"To Secure These Rights" Prologue: The Last File (VANITY)

# PROLOGUE ## The Last File Thomas Rourke had always liked November in West Virginia. By then the hardwoods had given up most of their color, leaving the mountains stripped down to gray trunks, brown ridgelines and scattered stands of pine that seemed almost unnaturally green against everything around them. The first real snow was usually still a few weeks away, although there had been years when winter arrived early and buried the county before Thanksgiving. On most November nights, however, the temperature simply fell below freezing after dark, woodsmoke settled into the hollows, and the mountains grew quiet in...