Key Witness (28 page)

“Think about that.”

W
YATT HIT ALL THREE
networks’ nightly news shows, plus CNN. Moira didn’t see him on the six o’clock nationals; she hadn’t come home yet. But she did catch the local news at ten.

They sat in the den, flipping from channel to channel. Michaela, back from studying at the library, watched with them. He was on all the local stations. The actual clip that showed his face was short, less than fifteen seconds, but still, there he was.

He could feel the tension coming off Moira, particularly since much of the spin on the story, which went on for a couple of minutes, wasn’t about the case per se; it was about a famous, well-entrenched corporate attorney, whose client list ran to Fortune 500 companies, abruptly shifting gears in midcareer and taking on a highly controversial criminal case.

“So who are you pretending to be now, Johnnie Cochran or F. Lee Bailey?” Moira asked acidly.

“Just me,” he said, refusing to rise to the bait. If she wanted a fight she’d have to look elsewhere. He wasn’t going to argue with her. As this went on she’d get used to it and realize it wasn’t anything to get upset about. He hoped.

“You looked good, Dad,” Michaela opined, trying to calm the waters. “I like you in that suit.”

“I’m going to bed,” Moira said bleakly. She got up and left the room.

An hour later, when he went upstairs, the room was empty. “Moira?” he called out.

She didn’t answer. He walked down the hallway to the guest room. Moira was in bed, reading. “I’m sleeping here tonight,” she announced without looking up from her book.

He went to bed alone.

Father and daughter had breakfast together in the morning. As they were finishing up, Moira came downstairs. She was in her nightgown and robe, and hadn’t put on any makeup. Pouring herself a cup of black coffee, she kissed Michaela on the forehead. “Have a good day at school, sweetie,” she said, pointedly ignoring Wyatt.

If she wanted to cold-shoulder him there was nothing he could do about it. “We’d better get going,” he said to Michaela, carrying his dishes to the sink, where he rinsed them and placed them in the dishwasher. Michaela rinsed her own dishes, then went upstairs to get her books. “I’ll call if I’m going to be late tonight,” he told Moira, putting on his suit coat, “but I’ll try not to be.”

“I won’t hold my breath.”

He bent over to kiss her, but she turned away from him. He kissed the back of her neck, where the tendrils of her hair ended. “I love you,” he told her.

She turned to him. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

The recent rains had exploded all the plants and flowers into bloom. The air was thick with fragrance and the pungent smell of earth. Wyatt lowered his window so he could enjoy them as the Jaguar cruised down the quiet streets.

Michaela was reading a schoolbook. “I’ve got a first-period chemistry quiz,” she explained as he glanced over.

“Didn’t you study last night? I thought you were at the library.”

“I like to look it over again at the last minute.”

She was a hard worker. He’d never had to worry about her. As he looked at her concentrating on her textbook, he wondered if she was seeing a boy and didn’t want him and Moira to know about it. Or maybe Moira knew things he didn’t—it wouldn’t be the first time.

“Daddy?” she said, looking up.

“Yes, honey?”

“What you’re doing? This trial?”

“Uh-huh?”

“I think it’s a good thing,” she said with conviction.

“You do?”

She nodded. “Everybody deserves a good defense, isn’t that right?”

“That’s the way it’s supposed to be,” he agreed.

“I mean it’s not his fault that he’s a black kid and doesn’t have any money.”

“No. It isn’t.”

“The kids at school think what you’re doing is cool.”

“They do?”

“Well, not all of them,” she admitted. “Some of them think they should just execute him on the spot, but that’s their parents talking. Some of these kids don’t have any original thoughts of their own. Not my friends,” she quickly added.

“I’m glad to hear that,” he said. “That your friends are independent thinkers. I know you are. I wouldn’t ever want you agreeing with me just because I’m your father.”

“I wouldn’t. I mean I don’t agree with Mom about it.”

“No.” He hesitated. “This has been a shock to her. She needs time to adjust.”

“Maybe she won’t be able to,” Michaela said candidly. “I don’t think she thinks you should be defending him at all.”

“Even if he’s innocent?” he asked.

“Yes.” She looked at him. “Do you think he’s innocent, Dad?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t thought about that yet. I’ve been too busy with the work. He tells me he is, so unless I find reasons not to believe him, I will. That’s how I always deal with a client.”

“Well, I hope he is innocent,” she said. “If it turned out that you had defended the real Alley Slasher, that would be hard to take. Especially if you got him off.”

T
HERE WERE OVER FIVE
dozen phone messages waiting for him when he got to work, most of them sent over from his office. Friends had called from all over the country. There were also several calls from reporters—newspapers, magazines, TV, radio—all requesting interviews. Larry King,
The New Yorker,
CNBC, Oprah. Not to mention the
New York Times, People, A Current Affair.
All to be put on hold. That stuff was dicey and potentially dangerous. He didn’t want to come across like some road-show Alan Dershowitz, especially since he was new to this part of the game.

Josephine stuck her head in his door. “You’re a popular guy this morning,” she said, handing him the requisite newspapers. She was dressed in a sexy outfit—shortish skirt, heels, tight blouse. She usually dressed this way—a little on the tight-flashy side. It was who she was. Nothing calculated.

“It’ll pass,” he said.

“Don’t count on that. This case has legs. You’re going to be in the limelight for as long as it lasts, whether you want to be or not.”

“I guess. It’s a funny feeling.”

“Funny ha-ha or funny weird?”

“Strange. But I’ll get used to it. I’ll have to, because Pagano will be trying this case in the press. By the time we get to trial everyone in the city, county, and state will have formed an opinion. It’s going to be a bitch getting a jury, that’s for sure.” He sipped his coffee. It was good—she had brewed it herself. “I want every police report on every one of the murders we’re charged with,” he said. “Prepare the necessary discovery documents and have them ready to file as soon as possible. Every murder that’s been attributed to the Alley Slasher, back to the first one.”

T
WO DAYS LATER THERE
were six large cardboard boxes filled with copies of police files sitting on the floor in Wyatt’s office. Each box contained all the material the department had on each individual murder. They were numbered one through six, in the order in which the killings had taken place. The file was thinner on the most recent murder, number seven. It contained Dwayne Thompson’s grand jury testimony, the affidavit of the woman, Violet Waleska, who had seen Marvin at the murder site and had subsequently picked him out of a police lineup, and the police reports pertinent to finding Paula’s body. The material in that file was in a manila envelope on a corner of his desk.

“What we’re looking for are similarities,” Wyatt told Josephine as they looked at the large paper-filled boxes that had been delivered that morning, in accordance with his filing the discovery motions. “In location, time of day, method of killing. Similarities in who the victims were—age, color, where they lived, what they wore, where they worked, whether they were married or single, lived alone or not, anything.”

“What are we trying to find from all of this?” Josephine asked.

“Alibis,” he answered. “As far as anyone knows, there has never been an actual eyewitness to any of these killings. But maybe there’s something in here”—he pointed to the huge volume of paperwork—“that belies that, stuff the cops didn’t want the public to know.”

“That’s always been one of the reasons the police have given for not being able to solve this,” she said.

He nodded. “No one’s ever seen the killer—assuming it isn’t Marvin. The closest so far is this friend of the latest victim’s who saw Marvin in the parking lot some time around the time of the killings.” He shook his head at the volume of material they had to go through. “Let’s have at it. I’ll start with the most recent, you go back to the beginning. Highlight everything that seems pertinent, anything that could cast suspicion on Marvin’s involvement, any areas of similarity that seem strange. At the end of the day we’ll compare notes.”

After lunch Josephine went to the Auto Club and got the largest map of the city they had. She took that to a custom photography store and had it blown up ten times. The finished product was twelve feet square. She pinned the gargantuan map up on the wall outside their office and stuck pushpins into the locations where each of the murders had taken place, numbering them in the order they had happened.

The day was dying. Wyatt had a crick in his back from sitting hunched over at his desk reading the police material. He had also reread Dwayne’s grand jury testimony and Violet Waleska’s police statement and identification. After that he had worked his way backward in the police reports of the previous murders. Dwayne’s testimony, in contrasting and comparing it with the police reports, was compelling and convincing. In instance after instance he had given the grand jury information that only someone with direct and in-depth knowledge about the murders could have known. Even small details—the color of a victim’s shoe, the brand of cigarettes she was carrying in her purse—were in both his testimony and the police reports.

“There is so much damn detail in this stuff,” he remarked to Josephine. “How in the world could Marvin have remembered all this minutiae?”

“But what if Marvin really is the killer,” she countered. “I’m talking hypothetically, of course, but if he was he could be completely obsessed about them. He could remember every single detail. The killer might even have kept a journal, so he could read about it and relive it. I’ve read about those things happening.”

“Marvin doesn’t strike me as a diarist,” Wyatt said with a frown. “He’s functionally illiterate. But it’s something we should explore,” he added, not wanting to dampen her enthusiasm. “Good thinking.”

“Thanks.” She could feel the blush, still on her neck and jaw.

“Which reminds me—we’re going to have to have him examined by a psychologist. And we should check to see if there are any outstanding IQ tests, other measures of his intelligence, especially his memory. Get hold of his school files.”

“I’ll do it first thing tomorrow.”

They stood looking at the map. The pushpins, although not clustered, were all located in the same section of town. Wyatt ran his finger along the line of pins from top to bottom.

“Hooker alley,” he said. “It’s a big area, but not that big in comparison to the city as a whole. Here’s another avenue to explore: check the arrest records of the women who were killed and see if there are any pimps attached to them. Or any johns, although they weren’t listing the johns until recently. Maybe more than one of them had the same pimp. That would be a big break.”

“Don’t you think the police would have investigated the pimps pretty thoroughly?” she asked.

“I’m not thinking of them as suspects. Sources of information. Did any of the victims have regulars who might have been a customer with another one of them, that kind of thing.” He stretched, massaging the small of his back. He’d love to get a run in tonight, but that wasn’t going to happen. He had other things to do that took precedence.

“Tomorrow you’re going to start making a list,” he instructed her. “Every witness the police interviewed. Every name in those police reports. We need to find out if any of them have something to say that isn’t in these records.” He paused. “We also have to find out if any of them are going to come forward and testify that they saw Marvin around when this shit was happening.”

“That would be awful,” she said with a shudder.

“Yep, it would. But better we hear it as soon as possible than get blindsided with it in the middle of the trial.” He got his briefcase and suit coat from his office. “Don’t work too late. I’ll see you in the morning.” He started to leave. “One more thing. Have a locksmith in here tomorrow morning. I want this floor to be secure, as much as is possible. And order a couple safes, so we can lock up the critical stuff.”

“A tad paranoid, are we?” she chided him.

“Damn straight.” He shrugged into his coat. “Don’t work too late, and have fun this evening.”

He wondered if she had a boyfriend. She hadn’t mentioned one, but they hadn’t known each other very long. He realized that there was a tiny seed of jealousy about thinking that she might. That he was a married man—happily married, despite the recent problems—should mean he had no right to think that. But he did anyway. Human nature.

“You, too,” she answered. “Are you going home now?”

“No.” Earlier, he had called home to let Moira know he’d be working late. She hadn’t called back. “I have something to attend to outside the office.”

W
YATT KNEW THE CITY
—he’d grown up in it; and although he’d gone away for college, law school, the service, and a few jobs early in his career, he had lived here most of his life. But he didn’t know this part of it, where he was driving now. Even as a kid and young man, when he’d gone to jazz clubs in black areas, he hadn’t been in locations like this.

This was urban hell. Block after block featured boarded-up storefronts covered with spray-painted graffiti, most of it gang-related, or closed-up businesses with heavy metal grates pulled down over them to prevent vandalism and theft. The people on the streets looked like they had nowhere else in the world to go. Not even drug dealers or hookers were hanging around this part of town. You saw it on these reality TV shows, cops busting junkies and dealers and hookers, people living in rat-infested tenements, but it didn’t quite seem real, it felt staged somehow, a relic from some other America. It wasn’t just his city—it was every urban area. Even the great garden spots, like San Francisco. New Orleans, he knew from having recently been there, was now considered one of the most dangerous cities in the country.