Full Disclosure

by Beverley McLachlin

  “Precisely, Officer. Tell us what was found there, according to the notes?”

  “It says, ‘Footprints, two, man’s treaded shoe.’ ”

  “Did you measure these footprints, Officer?” Jeff moves to the center of the courtroom. This is just the beginning, I think.

  “No.”

  “Did you take a photograph of them?”

  “No.”

  “Why not, Officer?”

  “We couldn’t see what relevance they could have. I mean, lots of people might have walked in that area. It was wooded, and it wasn’t even on the subject’s property.” Kostash exhales heavily. “We were looking for a gun.”

  “Did it occur to you that it might be useful to ask who could have accessed the property? Not to put too fine a point on it, the person who might have used the gun you were looking for?”

  “We knew—”

  “You thought you knew,” Jeff says contemptuously.

  I catch a few jurors taking notes.

  “You do agree, Officer, that the footprint could have been made by someone entering the Trussardi property on the day of the murder?”

  “I suppose, but it’s highly unlikely.”

  “Just answer the question. Yes or no.”

  “Yes,” Officer Kostash says, his voice barely audible.

  “And that person might have gone on to enter the house and kill Laura Trussardi?”

  Cy is on his feet. “Objection—counsel is asking the witness to speculate.”

  “Objection overruled,” Justice Moulton intones, and I suppress a smile. We need all the minor victories we can get.

  “I suppose it’s conceivable that a person making those prints might have entered the house,” Kostash finally answers.

  “Yet you didn’t bother to check the footprint for details, Officer. You didn’t even take a photo?”

  The answer takes a long time coming. “No.”

  “No further questions,” says Jeff and sits down. I give him a quick nod—Well done. From his perch in the prisoner’s box Vincent Trussardi inclines his head and catches Jeff’s eye—a gracious thank-you.

  CHAPTER 39

  I CALL DR. CHRISTINE MOYER,” Cy informs the court when we resume on Friday morning.

  Christine Moyer, bobbed hair shining, moves confidently down the aisle and into the witness box, her athletic figure sheathed in a blue pantsuit. She looks around the courtroom, acknowledges the jury, glances up at Justice Moulton. She is careful not to let her eye catch mine. She is a professional.

  Cy takes her through her report, line by line, confirms the cause of death. Then, swiveling back to his table, he picks up the sheaf of photos of the body, nods to the clerk to hand identical piles to each juror. I know his game. He’s going to horrify the jurors with the details of the killing, stoking their anger against the only available target, Vincent Trussardi.

  “You examined the body of the deceased carefully, I presume, Dr. Moyer?” he asks.

  “I did, Mr. Kenge.”

  I decide to let him go on for a while. If I object too soon, Justice Moulton will just wave me down. Besides, too much graphic detail may backfire on Cy. As he works through the first photograph, a process that takes five minutes, I watch the reactions of the jurors. Most are disgusted. Some try to look away. The nurse and the dockworker are fascinated. But Mr. Kasmirsky, our foreman, has put the photos down—You can’t force me to keep looking at this stuff.

  As Cy starts in on the second photo, a flicker of annoyance passes over Moulton’s face, and he looks at the clock.

  I rise. “My Lord, I would usually not presume to interrupt my learned friend’s examination of this witness. But may I respectfully submit that not much will be gained by dwelling on the injuries inflicted on Laura Trussardi’s body? The nature of these injuries is plain from the photographs, and the defense accepts them.” If Cy has his way, we will still be looking at these photos at noon tomorrow.

  “Ms. Truitt has a point, Mr. Kenge. What do you say?”

  “I take the point, my Lord. However, there are two photographs to which I feel I must direct the jury’s attention.”

  “Very well. Just two.”

  “Dr. Moyer, would you be so good as to find photographs forty-six and forty-seven?” Cy requests.

  Jeff has pulled them out, but I do not need to see them. Each shade, each gradation, is indelibly imprinted on my mind.

  “Would you describe for the jury what part of the body we are looking at in photo forty-six, and the nature of the wound?”

  “We are looking at a woman’s breast,” Christine answers.

  “And the nature of the wound?”

  The broad hand of Justice Moulton rises and hits the desk like a thunderclap. “Mr. Kenge,” he nearly shouts, “I take it you have completed your questions of this witness.”

  Brilliant. Cy shut down and nothing on the record to complain to the Court of Appeal about. Still, the brutal images have taken their toll. Across the room, Vincent Trussardi slumps, head to the side. Out of the corner of my eye, I glimpse Raquella Trussardi in her chair, stiff as a statue, her face white, her gaze fixed. She knew Laura, loved her; I feel her anguish as I watch her whirl her chair toward the door, but I have my own preoccupations.

  The beige Toyota still lurks in the periphery. The late-night hang-ups haven’t stopped. And Edith is still missing. The police have checked her townhouse and found nothing suspicious—She’s probably just away on vacation. They sent a junior officer over to tell me in person—Read: we’re taking you seriously, but you’re losing it. But that hasn’t stopped the rampages of my overwrought imagination. I’m on edge, overworrying, overreacting. I need a break from this case. I make a decision. Damn the trial. This weekend I’m going home to Martha.

  Cy’s up, interrupting my reverie. “I do have a few further questions of this witness, my Lord. On a different matter.” He turns to Christine. “You did a thorough autopsy, Dr. Moyer?”

  “I did.”

  “Including an internal examination of the abdominal area?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you please tell the jury what you found?”

  “The deceased was pregnant.” Dr. Moyer consults her notes. “About two months.”

  “Thank you, Doctor,” says Cy.

  I rise. “Dr. Moyer, did you have occasion to conduct a paternity test to determine the father of the unborn child?”

  “I did.”

  “Would you tell us about it?”

  I hear the click of Cy’s artificial limb as he stands. “I have had no notice of this,” he protests.

  “My Lord, when I last checked, the defense is not obliged to give the prosecution notice of what questions it will put to its witnesses in cross-examination,” I retort.

  “Ms. Truitt is right,” Moulton intones. “Witness may answer the question.”

  “I took a buccal swab from a man whom I identified as Vincent Trussardi,” Christine says.

  “The same man you see in here today?” I motion to the prisoner’s box.

  “Yes. I then compared the DNA on the swab with the DNA of the fetus that I had earlier removed from the deceased and preserved.”

  “Please tell the jury the results of your test, Dr. Moyer.”

  “The test results showed that Vincent Trussardi was the father of the unborn child.”

  I sit down.

  The buzz is welling up from the back again, the doors whooshing in and out. What man would murder the woman who is carrying his only child?

  Score one for the defense.

  CHAPTER 40

  FRIDAY AFTERNOON. FROM THE WITNESS box, Carmelina looks at Vincent Trussardi where he sits across the courtroom. He has not seen her since her suicide attempt, and his eyes momentarily widen at the diminished person before him. He gives the smallest of nods, and she turns her face away, raising a tissue to wipe the corner of her eye.

  Cy opens his examination gently, inviting Carmelina to tell the jury how she came to the Tr
ussardi household and what she did there, before launching into the laborious exercise of exploring the activities of the deceased in the days leading up to the murder. Carmelina sits a little easier as she recounts the mundane events of the Trussardi household. It takes a long time but the takeaway is simple—nothing out of the ordinary.

  The court learns that the day before the murder, Mrs. Trussardi had gone shopping and come home with a lavender gown and new shoes for an upcoming gala. “Bella, regalia, Prada. Madam was happy,” Carmelina tells the jurors in response to Cy’s probing.

  That night, Mr. and Mrs. Trussardi had gone out to a party—Carmelina doesn’t know where, just that they came home before ten and shared a glass of Prosecco by the fire before going to bed.

  “And the morning of the murder?” asks Cy.

  “Mr. Trussardi was already gone before I got up. He had told us the day before that he was going sailing, so I wasn’t surprised. Madam came into the kitchen where I was rolling out pasta.”

  “What time was that?”

  “About nine, I think. She said it was my day off. Usually, I took the bus to visit friends in Burnaby. But Mrs. Trussardi offered to drive me.” Carmelina wipes her eye. “She was very good to me.”

  “Did you notice anything different about her, about her mood?”

  “She was like usual. Only more relaxed than sometimes. Contenta.”

  Cy cranes his neck to look at the clock on the back wall, which says two fifty-three. Justice Moulton nods, happy to take the afternoon break. A small smile flickers over Cy’s face before he settles his features into studied indifference. My fist tightens around my pen; Cy has something up his sleeve.

  * * *

  “WERE YOU AWARE THAT MRS. Trussardi was having an affair with the architect Trevor Shore, Ms. Cappelli?” Cy asks Carmelina when we’re all back in courtroom twenty.

  I could object to leading but I know what Carmelina will say.

  “No, no,” she replies. “I mean, Mr. Shore came to the house a few times—he was the architect and had the door code so he could check on details. I served them lunch once, but they were always very proper.”

  “Let’s go back to the day of the murder. When did you return to the house?”

  Carmelina is tired. The circles under her eyes are dark, and she slumps in the witness box. But she has her pride, and she pulls herself erect to answer Cy’s question.

  “About seven o’clock, Emilia’s father drove me back, and Emilia came along. They let me out in the street outside the Trussardi house. I came down the drive and saw the police cars. I knew something was wrong.”

  “Did you go in?”

  “Yes. There was a policeman by the door, but when I told him I was the housekeeper, he let me by.”

  “What did you see when you entered the house?”

  “Police, everywhere. I went past them to the living room. Mr. Trussardi was sitting there on a sofa. He just looked at me for a while, like he couldn’t get up. Then he spoke. His voice was all broken; I could hardly understand. ‘A terrible thing has happened, Carmelina,’ he said. ‘Mrs. Trussardi has been killed.’ I must have screamed and cried. I don’t remember. The next thing I knew, they were carrying a bag—a long, lumpy, black bag. I knew it was Mrs. Trussardi. I must have screamed again.”

  “Laura Trussardi, the kind woman you admired and loved, carried out in a lumpy black bag.” He leans toward Carmelina sympathetically. “Terrible for you.”

  Carmelina dabs at her eye.

  “But the horror for you wasn’t over, was it, Miss Cappelli? What happened when the police eventually left?”

  I glance up at the clock—half past three. He’s stretching this out, I think, my stomach tightening.

  “Well, they didn’t all go right away—two of them stayed to guard the room because they hadn’t finished what they needed to do. Mr. Trussardi still was sitting on the couch in the living room in shock. I went to the policewoman they had left and said that I needed to get some things for Mr. Trussardi so he could go to bed in another room. She said okay. So she lifted the tape, and I got his pajamas and robe and some things from his bathroom and brought them to a guest room. Then I went back to the living room and told Mr. Trussardi he needed to get some sleep. He didn’t seem to understand, but when I pulled him up, he followed me. I left him in the guest room, and I went to my own apartment.”

  “What happened next, Ms. Cappelli?”

  Carmelina falters. “Nothing.”

  “Come, come, Miss Cappelli. That’s not what you told us in the course of the investigation, is it?”

  “I—I . . .” Carmelina convulses. We wait while she mops up her own tears. I stifle an inward groan. This is terrible—she should be getting through the bad part quickly and smoothly; instead she’s marking it—underlining and emphasizing and adding an exclamation mark to boot.

  I catch Carmelina’s eye, and she pulls herself together. “I couldn’t sleep,” she finally says. “I started thinking about Mr. Trussardi and how he looked. I got worried he might do something stupid, something to himself. So I put my robe on and went to the guest room.”

  “What did you see, Carmelina?” Cy’s voice is low, for the first time addressing the witness by her first name.

  “He was lying on the bed in his robe, crying. Big cries, like—how do you say it?—sobs. I went over to him.” She wipes her eyes again. “I put my arms around him.”

  “Was that all, Ms. Cappelli?”

  “No.”

  “Let’s get to the point,” says Cy, abruptly aggressive. “Tell the jury. Did you have sex with Mr. Trussardi?”

  “Yes,” she whispers, “we had sex.”

  The jurors stare at Carmelina, then at Trussardi in the prisoner’s box, disgust on the faces of the librarian and the nurse. Vincent Trussardi gives no sign that he has heard what Carmelina has said, nor that every eye in the courtroom is upon him. Cy’s narrative of a crazed and immoral man is taking shape.

  “Your witness.” Cy concludes, swinging back to his chair.

  “Court will retire for the day,” Justice Moulton says.

  I look at my big round watch. Four thirty on the dot. Precisely as planned, Cy’s left the jury hanging with the image of Vincent Trussardi in Carmelina’s arms four hours after the murder. The jury will spend the weekend with a bad taste in their mouth. By the time we get to cross-examine Carmelina on Monday, they’ll have made up their minds. I give Cy a pointed look. He responds with the fleetest of smiles before heaving his heavy body up to mark the judge’s exit. A game, and he plays it well.

  I check my iPhone, pull up a message from Richard: Got some info on Trevor Shore. Cops had him and blew right by. Think you’ll be interested.

  I text back. See you at the south entrance in five.

  CHAPTER 41

  IT’S FIVE THIRTY, AND I’M back at my desk. Below, in the street, the evening traffic thickens. Cabs halt, arm-linked couples cross the cobblestones beneath the mock gaslights to meet friends over a drink. I’ve sent Jeff home, this time for real. “Take Jessica out to dinner,” I told him. I sit alone and ponder the street scene.

  “I’m going now,” Debbie yells. I tell her to lock the door after her. I resume reading—research for my drug trial—but the words won’t jell. I shove the pages aside and grab my bag to go, when I hear the lock click on the outer door. I freeze.

  It wasn’t just my imagination—they’ve come for me. I reach for my lamp, turn off the light. In the dark, my hand finds my Inuit bear sculpture, heavy, substantial. I wait in breathless silence. Nothing. Then a squeak. The door easing open. I instinctively start to dive, then straighten. Come and get me. If I must go down, it won’t be cringing on the floor.

  The light clicks on.

  “Damon.” Relief washes over me. “You startled me.” I put down my stone bear.

  “Sorry, Ms. Truitt. I didn’t mean to scare you. Jeff asked me to do some research on a robbery case.”

  “Of course.” I feel myself recoverin
g.

  He angles into the chair opposite. “How’s the Trussardi case going?”

  So that’s why he’s here. “Damon, we can’t talk about the case. In fact, you shouldn’t be here at all.”

  He picks at a loose thread on his shirt. Unease, guilt maybe?

  “Damon, you didn’t tell me everything, did you? You told me about the night you saw Vincent Trussardi take out his gun. You didn’t tell me you went back.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The gardener says the boy—you—kept coming back to the house.”

  He pulls on the thread harder. “I was so crazy, so drugged up, and she was kind and lovely. So I went back, once or twice, hoping she might walk out onto the terrace. But she never did.”

  I take a wild intuitive leap. “You were there the night of the murder, weren’t you?”

  He starts to shake his head, then stops. “Cy subpoenaed me.”

  So Damon is Cy’s mystery witness. How the hell did he find out about the drugs, about Damon?

  “You’re not on the witness list,” I say. “And with this visit, you’ve made sure I can’t claim surprise.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t think of that, Jilly.”

  “I tried to keep you out of this.” I drum my fingers on my desk, thinking. Cy wants Damon to talk about the drug deliveries. I’m not sure why. Maybe he wants to imply Trussardi had a second reason to kill her. It wasn’t just the adultery; it was the drugs, the causes, everything—building up until he couldn’t take it anymore and killed her.

  Damon rises, miserable. “I’m sorry, Jilly.”

  I take in his contrite face. I believe him, but I’m not about to let him ruin my case. “One more thing, Damon.”

  He turns in the doorway.

  “You should know. When you testify, I will cross-examine the hell out of you. And not just about the drugs.”

  I watch the color drain from his face before he shuts the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 42

  GRAYING SKIES, IMPULSIVE GUSTS. MARTHA and I spend the weekend outside, tidying up the planters for the winter. As we work, we talk, desultory snatches of conversation on family doings. For hours at a time I’m able to forget about Trussardi and his trial.