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  Vail and Parver were waiting when Paul Rainey and James Wayne Darby arrived. Rainey was a deceptively pleasant man. Tall, slender, his dark hair streaked with grey, he wore gold-rimmed glasses and an expensive dark blue suit and could have passed for a rich, Texas businessman. Darby was his antithesis, an ex-high school baseball player gone to seed: six feet tall, thirty pounds overweight, and sloppily dressed in jeans, heavy hiking boots, a flannel shirt, and a camouflage hunting jacket. Cheap aviator sunglasses hid his dull brown eyes. His dishwater-blonde hair was cropped too close and he had a beer drinker's complexion, a beer drinker's stomach, and a beer drinker's attitude. He was thirty-eight but could easily have passed for a man in his late forties. A farmer from Sandytown, a small farming community of four thousand people on the north end of the county, he had shot his wife to death with a shotgun after claiming she first tried to kill him.

  Everyone on the team believed he had murdered his wife, but they could not prove his story was phony. There were some damaging circumstances, but that was all they were: circumstances. He was having a fling with a stripper named Poppy Palmer. He had insured both himself and his wife for $250,000 six months before the shooting. And the previous two years had been a disaster. Darby, on the verge of bankruptcy, was about to lose his farm.

  But there were no witnesses, so there was no way to challenge him. His story, supported by the bovine Miss Palmer, was that a hysterical Ramona Darby had called Palmer an hour or so before the shooting and threatened to kill both Darby and Palmer. A slip of paper with Palmer's number had been found near the Darbys' phone.

  Vail did the introductions, which were cordial enough. Vail and Parver sat with their backs to the camcorder and Darby sat across from them, slouching down in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest. He kept the hunting jacket on. Rainey laid a slender briefcase on the table and stood behind his client, leaning on the back of his chair.

  'Okay,' he said. 'Let's get this over with.'

  Vail smiled. 'What's the rush, Paul? Plenty of coffee. You can smoke. Nice view.'

  'Martin, I've advised my client to cooperate with you people this one, last time. He's been interrogated twice by the police - once for six hours - and previously by your department for three. He's not accused of a thing. This is beginning to feel a little like harassment. I want an agreement that this is a voluntary interrogation and that all formal requirements in connection with such are waived. Also this statement, or series of statements, by my client does not constitute a formal deposition or a sworn statement.'

  'Are you implying that he can lie to us with complete immunity?' Parver asked.

  'I am saying that Mr Darby has agreed to cooperate with you in this matter. You can take his statement at face value.'

  'Do you have any objections if we videotape the inquiry?'

  Rainey thought for a moment. 'Only if we get a complete copy of the tape and you agree that it will not be used as evidence in a court case and will not be released to the public.'

  Parver nodded. 'Acceptable.'

  'Then it's acceptable to my client. We haven't got a thing to hide.'

  Vail pressed a button under the table and started the camcorder.

  John Wayne Darby said nothing. He stared across the table at Vail and Parver, his lips curled in a smirk.

  Parver opened a file folder and took out a pencil. 'Are we ready?' she asked, trying to smile.

  'Any time, little lady.'

  She glared at him but did not respond. 'Please state your full name and address.'

  'Sheee… you know my name and address.'

  'Just do it, Jim,' Rainey said.

  'James Wayne Darby. RFD Three, Sandytown.'

  'How long have you lived at that address?'

  'Uh, eight years. My daddy left it to me.'

  'Age?'

  'Twenty-nine.' He laughed and then said, 'Just kiddin'. I'm thirty-eight and holding.'

  'Are you married?'

  'I was. My wife is dead.'

  'Was your wife Ramona Smith Darby?'

  That's right.'

  'How long were you married?'

  'Ten years.'

  'Did you graduate from high school, Mr Darby?'

  'Yep.'

  'Did you attend college?'

  'Yes, I did, on a baseball scholarship.'

  'And did you graduate from college?'

  'No. Got my leg broke in a car wreck when I was starting my third year. Couldn't play ball anymore and lost my scholarship, so I had to drop out.'

  'Then what did you do?'

  'Went to work on my daddy's farm.'

  'Were you married at the time?'

  'Yes. Ramona and I married just after I dropped out.'

  'That's when you went to live at RFD Three, Sandytown?'

  'Right. My daddy's farm. He built a garage apartment for us.'

  'Do you have any children?'

  'No.'

  'Is your father still living?'

  'He got a stroke four years ago.'

  'And died?'

  'Yeah, he died.'

  'How about your mother?'

  'She died when I was in college. Cancer.'

  'I will ask you if you will now agree to a polygraph test.'

  'Objection,' Rainey said. 'We've been over this. I've advised my client against the polygraph. It's not admissible in court and there's no advantage whatsoever to Mr Darby taking a polygraph since it cannot benefit him in any way. And let's not make an issue of this with the press, okay, Martin?'

  'I assume that's a "no",' Parver said.

  'That's right, little lady, it's a no,' said Darby.

  Vail leaned across the table, but Parver moved a foot over his and stopped him. She stared straight at Darby and said, 'Mr Darby, I'm nobody's little lady, especially yours. Now you agreed to this interrogation. We can do this quickly or we can spend the day here. It's up to you.'

  Darby's face turned a deep shade of vermilion. He started to get up, but Rainey put a hand on his arm and nodded towards his chair. Darby sneered, then shrugged, sat back down, and fell quiet.

  Parver took a diagram out of the folder and laid it before him. It showed the first floor of the Darby farmhouse. The front door lead from a wide porch into a small entrance hall. An archway opened on the left into the living room. Facing the archway was the sketch of a chair and a distance line between the arch and the chair that measured twelve feet, four inches. There were two Xs marked on the chair, two on the hallway wall opposite the chair, one on the wall next to the arch, and one that measured eight feet, seven inches marked floor to ceiling.

  'I show you this sketch, Mr Darby,' Parver said. 'Is this an accurate sketch of the scene of the crime?'

  'Strike the word crime,' said Rainey wearily. 'There isn't any crime. Nobody's been accused of a crime.'

  'Would homicide suit you?' Parver asked.

  'Event. I think scene of the event would be an accurate description.'

  'Mr Darby, is this an accurate sketch of the scene of the event?'

  Darby studied it for a minute and nodded. 'Yeah. There's some other furniture in the room.'

  'It's inconsequential, is it not?'

  'You mean did it enter into the shootout? No.'

  'Now, Mr Darby, will you please describe for us what happened on January 7, 1993?'

  'You mean getting out of bed, taking a shower…'

  'You were going hunting…'

  'Charlie Waters, Barney Thompson, and me went duck hunting. We go once or twice a week in the season.'

  'Where did you go hunting?'

  'Big Marsh.'

  'What time did you get there?'

  'We were in the blind by, I don't know, four-thirty, five.'

  'Did you speak to your wife before you left?'

  'She was asleep. I never wake her up. She made the sandwiches and stuff the night before.'

  'Did you two have a fight or a disagreement the previous night?'

  'Not really.'

  'What do you
mean, "not really"?'

  'We weren't getting along. I told you that before. Things were not exactly peaches and cream around the place, but we weren't yelling at each other, nothing like that. It was just kind of cool between us. Hell, she made my lunch.'

  'How long were you hunting?'

  'We left Big Marsh about three P.M. We always stop on the way home and have a couple of beers, brag about who bagged the most birds, like that.'

  'And it was on the way home from one of these hunting trips that you first met Poppy Palmer at the Skin Game Club, isn't that right?'

  'Sure, I told you all that before.' He looked at Rainey and held his hands out and shrugged.

  'Do you have anything new to ask?' Rainey said with irritation.

  'There are several points we need to clear up,' Parver said quietly. Vail was impressed by her control. 'How soon after you met Poppy Palmer did you first have sexual relations with her?'

  'In minutes or hours?' Darby smirked.

  'Hours will be fine,' Parver answered coolly.

  'Like I told you, we went into the Skin Game and she was workin' that day and we had a couple of beers and then Charlie asked her to have a beer with us only she wanted a champagne cocktail. That's the way it works, they put Coca-Cola in a glass or something and you pay five bucks for it and that's what they call champagne. So we fooled around talking until seven and she was getting off work, so I said, How about it? You want to stop somewhere, have a real drink? One thing led to another and we finally went to the Bavarian Inn and got a room.' He leaned across the table towards Parver and said, 'You want all the details?'

  'That won't be necessary.' She looked down at her notes. 'Not now, anyway.

  Nice shot, thought Vail. Let him think this isn't going to be the end of it. Throw him off.

  'Did you have sexual intercourse with Miss Palmer on that occasion?' Parver continued.

  Darby looked at Rainey, who waved off his concern.

  'Sure.'

  'How many times after that did you and Miss Palmer meet?'

  'I dunno, four or five. I don't remember exactly.'

  She checked her notes. 'Miss Palmer says she met you at the Bavarian Inn six times. You have said five. Then six. And this time four or five. Which is it?'

  'Look, what's the dif? I had a fling with her. I never tried to say I didn't. I told the cops that the first night they talked to me.'

  'So was it four, five, or six?' she asked calmly.

  'I just told you, I don't remember. Okay, six. Hell, it was six if Poppy says so. I don't mark my calendar, maybe she does.'

  'But you always had sex with her?'

  'Yeah. Why, does it turn you on hearing about it?'

  'That's enough of that, Darby,' Vail snapped.

  'Look, what I did was in self-defence. How many goddamn times do I have to repeat it to you people? Why don't you go out and bust some drug dealers, do something for the community?'

  Vail turned to Rainey. 'This can go on forever if that's what he wants,' he said.

  'Just answer the questions, yes or no,' Rainey said, still staring at Vail.

  'Let's go back to the day you shot your wife,' Parver said. 'Did you to to the Skin Game Club that day?'

  'No. We stopped in a beer joint out on 78. I don't know if it's got a name. The sign in front says cocktails.'

  'Did you see Poppy Palmer at all that day?'

  'Nope.'

  'Talk to her?'

  'Not before the shooting.'

  'At any time?'

  'I called after the police came and I found the paper with her number on it by the phone.'

  'Why did you call her?'

  'I wanted to tell her what happened and I wanted to know about the phone number. Where Ramona got it because Poppy's number isn't in the book and she told me Ramona had called her about four-thirty, five o'clock and went crazy on the phone. Said she was gonna fix me. You know all that, you talked to Poppy.'

  'What did she tell you exactly?'

  'Just that. Ramona called her and was all outta shape. And, like, blamed Poppy for what happened. And Poppy couldn't get a word in edgewise, Ramona was crying and screaming so. Said she was gonna fix my wagon. That's exactly what Poppy told me, that Ramona said she was gonna fix my goddamn wagon.'

  'What time did you leave the bar on 78?'

  'I don't know, about five-thirty. I wasn't watching the clock.' He chuckled. 'Usually my old lady didn't take a shot at me when I came home late.'

  'Roughly what time was it?'

  'It takes about a half hour to drive home and the news was coming on when I got there. I could hear Dan Rather talking on the TV when I walked in. It was just starting.'

  'Show us on the diagram exactly what happened when you entered the house.'

  'Damn!' He grabbed a pencil and traced his steps into the house on the diagram. As he told the story, he began talking faster. 'I come in the house here and I walk to the doorway to the living room that's, I don't know, five feet maybe, and as I look into the living room, she's… Ramona's… sitting in the easy chair here and she's aiming my .38 target pistol at me and she cuts loose! Just starts shooting! So I dive straight ahead to the other side of the arch and I'm against the wall here and she puts a shot here where this X is, and another one here, and I panic and I shove two shells in my shotgun and just then she shoots again and the bullet goes through the wall here and misses my head by a gnat's ass and I just thought, She's gonna kill me! So I charge around the corner and fire once and it kind of knocks her back in the chair and her arm flung up and she put another shot into the ceiling and I was charging right at her and I shot again. It all happened in, like, less than a minute.'

  'What did you think after all the shooting was over?'

  'What did I think? I was out of breath. I was scared. She almost killed me.'

  'But what did you think while this was happening? Did you call to her, try to reason with her?'

  'Hell, no, it all happened just like that. Bang, bang, bang, bang. Bullets flying through the wall. I wasn't thinking. I was trying to stay alive.'

  'Did you warn her?'

  'A bullet just flew that damn close to my head. Warn her about what? "Hey, Ramona here I come, ready or not"? I just panicked and I figured it's her or me and ran into the room shooting.'

  'So now it's over. Your wife is lying there with two wounds, one in her head. What went through your mind?'

  'At first I got choked up. I almost puked, I never shot a human being before. And she was bleeding. And I dropped the gun down and felt for a pulse in her wrist, but I, y'know, I was confused and upset, so I went in and called 911. That's when I saw where she broke into my gun cabinet and that's when I found the phone number beside the phone.'

  'Was the phone number in your wife's handwriting?'

  'Hell, I dunno, you think I was analysing handwriting? The cops talked to me for three, four hours that night. They took the note and I haven't seen it since.'

  'But you didn't write it?'

  Vail sat back in his chair and concentrated on Parver. She was doing a superb job. The handwriting of the note had not occurred to Vail - or to anyone that he was aware of. She was cool, quiet but not soft, very direct, and she was beginning to rattle Darby. She was totally focused. For a moment, she reminded Vail of Jane Venable, the prosecutor who had preceded him as chief prosecutor.

  'Hell, no,' Darby snapped. 'I told you, she wasn't listed, you think I wanted my wife to call her up?'

  'Do you have any idea where she might have found that number?'

  'No.'

  'Who else knew the number?'

  'How the hell do I know?'

  'Is it possible that you wrote the number down and forgot it and she found it? In a drawer or something like that?'

  'I… didn't… write… the goddamn number. Is that clear?'

  He turned to Rainey and said plaintively, 'It's the same damn questions as last time. They know the answers, what the hell is this?' He turned back to Parver. 'I killed m
y wife, okay? She shot at me, I shot at her. That's it. I got nothing more to say.'

  'He's right,' said Rainey. 'It's the same ground you ploughed last time.'

  'I just want to make it clear to you, Mr Darby, that we have two strong motives for murder here,' Shana Parver said. She counted items off on her fingers. 'Money - a $250,000 insurance policy, and you're about to go into bankruptcy - and infidelity. They're the biggies, Mr Darby. It's also a hard story to come to terms with, this shootout scenario. Your wife wasn't a violent woman from everything we've been told. And she also hated guns. Isn't it true that you wanted her to take shooting lessons and she refused to touch a gun?'

  'Yeah. Maybe that's why she missed me,' he said with a sneer.

  'The point is, Mr Darby, if we need to talk to you again, we will. We'll keep talking to you until we decide for sure whether or not this homicide was justifiable.'

  He stood up angrily and leaned towards her with both hands on the table. 'It happened just the way I said it happened. Ramona and me are the only two people that were there and she's dead. Try to prove otherwise or leave me alone, little lady.'

  He spun around and slammed out of the room.

  Rainey stood and put his papers in his briefcase. He looked at Vail and shook his head.

  'I object to this whole meeting, Miss Parver. The note is moot. It was there. It substantiates Miss Palmer's statement and both you and the cops have had rounds with her. Stop trying to make chicken salad out of chickenshit. You know this could just as easily have gone the other way. Jimmy could be underground and you could be going after Ramona Darby for blowing him away.' He shook his head. 'You two are whistling "Dixie" on this one.'

  He followed Darby out of the room.

  'Damn!' Parver said, slamming down her pencil.