Key Witness (79 page)

“If they didn’t, they’re blind.” This from Darryl. “The nurse, as nervous as he was, nailed her cold. Trying to lie her way out of that—and it was ugly to watch, she was so transparently lying to them—discredited everything else she said.”

“And that stuff about the law boards,” Walcott chimed in. “She screwed up royally there, too.”

“Speaking of which, I need to find out what’s going on with that,” Wyatt said for his own benefit, making a note to call his pal Ginsberg first thing in the morning and see if he’d got anything about Blake’s score. “What’s with the request for her computer?” he asked Walcott.

“It’ll be ready tomorrow. We’re gonna serve her and she’s gonna turn us down,” he cautioned Wyatt. “Pagano’s gonna tell her not to, in case she doesn’t get it. Then we’ll see if we can get an order from a judge, preferably Grant.”

Josephine breezed in as Darryl and Walcott polished off their beers and reached for their jackets. Wrinkling her nose, she lifted her arm and sniffed at her blouse. “I showered this morning, honest to God. I even shaved,” she said joshingly.

“Our departing is mere coincidence,” Walcott said, smiling.

“I can’t help it if the humidity’s Fahrenheit 451,” she complained. She slumped into a chair as the two men took their leave, indecorously shedding her high heels and wiggling her stockinged toes.

“Are we all set for tomorrow?” Wyatt asked, trying to sound at ease. In fact, he was nervous. People like Agnes Carpenter, who lived in a world that was part dream-fantasy, part revenge, and much preening and showing off, gave him the jitters when they were his witnesses. But thus far, in every encounter, every mock trial and tough question-and-answer, she had come through like a champ. She had her story, she stuck to it, she was rock solid.

“I’m going right back to the hotel as soon as you and I powwow over whatever we have to do,” she assured him. They had put Agnes Carpenter up at the downtown Hilton, registered under a pseudonym. As usual, Wyatt was paying out of his pocket. Josephine would be in a room next door, with access from her side only. Everyone, including room service, would come through her room to get to Agnes.

“Good. Anything new I need to know?”

“Yes,” she said, eyes alight with excitement.

“What, have you been holding something out on me?” he asked. He didn’t need any surprises from her, not with the meat of his case starting tomorrow.

“Relax, boss, I just got here,” she chided him gently. “Take a look at this.” She handed him a file folder with some pages clipped together inside. “I’ve been looking at these things for months, and I finally figured out what was bugging me.”

He opened the folder and glanced at the contents. “A record of withdrawal of police files,” he noted quickly. “What’s the point?”

“Check out who checked them out.”

He turned to the last page. “Detective Dudley Marlow,” he read aloud. “So?” he asked, a bit annoyed. “We knew he took out the files. He told us in court he did.”

“Open your eyes, Wyatt. Look at the code.”

He turned the last page over, the one with Marlow’s name on it. Then he did a double take. “This says it was accessed by computer.”

“Give that man a teddy bear!” she crowed.

“But he never did that. So he claimed.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“Which means he was lying.”

“Looks like it, doesn’t it? Now look at the date.”

He stared at the date on which the files had been electronically withdrawn, silently counting to himself on his fingers. “Less than a week before Dwayne Thompson took his dog and pony show to the grand jury.”

“Two days before he went to Pagano with it. We may have found our leak,” she said, unable to restrain her excitement.

“Slow down,” he cautioned her. “Don’t jump to any conclusions. He would have taken the files out, given that a fresh murder had just been committed; he’s already testified to that. And maybe he did do it through his computer, and forgot, or maybe one of the other detectives working with him did, and his name wound up on the request because Marlow’s the lead detective. It’s interesting, Josephine, but it could be nothing.”

“Or it could be something,” she came back, defending her find.

“It definitely could be,” he agreed. “Let’s bring him back for redirect, after Agnes.”

“You’ve got it.”

“And enjoy your evening,” he said straight-faced.

“Up yours,” she rejoined.

A
GNES CARPENTER, POISED, CALM,
and composed—remarkably, almost eerily so—sat in the witness chair. She was wearing an expensive silk dress, and was accessorized to the max.

“You are a married woman, Mrs. Carpenter?” Wyatt led off after the swearing-in and initial introductions.

“Yes,” she answered. Her voice was low and well modulated, the essence of an old-fashioned culture that seemed more appropriate to a woman of seventy-five than one a generation younger.

“For how long?”

“Thirty-one years.”

“Your husband is a physician here in the city?”

“Yes.”

“Do you work, Mrs. Carpenter?”

“I do volunteer work,” she said with a patrician air. “I don’t have a profession.”

He took a deep mental breath. Then he plunged forward. “Within the past two years, Mrs. Carpenter, have you had a relationship with the defendant, Marvin White?”

“Yes, I have,” she answered clearly.

“Would you describe that relationship to the court, please.”

Without hesitation, she said, “It was a sexual relationship.”

Wyatt looked over at the jury. Several of them looked like they were in shock. They gaped at her, then altered their looks to stare at Marvin, who sat impassively at the defense table, stalwartly staring at the wall behind Judge Grant’s head.

“Approximately how long were you and Marvin White in this sexual relationship, Mrs. Carpenter?”

“From shortly after he became the deliveryman for my laundry service until he was let go.”

“So that would be about a year and a half?”

“Yes.”

She gave the details of their biweekly sexual encounters as she had done at her house, during their first interview. At one point in her description Wyatt looked at Jonnie Rae, who was in her customary seat in the first row of spectators behind the defense table, directly to the rear of her son. Marvin’s mother was rocking silently, eyes closed shut, teeth biting the knuckles of a hand.

Wyatt extracted a slip of paper from his notes. “Did Marvin White spend the night of August eighteenth of last year at your home, is that correct?” he read from the paper.

“Yes, it is,” she answered.

“When did he arrive,” he asked her, “and when did he leave?”

“He arrived after he was finished work, about a quarter to seven, and left the following morning shortly after seven-thirty—he had to be at work by eight and he didn’t want to be late. I made him breakfast,” she added. “Pancakes, from scratch.”

“How is it that Marvin was able to spend that entire night at your house, Mrs. Carpenter, if you are married? Did he sleep in your bed with you?”

“Of course he did. That was the point.”

He looked at her inquiringly.

“My husband was not home that night,” she answered in reference to the earlier part of the question.

“You knew that with certainty?” he asked.

“Oh, yes.” Her jaw was jutted in front of her like a centurion’s shield.

“And how did you know that?”

“The private detective I hired to follow my husband had phoned to tell me he had booked a hotel room for that night, and had checked in by four-thirty. So I knew the good doctor wasn’t coming home.” She paused. “He did that frequently—stayed out all night. This time I was prepared to make my own arrangements.”

Wyatt walked briskly to the defense table, picked up a two-page report, and walked back to the witness stand. He handed it to her. “Does this report from the Floss Detective Agency confirm what you have just told us?”

She glanced at it. “Yes, it does.”

“I offer this report in exhibit,” Wyatt said to Judge Grant.

“So ordered. This will be defense number … seven,” he instructed the clerk, looking at his sheet.

Wyatt handed the detective report to Grant, walked across the narrow aisle, and gave a copy to the prosecution. Windsor snatched it from Wyatt’s hand and passed it to a subordinate without looking at it.

“If you’ll notice, Your Honor,” Wyatt said, “this is dated August twentieth. It refers to August eighteenth as the night Dr. Carpenter was not going to be home, because he had booked a hotel room at the Carlton Hotel, and had checked in earlier in the afternoon.” He paused. “As I’m sure you recall, the fourth Alley Slasher murder was committed on the night of August eighteenth, between the hours of ten that night and three the next morning, according to Dr. Ayala’s official report.”

“Objection,” Abramowitz called from her seat. “Dr. Ayala’s conclusions and reports are not the subject of this examination.”

“Sustained,” Grant gave her. “Save these linkages for your summation, Mr. Matthews.”

“Certainly, Your Honor.” The jury had heard the connection; that’s all that mattered. He’d hammer it home during his final summation. “No further questions,” he said, gathering his notes and returning to his chair.

“How many delivery boys or other men you aren’t married to have you had sex with since you’ve been married, Mrs. Carpenter?” Abramowitz asked, going straight for the jugular.

“I had one other affair, many years ago,” Agnes answered with an equanimity that was amazing, under the circumstances. “The man was a colleague of my husband’s who knew of Leonard’s philandering. It lasted only a brief time. I had no other sexual partners after that until Marvin.”

“No one-night stands?” Abramowitz bore in. “No quickies with the pizza boy, the plumber, the UPS man?”

“Objection,” Wyatt sang out. “This is not only irrelevant, it’s offensive in the extreme. Mrs. Carpenter has put her reputation at great risk by appearing here, and she doesn’t need to be treated shabbily.”

“I agree,” Judge Grant said. “You’re risking a contempt citation with this kind of badgering,” he warned Abramowitz.

She nodded curtly, but didn’t apologize.

Agnes answered anyway. “I have had no ‘one-night stands’ or ‘quickies,’ as you crudely put it, Miss Abramowitz, or whatever your married status is. Perhaps you are ascribing your own standards to me; I don’t appreciate it,” she said firmly.

Oooooh, Wyatt thought. Talk about being hoisted on your own.

Abramowitz, frozen in place by the vicious barb, flushed crimson. She started to retort, but bit her tongue. A thousand-dollar contempt fine was a healthy chunk out of her paycheck; much more importantly, she didn’t want to alienate the jury. “Did you pay Marvin White to sleep with you?” she asked instead.

“Yes,” Agnes answered without hesitation.

Wyatt had gone over that issue thoroughly with her in their practice sessions. “Don’t lie about stuff like that,” he’d cautioned her. “They’ll catch you up, and it’ll tarnish all your other testimony.”

“How much?”

“It varied.”

“What is the most money you ever paid Marvin White to sleep with you, for one encounter?” Abramowitz asked.

“Objection. The witness has already testified she paid the defendant to have sex with her. The amount is irrelevant.”

“Sustained.”

Abramowitz tried to compose herself. This was going nowhere. “Does your husband know you’re testifying here?” she asked.

Agnes scowled. “Yes. He knows.”

“When did you tell him about this?”

“Three days ago.”

“What was his reaction?”

“He’s enraged,” Agnes answered. “He’s filing for divorce. As far as he’s concerned, I’ve ruined him.” She stared at Abramowitz with hurt and pain—the first signs of suffering Wyatt had ever seen in her. “He can sleep with every chippie nurse in the hospital, flaunt it to my face, and then accuse me of ruining him because I’m standing up for a boy whose life is at stake? I’m ruining my own reputation,” she cried out.

“Thank you,” Abramowitz said hurriedly. “That will be all.”

Agnes wasn’t finished. “Don’t you think my life is going to be a disaster because I’m testifying about this?” she wailed. “I could have kept quiet and protected myself. I’m the one who’s ruined,” she lamented loudly. “But I had to, I couldn’t stand quietly and watch an innocent boy die.” She looked up at Judge Grant. “Doesn’t that count for something?”

T
OP
THAT
, WYATT THOUGHT
. And he would, with Leticia. Agnes Carpenter, although a compelling witness for Marvin, had no backup witnesses to buttress her story that she and Marvin had been together on the night of August 18, only her own naked, public humiliation (which situation Abramowitz, who by the time she got to her summation and had recovered from today’s horrifics, would hammer home). Agnes Carpenter was a spurned woman who could be accused of lying to protect a young stud who had given her something no man had given her in years—a good fucking on a regular basis. Plus the fact that she obviously hated her husband for his philandering, and knew her humiliation would be his as well.

Leticia Pope, on the other hand, had no axes to grind, complicated or simple. She and Marvin had spent a night together. End of story. Except the night was the night of another Alley Slasher murder, and she did have witnesses, lots of them. And there were the photographs—hard, incontrovertible, physical evidence.

Some housekeeping first. “Recall Detective Dudley Marlow to the stand,” the bailiff sang out.

Abandoning the lectern, Wyatt stood as close to Marlow as he could, the police report Josephine had discovered in hand. “Do you recognize this?” he asked the veteran detective, handing him the sheaf of pages.

Marlow leafed through the report. “Yeah, of course. It’s some of my reports from the murders.”

“All of them,” Wyatt corrected him. “Everything that’s on file at county records.”

“If you say so,” Marlow answered affably. “Didn’t we go over this already?”

“Yes, we did, but there’s a discrepancy here I’ve discovered. My staff discovered,” he added, wanting to give Josephine her due. “Do you see the date these files were removed?” He flipped to the proper page and pointed it out for Marlow.