Try Try Again (9 page)

“Did you mean to kill him? Or did you just mean to scare
him?”

“No, I meant to kill him.”

“Why?”

Charley Dukes thought for a minute. George had given him a
story to tell just in case he got caught, but it sounded pretty dumb to him,
and the cops sure hadn’t believed it, and the prosecutor hadn’t believed it, and
then he’d offered up his own idea that was shot down pretty fast, the one about
the Arabs. He guessed he’d try the drug story again. Well, George was a smart
fellow, so I’d better say what he told me to. Maybe it’ll work this time.

“There was a drug deal,” Charley said. “The guy took the
drugs but wouldn’t pay me.”

“No,” Liv said. “You gave that story to the police and it
didn’t fly. I don’t believe it, either. And I looked at your record. You’ve
never been busted for drugs.”

Charley shrugged, muttered “…smart, I guess. Maybe lucky.”

She wasn’t getting anywhere with this.

“Do you want to die in state prison?” she asked, louder. The
six men on the opposite side of the room stirred.

“The food’s on time there,” said Charley.

Half an hour later, Liv Saunders saw she was getting
nowhere. Charley wouldn’t say anything more than “I killed the politician.” But
he wouldn’t say why, or how he got to Grantwood, or gave any details except the
period after he’d fired at Barnes. From then on, it was all detail. About what
happened before the shooting, he wasn’t talking.

Liv reviewed, with Charley, the various statements he’d made
to the police after the “drug deal” story, receiving no response other than
“yeah, I told them that.”

After an hour, Liv shook hands with Charley, told him to
contact her if he had anything else to say, and she’d be back before the trial.
He nodded. She left.

The next day, Liv met with Brent again, and summarized where
she was. “Dukes said it was all his idea at first, he had some cockeyed story
that Barnes was in with him on a drug deal and Barnes refused to pay off. But
everything was wrong with that story, completely unbelievable. Then there was
that Arab story, then the story about someone driving him here who wasn’t an
Arab. It’s all bullshit. And then there was that thing about the Greyhound bus
station.

“So why did he do it?” she concluded. “What do you think?”

“Beats me,” Brent said. “But I got a confession and our
shrink says he’s not legally insane, and it was obviously premeditated; so I
get murder-one for this one. Lotsa luck, Liv!”

“But why did he shoot Barnes?” she insisted. “We have to
know that to understand what kind of sentence he should get.”

“I dispute that premise and so does the law, pretty much. To
answer your question, I don’t know. Maybe some grudge, some fantasy. All of
those stories he gave, Charley had no details, nothing. So he was making it up
on the spot. Everything but his confession.”

“I haven’t heard he confessed before he was read his rights.
You’ll have to tell me all about it. The law, you know.”

“OK, that’s all in the police report. He confessed right when
he was caught. The officer had to shut him up so he could read him his rights.
“I did it, I did it,” Charley kept saying, over and over, “I shot the
politician.”

“Well,” said Liv, “I’ll admit he confessed. He’s still
confessing to this day. A little too much, don’t you think? I won’t belabor the
point. But I don’t think he acted alone: there are questions that haven’t been
answered yet.”

“Such as?”

Liv shifted in her seat and cleared her throat. “Such as,”
she said, “how did Charley get to Grantwood from D.C.?”

“Drove, I suppose, although he finally told us someone else
drove him, someone of course too mysterious to be real.”

“But if he drove, or rode with someone else, why did he have
to hijack a car to get away?”

“I dunno. Why does it matter?”

“He had help,” she said. “Someone drove him to Grantwood,
just as he told the police, and finally, didn’t stick around to give him a ride
home. Someone you should be interested in.”

“Well then, maybe he took a bus the day before, stayed in a
motel or something overnight.”

Liv persisted. “That just didn’t check out. There aren’t
many hotels and motels this side of Harrisburg, and there’s no indication he
was at any of them – the police showed his photo around. Or if he did, someone
was fronting for him and Charley kept out of sight. And if he slept in a
doorway or in a car, or just stayed put somewhere out of sight, it would be a
big risk for him. I don’t think he’d have done that.”

“Look: Charley confessed,” Brent said with some annoyance. “Open
and shut. Criminals know other criminals and sometimes they help each other
out. So what? But even if he had some kind of help, it was Charley who pulled
the trigger. Right? Why should we care if some other low-life was in on it but
left him to take the rap alone?”

“There are a lot of holes in that argument, Brent. For
example,…

Brent interrupted. “You do believe his confession, don’t
you?”

“Yes.”

“And the word of all those witnesses?”

“Yes.”

“So?”

“I just don’t believe him when he says he acted alone, just
caught a ride with some stranger.”

“So what? Look, we’re going around in circles here. Catching
an accomplice would be a good next step, but first I want to finish off the
Charley Dukes case. I want a guilty verdict, and then we can look at this again
once Dukes has been put away.”

“Not just an accomplice,” Liv said, “but a plot. Charley was
just a tool, I think. It’s very implausible someone like Charley Dukes would,
or could, plan and execute an assassination like this. The important thing is
to uncover who’s behind the plot. Wouldn’t that look great on your resume Brent,
uncovering a successful plot to kill a U.S. Congressman? Dukes will fully
cooperate if he is allowed to plead guilty to a lesser charge than first-degree
murder, perhaps even manslaughter.”

Liv knew she was taking a chance here. Dukes hasn’t actually
said anything about cooperating; she was bluffing. But perhaps she could talk Brent
into a further investigation.

Brent laughed. “A sinister plot of some kind? Evil
masterminds behind the scenes? Great movie, bad case. Just think; Dukes was a
pretty unlikely hit man, wasn’t he? Who would have hired a convenience-store
hold up artist to kill anyone, especially someone of Barnes’ importance? No, I
just can’t believe there were evil conspirators who, in their wisdom, picked
the most unlikely of hit men to carry out their dark plans, the one most likely
to screw it up, as he almost did with those wild shots, and then left him out
to dry.

“Dukes had never shot anyone before, did you know that? Never
even aimed and missed apparently, just waved a gun around and shot into the
ceiling once or twice. And he’s the one these brilliant masterminds selected to
kill a Congressman? Look. It just doesn’t make sense.” Brent sat back in his
chair, smugness on his face.

“But does it make more sense that he acted alone?” Liv questioned,
speaking gradually louder and faster. “Why would he do that? If he wanted to
kill a member of Congress, there were four hundred forty five of them working
in a place he could have just walked to, waited for one to drive out of one of
the House garages, for example, or just strolled by the House steps a little
after adjournment one day. Congressmen wear these round lapel buttons, you
know. Think of those as bull’s-eyes. Shoot me.”

Brent smiled at her, but not in a friendly way. “I have
work
to do,” he said, “I’ll speak with you again later.”

Liv drove slowly back to her law firm. “Putting Charley
away” rang in her mind. Could mean prison, could mean the needle. And something
else was wrong. Had Charley been paid to smear Barnes’ reputation by calling
him a drug addict? Then why shoot him? It should be one or the other, if his
enemies wanted to ruin Barnes’ bid to replace Thomas Conning in the Senate or
to get him in trouble for some other reason.

Was that it? Someone didn’t want Barnes in the Senate. He’d
been stirring up discomfort with his various investigations into inefficiencies
and corruption. Maybe Barnes’ former staff would know something.

Liv asked Belinda Chase Epperly if the firm could hire a PI
to retrace Charley’s tracks in D.C. and find something that could possibly make
some sense of the crime. She was laughed at, and then apologized to, and then
reminded of the minuscule effort called for in this type of case, especially minuscule
expense.

Disappointed but not surprised, Liv sat down at her desk,
determined to do some investigating herself. She jotted down the main lines of
inquiry as she saw them:

Was Charley hired to kill Barnes?
  She was pretty
sure he was
. By whom?
If so, where did the money go?

Why would Charley go to Grantwood to kill someone who had an
apartment not far from his shabby room in D.C.? Actually, that one was easy:
Access and positive identification.

But that brought up another question: Why didn’t the
mastermind behind the killing hire a local Pennsylvania shooter? Maybe not
enough talent in Grantwood – but in all of Central Pennsylvania?

Another thought: How did Charley get from D.C. to Grantwood?
She recalled her conversation on that topic with Brent. Well, driving was
obvious, but Charley was poor and didn’t own a car. Better check with the
rental companies. But who would rent a car to a scruffy-looking loser with no
credit card? Hmm. That track was becoming interesting. Maybe someone rented a
car and handed it over to Charley? If so, where was the car now? Again, her
thoughts circled back to that unknown person who might have given Charley a
ride.

Who profited from Barnes’ death? Not Charley in any way she
could see, except possibly by being paid. Senator Conning? Yes, but unlikely.
Still, he’d have to be in the mix until he could be ruled out. What could
Barnes’ former staff tell her about a possible motive?

Who had Charley been seen with recently? That was a blank so
far. According to the police workup, Dukes lived near-Northwest D.C., in one of
the last rat-traps to vanish before an advancing army of condos, and he hung
out at several neighborhood bars and strip joints, wherever his tab didn’t get
too high.

The last two items seemed useful to investigate, and they
were areas the police hadn’t pursued, although it was likely the FBI had
interviewed Barnes’ staff. As both items were related to D.C., she’d just have
to go there.

First, she intended to meet with Barnes’ former staff. Some
of them may have left already, even though the new seventeenth-district
representative wouldn’t be sworn in for another few days. Yes, she thought,
she’d go to Capitol Hill and see if she could unravel this. Charley sure seemed
to her like he was taking a fall for someone, but facing twenty to life in
prison, or worse, why would he ever do that?

Second, she’d try to find out what she could about Charley
by visiting his D.C. hangouts, if he had any and if she could find out where
they were.

Back at the office, Liv had a long and loud discussion with
Belinda Chase Epperly about permission to take a few days to go to D.C. She
outlined her goals for the trip.

Epperly listed patiently but then denied Liv’s request. “I
suppose you’ll want to be paid for this, plus expenses even though the
economy”… and the firm… and bills and clients who don’t pay on time and all the
taxes and expenses the state puts us to blah blah blah, and the occasional yaddy
yack.

The outcome of the meeting was Liv could do whatever she
damn well pleased on the case, including visiting D.C., especially after Liv threatened
to go to Judge DuCasse, and tell her she wasn’t being given sufficient
resources to prepare her defense of Charley Wayne Dukes.

Liv left the meeting knowing she’d be fired as soon as the
Dukes trial was over. She tried not to think about that.

Later that day, she phoned the seventeenth district
congressional office in Washington and received a very chilly reception when he
told them she was Charley Dukes’ defense attorney. “Look,” she said, “I’m not
trying to get Dukes off, for insanity or actual innocence or any other reason.
He did it. He shot your boss; I know that. But I think there’s more to it. I’d
like to come by and meet with you. Tomorrow?”

“I’ll ask the – Mr. Sandelli,” the chief of staff said. A
minute later, “Yeah, OK. He says come on by. I think he just wants to keep us
busy and out of his hair, but our time is his time. I’ve got another Hill
position lined up starting next week, anyway.”

Late the next morning, Liv found the right building and the
right floor and the right office, passing security checks each time, and walked
in. She was greeted by a man of about thirty who enthusiastically said, “Hi!
You must be the lawyer from Grantwood. I’m Sam Sandelli, your very abbreviated
Congressperson.”

“What?”

“The governor picked me to fill in after Ezra’s death, maybe
because I’m the governor’s mother’s next door neighbor, knowing no one in his
right mind would ever mistake me for a real Congressman!” He smiled broadly. “I’ve
got one more week until the new incumbent is sworn in and I’m really excited to
be such an honored person – the ‘Temporarily Honorable Samuel Sandelli,’ actually,
with no worries and no duties, what with Congress out of session right now and
the staff doing all the constituent work.” He winked at Liv. “What a great job!
And lots of free health care if a disgruntled constituent – ah – guess I
shouldn’t have said that. Anyway, come into my office.”

Liv immediately liked Sandelli, but knew he’d be of little
use to her.

She briefly explained the puzzles she’d found concerning
Charley Dukes’ motives, and mentioned the drug-buying aspect.

Sandelli paused and called in four members of his staff.
“Look,” he said, “Ms. Saunders here is trying to help us understand what
happened – why that incredible unbelievable event – happened. So please help
her out in any way you can. Now you’ll please excuse me, I’m speaking to a
business something or other in a few minutes and I have no idea what I’m going
to say!” He pulled on his suit jacket and left.