladly wait.”
“I don’t need a lawyer.”
“Then I’ll proceed. Angus asked you for a favor. You asked for one in return.”
“Junior Minton married my daughter because he loved her.”
“I find that impossible to believe, Judge Wallace, since he’s told me himself that he asked my mother to marry him the night she was killed.”
“I can’t explain his fickleness.”
“I can. Junior was the trade-off for your ruling on Gooney Bud.”
“The district attorney’s office—”
“He was on vacation in Canada at the time. I confirmed that with his widow this morning. His assistant had enough evidence to arraign Bud Hicks for murder.”
“A trial jury would have convicted him, too.”
“I disagree, but we’ll never know. You prevented that.” She drew a deep breath. “Who was Angus protecting—himself, Junior, or Reede?”
“No one.”
“He must have told you when he called that morning.”
“He didn’t call.”
“He had to have called as soon as Hicks was arrested. What did Angus tell you?”
“He didn’t tell me anything. I never heard from him.”
She came out of her chair and leaned over his desk. “He must have said, ‘Look, Joe, I’ve gotten myself in a jam here.’ Or, ‘Junior’s taken this boys-will-be-boys thing a little too far this time,’ or ‘Can you help Reede out? He’s like a son to me.’ Isn’t that what happened?”
“No, never.”
“You might have argued that you couldn’t do it. You probably asked for time to think about it. Being the nice guy that he is, Angus granted you a few hours to mull it over. That’s when you came back saying that you would do this little favor for him in exchange for a marriage between Stacey and Junior.”