It was early the next morning when Mary returned to the interview room at the Roundhouse to meet with Newlin before his arraignment. She sat opposite him in the grim room, a bulletproof barrier between them. She wore a navy suit with a high-necked blouse to hide the blotches that would undoubtedly bloom like roses in court. That she felt them growing now, merely in Jack's presence, was difficult to explain. To herself. She didn't want to even think about explaining it to her client and was sure it breached several ethical canons, at least two disciplinary rules, and perhaps even a commandment.
Mary cleared her throat. 'I wanted to see you to touch base. I have a strategy for our defense and I need to prepare you for the arraignment hearing.'
'Sure, thanks.' Jack seemed tired, too, in his wrinkled jumpsuit, but his good looks shone through fatigue's veneer. His five o'clock shadow had grown to a rougher stubble, which only emphasized how careless he seemed about his good looks. He raked back his sandy hair with a restless hand. 'First tell me how everything's going.'
'Better than I expected. I'm very encouraged by my research. That's why I'm here.'
'No, I meant generally. The case is all over the news. How's Paige taking all of it?'
'Fine,' Mary said, noting that his first question was about his daughter. She decided to test the water. 'You know, I've been wondering about Paige. Where she was last night, when your wife was killed. Do you know?'
'Home I suppose. What's the difference?' Jack's expression was only mildly curious, and Mary, distracted, couldn't tell if it was an act. She both wanted and didn't want to believe him. She resolved to find uglier clients.
'Paige told me she was supposed to come to dinner with you and your wife, but she canceled. Is that right?'
'Yes, it is.'
'She's telling the truth?'
'Of course she is.' Jack's blue eyes hardened to ice.
'I ask because I thought teenagers made things up at times.'
'Not Paige.'
'I see.' Mary paused. Was he lying? 'You didn't mention that when we met.'
'I didn't think it mattered, and it doesn't.' Jack frowned. 'Who cares who else was supposed to come to dinner the night I murdered my wife?'
'I do, it's my job. I think Paige may have lied to me about something. She told me her boyfriend Trevor wasn't with her last night, and I think he was.'
'What? How do you know that?'
'I saw him leaving her apartment when I went to meet her.' She checked Jack for a reaction, but he managed to look calm, except for that jaw clenching again. 'And you said Paige doesn't lie.'
'She doesn't, except when it comes to Trevor. I don't like him, and Paige knows it. That's probably why she said what she did. She wouldn't want me to know he was over there. Paige edits her conversations, like all of us.' He appraised her. 'You're not a liar, Mary, but I bet you don't tell your father about the men you see, do you?'
Mary squirmed. He was right but she didn't find it persuasive. She considered confronting him about whether he was protecting Paige, but settled for planting a seed of doubt. 'Okay, let's move on. Paige isn't what I came to talk to you about. I've been doing my homework, and the primary evidence against you will be your confession. The videotape.'
They said there would be other evidence, too. Physical evidence. They told me that.'
'I know.' Mary checked her notes. 'But let me make my point. We can argue that you were drunk at the time you confessed.'
'Drunk?'
'Yes. You said you had some Scotch. Two drinks, you weren't sure.' She rummaged in her briefcase, pulled out her notes, and double-checked the law on point. 'You said you weren't used to drinking and that it caused you to throw up. That's legally significant, and throws doubt on the validity of your waiver. The case law is clear that you can't waive your right to counsel when you're drunk.'
'But I wasn't drunk.'
'You could have had three Scotches.'
Two, I think.'
'Isn't it possible you had three? You told me you had a few. A few is three.'
'You want me to say three, is that what this is about?' Jack smiled easily, his teeth straight and even. 'Are you coaching me, counselor?'
'Of course not.' Mary never coached clients, though she had been known to kick them under the table, collar them in the hallway, or tell them to shut up. None of these breached ethical rules, and was, on the contrary, looked upon with favor. 'But if you had two or three drinks, your blood alcohol had to be high. We'll get the tests when they turn them over, but frankly, I plan to argue you were impaired when you confessed.'
'But you saw me. I wasn't drunk.'
'By the time I saw you, maybe you weren't. Besides, I can't tell if someone's drunk in an interview, necessarily.'
This is silly.' Jack leaned forward, and the gravity in his tone telegraphed controlled anger. 'I'm telling you I wasn't drunk when I spoke to the police. They asked me if I was drunk and I told them no. I even signed and initialed the waiver.'
'You're not the judge of whether you're drunk or not.' Mary hadn't expected a fight when she was trying to save the man's life, though maybe she should have. The situation was downright perverse. 'Lots of drunks think they're sober. That's why they get into cars and drive.'
'I know I wasn't drunk.'
'How can you be sure, Jack? Your actions weren't exactly rational. Beginning the confession, then calling for a lawyer. You weren't thinking clearly. You'd had the Scotch, early on.'
'And then I killed my wife. It sobered me up.'
'I don't think that's funny,' Mary said coolly, though his bravado didn't ring true. 'Why are you fighting me on this? This is good news. Without that confession, their case against you is much weaker. I intend to cross the detectives about it at the prelim and file a motion to suppress the confession.'
'Don't do that. I don't think it's viable and it will jeopardize my chances for a guilty plea.'
'No, it won't. The D.A. will expect a motion to suppress on these facts.'
'I don't want to queer the deal.'
There is no deal.' Mary leaned toward the bulletproof glass. 'And don't bet there will be. They have all the cards right now and unless we fight back, they're gonna play them. They're likelier to deal if they think we have a decent defense or will win a suppression motion. They don't want to lose at trial either.'
'I see.' Jack nodded, dismissively. I'll think about it and get back to you.'
'I hand you a winner and you'll think about it?' Mary squeezed her pen, trying to keep her cool. His stubbornness only encouraged her confidence. If she was right about the truth, then she was fighting him for his own life. 'I'm the lawyer. Jack.'
'But I'm the client. I make the decisions in the case. In my own practice, I gave legal advice, and the client made the ultimate decision. Plenty of times I disagreed with my clients, and they with me. I did as they decided.'
This isn't an estates matter, where you assume your client's death. My job is to keep you alive.'
'In any case, the lawyer is only an agent.'
'Not exactly.' Mary had crammed last night, after she'd left her father. 'A criminal case is different from a civil case. As criminal counsel, I have a duty to file the motion to suppress. You don't determine the scope of your right to counsel, even though it's your right. It's grounded in the Constitution. Ever hear of the Sixth Amendment?' He fell silent, and Mary continued the lecture, on a roll. 'If I don't file the motion on these facts, you could have me before an appellate court on a PCRA. That's post conviction relief, for you estates lawyers. I'd be found ineffective per se, which isn't the sort of thing I want on my permanent record card.'
'I didn't want to say this, but I guess I have to. Isn't it possible that you're wrong about this motion to suppress?'
'No. I read the law.'
'But, as you told me directly, you aren't very experienced with murder cases. Have you ever filed a motion to suppress?'
Mary swallowed hard. 'No.'
'So isn't it possible that your judgment is wrong? I'm hearing things from the other inmates, who have more experience than you and me put together. They think you're crazy not to pursue the guilty plea right now.'
She felt like snarling. She didn't need legal advice from felons. She was right about the plea negotiation and the motion. It wasn't a matter of experience. Or was it? She couldn't think of an immediate reply.
'Mary, I know you're working hard on my behalf and I appreciate it. I hadn't thought about such a defense. It seems wrong on the facts. I need to mull it over. Isn't that reasonable?' He exhaled audibly, and Mary nodded, still off-balance. Maybe she shouldn't have taken this case. Maybe she wasn't experienced enough. She was playing with someone's life. Still.
'No. You can think about it until tomorrow morning. Then call me and tell me you agree.'
'I'll call you.' Jack rose, his handcuffs linking his arms against his jumpsuit. 'Please don't file a motion until we talk again.'
'Wait a minute,' Mary said, uncertain as she watched him stand up. 'I wanted to brief you on the arraignment. Let you know what to expect this morning.'
The arraignment is a detail. I don't care if I make bail or not.' Jack walked to the door and called the guard, who came almost immediately and took him away.
It left Mary stumped. She'd never had a client walk out on her, much less one in leg manacles. He had to be protecting his daughter; there was no other explanation. Defending Jack was turning out to be a road strewn with rocks he'd thrown there, and she was becoming the adversary of her own client.
She wanted to win, but feared that if she did, it wouldn't be much of a victory.
Davis hit the STOP button to end the videotape of Newlin's confession and eyed his boss. Bill Masterson, the District Attorney of Philadelphia. Masterson sulked in his sunny office, behind a mahogany desk littered with gold-plated awards, commemorative paperweights, and signed photos. The clutter of photos included Masterson with the mayor, various ward leaders, Bozo the Clown, the city council, and Elmo from Sesame Street, in town to open a new Target store. The D.A.s always joked that one-hour photo developing was invented for Bill Masterson.
Davis was concerned. They had viewed the video three times, and Masterson had said nothing except 'play it again' at the end. He hadn't reacted at all to Davis 's theory of premeditation. At the moment, Masterson was frowning, emphasizing jowls like an English bulldog's. He was a large man, a tall power forward out of LaSalle, big-boned and still fit. Ruddy skin provided the backdrop for round eyes of a ferocious blue, which fought with his large nose to dominate his face. 'So what do you think, Chief?' Davis asked.
'I'm not happy.'
'You're never happy.'
'This we know.' Masterson glowered under a thatch of grey-blond hair.
'So what's the problem?'
Masterson gazed out a window in a wall covered with citations, more photos, and framed newspaper articles. MASTERSON WINS AGAIN read one of the headlines, from under glass. The morning sun in a solid square streamed through the window, past the plaudits, and onto the desk, suffusing his crystal paperweights with light. Davis couldn't tell if Masterson was gazing out the window or reading his own press.
'Chief, I know it's early in the game, but I made up my mind. I've only asked twice before, in Hammer and in Bertel, and you know I was right on both counts. They're dead and they both deserved it. So does Newlin.'
Masterson squinted out the window or at his headlines. The tan phone on his desk rang loudly, and he reached over and pushed the intercom button to signal Annette to pick up. Davis, still at the VCR, pressed REWIND for something to do. He was expert in handling Masterson and knew to take it easy.
'You remember, Chief. The public, the papers, they went for it. They agreed. It gave them confidence in this office and in you. I don't have to remind you about Bertel, do I?' Davis had the facts, he didn't have to shout. Leon Bertel had murdered a popular pharmacist in Tacony, and his execution, which took place a month before the last election, had clinched Masterson's win. 'I say no deals with Newlin. I want your okay before the other side asks me. I got it? Chief?'
Masterson finally looked away from the wall and down at his desk. 'It's dirty,' he said finally.
'It's murder. All the more reason to crucify this asshole. He whacks the wife and weasels out of it. He's out in no time with his cash, livin' large again. I want to tell the press, too. Right out, from day one. No deals in the Newlin case. We're taking him down. Bringing him to justice.'
Masterson began fiddling with a slim gold Cross pen, rolling it across his blotter, back and forth. Sun glinted on the gold pen as it moved. The phone rang again, and the pen stopped rolling while Masterson pressed the intercom button wordlessly.
'I don't see the problem, Chief. This is a no-brainer. We got him cold-cock, blood on his hands. Think down the line. Say Newlin does his time or even makes parole. He'll have a decent case for it, the model prisoner, he'll keep his nose clean. You want him out and walking around? You think the people are gonna like that? The rich getting away with murder, with our, read Bill Masterson's, assist?'
The Cross pen rolled back and forth, so Davis took a cushioned chair across the desk and remained patient. He was one of the few assistants who got this much face time with the Chief. The word count was usually fifteen before the Chief's attention span evaporated, the mayor called, or the game started. Big Five basketball mattered. Masterson had priorities.
'You know he's lying, don't you?' Davis asked.
'Course.' Masterson waved the air with a large, fleshy palm. 'They all do.'
'Then what?'
'Newlin's at Tribe.'
'Yeah, so?'
'You know how much Tribe gave the campaign last year?'
Davis blinked. He never thought the Chief would say it out loud. 'He did it, Chief. He killed her.'
'Understood, but you gotta have your ducks in a row on this one.' Masterson didn't look at his subordinate, but watched the pen as if someone else were manipulating it. 'You can't go up against Tribe and be wrong.'
'I'm not wrong. You know that. You know me.'
The Cross pen came to a sudden stop. The phone started ringing, and Masterson looked over. This time instead of pressing the intercom button, he picked up the call, covering the receiver as he glanced at Davis. 'Get me more,' he barked. 'Talk to me after you do.'
'You're tellin' me no? That it's conditional?'
'Go!' Masterson said. He swiveled his chair to the side.
Davis rose nimbly, brushed his pant legs down, and took it on the chin. He hadn't expected the Chief to say no, but he wouldn't lie down. On the contrary, he accepted the challenge. It would make winning that much sweeter, and in a strange way, he would enjoy the delay of gratification. After all, he wasn't a sprinter, he was a marathoner. He had the stuff to go the distance. This was just a chance to let it shine, shine, shine.
So Davis hurried from the District Attorney's office to begin his search for the evidence that would convict, and kill. Jack Newlin.
The press mobbed the Criminal Justice Center. News vans, cameramen, and print reporters with skinny notebooks clogged Filbert Street, the narrow, colonial lane that fronted the sleek, modern courthouse. Black TV cables snaked along the sidewalk like inner-city pythons, and microwave transmission poles fought the linden trees surrounding the courthouse for airspace. TV reporters shouted to their crews, their puffs of breath visible in the morning air. The winter cold bit cheeks protected only by pancake makeup, but the reporters forgot the weather when a Yellow cab pulled up and out stepped Assistant District Attorney Dwight Davis.
'Mr Davis, any comment on the Newlin case?' 'Dwight, will the Commonwealth ask for the death penalty?' 'Mr Davis, will you be trying the case?'
'No comment,' Davis called out as he climbed the curb. His head was a helmet of dark hair, with sideburns just long enough to be risque for a D.A. He wore a pinstriped suit and moved nimbly from the cab to the courthouse entrance. The media loved Davis, and the feeling was mutual, just not this morning. His expression was dour, and when the reporters kept blocking his path, he lost any sense of humor whatsoever. 'Move the hell out, people!' he called, and hurried into the Criminal Justice Center.
Arriving on foot just after Davis were Mary DiNunzio and Judy Carrier. No press recognized them, much less plagued them for comment. They were merely associates of Bennie Rosato's and one of the throng of young lawyers heading into the Criminal Justice Center. Mary snorted at the ruckus. 'Dwight Davis, no less,' she said. 'They're rollin' out the big guns. They're scared of us.'
'Us? You mean you, and they should be.' Judy glanced ahead at Davis. 'Check it, Barbie. It's Ken, come to life. He's even got his plastic briefcase/
'Look at him run. He knows I studied. It'll take more than a Commonwealth to stop me now.' Mary was psyched despite her meeting with Jack. If her client was going to fight her, so be it. She had never felt so good before court. Where were the blotches? 'Step lively, little pretty.'
Judy laughed as she pushed on the revolving door of the courthouse. 'You're ballsy this morning.'
Temporary insanity,' Mary said, and grabbed the next door.
Jack found himself handcuffed to a steel chair in a tiled cell, and directly across from him was a large TV monitor on a rickety table. On the wall was a black phone but the cell was otherwise bare. There was nothing in it but Jack and the TV, so the scene felt surreal, as if Jack would be forced to watch bad sitcoms. Gray static blanketed the screen, which emitted an electrical crackling so loud he winced. Crk-crk-crk-crk.
He'd been told by the sheriff that he was going to his arraignment, but this was downright odd. He should have let Mary fill him in, but he had been too shaken by what she'd told him. Had Paige lied to him about Trevor's being there? Couldn't be. Her story had been so convincing and it made complete sense. It was how Honor would have reacted, what she would have said, especially when drunk. But did Trevor have anything to do with Honor's murder? Was Paige even there? Had Jack sacrificed everything -for nothing!
Crk-crk-crk-crk. He couldn't think for the crackling noise. He kicked himself for rushing to confess before he was sure of the facts. His reaction had been almost reflexive, the instinct of a good father; shelter, protect, fix. Or maybe it had been the instinct of a bad father, overcompensating. If he hadn't felt so responsible for what had happened, would he have been so quick to confess falsely? He couldn't answer that question. He didn't know. He shifted in the hard chair.
'Sit still!' commanded the sheriff, guarding the door. 'Else the camera won't get you right!'
'Camera?' Jack said. It must have been some sort of closed-circuit TV system. He scanned the cell. It was dim, lit only by a bare bulb in the hallway and the bright flickering of the TV screen. A camera lens peeked over the top of the TV. Crk-crk-crk.
'Sit still, goddammit!'
Suddenly the static noise ceased, the grey blanket on the monitor vanished, and a full-color picture popped onto the screen, divided into four boxes. The upper right box showed a courtroom made miniature and the upper left box was a close-up of a judge, an unassuming man in a tie and cardigan sweater instead of black judicial robes. In the lower left sat a well-dressed woman behind a sign that read COMMONWEALTH; in the lower right was a young man behind a PUBLIC DEFENDER sign. If he hadn't been so preoccupied, he would have laughed. It looked like the Hollywood Squares of Justice.
'Sit up straight!' ordered the sheriff. 'Be ready. You're on deck.'
The TV courtroom seemed to be waiting for something, but Jack's thoughts raced ahead. He doubted he'd get bail, considering Mary's inexperience. It was why he'd hired her, after all. He didn't want an experienced criminal lawyer who might figure out he was setting himself up. He had never intended to hire Bennie Rosato herself, but one of her rookies, and he'd been delighted by the reluctant voice on the telephone.
But he might have been wrong about Mary. She was evidently suspecting that Paige was involved, and it worried him. Ironic. With her inexperience came energy and she wasn't as callous as an experienced criminal lawyer would have been. She cared too much, and somewhere inside, Jack was touched. She hardly knew him, yet she was fighting for him. He smiled despite the tight handcuffs, the weird TV, and the fact that he was about to be arraigned for murder.
'Two minutes, Newlin!' the sheriff said.
Jack stopped thinking about Mary. She was his lawyer and she'd better be a lousy one. Her questions threatened to expose Paige and jeopardize his plan. And what she'd learned about Trevor, if it was true, made him crazy, but he couldn't turn back now. He had to stay the course; keep up the charade. He was good at it, from a lifetime of practice, he was coming to realize.
'Okay, Newlin,' the sheriff called out. 'You're up.'
The sharp crak of the TV gavel burst from the monitor, and Jack couldn't deny the tension in his gut. He had to know the truth and he'd have to find it out from behind bars.
But right now, it was time for the justice show.
Located in the basement of the Criminal Justice Center, the courtroom for arraignment hearings looked like the set of a television show for good reason. It was, essentially. The courtroom was the size and shape of a stage, half as large as a standard courtroom. It was arranged conventionally; from left to right sat a defense table, judge's dais, and prosecutor's table, but a large black camera affixed to the dais dominated the courtroom. Next to the camera sat a TV screen divided into four boxes: judge, courtroom scene, D.A., and P.D. A bulletproof divider protected those behind the bar of the court from the public, who sat in modern seats like a studio audience. The Newlin case was breaking news, packing the gallery with media and spectators wedged tight in their winter coats.
Mary sat with Judy in the gallery, waiting for the Newlin case to be called, and she kept comparing the real courtroom to its TV version. The TV reduced the gleaming brass seal of the Commonwealth to a copper penny and shrank the judge to an ant with glasses. Jack wasn't anywhere on the screen. This is wrong,' she said. Blotches big as paintballs appeared on her neck. 'Today a decision gets made about whether my client gets bail or not, and he's in one place and I'm in another. How are we supposed to consult?'
'Lots of states do arraignments by closed circuit now, because it saves money,' Judy said. 'You can use the phone to talk to him, remember? If you press the red button, the gallery can't hear you.'
'But the sheriff guarding him can hear everything he says, and the courtroom and judge would hear everything I say. Wake me up when we get to the right-to-counsel part.'
'You think it's unconstitutional?'
'Is the Pope Catholic?' Mary checked the monitor as the boxes vanished and Jack's face appeared, oddly larger than life above the logo PANASONIC. The close-up magnified the strain that dulled the blue of his eyes and tugged their corners down. She gathered she had him worrying with her suspicions about Paige, but that was as it should be. Maybe because he was on TV, or maybe because of the Kevin Costner thing, but she sensed that he was an actor playing a role and his story was more fiction than truth. In any event, her job now was to free him on bail, against the odds. She rose to go.
'Good luck, girl,' Judy said.
Mary mouthed her thanks, ignored the itching beginning at her neck, and walked to the door in the bulletproof divider, which a court officer unlocked. It was quiet on the other side, an expectant hush that intimidated her, but she nodded to the public defender, who stood to the side as she took his desk. Across the studio courtroom, Dwight Davis neatly took the D.A.'s desk. He looked more used to it than Mary, and she noticed the two sketch artists drawing him. She understood completely. He was a real lawyer and remarkably unspotted.
At the dais, the bail commissioner pushed up his Atom Ant glasses and pulled his cardigan around him. Bail commissioners weren't judges and some weren't even lawyers, and they rarely saw a private attorney at an arraignment, much less a D.A. the caliber of Davis. Mary had the impression that the bail commissioner was enjoying every ray of the unaccustomed limelight. 'Mr Davis, will you be handling this matter for the Commonwealth?' the commissioner asked, his tone positively momentous.
'Yes, Your Honor,' Davis said deferentially. Even Mary knew that most lawyers called him commissioner.
'Good morning, Your Honor.' Mary introduced herself, following suit, and the commissioner nodded.
'Excellent. Mr Newlin, can you hear us?' The commissioner addressed a camera mounted at the back of the courtroom, above a monitor that showed another image of Jack.
'Yes, Your Honor,' Jack answered, his voice mechanical through the microphones.
'Mr Newlin, this is your arraignment,' the commissioner said needlessly. 'You are arraigned on a general charge of murder in the death of Honor Newlin.'
Mary saw Jack wince, the tiny gesture plain on the large TV screen.
'Murder, that is, homicide, is the most serious crime one human being can commit against another. Your preliminary hearing is scheduled for January thirteenth in the Criminal Justice Center. You will be brought down at nine o'clock and taken in turn. Do you understand?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Very well. I see you have a private attorney present, so I will not appoint a public defender. Now we come to the question of bail in this matter.' The commissioner turned to the D.A. On the screen his miniature face turned, too. 'Mr Davis, I expect you have something to say on the bail issue.'
'We do, Your Honor.' Davis stood straight as a pencil. 'As you know, murder is, as a general rule, not a bailable offense in Philadelphia County. The Commonwealth feels very strongly that the commissioner should follow custom and practice in this matter, for in this case, bail is not in order.'
Mary bristled. 'Your Honor, bail should be granted. There is precedent for bail in murder cases, as you know. The law is simply that bail isn't automatic, as it is for other offenses. Bail is routinely granted where the defendant is an upstanding member of the community.' She had been up all night studying the law. 'That is the case with Mr Newlin. He is a partner at the Tribe firm, a member of the Red Cross Board, and of several charitable trusts. It
goes without saying he has no criminal convictions. He is a superb candidate for bail.'
'You make a nice point, Ms DiNunzio.' The commissioner mulled it over, rubbing his chin like a miniseries jurist. 'It is true, the defendant is well known in the community. Mr Davis, what say you?'
'Your Honor, in my view, the defendant's prominence cuts both ways. First, he should not be treated better than other defendants merely because of his social status. Secondly, as a wealthy partner in a major law firm, the defendant possesses financial resources far beyond the average person and has a significant family fortune. All of this argues that he poses a significant risk of flight. This individual can use his resources to flee not only the jurisdiction, but the country.'
Mary shook her head. 'Your Honor, Mr Newlin poses no flight risk. He has a number of ties to the community and in fact has immediate family here. His daughter, Paige, lives and works in Philadelphia.'
Jack flinched at the sound of her name, Mary saw it; his forehead creased in a frisson of fear. He didn't want Paige brought into it, and it conflicted Mary. She had to make the right argument, whether he wanted it or not. She caught the ghost of her own reflection in the glass of the TV, and she looked almost as stressed as Jack.
Davis stifled a laugh. 'Your Honor, I find it difficult to understand that defense counsel can argue Mr Newlin's devotion to his daughter. He is, after all, charged with the murder of her mother.'
The bail commissioner looked into the camera lens, as if for a close-up. 'Mr Newlin, I've heard your attorney's arguments, but I must rule against you. There will be no bail in this matter and you are remanded to county jail until your next court date.' The bail commissioner closed one pleadings folder and opened another. 'That concludes your arraignment, Mr Newlin. Please sign the subpoena in front of you and the sheriff will escort you back to your cell.'
Jack vanished as abruptly as if someone had grabbed the remote and changed the channel, and Mary watched with dismay as the screen returned to its four boxes. She knew, more than she could rightly justify, that he was innocent. All she had to do was prove it.
But her client was her worst enemy, and the first round had gone to him.
On the way back to the office, Mary took a detour through the young and hip floor at Bonner's Department Store, which was downtown near the Criminal Justice Center. The floor was actually named Young amp; Hip, which told Mary instantly that she wasn't allowed to be there. Growing up, she had only been Guilty amp; Sinful, and as a lawyer had segued right into Guilty amp; Billable.
She wandered through racks of shirts that looked too small to cover even a single breast and skirts you wouldn't have to roll to shorten. Now what fun was that? And how would you achieve that bumpy effect at the hem? She considered asking where the real clothes were, as opposed to the joke clothes, but she was on a mission. She searched for a salesperson.
'Can you help me?' Mary asked, locating a skinny young woman with about three hundred plastic clips in her hair. Each clip was shaped like a baby butterfly that had landed, quite by magic, on its own clump of hair. Mary addressed the woman without reference to her hair, pretending that a headful of insects was not only normal, but desirable. 'I need some information about a photo shoot that took place here Sunday. It was for the store. For a newspaper layout, I think.'
'Wait.' The saleswoman put a green fingernail to her cheek, and, again, Mary acted as if emerald were a naturally occurring shade in nongangrenous tissue. One couldn't question the Young amp; Hip. 'You have to ask the manager. She's over there.' She pointed, and Mary followed her green fingernail like a traffic light that said Go!
The manager turned out to be the youngest and hippest of all, which Mary should have anticipated; short, canary-colored hair that looked greasy on purpose, no discernible shame about her black roots, and a tongue pierce that created a speech impediment. The manager was otherwise tall and slender, with contacts, blue eyes and a name tag that read TORI!
'Excuse me, were you at the photo shoot at the store this weekend?' Mary asked.
'Sure.' Tori! leaned on a chrome rack of Capri pants, NEW FOR SPRING despite the fact it was midwinter. 'I'm at all the shoots. They have 'em at the store 'cause it's cheap. Swingin' in the racks, you know.'
Mary nodded. 'There was a model at the shoot named Paige Newlin. A redhead. Do you remember her?'
'Oh-my-God, her mom was just murdered, right?' Tori! squealed like they used to for Elvis, and Mary looked nervously around. The department was mercifully empty, Philly evidently not being Young amp; Hip enough. You had to go to New York for that. Mary leaned closer to Tori!
'I'd prefer you keep this confidential. I'm a lawyer working on the case, and I need to know if you saw Paige Newlin at the shoot.'
'But that is so weird, that her mom got killed and all. I saw her name in the paper. Newlin. That is sooo random.'
'Yes. Now, did you see a redhead? Long ponytail?'
'A redhead?' Tori! swirled her tongue around her barbell, which Mary gathered was helping her think. 'Uh, no. There were a lot of girls. I didn't think they were so hot.'
'Did you happen to meet any of their managers?'
'No, none of the managers come to the shoots.'
Mary considered it. Paige had said her mother was there. 'What about mothers who are managers? Like Paige's mother, Mrs Newlin.'
'I don't know. I don't remember. I was kinda busy, you know, getting the stock we needed.'
Mary sighed. 'So you didn't see Paige and her mother?'
'Nope. Can't help you out there.' Tori! clicked again, then started waving. 'Maybe Fontana can, though. She's our tailor. Fontana!' she called out, and Mary turned to see whom the manager was hailing. Coming at them with ladylike steps was a very short woman, Mary's mother's height. She wore a navy blue suit, a white shirt with a floppy bow tie, and brown shoes with sensible heels. Her glasses looked old and her smile sweet, and Mary knew instantly that they were both Little amp; Italian. She fought the impulse to run into her arms.
'I no like to tell bad things/ Fontana said, hurrying along on her little legs. The 'things' came out like 'dings,' but Mary could translate easily. If you grew up in South Philly, you could communicate instantly with any tailor, barber, or mobster.
'I don't want you to tell bad things,' Mary said, hurrying beside her, matching stride for stride. Fontana Giangiulio had to be pushing seventy but Mary could barely keep up. 'I just want you to tell me what you saw.'
'I have to do de weddin' dress now. Dey need me dere.'
I'll walk you. I don't want to interrupt your job. Just tell me, please, what you heard. It's very, very important.'
'I no like to say.' Fontana shook her head in a jittery way as she chugged forward. 'Ees no nice. Ees, what dey say, tales outta school.'
'No, it's not. If it's the truth, it's not a tale, and you can save someone's life.'
'Oh, Deo,' Fontana said, scurrying along. 'I no say.'
'You saw the Newlins on Sunday, the mother and the daughter, Paige. You fixed Paige's dress.'
'De seam, I said. No de dress. De dress, she was fine. De seam was no right.' Fontana didn't stop to frown. 'I put de clip in de back seam, to hold for de picture. Not for permanent, you know, for… come se dice, Maria' She waved a tiny hand.
'For temporary,' Mary supplied. 'For the picture, got it. So you worked with Paige.'
'I feex her seam. De customers, dey think we no hear, we no see. But we hear. We see.'
'I know, that's true.' Mary could imagine little Fontana buzzing around the models, kneeling as she chalked the hem at their feet. The tailors would be ignored because servants were invisible, especially to the likes of the Newlins. 'What did you see?'
'Oh, Madonna mia!' Fontana waved her hand again as they barreled to the escalator and climbed on. Mary took advantage of the chance to breathe, now that Fontana had to stand still for a minute. 'Dey fight, dees two!'
Mary tried to hide her excitement. 'A big fight or a little fight?'
'A beeg fight! Dey fight and dey fight! But only in de dressin' room, you see. Not where nobody can see.'
'What did they fight about?'
'De mother, she call de daughter alla names. She call her a puttana!'
'A puttana?' Mary was shocked. It meant a prostitute. A whore.
'Si! Si! Fontana no can believe!' She shook her head for half a floor, gliding downward with her chin high, upset at the very thought. 'Den de daughter, she start to cry, and de mother, she laugh.'
'Laugh?'
'Si! Si! She laugh and she walk allaway out!'
'She left?'
'Si! Si!' Fontana hopped off the escalator when it reached the second floor and took off past the makeup counter. The bright chrome of Clinique reflected on her glasses, but Mary could see her aged eyes go watery behind them. 'But de girl, she start cryin', so sad. De makeup, ees alla mess. De seam, Fontana do again, with de clip. De girl cryin' on her knees, so Fontana help de girl up. She so pretty, like angel.' Fontana motored past black and glossy Chanel, but Mary saw it as a dark blur. 'And Fontana, she hold de girl, hug de girl, until she no cry no more and she get up and she feex her makeup and Fontana feex de seam and she pretend like no ding happen.'
Mary tried to visualize it. Then what?'
'An' den she go out and dey taka her picture. Howa you like dat?'
That's terrible,' Mary said, meaning it. She knew there had been something very wrong between mother and daughter. She wondered how long it had gone on, emotional abuse like that. A long time, for Paige's powers of recovery to be so fast, her emotional scars hidden by makeup and a professional smile. Had Jack known about it? Had it been hidden in dressing rooms and behind closed doors, or was Mary making excuses for him? What had her father said, that night over coffee? If your mother was doing bad things to you, it would be my fault. 'Did anybody else see?'
'Si! Si! One person know what I say ees true.' Fontana stopped in her tracks and held up a finger.
'Who?' Mary asked, breathless.
'Jesus Christ, he know/ she said, with a faith that Mary couldn't begin to understand.
For her part, she could never fathom where Jesus Christ was when a mother called her daughter a whore.
Jack paced in his holding cell, waiting to use the pay phone outside. The guard said he'd get to it before they left for county jail, but that was an hour ago. He'd made a stink, claiming he had to call his lawyer, but it was a lie. Mary was the last person he'd phone right now. He had to call Trevor and get him down to the prison. Find out where that kid was the night Honor was killed. He'd shake the truth out of him.
'Guard! I need to make that call now!' Jack turned on his heel when he reached the bars of the cell, then turned back. The cells were a lineup of vertical cages, their white-painted bars chipped and peeling. Grime covered a concrete floor that sloped down to a small drain, and there was no toilet. They allegedly took the prisoners out for that, though the stench of urine filled the cell like a zoo.
'Fire! There's a fire!' Jack shouted, but even then there was no answer. An old man in the next cell laughed softly; he had been laughing to himself since they put him in there. Jack paced back and forth, driving himself crazy with what-ifs. What if Trevor had killed Honor? What if he and Paige had done it together? What if Paige had lied to him completely?
The prisoner in the next cell laughed louder, reading Jack's thoughts.
'Ms DiNunzio,' Brinkley said, standing beside Kovich, 'before you lay down the law, mind if we sit?'
There's chairs at the dining table behind you.' DiNunzio gestured, and Brinkley looked around Paige Newlin's elegant, feminine apartment. The couch, chairs, and coffee table were decorated in shades of white, and he felt suddenly like an anvil on a cumulus cloud.
'Here we go, Mick,' Kovich said jovially, yanking a chair from the dining room to the coffee table, and Brinkley dragged one over for himself. The chairs raked four wiggly lines in the thick white rug. Brinkley and Kovich sat down as the lawyer kept talking.
'Here's the way it goes, Detective Brinkley,' DiNunzio was saying, from a seat next to Paige Newlin. She had a pretty face but wore a blue suit with a high collar that made her look tight-assed. 'You can ask the questions you need to, but Paige cannot answer if I instruct her not to. She's been through a lot and she's feeling awful. As I told you on the phone, I don't know why you had to meet with her.'
'It's just for background information.' Brinkley slipped a pad from his breast pocket and flipped it open. Another woman lawyer whose name he forgot sat catty-corner to the sofa in a shapeless corduroy dress. He wasn't surprised that woman lawyers dressed as lousy as men lawyers. 'Ms Newlin,' he said, 'first let me say how sorry we are for the loss of your mother.' Beside him, Kovich nodded in sympathy, like he always did when they did next-of-kin notifications. 'Please accept our condolences.'
'Thank you.'
'I do need to ask you a few questions.' Brinkley worked a ballpoint from the spiral of his notebook. 'How old are you?'
'Sixteen.'
Brinkley was starting with the softballs, to get her talking. He didn't want her threatened and he wanted to observe her. The first thing he observed was that she had pierced ears. She was wearing tiny pearl earrings, smaller versions of her mother's. He thought of the earring back in the rug. 'Date of birth?'
She told him, sipped water from a glass, and replaced it on a coaster on the coffee table. Grief weighed each perfect feature and her mouth sagged with pain. She looked obviously bereft, even to his suspicious eye. Still it was hard to ignore her looks. Dressed in blue jeans and a classy white turtleneck, Paige Newlin was a knockout. Big blue eyes, pillow mouth, and glossy red hair that cascaded beyond her shoulders.
Brinkley made a note of her birth date. 'Born in Philly?'
'No. Actually, in Switzerland. My parents were traveling.'
'You reside here; at Colonial Towers?'
'Yes.'
'I understand that you used to live at home with your parents. When did you move here?'
'Early last year.'
'Your parents' home is beautiful, by the way. Antiques and such, everything nice.' Brinkley gestured vaguely. 'It's very well kept. Do your parents have help, for the house?'
'Yes. A maid.'
'How often did she come?'
'Twice a week, Monday and Thursday.'
'So she had been there yesterday?'
DiNunzio leaned toward Paige. 'If you know,' she said, and Paige shrugged.
'I don't know. I live here now.'
'I see.' Brinkley nodded. He was thinking about the dirt
on the coffee table. If the maid had come on Monday, it could have been new the night of the murder. 'How was it you came to live here?'
DiNunzio interrupted, 'Your question isn't clear. Detective, and I'm not sure I see the relevance anyway.'
'I'm just trying to get some background information.'
'Background or not, she doesn't understand the question, and neither do I.'
He shifted his weight and addressed Paige. 'I was asking you why you moved out of your parents' house.'
'I wanted to be on my own. Live alone. Be independent.'
'Did you get along with your parents?'
'Yes.'
'With your mother?'
DiNunzio cleared her throat. 'She just answered that, Detective Brinkley. Again, I'm not sure it matters who she got along with.'
'I'm wondering why she moved out of her house at such a young age. It's unusual, and we like to fill in all the questions the captain will ask us. He gets feisty about the details.'
That's your problem.'
Brinkley, his annoyance growing, addressed the daughter. 'Did your parents get along?'
DiNunzio cut him off with a chop. 'I'm instructing her not to answer that.'
Brinkley was getting pissed. He'd never met a lawyer who hadn't interfered with getting to the truth. He couldn't understand that kind of job. 'You're disrupting a police investigation, Ms DiNunzio.'
'I disagree, but I won't bother to argue with you.' DiNunzio turned to Paige. 'Don't answer.'
Paige nodded shakily, and Brinkley looked at his notepad. 'Did your father ever strike your mother?' he asked, and DiNunzio scoffed again.
'Detective, she's talking to you voluntarily. You wanna continue this line of questioning, you'll have to get a subpoena and we'll meet you at the Roundhouse.'
Brinkley exchanged looks with Kovich. Neither wanted the girl taken down. Officially, she was still victim's family. It would look like they were beating on her, with the suspect already placed under. 'I don't think that'll be necessary. Paige, when was the last time you saw your mother alive?'
DiNunzio eased back into the cushy sofa, and Paige answered, 'Sunday. The day before she… you know. We were at a photo shoot.'
'You're a model, I understand.'
'Yes.'
'Why was your mother at your photo shoot?'
'She was my manager.'
'Did you ever have another manager?'
'No.'
'Did you want another manager?'
'No. She was still my manager, when she -'
'Passed,' Brinkley supplied, and Paige nodded jerkily. Brinkley shifted forward on the chair. 'What does a model's manager do, exactly?'
'She managed my career, got me the shoots, dealt with the bookers.'
Brinkley made a note. 'Bookers are what?'
'People who give you modeling jobs,' Kovich chirped up, and Brinkley looked over, surprised.
'Okay,' he said, and turned slowly back to the daughter. 'You know what I don't get?'
'What?' Paige pursed her lips, which trembled slightly. It made Brinkley wonder. He made a mental note of it, then said:
'I don't get how you stay so thin.'
'You don't eat!' Paige answered, breaking into a smile that Brinkley thought looked relieved.
'How do you not eat?' he asked. 'Me, I love food. Ribs, burgers, shakes. You give all that up?'
'Milk shakes? Uh, hello.' She laughed.
Kovich nudged Brinkley's arm heavily. 'A lot of models smoke,' he said, with a savvy smile. 'That's how they stay thin.'
Brinkley wanted to hit him, but didn't. 'What do you know about getting thin, partner? Look at you!'
The lawyers laughed, and so did the daughter. Brinkley could feel the tension ebb away and the atmosphere warm.
'I know all about this,' Kovich said. 1 got my finger on the pulse, Mick.' He put a thick finger over his wrist in case anybody missed his point, then turned to Paige. 'I have daughter, she's your age. She tells me about the models. Who smokes, who doesn't. A lot of 'em smoke but they hide it. Kate Moss smokes. Naomi Campbell, she smokes. Am I right or am I right, Paige?'
'It's true. Their diet is, like, water and Camels.' Paige nodded vigorously. 'But that's not my diet secret.'
Kovich inched forward on his chair. 'What's your diet secret?'
'Portion size,' Paige said, her tone confidential. 'Most people, their portions are way too big. It's all portion size. I figured that out by myself.'
'Portion size,' Kovich repeated, like it was a goddamn state secret, and Brinkley tried to get back on track. He was getting there, just slowly.
'You can't make a small cheeseburger.'
'You can't eat cheeseburgers if you want to lose,' Paige said. 'No red meat. No butter. No oil.'
'No meat?' Brinkley asked casually. 'You a vegetarian?'
'Sure am.' Paige nodded in satisfaction. 'A lot of the supermodels are, too.'
Brinkley shook his head, his thoughts elsewhere. That would explain the hummus on the appetizer platter. The daughter had been there for dinner. 'I'd have to think about it. It's a lot to give up. I love meat.'
'You get used to it, you'll see.'
‘I can't get used to that,' Kovich said flatly, but Brinkley excused himself and stood up slowly, shaking his pant leg over his ankle holster.
'Ladies, I hate to interrupt, but may I use the facilities? I'll just be a minute.'
'Sure,' Paige answered. DiNunzio looked unhappy but didn't countermand her, and Brinkley headed off. 'First door on the right,' Paige called after him, and Brinkley slipped inside and shut the door behind him.
Inside the bathroom, he could hear them talking diet. DiNunzio wouldn't put up with it for long; Brinkley didn't have much time. He lifted the toilet seat loudly and coughed at the same moment as he opened the medicine cabinet. His eyes scanned the shallow shelves, which were almost empty. Glade air freshener, extra guest soaps. There. A comb.
Brinkley picked up the comb by the corner. Silky red filaments of hair were entwined in its teeth. He grabbed some toilet paper, slid the hair from the comb, and put the comb back on the shelf. Then he slipped the paper with the hair carefully into his inside jacket pocket. It wouldn't be admissible in court – the seizure wasn't kosher and the chain of custody nonexistent – but it wasn't for court anyway. He closed the cabinet, flushed the toilet, and opened the door and let himself out of the bathroom. He rejoined the group, which looked as chummy as a hen party. Kovich was good with women. Sheree always said he was like a big teddy bear. 'You lose weight yet, partner?'
'I'm on my way,' Kovich said, pushing up his glasses. 'No more oil for me. Kelley tells me the same thing. It's liquid fat. Right, Coach?'
Paige nodded happily, and Brinkley sat down. 'We'll finish up this conversation,' he told her. 'I don't want to keep you too long.' He picked up his notepad from the chair. 'I know this is a hard time for you.'
Thanks. I don't feel very well, it's true. I had a pretty bad migraine last night. I had one the night before that, too.'
Brinkley thought a minute. 'You got it after you heard about what happened -'
'No, I got it before, in the afternoon. I was supposed to have dinner with my parents last night, but I canceled because of the migraine.'
DiNunzio waved her hand like a ref calling foul. 'I think that's enough now. Detective, you said you were finished here.'
But Brinkley couldn't let it go. His hummus theory was in doubt, 'I want to clarify that. Did you go to your parents' house last night?'
'No. I was here. I was supposed to go to dinner, but I canceled. I stayed at home in bed.'
Brinkley studied Paige's face. Her thin skin colored with agitation, but she would have been upset, in context. It flushed his hummus theory down the drain. 'Is there a way we can confirm that?'
'What?'
'Your whereabouts that night?'
DiNunzio stood up abruptly. 'I don't see the relevance of the inquiry. I'm instructing Paige not to answer.'
'It's one last clarification.'
'No it isn't. You've charged her father with the crime. If Paige needs a lawyer, we'll get her one, too. And I don't remember you reading her her rights.'
'We don't have to Mirandize her unless it's a custodial interrogation, and she's not in custody.'
'It's starting to smell like she is,' DiNunzio said, and Paige picked up her water from the coffee table with a shaky hand.
Brinkley stood up, flipped his notebook closed, and returned it to his breast pocket. 'I don't think we need to continue this any longer.' He looked down at Paige, who, though tall, suddenly seemed to shrink into the couch. 'I'm sorry to have bothered you today, Paige. We'll try to handle this without disturbing you again. Feel free to call us if you have any questions.'
'She will,' DiNunzio said, but Brinkley bit his tongue.
'Please take my card.' Re slipped a slim hand into his back pocket for his wallet and flipped it open. The heavy gold badge of the Detective Division flashed in the sunny apartment as he extracted a business card, and he noted Paige's slight frown at the sight. A natural reaction? Lots of people reacted to the badge. He knew a cop who said it got him laid, every time. He pulled out a business card and extended it to Paige, but DiNunzio took it instead.
'Thank you,' she said, moving to the door. I'll show you both out.'
Kovich got up, and Brinkley grabbed his coat and left, with more questions than before.
'You're outta your mind, Mick,' Kovich said, shrugging off the winter chill in his polyester sportjacket. It was a cold clear day, the temperature barely above freezing, but Kovich never wore a coat. It wasn't a macho act; the man never got cold. Brinkley didn't understand it.
'I don't think so.' They strode from the tall apartment building toward the Chrysler. Wind gusted down Pine Street, and Brinkley buttoned his black leather topcoat.
'The hummus shit, that washed out. The kid was going over to dinner, Mommy put it out, then the kid canceled.'
'Got it.'
'She didn't do it, Mick. Plus we got the father locked up, and Davis on the case. What do you think's gonna happen? You got a stray one, and he's gonna let Newlin go? Are you nuts? The paper's already calling him "No Deal" Davis. The prelim's around the corner.'
Brinkley squinted against the cold sun like it hurt. 'She doesn't have an alibi.'
'She doesn't need one. You saw the lab reports. The prints are his. The fibers, it's all there.'
The lab reports don't mean anything. Not if he staged the scene to protect the daughter.'
'Nobody could stage a scene that good!'
'Not even a lawyer?'
'Jesus H. Christ!' Kovich picked up the pace, his breath puffing like a locomotive, and Brinkley could see he was getting worked up. 'You're losin' me, Mick.'
Brinkley didn't say anything.
'I was workin' with you before but now that I met her, you're losin' me. She's a kid. She's like the girls in the magazines, in Kelley's magazines. She's Kelley, for Christ's sake.'
'No, she's not. You don't know her.'
'Listen to me, I'm a father, Mick. Teenage girls, they're not that different. Didn't you see her? She's all broke up, she got the puffy eyes, the whole thing. Kids her age, they don't take stress that well. Kelley gets a zit, she cries in her room. They're Drama Queens, all of 'em. That kid was upset for real.'
'If she did it, she would be. Like you say, she's a teenage girl, not a scumbag.'
Kovich snorted. 'Anybody who kills their mother is a scumbag. It's automatic.'
Brinkley thought that one over as they reached the car. By then, Kovich was breathing easier but not much.
'So what'd you do in the bathroom?' he asked, opening the driver's side door.
'Number one,' Brinkley told him. He was thinking about that earring back.
Mary and Judy stayed with Paige, lingering in her apartment kitchen after the detectives had left. Mary's doubts about Paige were only encouraged by Detective Brinkley, who was apparently beginning to question Jack's confession and suspect Paige. Mary wondered what he knew and if he had any evidence that Jack was innocent. But Paige could know that, too. That wasn't much fun, was it?' Mary asked her.
'No.' The teenager opened her refrigerator door, retrieved a slim jug of orange juice, and set it down on the black granite counter. 'They got mean at the end.'
'They make extra for mean.'
Paige didn't smile. 'What do they want from me, though? They were acting like I was the guilty one. Do you think they suspect me or something?'
Mary searched her face, and Paige was plainly upset. 'They have to investigate the crime, and we have to permit that, within limits.'
'But they have my dad in jail.' She took a glass from the glistening cabinet and poured herself a fresh-squeezed orange juice, without offering it to anyone else. 'They won't even let him out on bail. Why are they coming to me?'
'They have to check everything out. I thought it would be more pleasant for you to be questioned here, rather than downtown.'
'It totally was. I never want to see that place again.' Paige wrinkled her small nose. 'I swear I saw a rat outside there last night.'
Judy smiled. 'You did. It's their pet rat. Size of a dog.'
Mary looked over, horrified. 'Are you serious?'
'Yep. The cop at the desk told me. His name's Coop.'
'The rat or the cop?'
'The cop, doof.'
'Great,' Paige said, with a shudder. 'Well, I'm just glad it's over.' She sipped her juice, leaving a parabola of pulpy film on the glass. 'It's kind of a lot to deal with. I mean, tomorrow is my mother's funeral. I don't suppose they'll let my dad go to that, will they?'
'I doubt it,' Mary said, and thought it a strange question. She found her suspicions about Paige confirmed the more time she spent with her. She just didn't have any solid proof. Yet.
'I feel so bad for him. Worried.'
'Don't worry.' Judy touched Paige's arm. 'We'll take care of your father, and you take care of yourself. We'll go the funeral, of course.'
'Thanks. That's nice.'
'We're happy to.' Judy exchanged looks with Mary, who remained dubious. She kept thinking of what Fontana had told her at the store, about Paige's mother calling her a prostitute. She wondered how that would make Paige feel about her mother the next day. Angry enough to kill her? No. But what if there were a lifetime of it? Mary decided to explore it. If she were going to prove Jack's innocence, she couldn't do it through him because he wouldn't let her. Maybe she could do it through Paige.
'I don't know much about being a model,' Mary said. 'It sounds fun. Glamorous. Do you like it, going to photo shoots and all?'
'Sure, yeah. It's cool. But it's not like you go to a photo shoot. It's like you work at one. I mean, it's work.'
'Well, how? Like take the Bonner shoot, for example. How is that work? Isn't it just fake-smiling in nice clothes? Like being a lawyer.'
Paige laughed. 'No way. You have to stand for hours and they don't treat you that well.'
'How so? I would think models get the star treatment, especially if they have a manager there.' Mary was choosing her words with care, and Judy shot her a warning glance.
'No way.' Paige nodded, not completely happily. 'Sometimes my mother would see things I should have done better, like if my hands looked stupid. I don't always know what to do with my hands.' She fell suddenly quiet and just as Mary was about to follow up, Judy interrupted.
'But Paige, I always thought the photographer could make you look better,' she said, and Mary knew it wasn't coincidental. Judy was the only person less interested in the modeling profession than Mary.
'No. They tell you how to stand, and that's it,' Paige answered, unaware of the tug-of-war over her. 'The girl has to do it.'
Mary yanked back. 'Who are some of the photographers you use, like for the Bonner shoot? I'm thinking about getting my photo taken for work. You know, tough woman lawyer in front of a row of law books.'
Judy snorted, and Paige set down her juice. 'Caleb Scott shot Bonner, but I wouldn't use him. He's a jerk. Most of the time, like for all the catalog work, we use Vivi Price. She has her own studio in New York. Ever hear of her? She used to be an assistant for Demarchelier.'
Mary made a mental note. Trevor must like having a girlfriend who's a professional model,' she said, pushing it.
'Trevor? Yeah. He's cool with it.' Paige checked her watch, a silver Rolex that hung loose as a bracelet on her knobby wrist. 'Well, I gotta go. I'm gonna meet him for a late lunch. He doesn't have any classes until three, and they have open campus.'
'Where does he go to school?'
'Downtown, at Philadelphia Select. He's going to Princeton next year. He's really smart.' Paige's smile turned professional. 'I should get ready or I'm gonna be late. It takes me forever to get ready.'
'Where are you meeting him? Maybe we can drop you off.'
'No. I can get a cab. It's just at the Four Seasons. Thanks, anyway.'
'Okay.' Mary touched Judy's arm. 'We'd better get moving then, lady,' she said, and tried not to sound too eager. She'd have to hurry to do what she needed.
Mary powered down the sidewalk, hailing cabs as she walked, with no luck. It was so cold that spittle froze on the concrete sidewalk. The trees were dark hands reaching to a stark blue sky. Still she loved Philly in winter. 'Don't you wonder about what Paige just said?'
'You're outta your mind.' Judy hurried along to keep pace, hauling a heavy brown briefcase, the accordion type that law professors carried. 'What is it with you and Paige? Why don't you like her?'
'I think she's selfish. Did you see, she didn't offer us any orange juice, and she barely said thanks. These things matter.'
'No, they don't.' Judy's mouth flattened to a hyphen, giving a sharp edge to her voice. 'Bad manners aren't against the law.'
They're telling details.'
Telling what? We're supposed to be preparing a defense, and this case isn't about her. It's about her father.'
'Well, I think he's innocent, so I have to investigate other possibilities.' Mary shivered in her cloth trench coat as she tried to hail a cab. She and Judy never argued. It suddenly felt very cold. 'Right?'
'Wrong. She's off the point.' Judy's eyes became skeptical slits of blue and she stopped in mid-sidewalk, against a backdrop of colonial town houses. The soft melon color of their brick and the bubbles in their mullioned windows testified to their authenticity. 'We still have no reason to think Newlin is innocent, or that she did it.'
'I told you about the fight Paige had with her mother, in the dressing room.' Mary faced her best friend on the street. 'I bet it wasn't the first time they fought that way.'
'That's not enough. Everybody fights with their mother sometimes, probably more often in dressing rooms than anyplace else. They don't just up and kill them.'
'Paige just said she wished her father could come to the funeral. If you thought your dad had stabbed your mom to death, would you want him at her funeral?'
Judy sniffed. Her upturned nose was red at the tip, from the chill. 'No.'
'And aren't you hearing Paige has a lot more sympathy for dad, who tells us he's the bad guy, than for mom, who got killed? I mean, if Paige had killed her mother and was letting her father take the rap, she'd feel guilty, wouldn't she? I can't be the only guilty person in the world.'
Judy blinked. 'Okay, I admit it, it does seem odd.'
'So, to support my theory about Jack covering for Paige, we have to understand a lot about this family in a very short time, and we need to know how they related. We need to reconstruct the events leading up to the murder, to put it in context. Make sense?'
'I guess.'
Mary suppressed her surprise. Had she won? Was it that easy? 'So you agree with me? You think I'm right?'
'I think you could be.'
'Are you sure? I mean, I'm usually not.'
Judy laughed. 'This time you are. You're growing up, right before my eyes. What do you want to do next, boss? It's your case.'
Mary thought a minute, suddenly giddy. 'Okay, you go back to the office and find precedent for the preliminary hearing. I was going to follow my lead.'
'Your "lead"?' Judy smiled. 'You're a lawyer, not a cop.'
'Don't question me, I'm the boss!' An empty Yellow cab whizzed by and Mary waved frantically. 'Yo, wait!
Stop!'
'Mare!' Judy called after her. 'Where are you going?' 'Catch me if you can!' she shouted, running after the
cab, and Judy shot off after her, laughing.
Brinkley stood beside the stainless steel table with Kovich and Dwight Davis as the autopsy began. Brinkley kept a lid on his testiness at Davis and his distaste at the procedure by listening to the piano music coming from the CD player on the shelf. Hamburg always played Chopin's Nocturnes, and though Brinkley didn't listen to classical music, he appreciated it. The sweet notes of the piano made incongruous background music for the coroner's dictation, into a black orb of a microphone that hung from a wire like a spider on a web.
This is the case of Honor Buxton Newlin, a forty-five-year-old female,' Hamburg began. He was wearing blue pressed scrubs under an immaculate white jacket.
The body of Honor Newlin lay naked on the steel table, her eyes closed and her chest sliced cruelly with the wounds that had killed her. Brinkley tried not to look, in some sense protecting her modesty, and Hamburg evinced a similar respect for the body. His tone was almost rabbinical as he recited her height, weight, sex, age, and eye and hair color into the microphone.
'On January twelfth, the subject was brought to the Philadelphia Medical Examiner's office…'
They were only at the beginning of the autopsy; Hamburg had just cut away the woman's clothes, the first step of the external examination. The inspection of her blouse had taken a while, since Hamburg had been so systematic, matching each stab wound to each tear in the white silk and squaring up the bloodstains. The D.A., the detectives, and the medical examiner had pored over the clothes and pink shoe with the torn strap, but Brinkley could draw no
new conclusions about the shoe and Davis thought it didn't mean anything.
'Head: The head is normal. There is no evidence of trauma to the head. The scalp hair is…'
Brinkley was bumped slightly by Davis, edging him into the green steel cabinets lining the morgue. The area reserved for autopsies was cramped, dominated by a lineup of steel tables with drains in the middle and a deep sink under the head. No other autopsies were being performed, which Brinkley counted as a godsend. He found himself looking away while Hamburg swabbed the dried blood from Honor Newlin's wounds, to the achingly beautiful strains of the solitary piano.
'Chest: The chest shows evidence of significant trauma. There are five wounds in the chest area. Left to right, the first wound is postmortem
Brinkley made himself look. The woman's skin was as pure and unmarked as porcelain, now that it had been drained of blood. He looked away again, confused. He had seen a zillion bodies, all nastier than this one. What was bothering him? Maybe because Honor Newlin made him think of better things. Or maybe because he wasn't sure they had her killer yet.
'Abdomen: The abdomen is flat. There is no evidence of trauma…'
Brinkley glanced at her waist, which was small. Her stomach looked toned and supple, her belly button a tiny, refined knob. How had this happened? Could her husband really do this to her? Could her kid? That kid, with the big blue eyes and the long hair? Brinkley needed answers fast. He knew the news stories about no deals were trial balloons, and the public was responding. The man-on-the-street interviews were all hang 'em high.
'Now, the back.' Hamburg motioned to an assistant and they turned the body over together, in one smooth, practiced motion. The woman's arms remained rigid at her sides, owing to rigor mortis. 'The back is normal in contour,' Hamburg continued. 'There is no evidence of trauma to the back. Upper extremities: The upper extremities show evidence of defensive wounds
Brinkley looked at the slashes to the woman's fingertips. The notion of somebody putting up their hands to protect against a knife always made him sad. The worst were defensive gunshot wounds. How many times had he seen Hamburg raise a body's hand to match where a bullet had passed through it? Brinkley knew it was reflex, but he couldn't help believing it was something else. Hope.
'Lower extremities: The lower extremities show evidence… hmmmm…'
Brinkley came out of his reverie. The body was lying on its back again, and Hamburg was bent over, his head down and his black yarmulke a punctuation mark. He squinted through his bifocals at the woman's feet and kneaded the large toe of her right foot. Without being asked, Brinkley turned and picked up the pink shoe with the torn strap, still bagged, and handed it to Hamburg, who reached up and turned off his microphone.
'I think our friend has a broken toe,' Hamburg said, preoccupied. Brinkley couldn't tell if he was thinking about the toe or listening to the music, which was particularly dramatic, the notes gaining speed as they descended the octaves. Hamburg took the shoe and held it against the foot. 'This is the right shoe, with the broken strap. Broken toe, broken shoe. Any theories, boys?'
Brinkley moved closer, intrigued. 'You think she broke her toe the same time she broke the strap?' he asked, and Kovich listened quietly.
Hamburg nodded. 'Seems reasonable.'
Davis, joining them, shook his head. 'Couldn't she have broken her toe another time? It's not like they treat broken toes. You just wait for it to heal.'
Hamburg nodded again. 'True, but there's a fair amount of swelling in the toe. I'd say it's a recent injury.'
'How recent?' Davis asked, hugging his pad to a pinstriped suit.
'Yesterday or the day before.'
'You don't put shoes like that on a hurt toe,' Brinkley said, but Davis snorted.
'You don't know that. You can't assume that. She seems like a vain woman to me.'
'How you get that from a body?' Brinkley asked, defensively. It seemed disrespectful.
'From the clothes. They're expensive. And she's thin, she stays in shape.'
Brinkley paused. Davis was smart but he was still an asshole. 'Look, it's a lot more likely that she kicked something hard enough to break her toe and her shoe. What do you say, Aaron?'
'Not my bailiwick, but it seems likely. You think she was kicking whoever was attacking her?'
'No.' Brinkley was puzzled. 'A defensive wound, to the foot? How often you see that?'
'From time to time,' Hamburg answered thoughtfully. 'In women, you see it. They do it out of desperation.'
'Sure,' Kovich agreed. 'We've seen it in the rape cases. Remember Ottavio, Mick?'
Brinkley remembered. 'But this isn't a rape case. In a rape case, the victim's on the ground and she kicks up. Tries to catch the guy in the groin or whatever. Here the lady is standing up, getting stabbed. If she kicks to defend herself, she destabilizes herself.' He demonstrated and almost toppled over. 'See?'
'She could have kicked up, being stabbed on the ground,' Kovich offered, but Hamburg looked dubious.
'I can't say no, but I can't say yes. With this wound pattern, I can't make an exact determination about which is the fatal wound. But remember, she had been drinking heavily. Her blood alcohol was high, so any fighting she did wasn't that vigorous. If she was kicking from the ground, she didn't hit much. Not enough to break a toe.'
Kovich said, 'Unless she kicked Newlin before he started stabbing.'
'If it's Newlin,' Brinkley corrected, then caught Kovich's annoyance. Davis, standing beside them both, said nothing and looked at the corpse. 'Newlin didn't say anything to us about her kicking him.'
'We didn't ask him, Mick.'
'But it doesn't jive with his story. The way Newlin tells it, all she did was yell. She provoked him verbally and he got aggressive. Yelled back. Threw the glass at her.'
'The toe's not that big a deal,' Kovich shot back. 'He overpowered her and she struggled. Anytime there's a struggle, things get broke.'
'I'm with Stan on this,' Davis said, speaking finally. His tone suggested a judge's ruling at the end of a case. 'The broken toe is not significant. She was drunk, she flailed out at Newlin, it's some sort of defensive wound.'
Brinkley eyed Davis. 'You're acting like you got your mind made up.'
'I do.' Davis nodded, almost cheerfully. 'I saw the tape, over and over, and I know how this went down.'
'You know?' Brinkley frowned. 'From a video?'
Hamburg waved them all into silence. 'Separate, you two,' he said, flicking on the overhead microphone.
After the autopsy, which ended routinely, Brinkley caught up with Davis outside the building. A squat edifice of tan brick with only a few slitted windows, the Joseph W. Spelman Medical Examiner's Building was situated on a busy corner, bordered by the Schuylkill Expressway and a complex of the University of Pennsylvania Hospital, Children's Hospital, and the Veteran's Hospitals. Wind swirled in unpredictable currents around the buildings and the traffic made a constant whooshing. ' Davis,' Brinkley shouted, knowing the D.A. was avoiding him. 'Got a minute?'
'For you, sure.' Davis turned, pad in hand, though he didn't break stride as he hurried across the parking lot to his car, a new white pool Ford. 'What can I do for you, champ?'
'You said you saw the tape of the confession.' Brinkley buttoned his jacket quickly in the cold air. Cars were parked willy-nilly in the lot, which was being repainted, and Davis was parked in a space with a sign that read PARKING FOR BEREAVED FAMILIES ONLY. 'Did you see what I meant about -'
'Yeah, matter of fact I did. I think Newlin's lying, too. But I think he's the doer.'
Brinkley didn't get it. 'What do you think he's lying about?'
The story he didn't plan it is bullshit. He's gonna plead out.' Davis 's determined chin cut the chill air. 'Or so he thinks.'
'Big mistake, Davis. I'm not sure he's the doer.'
'You got anything to back that up?'
'Not yet. I'm just starting -'
'Lemme know you find anything, okay, my man? Keep me up to speed. I gotta roll.' Davis opened the door of his car, but Brinkley held the door so it couldn't be closed.
'Listen, we talked to the daughter this morning, and I'm working on the theory that the father didn't do it. That he was protecting her, or somebody else.'
There's nothing to support that. Not a thing.'
'I'll find it.'
'You do that.' Davis gave him a dismissive wave, closed the Ford's door, and disappeared inside. The car's engine started quickly, and Davis took off, leaving Brinkley standing there.
When he turned back, he spotted Kovich waiting at the front of the coroner's building, a distant silhouette.
Mary glanced around the cavernous warehouse, as large a space as she had ever been in, especially in the city. It was near the Delaware River, bordering New Jersey. In Philadelphia you had to go to Camden to get any room. Afternoon sunlight streamed through the floor-high windows, their security cages casting a diamond-mesh pattern on the rough concrete floor. In Camden even empty space needed protection. You couldn't win on the East Coast, in general.
Mary stood there with her briefcase and said 'yo' to hear whether it echoed, but it didn't. The sound vanished into four tall stories of exposed brick. It was the shell of a furniture warehouse, completely empty except for the far corner, in which a little world had been created. She walked over, marveling as she approached. There were three distinct rooms of drywall, except that it looked as if the contractor had forgotten their ceilings and fourth walls. The first room on the left was an open dressing room, and young girls were changing clothes in front of everyone. Mary knew instantly that none of them was Catholic.
The room next to the dressing room was a makeup and hair salon, with two steel folding tables piled with an array of black makeup brushes and a layered box full of compacts and foundation. Models in lacy bras and slips sat on folding chairs, orange crates, and boxes while stylish men and women painted their eyes, contoured their cheeks, and styled their hair. One model was having a French twist combed out, and her head jerked back with each stroke. Mary winced. She was a lawyer, but she couldn't take that kind of pain.
Beside the makeup room was a final fitting room, with models going from one station to the next like a fashion assembly line, though Mary couldn't tell the order from all the milling around. In the corner stood a portable steam presser and movable racks of clothes, a quick glance revealing they were Young amp; Hip. From what Mary could tell, the Young amp; Hip biz was really thriving.
The operative word being Young. Mary got close enough to see the models and they looked like kids playing dress-up. They were preteens, starting at about age ten, up to fifteen or so. There wasn't a full breast in the crowd, though the kids appeared to be modeling slips that were supposed to be dresses. One model, a sprout of a blond with large blue eyes, looked barely twelve. She sat in a cloth-back director's chair while a man in black glued false lashes to her eyelids. Her feet, in strappy black sandals, didn't touch the ground and she clutched a Totally Hair Barbie, with coincidentally matching sandals. There was no mother in sight.
Suddenly shouting came from the largest room, which was merely a huge sheet of clean white paper hanging from a story-high steel brace. Background for the photographs, it curved onto the concrete floor like a paper carpet. The kids kept tripping on the paper's edge in their high heels, and a man kept yelling at them 'not to rip the seamless.' One of the mothers apologized for her daughter and grabbed her off the paper. Mary didn't get it. If anybody had spoken to her like that, her mother would have threatened to break his face. But Mary wasn't here to stop child labor. She had a client to defend.
She approached the closest man in black, a wavy brown ponytail snaking to his waist. He had his back to her and was bent over a large steel trunk of photographic equipment. Lenses, camera bodies, and flash units nestled in grey sponge cushioning, and Mary realized instantly that the cameras were treated better than the kids. 'Excuse me,' she said, but the ponytailed man didn't turn around. 'I'm looking for the photographer, Caleb Scott.'
'I'm his assistant, one of the million. He's over there but don't bother him. He's on the warpath for a change.' The assistant glanced over his shoulder, through the smallest glasses Mary had ever seen. 'I can tell you right now what he's going to say, honey. Save you the time.'
'Go ahead,' Mary said, surprised.
'You gotta lose thirty pounds, maybe more. You're too old for what he does. You need a nose job and you gotta do something with your hair. The color sucks and that cut is so last year.' He turned back to the trunk, and Mary considered giving the finger to his ponytail.
'I'm a lawyer, not a model.'
Then you're perfect,' he said, and didn't look back.
Caleb Scott simmered on the paper carpet, resting his Hasselblad on his slim hip like a gun. He was tall, reed-thin, and wore a black turtleneck, stone-washed jeans, and soft-soled Mephisto shoes. His spray of grey hair and a faux English accent served to distinguish him, in addition to his foul mood. Caleb Scott was angry about a yellow light on a tall steel stem, which kept firing at the wrong time. From the terrified attitude of the assistants struggling to fix the thing, Mary guessed that for Scott, anger was the status quo. But he didn't express his anger in a way familiar to Mary – shouts, tears, or the decade-long vendetta – he just got wound tighter and tighter.
'Mr Scott, I have a few questions, but it won't take long,' Mary said, hovering next to him.
'Take all day. I evidently have it.'
'I represent Jack Newlin and am investigating the murder charge against him. You may have read about it in the paper. I need to know about Paige and her mother, Honor.'
'I don't have time to read the newspaper. I have to get to work, where I stand and wait.' Scott scowled at an assistant, hurrying by with a new lightbulb. The kids in slips held their position under the lights, and their mothers stood off to the side, watching them sweat.
'You didn't hear that Honor Newlin was killed?'
'I didn't say that. Of course I heard it, from one of my assistants. Everybody knows about it. If we waited for the newspaper to get news, we'd wither and die. Like me, right now.' His thin lips pursed in martyrdom, and Mary figured he, at least, was Catholic.
'You photographed the Bonner shoot, didn't you?'
'I do all of Bonner's work, in town.'
'I understand that Honor and Paige had a fight at the shoot, in the store dressing room. Did you know that?'
'Of course! Do you think that anything is a secret in this business?' Scott gestured toward his assistants, who swarmed around the offending light. It still wouldn't fire when they pressed a black button on top of what looked like a car battery. 'We're the biggest group of gossips ever. You could dish all day if you had nothing better to do, but most people have better things to do. I, on the other hand, have to stand around and talk to lawyers. When I'm not baby-sitting.'
'So you knew there was a fight in the dressing room?'
'Honey,' Scott said, turning to Mary for the first time, 'they fought wherever they went. That mother was the biggest bitch, and that kid was the biggest princess. When I heard the mother was killed, I thought, "you go, girl."'
Mary couldn't hide her shock. 'What are you saying?'
'I'm saying that I thought the kid killed her.'
'Because of the fight, is that why? What was the fight even about?'
'Not because of the fight, no way. The fight was about what they all fight about.' This time Scott gestured at the mothers, sipping coffee near the paper carpet. Two were on cell phones, and Mary could hear them changing their kids' bookings now that the light had broken, delaying the shoot. 'Look at them. Can you explain this? Mothers who would put their children through this? I can't.'
She shook her head. She actually agreed. 'They do it for money, don't they?'
'No, I'll explain in a minute. Look at the girls.' Scott gestured at the kids, trying hard to stand in place, now going on five minutes. They're beautiful, right? Each one of them.'
Again, she had to agree, though their beauty was hidden by their makeup.
'None of this is about money, it's about a much stronger pull. It's about that their kid will become the next Claudia, Naomi, or Elle. That their kid will be the one to hit the jackpot. And after that, who knows? She can marry the prince. Or the rock star. Make movies. Be Julia Roberts. This is the lottery, with flesh and blood.'
Mary scanned the young faces as he spoke. They were all so pretty, like a lineup of dolls. 'But one of them will make it, won't they?'
'You mustn't interrupt.' Scott paused, apparently to punish her. 'The truth is, none of them will. They're kids from Philly and they look cute in catalogs and newspapers. Some of them will get go-sees to New York, but none of them is truly special. I have twenty-three of them here today and twenty-three tomorrow and twenty-three the day after that. They all have cute faces, but none of them have The Face. None of them will make it, and when they turn sixteen like Paige, it will be very clear. And the shit will hit the fan.'
Mary was finally understanding. 'Paige couldn't make it?'
'No way, but her mother didn't know that. "If only you light her this way" and "if only the makeup were better." It was everybody else's fault. It always was, especially with Honor.'
'You fought with Honor?'
'Each time I shot her daughter. Paige lost bookings because of her mother, I swear it. Nobody wanted to deal with Honor. It was about her, not Paige.' Scott scoffed. 'Soccer moms got nothing on model moms. This is the Little League for Anorexics.'
Mary didn't smile. 'Did you think Paige knew that she wouldn't make it?'
'Of course, at some point.'
'Did you talk to her about it?'
'No, I don't talk to the kids, I shoot them. But I know. The kids are the honest ones. The kids know it before the parents do. They see the truth.' Scott looked away, distracted by an assistant who was giving him a relieved thumbs-up. The light had been fixed. 'Brilliant chatting with you. Back to the salt mines,' he said, and walked off, raising his camera.
When Mary looked at the kids, she couldn't disagree. She lingered a minute to watch Scott work, clicking away as he shouted orders to them: turn your head three-quarters, no, less than that, somebody fix her bra strap, stop that giggling, stand completely still while I focus, not so much teeth, honey. When she turned away from the scene, she could almost understand why they'd grow up and want to kill their mothers. She wanted to kill their mothers.
She checked her watch and hurried for the exit. She had a lunch date to keep.
'Thank God,' Jack said, hoarse by the time a guard showed up in the lineup of holding cells. 'I have to call my lawyer!'
'Shut up, Newlin.' The guard was burly and young, with a brushy mustache and an angry expression. 'You're nobody special in here.'
'I have a right to call my lawyer, like anybody else.' Jack was controlling his temper. He had to get to Trevor.
'Your rights. That's all I fuckin' hear all day.' The guard took a ring of keys from his pocket as another guard appeared for backup. 'Here's your rights, pal. You have the right to three frees a day, delivered to you like room service. You have the right to free heat and utilities and the right to be in the news like a friggin' celebrity.' The guard shoved a key into the lock in the cell. 'You got so many goddamn rights I can't count that high. Now turn around and put your hands behind your back.'
'I need to make that phone call.' Jack turned his back and presented his wrists, as the guard opened the door and slammed the cuffs on.
'Tell them at the house, counselor.' The guard yanked him out by the elbow and shoved him down the hall, but Jack exploded in frustration.
'Goddamn! I've waited hours for one lousy call!'
'Shut up!' the guard shouted, and pushed Jack so hard he lost his balance, stumbled forward, and fell.
'No!' Jack cried out. He couldn't break his fall with his hands cuffed, and his chest hit the concrete squarely, knocking the wind out of him. His chin bounced on the
floor and he felt dazed for a minute. When he looked up he was eye level with the laughing man. Who abruptly stopped laughing.
The lab at the Roundhouse was busy, the criminalists bright-eyed except one. She was the one Brinkley had had working all night, liaising with the FBI and running the DNA tests he needed. He'd had to rush the report of the result, to stay ahead of Davis. Brinkley thought about saying thank you to the tech, but didn't. It was part of her job. If she didn't like it, she should find another. 'What did you find out about the earring back?' he asked, standing with Kovich at the black-topped lab table. Before them was a row of microscopes and slides, which were carefully stored and numbered by case. 'It's hers, isn't it?'
The stiff's?'
'No, the daughter's. The earring back is Paige Newlin's, isn't it?'
'No, it's not. I took some flakes of skin off the hair you gave me and compared it with the earring back. There's no match.'
'What?* Brinkley couldn't hide his disappointment. 'You're sure about that?'
'Hair? What hair?' Kovich asked, but Brinkley ignored him.
'You damn sure about that?' he repeated. He would have bet his life it was the daughter's earring.
'Absolutely, Detective. I did a visual inspect and double-checked with a DNA analysis, just to make sure -'
'Hold on.' Kovich smiled crookedly. 'Let's get back to the hair.'
'The hair's not your concern,' Brinkley said, but Kovich pushed up his glasses.
'Excuse me, Mick, I'm very interested in this hair. You
may not know this, but hair is a hobby of mine. In fact, if I get to see this hair for even one minute, I bet I can tell you where it came from. I am a fucking hair expert.'
The criminalist looked from Kovich to Brinkley and held up her hands. 'Don't get me in the middle, okay? I was told to look it over on the QT, so I looked it over.'
'S'all right,' Brinkley said, but Kovich held out his hand.
'Cough it up. Gimme the hair. I can carbon-date it. I amaze my friends, really. You oughta see me at parties.'
'Here.' The criminalist slid the bagged hair from an unmarked case folder and handed it over.
'Well, well.' Kovich took the bag and held it up to the fluorescent lighting. 'Yes, it's quite clear that this is a very special hair. Subject hair belongs to a gorgeous young model who is innocent of any major felony, but who is so good-looking she should be locked up.'
Brinkley could hear the edge to Kovich's voice. He said to the criminalist, 'Did you check what I asked you?'
'Yeh. Lookit.' The criminalist turned around and peered into a large black microscope that rested on a white lab table. She took a second to bring the scope into focus, twisting the chrome knob. 'Check it. It's a match.'
Brinkley elbowed Kovich aside and looked in the microscope. A perfect circle of bright white stared back at him, and through the center of the circle was a thick stalk of red, with a line in the middle. That's a hair? What's that line in the middle?'
'It's the cortex. The center of the hair, basically. Now look at this slide.'
Brinkley watched as the circle went bright white and another red stalk appeared. 'It looks the same.'
'It is.'
'Nice,' Brinkley said, under his breath, and Kovich nudged him out of the way.
'Let me play.' The heavy detective bent over the scope. 'Ah, yes, even more hair, my specialty.'
'A hair found on the decedent's body,' the criminalist said. 'One of several actually. It is the same hair as those in the bag.'
'You dig, Kovich?' Brinkley asked. 'We got the daughter's hair on the mother. What's that tell you?'
Kovich came up from the scope, his expression sour. 'It tells me you and me are goin' for a ride, Mick.'
'You know it's good, Stan.'
'We'll talk about it. Let's not fight in front of the lady. Foul language may be involved.' Kovich turned to the criminalist. Thanks.'
'You're not gonna make a stink, are you, Detective Kovich?'
'Nah. I'm just gonna bitch-slap my partner here. You wanna watch?' Kovich turned to go, with Brinkley following.
'Don't forget the reports,' the criminalist called after them, and she thrust a set of papers at Brinkley. 'By the way, the dirt in Baggie A, from the coffee table? It was gravel, soot, silica, and paniculate of dog feces. Like you'd get off a sidewalk.'
'I coulda told you that, Mick,' Kovich said, as he led Brinkley out. 'I am a particulate-of-dog-feces expert.'
Brinkley didn't reply and tucked the reports unread under his arm.
It was impossible to keep a secret in a police station, so Brinkley and Kovich always fought in the Chrysler. It wasn't that they planned it that way, it was just that the fights always seemed to break out when they were driving. Or maybe that was the only time they talked to each other, Brinkley didn't know. 'The hair on the mom is the daughter's,' he was saying, increasingly exasperated. 'You tellin' me that that doesn't mean anything?'
'No. It means something.' Kovich was driving aimlessly in the north end of town. He squinted over the steering wheel into the bright sunshine. 'It means the mom hugged her daughter.'
'But the daughter told us she wasn't with the mom that day.' The Chrysler, a shitwagon, hadn't warmed up enough to turn the heat on, so Brinkley kept his jacket buttoned up. The car was an '88 model, left over from another unit. Homicide got all the castoffs; their motor pool was a disgrace.
'So she hugged her mother another day. A day the mother was wearing the same blouse.'
'What's the likelihood of that? They didn't live together.'
They worked together and they hugged.'
'And the hair didn't fall off since then?'
'No. I'm the hair expert and I say hair sticks. Half the time, I got dog hair all over me and the dog's been dead a year.'
'Shit. Come on, Stan. We wouldn't charge on that kind of evidence, but we'd sure as hell follow up. But we're not. We're lettin' the daughter go free.'
'We already charged, Mick.' Kovich slowed the car to a stop at the light. 'We locked the guy up.'
'So we unlock him.'
Kovich laughed, his head jerking back like he had whiplash, though the car was at a standstill. That's not happening and you know it.'
'It should happen.'
'Yeah, right.'
'We go to the lieutenant and we say, look we got some doubts here.' Brinkley gestured, palms up. 'I tell him, gimme a day. Gimme two days. Let me talk to this kid and open her up. Lemme get down to it.'
Kovich sighed audibly as the light changed and the car cruised forward. ' Davis is sure of his case.'
'He's wrong.'
'He got the prints, everything.'
'All staged.'
Kovich steered right onto Broad Street, which thronged with Temple students in down jackets, carrying heavy knapsacks. McGonigle Hall and the university's other buildings lined the street, and its bright garnet flags, bearing a huge white T, hung from the streetlights, filling like sails in the wind. One was ripped. Kovich flipped on the heat in the car. Frigid air blew through the vents.
'You gonna back me up?' Brinkley asked, but Kovich was already shaking his head. Seemed to Brinkley he'd been shaking his head since the case began.
'No.'
'Thanks.' Brinkley looked out the window, watching the students. They walked in a throng from the Students' Pavilion, past the ivy-covered Mitten Hall, built with grey stones usually seen in medieval churches, and under the wrought-iron gate that led to Berk Mall. The college girls were young and pretty but Brinkley barely noticed. He fiddled with the air vent, trying to break it.
'Sorry, Cholly.'
'Got it.'
Kovich squinted hard. 'I'm not a bad cop, Mick.'
'I didn't say you were.' Brinkley moved the vent slats this way and that.
'Just that there's somethin' you don't understand. This isn't about Newlin at all. Not anymore.'
'What you mean?'
'Let's pretend that Newlin is innocent, like you say. I don't think it, but let's pretend. Like Gene London used to say.'
'Gene London?'
'Kid's show. You don't remember The Gene London Show, when we were little? "Let's pretend that it's story time"?'
'No.' *
'How about Pixanne? Chick in green tights? Flies around like a fairy?'
'No.'
'Chief Halftown? Guy in an Indian headdress?'
'No.'
Kovich frowned. 'Where the fuck were you raised, Mick?'
'Not the same Philly as you. So what?'
'Forget it. Say Newlin is innocent. You think that matters.'
'Of course. It's the truth.'
'No.' Kovich clucked as he swung the car onto a side street and powered it forward. 'You wrong, home. Newlin used to matter, but he stopped mattering the minute he picked up the phone and told nine-one-one he did it. Then the case wasn't about him anymore, it was about dispatch, the uniforms, the techs, and us. You follow so far?'
'No.'
'You do, too. Next it got to be about the crime lab and the bloody prints and then, shit, the D.A.' Kovich hit the steering wheel with a palm. 'The D Fucking A. Mr Dwight Davis and his crew. Then the bail commissioner, and at the prelim it'll be the Municipal Court judge. Now it's about the American Justice Machine. Still with me?'
Brinkley stopped playing with the air vent. It was unbreakable. Nothing had been going his way, not since the lady left.
'Now Newlin's in the machine, and the machine is callin' the shots. And you know what? Newlin don't seem to mind very much. In fact, he's the clown who got the machine in motion. Cranked the sucker up. Engaged it, like a clutch. Poked that tiger with a stick. You understand?'
Brinkley's gaze fell on the reports in his lap. The daughter's hair was still in the folds of paper. Part of him wished he'd never taken it. Maybe he could forget about it then. Just let it go. He'd been wrong about the earring and the hummus. What was the matter with him?
'So, you get it, this is not about Mr Newlin at all. He may have been a rich, powerful lawyer, but now he's the guy who switched on the machine, and it ate him up like it was the whale and he was Jonah. Ain't nobody can save Mr Jonah now, not you and not me. Can't even see him no more. He's gone, Mick. All gone, and before you start cryin' for him, remember he brought the whole damn thing on himself.'
Brinkley stared at the reports encasing the hair. CRIMINALISTICS LABORATORY REPORT. It was for nothing. If the truth didn't matter anymore, then Brinkley didn't know what did. It was like with Sheree. He could never convince her that she already had what all her new friends were looking for. Whether she called it God, Allah, or Jehovah, it was all about love. And Sheree already had love. With him.
'So my question to you, is if our Mr Newlin wants himself convicted and the American Justice Machine wants him convicted, and even his own daughter wants him convicted, why you think you can try and stop it?'
The words on the reports swam before Brinkley's eyes. Was he losing it? Always thinking about Sheree, instead of business. Maybe that was his problem. The black letters on the crime lab reports came into sharp focus. It was the DNA comparison of the skin on the hair, Sample A, with the skin on the earring, Sample B. Lots of little letters that meant no match. Sample A indicated the DNA of a female. Sample B indicated the DNA of a male. Brinkley read the sentence again. The earring back was from a man's earring?
'Stan, pull over,' Brinkley said, and the car came to an abrupt halt.
Many sat on a frigid park bench behind Ray-Bans, on a busy Logan Square. Runners sprinted by in sweats and cotton gloves, heading to the river to do the eight-mile circuit. Catholic schoolgirls from Hallahan flocked together, their saddle shoes and blue uniforms out of a bad porn movie. Business-people hurried by, heading back to the office after lunch at one of the neighborhood restaurants like Au Bon Pain, Subway, and Mace's Crossing. Mary could count on one hand how many of them would have eaten at the Four Seasons.
'It's freezin' cold, Mare,' Lou said, sitting next to her. Lou Jacobs was a retired cop who worked as an investigator at the Rosato firm. His thin hair had silvered like cedar shakes and his skin weathered from a lifetime of weekend fishing trips to Ventnor. He was compact, though trim and fit, with sharp blue eyes and a nose curved like a gull's beak. Lou and Mary had worked together on a previous murder case and had survived – each other. Mary, newly in charge, had called him and asked him to meet her here.
'I know it's cold, Lou. We bosses aren't bothered by cold. In fact, we welcome cold.'
'Gimme a break.' Lou shoved his hands into the pockets of a lined windbreaker, with a zippered neck. Underneath he wore a blue cotton shirt, knit tie, and corduroy pants. He liked to look good while he froze his nuts off. 'Mare, let me give you a clue. When I was on the job, I ran plenty of stakeouts. We always waited in the car, where there was heat.'
'We can't do that. There's no parking around here.'
'Plus if you can't bug the suspects or put in a tap, you have to get real close to hear them talk. Take it from me. I'm giving you the inside track here.' Lou waved a wrinkled hand at the curved grey building that was the Four Seasons Hotel, perched on the corner across the street. The hotel restaurant faced Logan Square, and the Parkway encircling it was clogged with traffic. This may be too much of a detail for a boss, but trust me. We're too effin' far away to see or hear anything.'
'I know that. I'm working on that.' Mary sulked behind the sunglasses. I'll have a plan in a minute.'
'Well, let's review. We came, we saw the girl, Paige, and the boyfriend hug hello, then we saw them go inside to the restaurant. Now we're sittin' here like ice cubes.'
'Well, what do you think we should do? We bosses do use consultants from time to time.'
'Thank you.' Lou nodded graciously. 'Now. This girl, Paige, she obviously knows what you look like. But she doesn't know what I look like.'
'No.'
'Well, it's late and I haven't eaten yet. So, I suggest I have lunch, right now, at the Four Seasons.' Lou nodded, turning to the hotel. 'Maybe a nice, thick steak. With a beer. Imported, naturally, to go with my steak.'
Mary perked right up. 'That's a great idea! What a good consultant you are! You go in and listen!'
'Heineken would be nice.' Lou gazed at the hotel. 'Or Amstel.'
'You come back and tell me what you hear!'
'Maybe, for dessert, a little cappuccino. I like a little cappuccino with my imported beer.' Lou turned to Mary with a sly smile. 'I hear better when I have a little cappuccino, after my steak and my Amstel.'
'Go, already!' Mary said, giving him an excited shove, and Lou rose from the bench stiffly.
'Should I bring you a doggie bag?'
'Bring me evidence! Evidence to go!'
Lou muttered something and walked off.
Five minutes after he had gone, Mary realized she could have waited somewhere toasty, but by then it was too late to leave the bench. She pressed her legs together for warmth and huddled deep into her coat. The skyscrapers blocked the sun. Wind from the Schuylkill River whisked down the wide boulevard. Passersby looked at her curiously. She caught sight of Lou in the warm restaurant, being seated at a table near Paige and Trevor. She edged forward on the bench. Her butt was frozen. Her pantyhose formed crystals.
Mary watched as Lou ordered, then was brought a meal. She shivered as runners, businesspeople, and even the homeless came and went. She was cold to her contact lenses, but she didn't want to leave. This was her shot. If her theory was right, Paige and Trevor were conspirators to murder. She prayed Lou was hearing something incriminating.
She got up and paced to keep warm and kill time. She walked around until her pumps got caught in the grey cobblestones and she had memorized the placards posted for tourists. She learned that Logan Square used to be a site of public executions, that the Swann Fountain was named after the president of the Philadelphia Fountain Society, and that the three verdigris statues at the center of the fountain – man, woman, and young girl – represented the three rivers of Philadelphia: the Schuylkill, the Delaware, and the Wissahickon. She hoped that Lou learned something more useful, or at least, more interesting.
An hour later Mary saw Paige and Trevor pay the bill and leave the restaurant. As soon as they were out of sight, Lou got up and went after them. She couldn't suppress her excitement. What had Lou overheard? What if they were both in on it? She shivered, this time with anticipation, and trained her eyes on the hotel entrance. In time Lou came out, crossed the valet parking area, and walked briskly across the street and toward the park bench.
Mary stood up. Tell me, tell me, tell me!' she said, practically jumping up and down.
'Cheese and crackers! It's cold out here!'
'What'd you get?'
'A Caesar, to start, then I went with the Chilean sea bass, not the steak. For dessert, I had the chocolate chiffon cake with a decaf cappuccino. It hit the spot.'
'No, I mean, what did you hear?'
'Nothing.'
'What?' Mary was crestfallen. 'You didn't hear anything?'
'I heard, but they didn't say anything that mattered. They talked the whole time about nothing. He talked about his French test and his track team. She talked about Wu-Tang.'
'Wu-Tang?' Mary flopped down on the bench, dejected.
'That mean something to you?'
'It's music. A rap group.'
'Rap!' Lou snorted. 'Rap isn't music. Stan Getz is music. Or the Bird. Or Miles.'
Mary was too disappointed to debate it. 'So my lead doesn't pan out.'
'Don't take it too bad.' Lou sat down on the bench, tugging on his corduroy pants first so they didn't wrinkle. 'You didn't ask me where they are now.'
'Where they are now?' Mary looked over at him, then brightened. 'Where are they?' She checked the hotel entrance. They didn't come out. You came out but they didn't!'
They're inside. They tried to get a room.'
'A room?' Her mouth dropped open. She didn't know she was such a prude. Well, she kind of did. They tried to get a room together?' •,
'No separate.' Lou snorted. 'Of course, together.'
That's disgusting. They're way too young for that.'
'Not possible. Anyway, the hotel was booked and they didn't have a reservation. The room is beside the point, anyway.'
'It is? Why?'
'Because they're having sex in the cloakroom.'
'What?' Mary was astounded, but Lou checked his watch matter-of-factly.
'They should be done by now.'
'Done?'
'He's young. What can I say? We all go through it.'
Mary ignored him. 'How do you know this?'
'I followed them after they got turned down at the reception desk: I thought they were going out to the atrium but they took a quick right into the cloakroom. It's right off the main lobby.'
Mary sat back in the bench, appalled. 'Her mother was just killed. When does grief-stricken start?'
'Hold off on that. Mare.' Lou's eyes watered as he squinted against the cold wind. Sterling silver filaments of his hair flew around wildly. 'Look, if she were my kid, I'd smack her one. The both of 'em are outta control, you ask me. Rich kids. They think they're entitled.'
Mary nodded in agreement. Sometimes Lou sounded so much like her father it was scary. Mary decided that Italians and Jews weren't so different, except that Italians had even more guilt.
'It isn't good behavior, but it doesn't mean the kid killed her mother. I know, I've seen lots of victims' families. One father, when I told him his kid was dead, he just laughed and laughed. You can't judge by that. People show their grief in different ways.'
'Sex in public is mourning?'
'Yeah, for some people.'
Mary glanced at the hotel dubiously. 'Wonder when they'll come out. She told us Trevor had a class at three.' She checked her watch. It was almost three o'clock now. 'She lied about that.'
'Maybe she didn't lie. Maybe she talked him out of it.'
'I don't understand.'
'You're not a man. End of story.'
'Hmmm.' Mary watched the entrance, feeling torn. She wanted to see how long the two of them were there and what they did next, but she also felt guilty leaving Judy back at the office. She explained the quandary to Lou as she reached into her bag for her flip phone, dialed the office number, and left a message. 'She's not there,' she said as she slid the antenna down with a flat palm. 'So I should stay, at least.'
'Stay? In this cold?'
'You go back to the office. I'll stay here.' Suddenly Mary felt a surge of well-being. Dividing labor. Managing the case. Pushing old men around. Was this what they meant by empowerment?
'What are you gonna do here alone?'
'Watch when they come out, maybe follow them. Surveill them,' she answered, but Lou was looking at her, his eyes blank pools of blue in a tan, lined face. Either he didn't understand real police lingo or resented her empowerment. 'All right, Lou. You're the cop here. Help me out. Tell me what to do.'
'I'll stick around. See what happens.'
'Okay, good. I approve.'
'Like it matters.'
Mary smiled. 'I think you enjoy our quality time.'
'I think I got nothin' better to do. Plus I don't want you near that kid, the boy. I don't like him. He's a punk.'
Mary felt her suspicions gain strength. Lou knew this stuff. 'You think Trevor's in on it?'
'I don't know who's in on what. To me, the jury's out on the both of them. I don't know enough to make any conclusions, except that for kids with a lotta class, they got no class.' *
Mary didn't disagree.
Mary and Lou watched the entrance to the Four Seasons through two cups of hot coffee, three soft pretzels, and a hot dog with sauerkraut, which she had carted from a hot
dog stand in front of the Academy of Natural Science. At three-thirty, she switched to chocolate water in a white Styrofoam cup. There was still no sign of either Paige or Trevor, although Mary saw the entire partnership of Morgan, Lewis and Bockius leave a firm luncheon, laughing and talking. They'd had a good year. Again.
'Why does everybody hate lawyers?' she asked Lou, sipping lukewarm chocolate water. She kept her eyes on the hotel entrance.
'Because they can,' Lou answered. 'It's like that dog joke. You know that joke.'
'Yes, you told me that joke. The punch line is, "Because they can," right?'
'Right,' Lou said, though he didn't remember telling Mary that joke. He would never tell a woman that joke, and even though Mary was a kid, she was still a woman. 'Did I really tell you that joke?' he asked, to double-check.
'Yes,' she said, watching and sipping.
If he did, Lou regretted it.
Mary was giving Lou a pop quiz. 'Do you know what the three statues in the Swann Fountain are?'
Lou squinted behind him at the still fountain. 'Naked.'
'No. They're a man, woman, and young girl.'
'Naked.'
'No!' Mary's teeth chattered. 'I mean, do you know what they represent? Beside the Newlins?'
'No clue.'
The three rivers of Philadelphia. Can you name them?'
'The Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria '
'No.'
'Manny, Moe, and Jack?'
'No.'
'Moe, Larry, and Curly?'
Mary waited.
'Okay, tell me,' Lou said, after a time.
'It's them! They're out!' Mary leapt from the frosty bench when she saw Paige and Trevor materialize at the entrance to the Four Seasons, looking remarkably remote for a young couple that had just had sex in a coatroom. They weren't even holding hands, a fact that Mary couldn't help noting. 'See?' she said.
'I see 'em,' Lou said, rising stiffly and shoving his hands in the pockets of his corduroys.
'No, I meant, see, she shouldn't have had sex with him. He's not even holding her hand.'
His eyes were trained on the hotel and he squinted against the cold. 'What?'
'Forget it.'
'Look.' Lou frowned. 'She's takin' the one cab, he's takin' the other.'
'Oh, no.' Mary watched as the doorman retrieved a cab for Paige and Trevor helped her into it, then waited until the next cab in line pulled up for him. 'Where's he going? His school is three blocks away. What's he need a cab for?'
'Maybe he's late.'
'It'll take longer in the cab.' Mary snatched her bag from the bench. 'I'll follow him.'
'No, I will. I don't want you near him.' Lou hustled to the curb and hailed a cab that was coming toward them down the Parkway. 'You take her.'
'No, she knows what I look like.' Mary hustled in front of him at the curb and waved frantically at the cab. 'I'm following him.'
'Mare, wait.' Lou grabbed her arm in protest. 'Let me do it. You take her, I'll handle him.'
'No!' Mary said, and as the cab slowed to a halt, she lunged forward to take it, flinging open the door even before the cab had stopped. 'Follow her.'
'Mary, stop!' Lou kept a wrinkled hand on the door handle. 'This kid could be dangerous. Don't talk to him. Don't get close to him.'
I'll be careful. I'm not Judy or Bennie. You got your lawyers mixed up.'
'Hah! You're all trouble,' Lou called back, flagging the next cab, as Mary climbed into hers and took off.
Dwight Davis had gotten a job offer from the law firm of Tribe amp; Wright, so he remained uncowed by the grandeur of the place. Set at the pinnacle of a skyscraper, the firm occupied six floors, each one tastefully outfitted with light, custom furniture, giving the place a uniformly costly glow. As Tribe's managing partner, William Whittier had the largest office, and Davis was waiting for him in it. According to his secretary, Whittier had 'stepped away,' which was Tribespeak for went to the bathroom.
Davis sat with his flowery cup of coffee and suppressed his smile at the plush surroundings. Success at law firms was no longer measured in the number of windows – with modern architecture, even first-year associates couldn't be deprived of light and air – but in the number of desks. Second and third desks had become as important as second or third homes. Whittier had three desks; he not only ran the firm, he received the highest percentage of all fees it received. In other words, he was a major landowner, if not king.
Whittier 's main desk was a huge, glistening affair of white oak whose raison d'etre was to bear a single stack of correspondence, a shiny brass ship's clock, and a miniature walnut cabinet for a fountain pen collection. The second desk, to which Davis had been shown, was the Palm Beach house of desks, semitropical and relaxed. A large teak circle on a pedestal, it was as bare as the main desk except for a grey-green conferencing phone with footpads like a gecko. The third desk, tucked in the corner like a country home, was a computer workstation that held a slim laptop. For what it cost, Davis could hire an expert
that would put some scumbag in jail for consecutive life terms, but nobody at Tribe thought that way, which was why he'd turned them down.
'You must be Dwight Davis,' Whittier boomed, appearing at the door. Bill Whittier was a lanky six-footer, wearing a grey pinstriped suit and a broad, hale-fellow grin. He was middle-aged, but crossed the room with a sloppy step that reminded Davis of an overgrown frat boy, especially when Whittier clapped the prosecutor on the shoulder. 'Brother Masterson's told me all about you,' he said, and extended a loose handshake.
'You play tennis with a grip like that?' the D.A. said.
'Hah! Very good. Squash, actually. The bar's closer.'
There you go.' Davis smiled. Of course. Squash. He eased back into his seat. Thanks for your time today.'
'No problem. This matter 'is top priority, with me.' Whittier seated himself at the second desk opposite Davis and brushed back his pale blond hair with stubby fingernails, then twisted to the door just in time to see a second lawyer in an Italian suit coming in. 'And here's Art, right on time as usual.' The entering lawyer was thinner and shorter than Whittier, with gaunt cheeks, slick black hair, and dark eyes sharp behind eyeglass frames the size of quarters. Whittier turned back to Davis. 'You won't mind if one of my partners, Art Field, sits in.'
'Of course not, he's welcome.' Davis had expected as much and shook Field's hand before they both sat down. Field would function as Whittier 's counsel, to make sure the frat boy didn't get himself or the firm in trouble. Field would also qualify as a human tape recorder, to back up whatever Whittier said he said, whether he'd said it or not. What else were partners for?
Whittier relaxed, crossing one strong leg over the other. 'So tell me, how's your boss? Keeping the bad guys locked up, I hear. We're very proud of him, here at Tribe.'
Tm proud to work for the man,' Davis said, wondering if Whittier was reminding him of the firm's campaign
contribution. 'But if I tell him we're proud of him, he'll tell us to go straight to hell.'
Whittier laughed, a hearty ha-ha-ha signifying manners, not mirth. 'He is a little cranky, isn't he?'
'I try, Lord knows I try.'
Whittier ha-ha-haed again, then quieted. Terrible news about Honor Newlin, just terrible. And Jack of course. He was one of us, you know.'
'Yes, I do.' Davis nodded, impatient. Of course he knew Newlin worked here; that's why he'd asked Masterson to set up the meeting. Every muscle in him strained to cut the shit, but if he did that, he'd get nothing.
'It's a terrible tragedy, just terrible. We're still in shock, my partners and I, and awfully conflicted. Jack's confessed, I understand. It was reported in several of the morning papers.'
'I can't confirm or deny that.'
'Of course.' Whittier shook his head. 'All over the news. Partner at Tribe amp; Wright, well, just terrible. Terrible for Jack, and for the firm.' He kept shaking his head, though his wavy blond hair remained in order. 'Impossible to understand, you see. Jack was such a wonderful partner. A responsible husband and father. Impossible, really.' He sighed. 'As they say, who know what goes on behind closed doors?'
'Yes,' Davis said, for lack of something better, though Whittier didn't seem to be listening anyway. Davis couldn't shake the impression that Whittier was no Felix Frankfurter in the legal department and had become managing partner because of politics, not brainpower. And he undoubtedly had the right connections, which was all that really mattered in administrative jobs.
'And Honor Newlin was a lovely woman, a lovely woman. One of my wife's favorites.'
'Oh? Did you see them socially?'
'Not much.'
'How often?'
'Rarely.' Whittier eyed Davis warily. This concerns Jack, I assume. Not me or my partners.'
'Correct,' Davis answered, instantly wishing he had said something more casual. Once a D.A., always a D.A., and now Whittier had edged away, sitting farther back in his chair.
'Now, Davis, I'm no trial lawyer, I spent my long professional life in corporate law, as you may know. But I'm not so old I've forgotten what a subpoena is, and I understand that I am under subpoena to talk with you today. Is that the case, sir?'
'Of course.'
'You have a subpoena with you, for the record?'
'Definitely.'
'You'll leave it with Art before you go. I wouldn't want to be in the position of voluntarily doing anything that could harm Jack, if you understand.'
'Understood. May I?' Davis picked up one of the blank legal pads from the table. He knew that yanking out his own pad would put Whittier on guard and the only way he could get what he needed was if nobody acknowledged what was happening. 'Now, remind me, please. You are the managing partner here, and Jack Newlin headed the estates group, correct?'
'Yes, quite right.'
'He reported to you as such?'
'Yes. All department heads report to me.'
Davis made a note, to get Whittier used to it. He did it all the time in court so the jury couldn't tell what mattered and what didn't. 'Now, Honor Newlin's family foundation is represented by the Tribe firm.'
'Yes, the Buxton Foundation.'
Davis nodded. 'What is a foundation, anyway?'
'Damned if I know.' Whittier laughed again. 'Only kidding.'
'I figured,' Davis said, though he hadn't been so sure.
'Well, let's see, a foundation is simply a private charity,
established in this case, by a family. The Buxton Foundation donates the Buxton family money to public charities. By law, the Foundation is required to give away five percent of the total fund each year. Our firm helps it do that, with the tax advice and filings and whatnot required by Uncle Sam. It's a real tangle of paperwork, you can imagine. You work for the government, in effect.'
Davis ignored the slight, even if it was intended. 'And Buxton Foundation matters were handled by Newlin?'
'Yes, Jack brought the Foundation to us when he married Honor, and he supervised its matters for the firm. Essentially, he ran the Foundation, sat with Honor on the board, and doled out its legal work to our partners in various fields, as well as associates and paralegals.'
'How large is the Buxton Foundation?'
'Hah! Real large.'-
'How large?'
Whittier glanced at Field, who nodded imperceptibly. The Buxton is one of the more substantial family foundations. Two hundred million dollars, approximately.'
Davis blinked. Large. 'How much does the Foundation pay Tribe per year, in fees?'
'Does this matter?' Whittier cocked a pale eyebrow, his good cheer gone flat as keg beer.
'Absolutely.'
Three and a half to four million dollars a year.'
Davis made a note, as if he could forget that staggering a sum. The firm cannot have many clients that bill as much, can it?'
'Frankly, the Foundation is our largest client, and that's all I'll say about the Foundation. Understood?'
'Understood.' Davis switched gears. 'As to Jack, did he receive a portion of the fees the Foundation paid the firm? I know that's typical in the larger firms.'
Whittier nodded. 'He did. Jack was the billing partner on most matters, so he received a percentage of his client's fees, as a billings bonus.'
'What percentage?'
'It was substantial. Thirty-three percent, as I recall. We could supply you with the exact number under document subpoena.'
'I'll look forward to it.' Davis accepted the answer for now. So Newlin would get thirty-three percent, more than a highway robber but less than a personal injury lawyer. If the Buxton billings amounted to three million dollars a year, which they easily did, Jack would take home a mil of that. And it also meant that as between the Foundation or Newlin, the Tribe firm would choose the Foundation, never mind that they'd have to hang their own partner. 'Let's get to the night of Honor's murder.'
'Yes, let's,' Whittier said, plainly relieved, and Davis thought it ironic that Whittier would rather talk about murder than money.
'You saw Jack the night of the murder, didn't you?'
'Yes. Let me think a minute.' Whittier gazed out an immense window to the spectacular view of the city below. Davis was watching him so closely he saw his pupils telescope down in the light. 'Around six o'clock, I think.'
'How long did you two speak for?'
'About fifteen minutes, as I remember.'
'Would you have billed that time?'
'Yes, we bill in six-minute increments,' Whittier answered, without apparent shame. 'My time records would reflect the exact time we spoke.'
'I'd like to see your records for that day, if I can.'
Whittier exchanged looks with Field, then said, 'You're serving the firm with a document subpoena.'
'Yes, it's already included.'
'Fine, then.' Whittier pressed a button on the conference phone and asked his secretary for the records. Davis was sure Whittier could have accessed them from his laptop, but that would have necessitated moving from the second home to the third. While they waited for the records, Whittier remained silent, taking in the view
out his window as if neither Davis nor Field were there. In a minute, the secretary emerged with the records, handed them to Whittier, and vanished. Whittier slipped tortoiseshell reading glasses from his inside jacket pocket and popped them on the bridge of his nose. 'I hate that I have to wear these now,' he grumbled, almost to himself.
'What do the records show?' Davis asked, because he couldn't not. If something had gone wrong with Newlin's plan, it could have been the timing.
'Well, I was right,' Whittier said, underlining one entry with his finger.' C I: JN re Florrman bill. That means I spoke with Jack Newlin from 6:15 to 6:30, regarding the bill in Florrman.'
'May I see that, please?' Davis accepted the records, without remarking that Whittier would bill a client for discussing the client's bill. He knew it was common in the white-shoe firms. That was how they paid for the second and third homes. Davis skimmed the records. Shit. The timing was a dry hole. 'Did you record this right after the conversation?'
'Yes, I always do.' Whittier paused. 'It does bring back my conversation with Jack, that night.'
'I was just getting to that. Tell me about it.'
'Well, I saw him walking past my door, his office is just down the hall, and it struck me as earlier than he usually left. I had been wanting to talk to him about the Florrman bill all day but I got tied up in meetings, so when I saw Jack I knew I had to grab him. I called to him and he didn't stop, so I went to fetch him in the hall. I told him I had some concerns about the bill in Florrman, that at six months it was an older receivable. It-was time to dun the client in some effective manner. More effective than whatever Jack was doing.'
'What did he say to you?'
'He loathed to dun clients, but he said he'd get it current and that he had to go. He said he had dinner planned with Honor.'
'He said "dinner planned with Honor"?'
'Yes, and he seemed agitated.'
Davis wrote it down verbatim. 'How agitated?'
'Very. He was preoccupied the entire time I was speaking with him. He seemed nervous, and in a hurry. It was evident, and I told him so. I asked him if anything was the matter.'
Davis made a another note. It was so good for premeditation. 'What did he say?'
'He said he was fine. Great. Never better.'
'Would you testify to this conversation and your observations at trial?'
'If I were subpoenaed.'
'Fine. Do you know how he and Honor got along?'
'Well, as far as we could tell. They were an intensely private couple, though, not the type to socialize or serve on boards other than the Foundation. Still Honor was a wonderful woman, a lovely woman. Devoted to her husband and daughter.'
Davis paused. 'She must have left a will.'
'Yes, it will be probated as soon as possible.'
The will was prepared by this firm, right?'
'Yes. I supervised its preparation.'
Davis wasn't surprised. A document that important would have to be blessed by the firm's managing partner, and Newlin was too smart to do it himself. It would look like a conflict of interest for him to prepare a will that named him the lucky winner of the Buxton lottery. 'Who benefits under her will?'
The beneficiary won't be released until we receive a death certificate, and that information is confidential.'
'Again, I'll honor the confidence until probate, when it becomes public record. But I need to know now. Who benefits under the will?'
'Well, well.' Whittier cleared his throat, setting his neck wattle jiggling above a stiff white collar. The answer to your question is rather complicated, but in essence, Honor
left a personal estate worth fifty million dollars. Now, as you know, that's separate from the Foundation's corpus, which would exist in perpetuity, even after her death. Only the fifty million descends under the will, and none of it was earmarked for charity.'
Davis smiled to himself. Only the fifty million. 'So Newlin gets the fifty mil.'
'No.' Whittier shook his head. 'Not at all. The daughter does. Paige inherits the fifty million.'
The prosecutor's mouth went dry. It couldn't be. His theory of motive flew out the window. 'Newlin doesn't benefit under the will?'
'Jack? Not a penny.' Whittier 's lips set firmly. 'He gets nothing.'
That can't be. Do you have the will? I'll keep it confidential and I did subpoena it.'
'I have it right here.' Whittier glanced at Field, pulled a thick packet with a blue backer from a folder in front of him, and passed it across the desk.
'Thank you,' Davis said, snatching the will from the table. Its pages felt smooth under his fingers, which almost itched as he thumbed through the document. How could this be? He speed-read the provisions, all corporate boilerplate, until he got to the relevant provisions, which clearly explained the bequest. It provided that Paige would inherit one-third of her mother's estate at age twenty-one, one-third at age twenty-five, and the final third at age thirty. There was no mention of Jack Newlin at all. Davis looked up, speechless, but Whittier had taken a sudden interest in the cityscape outside the window.
'You may want to talk with one of our other partners, if you have further questions,' he said casually.
'What do you mean?' Davis looked from Whittier to Field and back again. He didn't get what was going on. The will had thrown him off-balance. Were they trying to tell him something? And trying not to, at the same time? It was exactly what you'd expect from a law firm that wants to
shaft one of its own partners and avoid massive liability therefore. 'Who else should I speak with?'
'His name is Marc Videon. But you'll need a subpoena.'
I'll have it sent right over.'
'We'll need it before you speak with him.'
'Consider it done.' Davis felt urgent. Where was this leading? 'Who's Videon?'
'He's one of our more specialized lawyers at Tribe. Sui generis. A department unto himself.'
'What's this Videon do?'
'Divorce,' Whittier answered, and for a minute, Davis couldn't reply.
Follow that cab!' Mary told the cabbie and couldn't help but feel a little thrill.
The driver, a diminutive, dark-haired man with a curly mustache, turned around in the front seat. 'No Eeenglish,' he said, and Mary pointed at Trevor's cab, a trifle disappointed.
'Go! There!' she commanded. She kept her eyes on the cab ahead as it idled in the congested traffic on Market Street. The outline of Trevor's head was visible and he moved as if he were talking to the driver. In the next minute his hand emerged from the back window, halting a car that was trying to cut in front of them. He must have been in a hurry. Trevor's cab burst forward, going west, away from the city.
'Hurry, please!' Mary said. Trevor's school was behind them, so he wasn't going back to class. What was he up to? Something was going on; her lead hadn't been so dumb after all. Trevor's cab reached Seventeenth Street and took a left, a familiar jog that Mary took all the time, negotiating the one-way streets of her hometown. William Penn had laid out the grid two hundred years ago, and he hadn't taken cabbies and lawyers into account. She took a guess where Trevor was headed, and ten minutes later found out she was right.
Both cabs pulled up in the drop-off island at the Thirtieth Street train station, one after the other, as if unrelated. Both cab doors opened at the same time, and Mary left her cab only a split second after Trevor left his, and followed him into the station, keeping her excitement in check. Trevor hurried into the tan marble concourse past the left
wing of the station, bypassing the suburban trains. Mary tracked him as he threaded his way through the crowd of travelers getting off the train from Washington. Trevor made a beeline for the ticket counter, and she picked up her pace.
The lines were long at the ticket windows, and Mary got behind Trevor in line, a zigzaggy affair cordoned with black tape. She looked at him up close, to see what she could see. Was he the kid who had bumped into her in the hall at Paige's condo? She couldn't tell. His hair was a light brown color, expensively feathered around the ears, and he wore a thin gold hoop in his ear. His eyes were large and clear blue, and in profile, he had a straight nose with a suspiciously perky tip. His shoulders were broad in a brown bomber jacket with a white T-shirt underneath, and he was easily six feet tall. Trevor struck her as a young prince, a type Mary disliked. Maybe because she couldn't pass for a princess. If Paige was the delicate cycle, Mary was distinctly regular.
NEXT AGENT AVAILABLE read the white blinking letters, and the line advanced. It moved unusually swiftly, with four agents working away and nobody asking for a complete oral timetable for a change. Trevor seemed impatient, even jumpy. His hand wiggled at his side and he kept shifting his feet from one brown suede Doc Martens to the other. What was his problem? Why was he in a hurry?
The line moved forward again, and though Trevor was three travelers from the front, he pulled a wallet from his back pocket and flipped it open as Mary peeked. It was a thin calfskin billfold and on the left were four credit cards, including a gold American Express card, VISA, and MasterCard. Mary didn't get it. Even she couldn't qualify for a gold Amex. Did this kid pay these bills himself? Where would a student get bucks like that?
Mary made a mental note, and the line shifted forward. She thought it was Trevor whom she'd passed in the hall but wanted to make sure. She cleared her throat and
decided to shake his tree. 'Excuse me, I hate to be rude, but do you live at Colonial Hill Towers? I have a friend who lives there and I think I've seen you there.'
'No.' Trevor shook his head, jittery. 'I live in the subs. Paoli.'
'But have you been there? At Colonial Hill?'
The line shifted forward, putting Trevor at the front. NEXT AGENT AVAILABLE, blinked the sign. He turned to the ticket counter, and one of the agents waved him forward. 'No,' he answered, over his shoulder. 'Never.'
'Oh, sorry.' Mary watched Trevor hustle to the agent. So he had lied; he had obviously been at Colonial Hill. Why would he lie about it? Or did people who lied lie all the time? And where was he going? She tried to overhear him at the ticket counter but it was too far away. Then the lighted sign started blinking again and an agent at the other end was waving her forward. Damn. She wanted to know where Trevor was headed. She stalled, trying to hear what he said to the agent.
'Lady, you goin' today?' a man behind her asked irritably, and Mary walked to the ticket counter.
'I don't really need a ticket, I have a problem,' she said, when she reached the window. The Amtrak agent was an older woman in a red-and-blue uniform. Her eyes were overly made-up behind glasses with swirly gold-metal frames, and her smile was lipsticked a rosy red.
'Problem?' The ticket agent cocked an eyebrow penciled like a half-moon, and Mary inched closer to the glass.
'I'm in love.'
'That's a problem.'
'That guy over there. I just got in the ticket line because I thought he was so cute. Do you think he's cute?'
The agent's gaze slid sideways to Trevor and back again. 'For a guy with a nose job.'
'You think?'
'I know.'
'I hate that. Why is it okay when women are vain but not men?'
The agent smiled, her lipstick glossy. 'They don't teach us that at Amtrak.'
Mary laughed. She kept an eye on Trevor, who was leaving the ticket window with two blue tickets in his hand. 'Can you tell me where he's going? Look him up in the computer?'
'No. Forget about him anyway. It ain't happening.' The agent pointed, and Mary turned around.
Trevor was rushing into the outstretched arms of a pretty blond girl with long, straight hair. She looked slightly older than he, but had a matching nose job, and Trevor embraced her, giving her a long, wet kiss. 'Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,' Mary said, under her breath.
'Looks like he's taken.'
'You don't know the half of it.' Mary shook her head and watched Trevor go down for another deep, lingering kiss.
'You gotta go,' the agent said. 'Remember, there's a lotta fish in the sea.'
'Sure.' She nodded and moved from the window as Trevor hugged the girl close. Then he checked his watch, put his arm around her, and they hurried laughing into the concourse.
Mary followed him to find out which train they took. She couldn't believe this guy. Scum, total scum. She lurked under the black information board in the middle of the busy concourse. 'Metroliner to New York, all aboard Track Six,' boomed a voice over the loudspeaker. The information board changed, its numbers flipping noisily around, and she watched Trevor and the blonde sprint into the line at Track Six, where the passengers were already showing their tickets to a blue-jacketed conductor.
So that was it. Trevor had another girlfriend and they were going to New York. Mary saw him and the blonde show their tickets to the conductor, then waited until they disappeared down the stairs to the train.
Lou, in an old black gypsy cab, trailed Paige's Yellow cab down Race Street. Behind them was the Parkway, ahead lay the red-lettered signs of Chinatown's restaurants. Paige's cab was heading east, away from downtown. Lou slid forward on his seat, his eyes on the Yellow. What kind of girl was this Paige? Eating at the Four Seasons? Takin' cabs everywhere?
Lou shook his head. When he was a kid on Leidy Street, he walked. Rode his bike. Took the trolley, with sparks flying from the wires that hung over the city like black lace. Or the subway-surface cars, with that burnt rubber smell. Forget cabs. He wasn't in a cab until he was twenty-five. It was a very special thing to take a cab. Lou still couldn't hail one without feeling rich.
'She's turnin' onto Race,' the driver said. A young black kid, excited to be following someone. Lou didn't mind it. He liked enthusiasm in people.
'Stay with her,' Lou said, his thoughts on this Paige. What kind of a name was Paige anyway? When did girls start getting named Paige? He understood names like Sally, Mary, Selma. But Paige? Lou's mouth set grimly. How you expect a girl to turn out when you name her Paige?
'She turned right on Twelfth, goin' up,' the cabbie said, gesturing with his hand. A colorful braided string was tied to his wrist. 'You want me to step on it?'
'Nah. Just don't lose 'em.' The cabbie's shoulders drooped, and Lou felt bad raining on his parade. 'You like music?' he asked, just to make conversation as they sat stalled. Construction around the Convention Center clogged the street, the jack-hammers like machine-gun fire.
'I love music,' the cabbie answered.
'What do you like?'
'Rap.'
'Everybody likes rap, nowadays.'
'It's good.'
'It is? Who's a good rapper?'
'DMX Dr Ore. You know them?'
'I know Dr Dre. Takes care of my prostate,' Lou said, and the cabbie laughed.
Paige's Yellow cab took a right toward The Gallery, and Lou was surprised. She was going shopping? He had her figured more for Neiman Marcus than JCPenney, but the cab stopped on the right, short of The Gallery. He looked around. What else was there? The bus station. What, was she leaving town?
'She's gettin' out,' said the cabbie, edging up in his seat, and Lou's cab slowed to a stop a half a block behind the girl's. The back door of the Yellow cab opened, and Lou quickly fished out a twenty and handed it to the cabbie, who looked at the money in astonishment. 'But the fare's only three bucks.'
'I know that. You gotta buy a record with the difference.'
'A record? You mean a CD?'
'A CD, yes. Buy yourself Stan Getz At the Shrine:' Lou could see Paige moving in the backseat of her cab. She must be paying, too. 'Getz. You got that name?'
'Never heard of him. He new?'
'No, he's old. Very old. Old as me. Promise you'll get that CD.'
'I promise,' the cabbie said, and Lou climbed out of the cab after the girl.
But when Paige got out of the cab she didn't look the same as when she went in. She was wearing a black baseball cap that she must have put on in the cab and her red ponytail swung from an opening in the back of the cap. She slipped on a pair of dark sun-glasses as she
walked. It was a disguise, strictly amateur, but why would she do it? To go shopping? To take a bus? What gives? True, the Newlin murder was all over the Daily News and the Inquirer, but nobody had published the girl's photo yet. The father was the story.
The girl kept walking down the cross street and even in the glasses and baseball cap caught plenty of stares from passersby and construction workers. Lou could see why. She wore a black miniskirt and legs. It was cold out, but you'd never know it from how she was dressed, in a navy pea coat that almost covered the skirt. She took strides so long he had to huff and puff to keep up with her, and the motion of her walk was something else. Even in clunky black shoes, she moved like the sidewalk was a catwalk. Lou didn't mind watching her, then felt guilty about it. She was way too young, and he liked young girls to be ladies, not to do the stuff this kid was doing. At the Four Seasons yet.
She crossed Market Street past The Gallery, and Lou followed her at a safe distance. Where was she going? Nowhere close. And why have the cab drop you so far from where you're going? Lou thought about it. Because you don't want anybody to know where you're going. And considering her disguise, he figured the girl was either paranoid or had something to hide.
They entered the old business district, abandoned now that most of the large companies had fled uptown to the new, glistening skyscrapers… Lou remembered when this part of town hopped, because of the Ben Franklin Hotel, the Old Federal Courthouse, and the busiest, the Post Office. Nowadays everything was e-mail and Chestnut Street was lined with car stereo outlets, credit unions, and Dollar stores. But Lou didn't have time to reminisce. He followed Paige to a sooty sliver of a low-rise and watched her disappear through its stainless steel door. Lou didn't know the building. Its sign was small and he squinted to read it.
PLANNED PARENTHOOD.
Lou halted in his tracks. He felt suddenly like he wasn't allowed to enter, like it was a ladies' bathroom or a bra store. He thrust his hands in the pockets of his corduroys. Wind ruffled his hair as he stood in the cold sun. People hurried past, looking back curiously. Even if he was a man, he could still go inside, couldn't he? It was a free country. He smoothed his hair in place, straightened his tie, and went in.
Paige took an elevator to the fourth floor; Lou knew because he watched the old-fashioned numbers light up to track the single car, and he went up after her. Planned Parenthood's offices turned out to be brightly lit and painted a watercolor lavender, with matching cushioned chairs arranged in two rows in front of a TV mounted in the left corner of the room. The large reception desk was shielded by clear glass, which Lou figured was for security. Pastel pictures of women covered the walls, and women's magazines were fanned out on display on the side wall. On the rug under the display sat a large wicker basket in which Lou would have expected some artificial fruit. Instead were sample packets of Stayfree minipads.
Lou looked away, embarrassed, then spotted the Newlin girl. She had taken off her sunglasses but was still in her cap talking to a young, black receptionist behind the glass shield. By the time he found them, both women were looking at him funny. He guessed it was because of security, and not just because he was an old Jewish guy.
'Can I help you, sir?' the receptionist said, calling across the room, and Paige looked expectant under the brim of a cap that said GUESS. Lou didn't know what the hat meant, unless it was how he felt.
'Uh, no, but thanks,' he answered. 'I'm… meeting someone here.'
'Who?' The receptionist was pretty, with big brown eyes and a sweet smile. Her hair had been marceled into finger waves, which Lou liked. He remembered when women
wore finger waves the first time around. And pleated skirts. He liked them, too, but they were long gone.
'I'm, uh, waiting for my daughter. She asked me to meet her here, and I'm early.'
'Does she have an appointment?'
'No, she was coming in without one.' Lou took a few steps forward, and if he had a hat it would be in his hand. He noticed Paige watching the exchange, her mild impatience betrayed by a pursing of her lips. 'Is that okay?'
'Well, some of our clients are walk-ins, but she'll need an appointment to use our services.'
'Oh, sure. Right. I am in the right place, aren't I? I mean this is the place where you give out birth control, right?'
'We do perform that function, among other services.' The receptionist permitted herself a smile as she gestured to a bank of pamphlets sitting on the counter in plastic holders. YOUR REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEM, BREAST SELF-EXAMINATION, THE FIRST VISIT TO THE GYNECOLOGIST, read some of the titles. 'If you want to learn more about us, read the pink one.'
'Thanks.' Lou picked up the pink pamphlet, which read SERVICES WE PROVIDE. It would be useful and it was less embarrassing than YOUR BREASTS. 'I'll study up.'
'Feel free to take a seat. You can wait for your daughter, and when she gets here I can make an appointment for her.'
'Sure, okay, I knew that. I'll just wait.' Lou nodded and looked around the lavender sea for a seat. The last time he felt this funny was when he went to Rosato's law firm for the first time and all he saw everywhere was women. Now he was used to it; it had only taken him a year: He saw a chair near the reception desk and sat down, straining to overhear what Paige was saying to the receptionist. It sounded to Lou like, 'Isisinwn sjduudun?' He'd had the same problem in the Four Seasons and was thinking it might be time to break down and get a hearing aid.
Paige finished her conversation with the receptionist and
sat down in a chair a few away from his, against the same wall. If she recognized Lou from the Four Seasons, it didn't show. She opened her pea coat, crossed her legs in her black skirt, and picked up a Seventeen magazine. She began to read it, baseball cap bent over the glossy pages, as if she were memorizing it.
Lou's experience on the job told him to take it slow. The girl was here for a very personal reason and part of him felt bad prying into her life. Far as he knew, the girl was the daughter of a murder victim and had been through hell in the past few days. So what if she messed around with her boyfriend in the coatroom? It wasn't his business, and if her emotions were all confused, he could understand that. But why was she here?
He considered it. If she needed birth control pills or had some plumbing problem, she probably had a real gynecologist. One of those classy ones around Pennsylvania Hospital, closer to where Mary said she lived. No reason for a rich girl to come to Planned Parenthood in a half-assed disguise, unless it offered something she couldn't get anywhere else.
Lou had a guess, but he wasn't certain. He opened the pamphlet and read: 'We offer reproductive health care for women and teens. Every FDA-approved birth control method, gynecological exams, walk-in pregnancy testing, testing for sexually transmitted disease, and first trimester abortion.' The girl could get all of the services at a regular doc, without a baseball cap, except one.
Poor kid. She must be in trouble, big-time. Lou glanced over at her to see if she looked pregnant, but he couldn't tell. She looked skinny and gorgeous; maybe she wasn't showing yet. He had two sons, both grown and moved away, and didn't remember much about pregnancy except that anchovy pizza was a definite no. It was a different time then. He wasn't there when his kids were born; the nurse brought them out like UPS.
Lou had to confirm his theory. He got up, crossed the
room, and picked up another pamphlet from the counter. It was white, entitled, WHAT TO EXPECT IF YOU CHOOSE ABORTION. The receptionist was on the phone, and on the way back he smiled at Paige, letting her see the pamphlet. He eased into the chair with an audible groan and opened the bifold. This is amazing, what they do here,' he said, to no daughter in particular.
Paige didn't reply, but continued with her magazine.
'It looks like they really know their stuff.' He turned to Paige. 'You think they do?'
'I don't know.' She looked noncommittal under the GUESS.
'I mean, I'm kinda worried. My daughter, she's thinking she might have to have an abortion.'
'Oh,' Paige said, and her face flushed. Lou was struck by the fairness of her skin.
'I don't mean to get personal, it's just she's my only girl. She has lots of questions. She can't decide, and I don't want her to… to… well, it's not like this is a hospital, you know.' He returned quickly to the pamphlet. 'Well, sorry. I shouldn't have said anything to you.'
Paige returned to her magazine with a quick swivel of her long neck.
Lou pretended to read the pamphlet and let the silence fall. If she had something to say, she'd come to him. He had seen it over and over when he questioned younger witnesses, on the job. Young girls, deep inside, just wanted to please. Sometimes silence proved the best weapon. So he didn't say anything.
Neither did Paige, who read her magazine.
Lou rustled his pamphlet.
Paige studied her magazine.
Lou worried that silence might not be the best weapon.
'She needs a counselor,' Paige said, finally looking over, and Lou nodded.
'A counselor? Not a doctor?'
'No, not doctors. Counselors don't do exams or anything.' Paige's expression had softened and she suddenly looked to Lou like an ordinary teenager, instead of a model. They'll answer all your daughter's questions. They'll help her decide what to do. They'll just talk to her.'
Lou waited, taking it slow. 'They just talk to her?'
'Yeah.' Paige nodded, the cap brim bopping up and down. 'As many times as she wants, and they're really nice.'
They're nice?'
'Really nice.' Paige broke into a smile. It seemed to Lou as if she wanted to talk to him, but part of her held back.
'So you think they'll help her decide? I mean, she's kinda confused.'
'Oh, sure, that's their job. I mean, they don't push you one way or the other. They just listen and help you decide.' Paige smiled again, with her eyes, too, this time, and Lou felt how young she was, how vulnerable. She knew too much about this process not to be in the same position herself.
There was a loud intercom beep at the receptionist's phone, and both Lou and Paige looked up at the sound. The receptionist put her phone call on hold, stood up, and picked up a manila folder from the desk. 'Ms Stone,' she said to Paige. 'You can go in now. I'll buzz you in.'
Ms Stone. Lou wasn't surprised at the use of the alias. This girl played it so close to the vest he wondered if anybody else knew she was in trouble. He watched as she squared her shoulders in her man's pea coat and followed the receptionist out of the waiting room. She was so in control for her age it reminded him of the young gangbangers he met on the street. Kids, with no mother and no father to speak of, who raised themselves. They got older but they never really grew up, and they stayed hollow at the core. And this girl, who musta had every advantage, didn't seem any better off.
Lou didn't get up from his chair, even though it was
his chance to slip out of the place. He felt tired suddenly. He didn't know when kids had changed, but they had, in his lifetime. They got to be empty inside; they didn't care about anything. They listened to one-hit wonders, watched movies that weren't funny, and didn't read enough books. They didn't play ball in the street; they collected guns and shot each other. Lou didn't understand how it had happened, but it had, and it happened to Paige Newlin, too. There was something missing at her heart, and Lou worried that there was nothing in the world that could set it right.
It took Lou a few minutes before he could get up from the chair, but get up he did.
Kovich studied the criminalistics report, resting it against the steering wheel of the car, which idled at the curb. Temple students going to class flowed in front of the car but Kovich didn't notice. 'The earring back is from a man?'
'That's what it says.' Brinkley leaned over and pointed on the report with a cold finger. The heat still hadn't warmed up in the beat-up Chrysler and the tall buildings on Broad Street blocked the sun. 'Contained sloughed-off skin cells from a male.'
'Okay, so?' Kovich looked over, and Brinkley edged back into his seat.
'I don't know. Let me think. It's a surprise.'
'Only because you figured it was the daughter's, which it ain't.'
Brinkley collected his thoughts. Take it step by step. We find an earring back next to the body, which suggests it came off after a struggle with the doer.'
'The location suggests a possibility it came off during the struggle with the doer. It coulda come off anytime at all. Fallen off a rug cleaner who wears an earring. A gay decorator who wears an earring. Every guy in Philly wears an earring nowadays, maybe two. My brother wears one, for fuck's sake. Coulda been anybody, anytime.'
'Okay, but it's possible that it came off in the death struggle.'
'It's possible.'
'Good. At least it's possible.' Brinkley looked out the windshield of the car at the Temple students. Boys and girls flooded into the buildings in parkas, lugging backpacks like tanks. A couple of the boys had their arms around the
girls, but the backpacks got in the way. Brinkley watched them idly. 'I thought it could have been the daughter's because I'm working on the theory that she's the doer, and the father is taking the fall, right?'
'Also you are dumber than you look, in contrast to me. But yes. Right.'
Brinkley was thinking too hard to ask Kovich what he was talking about. 'If the location suggests the earring back came off during a struggle with the killer, then the killer was a male. So if you combine my theory with this physical evidence, it suggests that a man was at the scene with the daughter.'
Kovich nodded. 'Unless Newlin wears an earring, and he don't.'
'Also, remember that there was dirt on the coffee table, put there by someone's shoe, and it had to be someone who put it there Monday after the maid cleaned. It's consistent with a male, since lots of women don't put their feet up on coffee tables.'
'Mostly but okay. So what we got?'
'We got a man at the scene, brought there by the girl. Because I don't believe Newlin is the doer and there's no male in the picture he would protect, except a man he didn't know was there. A male his daughter brought in.' Brinkley's heart quickened and he kept staring out the window. Two of the Temple students kissed. Young love, he could barely remember it. And then suddenly he could. 'The daughter has a boyfriend.'
'How do you know?'
'You saw her. She's a knockout. She's gotta have a boyfriend.' Brinkley gestured out the window to the kids eating face. 'Girl like that*, she's gotta have a ton of boyfriends.'
Kovich grew quiet, but Brinkley didn't notice.
'So let's say she goes over to dinner with the boyfriend and they kill the mother together. Or the daughter does it and the boyfriend helps, one way or the other. We got the
wrong guy, Stan. We have to talk to the daughter again and find out if she has a boyfriend.'
'No.'
'What?'
'We're not bothering that kid again.' Kovich shoved the report at him, and Brinkley knew he was in trouble.
'Why not?'
'Because she's a kid, Mick.'
'So what? We question lots of kids. This kid's not from the projects, so we don't question her?'
'Don't go there, Mick. You know me too well for that.' Kovich raised his voice a notch. The girl lost her mother and now her father. You wanna find out if she has a boyfriend, find another way.'
Brinkley thought about it. 'Okay, let's go. Turn around.'
Kovich leaned over and released the emergency brake. 'Fine,' he said, and Brinkley heard the winter wind in Kovich's voice.
It was never fine when Kovich said it was fine.
Brinkley scanned the lobby of Colonial Towers. Black marble, cushy tan chairs, and a classy security desk with a young white kid sitting behind it. His hat had slid back on his forehead and his neck sprouted like a stem out of his collar. Brinkley introduced himself and Kovich to the kid, who sat up straight when he saw the badges. 'Homicide detectives? Sure, sure. How can I help you?'
'I wanna ask you a few questions about one of your tenants here. Paige Newlin.' The guard's face changed immediately from fear to familiarity.
'You know who I mean.'
'Sure, the model.' The guard frowned. 'I read her dad killed her mom. That's heinous.'
Brinkley didn't comment. 'We're investigating that murder, and I need background information about her comings and goings.'
'She comes and goes, nothing regular, for her job. But
you notice her, you know.' The guard smiled shyly. 'She's totally hot.'
'You ever see her with guys? You know, like boyfriends.'
'Uhm, yes. She sees some guy, a prep, since she moved here.' Bingo. 'She's dating him?'
'Looks that way.'
'He stay over?'
'I'm the night shift, not the morning. But I think so.'
'What's he look like?'
'We call him Abercrombie Boy. He's like, right out of the catalog, you know.'
Brinkley had no idea. 'No, I don't.'
Tall, a jock. Good-looking. A rich boy.'
'He got an earring?'
'I don't know. Mostly I look at her.'
'You got a sign-in log?'
'Yeah, sure.' The guard went behind the desk, pulled out a large black notebook, and opened it up.
Turn back to the page for Monday,' Brinkley asked, and the kid found the page and turned the book toward the detectives. It was a standard ledges, with signatures in a list and the time they signed in. Brinkley ran his finger down the page, stopped at the name of Paige Newlin, then jumped to the signature next to hers. Trent Reznor. Trent Reznor, that's his name,' Brinkley said, satisfied.
'Huh? That can't be his name.' The guard came around and peered at the logbook. Trent Reznor's with Nine Inch Nails.'
'What?' Brinkley read over the guard's shoulder, then thumbed back in time and checked every name written next to Paige Newlin's. 'Ben Folds, Thurston Moore, Gavin Rosdale,' he read aloud, and the guard took off his hat.
'Wait a minute. Ben Folds is with Ben Folds Five, Thurston Moore is with Sonic Youth. They're all bands. None of those are real names.'
Brinkley went further backward in time, reading the log
entries. 'Dave Matthews, Eddie Vedder. Also rock stars, aren't they?'
'Yeah, older ones.'
Brinkley tore through the book, checking each time he saw Paige Newlin's name on a line. The entries went back to December of last year and each name next to hers was different, as was each line of handwriting. Some slanted forward and some back, but he never wrote in the same hand twice. Shit! 'Don't you read what these people write down?' Brinkley demanded.
'Uh, no.' The kid colored. 'I mean, not usually, I guess. We just ask them to write it.'
'What's the point then? Why have them sign it if you're not going to check? What're you doin' the goddamn job for?' Brinkley raised his voice, and Kovich grabbed his arm.
'Excuse us,' he said tensely. 'Me and my partner are leaving now. Thanks for your help.'
'Uh, sure,' the guard answered, shaken, as Kovich steered Brinkley to the entrance door and out onto the sidewalk. The sun was bright but the wind gusted in currents in front of the tall building. Traffic whizzed by, moving smoothly at this hour, and two well-dressed older women approached. Kovich squeezed Brinkley's arm.
'You gotta calm down, Mick. You were screaming at the kid.'
'He's a fuckup!' Brinkley heard himself shout, which he never did.
'He's ten years old, for Christ's sake!' Kovich yelled back as they squared off on the sidewalk. The two women picked up their pace past the detectives.
'Then he shouldn't be working the job! Security is supposed to mean something.' Brinkley gestured at the women, who looked back, startled. These people, they're payin' for security!'
'What do you care? You don't live here. You're losin' it on this case, don't you see!'
It only made Brinkley angrier. It was like nobody but him could see the truth. The kid, the boyfriend, he's hiding something, don't you see?'
'No, no, you know what I see?' Kovich was shouting now, full bore. 'The boyfriend is a wise-ass. A kid playin' games. Thumbin' his nose at authority. Who hasn't signed a fake name for a laugh?'
'Me!'
'Well I did, plenty of times, when I was young.'
'What the fuck for?'
'For fun, Mick! For goddamn fun!'
'That's not fun!'
'You wouldn't know fun if it bit you in the ass, Mick. You don't know how to laugh anymore! You've been an asshole ever since Sheree walked out on you!'
Brinkley was about to yell back but he stopped short, his chest heaving, as soon as it registered.
Kovich blinked behind his big aviator glasses. 'Aw, shit,' he said quietly. His soft shoulders slumped.
Brinkley suddenly found it hard to swallow. Or even speak. He pivoted on his heel and walked away, ignoring the stares of passersby, so blind in anger and pain that he didn't notice the man in the car parked at the curb, photographing the scene on the sidewalk.
Davis knew who Marc Videon was the moment he entered the divorce lawyer's office at Tribe amp; Wright. Marc Videon was The Necessary Evil. Corporate law firms didn't want their CEO clients to go to elsewhere to off-load their wives, because there was a chance they wouldn't come back, so the firms were forced to employ a Necessary Evil. Davis had encountered one in every white-shoe Philly firm, and the suspect profile was so blatant it should have been unconstitutional: The Necessary Evil was always an outsider in a bad suit, nominally a partner and compensated on a salaried basis, and invite only to those firm social functions that the messengers went to, democratic events like the Christmas Party. Meeting Videon, Davis saw that he fit the bill, with his too-wide pinstripes that fit too tight on his squat form, a slightly greasy face with small features, and unnaturally dark hair that matched a pointy black goatee.
'Sit down, please,' Videon said, seating himself. His office was as large as other Tribe partners, but in law firms, everything was location, location, location, and Videon's office was nowhere, stuck on the bottom floor of the firm near the duplicating department. Davis could practically feel the heat and hear the harsh cathunka of Xerox machines as big as oil tankers, belching paper like smoke. Nor was Davis surprised to see that Videon had only one desk, an undistinguished box of walnut veneer, with chairs and end tables that reflected only a mid-range furniture allowance.
'Thanks.' Davis introduced himself, then sat down across from Videon's desk, which was cluttered with papers, cases, and scribbled notes. The Pennsylvania guidelines for alimony rested on the keyboard of a thick grey laptop,
and Davis pulled out his legal pad. Next to him sat Art Field, the tape recorder with a law degree. Whittier had excused himself for this meeting, and Davis assumed he'd gone on to gouge the Fortune 500 in six-minute increments. 'I appreciate your agreeing to meet with me on such short notice.'
'What "agreeing"? I'm under subpoena, n'est-ce pas?' Videon's neat head swiveled to Art Field, who was clearly annoyed at being acknowledged.
'Yes,' Field answered. 'There is a document subpoena as well.'
Videon smiled. 'Oh, goody. I like it rough.' He ran a manicured hand through his thinning hair, which was nevertheless black as night. In fact, Davis figured that BLACK AS NIGHT was the name on the box. Videon had to be sixty, if he was a day. 'I knew you'd come to talk to me sooner or later. Let's start with what a shame it is about Honor Newlin.'
'It is a shame,' Davis said, seriously. He wasn't so sure he liked The Necessary Evil, which would make sense. Evil shouldn't have a lot of running buddies.
'Yes, of course, a shame. A terrible shame. A terrible tragedy. Have I said "terrible" enough yet to convince you of my sincerity? Put otherwise, are you buying this shit?' Videon paused as if expecting an answer, but Davis didn't give him one. 'Yes, well, to the facts. Honor Newlin was in to see me on Monday. The day she was murdered. She wanted to divorce Jack.'
'Begin at the beginning.' Davis took out his pen and pad. 'What time did you see her?'
'First thing in the morning, I think. Hold on.' Videon moved the alimony guidelines aside, adjusted the laptop, and hit a few keys. Davis couldn't read the screen because of the angle. 'Honor came in at 9:30. She was late and she'd already had a drink.'
Davis made a note, hiding his surprise. He didn't dare look over at Field. 'How do you know?'
'I knew her. Besides, I offered her one, and she turned me down. She said she'd already had one. Other than that, pure guesswork.'
'What did you offer her?'
'She drank Scotch.' Videon paused, then smiled. 'You disapprove.'
'Frankly, yes.'
'Have you ever been divorced, Mr Clean?'
'Yes.'
'Good for you. Was it nasty at least?'
'Amicable.'
'Lord, what a waste.' Videon sighed. 'Sorry you disapprove of my methods. I'm a divorce lawyer, son. I keep Kleenexes for the wives and Scotch for the husbands. Sometimes, there's a crossover, for women with more bucks than estrogen.' He waved in the direction of a dark cabinet under a window that over-looked a rooftop parking lot. 'You want a snoot?'
'I don't drink.'
'I knew that,' Videon said, and laughed. 'What do you do for laughs?'
'I do justice.' Davis smiled.
'Hah! I knew we had nothing in common.' Videon shifted forward in his high-backed chair. 'You try to change the world, right?'
'Perhaps,' Davis answered, though he had never thought of it that way.
'Well, I try to keep it the same. The rich retain power and money. The poor try to get it and lose. You even up the odds, and I keep them out of whack, the way my clients want them.' Videon eased back in his chair, his dark eyes scrutinizing Davis. 'You aren't comfortable with my honesty.'
'I'm comfortable with what pertains to the Newlin case,' Davis answered, impatient.
'Oh, but it does. Honor Newlin walked in with all the money and she wanted to walk out with it.' Videon turned
to his laptop and hit a key to scroll down. 'This year I saw Honor Newlin twice, including the day she was killed. I'll give you a copy of what I'm looking at, it's my time records. Besides the day she was murdered, I met with her on January fourth, the first business day after the New Year. She said her New Year's resolution was shedding Jack.'
Davis made a note. 'Back up a minute. She called you, for the first appointment?'
'Yes, naturally.'
'Tell me about it.'
'The first time, she told me she wanted a divorce.'
'Did she say why?'
'She felt her marriage was moribund. Things hadn't turned out the way she hoped. She had Vennui, la malaise, and other French things. She was a victim of empty mansion syndrome and expected Jack to fill the void, to ascend the ranks to managing partnerdom. But he wasn't, even with the Buxton dough. Why?' Videon glanced at Field, seeking neither permission nor approval. They used to say Jack was too much of a nice guy. That he didn't have the killer instinct. Hah! Perceptive, non?'
Field cleared his throat. That's quite enough, Marc.'
'I heard that Jack confessed to the police,' Videon said to Davis. 'Did he?'
'I can't comment.'
'Of course. What a perfect answer. How do they make people like you? So upright. You're the good guy. I always wanted to meet a good guy, but I'm a divorce lawyer. Did I mention that?' Videon smiled at a joke only he knew. 'As I was saying, Honor wanted the divorce, and she asked me, in our first meeting, to review her prenuptial agreement.' *
'She had a prenup?'
'Do I look stupid?'
'You drafted it?'
'I'm more than just a pretty face.'
'What did it provide?'
'What else? That if they divorce, Jack gets rien. Nothing. Squat.'
Davis made a note. 'Isn't that a conflict? I mean, you worked with Jack, so why would she come to you for a prenup?'
'Jack asked me to draft the damn thing, and it was completely against him. Go figure. The Foundation has since become one of our most valued clients, heh hen.'
'What's funny about that?' Davis asked, cranky, and Field looked miffed as well.
'Well, the Foundation is a private charity, as opposed to a public charity, like the Red Cross. That means there's virtually no oversight of the billings at all. It's even better than a corporate client because they watch the bills. The Buxton Foundation was a license to rape and plunder.'
Field gasped. 'Marc! Show some judgment!'
Videon scoffed. 'As if it weren't common knowledge.'
'It isn't,' Field said. 'Please excuse my partner -'
'- he knows not what he does/ Videon supplied, but Field was visibly agitated.
'That's quite enough, Marc. Please. Mr Davis, leave this subject or I end the interview.'
'Fine.' Davis nodded, though it confirmed his suspicions about the Foundation's value to Jack. 'You were saying, about the prenup.'
Videon sighed theatrically. 'Anyway, the prenup was sound and I told Honor so. She asked me to prepare the divorce papers and came in to review them with me the day she was murdered.'
'Did she get them that day?'
'Actually, no. There were two typos, both inconsequential, but she wouldn't wait for them to be corrected. I said we'd redo the papers and FedEx them to the house, but I got called into a meeting. I did have her sign the signature page for convenience.' Videon searched his desk, rifling through yellow slips that littered his desk like autumn
leaves. He produced a piece of white paper and handed it across the desk. 'Here.'
Davis skimmed the page. A standard verification, and at the bottom Honor's signature. Honor Buxton Newlin. Her handwriting was feminine, and Davis stared at it for a minute with sympathy. It was as if she had signed her own death warrant. He pondered its significance. 'If Honor had lived to divorce Jack, would he have stayed at the firm?'
Videon fingered his stiff goatee. 'Probably not.'
'Even though he was head of the estates department?'
'Big fucking deal.'
'Would he have been fired?'
'No, but he would have left on his own, public emasculation being an excellent incentive.'
'How so?'
'Honor told me she didn't want to deal with Jack on a day-to-day basis, on matters for the Foundation. The management and billings of the array of Buxton matters would have shifted to somebody else in the firm, probably Big Bill Whittier, because we'd be damned if we'd lose it. Jack would have been shit out of luck.'
Davis remembered his meeting with Whittier. He turned to Field. 'If Honor divorced Newlin and he lost the Buxton billings, his draw would be lowered by about a million dollars a year? Ballpark?'
'Yes,' Field answered.
Videon burst into laughter. 'Rags to riches and back again,' he said, but Davis was too intent to make light of it.
'Did Newlin have any other sources of income that you know of?'
'Not that I know of,' Field answered, and Videon looked incredulous. *
'Are you kidding?'
Davis considered it. 'So the only way Newlin could keep his job and his income from the Buxton billings was if Honor stayed married to him. Or if she died before she could divorce him.'
'I didn't say that,' Field said quickly, and Videon waved his hand.
Tm a witness. He didn't say that. If he said that, he'd get his ass sued.'
Davis tuned Videon out, putting his case together. It no longer mattered that Newlin didn't benefit under the will. A million dollars a year and preservation of career were more than enough for motive. Of course Newlin had planned to kill her, to keep the goodies. But Davis's premeditation theory worked only if Newlin had known the divorce was coming. He turned to Videon, who had finally stopped laughing. 'How often had they discussed divorce?'
'They hadn't discussed divorce at all.'
'What? Of course they had/ Davis said, and Videon smiled.
'How do you know?'
'I assumed it.'
'Mr Clean, you should know that "when we assume, we make an ass out of you and me." Camus said that. Or Sartre. Or my fourth-grade teacher.'
Davis still wasn't laughing. 'How could they not have discussed divorce?'
'They hadn't. I got the impression she had been thinking about it for a long time, then – boom – decided to do it. That would be Honor, impulsively destructive. She told me she was worried that Jack was thinking about it and she wanted to beat him to the punch. He had no idea she was planning to make the first move. She said she couldn't wait to see the look on his face when she told him.'
'Do you think she could have mentioned it to him on the phone, maybe that day?'
'She could have, but she wouldn't have. That's not Honor.'
Davis couldn't let it go. The state of Newlin's knowledge was the linchpin of his prosecution. Otherwise, the jury would buy Newlin's rage-at-the-divorce defense. 'It doesn't
stand to reason. People always talk about divorce for a long time before they file.'
'Another assumption, monfrere.' Videon shook his head. 'Some do, but many don't. It's more husband behavior than wife, but it happens with some wives, too. They avoid the issue until they have to, then do it. The perfect clean break. In fact, where there's family money involved, I always advise a preemptive strike to maintain the advantage. Eliminate the fight over the prenup, like Pearl Harbor before the divorce war.'
Davis thought about it. 'Wait a minute. You work here, at Tribe, on the twentieth-fifth floor. Newlin works on the thirtieth. How is it that Honor comes to see you without him finding out?'
'He may have found out, for all I know. I asked her if she wanted to meet me somewhere else, both times. You can see, it ain't Versailles.' Videon gestured to his office mock-grandly. 'I was trying to respect her privacy and not tip off Jack. But Honor insisted we meet here.'
Davis brightened. 'So if Honor comes in to see you, the firm's divorce lawyer, everybody who sees her knows she's coming in to divorce Newlin. Secretaries, messengers, other lawyers, they'll all see her coming here. It would be a gossip item, wouldn't it?'
'Very dishy stuff. Not as cool as the sex-in-the-shower story I spread last week, but that's not pertinent here.'
Davis ignored it. What a loon. 'So it's possible, even likely, that Newlin could have found out that Honor had been in to see you that morning?'
'Correct, as you say.'
Davis felt a relieved grin spread across his face. He could prove through Videon that Newlin knew he was about to be disposed of, and it would also support Whittier's testimony that Newlin appeared agitated when he was leaving to go home. Newlin must have guessed Honor would be breaking up with him at dinner and decided to kill her then. That was premeditation, for sure. The law
was premeditation could happen in a matter of minutes; it didn't require weeks to plan. And Newlin couldn't hire somebody to do it because he didn't have time. Honor's murder was simply damage control. Davis almost jumped up in excitement as the puzzle fell into place. 'I assume you would you testify for us in court?'
Videon looked at Field. 'What's my line, boss man?'
'If you are subpoenaed, you must appear and give testimony.'
Videon looked at Davis. 'What he said.'
But the prosecutor had one last question. 'Why would the wife want to come here, to see you, for a divorce? Why risk it herself and why make it public? Why, even, embarrass her husband?'
'Again, you assume others see the world as you see it, but that, is a critical mistake. You cannot imagine why Honor Newlin would humiliate her spouse because you wouldn't. And undoubtedly didn't. You had an amicable divorce, you said.' The angles of Videon's face hardened. 'You did not know Honor Newlin. She was a beautiful woman, a gorgeous woman, but not a kind woman. Not a nice woman, at all.'
'Don't speak ill, Marc,' Field interrupted, but Videon waved him off.
'You must understand. Honor Newlin was one of the meanest women on the planet. It was subtle, it was socially acceptable, but it was true just the same. She just didn't connect with people. Maybe men, but not even them for long. She had no enduring emotion except indifference. Honor Newlin was a sociopath in silk.'
'Marc, Jesus!' Field cried, but Davis bristled.
'That's a little harsh, isn't it?' he asked. 'She was a philanthropist. She did good works through the Foundation.'
Videon scoffed. 'Are you completely naive, or just rehearsing for the jury? Honor Newlin didn't care about charity. The Foundation existed for generations before her and it
will exist for generations after. She had no interest in where the money went. Jack made all those decisions. He actually cared about the causes. Honor couldn't care less.'
Davis resisted it. 'Did you know her that well?'
'Well enough. Women tell their divorce lawyers everything. We're the gynecologists of the profession.' Videon leaned over his messy desk. 'I tell you. Honor Newlin would have enjoyed humiliating Jack in front of his partners, the secretaries, the clients, the whole fucking firm. She had decided to cut his balls off with a dull knife, merely to alleviate her own boredom, and she would want everybody to see it. All the better, so they all knew that she wielded the knife. Except, surprise, Jack upped the ante. He's more of a man than I knew.'
'Marc!' Field jumped to his feet. 'I think that's enough, quite enough. Mr Davis, you have the information you need, do you not?'
Davis nodded quickly. 'From Mr Videon, yes. But I do have one last stop before I leave.'
Trevor's gone,' Mary said, bursting into the conference room, cluttered with papers from the Newlin case. It was after hours so the firm was closed and nobody was working overtime with the boss away. She slipped out of her coat, tossed it onto a swivel chair, and told Judy and Lou what had happened at the train station with the blonde and the Metroliner to New York.
Judy's eyes widened. 'Sex in a coatroom with Paige? Then he hops a train with another girl? What a jerk!'
'I ain't surprised,' Lou said sadly, smoothing out his pants and easing into a chair at the conference table. He had just gotten in himself and was wishing for a roast beef special, a bag of chips, and a Rolling Rock. 'I knew the punk was bad news, only you two don't know how bad. I got a story to tell, too.' He filled them in about Paige and Planned Parenthood. When he was finished, the three fell silent.
'It has to be an abortion,' Mary said, after a minute. As much as she disliked Paige, she couldn't help sympathizing with her predicament. 'Abortions are what they do, mainly. That's why they get picketed all the time.'
Judy nodded. 'I used to get diaphragm cream there, but I'm the only person cheap enough to do that. You're right, Mare. I think she's getting an abortion, too.'
Think she got one right then?' Mary walked to the credenza, where she poured a Styrofoam cup of hot coffee and powdered it with fake sugar and fake milk. She took a sip but it didn't thaw her nose. Italian noses took longer. 'It could be, with the disguise and all.'
'No way,' Judy said. 'She just had sex, remember? Who gets a pelvic after that, much less an abortion?'
Lou didn't want to hear this. Pelvics. Diaphragm cream. Breast exams. If it kept up, he could turn gay. Where was the beer?
Mary sipped her coffee. 'So she's talking to a counselor. That makes sense. She's got no friends, her mother's dead, and her father's in jail. She needs someone to talk to. Since Trevor wasn't with her at the clinic, it sounds like she's not talking to him about it.'
Lou stretched his legs, then crossed them. 'I don't think he knows. I don't think a guy who knows his girl is pregnant does what they were doing in the coatroom, and they weren't talkin' babies at lunch.' He sighed. 'I feel bad for the girl, I do. Pretty girl like that, everything going for her. She's on her own and I think it's a crying shame.'
Mary felt worse for Paige's father. 'If Jack knows his daughter is pregnant, that gives him a stronger reason to protect her. He has to protect her and the baby. In fact, we're missing something here. At her age, doesn't she need parental consent for a abortion?'
Judy frowned. 'Of course, you're right. Seventeen or younger, in this state. But if Newlin knew Paige was pregnant, he wouldn't let her abort at a clinic. If he's such a great father, he'd get her to the best doctor in the city.'
'What if he knows about the pregnancy, but not the abortion?' Mary asked, thinking aloud. 'That could be, especially if she's getting counseling about it. She wouldn't need the consent for that, not yet. If Jack knows only that she's pregnant, he'd take the rap for her.'
Lou was shaking his head. 'You never asked me, but I wouldn't take a murder rap for my kid. I'd want her to accept the consequences of her actions. How's she gonna learn anything otherwise? How's she gonna become an adult?'
Mary was again surprised. It was two to one. 'What if you felt responsible for it? If you had let the mother abuse the kid over time. Not physically, but emotionally.'
Lou puckered his lip. 'Sorry, Mare. If she picks up the knife, she's responsible. She should do the time, even though she's my kid.'
'My father would do it, and I think Jack would, too.'
Judy's expression was tense. 'Mary, isn't it possible that you've got Newlin on a pedestal? You don't know him that well and you're projecting all sorts of qualities onto him. He's not your father.'
'I know that,' Mary snapped, her face suddenly hot. This case was straining their friendship. 'Jack is innocent, and I'm not going to see him convicted for a crime he didn't commit. We're close to something and we have to get to the bottom of it.'
'But Bennie's been calling us.' Judy gestured to a stack of yellow slips. 'She may be out of the country, but they have phones. Do I have to tell you what she'd say about this? Working against our own client's instructions, to prove his innocence? Allegedly?'
'I don't care.' Mary heard her voice waver and knew her emotion came only partly from the injustice of the situation. 'We have momentum now. We're making progress.'
Lou looked doubtful. 'I wouldn't say that. All we're doin' is messin' around in people's private lives.' He looked at Mary. 'I think you should think about withdrawin' from this case, Mare. It's out of control, and Rosato pays the bills around here.'
'We can't file withdrawal papers today anyway. Court closed a long time ago.' Mary checked her watch. Seven o'clock. 'Hey, it's about the time the murder was committed. It's the best time to visit a crime scene.'
The crime scene? You hate crime scenes!' Judy said, but Mary grabbed her coat and bag.
'That was the old me. The new me loves crime scenes.' She slipped back into her coat, which still felt cold, and looked at Judy with hope. Their eyes locked, and Judy surrendered first in their game of emotional chicken.
'Tell you what, Mare,' she said. I'll go with you on
this, but just for tonight. If we find nothing, we're out. We withdraw tomorrow and refer the case.'
Mary considered it, then nodded. 'Deal. Let's go. If I have one night, I'm using it.'
Lou didn't budge. 'Hold on there, ladies. What about Bennie?'
Mary headed for the conference room door. 'You don't have to come, Lou. We'll understand. Won't we, Jude?'
'Of course.' Judy got her puffy white coat from a chair. 'Stay here. Show common sense, unlike me. I could get fired twice by the same person.' Judy looked at Mary. 'One thing. We have to go home and walk Bear. Remember, I'm dog-sitting.'
'Bennie's dog?' Mary headed for the conference room door. 'Okay. She might not fire us if we show the dog a good time.'
Judy snorted. 'Oh she'll fire us, all right. She just won't kill us.'
'Sure she will,' Lou said, and reached for his windbreaker.
It had taken all day for Jack to be transferred and processed into county jail with a busload of other inmates; he'd been showered, shaved, sprayed prophylactically with lice treatment, and issued laundered and steam-pressed blues. By nightfall he found himself in a plastic bucket chair against the back wall of the TV room of Housing Unit C. A caged television blared from its wall mount in the corner and thirty-odd inmates ignored Access Hollywood, clogging a space that was smaller than most living rooms. The room was in constant motion, the noise deafening, and the air rank with body odor.
The inmates were large, muscular, pockmarked, and pierced. They had long hair, dreads, and Willie Nelson braids; one bald inmate had tattooed his skull with bright flames. Another huge inmate, a wiry blond ponytail snaking down his broad back, looked like a deranged Norse god. Jack didn't break eye contact when it was made by the inmates or the guards. He knew he was a novelty here; his photo was splashed across the tabloid on the bolted-down table, and the inmate who had piled mashed potatoes on his dinner plate that night had stopped serving to shake his hand.
'Why?' Jack had asked, astonished.
'I never met no millionaire before,' the inmate had answered.
He had been thwarted in reaching Trevor. There was an 'approved list' for calls from county jail, which contained only the inmate's attorney and one contact in the immediate family. He mulled over calling Mary and coming clean with his doubts about Trevor, but he couldn't sacrifice Paige. A commercial for Listerine came on TV, and in
time Jack realized that his thoughts had stopped with Mary, which both worried and comforted him. At the same time.
THE DEVIL'S INN, read the boxy white sign. It was illuminated from within and lightweight enough to be blown around by the wind, which set its old-fashioned drawing of the devil, wiry and red with a spiked tail and trident, whipping back and forth. The Devil's Inn was like every other run-down tavern that dotted Philadelphia's street corners, concentrated in the working-class residential neighborhoods, and Brinkley had been a cop long enough to disapprove not only of the bars but of the liquor billboards that popped up around them like mushrooms. That he disapproved didn't stop him from hanging in the Devil's Inn, sipping the whiskey they advertised on every block.
It was his favorite bar, in West Philly, on the corner and down the block from where he had grown up. He didn't go to Liberties, the bar in Fairmount where all the detectives went. He hated a bar like in Cheers, that TV bar where everybody knows your name. He went to the Devil's Inn because nobody knew his name there and he liked it that way. That was its only attraction for him, because it certainly wasn't a nice joint. It was small, dim, and smelled like dust and dirt. Stale cigarette smoke clung to the cocktail napkins and grit lay on the tile floor. The mirror behind the bar was too greasy to reflect anything, dust coated the few bottles of top-shelf, and a garland of dull tinsel festooned the cash register. It was leftover from Christmas, five years ago. Brinkley doubted it would ever come down.
He hunched over his shot and squinted down the knotty bar at the other patrons. Aging black men, they all looked
like him without a tie, and no one acknowledged him. He guessed they didn't like Cheers either, and none of them were his old neighbors. Those were long gone, surrendering what used to be a decent black neighborhood to gangbangers, pipers, and crack whores, emptying his old block. Sheets of plywood covered the windows that used to have sheer curtains and Venetian blinds; the city boarded up vacant rowhouses to keep trouble out, but the cops knew it only hid the bad guys. Brinkley's childhood home didn't even have plywood over the windows; the place lay exposed to the elements as a nude woman. He didn't drive by the house when he came to the Devil's Inn. He always took the other way around.
He sipped his booze and cupped his shot glass, which leeched the warmth from his palm and then returned the favor. Brinkley's hand never left his glass the times he came drinking at the Devil's Inn and he wondered what that was about. He was in deep shit if all he had in the world to hold on to was a shot glass. He downed the last of his drink and when he looked up Kovich was sitting on the barstool next to him. 'Boo/ Kovich said. 'I'm Casper the Friendly Ghost.'
Brinkley didn't know what to say, it was so unexpected. He had never brought Kovich here, never even mentioned it to him. But there he was, with no coat on. Brinkley could smell the cold night on him.
Kovich looked around the bar, layered with a visible haze of cigarette smoke. 'Is this a bad dream?'
Brinkley smiled crookedly. 'How'd you know I was here?'
'I followed you.'
'For real?' s
'Only twice.'
'Stalker.' Brinkley smiled again. It was the whiskey that let him.
'How else am I gonna find out stuff I need to know? You don't tell me squat.' Kovich waved to the old bartender,
who had his back turned, and called for a Miller Lite. Brinkley didn't tell him it would be a long wait. 'I checked it out when you started getting cranky. I figured it was trouble between you and Sheree.'
'How?'
'I'm a detective, remember? I detected.' Kovich gestured again to the bartender, who was washing a glass in the grimy sink. 'Hey, buddy, a Miller Lite for me and another shot for my lawyer.' The bartender didn't turn around, and Kovich's heavy lips curled into an unhappy line. 'What is this, Denny's? I'm too white to get a drink?'
'He's hard of hearing.' Brinkley leaned over. 'James!' he fairly shouted, and the bartender turned. 'A Miller and another!'
'Lite!' Kovich added, loudly. When he looked over Brinkley was staring at him. 'Portion size is key.'
Brinkley laughed as the bartender came over with a sweating bottle and pilsner glass for Kovich and poured him another shot. Both detectives took a first sip.
Kovich cleared his throat. 'So you're thinkin' the boyfriend is trying to hide something, the way he signs the logbooks. Right?'
Brinkley nodded. He was relieved Kovich didn't start talking about Sheree.
That meant to follow up, we had to find out his real name. So while Goofus cries in his beer. Gallant gets busy.' Kovich leaned down, picked up a paper grocery bag, and pulled out a stack of girls' clothes catalogs. He slapped them on the bar and spread them out like a winning deck of cards. There were easily ten, marked with yellow Post-its. 'My kid saves these to bankrupt me.' He flipped open the top catalog and inside was a photo of Paige Newlin. She wore a floppy hat with a fake daisy on it. 'Recognize our girl?'
'Sure, yeah.'
'So I call up the catalog company and ask about the girl but I can't get anybody who knows her. They give me the
name of the photographer they use in Philly and I call him up. David Something, his name is. He don't know much about her and he only dealt with the mother on the phone, but he says the boyfriend stopped by the shoot. He remembers the boyfriend's name in a flash, he says because it's an unusual name, but I say it's because he's queer as my dick is long.'
Brinkley straightened on the barstool. 'So what's his name?'
Trevor Olanski. How's that for a handle?' Kovich took a gulp of beer. 'So I check him out. Call Morrie in juvy on a flyer and ask around.'
'What did you find out?' Brinkley said, his head clearing suddenly.
'Seems our Trevor got tagged for dealing coke, on Tuesday of last week. At Philadelphia Select, that ritzy private school in town. He goes there.'
'No shit,' Brinkley said, surprised. 'Was there a complaint?'
'Don't show up in the file. The docket they keep shows it got withdrawn the next day. Smells like strings got pulled, but the officer in charge is on vacation. I'll find out when he gets back.'
'So we gotta talk to this kid.'
'I got an appointment with him tomorrow morning, at his parents' in the subs. You can come with, even though you're black.'
'Damn!' Brinkley laughed. It was great news. Maybe they were on to something, with the boyfriend. This mean you think I'm right?'
'No fuckin' way. I still say you're full of it.'
'Good, then I know I'm on the right track,' Brinkley said automatically, but it wasn't what he meant. What he meant was, I appreciate what you did for me.
Kovich put his catalogs away. 'You're welcome,' he said, after a minute, and Brinkley forced a smile.
Davis surveyed Jack Newlin's spacious, well-appointed office, on the top floor of Tribe amp; Wright. The wall of windows displayed the entire western half of the city, twinkling at night. A cherrywood Thos. B. Moser desk and end tables flanked a patterned sofa, and Newlin had two other desks: a polished library table in front of a matching file cabinet and, against the side wall, a modern workstation with a laptop. Three desks total; Davis would have expected as much. Atop them rested silver-framed photos of Honor and Paige Newlin. It was odd seeing a photo of Honor Newlin alive and it reminded Davis of his purpose.
He wanted to know all he could about Jack Newlin. He crossed to the file cabinet and opened the top drawer, which slid out easily on costly runners. He scanned the files, neatly kept, and all of them were Buxton Foundation matters. He reached into the first accordion, pulled out a manila folder of correspondence, and flipped through it. The letters concerned the tax structure of a charitable gift to libraries worth almost a million dollars. The D.A.'s eyes would have glazed over if it hadn't confirmed his belief that Newlin was a meticulous and patient planner. He marked the files for seizure by the uniformed cop waiting outside, with a warrant and a cooperative security guard from Tribe. He'd read the files at his office, to see the details they contained.
Davis opened the second drawer and zeroed in on the folder that said 'CONFIDENTIAL – COMPENSATION.' He pulled it out and skimmed the stack of papers inside. It was a listing of the partnership draw of the firm's lawyers
from last year. They were ranked in order from the highest paid to the lowest, and he didn't have to look far to find Newlin's name. It was in second place, just under William Whittier's. Newlin's compensation was listed at $525,000 in partnership draw and a million dollars in billings bonus, from the Foundation business he'd brought to the firm.
Davis whistled softly. He had learned the information from Whittier, but it was something else seeing it in black-and-white. He flipped back through the years, fully expecting the most recent year to be the highest. But it wasn't. The previous year, Newlin was still number two, but his draw was $575 grand and his billings bonus was higher, $1.1 mil. The prosecutor double-checked, but he had read it right. He thumbed backward in time, to the previous year's compensation. Again, to Davis's surprise, it was higher than the more recent year, $625 in draw, $1.3 in billing bonus. And Newlin was number one in compensation that year, not Whittier. What gives?
Davis eyeballed Whittier's trend and that of some of the other highly ranked partners. All of them had partnership draws and billings bonuses that increased through the years. That would be the logical trend of the income of a successful lawyer; it was Davis's own salary history, though his pay was much lower. But Newlin's pay was going down.
Davis mulled it over. Given what Videon had told him, he suspected that Honor Newlin had been gradually decreasing the amount of work the Buxton estate was sending her husband and apparently beginning to funnel the billings to Whittier. She was costing Newlin hundreds of thousands of dollars and humiliating him in front of the entire partnership. In effect, Honor Newlin was firing her husband gradually, giving him every reason to want her dead before she cut him off completely.
Excellent, for motive. Davis slapped the folder closed, marked it for seizure, and searched the third drawer, which yielded nothing significant. He stood up, brushed
off his suit, and was about to leave when he glanced at the third desk, the workstation. Newlin's laptop, he'd almost forgotten it. He went to the laptop and lifted its lid, which opened more easily than he expected. It hadn't been latched completely, merely closed to protect the keyboard from dust. Davis had the same careful habit.
The large screen was black, saving power, and he moved the mouse to wake it up. It came to life with Newlin's time records for the day of the murder, and Davis sat down and studied them carefully. Newlin's day in six-minute slices, spent on matters for the Buxton Foundation. The description of the billed time was detailed and complete: prepare contracts, prepare documents for gifts to local college; revise press release with regard to computer-to-schools program; discuss joint gift to the Cancer Society.
He checked the list for telephone calls and other items. All of the calls were related to the Buxton Foundation. The only nonbillable time was for the Hiring Committee; Newlin had interviewed a law student for a summer job. The laptop wasn't much help, but he would seize it anyway, since it was arguably within the scope of the warrant. Davis was just about to shut it down when he noticed the task bar at the bottom of the screen.
He looked closer. The computer was running another program behind a minimized window. He moved the mouse and clicked on the box. A multicolored website popped onto the screen. It was an online travel agency, confirming travel to London, England. There was a ticket on British Airways, ordered that morning and leaving next week, with no return date. He checked the names of the reservations. JACK NEWLIN. A single ticket, no wife.
'Yes!' Davis said aloud and hit a key. That was it! Why wasn't Newlin taking his wife? Because she'd be dead, that's why. Newlin had been planning to leave the country alone after her funeral. Davis felt like he had won a marathon. With what he had learned from Videon, it was more than sufficient evidence to convince Masterson they
shouldn't offer a deal, and after him the conviction would be a snap. The single ticket was just the sort of detail juries ate with a tablespoon. Newlin would pay for the crime he had committed.
Davis moved the mouse and clicked PRINT, just for a souvenir.
Mary, Judy, and Lou walked through the first floor of the Newlins' elegant town house, taking notes on its layout for trial exhibits and trying to orient themselves, but after a thorough search of the living room, dining room, and kitchen, they hadn't turned up anything that would support their defense. Mary was especially troubled, and it wasn't her usual revulsion at crime scenes. Even the blood that had soaked into the dining room rug hadn't fazed her, because she was so preoccupied. Nothing about the scene was supplying any clues about how the murder had been committed, other than what Jack had told them. 'This is not going well,' she said aloud, though Judy was drawing the layout and Lou was walking around in a professorial way, his hands linked behind his back.
'We shoulda brought the dog,' Judy said, sketching. They'd left the dog tied up out front, on orders from the uniformed cop at the door. He'd been posted to keep out the reporters, but had made a spot ruling on golden retrievers.
But Mary was barely listening. It was odd, being in Jack's house and seeing no evidence of him. His presence was completely absent from the stone-cold living room, the overdecorated dining room, and the white kitchen that had no aroma whatsoever, a larger version of Paige's kitchen. Whenever Mary looked into this family, she kept seeing the troubled connection between mother and daughter, with Jack off to the side. She thought of the Swann Fountain in Logan Square, where she'd lurked all afternoon; the woman, daughter, and on the other side of the fountain,
the man. So what? She had psychology, but what she needed was evidence. Maybe upstairs.
She ascended the carpeted stair with Judy behind her, sketch pad in hand, and Lou taking up the rear. At the top of the stair was a small library, which she quickly assessed as being for show, so she left Judy there. The next stop down the hall was a small home office, and she knew from its chilliness that it had to be Honor's, so she foisted it off on Lou and moved quickly down the hall to the master bedroom. The white double doors at the hall's end were closed, and she reached them with an undeniable tingle of anticipation. She had to find something here. Jack would be dead without it. She opened the doors.
The room was bare. There was a king-size master bed with the sheets stripped, a bank of dressers with the drawers open, an alcove with a window seat with the seat pad gone and all the novels taken from the shelves. The cops must have seized Jack's things as soon as he was charged. Mary's heart sank and she walked into the room like a sleepwalker. She should have come here earlier. Was there nothing left? She scanned the room and it was completely empty. Off the bedroom was an open door, obviously a closet, and she went to it.
A double walk-in with long racks on each side, also empty, even of hangers; the wood cubbyholes for shoes were bare, as if in move-in condition. Damn. She left the closet and eyeballed the room. In the corner were another two doors and she went to them though she knew what she would find. Two bathrooms, empty. She shook her head. She had blown it. There was only one chance. Paige's room.
She left the empty bedroom and hurried back down the hall the way she had come. She had to bet Paige's bedroom would be on the other side of the stair, the way rich people lived. Keep the kids separate. It seemed so foreign. In her parents' house, Mary and her twin had shared the bedroom across from her parents, so close they used to call to each
other from bed. She hurried down the hall and to the end, where she opened the second set of white double doors and turned on the light.
The room had been left untouched. There were evidence tags on the dressers, but the cops hadn't seized them yet or hadn't given them the priority they'd given to Jack's belongings. She entered the room, which was the same size as the master bedroom, and it looked like every little girl's dream. A white four-poster bed dominated the space in the center of a large powder pink Oriental rug, and the bed linens were a custom white-and-pink-quilted pattern. White night tables flanked the bed and matching dressers lined the room on the left, near a closet.
On the right wall of the room stood white bookshelves and a white hutch, which caught Mary's attention. It was full of dolls, all of them six inches high with identically perfect faces, round eyes, and red cupid mouths. They were dressed in beautiful outfits, and she knew instantly what they were; she had seen them in the bedroom of one of her friends growing up. They were called Madame Alexander dolls, and the DiNunzios could never have afforded them. They cost fifty dollars apiece then; she couldn't imagine what they cost now.
She stood before them, momentarily enchanted. At least twenty dolls sat legs akimbo, in the top row, with their round Mary Janes in black velveteen, touching toe to toe. The German doll wore a dirndl, the French doll the French flag, and the Italian doll sported red and green ribbons flowing from her synthetic hair. In the center of the top row was a doll that was bigger than the rest, also a Madame Alexander but clearly the creme de la creme. Mary had to stop herself from picking it up. She was supposed to be working, not playing with dolls.
She walked over to check the rest of the bookshelves. The books looked like assigned reading and school textbooks; no novels otherwise. She always thought you could learn a lot about someone from their bookshelf, and this bookshelf
confirmed what she thought about Paige. In the shelf above the desk was a large Sony CD player, which Mary found strange. Paige hadn't lived here in a year. Why would she leave a C D player behind? It would be expensive to replace, even for a girl with bucks. Mary walked to the desk area to check.
The CD player looked brand-new, and there was a stack of CDs next to it. Weezer, Offspring, Dave Matthews Band; music that Mary had heard about but didn't know. How old were these CDs? She picked a few up and squinted at the infinitesimal copyright dates. All last year. Paige had left these behind, too. Why? Then she noticed something in the middle of the desk, on a blotter covered with teenage doodles. Paige's driver's license, with a picture of the girl, posing prettily even for the state's camera. What kind of teenager leaves her driver's license behind? CDs you can replace, even a CD player, but a driver's license? That was a headache. Paige wouldn't have left that behind. Not if she had a choice.
Mary looked around the room, her thoughts racing. The bedroom was too neat to have been left in haste, but it was left abruptly in some way. She crossed the room and peeked inside the closet. It was completely full; a double rack of skirts and tops, matching sweater sets folded in shelves, and fancy shoes in cubbyholes. What gives?
She constructed a scenario. Imagine that Paige told her mother she was going to move out, even that she already had picked out a condo at Colonial Hill Towers. What would have happened? What could explain what Mary was seeing? Then she realized it. Paige hadn't left abruptly, or in haste, but she must not have been permitted back in. That was it. The bedroom was just as it was the day that Paige had told her parents – or her mother – that she intended to move out. Her mother hadn't let her pack anything; it was all here. And she hadn't let her back into the house. All of it, even the driver's license, had had to be replaced.
Mary felt her heart quicken. So much for the facade of
the young model movin' on up. Maybe Paige had no hard feelings about moving out; her mother sure did. Mary was about to tell the others when she remembered she hadn't checked the bathroom. She should, just to be complete. She walked to it and flicked on the bathroom light, and looked carefully around. Nothing unusual except for too much makeup and a complete line of Kiehl's shampoos, conditioners, and 'silk groom,' whatever that was.
She left the bathroom and walked by the shelves, pausing again at the dolls. They were so pretty; so perfect. Especially the big one at the top, with a blue gown and matching train spread around her, glistening and satiny. Her hair was a beehive of blond plastic; Mary guessed it was Madame Alexander's version of Cinderella. She itched to hold it just once.
Oh hell. What was the harm?
Mary tugged her shirtsleeve down over her hands to cover her fingerprints, so the cops wouldn't indict her for murder. It seemed professional, especially if you were doing something as dorky as playing with dolls at a crime scene. Once her hand was covered, she scooped up the doll by the hair. Then she gasped. Not at the doll. At what lay hidden under the doll's satin gown.
'Lou!' she called. 'Judy! Come quick!'
A small, pink leather book sat on the shelf where the doll had been and its cover said 'MY DIARY.' The doll lay forgotten on the floor. Mary told them her theory of what had happened between Paige and her mother while the three of them gathered around the diary, deciding what to do.
'Let's take it and run,' Mary said, excited. 'Finders keepers, losers weepers. Isn't that a legal principle?'
'Shouldn't we tell the cop at the door?' Judy asked, but Mary shook her head.
'No, he'll seize it. He'll turn it in unopened, and we won't get to read it.' She turned to Lou for verification.
'That's right. The uniform at the door won't open it. He doesn't have the authority, and once it's bagged, it's theirs.' Lou's mouth set in the harsh bathroom light, emphasizing the deep lines of his jowls. Still he didn't look old to Mary, he looked experienced.
'If it helps Newlin's case, they have to turn it over to us, under the discovery rules.' Mary was remembering from her cramming. 'But I don't know when we'll get it. A lot of the cases suggest it could take months, if we ever get it back.'
Judy looked grave. 'It's true. I've read cases where they never turn it over.'
'I'm opening it,' Mary announced, reaching for the diary, but Lou stopped her arm.
'No. Let me, in case I gotta testify.' He reached into the inside pocket of his windbreaker, withdrew a white cotton handkerchief, and deftly wrapped his hand with it. Mary was impressed.
'You carry that to pick up evidence?' she asked.
'No, I carry it to wipe my nose,' he answered, and picked up the diary.