so the Book Place let me have them cheap. They even marked the pages for you. How are you feeling?”
Spencer sighed. “I’ve been better. Thanks for the books.”
“I brought you something else that you might want to see.” She handed him a copy of the Johnson City Chronicleopen to the headlinePARENTS OF SLAIN GIRL DEMAND DEATH OF KILLER . Colonel Charles Wythe Stanton, older and grayer but still in charge, stared out at him from the page of newsprint. He was wearing a dark suit and tie instead of an army uniform, but his piercing expression had not changed. Spencer skimmed the article, already knowing what it would say.
“Colonel Charles Stanton (U.S. Army-ret.), whose daughter Emily was murdered on the Appalachian Trail in 1977, met today with a Tennessee victims’ organization to discuss the scheduled execution of the man who killed his daughter. ‘Fate Harkryder should be executed at once,’ Colonel Stanton told the
group. ‘His legal ploys have given him twenty years of life to which he was not entitled. I wish he had shown as much mercy to my daughter. He didn’t let her live to be twenty.’ Colonel Stanton stressed the victims’ families’ need for closure, so that they can go on with their lives.” The article went on for another half dozen paragraphs, but Spencer had heard it all before, and he didn’t dispute any of it. That wasn’t what worried him.
“Where’s the front page of the paper, Martha?” asked Spencer, noting that the part he was reading was section B.
“LeDonne spilled Pepsi on it this morning,” said Martha with a shrug. “It wasn’t dry yet.”
He heard an odd note in her voice, and filed it away for future consideration.
Martha turned her deck chair to face the view of sunlit mountains and sat down across the table from him. “I don’t know how you can bear to go inside,” she said. “I’d just stare out at these hills for hours at a time.”
He smiled. “It gets cold up here after sunset.”
“It’s always a different scene, though, isn’t it? The mountains change color from one day to the next. I can count six shades of green without even turning my head. So peaceful.”
“Most of the time.” There was a small photo of Emily Stanton accompanying the newspaper article.
Martha took a sip of coffee. “Have you done any more thinking about Frankie Silver?”
“Off and on,” he said, shrugging. “It doesn’t fit into my experience anywhere yet. She was an eighteen-year-old girl. By all accounts she was pretty, hardworking, and virtuous. Yet she killed her young husband with an ax. Why would she do that?”
“Maybe she was crazy?”
“She seemed sane enough during the trial, apparently. They convicted her anyhow.”
“Cabin fever? It was winter when it happened. I remember Mrs. Honeycutt talking about snow on the ground and the river being frozen. Maybe she just got tired of being shut up in that little one-room cage.” Martha shivered. “I know I would.”
“Yes,” said Spencer, “but you hadn’t lived in a place like that all your life. Surely Frankie Silver was used to it.”
“I guess you’re right,” said Martha. “Maybe you’ll never understand it. Times were different then. I don’t see what you can do with a case that’s a hundred and fifty years old, with not even a crime scene left to look at, but if it keeps you off your feet for a while longer, then I’m all for it. Better than thinking about that other case.”
“Fate Harkryder.”
“There’s nothing you can do about that one, either. Are you still thinking about going to the—” She didn’t want to say execution.
He nodded. “I called and told them I would. If it happens.”
“Which it won’t,” said Martha. She stood up and brushed imaginary dust from her trousers. “Well, I wish I had time to sit up here in this pretty place looking at mountains and playing detective, but I guess I have to go prowl for expired car-inspection stickers.”
Spencer smiled. “Prowling for expired county stickers isn’t unimportant, Martha. The county needs the revenue. How is Joe doing?”
“Oh, he’ll be up one of these days. You know how he is.”
“Tell him I’m not sick,” said Spencer. LeDonne would rather work twenty-hour days than visit sick people.
When Martha had gone, Spencer turned again to the article in the newspaper. He had not wanted her to see how concerned he was about the case. Martha worried too much.
The photograph seemed to be staring directly at him from out of the newspaper. Charles Wythe Stanton, still