"What about it?"

"Wouldn't you like a son, Jamy?"

He shrugged.

"Someone to carry on the Halligan name."

"It's getting late," he replied, suddenly, cross. "Go to sleep."

He pulled his blanket over his head and turned toward the wall. He was tired, but his mind wouldn't shut off. It kept swirling with thoughts, with memories. He thought about what Daley had asked him, if he'd ever had a special girl. He'd had plenty of girls. Pretty girls and plain ones. Young ones and those that had been around the track a time or two. Some had to be sweet-talked out of their virginity as if it were some precious gem, while others were only too happy to give it away. There was a shy blond girl named Siobhan, from Wexford, when he worked for Mr. Fitzgibbons. And a hot-tempered redheaded wench named Maraed who had a shapely calf. He'd always had a way with women. He'd smile and they would smile-back, and he'd say he liked their hair or their eyes, and one thing would lead to another.

Now, though, he could hardly recall any of them. They receded into his mind like dreams after a night of too much drink. All, that is, except Bridie. He remembered her all right. The silky touch of her skin, the smell of her hair, like fresh-cut apples. The dark gleam of her eyes. Such earnest and taciturn eyes. At first glance, she gave every appearance of being the prim and proper daughter of a well-to-do Protestant landlord. The modest way in which she carried herself across the yard into the stables, the assured tilt of her head, the way she spoke to the hired help, with courtesy but also with the confidence that came of having money and status, with knowing how to command without commanding. Later, how that facade would fall away when she was in his arms and she would startle him with her passion. She was like a wild animal, biting his neck, digging her nails into his back. Afterwards whimpering and purring softly deep in her throat. Yes, how could he forget her?

Have you never had a special girl?

What about a family ?

Wouldn't you like a son?

Someone to carry on the Halligan name.

Daley's questions were like a knife blade in his gut. He'd never told Daley about her. He couldn't even say why he hadn't told him, his best friend, his only friend, and here the two of them had been locked up tighter than a couple of doves in an osier cage. In fact, when Daley had once asked him about a name he had cried out in his sleep, Halligan only shrugged it off as some girl he'd known back home. Just some girl. Nothing more.

Wouldn't you like a son?

For some reason, when he let himself think about it, he pictured a son. A lad, though he never permitted himself to imagine what he might look like, his eyes, the sound of his voice, whether he had Bridie's raven-black hair. Just how old would the child be now, he wondered. Three? He'd been gone almost four years. The lad would be about his own age when his mother died and left him all alone. But this boy wouldn't be alone, of course. He'd have a family, a wealthy one at that, to see that he didn't go without.

He remembered the last time he'd seen Bridie. It was up on Mount Eagle behind her father's estate, overlooking the sea. Sometimes he used to work up there cutting turf, hauling it down the mountain in a cart pulled by a donkey. He liked working there, all alone, the salt breeze off the water, the vast expanse of the ocean stretching to the pale blue of the horizon. Why, you could almost see all the way to Amerikay. Meet me tonight up on the mountain near the old bothan, her note had said. We must talk! She had hurriedly pressed it into his hand in the stables as she mounted Tristan, her white charger, to go for a ride earlier that day. He wondered at its urgency. Was something wrong? Had her father found out about them? But if that was the case, he'd already be knowing it. Her da would have cut off his bullocks for him right quick.

He waited for her that night at the old shepherd's stone hut, just below the crest of the mountain. A warm summer moon bathed the Dingle hills in a pale, silvery glow. When she finally arrived on foot, a shawl tossed over her white gown so that she reminded him of a ghost, she threw her arms around him.

"Do you love me, James?" she demanded, her voice filled with an unsettling gravity, even for her. Her arms around his neck clung so hard they almost cut off his breath.

"What?" he said, pulling her away so he could look at her.

"Do you love me?"

"What's all this?"

"Do you?"

"Of course."

She was young, seventeen, a naive girl inexperienced in the ways of the heart or the soft unctuous words of men. Sheltered by a widowed father who doted on her and shielded her from the roughness of the world. What did she know of love? And the truth was, he was fond of her. Very fond indeed. This serious, raven-haired, dark-eyed girl had cast a spell on him. In fact, he was more fond of her than he had been of any of the other women he'd been with. That's why, perhaps, he'd stayed as long as he had. Seven months. He hardly ever stayed that long anyplace. No matter what, there always came that moment when the pull to be moving on grew too strong. But with this girl things were different. He didn't want to leave. He found himself wanting to stay where he was, his will made torpid by Bridie's charms.

"Really and truly, James?" she asked a third time. "Tell me the truth."

"Yes. I love you," he replied, kissing her eyes, her cheeks, finally her lips. "Now what in blazes is this all about?"

She looked up at him, her expression an odd mixture of fear and excitement. He stared into her dark eyes, iridescent in the moonlight. And then, she told him the thing that would change everything, the thing that would make his heart stop: she was carrying his child. She told him with this naive expectancy, almost as if she actually believed he would be excited by the news. Instead he felt sick to his stomach. Sweet Jesus, he thought. Now there would be hell to pay. When her father found out he would kill him. Bad enough that he, a dirt-poor Catholic, was fucking the mans daughter. But getting her with child was too much. His goose was cooked, no two ways about it.

"How long?" he managed to get out.

"I don't know. A couple of months."

"Jaysus," he said, holding his head in his hands. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

"I didn't know. For sure anyway. Don't be mad," she pleaded, beginning to sob. "Please don't be mad, James."

"I'm not mad. I'm just. . ."

"What are we going to do?"

We, he thought. "I don't know," he said.

"We could go away."

"Where?"

"To America."

"America?" he scoffed.

"You've talked about it before."

"Yes, but... by myself."

"We two could go. I have a little money saved."

"And what would we do there?" he said, sarcastically, bitterly, wanting to hurt her now for some reason. As if it were all her doing, this child of theirs. As if she had planned this, as he knew some women did to snag a man.

He turned and gazed out at the sea with its moon-dappled skin, glimmering like black ice. It looked almost firm enough to hold a man's footstep, as if he could walk across to America if he had to. The option had always seemed more a dream than anything real, more a hope that sat in every Irishman's heart like a trump card he would never use, in a game he could never win.

"We could get married," she said. "We could have a life there together."

"And what about your family, Bridie? Could you leave them?"

"Yes," she replied, hesitantly. Then more confidently, as if trying to convince herself too, she added, "Yes, I could. I could."

"Could you really leave all this behind? Everything you knew."

Tears slid down her cheeks. "I don't care, James. I'll go wherever you go. Just as long as we're together. That's all that matters."

"Oh, my dear sweet girl," he said, kissing her tears. He felt then a wave of genuine tenderness for her, this beautiful, frightened girl. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen."

"I know. I love you, James. Just as long as the three of us are together."

The three of us, he thought. How could he fix this? How could he get out of the bind he'd made for himself? Finally, he saw the only way out. It was like a door, the only one that opened for him, and he grabbed it and opened it, ready to run through.

"All right," he said calmly. "We'll go away together."

"Do you mean it, Jamy?" she squealed with delight. "Do you really?"

"Aye," he said. "But I'll need to take care of some things first."

"We can't wait long. I'll be showing soon."

"Not long. I promise."

They worked out a plan. She would give him some money to book passage for two out of Cove, a port town just south of Cork, two days' journey from Dingle. She would meet him there in a fortnight. She would tell her father she was going to visit a cousin in Cork and then slip away and join him. Together they would board a ship bound for America. They worked it all out.

He kissed her one last time, tasting her salty tears on his lips. He had never seen a more beautiful, a more touching sight in all his days than that of Bridie at that moment. She was like the most perfect day a man could imagine, bright and cloudless, one where the air smelled of heather and your heart beat with hope, and there was not even the possibility of pain or loneliness or hunger or death anywhere in the world. In her dark lovely eyes he might have lived forever. He would miss this girl, he knew. More than all the others. More, perhaps, than he'd ever know.

"I love you, James," she said one last time.

He wanted to reply, but the words stuck in his throat.

He left the next day, telling Mr. Maguire he had some personal business to attend to in Cork. When he reached Cove, he booked passage on a ship sailing that very day for Boston. On deck, looking back over the stern as the green hills of the land he'd never see again faded into a fuzzy memory, he told himself he'd done the right thing. The only thing. What else could he have done? Their plan would never work. If they caught him running off with the seventeen-year-old pregnant daughter of a wealthy Protestant, he could only imagine the trouble he'd be in. But even if they somehow did make it to America, what then? What sort of life could they have had? They were too different, the worlds they came from too far apart. She was used to elegant things, servants and a great big house, a fine horse to ride. A life soft as velvet. Never getting her hands dirty or having to work to put food on the table. And he was a penniless spalpeen, a man who could claim only the clothes on his back and some big dreams. What sort of life could he have provided for her or the child? What chance of happiness could they have had with him? No, it was for the best. She'd be better off without him, he convinced himself. He pictured her standing on the dock, holding a valise with her things, waiting for him to come. Waiting and waiting. How long before she realized the truth? He knew when she found out he'd lied, it would break her heart. He felt awful about that and about the child he was leaving behind--as his own father had no doubt left him behind. In time she would come to understand the Tightness of this decision. As the years passed and she fell in love again, as he knew she would, and got married and had more children, maybe she would think back on that brief time with him, and no longer hate him. Maybe she would look into the eyes of their child and realize it had been the only thing possible. Maybe.

Now, as he listened to the ragged snores of Daley, he had two thoughts, separate but connected to each other like a pair of manacles. He didn't believe in any sort of divine justice, whether it be rewarding the good or punishing the bad. There was luck, of course, good or bad. Some men were lucky and others weren't. But mostly he thought a man made his own way in life, had only himself to blame. Still, if he had been a believer in such things, he'd wonder if his current situation had anything to do with what he'd done. It was something to puzzle over. And there was the other thing: that odd notion he'd had right before he was arrested at the tavern. Of sending for her. Had he been serious? Would he have actually done it? Or was it something he told himself exactly because he knew it was too late?

Dlake didn't return until mid-morning the next day. This time the turnkey was able to scrounge up a regular chair for him to sit upon instead of the stool.

"Good morning, gentlemen," the lawyer grunted as he entered the cell. He wore the same clothes as he had the day before, which looked as if he'd slept in them. He appeared haggard, his blue eyes red-rimmed and glassy. His pantaloons were wrinkled and grease stained, his cravat askew, his overcoat fouled by mud, as if he had fallen in the gutter. And he brought with him a stale tavern smell of rum and smoke.

He sat down heavily in the chair. He held his head in his hands for a moment, silent except for his labored breathing. Daley and Halligan exchanged glances.

"Are you all right, sir?" Daley asked solicitously. "Could I get you some water?"

"No, I'm fine," he said. "It's just that I've come down with a cold in this dreadful weather. Up all hours of the night with it." And as if to prove it, he coughed several times, covering his mouth with a filthy handkerchief. His puffy cheeks flushed with color, the broken blood vessels a spidery web across his face.

"Oh, you'll want to take care of that, sir," Daley said. "Don't want that cough to get down in your lungs. That's what happened with me mam. A cough got down in her lungs, and she's not been the same since. Melted butter is what you want."

"Melted butter?" Blake asked, the very thought seeming to make him sick.

"Aye. That'd be just the thing for a cough. Some melted butter with just a spot o' whiskey in it, sir."

"I would just as soon skip the butter," he said, smiling wearily. He reached into the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out a small silver flask. He unscrewed the top with practiced movements of his pudgy fingers and took a long draught. "Ahhh," he said, reviving a little.

Once more he used Daley's bunk as a writing desk. From his valise, he removed his papers and spread them out and arranged his writing instruments. As he perused the papers, he gnawed on a fingernail until it bled. He fixed his spectacles on his red, splotchy nose and jotted something down on his writing tablet. "Hmmm," he said to himself, nodding. "Yes. Here we are."

"Mr. Blake," Daley interrupted. "We ain't talked yet of your fee."

"My fee?" the man asked, looking up from his papers. His eyes were distorted behind his glasses, the whites looking large and slimy as the belly of an eel.

"We ain't wealthy men, as you can well imagine. But we'd be willing to work off the debt, whatever it be."

"That won't be necessary," Blake said. "I am being remunerated by the state. Now according to statements you gave when arrested, it took you five full days to travel on foot from Boston to Wilbraham, the scene of the murder, a distance of some eighty miles. And yet, from Wilbraham to New York, which is over one hundred and thirty miles, it took you a mere two days. How do you explain that?"

"I don't know, sir," Daley replied. "We just walked till we got tired."

"But you can see how one might interpret such a fact. Your pace was less than twenty miles per day before the murder but nearly three times that after it. The prosecution will make it look as if you were fleeing from something."

"We weren't fleeing from anything," Halligan interjected.

"But how do you explain it then?"

"There were hills we had to cross east of there. The road south of Springfield was flat and easy walking. So naturally our pace was a bit faster."

"More than a bit," Blake challenged.

"And it had been raining the days before . . ." Daley said, pausing, "the murder. The road as far as Palmer was muddy. And later in the week the weather was clear."

The lawyer reached into his waistcoat pocket, removed his snuff box, and took a pinch for each nostril. His lids fluttered and his eyes rolled way back in the sockets, then he sneezed vigorously several times into his handkerchief.

"I think," Blake said, "I shall be able to handle that issue without too much difficulty. However, the bank bills found on you might pose a problem. Tell me where you got them again?"

Daley glanced furtively at Halligan and quickly averted his gaze. "I earned that money doing honest work."

"Where?"

"Some was from digging on the Mill Pond Dam. Some I got working on the South Boston Bridge. The rest here and there. 1 don't remember it all."

"And you?" he asked of Halligan.

"Same. Here and there."

"Do you have anyone who can vouch that you earned it as you say? An employer that would be willing to testify on your behalf?"

"Oh, I doubt that, sir," Daley said. "I'm just a common laborer. The only time they remember you is when you done something wrong."

"If you could prove the money was yours, it would greatly aid our cause."

"Why do we have to prove it was ours?" Halligan jumped in. "Shouldn't they have to prove it wasn't?"

"One hundred dollars is a good deal of money to be carrying about."

"What you're saying is," Halligan offered, "what's a lazy Irishman doing with that sort of money? He must have stolen it from somebody, right?"

"Gentlemen," Blake said, taking his glasses off his nose and looking at the two. "I'm only trying to be prepared for what they'll ask in court. And yes, the jury will wonder how a pair of unskilled laborers came to be in possession of such a considerable sum, and drawn on the very same banks as those bills carried by the victim. I would prefer to offend your sensibilities and save you from the gallows. Is that clear?"

" Tis, Mr. Blake," said Daley, glancing at his cellmate.

"In any case, I don't suppose the prosecution," Blake continued, "will spend a great deal of time on this issue of the bank bills. It is rather remote from the central circumstances of the case, and it could actually confuse the issue, particularly if they thought we might be able to call a witness of our own proving the money was legitimately earned through gainful employment. So we'll leave that for the time being." Blake shuffled through his notes. "All right," he said, "the rest of the prosecution's case seems rather circumstantial to me. They have a number of witnesses who saw people fitting either your description or that of Mr. Lyon at various points along the turnpike on Saturday the ninth of November. And then they have that merchant from Boston who claims that an 'Irishman' came into his store and purchased pistols similar to those found at the murder site. However, he cannot say with any degree of certainty that it was either of you, nor that the pistols he sold were those found at the murder site. Again, such presumptive testimony will be of dubious value at best. So what the state's case will largely rest upon will be the testimony of the Fuller boy."

The lawyer spent a long time going over the statement the boy had given during the inquest. That he said he'd seen the two passing along the Post Road heading west. That he spotted them returning some "short time" later leading a large bay horse with a "handsome saddle." That he followed them up a hill toward an apple orchard where he got a good look at Daley's face but not Halligan's. That one of them rode while the other pushed the horse, driving it into the pasture of John Bliss.

"The outcome, I believe, will largely hinge on the boy's testimony," Blake said. "To be perfectly frank, left uncontested it will be quite damning. An eyewitness always carries a great deal of weight with a jury."