The second photograph was of the man. He was dressed in a suit, walking down the steps of a courthouse, his back erect, his hands manacled in front of him. The photo was part of a newspaper story. The headline read: OSCAR REYNOLDS SENTENCED TO
DEATH.
The third photograph was of Matthew and his father. They were standing by a stream in the forest. Matthew must have been six or seven. His father held a fishing rod in one hand and his arm was draped around Matthew's shoulder. Matthew beamed out at Tracy, so proud to be the one his father was honoring with his touch.
Tracy felt like she might cry. She took a deep breath. When she was back in control, she started going hurriedly through the drawers.
Matthew's clothes were whites and blacks. There were no golf shirts, no tennis shorts, nothing that hinted at leisure.
Nothing that hinted at anything but single-minded devotion to his cause.
Across from the bedroom was Matthew's study. Tracy glanced at the position on the marble chessboard. She had been bringing the ,postcards from the correspondence games to the hospital and recognized it.
Tracy looked up from the board. Around the walls stood collections of famous closing arguments, biographies of Benjamin Cardozo, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Felix Frankfurter and other great Supreme Court justices, a set of notebooks with every death penalty case decided by the United States Supreme Court and volumes on philosophy, psychology, forensic medicine and other topics related to Matthew's work. Tracy fingered some of the volumes, running her hands down their spines. This was Matthew's private sanctum, where he developed the ideas he used to save human lives. This was where he thought his most private thoughts.
If there was a place in this house where Tracy would find the truth, it was here.
Tracy worked quickly, worried that the lunch hour would end before she was done. She was halfway through Matthew's rolltop desk when she came to the bottom right drawer and found the manila envelope. She reached in and touched the bankbook. She had prayed that she would never find what she was looking for.
Now that she had it, she was afraid to open it.
Tracy leaned back and the antique wooden chair creaked.
There was $300,000 in the account after Matthew deposited the $250,000 he received for defending Joel Livingstone. There was only $150,000 the week after Justice Griffen's murder.
Tracy's hand shook as she emptied the contents of the envelope onto the blotter. She felt dizzy. She knew what she was seeing, but she wished with all her heart that it was not there.
First were the articles about Abigail Griffen. She moved them aside and saw the photographs.
'Oh, God,' she whispered as she shuffled through them.
There were pictures of Abbie outside an office building in a business suit, talking earnestly to another attorney, and Abbie in the park across from the courthouse, resting on a bench, her head back, face to the sun, oblivious of the fact that her picture was being taken with a telephoto lens. Then there were pictures of Abbie at the house where Justice Griffen was murdered and the rental house where the metal strip had been found. One shot showed Abbie gardening in her yard in jeans and a tee shirt.
There were several shots of Abbie inside both houses that had obviously been taken through a window at night.
Tracy picked up a set of 81/2 x 1 1 photographs, taken with a telescopic lens from the woods on the edge of Abbie's property, which showed Abbie by her pool in a bikini. The first shot showed Abbie stepping through the French windows onto the patio and the shots followed her to the side of the pool. Several more photos showed Abbie in seductive poses: languorously stretching like a cat; lying on her side with her knees drawn up looking like a child; and resting on her forearms with her face to the sun. A final set, taken in extreme close-up, concentrated on every part of her body.
Tracy thought back to the wilderness photographs she had seen on her first visit to Matthew's office. Especially the shot of the doe and her fawn in the clearing. She realized, with horror, that Matthew had stalked Abbie with his camera the way he had stalked the deer.
But it was the final batch of photographs from the manila envelope that brought everything into focus. The shots Matthew had taken at the cabin on the coast. Abbie circling the cabin with her Pentax camera on the day she was attacked, Abbie walking on the beach, pictures of Abbie taken at night through the window. In several, she was naked, wandering through the living room unselfconsciously, searching for something. In the next group of pictures, she was terrified and racing through the woods.
Tracy could not feel the pictures in her hand as she slowly shuffled through them. In the next shot, a man in black was staring away from the camera. In the next, he was facing it. The man was wearing a ski mask, but he had the physique of Charlie Deems.
The last group of photographs solved the mystery of the intruder's identity. Matthew had captured Charlie Deems, the ski mask removed, standing in the recesses of a deserted parking lot under a streetlamp, talking to Robert Griffen.
Chapter THIRTY
Tracy Cavanaugh sat beside Matthew Reynolds in his hospital room and imagined instead that they were in a narrow cell in the penitentiary after dark. The image would not hold. The concept was unbearable. The idea would not leave her.
'The outline for oral argument is excellent,' Matthew said as he reread the last paragraph of the document Tracy had prepared for the Texas case. Though Reynolds looked tired, and his pale skin seemed thin as parchment, a glow suffused him. 'Thank you,' Tracy answered stiffly.
Reynolds took no notice of her mood. He put down the outline and examined the wedding invitation again. He held it up and beamed with happiness.
'I think they did a good job, don't you?' he asked.
Tracy did not answer. Until now, she had been unable to tell him the real reason for her visit.
'Tracy?' Reynolds said, putting down the invitation. She was staring at the window. It was streaked with rain. Tracy shivered.
'Do you remember telling me about your father?' Tracy asked. 'The way you felt growing up. Losing him and loving him so much.'
Tracy paused. A hard and painful lump had formed in her throat.
'What's wrong?' Reynolds asked, his face clouding with confusion and concern.
'I tried to imagine what that must have been like for you,' Tracy went on. 'Knowing he was going to die and not being able to save him. Now, I know how you felt.'
Reynolds cocked his head to one side, but he said nothing.
'It wasn't just the photograph, was it? You created every piece of evidence. You manufactured the bomb and the duplicate metal strips, then you lured Abbie to the rose garden so you could plant one of the strips and the Clorox bottle in her garage. You paid Charlie Deems fifty thousand dollars to testify against Abbie. You told him what to say and you created the account with the hundred thousand dollars, so you could destroy him on cross.'
Matthew's eyes were fully alive and focused on her. She had his full attention.
'What are you talking about?' Matthew asked evenly.
'When was the first time you knew the state thought the metal strip was significant?' Tracy asked, ignoring his question.
'After Torino's testimony. You know that.'
'I also know that you called Dr. Shirov before the trial started to make sure he would be in town, and that the reactor would be available.
What possible reason would you have to do that, unless you knew you would need his testimony to discredit the testimony of Paul Torino?'
'If I understand you correctly, you're saying that I murdered Justice Griffen and framed his wife for his murder.'
'That's exactly what I'm saying.'
'Have you forgotten that Abbie and I are going to be married?'
'No.'
'Do you understand that I love Abigail Griffen more than I love life?'
