THE STORY: Mrs. Martin Cage is in police custody for the shooting of Phyllis Dean. While in the supermarket that morning, Mrs. Cage witnessed a crime. Billy, an eighteen-year-old boxboy, was helping Phyllis Dean take her groceries to her car when her purse was snatched. Billy tried to stop the thief and was shot in the chest, but as he lay dying Phyllis Dean continued to scream about her stolen purse. So Mrs. Cage picked up the thief's fallen gun and shot her between the eyes. Now Mrs. Cage is being interrogated by Lt. Reuben Angel about the crime, but what she ends up talking about is herself: Her 33-year marriage to Martin, a defense lawyer, who has never lost a case, who is often vulgar, and who no longer really sees his wife, and their daughter, Elizabeth, a civil lawyer, who despises her mother's life of subservience to her husband and is in the middle of her own divorce. As Mrs. Cage talks, she paints a picture of her lonely life and her actions become clearer. She knows what she did was wrong; she has declined her right to have a lawyer present; she is making a full confession; and she is ready to suffer the consequences. She may be the last person in the world willing to take responsibility for her actions.