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conscience. He was here in Iraklion to visit her in prison and to arrange for her to get some sort of counselling and education so that when she gets out of prison she can begin a new and fresh life for herself. He’s a man who lives by the law, in that he is unbending, but he also has a forgiving and generous heart.’
    Chadwick felt sick to her stomach. ‘He’s a man who lives bythe law, in that he is unbending.’ Those words kept ringing through her head, terrifying her. She fought to keep herself in check so Captain Dimitri would not feel her sense of despair. Quite calmly she enquired of him, ‘How do you know all that, about the murderer Melina, and his being at the prison today?’
    ‘They were talking about it in town. Even now the murder trial is much talked about because it took place in Iraklion and the victim was a foreigner. It was a crime of passion, a man and a woman, and her defence was that Cretan pride demanded she behave as she did. The old Cretan vendetta raised its head: Melina had one against Arnold Topper for an insult he gave her in public – he called her a thief. I assumed you knew all that?’
    ‘No, I didn’t, and would you mind if we changed the subject?’
    ‘Murder not your thing? Well, I can understand that.’
    Chadwick wanted to walk away from him, at the very least shout at him for God’s sake to be quiet on the subject, but she could do neither. She was too fragmented by the past and pressured by the present, love and lustful desire. Fortunately it was Captain Dimitri who left her to instruct the crew to make ready to sail in an hour for the old port of Chania where they would replenish supplies. She was for the moment saved.
    The conference room of Chambers, Lodge, Dewy & Coggs was like the inner sanctum-cum-library of a New England eighteenth-century banking house rather than that of a twentieth-century Fifth Avenue law firm acting for New York old money: the Roosevelts, Woodwards, Milikens, Vanderbilts, that sort of clientele, with arms that extended to the Boston Mayflower clans, and the Philadelphia main liners. Hannibal Chase’s financial empire and family affairs had for generations been handled by the firm. Hannibal, his children and his philanthropic trusts had always been favoured clients for they were not litigious, were conservative, honourable, and very nearly scandal free. That was up until the unexpected and strange death of sixty-seven-year-old Hannibal, when his wife Chadwick inherited his entire fortune.
    Now the firm was involved with just the sort of law theypreferred not to deal with. Andrew Coggs Junior, who had gone to school with Warren Chase, the only son of Hannibal from his first marriage, was sitting opposite him and his sister, Diana Chase Ogden, Hannibal’s only daughter from that first marriage.
    These were the two people at the hub of the problem concerning Hannibal’s estate. They were contesting their father’s last will and testament which had been drawn up by the firm only weeks before Hannibal’s death. The firm, and especially Andrew Coggs Senior, who was a life-long friend of Hannibal Chase, believed the will to be legal and binding and that there had been no skulduggery of any sort. Andrew further believed Hannibal’s widow Chadwick to be innocent of the accusations being made by Warren and Diana: that she had used undo influence over Hannibal to change his will in her favour.
    Warren and Diana had been made wealthy long before Hannibal’s death. Hannibal had delighted in passing over his wealth and property to his children while he was alive. He enjoyed watching them invest their money and liked seeing the security and independence his generosity gave them. They were multi-millionaires and had been for most of their adult life, therefore there was more than just money involved in their contesting of the will. Warren and Diana had been extremely close to their father and step-mother, although she was much younger than either of them.