Chapter Two
Instead of taking the highways, Ward came into the busy little town of Middleburg from the south on meandering, rural Halfway Road. Halfway and Middleburg itself – so named because they mark the midpoint between Alexandria and Winchester – are the heart and soul of Virginia’s hunt country and filled, end to end, with beautiful, prolific horse farms, many with magnificently renovated two hundred year old Southern manses. But true to private, conservative old Virginia, all that is visible from the road are low walls of stacked field stones, thick stands of deep green trees and, occasionally, lush fields bordered with the tall orange day lilies that grow like weeds in every gulley and drainage ditch.
“Smith.” The phone’s ring and Daddy’s clipped voice cut through the quiet whir
