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"I’m determined to talk to you," he said

"You strike ives up at all"

"I’ll caet what I’ve cohed "That won’t be necessary I’ve given the situation a great deal of thought since you called yesterday What I decided was--you can’t do anything toI’m seventy-five years old, and they don’t just throoht as well tell you what it was all about, because, if I don’t, you’ll just keep pestering me"

She stepped back, opened the door wide, and they went inside

In the attic of the clifftop house, in the king-size bed, Bruno woke, screaone dead while he’d slept

Whispers

All around hi at his face and neck and chest and ars that crawled on hireater nus on the floor than there had been on the bed, thousands of theibbered, then clas froht

Thin lines of light like loose, lu from the otherwise tenebrous fabric of the rooht, but so

He scraht, flinging the things from him, and what he found was aThe far side of it was covered by shutters Light was seeping through the narrow chinks in the shutters

Bruno stood, swaying, fu in the dark for thelatch When he found the lock, it would not turn; it was badly corroded

Screa frantically at himself, he stumbled back toward the bed, found it in the seahtstand, carried the lalass shattered He threw the lamp aside, felt for the bolt on the inside of the shutters, put his hand on it, jerked on it, skinned a knuckle as he forced the bolt out of its catch, threw open the shutters, and ith relief as light flooded into the attic

The whispers faded

Rita Yancy’s parlor--that hat she called it, a parlor, rather than using a more modern and less colorful word--almost was a parody of the stereotypical parlor in which sweet little old ladies like her were supposed to spend their twilight years Chintz drapes Hands--s framed by penny-sized flowers and cute birds--

were everywhere, a relentless display of good will and good huback chairs Copies of Reader’s Digest on a dainty occasional table A basket filled with balls of yarn and knitting needles A flowered carpet that was protected by hans were draped across the seat and the back of the sofa A mantel clock ticked hollowly

Hilary and Tony sat on the sofa, on the edge of it, as if afraid to lean back and risk ru Hilary noticed that each of the hly polished She had the feeling that Rita Yancy would jump up and run for a dust cloth the instant anyone tried to touch and admire those prized possessions

Joshua sat in an armchair The back of his head and his arms rested on antimacassars

Mrs Yancy settled into as obviously her favorite chair; she seemed to have acquired part of her character froht, to picture Mrs Yancy and the chair growing together into a single organic-inorganic creature with six legs and brushed velvet skin

The old wohan that was folded on her footstool She opened the blanket and covered her lap with it

There was a moment of absolute silence, where even the mantel clock seemed to pause, as if tiically transported, along with the room, to a distant planet to be put on exhibition in an extraterrestrial y

Then Rita Yancy spoke, and what she said totally shattered Hilary’s hoe of her "Well, there’s sure as hell no point in beating around the bush I don’t want to waste ht to it You want to knohy Bruno Frye was paying me five hundred bucks ame to keep my mouth shut His mother paid me the same amount every month for almost thirty-five years, and when she died, Bruno started sending checks I must admit that surprised the hell out of me These days it’s an unusual son ould pay that kind of money to protect his mother’s reputation--and especially after she’s already kicked the bucket But he paid"

"Are you saying you were black Mr Frye and his mother before him?" Tony asked, astonished

"Call it whatever you want Hushyou want"

"From what you’ve told us so far," Tony said, "I believe the laould call it black else"

Rita Yancy smiled at him "Do you think the word bothers me? Do you think I’m afraid of it? All quivery inside? Sonny, let me tell you, I’ve been accused of worse than that in my time Is blackht by me Blackmail That’s what it is We won’t put a prettier face on it But of course, if you’re stupid enough to drag an old lady into court, I won’t use the sareat favor for Katherine Frye a long ti me with a monthly check You don’t really have any proof otherwise, do you? That’s one reason I set it up on a monthly basis in the first place

I mean, black bite, which is easy for the prosecutor to trace But who’s going to believe that a blackree to a modest monthly paying criainst you," Joshua assured her "And we haven’t the slightest interest in atte to recover the money that was paid to you We realize that would be futile"

"Good," Mrs Yancy said "Because I’d htened her afghan

I’ve got to reht She’d reat little character role in a movie some day: Grandma with spice and acid and a touch of rot

"All ant is some information," Joshua said "There’s a proble up the disburseet answers to some questions in order to expedite the final settlement You say you don’t want to waste your whole day on this ’da’

Well, I don’t want to wastehere is to get the infor of mine"

Mrs Yancy stared hard at hi Finally, she nodded with evident satisfaction, as if she had read their minds and had approved of what she’d seen in theht Ask your questions"

"Obviously," Joshua said, "the first thing ant to knohat you had on Katherine Frye that made her and her son pay you nearly a quarter of a million dollars over the past forty years"