Being obstreperous is common among attorneys. It was what they did. And they got away with it because, if you brought a motion to stop it, the judge would always say, now now, you young children get along, go back and try it again. There just aren't enough judges around who will spank an attorney for behaving badly.

Hackett probably wanted to ask her why in the hell I was asking about her and her husband sleeping in separate rooms, and if there was something he should know. Clearly she hadn't told him about their marital problems. He'd find out soon enough. It wouldn't make any difference in his demands or anything else about the way he'd approach the case, but he'd find out. And he'd be a little annoyed. But I wasn't there just to point out things to him that he didn't know, I was there to find answers that would change the case. If a woman came into a courtroom crying about the death of her loving husband, and it turned out they hadn't slept together in five years and she'd filed for divorce while sleeping with someone else, that was an entirely different case.

She returned. Hackett sat down beside her. "She's ready to answer."

"Do you remember the question?"

"Yes."

"And what's your answer?"

"Our relationship was fine. We slept together in the same bed, every night."

I looked her in the eye and saw nothing but hardness. So she was willing to lie. Either that or Tinny Byrd had gone to the wrong house. So how do you prove that a woman hadn't been sleeping with her husband? Who else is going to testify about that when she's lying and he's dead?

"You're still living at the same house where you lived on the day of the accident?"

"Yes."

"And have you changed anything, have you rearranged any furniture, moved anything from one closet to another, anything like that?"

"I've cleaned up a little bit."

"Have you moved your husband's things? Have you taken his books, clothes, personal effects, and moved them from one room to another?"

Hackett sat up and leaned his elbows on the table. "What is the possible relevance of this, counselor?"

I ignored him. "You can answer the question."

"No. I've left everything where it is. I'm not able to do that yet."

I looked at Hackett. "I'd like you to instruct your client to keep everything as it is. I will be preparing a formal demand to enter her premises and inspect the house, and I will have it personally served on you today. We'll be doing that inspection"-I glanced at my watch-"in ten days."

"There's no reason to inspect her house. This is just to annoy her," Hackett said, annoyed himself.

I turned to Rachel and whispered in her ear, "E-mail Braden to prepare a demand to inspect her house." She nodded and pulled out her BlackBerry.

I continued, "And if you were sleeping in the same room, when was the last time you had sex with your husband prior to the accident?"

Hackett slapped his hand on the table. "This is ridiculous. You don't need to ask these questions."

"Are you making a demand for loss of consortium?"

"Of course. It's part of the standard wrongful-death case."

"Then I am entitled to find out the nature of the relationship."

He sat back and huffed, but said nothing else.

"Your answer?"

"The night before."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"And before that night, when was the last time you had sex with your husband?"

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

"On the average, how often did you have sex with your husband?"

"It varied. He was gone a lot."

"When he was home."

"I don't know. Maybe three times a week, maybe twice."

Now that I had her feeling uncomfortable and realizing that this was very real, and that this testimony could be used in trial if it came to that, she was much more reserved than she had been when we entered the room.

"Did you understand what I and your attorney were talking about? That we're going to ask that you allow us into your house to inspect it, look at it, videotape it, and have a better understanding of your living relationships with your husband, where he spent his time and the like, you understand that?"

She shook her head. "I don't understand why you would need to do that to me."

"What I need from you now, ma'am, is an assurance that you will not change anything materially inside your house that might help us understand your relationship with your husband. Do you give us your word on record that you will not change it any?"

Hackett put his hand in front of her on the table so she wouldn't answer. "She's not here to make promises. She's here to answer questions."

I continued to look at her and said, "I have asked her a question, whether she's willing to give me that assurance. If not"-I turned my head to Hackett-"I will simply ask the court to impose an order that nothing be changed or modified. We can do it either way."

Hackett said, "She won't change anything materially."

"I appreciate that you're willing to give me your assurance. But unfortunately you don't live there."

I looked at her again. "Will you give me yours?"

"Yes, there's nothing to change, of course."

"Fine. Let's go on with some of the other questions then." I spent the rest of the day asking the questions that you have to ask in a wrongful-death case. It's difficult to probe into a person's life and ask questions that he or she has never been asked by anybody, not even their parents. It's difficult to ask how someone values the death of a spouse. What did her husband mean to her? How different is her life? She told us of the dreams that they had together, the life they had planned after his retirement from the Marine Corps, the mountain home he planned to build in North Carolina, how difficult it had been not to be able to have children. They had grown to love the independent life that they lived, the ability to travel at the drop of a hat. Her ability to go visit him in the places he was stationed, in Japan, in Europe, in ports in the Mediterranean. She had traveled the world and had enjoyed her life. And that had all been snatched from her. She cried, she took breaks, she showed that she cared and that she was vulnerable.

And I wasn't buying it. Ever since she had told me that she and her husband had slept in the same room, I wasn't buying it. It was just fabrication to support the first lie. If it was as she said, how could their lives not be completely intertwined in a wonderful relationship? She was just giving me the answers she had to give. It all sounded too good and sweet.

I ended the day after she was tired and wanted to quit, and after I had implied that we were going to go on for three days. "Your husband was quite the reader."

"Yes."

"I know that you provided copies to us of the books in his den, or rather in your house."

"Yes."

"He left margin notes in nearly every book he read."

"True. He was always writing in the margins."

"He said what he thought about things in the margins, about the author, or the topic, or something else entirely."

"I didn't really read his notes."

"It would be strange for him to say things he didn't mean in those notes, wouldn't you agree?"

"I'm sure he meant every word. He was never one to say something he didn't mean. It was one of his pet peeves, when other people would say things to please others, or to be better regarded."

"Did he have any particular interest in the international policies of President Adams? And Asia, in particular?"

____________________

I walked to my car in the parking garage in the basement of Hackett's building. I thought the deposition had gone reasonably well and checked my BlackBerry for messages. I had an e-mail from Frank Flannery. He was ready to meet. I said to Rachel, "You want to go meet the mystery witness?"