Weep No More My Lady by Mary Higgins Clark Page B

unbroken view of the ocean, but that would have meant risking being noticed by the others.
    If only Sammy were back, she thought as she began to quicken her pace. I could talk to her and be on a plane this afternoon. She wanted to get away from here. If Alvirah Meehan was to be believed, Cheryl had called Leila a “washed-up drunk” last night. And except for Ted, her murderer, everyone else had laughed.
    Min, Helmut, Syd, Cheryl, Craig, Ted. The people who had been closest to Leila; the weeping mourners at her memorial service. Oh, Leila! Elizabeth thought. Incongruously, lines from a song she had learned as a child came back to her.
    Though all the world betray thee,
    One sword at least thy rights shall guard,
    One faithful heart shall praise thee.
    I’ll sing your praises, Leila! Tears stung her eyes, and she dabbed at them impatiently. She began to jog faster, as if to outrun her thoughts. The early-morning mist was being burned away by the sun; the thick shrubbery that bordered the homes along the road was bathed in morning dew; the sea gulls arced overhead and swooped back to the shore. How accurate a witness was Alvirah Meehan? There was something oddly intense about the woman, something that went beyond her excitement at being here.
    She was passing the Pebble Beach golf links. Early golfers were already on the course. She had taken up golf in college. Leila had never played. She used to tell Ted that someday she’d make time to learn. She never would have, Elizabeth thought, and a smile touched her lips; Leila was too impatient to traipse after a ball for four or five hours. . . .
    Her breath was coming in gulps, and she slowed her pace. I’m out of shape, she thought. Today she would go to the women’s spa and take a full schedule of exercises and treatments. It would be a useful way to pass the time. She turned down the road that led back to the Spa—and collided with Ted.
    He grasped her arms to keep her from falling. Gasping at the force ofthe impact, she struggled to push him away from her. “Let go of me.” Her voice rose. “I said, let go of me.” She was aware that there was no one else on the road. He was perspiring, his T-shirt clinging to his body. The expensive watch Leila had given him glistened in the sun.
    He released her. Stunned and frightened, she watched as he stared down at her, his expression inscrutable. “Elizabeth, I’ve got to talk to you.”
    He wasn’t even going to pretend he hadn’t planned this.
    â€œSay what you have to say in court.” She tried to pass him, but he blocked her way. Inadvertently she stepped back. Was this what Leila had felt at the end: this sense of being trapped?
    â€œI said listen to me.” It seemed that he had sensed her fear and was infuriated by it.
    â€œElizabeth, you haven’t given me a chance. I know how it looks. Maybe—and this is something I just don’t know— maybe you’re right, and I went back upstairs. I was drunk and angry, but I was also terribly worried about Leila. Elizabeth, think about this: if you are right, if I did go back up, if that woman is right who says she saw me struggling with Leila, won’t you at least grant that I might have been trying to save her? You know how depressed Leila was that day. She was almost out of her mind.”
    â€œIf you went back upstairs. Are you telling me now that you’re willing to concede you went back upstairs?” Elizabeth felt as though her lungs were closing. The air seemed suddenly humid and heavy with the scent of still-damp cypress leaves and moist earth. Ted was just over six feet tall, but the three-inch difference in their heights seemed to disappear as they stared at each other. She was aware again of the intensity of the lines that seared the skin around his eyes and mouth.
    â€œElizabeth, I know how you must feel about me, but there is something you have to understand. I