4Ray Atlee es un profesor de derecho en la Universidad de Virginia. Tiene cuarenta y tres a os, y desde hace poco vuelve a estar soltero. Su padre, un hombre mayor y enfermo, vive solo en la casa familiar de Clanton, Mississippi. Era un juez temido y apreciado, alguien que ha estado por encima de la ley y la pol tica local durante cuarenta a os. Ahora casi se ha vuelto un recluso. Al ver de cerca su fin, el juez Atlee manda una citaci n a Ray. Quiere que vuelva a casa, a Clanton, para acordar los detalles de la herencia. Su hijo se encamina, reticente, hacia el sur, pero el encuentro no tiene lugar: el juez muere demasiado pronto. Con ello, deja tras de s un secreto sorprendente que nicamente llegar a conocer Ray. Y quiz alguien m s. ENGLISH DESCRIPTION A pillar of the community who towered over local law and politics for forty years, Judge Atlee is now a shadow of his former self--a sick, lonely old man who has withdrawn to his sprawling ancestral home in Clanton, Mississippi. Knowing that the end is near, Judge Atlee has issued a summons for his two sons to return to Clanton to discuss his estate. Ray Atlee is the elder, a Virginia law professor, newly single, still enduring the aftershocks of a surprise divorce. Forrest is Ray's younger brother, the family's black sheep. The summons is typed by the Judge himself, on his handsome old stationery, and gives the date and time for Ray and Forrest to appear in his study. Ray reluctantly heads south to his hometown, to the place he now prefers to avoid. But the family meeting does not take place. The Judge dies too soon, and in doing so leaves behind a shocking secret known only to Ray . . . and perhaps to someone else.