indicated by the evidence, giving his opinion that I had arrested Shevlin and started out with him. Somewhere along the line I had grown momentarily careless, Shevlin had seized the opportunity to slug me with the oar, unlock the cuffs—they had found the key where I had dropped it—and had dropped me over the side with the anchor tied to my body. Then he had gone back for his wife—for by this time it was known that he was married, though no one could remember having seen her in almost a year—and on the way out of the swamp in his boat he had hidden the rental boat and then escaped. It was as nearly what I had planned as if I’d left him a script to read.
Full of elation, I paused to light a cigarette, and then read on, looking for some hint about the grand jury.
Young Marshall, a veteran of World War II and well known and liked throughout the county, was the only son of the late Judge Halstead Marshall and the last of a family quite prominent in this part of the state for over a hundred years.
I put the paper down. That last paragraph might be the answer. It carried a hint of something I had hoped for but had not dared count on too heavily. Now that I was presumably dead and nothing could be gained by investigation except to raise a smell, there was a good chance they had let it die out of respect for the Judge’s memory. Probably they had started, got far enough into it to see where it was going to lead, and now that I was dead they’d let it drop. I hoped so, anyway.
I paid for the coffee and went back to the hotel, walking as if a hundred-pound weight had suddenly been lifted from my shoulders and knowing that at last there was no danger. I almost ran the last few steps down the corridor to get into the room to tell her.
She was just coming out of the bathroom in her robe. I caught her excitedly and kissed her while she looked at me in wonder, and then I handed her the papers.
“Read it,” I said. “We’re in the clear. They went for every bit of it. No, wait.” I interrupted myself. “Before you start, call room service and order your breakfast. I’ve already had some coffee and I’m too excited to eat any thing.”
“All right, Jack.” She made an effort to smile, but it was a strained and pitiful attempt, and I knew that the terror of last night was still alive there somewhere below the surface. After she had made the call she started reading the news stories and I watched her face as the hope and relief grew in her eyes. When the waiter knocked on the door I went into the bathroom and hid while the set up the breakfast things. When he had gone I came out and drank a little of her coffee and watched her while she finished the papers and tried to eat. She didn’t get much of it down.
“Look,” I ran on, too full of plans now to be quiet, “the other things you bought will be delivered to the hotel by noon today and I’ll have the suit and a change of clothes. We have luggage and can travel looking just like anybody else. So we’ll check out, separately, sometime this afternoon, and catch the first bus. No, by God, we’ll take the plane. We can afford it now. Why didn’t I think of it sooner? We’ll take the plane to San Francisco, stay there a few days, and then go on up to Seattle by bus to see the country.”
She had begun to catch my excitement now. “I think that’s wonderful, Jack,” she said. She called the airline and found there would be a plane at six-fifteen p.m., and made her reservation.
“You’ll have to go down and pick up the ticket sometime this morning,” I said. “I’ll follow you and get a ticket for myself. Maybe we’d better make it pretty soon, so they won’t be sold out.”
She called room service and I went back into the bathroom while the waiter took away the dishes. I prowled the room restlessly while she was in the bath changing into street clothes, and when she came out I spoiled her lipstick kissing her.
“You’re just like a big bear,” she said, smiling. She started to pin her