Ring of Truth
I notice something and ask, “Speaking of signs, what’s that, Carl?”
He turns to see what I mean: a big white cardboard sign with a fat black “8” on it. “The number of days left till the execution of Stevie Orbach,” he tells me. “That’s our countdown calendar.”
“You do that for all your killers?”
“No, just Stevie. Somebody rapes and murders the niece of one of our guys, we’re going to pay special attention.”
“Will you do that when it’s time for Bob Wing?”
“No.” Carl shrugs. “He’s nothing to us.”
“One more question.”
He fakes a put-upon sigh.
“It’s about Artemis McGregor. Do you think she’s dangerous?”
He gives me an amused, cynical look. “No, I think she’s scared.”
“Scared?”
“Sure. I think she got caught up in something she never intended to happen and she feels lucky to have got off so easy.”
“Doesn’t it piss you off that she was acquitted?”
“Nah. We got the bad guy. Her life is ruined, she’ll never pick up the pieces from this. She was just a pawn. If they’d gotten away with it, she’d probably have been next on his list.”
“You think he’d have killed her, too?”
“Sure, first they killed his wife, then they would have killed her husband, and then Wing would have killed her. She’s got money, right?”
“So,” I say, a shade ironically, “you’re saying that in a way you may have saved her life.”
“Listen, we don’t need to execute her. She’ll fall for another one just like him. Women like that, they do themselves in, every time.”
The assistant state attorney, Tony Delano, tried to make the case in court that Artie McGregor was a canny, manipulative femme fatale who bashed her rival to death with a baseball bat. And now here’s Carl Chamblin saying she’s nothing more than a fool and a helpless tool for a good-looking man.
“What about the stuff in the boat bag, Carl, the condoms and stuff?”
“What about them?”
“Seems like evidence of their affair. I’m going to put a photo of it in my book. I’m taking a photographer out to the mansion with me today to pose the bag in the cabinet where Jenny found it.”
“You got permission to go in there?”
“I’ve notified the owner.”
Carl’s good-bye smile is cruel. “If you ask her nice, maybe she’ll recreate the murder for you. Get pictures. Ask her to sign one for me.”
* * *
In the lobby, I stop to use a pay phone to drop my third piece of bait. When defense attorney Tammi Golding comes on the line, I say, “Tammi, it’s Marie Lightfoot, and I won’t take but a minute. You know that canvas boat bag that Jenny Carmichael found? Well, they gave it to me. I’m going to take it out to the old mansion this afternoon and get some photos of it up in the tower where Jenny found it. Is there any chance your client would come out to have her picture taken, too?”
Tammi expresses the opinion that I must be nuts.
I laugh, and say, “I have learned that it never hurts to ask. Will you at least run the idea past her this morning?” I get the reluctant agreement I’m seeking and hang up, thinking: Almost hooked now. I figure it has to be Artemis who tried to get her hands on the bag, and Tammi’s my best bet for being the one who told her about it, however innocently. But I need to contact everyone the Carmichaels told, just in case Artemis fails to listen to her messages and there is another route by which the news gets passed along. That’s why my next stop is the assistant state attorney’s office, and my excuse is that he’s the one who asked to see me.
* * *
I don’t make it out of the back door of the police station, however, before I’m waylaid by the chief of police himself.
“Marie?” I turn to find Marty Rocowski bearing down on me, looking dapper in a light summer suit with a matching shirt and tie, so that he’s dressed all in cream. After a few polite preliminaries, he gets to the point, with a self-effacing grin. “How you doing on that book of yours?”
“Mailed it to my editor yesterday, Marty.”
I can’t bring myself to call him Rocco.
“Hey, congratulations. Would you let somebody read it now?”
“I don’t usually do that.” That’s a partial truth; frequently, I allow some people to read short excerpts, to check for accuracy. But I don’t want a chief of police getting his hands on my manuscript, because he’d naturally be inclined to try to censure anything he didn’t like that I had written about his officers. “Why, Marty?”
“I’m only asking for my wife.” His grin grows wider and more charming. “Betty is one of your biggest fans. She can’t wait to get her hands on this one, and her birthday’s coming up. I’d score bigtime if I could take a copy of it home to her before any of her friends could read it.”
“I’ll give you a signed copy when it comes out.”
He hides his disappointment fairly well, but it leaves us in an awkward moment of silence, which he fills by asking, “Now that you’re finished with it, will you take a vacation?”
“Hope to, although I still have some work to do on it.”
“You ought to go,” he urges, enthusiastic as any travel agent.
“How about you?” I ask, to get his attention off me. “Can you and Betty escape any of Spring Break?”
“For a few days. We’re going to Ft. Meyers to play golf right after the execution.”
“Excuse me?”
“Stevie Orbach. I’m taking a group of officers up to watch, friends of Lyle Karnacki’s. Then I can go play golf.”
“Is that usual, for groups of you to watch executions?”
“I consider it part of the job.”
I’m truly curious now. “Why, Marty?”
He looks at me thoughtfully, then says, “My philosophy is that we ought to see the consequences of the laws we enforce. If we arrest people and testify against them, then we ought to take it all the way to the end and see them executed, if that’s the case. Families aren’t the only ones who need closure. Cops do, too.”
“You mind if I use that quote in my book?”
He smiles down at me. “Not at all. If you change your mind about the manuscript, call me, all right?”
“Sure,” I say, while thinking that as much as I want to keep on the good side of my hometown police department, that particular favor is not gonna happen. As I return to my car, I have a moment of realizing how lucky I am to have the easy access I do. Computers have made life hard for regular crime reporters on newspaper beats. There are new security systems to keep you out of anywhere the cops don’t want you to go, and there’s the new fashion of “escorts” who keep you from wandering off into interesting corners, and new gag rules on cops, prohibiting them from talking freely to reporters. Not only that, but there’s no paper trail to follow anymore. If you’re a journalist with a police beat, you want to be able to search inventory lists, for instance, that show everything the cops seized with a warrant. But those physical files are gone, replaced by impenetrable computers. To get inside information now, you may have to file for it under the Freedom of Information Act, and you’ll be lucky if the city attorney okays it. At that point of maddening frustration, some reporters write the only story left to them—about how the cops won’t cooperate with the press. You can just imagine how popular that makes the reporter and how congenial that makes the cops. As I sail past the metal detector, I know these same doors would lock me out if I were any writer but me doing any other kind of crime writing. But since I am only writing about good cops doing good jobs in cases that are already solved, they let me pass “go.”
I pause to look back at the incongruously pink building.
What if I had to write something really bad about them? Would they let me back in again? My portrayal of Carl Chamblin and the other detectives is pretty blunt in the new book; I hope there’s enough oil left on the h
inges of their good will to keep the door swinging open for me.
* * *
This is Franklin’s domain: the state attorney’s office.
The moment he spies me, Tony Delano launches right in. “I’ll tell you why he got convicted and she didn’t.”
I nod, even as I’m clearing off a chair on which to sit.
Tony is short, stocky, intense as his Sicilian forebears are reputed to be. The fingers on which he ticks off his points are stubby as sausages, but better groomed. “We got him on five points: the baseball bat, the semen, the uncorroborated alibi, and enough motive to choke a rhinoceros. After the testimony about the life-insurance payout, he was a cooked goose.”
I nod again. Tony’s right: he had a strong enough mix of direct physical evidence and circumstantial evidence to convince any jury. The murder weapon was proven to be the baseball bat. The bat belonged to the preacher and it was found in his front hallway with her blood and tissue embedded in its cracks. The semen wouldn’t have been convincing—they were married—except that the medical examiner thought she may have had forced sex before she died. The alibi was a farce. It amounted to, “I was with her,” the “her” being his codefendant, whose alibi was, “I was with him.”
Satisfied that I’m agreeing with him, Tony plunges on. “Now I’ll tell you why we didn’t convict her.”
“All right.”
“We didn’t establish any physical evidence to tie her to the scene.”
I wait for him to go on, but he just sits there looking at me until, finally, he says, “That’s it.”
“I don’t agree, Tony. I mean, I agree it was bad that you only had circumstantial evidence on her, but I think you still might have convinced the jury. That’s the impression I got from a couple of jurors.”
He winces like a man who doesn’t want to hear bad reviews of his own performance in the courtroom. “Okay.” He sighs. “Hit me.”
“You lost her at three points in the trial, Tony. The first was when Tammi demolished those three witnesses of yours, the church women who said they knew about the affair. Tammi made them look like jealous gossips. The second was Artie herself, who sat there looking like the first angel at the right hand of God. Nobody could convict that woman of anything, Tony. She looks too damned sweet and innocent. They were never going to believe that she stood in that house and watched him force sex on his wife and they sure weren’t going to believe she picked up a weapon of her own—which you never produced—to help kill Susanna. You’re lucky they didn’t convict you for saying all of those nasty things about her. And the clincher was when Tammi put on that nurse from the retirement home who told about how all the old folks adore Artie.”
“Barf.”
“You might have tried that.” I give him a sympathetic smile. “That might have convinced the judge, but I don’t think Franklin DeWeese himself could have brought in a conviction on Artemis McGregor. And where is your boss this morning?”
“He might drop by.”
“So what’s the information you have for me that you couldn’t bring out at trial?”
“Those church women.” Tony’s looking serious now. “The ones that Tammi turned into petty, gossipy bitches?”
“Yes?”
“Marie, they’re not.”
“That’s your new information?”
“Listen, okay? Think about the implications of what I’m saying, what they said, the telephone conversation they overheard. They really did hear it, I’m totally convinced of that, and I’m not exactly naïve, Marie. Maybe this sounds stupid to you, for me to say this, but they are not goody-goody hypocritical white-glove church ladies. They’re kind, intelligent women, and their only sin was accidentally overhearing a damning telephone conversation between a husband and a wife, and then making the awful connection between it and her death, and then having the guts to go up against their beloved minister and the whole congregation who idolize him and say so. Marie, those women have been pariahs ever since it became known that they took their evidence to the cops. You saw how Tammi treated them in court, like they were dead fish and she was dangling them by their tailfins. They were crucified on the witness stand, and I feel damned bad that I couldn’t protect them once Tammi got rolling.”
He pauses, takes a breath, which he blows out like he’s winded.
“But this isn’t even about how lousy this is for them and their families, Marie. This is about what it means if they really did hear what they said they heard. Now, you tell me—what would that mean?”
“That Bob and Artie really were having an affair.”
“Yes. What else?”
“That she’s probably guilty.”
“Yes, at the very least of being a coconspirator or an accessory. And, therefore, a guilty woman—”
“Got off. To which I still say: Sorry, Tony, you lose. You’re the lawyer, you tell me—isn’t that how our judicial system works?”
“Or doesn’t,” he says, looking glum.
“Right. Or doesn’t.”
“So that alone,” he says with a challenging air, “doesn’t inspire you to correct in print the egregious wrong that has been done to those nice women, those good citizens? You don’t even want to raise the possibility in your book that they did overhear what they said they did? And at least let your readers draw their own conclusions. Or, are you going to be satisfied with portraying them in the way the defense manipulated them to appear?”
I give him a look as if to say, “Well, when you put it that way . . .”
“What if I told you where you could get your hands on new evidence?”
I smile at him a bit smugly. “If you mean the canvas bag, I’ve already got it.”
His eyes widen. “You do? How the hell—?”
“They brought it to me when you didn’t want it. Why didn’t you?”
“Too late. Besides, the chain of evidence is fatally compromised by now. But you’ll mention it in your book, right?”
“I’ll do better than that, Tony. I’ll even put in a picture of it.”
He smiles happily at me. “All right.”
“In fact, when I leave here, I’m taking the bag out to the mansion to have some pictures taken of it right where Jenny found it.”
“I knew you cared about the right things.” Tony picks up a ballpoint pen and clicks it a couple of times. “Would you go to a movie with me sometime?”
I blink in surprise. Where’d this come from? The universe seems to have heard about my desire to go to a movie with a grown man, but it has gotten the fulfillment of it a little confused. Usually, I can see these things coming, but Tony has blindsided me here. I’m suspicious. Is this a test? To see if I’ll confirm some gossip?
“Why do you want to take me out, Tony?”
It’s his turn to blink, then to smile. “That’s a new one. I’ve heard ’No’ in all its permutations, but I don’t believe I’ve ever had a woman actually question my motives.” He makes a show of thinking it over. “I want to take you out because you’re shorter than I am.”
“I’m not, actually.”
“Close enough.”
“I suppose I’ve been asked out for worse reasons. I can’t, Tony.” I decide to tell part of the truth and see if he reacts to it. “I’m busy getting my heart broken by another man. Believe me, going out with you would be a lot more fun, but what can I do? I have an opportunity to be really miserable, and I’m determined to take it, by God.”
He’s shaking his head in amused sympathy.
I can see nothing in his face that shouldn’t be there.
“Tell me who he is, Marie. I’ll have him arrested for something. What charge would you like? Felonious mischief? Leaving the scene of a romance?”
That makes me laugh, though I still wonder what he knows.
“We could probably keep him in jail until he comes to his senses.”
“Thanks, but he’s already arrested, Tony.”
Tony doesn’t miss much, including my little
pun. “Arrested development? I hear it’s epidemic among American men. Not me, Marie. I may not look it, but I promise you I’m a grown-up. My heart is mature.” He places his right hand over his chest dramatically, making me smile again. Suddenly he takes his pen and scribbles on a slip of paper, which he then hands to me. “Here. If you ever need cheering up, use this coupon that’s good for one night out with a man who guarantees that he will appreciate you.”
“What a deal.” I take it, smiling, and make a show of putting it in a safe place in my purse. “Thank you. You are an honorable but devious man, Tony.”
“Kinder words could never be said to a lawyer. Who’s going to play me in the movie?”
“Who do you want?”
“Well, I’m pretty much the spitting image of Russell Crowe.”
I throw him a kiss as I leave. “I’ll see what I can do, Russ.”
* * *
The gate to the property that Artemis still owns is padlocked. The NO TRESPASSING signs are more numerous than ever. If Tammi does call her and tell her what I’m doing, and she objects to my being here, there’s no way to tell me now. And if locks, signs, and a fence couldn’t keep out two ten-year-olds, it certainly can’t keep out Bennie, George, and me. One of them is playing professional photographer, the other is playing photographer’s assistant, and I’m carrying the bag. Like the girls, we have to leave our vehicles outside and then clamber over, equipment and all. Together we walk up the overgrown driveway, playing our roles, talking of the weather, the trees, our fears of crawly things. Then, cautiously, we climb to the tower, stand in the windows and admire the views, then set up our pictures, which I may in fact use, and take them. George, our “photographer,” gets carried away and starts snapping pictures right and left, trying for “artistic” shots, until Bennie and I pull him away.
The bag stays behind in the cabinet in the tower.
No way was I coming in here alone, not even in daylight. And when we come back tonight, from a hidden side path, without any baggage, my ex-military bodyguards will flank me all the way.
But first I have an appointment I have to keep at home.
Bennie drives me back so that he can relieve his substitute at our own gate. George, meanwhile, glides into the shadows, to watch the property until we join him later.