I look past Bracken out the window at the mild March sunshine striking gold on the concrete ledge. His last spring. Yet there is not an ounce of self-pity or regret in his voice. Maybe religion has reconciled him to leaving much too early. Who will miss him? Criminals.

Lawyers like myself, who dropped by the courtroom to watch him try a case. His family, I suppose, of whom I know nothing. So what if religion is a crutch? For all I know, that’s all he’s got left.

“So what do you think this is all about?” I ask, watching Bracken scan his investigator’s report as if something new might have magically appeared in it.

“Page, I wish I knew,” he says.

“Make a copy of the file, get it back to me tomorrow, and we can talk. I’ll telephone Leigh and tell her that you’ll be working with me. Maybe she’ll talk to you.”

I take the file from him, shaken by how little confidence he has left in him. Normally, his arrogance is as much a trademark as his jug ears. I’d be cocky too if I got his results, but that is all gone now. His brusqueness almost seems a smoke screen to hide the lack of progress he has made. I’m amazed that Bracken managed to get her out on bond. Yet maybe it wasn’t that hard. I re call reading that members of Christian Life flooded the court with affidavits to the effect that Leigh Wallace was no threat to flee the court’s jurisdiction. Old hands around the courthouse said there had never been any thing like it in Blackwell County. The power of Shane Norman, I guess. There are many influential members in Christian Life, and not a few of them were contributors to Judge Shellnut’s reelection campaign for municipal court judge. Still, he set bond at $500,000, which didn’t faze Christian Life in the slightest.