This being the provinces, a scuffed Formica dais stood at the front of the small courtroom, flanked by cheap nylon flags of the United States and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The counsel tables were wobbly, with peeling veneer, and instead of the typical fixed pews for spectators, there were chairs arranged in rows, like at an Amway demonstration. In fact, with the reporters and police milling around, the courtroom felt more like a Tupperware party than a preliminary hearing, at least until the judge took her seat on the dais and the bailiff shouted:
“The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania versus the Honorable Fiske Harlan Hamilton.”
Fiske stiffened as he sat next to me in a dark blue suit.
The assistant district attorney launched into what turned out to be a histrionic opening statement; full of sound and fury, signifying no surprises. Apparently the witness ID, the license plate, and the fingerprints were all the Commonwealth had so far. Like they needed more.
“Ms. Morrone, are you representing Judge Hamilton?” asked Justice Sarah Millan. She was petite, with small features behind owlish glasses, and her short hair was clipped into salt-and-pepper waves. I’d never been before Justice Millan, but everyone called her a bitch. I figured we’d hit it off.
“I am, Your Honor,” I said, standing up.
“Make your opening statement, but keep it short and sweet.” Justice Millan looked sideways at the press clogging the perimeter of the courtroom. “I have a busy docket and I hate houseguests.”
“Yes, Your Honor.” I made my opening, keeping the table pounding to a minimum, but using the words distinguished and innocent a lot, and even throwing in a rush to judgment or two.
Justice Millan looked at the assistant district attorney. “Okay, Mrs. Ryerson, let’s see what you got.”
Assistant D.A. Maura Ryerson was a young, slim Villanova grad with bobbed reddish hair. She wore a coral-colored lipstick that matched both her hair color and her summer suit; it showed doggedness, if not taste. “Your Honor, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has an eyewitness in this matter.”
“Good for you,” Justice Millan said. “Get him up there.”
“It’s a woman, Your Honor.”
“We take both. Call her.”
Everybody chuckled, except for a stony Fiske, who stared rigidly ahead. I read his fixed expression as pure mortification. He had downed serial Scotches last night when I told him I wasn’t going to let him testify. I had no choice. His alibi had sounded worse with each retelling, and since the defense didn’t have to prove anything, the safe bet was to stand pat.
“At this time,” Ryerson said, standing up stiff-kneed, “the Commonwealth would like to call Mrs. Allison Mateer to the stand.”
Justice Millan rolled her eyes. “So do it already.”
“Mrs. Mateer, please come up now,” Ryerson said, waving grandly, Bic in hand.
An older woman, Mrs. Mateer rose stiffly from the third row. She wore a white linen suit with a flowered scarf and smiled at me politely as she walked by. Funny, she hadn’t smiled yesterday when she closed the door in my face. I’d gotten the gist of her testimony from the affidavit the police had turned over at the last minute.
Mrs. Mateer was sworn in and Ryerson took her through her identification and address, but I was distracted by a noise from the back of the crowded courtroom. I looked back to see Tobin leaning against the door-jamb, eating Jujyfruits. Who invited him? I gave him a dirty look, but Paul, sitting in the front row with Kate, thought it was for him.
Men.
“Mrs. Mateer, will you please tell the court where you were on the afternoon of June 18 of this year?” Ryerson asked.
“I was at my home.”
“Where in your house were you, do you recall?”
“I was in the kitchen, at the back of the house.”
“Facing south?”
“Yes, that’s right. South. A wonderful exposure, plenty of sun, but you have to water constantly.”
“Water?”
“My garden. If you don’t, the flowers burn right up, and the lawn as well.”
I made a note on my legal pad and edged it toward Fiske. Are you sure Mateer doesn’t know Kate? Maybe from garden club? Fiske read it, frowned, and made a precise question mark with his fountain pen. I turned around to check with Kate. She was watching Mrs. Mateer but didn’t appear to recognize her.
“What were you doing at approximately 5:30 P.M.?” Ryerson asked.
“Preparing dinner. A salad. I eat lightly, generally.”
“Now, does your kitchen have a window in it, Mrs. Mateer?”
“Yes. Over the sink. It’s a rather large window, because it’s a double sink. I have a view of the backyard and the carriage house off to the right.”
“You rented the carriage house to Miss Sullivan, is that correct?”
“Yes. My late husband and I, for the past two years.”
“By the way,” Ryerson paused, “did you know Miss Sullivan?”
“We were friendly, I suppose, as one would be. She was a lovely girl. A lovely young woman.” Mrs. Mateer’s hooded eyes slid over to Fiske with a contempt the reporters picked up immediately. You could almost hear them scribbling away, and there was shuffling at the side of the room. I glanced back to see if it was the Philadelphia Inquirer duking out the New York Times. It was Stan Julicher, Patricia’s lawyer, elbowing for a better view, pissing off a reporter with a steno pad. He was managing to stay in the limelight even without a client.
“Patricia Sullivan was a lovely young woman, wasn’t she?” Ryerson asked.
Oh, please. “Your Honor, I’m willing to stipulate that the victim was lovely, and I sincerely hope the Commonwealth catches her murderer, because they don’t have him yet.”
The gallery laughed. Justice Millan caught my eye, amused, then said, “Overruled.”
Not amused enough.
“I’ll withdraw the question,” Ryerson continued. “Mrs. Mateer, what did you see from your kitchen window?”
“I looked out the window to check on the garden. It had been so hazy that afternoon, and then the storm blew up. I remember thinking, well, I won’t have to water tonight.”
“And what did you see? At the carriage house?”
“I saw a man getting into a car.”
Ryerson flashed me a set of head shots as quickly as legal ethics allowed, then approached the stand with them. “I move to have these photographs marked as Commonwealth Exhibits A through H.”
“Fine, fine, fine,” Justice Millan said.
“Did the police show you these photographs, Mrs. Mateer?”
The witness glanced down at the pictures. “Yes.”
“And did you identify one of them as the man you saw running from Patricia Sullivan’s carriage house?”
“Objection,” I said, but Justice Millan waved me off like a fly.
“I picked out this one,” Mrs. Mateer said. She held up a picture of Fiske, taken from a newspaper the day he was arrested. “Judge Hamilton.”
Ouch. I tried to remain expressionless. Fiske tensed. The reporters scribbled and whispered.
“He was wearing a trenchcoat and hat when I saw him,” Mrs. Mateer added.
Fiske was wearing a tan trenchcoat that day, but so was I, so was everybody. It was raining like hell.
“What sort of hat was he wearing?” Ryerson asked.
“It was dark brown, a fedora. With a wide brim. It was over his nose.”
The hat still hadn’t been found, and I’d never known Fiske to have a hat like that. “Objection,” I said. “How could the witness identify this person if he had a hat covering his face?”
“She didn’t say it covered his face,” Ryerson said.
Mrs. Mateer sat forward on her chair. “I saw most of his face and chin, and I saw him when he drove by, too. I feel sure it was Judge Hamilton. I feel sure of that.”
Give me a break. “Your Honor, I have to object. The witness feels sure? Since when is that enough to support a murder charge? I also object to this witness being trumpeted as an eyewitness. If she didn’t see a murder being committed, she’s not an eyewitness.”
“Your Honor,” Ryerson said, “Mrs. Mateer has given a positive identification of Judge Hamilton and is an eyewitness to events subsequent to the murder. Of course, the Commonwealth has additional conclusive evidence to support its charge, such as an identification of the defendant’s car and license plate, and his fingerprints in the room where the victim was murdered.” The reporters began to whisper as the weight of the evidence made its impact.
“Is the district attorney testifying now?” I said, but I was wondering how Kate would take the news about the fingerprints. We had prepared her for it by saying Fiske had been to Patricia’s to drop work off.
“Overruled,” Justice Millan ordered, banging the gavel loudly. “Quiet in the back, or I’ll clear the courtroom. Ms. Morrone, save your objections for cross-examination. Let the witness tell me what she saw, ladies.”
Ryerson looked at me sideways, like a driver edging a slowpoke out of the fast lane. “Thank you, Your Honor. Now, Mrs. Mateer, you are positive it was Judge Hamilton you saw?”
“Absolutely. Also he was quite tall, about six feet, and of muscular build, like Judge Hamilton. It was him.”
“What did you see the defendant do next?” Ryerson asked.
“I saw him leave the carriage house and get into his car.”
“Was he running?”
“No, not running, but kind of hustling, with his head down, as if he didn’t want to be seen.”
I made a note and heard Fiske shift in his chair.
“What did the defendant do then?”
“He got into his car and backed out of the driveway. It’s rather long and curving, so you have to reverse quite a ways to get to the street.”
“So you got a good look at the car?”
“Objection,” I said.
Justice Millan smiled. “Relax, Ms. Morrone. She’s young, she can lead a little.”
Ryerson wasn’t sure whether she’d been insulted. “Mrs. Mateer, do you know what kind of car it was?”
“I do. It was a black Jaguar, a newer model.”
“How do you know it was a Jaguar?”
“I should know a Jaguar when I see one.”
There was mild laughter from the gallery, and Mrs. Mateer drew her scarf closer to her throat.
“I see,” Ryerson said. “Now, did you testify that the back end of the car was facing you as you looked out the window?”
“Yes. It had to reverse.”
“Did you see the license plate on the car?”
“I did. I saw the license plate the whole time. It said GARDEN-2, so I remembered it.”
“And you saw that very clearly?”
Come on. “Objection, Your Honor,” I said.
Justice Millan nodded. “Sustained. Mrs. Ryerson, don’t push your luck.”
“Mrs. Mateer, did you see the defendant do anything else unusual?”
I leaned forward. “Objection, Your Honor. The question assumes the actions described were unusual.”
Ryerson leapt to her pumps. “There certainly is something unusual about a man scurrying out of a private home, jumping into a car, and driving quickly in reverse.”
Justice Millan smiled tightly. “Oh, really? I had an ex-husband who did just that.”
The gallery laughed, but I didn’t. I was thinking of something. Something I couldn’t put my finger on. Something was wrong, bothering me. I sat upright, listening.
“Then what did you do, Mrs. Mateer?” Ryerson asked.
“I waited a little, I wasn’t sure what to do. It all seemed so odd to me. Then I decided to call the police. They came and found Patricia, dead. Murdered.”
“Thank you. I have no further questions,” Ryerson said, and sat down.
Justice Millan eased back in her chair. “Ms. Morrone, your turn.”
I stood up to cross. “Mrs. Mateer, let me begin with just a few general questions, if I may. Do you know that the distance from your kitchen window to the carriage house is about a hundred yards?”
“I suppose.”
“And there are trees in front of the carriage house, aren’t there?”
“There are some trees.”
I looked at my notes. “At least five large oaks, with very thick trunks, lie between your house and the carriage house, isn’t that right?”
“I suppose.”
“Also, there’s a tall hedge between the two, isn’t there?”
“Yes.”
“It’s about five feet, is it not?”
“Yes, but we keep it trimmed.”
“But it hasn’t been trimmed recently, has it?”
“No. It was due in early June, but the lawn service isn’t overly reliable. Sometimes in the summer months, the service gets too busy, what with people spraying chemicals everywhere, willy-nilly.” She shuddered.
“It was raining the afternoon of June 18, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“The storm began about three o’clock, didn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Objection,” Ryerson said. “What’s the relevance of this weather report?”
Fuck you. “Your Honor, the relevance will be clear if the young Mrs. Ryerson can be patient.”
“Good. Overruled,” Justice Millan said, and Ryerson flounced into her chair like Scarlett O’Hara. Fiddle-dee-dee.
I cleared my throat. “Do you recall that the sky became very dark as the storm came up, Mrs. Mateer?”
“Yes. It got quite dark. It was the tail end of that tropical storm. Wind was gusting, trees were knocked over. Conestoga Road was blocked for some time, by a branch, in fact.” Her gold bangles jingled as she folded her hands on her lap.
“Mrs. Mateer, wasn’t it raining hard when you saw this person?”
“Yes.”
“It was a driving rain, was it not?”
“A drenching rain, I would say. I was pleased to see it, as a gardener.”
I thought of asking her about the garden club but dismissed it. With what was to come next, it would sound like I was bringing Kate into it. “Did the person you saw have the hat down over his or her eyes?”
“Only partly.”
“Do you remember if they held the brim of the hat, as if to shield themselves from the rain?”
“I don’t think so, but I’m not sure.” Mrs. Mateer closed her eyes, trying to remember, and her eyelids fluttered slightly. “Maybe, I don’t know,” she said, nodding, and Ryerson made a note.
“Did you notice any jewelry on his or her hand as they held the hat brim?”
She paused. “No. He may have been wearing gloves, I don’t recall for sure.”
“Did the person have the collar of the raincoat up around their face?”
“I don’t recall.”
Ryerson made another note.
“And you testified the person was rushing, too, so you only saw him or her for a short time?”
Justice Millan harrumphed from the dais. “Do we have to say ‘his or her’ every time, counselor? It sounds so politically correct.”
The reporters laughed. Justice Millan gave good copy.
“Your Honor, this witness’s identification of the defendant is sketchy at best. I can’t concede it was even a man that she saw.”
“Fine, fine, fine,” Millan said. “But dump the ‘his or her.’ I’ll remember you have a continuing objection. I’m a woman judge, if you haven’t noticed.”
The gallery chuckled.
“Mrs. Mateer, you testified that you saw this person rush to a black Jaguar?”
“Not exactly. I testified that I saw Judge Hamilton rush to the Jaguar.”
Ouch. “And he got into the car and reversed out the driveway?” I tried to picture it in my mind.
“Yes.”
And the car was backward. “He didn’t turn around in the driveway and drive out with the front of the car facing you?”
“No, there’s not enough room, one has to reverse out. It’s quite inconvenient.”
I paused a minute and the courtroom fell silent. A reporter coughed in the back, and there was whispering. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but something was nagging at me as I pictured Fiske running to his car and jumping in.
“Mrs. Mateer,” I asked, “did this person enter the car from its left side or its right?”
She paused. “What do you mean?”
“When the person got in the car, did he enter on the right side or the left?”
She blinked. “I don’t recall. The driver’s side, of course.”
I was building on something, but didn’t know exactly what. I got the same sort of hunch at the poker table, and followed it every time. “You say the driver’s side, Mrs. Mateer, but was it the left or the right side of the car?”
“The right, I believe.” She held up a bejeweled index finger. “Wait… it was the left.”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Ryerson said. “Defense counsel is trying to confuse the witness.”
Not this time. “Your Honor, I’m trying to understand exactly what Mrs. Mateer saw. The Commonwealth calls her an eyewitness, after all.”
“Overruled.” Justice Millan nodded, and Ryerson sulked in her chair.
“Mrs. Mateer, I need to know whether the person you saw got into the car from the right or the left. Please take a minute and think about it.”
Ryerson sighed, making a great show of her exasperation, and Fiske tensed at my elbow. He knew where I was going and suddenly so did I.
“The left side,” Mrs. Mateer said. “I’m positive now. The left.”
GO FOR IT! Fiske wrote on my legal pad, but I shook my head. Better to save it for later. It wasn’t a home run at a preliminary hearing but might be enough to constitute a reasonable doubt at trial. I didn’t want to show my hand.
“Mrs. Mateer, you’re sure that the person got into the car on the left in a great hurry, started it immediately, and drove off?”
“Yes.” She drew a deep breath, now that she felt on safer ground.
“And the person didn’t slide over in the front seat to start the car?”
“No.”
“He jumped in and started right off?”
“Yes.”
Fiske wrote GO! GO! GO! on the pad.
No, I wrote back. Not today.
He pursed his lips. He couldn’t have been as good a chess player as I thought. I had learned something, but the police wouldn’t drop a murder charge on it. Fiske’s Jaguar, being British-made, had the steering wheel on the right, so the driver would have entered from the right side of the car. Either Mrs. Mateer wasn’t so good on the details or Fiske was being framed for murder by someone who knew his license plate but didn’t know about his steering wheel. Or who had forgotten.
“Do you have any further questions, Ms. Morrone?” Justice Millan said. “Let’s keep things moving.”
“Just a couple, Your Honor. Mrs. Mateer, how often do you look out of your kitchen window?”
“Every time I’m at the sink. And other times, to check on my garden.”
“I understand.” You’re not a nosy old bird. “Did you ever see people coming and going from the carriage house?”
“Yes.”
“It was mostly men who came and went, isn’t that right?”
“Objection, Your Honor!” Ryerson said. “What is defense counsel suggesting?”
“Your Honor, I’m hoping Mrs. Mateer can help me understand who visited the carriage house. That is highly relevant to proving who killed Patricia Sullivan, which is the only thing the Commonwealth should be concerned about.”
“Overruled,” Justice Millan said. “She’s entitled to inquire.”
“Mrs. Mateer, you said you rented to Patricia Sullivan for a two-year period. Did you happen to notice that men visited her during that time?”
“Well, yes.”
“Would you say that many men visited her or just a few?”
She paused. “I would have to say more than a few.”
“You would have to say ‘many,’ am I right?”
“Yes.”
The reporters started yapping, as I knew they would. I wondered how Fiske would take this. Or Paul. “Mrs. Mateer, did you meet any of these men?”
“What?”
“Let’s back up. You work in the garden out back, and you’re a gardener, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Are you a member of the Wayne Garden Club, by the way?”
“I was for many years, but no longer.”
Hmmm. Kate’s club. Did it matter? “When you were out working in your garden, did Patricia Sullivan ever introduce you to any of her visitors?”
“No… well, only one. I forget his name.”
“Is he in the courtroom today?”
She scanned the crowd slowly. I held my breath, praying she wouldn’t point at Paul. I’d normally never ask such an open question on cross, but I needed this answer. After a long time, Mrs. Mateer said: “Well, I see a man I recognize, but Patricia never introduced us.”
My mouth went dry. “Who would that be?”
She pointed a bony finger at the gallery. Heads swiveled frantically among the pews. I looked at Paul, who sat bolt upright, seemingly unafraid of her identification.
“In the back,” Mrs. Mateer said. She aimed her finger at Stan Julicher, who raised his hand and smiled at the press.
“Besides him, is there anyone else?”
“No.”
My mind flipped through the drawings I’d seen in the other sketchbooks in the garage, then the sketch I stepped on. “Mrs. Mateer, wasn’t there one man who visited more frequently than others?”
“I have to object, Your Honor,” Ryerson said. “This line of questioning casts aspersions on the character of the victim. This is the worst kind of-”
“Overruled. Get to the point, Ms. Morrone,” Justice Millan interrupted. “I’m not interested in watching while you fish.”
“Yes, Your Honor. Mrs. Mateer, there was one man who visited more than the others, wasn’t there?”
“I don’t know his name.”
I thought of the front door, unlocked. “Did he live with Miss Sullivan?”
“I’m not sure.”
“He was tall, wasn’t he, about six feet?”
She nodded. “I suppose.”
Ready, set, go. “And he was black, was he not?”
Mrs. Mateer cleared her throat. “Well, yes.”
The gallery burst into excited chatter and Justice Millan pounded the gavel. “Now, children,” she said.
“And he rode a BMW motorcycle, didn’t he?”
“Why, yes.”
And he left the seat up, too, but we won’t go into that. I glanced at Fiske, who looked puzzled. Paul didn’t. “Mrs. Mateer, I have one final question. You never saw Judge Hamilton visit the carriage house, did you?”
“No.”
Thank God, Fiske had kept his trysts nocturnal. “I have no further questions of this witness.”
I sat down and half listened to a repetitious redirect by Ryerson, then put myself on autopilot as Lieutenant Dunstan described in mind-numbing detail the police procedures for license-plate and fingerprint identification. He testified that they’d found Fiske’s prints in the living room, which squared with what Fiske had told me. He’d confined his close encounters to the sofa. Why do you think they call it a love seat?
On cross-examination, I established that the police had dusted the carriage house and found no other fingerprints from Fiske, and had examined Fiske’s Jaguar and had not yet found any evidence of the victim’s blood, hair, or fibers from her clothes. But I couldn’t resist a final line of questions, just to get the press salivating.
“Lieutenant Dunstan, did the police consider that one of the male visitors to the carriage house could have committed the crime?”
He nodded. “We investigated thoroughly, including the gentleman you referred to.”
A shake, rattle, and roll emanated from the back of the courtroom. I looked back. It was Tobin, shaking his box of Jujyfruits, presumably warning me not to press further. Still, I couldn’t resist a parting shot:
“Lieutenant Dunstan, how easy do you think it is to make a fake Pennsylvania license plate, one that would look real at a hundred yards, in the middle of a dark rainstorm?”
“I have no idea.”
“What if I told you I made one this morning in only ten minutes, out of cardboard and indelible markers?”
“Objection!” Ryerson said, but the reporters responded predictably, salivating and scribbling, scribbling and salivating. Justice Millan banged her gavel again and again, to no avail. All the news that’s fit to spin was being spun, like straw into gold.
“Never mind, I withdraw the question,” I said. “I have no further questions.”
I sat down and promised myself that someday I’d try to make a license plate out of cardboard and indelible markers. When I got a spare ten minutes.