I examined the black book that Bill Ross had given me. It was a pocket size Day-Timer with one page per day for November 2006 through February 2007. The initials on the black leather exterior were FLH, which I knew stood for Franklin Leonard Hill, the chairman and CEO of MidSouth Bank. In addition to the two calendars, there was an address book brimming with addresses, telephone and fax numbers, email listings, and notes of all sorts. Obviously Martha Simonton did work for Mr. Hill. Otherwise, how could she have obtained possession of this most interesting calendar?
I flipped through the pages of the book, wondering how I could unlock the secrets that I just knew were hidden inside. Bill had taken the calendar to Senator Goss in Washington, but he had declined to even look at it. He said Matt’s confession had blown any chance of a congressional investigation into predatory credit card practices. Dejected, Bill had returned to Dallas and given the black book to me. I looked up as I heard Erica walk in.
“Hi, honey,” I said.
“Any luck?”
“Not much. I did find an address of a woman who I think was Mr. Hill’s secretary before Martha Simonton.”
“How did you figure that out?” Erica asked.
“Well, I noticed several different people wrote in the book. It looked like Mr. Hill on a few occasions made his own almost illegible entries, but most of the time Martha Simonton would make nice clearly printed entries. There was also a two-week period during which a third person made entries in the calendar. Since that was about the time Martha came to work for Hill, I assume the entries were made by his former secretary.”
“What was her name?”
“Well, both she and Martha initialed any entries they made. Her initials were RW. I checked the address book, and the only one with those initials is Roxanne Witherspoon.”
“So, what are you going to do?”
“I’ve talked to Bill Ross and told him to find her. He’s probably halfway to Albany as we speak. Perhaps she knows something about MidSouth’s conspiracy to destroy Matt.”
“I bet she does. You’ve got to find her. She may be our only chance to get Matt a new trial.”
“Bill will find her. Don’t worry. In the meantime, I’m going to check out every name and number in this book. I’m bound to find something out that will help us.”