Free These Honored Dead by Jonathan F. Putnam Page A

shifted my focus to Prickett on the wooden bench next to me. The prosecutor had been intently studying several packets of paper in his lap, paying no attention to my presence or to the proceeding in front of us. I knocked against his shoulder and whispered, “Pardon me. I didn’t see you there.”
    “Speed,” he said with a nod, then looked down again at his papers.
    “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” I whispered, “regarding the murder of the Menard girl—have you made any progress in your inquiries?”
    “A good deal,” he replied without looking up.
    “What have you—”
    Suddenly there was a commotion in front of us. An older man had been sitting in the first row of the gallery, directly behind Logan, dressed in full military regalia with a blue coat, white breeches, and a tall plumed hat, all badly faded. This was, presumably, the esteemed Major Richmond. He was on his feet now, pointing at Patterson with a trembling arm.
    “We had a contract,” Richmond shouted, his prominent nose glistening an angry red. The crowd murmured excitedly.
    “No, we didn’t,” growled Dr. Patterson, turning in his seat to glare at Richmond across the gallery. “We never signed anything. We—”
    “Silence!” shouted the judge, banging his gavel with so much force I thought it would split in two. “Only the lawyers may speak in my courtroom. If either of you says another word”—he pointed with the burning end of his cigar toward Pattersonand Richmond in turn—“I’ll have the sheriff throw you in his jail cell.”
    Richmond sat down, still shaking his fist in anger and muttering to himself. Patterson and his daughter exchanged self-righteous looks.
    “Thank you, Your Honor,” Logan resumed smoothly. “As I was saying, the nub of the matter is Dr. Patterson doesn’t want to pay the agreed upon price for the land anymore. He doesn’t want to fulfill his agreement, given what’s been happening to land values, as I’m sure I don’t need to tell Your Honor.”
    An angry shadow passed over Judge Thomas’s face and he spit into a tarnished spittoon resting at the side of his bench. I expected the judge carried in his pocket at that very moment a half dozen land deeds; most officials did these days, and in my experience, they were constantly monitoring the prices at which similar properties were exchanging hands.
    I turned back to Prickett. “What have you found?” I whispered. “I’d like to help you, if I can.”
    “You don’t want to know where the investigation is going,” he replied in a low voice. “Trust me.”
    “If you mean to suggest you still think the Widow Harriman had some involvement, I’m sure you’re wrong,” I replied in an urgent whisper. “She’s a kindly woman. She’d just rescued her niece and nephew, an act of Christian charity. Why would she have done so if she meant to harm the girl?”
    Prickett did not reply. In front of us, Logan had completed his argument and sat down with a self-satisfied smile. Lincoln stood and, reaching a long arm up to his hat, pulled out the thin packet of papers from its band. As he smoothed out the pages, his hands trembled slightly.
    “Your Honor,” Lincoln began, a little shrilly, “my brother counsel does not state all the facts of the matter. In reality—”
    As Lincoln began to lay out his client’s position, Dr. Patterson and his daughter whispered back and forth with vigor. His arm rested lightly, comfortingly, on her shoulder. I found myselfstaring at the daughter. She appeared to be a year or two shy of twenty, about the same age Lilly had been. Her pretty, fresh face was not unlike Lilly’s had been in life. Why had Fate rendered one an orphan in a poorhouse and then the prey of some horrible villain, while the other enjoyed the loving attentions of her prosperous father? What grand design, I wondered, what higher purpose was served by such bitter inequality?
    Lincoln’s final peroration broke into my contemplations. “And