As we walked past Vera Strong and the museum director, we caught a snippet of their conversation. "The bloodlines on both sides are magnificent," Mrs. Strong was saying. "You should see the way she carries herself. She has an even temperament and bright eyes. She's very intelligent."

"Not another dog!" Williams cut in.

"Who said anything about a dog?" Mrs. Strong replied.

"Now don't be coy, Vera," said Williams. "'Magnificent bloodlines ... even temperament.' No one begrudges you another poodle. Come, come. Fess up!"

Vera Strong suddenly gasped. "My G.o.d! How embarra.s.sing! I was talking about Peter's fiancee. I'm going to be a mother-in-law!" She threw her head back and laughed; then she clutched Williams by the arm. "You must swear swear you'll never tell anybody what I just said!" Having sworn Williams to secrecy, she turned to the couple standing next to her. "Did you hear that? Jim overheard me talking about Peter's fiancee, and it's simply you'll never tell anybody what I just said!" Having sworn Williams to secrecy, she turned to the couple standing next to her. "Did you hear that? Jim overheard me talking about Peter's fiancee, and it's simply too too mortifying, I was saying ..." mortifying, I was saying ..."

Williams turned aside. "Well, that's Vera Strong. One of her many saving graces is her sense of humor.

"Now those two," he said, nodding toward a handsome middle-aged man and woman, "are Roger and Claire Moultrie. He was president of the Savannah Gas Company until about fifteen years ago, when they got involved in a bit of a scandal. One night they drove out to a secluded spot along the river and parked their car. A night watchman came by and told them to leave, because they were trespa.s.sing on the grounds of some shipyard or other. They refused to budge. The watchman called the cops. A cop came and demanded identification. Roger became belligerent and scuffled with the policeman. At that point, Claire grabbed a pistol out of the glove compartment and shouted, 'Duck, Roger, I'll kill the sonofab.i.t.c.h.' The cop dragged her out of the car and pummeled her so badly she spent a week in the hospital. Both were charged with trespa.s.sing, drunkenness, disorderly conduct, and resisting arrest-she with threatening the life of a policeman, he with striking a police officer. Roger refused the judge's suggestion that he pay a small fine and be done with it, so they went to trial. At the trial Roger said they had driven to the moonlit spot to inspect the installation of gas lines and that therefore, in so many words, they had been on company business. The most respected citizens of Savannah lined up to serve as character witnesses, and the jury delivered its verdict in twenty-five minutes: innocent of all charges. Those two don't feel they have to answer to anybody. That's probably why they're here tonight."

Williams looked around the room. "That man over there in the formal hunting outfit is Harry Cram. He's a legend." Williams was speaking of a patrician gentleman, about seventy, who was wearing a scarlet tailcoat with gold embroidery over one pocket. "Harry Cram has never worked a day in his life," said Williams. "He's one of the first remittance men to come to the low country. His family sends his monthly checks from Philadelphia with the understanding he'll never go back there, and he leads a life of high style-traveling around the world, hunting, drinking, and playing polo. He's a wild man, completely charming. The woman standing next to him is his fourth wife, Lucy. They live out on Devil's Elbow, a huge, wooded island off Bluffton, South Carolina. There's a John Singer Sargent portrait of Harry's grandfather in the dining room." In his formal hunting togs, Harry Cram looked a fit subject for a Sargent portrait himself.

"Harry used to amuse himself by flying over friends' houses in private planes and bombing them with bags of flour, aiming for the chimney," said Williams. "One time he rode into the old DeSoto Hotel on horseback. He's a daredevil and a superb marksman. When he was living out at Foot Point Plantation, he'd invite people for Sunday lunch and tell them, 'Now, be sure to arrive by noon.' And he meant it. At quarter to twelve, he'd take a drink and his rifle and climb into a tree, where he could watch his guests coming up the long driveway. At the stroke of noon, he'd take aim through the telescopic sights and shoot the hood ornaments off the cars of the latecomers, just to let them know they were late."

Williams caught Harry Cram's eye from across the room, and we started moving in his direction. "One last story before we say h.e.l.lo to Harry," Williams said. "About five years ago, two Parris Island marines swam over to Harry's island in frogmen's suits and broke into the house. They took Harry's sixteen-year-old son, Peter, at bayonet point, down the hall to Harry's bedroom door. Peter called out, 'Dad, there's two men here with bayonets. They say they're going to kill me unless you give them some money.' Harry called back through the door, 'All right, just let me get the money.' Peter knew what to expect, so the moment Harry flung the door open, he ducked. Harry fired two shots with his thirty-eight and hit both marines between the eyes."

At this point, Williams and I were standing in front of the Crams. "I didn't hear you ask for a ginger ale ginger ale, did I, Harry?" Williams asked in mock alarm.

"I'm afraid you did," said Cram. "Isn't it shameful! I'm on the wagon, believe it or not. It's been about a year now." Cram had bright, darting eyes and wispy hair that stood straight up on the top of his head like the crest of a snowy egret. "Lucy brought me to the Veterans Hospital in Charleston drunk as a fiddler's b.i.t.c.h. Apparently, they asked me who the president was. They always ask drunks that. I hadn't the vaguest idea. So they put me in something called 'the Tank.' I was there a week, and I haven't wanted a drink since. I have no idea what they did to me. I've been meaning to ask."

Mrs. Cram nodded. "The time had definitely come," she said. "Harry wanted to play William Tell and shoot an apple off my head."

"I must say, though," said Harry, "I never shot badly during my drinking years, and I don't think I was ever sober from the age of sixteen. I've gone on the wagon quite a few times in my life, but I always got off it in a hurry. This dinner jacket is proof of that. See this little hole?" Cram pointed to a small hole just below his breast pocket. "One time, years ago, I stopped drinking and locked all the liquor in the closet. The next day I decided I'd been sober long enough, but I didn't have the patience to look for the key. So I just shot the lock off the door. The bullet went through every suit on the rack." Harry turned around. There was another bullet hole in the back.

A couple standing next to the Crams joined the fun inspecting the bullet holes in Harry's jacket. Williams drifted toward the living room. "And that's Harry Cram," he said. "I imagine he's here tonight because it would never occur to him that he shouldn't be. Now, see that lady standing over by the window, talking to the bald-headed man? She's Lila Mayhew. Her family's one of the oldest in Savannah; they've lived in two of Savannah's most important historic houses. She's a little dotty though, so it's possible she doesn't even know that I've shot anybody."

Williams left me and went back to the entrance hall, and I drew closer to Mrs. Mayhew. She was speaking to the bald man.

"Now, exactly where did Jim shoot the young man?" Mrs. Mayhew asked, her voice sounding like that of a little lost girl.

"I think it was in the chest," the man said.

"No, I mean where in this house?"

"Oh, ha-ha. In the study. Across the hall, where you put your coat."

"And what did they do with the body?" she asked.

"I suppose they buried it. Wouldn't you?"

"That's not what I mean," said Mrs. Mayhew. "Did they cremate it first or bury it whole?"

"That I couldn't tell you."

"Because you know what happened to Grandmother, don't you?"

"I certainly do," said the man.

"Grandmother's body was sent to Jacksonville to be cremated."

"Yes, I remember that well," he said. "That's a famous story-"

"And the crematorium sent her ashes back to us in an urn. We put the urn in the parlor until it could be interred at Bonaventure. But Father was a chemist, you know."

"And a very good one too," said the man. "The very best."

"Father was feeling downcast and at loose ends. After supper, he took the urn downtown to his laboratory and performed tests on the ashes. That's when he found out they were not Grandmother's at all. The ashes were pure oak. They'd sent us the ashes from an oak tree. We never did find out what happened to Grandmother. When Father pa.s.sed on, we took no chances. We buried him just as he was when he died, in his raincoat. That's why I wondered if they cremated the young man Jim shot and, if they did, whether they know for certain they got his ashes back ..."

Lila Mayhew trailed off into a sort of reverie, and the bald man peered out the living-room window. "My G.o.d," he said, "here comes that Dawes woman! She's all in green, from head to toe!" Serena Dawes was just then coming up the walk on the arm of Luther Driggers. She was wrapped in a green feather boa, and her fingernails, toenails, and eye shadow were green to match.

Williams greeted them at the front door. "Our emerald bird has arrived at last!" he said.

"I need a drink and a place to rest my ankles," Serena said, blowing a kiss and sweeping past him into the living room. She settled herself in an armchair, arranging her ostrich feathers with one hand and scooping a martini from a pa.s.sing tray with the other. Her eyes swept the room. "Boy!" "Boy!" she called to a short man with a camera. "Come over here and take a picture of a real lady!" Once the afterimage of flashbulbs had cleared from Serena's vision, her gaze came to rest on a pretty young blond woman. she called to a short man with a camera. "Come over here and take a picture of a real lady!" Once the afterimage of flashbulbs had cleared from Serena's vision, her gaze came to rest on a pretty young blond woman.

"I don't believe I've had the pleasure," Serena said sweetly. "I'm Serena Dawes."

"My name is Anna," the blond woman said. "I'm visiting from Sweden."

"Isn't that nice," said Serena, "and what brings you to Savannah?"

"Well, it's such a beautiful city. I love to come here to ... to look at it."

"Really! Just to look? Is that all?"

"I love architecture, and you have such beautiful houses here."

"But do you have friends in Savannah?" Serena persisted.

"Oh yes," said Anna.

"Do tell me who!"

"Colonel Atwood."

"Well!" said Serena, fluffing her feathers. "Why didn't you just say you've come to Savannah to f.u.c.k? We'd all have understood completely!" said Serena, fluffing her feathers. "Why didn't you just say you've come to Savannah to f.u.c.k? We'd all have understood completely!"

A dark-haired gentleman bowed and kissed Serena's hand. "Serena, how lovely to see you out of bed."

"Colonel Atwood, you're too kind. I'd get out of bed for you anytime."

Colonel Jim Atwood was a man of varied interests. He was the first person in America to cultivate water chestnuts on any considerable scale, having planted fifty acres of them in a former rice paddy south of Savannah. But that was just a hobby; Atwood was primarily an entrepreneur and a trader who dealt in everything from storage tanks to damaged merchandise. He had been known to produce his American Express card and buy, sight unseen, the contents of entire warehouses and oceangoing freighters. He had bought and sold 119 water-damaged sports cars in one deal and 400 tons of squashed dates in another. One of Colonel Atwood's many interests was the subject of his book Edge Weapons of the Third Reich. Edge Weapons of the Third Reich. At the time the book came out, he had cornered the market in n.a.z.i daggers, swords, and bayonets. He had bought sixty German arms factories together with their stocks of abandoned n.a.z.i weapons. He also owned Hitler's personal silverware, heavy oversized pieces with AH engraved in a slender sans-serif. At the time the book came out, he had cornered the market in n.a.z.i daggers, swords, and bayonets. He had bought sixty German arms factories together with their stocks of abandoned n.a.z.i weapons. He also owned Hitler's personal silverware, heavy oversized pieces with AH engraved in a slender sans-serif.

Serena batted her eyes at Colonel Atwood. "Are you carrying any of your Kraut daggers tonight, Colonel?"

"Nope. Only my trusty sidearm," said Atwood. He took a small revolver out of his pocket and held it in his palm. "Know what this is?"

"Of course I do," said Serena. "My late husband blew his brains out with one of those."

"Oh!" said a bone-thin woman standing next to Serena. "So did mine! I'll never forget it." The woman was Alma Knox Carter, a convenience-store heiress who lived across Monterey Square. "I was fixing myself a drink in the kitchen. Gunsmoke Gunsmoke was on TV, and I heard a shot. Naturally I didn't think anything about it. I thought it was part of the TV show, but then I walked into the foyer and saw Lyman sprawled out on the floor with a pistol in his hand." was on TV, and I heard a shot. Naturally I didn't think anything about it. I thought it was part of the TV show, but then I walked into the foyer and saw Lyman sprawled out on the floor with a pistol in his hand."

Colonel Atwood's revolver caught the attention of Dr. Tod Fulton. "Twenty-two Magnum, huh? Not bad. I carry this little number." Dr. Fulton reached in his pocket and took out a black leather wallet. The wallet had a hole through the middle. The crescent curve of a trigger could be seen along one edge of the hole. "It's a twenty-two Derringer in disguise," he said. "If a mugger holds me up and demands my money, all I have to do is pull out this wallet and ... payday!"

"My word!" said Mrs. Carter.

Dr. Fulton pocketed his wallet. "My wife carries a thirty-eight," he said.

"So do I," said Anna brightly.

"I'll tell you one thing," Mrs. Carter said. "If I'd so much as touched that gun in Lyman's hand, they'd have charged me with murder as surely as I'm standing here!" Mrs. Carter was so frail one might have doubted she had the strength to lift a gun.

"Someday I will will shoot a man!" said Serena. "G.o.d knows I've already tried!" She lifted a pearl-handled revolver out of her purse and held it daintily by its chrome-plated muzzle. "Just ask my former sweetheart, Shelby Grey. I wanted like h.e.l.l to shoot him! I begged him to let me do it! I didn't want to kill him, of course. I only wanted to shoot him in the toe, just to give him something to remember me by. But the coward wouldn't hold still! I blew a hole in the air conditioner." shoot a man!" said Serena. "G.o.d knows I've already tried!" She lifted a pearl-handled revolver out of her purse and held it daintily by its chrome-plated muzzle. "Just ask my former sweetheart, Shelby Grey. I wanted like h.e.l.l to shoot him! I begged him to let me do it! I didn't want to kill him, of course. I only wanted to shoot him in the toe, just to give him something to remember me by. But the coward wouldn't hold still! I blew a hole in the air conditioner."

"You ... shot him?" Mrs. Carter said, wide-eyed.

"I missed."

"How fortunate."

Serena sighed. "Not for dear Shelby. Now he has nothing of any permanence to remind him of my love. Still, I am very much afraid I will have to shoot a man one day, and it won't be in the toe. My husband left me priceless jewels, as everybody knows, and certain individuals would love to get their hands on them. I live in fear of burglars day and night. That's why I always have this little beauty close at hand. When I'm home I keep it by my bed." Serena glanced at Colonel Atwood. "And when I leave the house I put it in my purse. But anytime I feel the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds are about to spring, I just stash it between my b.o.o.bs." Serena tucked the revolver into her bosom and lifted a fresh martini from a pa.s.sing tray.

Feeling in need of a drink myself at this point, I intercepted the waiter as he came in my direction. Two other guests, a man and a woman, stepped up and helped themselves too.

"It was a crime pa.s.sionnel," crime pa.s.sionnel," the woman was saying, "so I don't think it counts. You know, a lovers' quarrel. These things happen. It isn't the same as murder." the woman was saying, "so I don't think it counts. You know, a lovers' quarrel. These things happen. It isn't the same as murder."

"My dear," said the man, "it may have been a crime of pa.s.sion, but I know three people who served on that grand jury. They've seen the evidence, and I gather it's going to be sticky for Jim."

I turned my back and looked in the other direction, but at the same time I moved closer to the couple in order to hear them better. The man lowered his voice.

"First of all," he said, "I'm told the Crime Laboratory came up with some troubling results. There was no gunpowder residue on Danny Hansford's hands. That means he couldn't have fired the gun at Jim, as Jim claims he did."

"Good Lord!" the woman gasped.

"The location of the bullet wounds also appears to be at odds with Jim's scenario of self-defense," the man said. "One bullet entered the chest, which sounds all right, but another hit Hansford in the back. A third one hit him behind the ear. So the way it looks, Jim shot him once in the chest and then stepped around the desk and shot him twice more as he lay facedown on the floor, in a sort of coup de grace."

"How dreadful," the woman said. "You mean it wasn't self-defense?"

"I'm afraid it doesn't look that way. The fingerprint a.n.a.lysis is even more damaging. The gun found under Hansford's hand had no fingerprints on it at all, even though it had been fired. This means somebody wiped them off. So it begins to look as though Jim shot Danny and then got a second gun and fired a few shots from where Danny had been standing, to make it look as if Hansford had fired at him. Then it seems he must have wiped his fingerprints off the gun and put it under Danny's hand."

"I'm feeling faint," the woman said. "What do you think will happen to Jim?"

"Just what I told him when I arrived here tonight. He'll get off."

"But how is that possible?" the woman asked.

"A good lawyer can challenge the evidence, maybe even turn it around to the defendant's advantage. And Jim has good lawyers. That's why I think he'll get off. That, and because of his standing in the community."

Having delivered his private a.s.sessment of the case, the man changed the subject, and I drifted into the hallway, where Williams and his mother were standing with a small circle of guests.

Blanche Williams had driven in from Gordon, Georgia, where she had lived all her life. Now in her late seventies, she was a tall woman, thin as a stork. Not a hair was out of place in the arrangement of tight white curls that covered her head like a snowy cap. She stood shyly with her hands clasped in front of her. One of the other women was admiring her evening gown.

"Why, thank you," Mrs. Williams said politely. "James gave it to me. Whenever he has a big party, he likes to make sure I have a pretty new dress and that there's a flower waiting for me when I get to Savannah." She glanced at her son, as if to rea.s.sure herself that she had said the right thing.

"Mother is always the belle of the ball!" Williams said heartily.

Mrs. Williams took this as a sign of approval and was emboldened to continue. "James has given me so many pieces of jewelry until finally I got to where I told him one day, I said, 'James, I don't know how I'll ever wear them all!' And he said, 'Well, Mother, I'll just have to give more parties so you can come to Savannah more often and wear all the things you've got.' James is real good about taking me places too. He's taken me to Europe five times, and oh! oh!, one time he called and said, 'Mother, we're going to leave in three days for London on the Concorde,' and I said, 'Now, James, don't tell me that. We're not going to fly anywhere on the Concorde!' And he said, 'Oh yes, we are. I've already got the tickets,' and I thought, 'My Lord, what did they cost!' But then pretty quick I knew James was serious, and I had to stop fussin' and get busy. I had to get ready in three days, and I did, and sure enough we went to London on the Concorde."

Mrs. Williams spoke in a quiet rush of words, as if wanting to finish quickly and not trespa.s.s on the conversational terrain any longer than necessary. Her erect posture and the alert look in her eye suggested that despite her apologetic manner, she was a lady of considerable fiber and determination. In a few moments, Williams was drawn into a conversation with new arrivals, and Mrs. Williams and I found ourselves facing each other. I uttered a pleasantry about the festive party, and Mrs. Williams nodded in agreement.

"James has always had a crowd around him," she said, "even when he was little. One time, he got him a little picture machine-the kind that flashes pictures on a wall-and he'd give little picture shows, and the other children would come over and have the best time, and he'd charge them a penny apiece. Course I had to have a little something for them to eat or drink, you know, just to munch. That was when he was eleven or twelve. When he was thirteen, he used to ride around the countryside on his bicycle, buying antiques to sell. That's how he started out. At first he went to the n.i.g.g.e.r houses, and he'd buy little oil lamps and things they didn't want. He'd pay a quarter for them and then fix them up and sell them for fifty cents. Then he bought better things, like mirrors and furniture and whatnot, and he'd fix them in his woodworking shop. He put a little ad in the paper, 'Antiques for Sale,' and you'd be surprised. The ladies from Macon would come to Gordon and get him out of high school! The superintendent was so impressed. They were high-cla.s.s ladies-doctors' wives and so forth-and James would bring them to the house, and they'd buy things right out of his bedroom! He worked his way up. Bit by bit, all by himself.

"It got to where a few years ago I thought, Isn't life grand! My children have turned out fine. My daughter teaches at the university, and James is doing so well in Savannah. My work is done. The Lord can take me now. But He didn't. And when James got in this awful mess, I thought this must be what G.o.d has been saving me for."

The din of the party surged in volume, but Mrs. Williams did not raise her voice. She kept speaking in her quiet way, looking straight into my eyes-in fact, she seemed to be looking through me.

"James called me on a Sat.u.r.day, right after lunch I believe it was, and he told me, 'Mother, I've got bad news. I had to shoot Danny.' Well, I just froze. I said, 'Sugar, you come right straight home,' and he did, and when he got there I didn't question him. I just let him talk when he felt like it, because he was so keyed up and hurt and everything else, and before long people found out he was there, and I tell you people started calling. Goodness, there were so many calls I just put them on a slip."

Mrs. Williams paused as two guests stopped to say good-bye. "Y'all be sure and come back again next year," she told them. Then she turned back to me.

"I never did trust that boy. He was kind of vague, the way he looked at you. I wouldn't tell James this, but to me that Danny Hansford was just b-a-a-ad news. James brought him to the house one time. In a little bit, James went out in the back to wash his car, and I didn't see the boy, and I said, 'James, I don't see him,' and James said, 'Oh, that's all right, Mother. He told me he was just going to walk around out front.' Well, when it came time to eat, the boy was still not there, and James said, 'Mother, I'll tell you what: If Danny takes a notion to go somewhere, he won't tell anybody about it, he'll just go. He's done it before.' Well, right then I understood what the boy had done. Don't ask me how I knew. Something just told me. I had an idea he was downtown huntin' dope. Gordon's only a small town, but I figured he saw something down at the filling station on the way to the house, and he wanted to go back there and buy some dope. James found out the next day that the boy had hitch-hiked all the way back to Savannah."

Mrs. Williams looked down briefly as she rearranged the wadded handkerchief she'd been clutching in her hands.

"Now, I'll just be frank with you," she said. "Sometimes James is too good to people. I don't know, maybe he got it from me. I can get feeling sorry for people too quick, and that's not good, because a lot of people know how to play you and get your sympathy. I know some people do James that way, and he'll get to where he feels sorry for them. He'll try to help 'em, like he tried to help that boy. There were times I felt like maybe I should talk to James, but being a mother I was afraid I might be interfering. You don't want to overstep the line, so I never did talk to him like I wish I had.

"James would help anybody, and that's the reason I just hate to see him in this mess. Why, when James sold Cabbage Island and made a bunch of money, the first thing he did was he fixed up my house, and then he gave my church a check for ten thousand dollars to buy an electric organ. I just don't know. Maybe this mess is going to be a lesson. I believe it's going to make James realize that he's got to think of himself sometimes ...."

Mrs. Williams smiled as her son reappeared at her side.

"Well, I'll hush now," she said.

"What have you two been talking about?" he asked.

"I was saying how everything is going to work out just fine, James." Mrs. Williams's answer was drowned out by the convivial hubbub around her.

"I'm sorry, Mother, I didn't hear."

Mrs. Williams took a deep breath, and for the first time all evening she raised her voice a little. "I said, 'Everything is going to work out ... just ... fine!'"

"Of course it is, Mother," he said. "It always has, and it always will."

Chapter 15.