“As well as can be expected, I guess,” she said with a cheerful smile.
Mason’s voice was sympathetic. “I’m minded of the old adage,” he said, “that it never rains but it pours. You find yourself with concussion of the brain, a broken leg, a charge of murder hanging over your head, and, on top of that, comes the news of your brother’s death.”
She said philosophically, “Well, I can either grin and bear it, or bear it without grinning. As far as the murder case is concerned, it’s up to you to do the best you can to get me out of it. As far as George is concerned, there’s nothing anyone can do. I hope they bring his murderer to justice. Naturally, it’s a shock to me. I was fond of him. I’m going to miss him a lot as time goes on, but a person doesn’t live to be as old as I am without having had plenty of experience with death, Mr. Mason.”
“I try to look at life and death from a broad-minded viewpoint. If you’re going to have births, you must have deaths. Life is a stream death is a part of the scheme of things and it’s a necessary part. If babies kept being born, and no one died, the world would become completely overcrowded. If babies weren’t born and no one died, it would be a pretty sorry, disillusioned world with no youth and gaiety, no romance, no honeymoons, and no children’s laughter. I’m sorry George had to die, but as far as he’s concerned, he’s dead. As far as I’m concerned, I miss him but when I grieve about missing him, it isn’t being sorry for him, it’s being sorry for me. It’s hard to explain, Mr. Mason. It may seem cold-blooded to you. It really isn’t. I have a great deal of love and a great deal of affection for George. He’s dead. We all have to go sometime.”
Mason drew up a chair by the side of the bed and said, “All right, let’s talk about you for a while.”
“What about me?” she asked.
“About the case against you.”
“And what about the case?”
Mason said, “In some ways it doesn’t look so good.”
Sarah Breel said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Mason, but I can’t help you. I haven’t the faintest recollection of what happened after noon on the day Austin Cullens was murdered... Don’t you want a cigarette, Mr. Mason? I know you smoke, and I don’t mind... No, thank you, I won’t have one with you. Just light up and smoke. Go ahead, tell me what you have to say. Don’t try to break the news gently.”