The Partner by John Grisham Page A

alive, and right now nothing else mattered. Sandy amused himself by recalling images of the funeral and burial, of the casket being lowered on a cold and cloudy day, of the priest’s last words and Trudy’s controlled sobs. It was downright funny, to think that old Patrick had been hiding in a tree not far away watching them grieve, as had been reported for three days now.
    He laid low somehow, then snatched the money. Some men crack up when they near forty. The midlife crisis drives them to a new wife, or back to college. Not old Patrick. He celebrated his angst by killing himself, stealing ninety million dollars, and disappearing.
    The real dead body in the car suddenly erased the humor, and Sandy wanted to talk. “There’s quite a welcome committee back home, Patrick,” he said.
    “Who’s the chairman?”
    “Hard to say. Trudy filed for divorce two days ago, but that’s the least of your problems.”
    “You’re right about that. Let me guess, she wants half of the money.”
    “She wants many things. The grand jury has indicted you for capital murder. State not federal.”
    “I’ve watched it on television.”
    “Good. So you know about all the lawsuits.”
    “Yeah. CNN has been quite diligent in keeping me up to date.”
    “You can’t blame them, Patrick. It’s such a wonderful story.”
    “Thanks.”
    “When do you want to talk?”
    Patrick rolled to his side and gazed past Sandy. There was nothing to look at but the wall, painted antiseptic white, but he wasn’t looking at it. “They tortured me, Sandy,” he said, his voice even quieter, and breaking.
    “Who?”
    “They taped wires to my body and shot current through me until I talked.”
    Sandy stood and walked to the edge of the bed. He placed his hand on Patrick’s shoulder. “What did you tell them?”
    “I don’t know. I can’t remember everything. They were shooting drugs in me. Here, look.” He lifted his left arm so Sandy could inspect the bruises.
    Sandy found a switch and flipped on the table lamp so he could see. “Good Lord,” he said.
    “They kept on about the money,” Patrick said. “I blacked out, then I came to and they shocked me some more. I’m afraid I told them about the girl, Sandy.”
    “The lawyer?”
    “Yeah, the lawyer. What name did she give you?”
    “Leah.”
    “Okay, good. Her name is Leah then. I might have told them about Leah. In fact, I’m almost certain I did.”
    “Told who, Patrick?”
    He closed his eyes and grimaced as the pain returned to his legs. The muscles were still raw and the cramping had begun. He gently rolled again and rested on his back. He pulled the sheet down to hiswaist. “Look, Sandy,” he said, waving his hand across the two nasty burns on his chest. “Here’s the proof.”
    Sandy leaned a bit closer and inspected the evidence—the red sores surrounded by shaved skin. “Who did this?” he asked again.
    “I don’t know. A bunch of people. There was a whole room full of them.”
    “Where?”
    Patrick felt sorry for his friend. He was so eager to know what had happened, and not just about the torture. Sandy, as well as the rest of the world, wanted the irresistible details. It was indeed a wonderful story, but he wasn’t sure how much he could tell. No one knew the details of the car crash that burned John Doe. But he could tell his lawyer and friend about his seizure and torture. He shifted his weight again and pulled the. sheet up to his neck. Drug free for two days now, he was coping with the pain and trying mightily to avoid more injections. “Pull that chair closer and take a seat, Sandy. And turn off that switch. The light bothers me.”
    Sandy hurriedly followed orders. He sat as close to the bed as possible. “This is what they did to me, Sandy,” Patrick said in the semidarkness. He started in Ponta Porã, with the jogging and the small car with a flat tire, and told the entire story of how they grabbed him.
    Ashley Nicole was twenty-five months old when