“Yes.” Sara sat down at Puck’s big table, Jack and Kate beside her.
“Did you tell her?” Sara asked Puck and she nodded.
Diana took a seat. “I haven’t seen the photos and I don’t want to. Sean...” Tears came to her eyes. “It was all because of me. But he told me to go. I begged him to leave with me but he said he couldn’t. He gave me his suitcase and I—”
“Wait!” Sara said. “Don’t tell us now. Byon and I are going to write it all down.”
“For the newspapers?” Diana sounded shocked.
“No,” Sara said. “Tonight we’re going to make a play about that night and act it out so we can find the answers. Unless you know everything and can tell us.”
“No.” Diana shook her head. “I know Sean had the gun and—” She broke off at Sara’s look. “I don’t know it all. If Sean was...murdered, I don’t know who did it.”
“What about hiding his body in the old well?” Kate asked.
“What well?”
“In the conservation area.”
“You mean that old fenced-off acreage in the north? Bertie said there were fox holes there. He was afraid one of the horses would be hurt.”
“Afraid one would fall down the hole and never be seen again. By the way, I’m Jack and this is Kate.”
Diana smiled. “Puck hasn’t stopped talking about you three.” She looked at Sara. “Sorry about what my country’s paper said about you. From what I read online, you’ve had enough success for a dozen lifetimes. Sure is better than trying to run a horse farm.”
“Thank you,” Sara said. “So that’s where you’ve been all these years?”
“Yes. I guess I should have contacted them and told them where I was, but...” Her hands went into fists, her teeth clenched.
“But you never wanted to see them again,” Sara said. “I can understand that.”
“So how does this play thing work?”
“Today, one by one, everyone who was there that night is going to tell Byon and me what they did and what they saw. Then we’re going to write individual plays for each person. No one will know what the others do.”
“Just like that night,” Diana said. “We didn’t know where anyone was or what they were doing. Puck told me about Nadine and Sean. I guess she was why he wouldn’t leave with me.”
“How did you leave?” Jack asked.
Diana smiled. “On one of Bertie’s pregnant mares.”
“Impregnated by stolen semen,” Jack said.
Diana nodded. “Right, but Sean and I figured that part was payback. Bertie was ripped off by every horseman in three counties. They owed him.”
“Maybe I’m being presumptuous,” Sara said, “but you don’t seem like one of the Pack.”
“That is a great compliment. Thank you,” Diana said. “Nicky thought the world owed him, Byon gloried in his ability to use words and Nadine was obsessed with how good she looked.”
“What about Clive and Willa?” Sara asked.
Diana gave a snort of laughter. “Talk about love-hate. Those two! Her family ancestry was all ol’ Clive had ever dreamed about. He’d been tossed around by his own family, then here came Bertie. Offered him a ratty little room in the house in exchange for eternal servitude.”
“And Willa?”
“Pathetic. She just wanted to belong. To anyone.”
“If your own family doesn’t want you,” Sara said softly, “you hunger after being part of any semblance of a family that you can find.”