'Can it wait?' he asked pleasantly. 'We've got to whip this memo into shape and I have some ideas I want to run by you.'
'I don't think the memo matters anymore, Mr. Reynolds,' she said sadly.
Reynolds frowned. 'What do you mean?'
'I know Mrs. Griffen is guilty,' Tracy said.
For a moment, Reynolds did not react. Then he looked at her as if he was not certain he'd heard Tracy correctly. 'What are you talking about?'
Tracy took the FotoFast envelope out of her purse and laid the photo of the shed on Reynolds's blotter.
'I spent last night looking at the negatives with Barry,' she said. 'He explained how it was done.'
Reynolds looked confused. He glanced at the photograph, then back at Tracy.
'I'm afraid you've lost me.'
'This photograph of the shed is a fake. It was taken in September.
We'll have to tell Chuck Geddes and Judge Baldwin.
We'll have to resign from the case.'
Reynolds studied the photograph, but made no move to touch it. When he looked at Tracy there was no indication of guilt or fear on his features. If Tracy had not seen the way Reynolds controlled his emotions in court, she would have concluded that he was innocent.
'What makes you think the photograph was faked?' Reynolds asked calmly.
Tracy told Matthew about her trip to the cabin with Barry and explained about the position of the volleyball.
'It must be a coincidence,' Matthew said. 'The ball was in the position in the photograph on August 12. Then Sheriff Dillard or one of his deputies moved it onto the net when he checked the shed for the dynamite.'
'I hoped that was the solution, but it's not.'
'Then how could the negative have August 12 stamped on it?'
Tracy explained the way the fake was created, hoping that Matthew would drop his pretense and admit what he had done.
As she spoke, Reynolds grew agitated and began to shift in his chair.
'But how could Mrs. Griffen have created the substitute strip?' Matthew snapped when Tracy was through with her explanation. 'It's ridiculous.
She's been confined to her house since the last week in August.'
'She didn't make the fake. Mrs. Griffen had an accomplice.
Someone who had access to the Pentax and the negatives. Someone who knows enough about photography to think up this scheme.
'How could you do it, Matthew? She's a murderer. She killed a good, decent man for money and she killed a good friend of mine.'
Reynolds tried to maintain his composure, but he failed. Moments before, he had been the happiest person in the world. Now everything was slipping away from him. His shoulders hunched and he slumped in his seat. He took a deep breath. When he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.
'I'm sorry,' he managed. 'I know how this looks, but, believe me, it's not what it seems.'
Matthew's chest heaved. It took him a moment to regain his composure.
'Abbie had nothing to do with the photograph and she didn't kill her husband or Laura Rizzatti.'
'I don't believe that.'
Matthew paused again. Tracy could see he was trembling. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back. When he opened his eyes, they were moist with tears.
'When you interviewed with me, I told you about several fine attorneys who have visited a prison after dark and left with their client dead.
Then I told you that neither I nor any attorney who worked for me had ever visited a prison after dark. That wasn't true.
'When I was eight years old, I visited a prison after dark.
When I left the prison before dawn, the man I had spoken with was dead.
He was my father. I loved him very much. He was executed for the murder of a young woman with whom he worked. The prosecutor convinced a jury that my father had been having an affair with this woman and had killed her because she threatened to tell my mother about their affair.
My father swore that he loved my mother and was only the girl's friend.
The jury didn't believe him and he was executed in the electric chair.
'Two years after he died, the real murderer confessed. He worked with the woman and they were having an affair. My father had simply been the woman's friend. He was executed for a crime he never committed. If it wasn't for the death penalty, he would have been freed from prison and I would have had my father back.'
Matthew leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.
'I know I must disgust you, Tracy. Preaching about morality and honor and dishonoring myself and my profession. But I had to . . . I was compelled to . . . I saw no other way.'
Matthew stopped again. He looked across the desk at Tracy.
His eyes pied for understanding.
'She's innocent, Tracy. I'm absolutely certain. And I couldn't bear the thought that she might die. She doesn't know a thing about the photograph of the shed.'
'But how could you invent evidence?' Tracy asked, the words catching in her chest.
'I can't do it anymore,' Matthew said. 'Fighting for every inch, every minute I'm in trial. Having to be perfect, every time, because my client dies if I'm not perfect. It's worn me down. I've lost my confidence. I know I'm going to lose someday. That a client of mine will lie.'
Reynolds paused again. Tracy could see him struggle to come up with the words he spoke next.
'You have no idea what my life has been like. I'm so alone. At first, my loneliness was a badge of honor. I had my crusade against death and I didn't need anything else. Then the crusade became an ordeal. So much was expected of me. I wanted someone to share my pain and there was no one. Then I met Abbie.'
Reynolds's face showed surprisingly little emotion, but tears rolled down his cheeks.
'I love her, Tracy. I couldn't live with myself if she was the one I couldn't save. I simply could not let her die. I just couldn't.'
'It's easy to fool yourself about a person you love,' Tracy said gently.
'What if Abbie did murder Justice Griffen and Laura?'
'It's not possible. I . . . I know Abbie too well. She's being framed. The metal strip proves that. And what about the money?
Where did Charlie Deems get a hundred thousand dollars?'
'She could have paid Deems to kill Justice Griffen. She's a very wealthy woman.'
'Then why would Deems go to the district attorney and implicate Abbie?
No. Someone else killed Justice Griffen and framed Abbie.'
Tracy was so certain of Abbie's guilt when she entered Reynolds's office. Now she did not know.
'What are you going to do?' Matthew asked her.
Tracy remembered Barry asking that very question.
'What choice do I have? I'll have to report you to Judge Baldwin this afternoon. Do you think this is an easy choice? You're one of the finest human beings I've ever known. If I go to Judge Baldwin you'll be disbarred and go to prison. But if I keep silent, I'll be abetting what you've done, I'll be opening myself up for the same punishment and I'll be betraying my oath as an officer of the court.'
'I'm not thinking of myself, Tracy. If you reveal what you know to the judge, he'll have to tell Chuck Geddes. Geddes will use the evidence in Abbie's trial and she'll surely be convicted.'
'But she didn't know. You said so.'
'Geddes, doesn't have to believe that. If he finds out about the photograph, he'll argue that Abbie did know it was a fake and there will only be my word that she didn't. Geddes will use the fact that I used a doctored photograph to rehabilitate Charlie Deems. The jurors will believe he saw the dynamite in the shed.
They'll believe that a prosecutor who kills, then tries to subvert justice by fabricating evidence, should die.
