The sun had barely cracked the horizon when the first carriage wheels groaned against the cobblestone path leading up to the Westing mansion.
Then the second.
Then the third.
One after another, like a procession of guilty men who had nowhere else to go.
The Hartfield territory stretched quiet under the pale gold of early morning — the fields beyond the iron gate still damp with dew, the air carrying the smell of wet grass and wood smoke from the distant tenant houses. The mansion itself sat at the end of the lane the way old guilt sits in a man's chest — heavy, unavoidable, slightly larger than he remembered it being.
It was not what they expected.
