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"Oh God, I don’t know All right? Hoould I knohat Danny knew and didn’t know?"

"You knew Justice Califano," Savich said "Dannywith so Justice Califano left lying on his desk by accident So Think back, Eliza"

She sat back down on the sofa, clasped her hands between her blue-jeaned knees, and rocked a bit

Savich’s voice deepened slowly, and he stretched his words out evenly It was his interview voice, deep and soothing "I want you to think back to Friday You’ve just come in I want you to tell us exactly what Danny did on FridayThink particularly about when he had the opportunity to speak privately with Justice Califano Just relax and think back, Eliza"

But she wasn’t ready, and said instead, "Danny’s mom, dad, and three brothers live in New Jersey"

"Yes, they’ve been notified"

"You didn’t tell them why you think he was murdered, did you?"

"No," Savich said "They’d spoken to him yesterday when the news of Justice Califano’s murder hit the airwaves They wanted to ht He reassured them and told them not to worry Now, it’s ti about Friday for the last three hours Talk to us"

"I have, yes," she said, still distracted But Eliza Vickers was smart She turned her eyes to Savich Sherlock knehat she was seeing--dark fathomless eyes, eyes that held no threat at all, but an invitation to trust, and the unspoken pronized the concentration on Eliza’s face She sat forward a bit, all her own attention on Justice Califano’s lover and senior law clerk, a woman she wished she could have met under different circumstances, a woman who could have been a friend

Eliza spoke slowly, her voice cool and steady now "Friday , all the Justices meet alone in the Chief Justice’s conference room, at exactly ten-thirty Like clockwork But Stewart see out of his chambers at exactly ten-thirty a?"

"At a quarter of eight Always the same time Steas very punctual On Friday, we arrived at the sa sesahth Circuit Every Justice is responsible for supervising one or more of the thirteen Federal Appellate Courts Stewart supervised the Eighth We went over the majority opinion Fleurette had drafted for Winters v Kentucky, reviewed several bench uh all of this very quickly Then he said he had sos he needed to do and wanted to be alone for a while"

"This was unusual?"

"No, not at all That’s why I didn’tI left his, in your experience, would occupy his, outside business?"

Eliza’s eyes res The Court was revisiting the death penalty in the upco on that one, trying to determine if they should overturn the opinion they rendered in 1989

"Now that I think of it, since we’d been talking about this case for several days, I don’t think he neededti else Maybe it was about the party Margaret gives every year She invites all the A-list people, and Stewart has to approve the list The A-list gets turned on its head whenever there’s a change of party after an election As both of you know, it’s a crazy town Only the Justices get to be carried out in coffins, or choose to retire, depending on their personal political leanings, and who is in office at the time

"Most of the Justices don’t socializesociety hostesses in Washington They tend to be private Those who are like-ether socially, but not all that often They have such different interests, like Justice Xavier-Foxx’s family horse farm Justice Gutierrez has this incredible instinct for finance Rich and very private, is Justice Gutierrez Happily randkids Good , knows every square inch of the Chesapeake"

Savich drew her back "So Justice Califano is in his office thinking about so Fro time for him to be alone, isn’t it?"