Silence Of The Hams

notebooks containing his team roster and make notes.
    “We were a bit surprised to see you here,“ Shelley said. “We thought with the funeral just this morning...“ She let the rest of the sentence hanging for him to pick up.
    He did so. “Rhon—Mrs. Stonecipher didn’t really need me at the house. She’s got a lot of family there. A lot of family,“ he added with a smile.
    “Still, I’m sure it’s been a great boon to her to have your support,“ Shelley said.
    “I hope so. Robert and I didn’t always get along as well as we might, but I owed him a lot, and if I can help his wife get through a bad time, I’m happy to do it.”
    Jane and Shelley exchanged a quick look. Jane made a little go-ahead gesture.
    “I guess he was hard to get along with,“ Shelley prodded.
    Tony Belton closed his notebook. “Anybody with such strong opinions sometimes rubs people the wrong way. But as a mentor, he was tops. He really knew the law inside and out. I think I learned as much from him in four years as I did in law school.“
    “Is that when you joined his firm? Is it a firm when it’s just one person?“ Jane asked.
    Tony smiled. “I’d have to research that. Actually, Robert and I both turned up here at the same time and a mutual acquaintance introduced us. I’d grown up here, then practiced in Connecticut for years. When I got divorced, I came back so that when I have my son here and have to work, he could be with my parents instead of a babysitter.“
    “What a good idea,“ Jane said.
    “It’s worked out pretty well. My folks spoil him rotten. But then, so do I.“
    “How old is your son?“
    “The same age as your boys. He’ll be here for the summer next week and be on the team. His school isn’t out yet.”
    Shelley politely asked him about his son and they got a run-down on what a great kid he was. Tony was a besotted father. Finally Jane dragged the topic back. “So Mr. Stonecipher came here at the same time?“
    “Right. He’d had a successful practice, but the pressure had gotten too much, so he and his wife came back here—she’s from Chicago originally—to retire. But a man of his energy couldn’t really retire so early and he was just starting up a new practice when I met him.“
    “And where does Emma Weyrich come into this?“ Shelley asked bluntly.
    If the question made him wary, he didn’t show it. “She’d worked with him out West, and he invited her here when he started getting things lined up.“
    “Was she that good at whatever she did?“
    “Sure, Robert wouldn’t bother with anybody who wasn’t good. Well, that sounds bigheaded of me—“
    “Not at all,“ Shelley said. “But I get the feeling you didn’t like her much.”
    That did make him pause carefully. Jane guessed that he wasn’t normally given to talking about himself so much, but had been inundated with Rhonda’s concerns for the last couple days and perhaps appreciated somebody asking about him for a change.
    “I didn’t dislike her,“ he said, sounding more like a lawyer than a soccer coach.
    “But you weren’t entirely thrilled to work with her?“ Shelley prodded.
    “I didn’t ‘work with her’ much. She worked with Robert, not me. Research, mainly. And some routine minor filings. Property settlements, that sort of thing.“
    “You knew they were having an affair?“ Jane asked.
    He looked surprised. Not at the information but at Jane’s knowing it. “It was none of my business.“
    “Then what—?“
    “Look, I don’t know why this interests you, but Emma was an advice giver. One of those people who’s always volunteering what you ought to be doing about things, whether you wanted her opinion or not. I didn’t like it. She had all kinds of half-assed opinions on how I should be raising my son. Coming from a woman who didn’t have children and hadn’t been asked, it was really irritating. That’s all.”
    He was obviously getting irritated with their questions as well. It was time for some repair work.
    “No!“ Jane exclaimed. “Why, how outrageous. But there are a lot of people like that. In fact, people without kids often think they know more about raising them than the parents like us who are in the trenches.”
    This mollified him a bit. “Yeah, there’s a big difference between theory and reality. She had a loony idea about year-round school and how I should make him take summer classes when he visited with me. She was always harping on it. Thought it would make