“Good idea. Take your time.”

  The door closed. Buddy again reached the bottom of the box. Still nothing. There were fifteen or sixteen similar-looking boxes stacked to the left of the staircase. Buddy had always assumed they contained miscellaneous information related to Rascal’s business dealings. His father was a disorganized pack rat who never threw anything away. That’s why he hired Millie Graham. Going through all the boxes would take hours and couldn’t be done tonight. And Buddy faced a more immediate issue—whether to talk to his mother about his discovery.

  Sticking the envelope in the back pocket of his pants, Buddy replaced the lid and returned the box to the stack. He was about to climb the stairs when he had another thought. Sitting down on a higher step, he inspected the back of the checks a second time. Amber took the first check to the First National Bank of Milton County, the same bank on which it was drawn. Most likely Rascal notified a bank officer that a teenage girl would be coming in with the check. There were several bank employees who’d worked at the bank for many years and might remember the transaction. It wasn’t common for a seventeen-year-old to have such a large check, especially one made payable to “Bearer.” And Amber likely requested cash if she was going to leave town for good.

  Subsequent checks were presented at banks in Atlanta, Savannah, Chattanooga, and St. Louis. Of the final four, three were negotiated in Atlanta at a well-known bank with branches across the country. The scrawl Amber adopted as her legal signature after the first year no longer contained an “o” shaped like a heart, but the way she formed her “A” bore a strong resemblance to her original handwriting. After that, the signature circled around a few times and died in a small loop that could be interpreted as an “e.” To him, the illegible name spoke of the ongoing desire for anonymity. Returning upstairs to the kitchen, he glanced at the clock and realized he’d spent almost an hour doing a job that took less than a minute.

  Grabbing a bottle of water from the refrigerator, he made his way through the living room and stepped onto the wide front porch that stretched across the entire front of the house. There was a large swing to the right and a pair of wicker chairs with a small table between them to the left. His mother was standing with her back to him and watering a spectacular cluster of tall orange gladiolus. Beatrice turned around, smiled, and waved. Seeing her contented face, Buddy suspected she hadn’t looked at the checks or, if she did, she had no idea what they were for. It wasn’t the right time to drop a bomb on his mother’s world.

  “I’ll talk to you tomorrow!” he called out.

  His mother turned off the water. “What were you doing in the basement?” she asked. “I know it’s messy, but I don’t want you wasting your time straightening up down there when you have more important things to do.”

  “It wasn’t a waste of time.”

  Four

  Opie slept in a comfy dog bed in the corner of Gracie’s bedroom. It was hard for an animal bred to protect Irish farmhouses from varmints to turn off his genetic wiring, and if he heard a strange noise in the night, he issued a series of sharp barks that caused Gracie to jerk awake. The dog went to bed shortly after the sun set and liked to greet the day as soon as the sun appeared. That schedule suited Gracie. Early mornings were a prime time of the day for her. She enjoyed drinking a cup of freshly ground coffee sweetened with cream and sugar at the kitchen table or while sitting on a small deck built onto the rear of the house. This morning the outside air was cool and pleasant, so she chose the deck.

  Gracie read a chapter each in the Old and New Testaments, then opened a prayer list she kept on a tablet. She liked routine and had organized the extensive list so that items appeared daily, weekly, monthly, and annually. When she received an answer, she recorded the result. Sometimes a sick person recovered. Other times the person died. Regardless of the outcome, Gracie faithfully made an appropriate entry and moved the request to a separate file.

  Sue Ellen Ford and little Jack had been added within the past forty-eight hours. This morning Reagan Landry made her first appearance on the daily list. To make room for them, Gracie moved two other prayer concerns to weekly reminders. Another went from weekly to monthly. It wasn’t just a record of requests; it was also a celebration of answers. One of Gracie’s cousins who’d been laid off from his job had found a new position for better pay, and she entered the answer followed by an exclamation mark of thanks. Moving down the list, she was prompted to pray for a woman who worked for her at the clerk’s office who was having marital problems. Recently, the couple had agreed to counseling. Gracie changed her prayer reminder to focus on that aspect of the situation. After forty-five minutes she reached the annual items that she hadn’t seen for a year.

  The first one that popped up was a prayer that Buddy Smith would find his daughter, Elise. The situation had been on Gracie’s prayer list for a long time, but after years without progress it had been relegated to annual status. As clerk of court, Gracie had seen the original birth certificate. For some reason the document issued to Amber listed the female baby’s father as “Unknown.” There was the possibility that Buddy wasn’t the father, but he believed he was and Gracie had no reason to doubt him.

  Buddy and Gracie had known each other since sharing the same third-grade classroom in elementary school. Gracie was a chubby little blonde, and Buddy was the smartest boy in the class. That winter he drew an amazingly detailed picture of a dog romping in the snow and gave it to Gracie, who still had the drawing in a box that contained memorabilia from her school years.

  In the tenth grade, she and Buddy shared a table in biology and partnered in dissecting a frog, growing green bean seeds in pots with different brands of fertilizer, and doing an experiment to illustrate Mendel’s laws of genetics using colored M&M candies. As part of the genetic project, the teacher required a fifteen-minute verbal presentation of Mendel’s principles to the entire class. To Gracie, who’d not completely grown out of her chubby stage, fifteen minutes standing in front of the class sounded like fifteen hours, but Buddy boldly stepped in. He wrote most of their paper and allowed Gracie to demonstrate the concepts while he spoke about them. The teacher gave them both an A, but Gracie knew who’d earned the grade. During that time, she’d developed a secret crush on Buddy and whenever possible positioned herself near him during lunch or study hall. He was nice to her but was mostly oblivious to her presence. That summer Gracie played summer league softball and showed up for their junior year fit, attractive, and with more confidence than ever before. She walked into chemistry class hoping to share a table with Buddy, but he was sitting next to a new girl, Amber Melrose. Gracie had to find another lab partner.

  Amber had sailed into the high school after living all over the country and immediately threw herself into cultivating relationships with the boys—not the girls—in their class. A decent athlete, she briefly played on the softball team but soon quit. Once she and Buddy paired up, they were inseparable.

  In a conservative area like Milton County, a high school pregnancy, especially involving someone as well-known as Buddy Smith, was a big deal that generated a massive amount of talk and gossip. Amber didn’t seem to care. During their senior year, she flaunted her increasing baby bump and accepted the special accommodations she received from teachers. Buddy was so fixated on Amber that he appeared immune to negative opinions. The scuttlebutt around the school was that Buddy and Amber were going to marry upon graduation. It didn’t happen, and Amber abruptly left town shortly after the baby’s birth. Gracie heard several versions of why they broke up and Amber disappeared, but she never learned the truth from Buddy.

  Tapping the tablet with her finger, Gracie prayed that Buddy would find his daughter and be able to establish a good relationship with her. She didn’t add anything about Buddy reconnecting with Amber. She didn’t have to pray about that. Gracie never believed they were a good match for each other when they were in high school, and nothing since then had changed her opinion.

  Closing the tablet, Gracie sat quietly in her chair for a few minutes with Opie lying contentedly at her feet. Beginning her day with the Lord was the foundation for everything else that followed. Gracie relished the final moments of quiet and peace before entering the high-stress world of the courthouse.

  Before leaving for work, she made sure the dog had plenty of water in his outside bowl. He could find shade under the deck or beneath several large trees in the small backyard.

  Gracie parked in a space reserved for “Clerk of Court.” She was fourth in line in the local governmental hierarchy, ranked behind only the two superior court judges and the county sheriff. Sometimes the status she held still seemed unreal to her.

  “Morning, Brenda,” Gracie said to her chief assistant.

  “Hey,” Brenda replied. “I sorted your mail.”

  Gracie’s position hadn’t earned her a private office. Instead, her desk rested against the back wall so she could oversee everything that took place: filing lawsuits and other pleadings, recording deeds, notifying jurors when it was time to serve, maintaining court records, assisting the judges with the court calendar, helping attorneys, and performing anything else the county commissioners wanted done. The clerk’s office employed six people, five women and one man. Jeremy Prater, the lone male, was a young man who wanted to become an appraiser in the county tax department. Gracie knew about his goals and had assigned him to the real estate department.

  Managing people was a lot like coaching a sports team, and Gracie brought the same approach to the office that she’d perfected on the softball diamond. That meant cross-training among different positions and fostering a willingness among her employees to help wherever and whenever needed. She’d fired two people since becoming clerk, both for pushing back against that expectation.

  The morning passed quickly. Automation in Milton County wasn’t as sophisticated as in metropolitan areas. There was a lot of hands-on work with paper records and documents. Around 10:30 a.m., Judge Claremont, the senior judge, threw Gracie a major curve when his administrative assistant called to tell her the judge had decided to take a few extra days off the following month. This had a domino effect on the court calendar. By the time Gracie finished, it was lunchtime. She walked across the street to the Crossroads Café.

  * * *

  Buddy leaned back in his chair and read Jennifer Stockton’s résumé. The secretarial candidate was a tall girl with a thick country accent. She’d completed several business courses at the local community college. Jennifer’s references confirmed the young woman was a hard worker with above-average organizational skills.

  “I brought a typing sample,” the dark-haired nineteen-year-old said, laying a few sheets of paper on the edge of Buddy’s desk. “And I’m prepared to take a typing test.”

  The samples included court pleadings in both a civil case and a criminal case. Jennifer had correctly laid out the headings and format and selected the proper font size. Buddy didn’t see any errors and liked what he saw. But training people wasn’t his favorite activity.

  “That won’t be necessary based on your coursework.”

  “And I’m a self-starter who isn’t afraid of taking initiative.”

  “Is that something your career counselor at the community college told you to say?”

  The young woman was perched on the edge of her seat. Her face flushed. “Yes, sir. But it’s true.”

  “That’s okay,” Buddy said with a wave of his hand. “How soon could you start?”

  “As soon as you like. My boss at the restaurant knows I’m looking for an office job and told me not to worry about working out a notice.”

  Buddy wasn’t afraid of making a quick decision. “You have the job,” he said. “Come in tomorrow.”

  “I do?” Jennifer asked, her eyes wide.

  “Yes.” Buddy nodded with a smile. “But be sure that you make Millie happy.”

  “I will. I know she can teach me a lot.”

  “Millie will set you up with everything you need.”

  The young woman beamed. “Thank you, Mr. Smith. I really appreciate the chance to work for you.”

  Nobody in the office called him Mr. Smith, but Buddy didn’t correct her. It might be a good idea to keep things formal for at least a couple of weeks. He escorted Jennifer to the office manager’s desk. Millie had already prepared a new employment packet for the young woman. Jennifer left with the information in her hands.

  “How did you know I would hire her?” Buddy asked.

  “We both know some fresh blood will be good around here.”

  Buddy walked across the street and filed the complaint for divorce and the motion for an expedited custody hearing in Ford v. Ford. There weren’t any clouds in the sky, but the air was humid, which would make the heat later in the day even more oppressive. Instead of returning to the office, he made his way to the First National Bank of Milton County.

  Inside the front pocket of Buddy’s jacket were the two checks that Amber negotiated at the local bank. Unlike his father, Buddy didn’t have any accounts there. He entered, and a young woman approached him.

  “How may I help you?” she asked.

  “I’m Blair Smith. Is there a vice president available?” Buddy handed her one of his business cards.

  “Let me check with Ms. Brockington.”

  A middle-aged woman emerged from a side office and introduced herself.

  “I knew your father,” she said with a smile. “I had several opportunities to work with him. He was quite a character, very entertaining to talk to.”

  It was a common description of Rascal.

  “Could we speak in private?” Buddy asked.

  They went into a small enclosed office in a corner of the main floor. Ms. Brockington closed the door and sat behind a shiny wooden desk.

  “How long have you been with the bank?” Buddy asked.

  “Twenty years. I started as a teller.”

  Buddy removed the two checks from his jacket but kept them in his hand. “I have a question about a couple of transactions that took place a number of years ago. Both of them involved my father’s money market account. One was seventeen years ago, the other shortly before his death. If you need to see any formal paperwork before you talk to me, I’m the executor of his estate, but my questions don’t involve confidential information. They have to do with these checks.”

  He handed her the checks. The bank officer examined the front of each document, then the back.

  “Obviously, writing a check to ‘Bearer’ for $10,000 is unusual,” Buddy continued.

  “Yes, it is.”

  “And I’m interested in finding out if you, or someone else who worked here at the time, assisted my father or the holder of the checks when they were presented to the bank.”

  Ms. Brockington held up one of the checks. “I remember the most recent one. Your father came in with a young woman and obtained my approval for delivery of cash.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes,” the bank vice president responded slowly. “It was a situation that made me personally uncomfortable, but there was no reason not to honor your father’s instructions. The money was in the account. The woman was quite a bit younger than he was.”

  Buddy suddenly realized Ms. Brockington suspected Amber was his father’s mistress.

  “No, no,” he said quickly. “There was nothing wrong between my father and the woman. She was the mother of his first grandchild.”

  “Oh,” Ms. Brockington said as she visibly relaxed. “That makes sense now.”

  “In a way it might, but not totally. Tell me everything you can remember.”

  “Details are fuzzy. I was puzzled why your father would write a check payable to ‘Bearer.’ He could have simply withdrawn the money himself. It seemed like an unnecessary step. And a transaction for that much in cash isn’t a common occurrence. We don’t report cash withdrawals to the feds unless they exceed $10,000.”

  Buddy wasn’t interested in discussing bank regulations. “What do you remember about the woman? Was she alone? Did she have a child with her? What did she look like?”

  Ms. Brockington thought for a moment. “All I remember thinking is that she was attractive. Maybe her hair was dark, but I’m not one hundred percent sure. She was alone except for your father. There wasn’t a child with her.”

  Amber was a natural brunette in high school.

  “Where did you meet with them? Try to remember any snippets of conversation. That could help bring back more information.”

  “Uh, I think we went directly to one of the tellers who took over from there. I believe I simply initialed the authorization for disbursement of the cash.”

  “Do you remember the teller?”

  “No.”

  “Does the name Amber Melrose mean anything to you? I suspect she’s the woman who negotiated the check.”

  “No,” Ms. Brockington replied and shook her head. “I realize you’re the executor, but I may have told you more than I should.”

  “I’m not going to take your deposition or anything like that,” Buddy said reassuringly. “I’m just trying to unravel a mystery from the past.”

  “Sorry I can’t be of more help.”

  Even though he’d confirmed what happened, Buddy left the bank feeling unsettled. Information didn’t necessarily lead to progress. All he’d done was verify what the checks already told him.

  Shortly before noon, Buddy received a call from Christopher Henley, a fellow lawyer who was one of Buddy’s best friends. Chris was a junior partner in Clarksburg’s largest firm, a group of five attorneys. Vince Nelson, the senior partner in the group, was a white-haired lawyer who’d served several terms in the state senate and held more political power than anyone else in Milton County. Buddy hated facing off against the unflappable southern gentleman who treated his opponents with respect as he skillfully gutted their claims.

  “Did you forget what day it is?” Chris asked in an accent that revealed his Tidewater roots outside Richmond.

  Buddy looked at the calendar on his computer. There were no special notations.