Q: Why did God make you?
A: To represent cold-blooded murderers and various other swine.
Mary gritted her teeth. She grabbed a legal pad, put her head down, and started taking notes. As long as she had this job, she was going to do it and do it right. It was the only way to cope with defending Connolly, and she suspected it was the only way most criminal defense lawyers defended their clients.
Without looking up.
Judy lurked inside the door of the boxing gym, reacquainting herself with the place. The sparring match staged earlier in the day was gone, and a white man pounded the heavy bag in the corner. Two black men worked the speedbags, their muscled arms pumping in deft circular motions. A janitor swept up with a long wooden pushbroom, an unlit cigarette plugged into the side of his mouth. Nobody noticed Judy, or if they did, they didn’t bother her.
She watched the boxer on the heavy bag that hung from the ceiling like a dead body. Womp, womp, womp, went the sound of leather on thick canvas, reverberating in the gym. The fighter’s body swiveled from side to side with each jab. The rhythm reminded Judy of the natural swing of cross-country skiing and the solitude of the boxer was like rock climbing. Odd to find remnants of her two favorite sports in a filthy gym, but Judy had the capacity to romanticize anything. Even really smelly things.
Behind her, in the corner, was a scene she hadn’t seen from the door. A short older man in gray sweats was demonstrating a classic boxing stance in front of a lineup of little kids in low-slung boxers. His skin was the color of chestnuts and his eyes a rich, resonant brown, large and lively in a barely lined face. Hair worn natural covered his neatly shaped head, with patches of gray at the temples, and he smiled easily, almost like a kid himself. “Think you can do it? Give it a try!” the man shouted to the group, and Judy walked over to watch.
The kids stepped forward and imitated the stance, their flat torsos and lanky arms ending in puffy red boxing gloves, crisscrossed with duct tape.
“Way to go, boys! That was great!” the man called out, and the kids’ chests puffed visibly. “Now, lefts up!” The kids cocked their left fists protectively. “Look like you mean it!” the man shouted. He wiped his brow and grinned at Judy. “They look real good, don’t they? They only had two lessons, these boys.”
“They look awesome!” Judy said, loud so the kids could hear.
The man returned his attention to the kids. “Now let’s see a few jabs, boys.” The kids started swinging, imitating moves from TV. “Way to be, way to be!” he called to them as they swung.
“You teach boxing, I gather,” Judy called out.
“Sure. Boxin’ gives kids somethin’ to do, teaches ’em self-esteem. I make ’em do a good deed, too, every day.” The man’s forehead wrinkled as two kids started shoving each other. “Hey, cut that out, you two. Troy! Vondel! Okay, we’re done for the night. Hit the showers!” The kids fell out of line and scampered across the worn Astroturf for the locker room. “Don’t leave the towels on the floor! Put ’em in the hamper!” he shouted after them.
“I don’t think they heard you,” Judy said, smiling.
“They heard, but they don’t listen.” The man wiped his brow on the sleeve of his sweats and extended a large hand. “I’m Roy Gaines. Everybody call me Mr. Gaines, don’t ask why. Not that I won’t tell you, jus’ I don’t remember. Jus’ started that way and there’s no stoppin’ it. So now Mr. Gaines it is.”
“Happy to meet you, Mr. Gaines. I’m Judy Forty,” Judy said, shaking his hand. It was a false name, but she was undercover. People didn’t line up to help lawyers, and she wanted to keep her connection to the Della Porta case under wraps. If she could avoid seeing Star for the next few days, she could pull it off. “You give lessons to adults, too?”
“Ha! I trained half the fighters outta this gym.”
“So you must know a lot about boxing.”
“Been boxin’ since I was a kid. Started out wrasslin’ in the schoolyard, down Georgia. Didn’t have the height nor the reach to be no professional, though. Been givin’ lessons for a long time. Ask the manager of the place, Dayvon Allen, he here in the daytime. Ask him. Ask anybody. Everybody know Mr. Gaines.”
Judy nodded. It sounded perfect. “I’d like to take boxing lessons from you.”
“Boxin’ lessons? Sure.” Mr. Gaines looked Judy up and down, appraising her. “You could do it, girl. Got the build for it. Tall, strong. Long arms. Lotsa women boxin’ now.”
“Really?”
“Christy Martin, the coal miner’s daughter? White girl, wears pink shorts, built like a truck. On a card with De La Hoya one time. Helluva boxer. Holds her own, Christy does, and there’s that Dutch girl, the real pretty one. What’s her name?” Mr. Gaines frowned in thought, then snapped his fingers, an unexpectedly loud sound. “Lucia Rijker! You see her?”
“No.”
“Well, you should.” Mr. Gaines frowned. “You interested in boxin’, you oughta watch it. Watch it all you can. Watch the men, watch the women, you can always learn somethin’. S’like anythin’ else, you gotta study it. Practice. Train. Work. Can’t be traipsin’ in here lookin’ for no diet program.”
“How much are lessons?”
“Twenty-five bucks a half hour. Gotta sign me a form, if you serious.”
“I am.” Judy felt dismayed. A half hour? She couldn’t learn much about the gym in half an hour. “Can I take an hour lesson?”
“A half hour be more than enough.” Mr. Gaines chuckled, revealing a cracked front tooth that looked like a piece of white bread with a bite taken out of it. “Believe me. Puh-lenty. You got time on your hands, you train. In between lessons, you train. Hear me? Train. Run. Lift. Heavy bag. Reflex bag. I give you a schedule. All my students got a schedule.”
“How about three lessons a week?”
“Hoo-ee, you fast. Most people, they do one a week. What the hurry?”
Judy paused. “I already know the basics. My dad boxed. He was a cop.”
“A cop, huh?” Mr. Gaines repeated, and Judy nodded, though she was making it up as she went along. Her father was a Stanford professor who would have abhorred boxing if he’d ever deigned to form an opinion about it.
“I think there’s something about cops and boxing, don’t you?” Judy asked, digging for information. “They seem attracted to it. Isn’t there a detective who manages a boxer here?”
“Sure. Star Harald. Great boxer, about to turn pro. You oughta see that fight, at the Blue. Too late to get tickets, gonna be on the USA channel and all.”
“Do you know him, this detective?”
“He’s dead now.” Mr. Gaines clucked. “Good manager. Knew the sport. He got shot. Murdered.”
“Shot? That’s awful. Did they catch who did it?”
“Sure did. His girl. She’s went to jail for it, I think.”
“His girl?” Judy echoed, as if she hadn’t known. “Did you know her?”
“Nah. Not much. She was mean, you know? Never said nothin’ to me, hung with the wives and girlfriends. Figured she was the one who done it, when I heard about it.”
“Why? What made you think that?”
“Some people, they jus’ bad.” Mr. Gaines shook his head. “Wrong numbers, my mama use to call ’em. Now that girl, she was jus’ a wrong number.”
Judy worried. Everywhere she turned was a completely credible witness who thought Connolly was guilty, and Bennie wouldn’t hear any of it. Rather, as Mr. Gaines would say, Bennie heard but she didn’t listen.
“Now, Miss Judy, you want to talk lessons or not? You sign me the form, we can start nex’ week.”
“How about tomorrow morning?” she asked, and Mr. Gaines laughed.
31
Bennie worked in a fever, hauling box after box upstairs from the storage area in the basement of Della Porta’s rowhouse. She’d convinced the superintendent that as Connolly’s lawyer she had a right to her personal belongings, and he was reliably drunk enough to buy it. Bennie was hoping that re
constructing the apartment would help her to understand the way Connolly and Della Porta lived. Their relationship was the crux of the murder case and its subtleties could lead Bennie to useful evidence or a new angle. And part of her was driven to know more about Connolly, now that she looked more like her with her new haircut and makeup. She was mildly disappointed. The super had been too buzzed to notice her makeover.
Bennie piled boxes late into the night, a wall of almost forty of them in the living room, and surprisingly, the effort reinvigorated her. By the time she had the last box upstairs, it was almost two in the morning and she’d forgotten to call Grady. She tried him on her cell phone but there was no answer. He was undoubtedly sound asleep. She dropped the phone back into her purse, reached into her briefcase for the case file, and located the list of photos taken by the mobile crime unit. The MCU had been thorough, taking grisly but informative photos of the living room.
Bennie set the file down, tore the brown tape from the first box, and began to unpack. It took almost until dawn and left her lower back aching, but by the time she was finished, the apartment was completely reassembled. She walked from room to room, ending up in the doorway to the kitchen, which turned out to be well stocked. Della Porta had evidently been a cook; twenty cookbooks bearing his name inside sat atop the counter next to a Cuisinart. Heavy Calphalon cookware stocked the cabinets: an omelet pan, a middle- and large-size fry pan, even a tiny pan for melting butter. Eyeing the set, Bennie felt a twinge for his loss. Who could have killed Della Porta, and why?
She left the kitchen for the living room. Completely fitted out, it revealed sophisticated taste. The paintings on the front walls were original oils of city scenes by a fine artist named Solmssen: gas stations, storefronts, and a street in Manayunk that had the starkness of Edward Hopper. Over the dining room table hung an abstract watercolor, and a large reproduction of a Lichtenstein dominated the living area, its broad black lines showing a weepy comic-book blonde. Bennie stood staring at it. Interesting taste for a cop, but something about it troubled her.
She walked into the bedroom, which would have been equally classy if she had bothered to rebuild the heavy bed. She’d dragged up only the headboard, of antique brass, and rested it against the front wall according to the police photo. The hue of the brass told Bennie it was genuine, though its lightness suggested it was hollow. Matching pine nightstands flanked the bed, and in the corner stood the most unusual piece of all: an antique stand-up teacher’s desk, which looked like a lectern on spindly legs. Bennie walked over to it and ran her fingers along the dense grain of its dark wood. The thing must have cost a fortune.
That was it. She whirled around. The cookware in the kitchen, the art in the living room, the antiques in the bedroom cost major money. That would be in addition to the rent, a thousand a month, which was straining even Bennie’s finances. She had read in Della Porta’s obit that his deceased parents were middle-class, so there was no family money. Certainly his managing a boxer suggested a man with an interest in making a killing. So how did Della Porta get this kind of money, on the police force? And why spend all the money on the inside, hidden, and not on the apartment itself? Why not move to a better neighborhood, even?
Though the answers would help her defense, they weren’t ones Bennie welcomed.
32
“Where have you been, Bennie?” Grady asked, turning from the mirror in the bathroom. The unhappy downturn to his mouth was illuminated by a bare bulb hanging from a wire in the ceiling. His hair dripped from his morning shower and was still soggy at its curling ends. “It’s six in the morning. You were out all night.”
“I was working on Connolly.” Bennie stood in the center dim hall, still awaiting a light fixture. A spray of black wires sprung from the ceiling like an electrical spider, for which Bennie was momentarily grateful. Grady wouldn’t be able to see Connolly’s haircut in the dark.
“Where were you working? You weren’t at the office. I called and got your voice mail.”
“I was at the crime scene. Where you off to, so early?”
“I have to be in King of Prussia by eight o’clock.” Grady gave the Goody comb a shake and set it down. He was dressed for work in a light gray suit, white oxford shirt, and flowered Liberty tie. “The merger is on again and the venture capitalists want more changes. I don’t know when we’re gonna close. Also, the plumber never showed to put in the kitchen sink. The key was where you left it.”
“Wonderful.” Bennie scratched Bear’s head as he sat at a floppy heel. “I have no time to call him.”
“I’ll do it. You get too damn crazy.”
“Thanks. You finished in the bathroom? I need to shower. I have to get back to work.” Bennie kicked off her pumps and Bear ambled off to sniff one.
“I see the press is smelling blood.” Grady looked sympathetic. “You were all over the news on the radio. They’re reporting that Connolly is your twin. Who do you think leaked that?”
“God knows.” Bennie slipped off her jacket and blouse in the dark, shimmied out of her skirt, and dropped the entire outfit in a pile on the hall floor. “Hang tough. It’s gonna get worse.”
“Hey, did you get your hair cut or something?” Grady came over, squinting. They stood in the hall together, and Bennie hoped it was dark enough to conceal traces of her Connolly makeup, which she had wiped off. “I thought you liked it long,” he said. “I do, too.”
“I needed a change.”
“Well, I can’t see your hair too well,” Grady said, fingering a strand. “But the rest of you looks pretty good.” He gentled her into a kiss, cuddling her in his jacket. She would have lingered in his arms, but she broke the embrace, feeling vaguely undeserving.
“I have to get going. Sorry.” Bennie put her head down and flicked off the light switch to hide her hair before she entered the bathroom.
But Grady stayed at the threshold. “Making any progress?”
“I hired an investigator,” she offered, fully aware it was the least significant event of yesterday. Funny how one material omission could lead to another. Maybe not so funny. Bennie bent over the sink and twisted on the warm water, then soaped up her hands with an amber bar of Neutrogena. “Now, don’t you have work to do? Software companies to merge and acquire?”
“Did you see what I left you on the dining room table? I got some information about DNA testing from a lab down in Virginia. I found them on the Internet and they faxed me the application. The test costs about three hundred bucks and it’s confidential. I think you should do it.”
“DNA?” She lathered up and buried her face in warm water. “I’d feel funny about that.”
“Why? It’s reliable. I gave ’em a call and a researcher explained the whole process. They cut the DNA from the two blood samples and count the VNTRs, whatever they are. Identical twins have an unusually high number of matches of VNTRs. The test proves if someone is really your identical twin.”
“I’m supposed to take Connolly’s blood?” Bennie said, then caught herself wondering if she’d done that once already, in the womb. She splashed water on her cheeks.
“Connolly won’t mind giving it, if she’s really what she claims to be. You’ll get an answer in seven to ten days. You’ll know the truth.”
Bennie twisted off the water and reached for a towel. The truth suddenly struck her as a disruption, a distraction from the case. She’d been trying to keep the personal issues separate from the legal, with less and less success. A DNA test would only make it worse, wouldn’t it? She ducked into the clammy towel.
“Bennie?” Grady said. “I think you should do it.”
“Maybe I will, but not now.” She stuffed the towel onto the rack. “I appreciate what you did, but I don’t see the point. I wouldn’t have the answer by the trial anyway.”
Grady pursed his lips. “I’ll leave the application on the table, in case you change your mind.”
“Fine.” Bennie pushed aside the Plexiglas shower door, circa 1960s, which
rumbled in its mildewed tracks. She turned on the water and it sputtered into the brown stain of the ancient tub she used to think was charming. “Christ. Sometimes I’m sorry we bought this house.”
“Wait a minute.” The light went on in the bathroom, and Grady gasped. “Bennie?” he said, disbelief in his voice. She turned to slip into the shower, but Grady caught her arm. Bennie felt her nakedness fully as he pulled her close, staring at her hair and face. A ribbon of water dribbled forgotten into the tub. “Your hair, it’s like Connolly’s.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Yes, it is. I saw her mugshot in the paper. Did you get your hair cut like her? You’re trying to see if she’s your twin?” Grady looked worried, his gray eyes slightly puffy behind his wire rims. Bennie guessed he hadn’t slept well last night and felt a wave of responsibility for that. He deserved a straight answer.
“I’m dressing like Connolly to help her defense. The press has the story that we’re twins, and I’m going to exploit the situation to her advantage. That’s it. Now I have to take a shower. My new investigator’s coming in this morning, I hope.”
“So you’re trying to look like Connolly?” Grady shook his head in wonderment. “When, at trial?”
“Yes, and before.”
“Why before?”
“So it’s not obvious that I started at trial.”
Grady released her arm. “Don’t you think that’s beyond the pale?”
“Not at all.” Bennie wished she could cover herself, even though locker rooms had cured her of any residual modesty. “Any lawyer would do it.”
“No, they wouldn’t. I’m a lawyer and I wouldn’t.”
“She’s my client. I’m trying to save her life.”
Grady set his jaw. “Bennie, this is not about your defense of a client. This is about you, trying to figure out your relationship to Connolly. If that’s what you want to understand, take the goddamn blood test.”
“You have it wrong. I’m doing everything in my power to get her off, and in this case, I happen to have one more weapon than usual.”