She raised a hand, touched my cheek. “‘Thou mayst think my ’havior light,’” she said: “‘But trust me, gentleman, I’ll prove more true than those that have more cunning to be strange.’”

“Is that Juliet?”

“On the balcony. But it proved to be a lie, and I’ve been paying for it ever since.”

Was I a fool to think it was my misplaced trust and my betrayed hopes that had been plaguing her all these years?

“It’s time to go home,” she said.

Was I a fool to wonder if my heart was the home for which she yearned?

“I’m here,” I said.

“I know, but I want to go home.”

Yes, I was that fool. I stood, straightened my spine to a lawyer’s posture. “You can’t go back to your house,” I said. “It’s now a crime scene. The coroner would have already picked up the body, but there will be yellow tape across the front door, there will be technicians taking prints and searching for evidence. There will be blood.”

At the word blood, her eyes focused, as if some red and sodden image had snapped her back to the present and its prickly predicament. She pulled the blanket up to her neck. She noticed the beer in her hand and took a long drink.

“I’ll just stay here,” she said.

“The cops are going to find you, Julia. It’s better for you if you find them first.”

“What do I tell them?”

“Either you tell them the whole truth or you tell them nothing. Those are your choices.”

“Which should I do?”

“Do you have an attorney?”

“I suppose. Wren did, at least. Clarence, Clarence Swift.”

“Then you should call this Clarence Swift and ask his advice.”

“But what about you? Why don’t you be my lawyer?”

“I can’t represent you. I’m a witness to your whereabouts. If I try to represent you, they’ll have me disqualified immediately, and it will gum up everything. But as a friend, I would advise you for the time being to tell them nothing before you talk to your lawyer.”