“The reasons are my own, and you’ve got no right to know them.” Adam caught himself, voice husky with emotion. “There were times, growing up, when I wished you were my father. Now I wish you’d been as strong as the man who pretended I was his son. But for better or worse, I absorbed Ben’s will, his nerve, and his talent for survival. Along the way I learned to trust absolutely no one. A useful trait in a family like ours.” Adam paused, then finished with weary fatalism. “On balance, I suppose, I’d rather have you as a father. Yet right now I look at you and Mother, and all I want is to vanish off the face of the earth. But I can’t, because the two of you have created a mess I plan to straighten out.”
Jack cocked his head. “What do you have in mind?”
“We’re starting where you and Ben left off,” Adam responded coldly. “Tell me how you killed him, Jack.”
Jack hunched a little, hands jammed in his pockets. “So now you’re the avenging angel, or perhaps the hanging judge. You seemed to have developed the soul for that.”
“No doubt. But not without help.”
Jack seemed to flinch. “Maybe I deserve that. But before you judge me, listen.”
He found his brother sitting slumped on the rock, his eyes bloodshot, his gaze unfocused. With terrible effort, Ben sat straighter. “I’m taking a rest,” he said tiredly. “I can only assume she called you.”
Jack knelt by him, staring into his face. “You can’t do this to her,” he told Ben. “Not after all these years.”
Ben’s face darkened, and then he bit off a burst of laughter. “So I should leave everything to Clarice? Then you could move into my house, claim my wife, and take the fruits of all I’ve done. You may have lived for that, Jack. But by God, I did not.” Ben lowered his voice. “I’ve found someone who loves me, a woman with grace and grit who’ll give me a son that’s actually mine. They’re what my life comes down to, and where my money is going. You and Clarice can do what you please.”
Filled with anger, Jack leaned forward, his face inches from Ben’s. “This is her home, Ben. You can’t take that from her.”
Ben smiled a little. “I already have,” he answered calmly. “I gave you a home, Jack-our parents’ cracker box. Ask Clarice if she wants to live there with you. But I suppose you learned her answer long ago. All these years she preferred to live with me than in the mediocrity that is your birthright-”
Filled with hatred, Jack grabbed his shirt. “She can file for divorce, and challenge the agreement you forced on her.”
Despite the violence of Jack’s actions, Ben’s face revealed nothing but mild interest. “Not a bad idea,” he remarked. “That’s what I’d have done in her place, many moons ago.” He paused, gathering strength. “Unfortunately for you both, I’m dying. She can’t divorce me fast enough. So unless she wins a will contest, which I believe she can’t, she’ll have nothing but the deathless love you’ve imagined sharing. She’ll be looking for a rich man by Thanksgiving.”
Overcome by rage, Jack wrenched him upright, ripping a button off Ben’s shirt. In two steps he held his brother over the edge of the cliff, staring into the face he had always loathed. “I can kill you now,” he said in a strangled voice. “I’ve wanted to for years.”
Ben stared at him with contempt. “So did Adam. But even he couldn’t, and I don’t think you have the guts for it. He got all that from me.”
Jack thrust his brother forward, his grip all that kept Ben from falling over the precipice. Ben looked back at him, speaking with his last reserves of will. “You’re a loser, Jack. And you’re about to lose again.”
Jack held Ben’s face an inch from his. “Do you think I can’t do this, Ben?”
Smiling with disdain, Ben spat into his face.
Jack felt the spittle on his cheek. A surge of insanity seized his body and soul. He stared into his brother’s adamantine eyes, then felt his hands let go.
Frozen in time, Ben filled a space above the void. Then he hurtled toward the rocks. For an instant, Jack swore that his feeble cry turned into laughter. Then a distant thud echoed in the dark, marking the death of his brother.
Facing Jack, Adam felt his skin crawl. Perhaps, as Ben had implied to Teddy, he might have provided for his family had he lived a day longer. Perhaps the laughter Jack imagined hearing had been real.
“You held him over a cliff,” Adam managed to say, “then let him fall. Murder, plain and simple.”
Jack’s voice shook. “He’d been spitting in my face ever since he learned to walk. For that one instant, I could do what I’d imagined all my life.”
“And save my mother from humiliation in the bargain. Or so you thought.” Adam heard the horror in his voice mingling with despair. “You helped him commit suicide and lock in the new will, putting yourself at risk. No wonder he died laughing.”
Jack closed his eyes. Watching him, Adam was overcome by the tragedy of all that he had learned, the incalculable damage to so many lives. Quietly, he said, “You’ve been worried all along that you’d get found out. It was you who followed me here, wasn’t it?”
Drained, his father could barely nod. “I wanted to see what you were doing. From the start, you were sure that someone killed him.”
“What does my mother know?”
“Nothing. When I came back to the house, I told her I couldn’t find him. By morning, I’d figured out a plan. Incinerate the boots I’d worn, then stumble across his body on the beach, as though his death were an accident.” Jack paused, touching his eyes. “It almost worked.”
“Not for Teddy,” Adam retorted. “They’re about to charge him with killing Ben.”
Jack stiffened. “How can that be?”
“Doesn’t matter. The point is that I know you’re a murderer. But if I turn you in to the police, they may think my mother’s an accomplice. On the other hand, there’s Teddy to consider. I can’t let him take the fall for you.”
Jack straightened. “Do you think I can? After I tell Clarice what happened, I’m going to the police.”
“Don’t overdo it, Jack. There’s been heartache enough, most of it Ben’s doing.” Adam paused, finding a calmer tone. “You are my father, after all. So I’d prefer that you not pay for getting Teddy off the hook. And given that you’re a reasonably accomplished liar, why not make that work for you?”
“What the hell are you saying?”
“You’ll have to improve your story, merging it with Teddy’s. In my version, Ben never threatened my mother with disinheritance. Because he was drunk and abusive, you decided to confront him in your role as her protector.” Adam looked into his father’s eyes. “You found him here, and asked him to stop mistreating her. A quarrel ensued. Suddenly, he took a swing at you and lost his balance, the victim of alcohol and disequilibrium caused by his tumor. When you reached for him, it was too late.”
Jack stared at the place where Ben had fallen. At last, he said, “Still more lies, after so many. Do you think they’d believe me now?”
“Not really. They’ll also think you’re protecting Teddy. But I’ve become familiar with what the police know and don’t know. They have no witnesses to the murder. Teddy’s account will cover all the physical evidence, leaving them with nothing to refute your latest story.” Reading Jack’s doubt, he added, “Granted, telling it will take some nerve. But once you do, it creates reasonable doubt in Teddy’s favor, and he’ll do the same for you. George Hanley is nothing if not practical. He’ll see the wisdom in letting go of the death of a dying man.”
Jack studied him, then shook his head. In a tone of sadness, he asked, “When did you become so cold- blooded? I wonder.”
“The day I left here. All I’ve done since is refine my talents.” Adam paused, struggling with emotions he refused to show. “But that’s for another day-if ever. This family has one more thing it needs to settle.”
Eleven
“You can practice on my mother,” Adam had told Jack on the way to the house. Now, as the first light came through the window, he watched her face as she listened to Jack’s carefully crafted falsehoods.
In rapid sequence, her expressions betrayed surprise, bewilderment, anger, horror, and, at length, deep anxiety. Unless she and Jack were extraordinarily accomplished actors, Adam concluded to his relief, their
