The Final Judgment

by Richard North Patterson

  “It’s a little thin, on both fronts.” Lemieux seemed to organize his thoughts. “She did see Case, all right, and early April doesn’t mean anything to her neighbors—they weren’t keeping track of her affairs by date. But James’s picture has been in all the papers, and the two folks who can remember seeing him at Megan’s place think that it was quite a few weeks ago. Which is the same thing that kid Daniel Suarez said. Anyhow, they all agree they hadn’t seen them together for over a month. Which gives us at least a couple of weeks before the murder.”

  “Her story is that they were hiding out. Making beautiful love, of course.”

  “Must have been, is all I can say. ’Cause no one saw them come up for air.”

  Caroline considered that for a moment. “Keep digging. I need anything that suggests the presence—or absence—of a relationship at any time close to the murder.”

  “Okay. Now, about the boyfriends, there’s even less.”

  “Less, or nothing?”

  “One thing. Months ago, Megan cornered one of her neighbors in the laundry room—a middle-aged lady who wasn’t that up for it—and started carrying on about her relationship with an older guy. Something about how much better it was.” A note of humor entered Lemieux’s voice. “It took awhile to get this lady to admit that ‘it’ was sex, and that Megan’s not very bashful on the subject. Even without meeting her, Megan sounds a little quirky, although even this lady described her as ‘charming’ and ‘vivacious’—just a little too emancipated for her taste.”

  “The word,” Caroline said dryly, “is ‘liberated.’ Which took place somewhat later than the end of slavery. But I’m wondering if Megan isn’t something more.”

  There was silence. “If you mean unstable,” Lemieux said dubiously, “no one seems to think that.”

  “Does anyone purport to know her?”

  “Know her?” Lemieux thought for a moment. “The impression people gave me was that Megan could be pretty voluble. But I don’t think they mean the same thing, and I really don’t have a handle on how she might be with her peer group.”

  “No girlfriends visiting?”

  “Not that I heard of.” Another pause. “Actually, I didn’t meet anyone who mentioned being inside her apartment.”

  “What do you have about her family?”

  “A little, and it’s not a pretty picture. Her father died in a boating accident when Megan was roughly twelve. Which apparently left her mother so depressed that she became very withdrawn, and stayed there. She’s been in and out of institutions.”

  Caroline was quiet. “Find out more about the mother,” she said finally. “Dates of institutionalization, if possible. Also, I’m still interested in any therapy for Megan. And do you think you could get me her class schedule?”

  “For what?”

  “For ever since she got there.”

  Lemieux considered this. “Without breaking the law?”

  “That would certainly be preferable,” Caroline answered in an arid voice. “For both our sakes.”

  “I agree. Anyhow, I’ll see what I can do.”

  Caroline thanked him, and hung up.

  She went to the window. Twilight was settling over the white houses, the rolling countryside. An older couple strolled slowly beneath the window of the inn until they disappeared from view; oddly, it made Caroline wonder how many meals in her lifetime she had eaten by herself.

  She should eat something now, Caroline thought without enthusiasm; she felt weak from hunger. She was wondering where to go when the phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  “Caroline.” Betty’s voice was strained. “I’d like to see you. Please.”

  Caroline sat on the edge of the bed. “Can we make it tomorrow?” she asked.

  Six

  “Thank you for coming,” Betty said.

  They sat on the porch; the morning was clear but cool, and steam rose from Caroline’s cup of black coffee. In profile, her sister was pensive; it was as though the enormity of Brett’s problems had dwarfed their estrangement.

  “You asked me to,” Caroline answered. “So I did.”

  Betty did not look at her. “I know how much you hate me. You think that I betrayed you—twice.”

  Caroline suppressed a bitter smile. What was of interest was not Betty’s insight—it was hardly that—but the fact that she expressed it. Softly, Caroline answered, “Not just me.”

  Betty’s eyes narrowed; for a moment, Caroline wondered if she had caught her meaning. “For years,” Betty said at length, “I told myself that I was acting out of love.”

  “And now?”

  “I know how jealous I was—of you and of him. Of you, I always had been.”

  Caroline gazed across the gravel road and down the swiftly sloping hill toward the village of Resolve. Remembered those few grades when she and Betty, five years apart, would stand beside the road until the bus came. Together, Caroline thought, and yet separate—sisters, and yet not. “I was only a kid,” Caroline said. “No one at all, really.”

  Betty shook her head. “To me, you were his dark-haired princess, with a beautiful mother who’d taken my mother’s place, just like you’d taken mine.” Her voice went quiet. “Pathetic, I realize—even then, you didn’t think of me at all. But maybe that was the worst of it.”

  It was pathetic, Caroline thought. “If only I’d known the price for it,” she answered, “I would have been more sensitive. But then seven-year-olds so seldom are.”

  Betty turned to her, gray eyes almost accusing. “Do you know how terrible it is to see you now? It’s like seeing all my failure and guilt, everything I’ve done wrong, trying to right what I did then.” Her voice softened. “You even blame me for this, don’t you?”

  So she had understood, Caroline thought. She sipped her coffee, coolly studying her sister over the rim. “At the risk of being insensitive yet again, I find that I lack the energy to care. But then we each must form our own ideas about what—and who—is important to us. Especially at a time like this.”

  Betty turned crimson. “You have a talent for cruelty, Caroline.” She paused a moment, and then continued in a halting voice, “I asked you here to talk about Brett, not my feelings. But I thought it might help if first we confronted what happened, as honestly as we could.”

  Caroline considered her. “What would it help?” she asked quietly. “Sometimes the fact of something overwhelms the reasons for it. Do you think it really matters to me that you didn’t intend what happened? Even assuming that it’s true.”

  Betty looked down; in the haggard face of this aging woman, Caroline could see traces of the young Betty she had known—watchful, a little afraid, as if something would be taken from her. It was a measure of all that had happened between them that compassion felt beyond her. “Betty,” she said softly, “this does no good. It never will. Perhaps, for both our sakes, we should concentrate on Brett.”

  Betty closed her eyes. “I did what I thought was best for her, too,” she said finally. “And if I hadn’t, and she had gone away, perhaps there would never have been someone like James Case.”

  Caroline said nothing; the knowledge of irony, plain in Betty’s eyes, kept her from responding.

  “I thought I was being a good mother,” Betty continued, “keeping her close, watching over her—everything I used to wish I had a mother to do.” She turned to Caroline. “The precious mother that I knew you had, and that you and Father loved in common.”

  Caroline watched her closely. But there was no awareness on her sister’s face. He never told you, she thought with grim amusement, just how and why my mother died. It was as if they had lived in different families, their understanding of each other defined by the one common member, whom, in turn, they had come to see so differently. The thought made Caroline quiet and still.

  “Didn’t he,” Caroline asked at length, “also want Brett ‘close’?”

  Betty straightened in her chair. “We all did. Perhaps I wasn’t the best mo
ther, or the wisest. Perhaps I’ve pushed her away. But I tried.” She paused. “This may be cruel of me, Caroline. But you’ve never had to face the moment where you’re holding this baby and suddenly you know that with all your shortcomings and blindnesses, you more than anyone will make her what she becomes.” Her voice lowered. “There was only one moment that felt as awesome, and as frightening: the day I sent Brett to kindergarten and it came to me that there was so much in the world which would touch her, and which I couldn’t control at all.”

  Caroline held the coffee cup, cold in her hands, sorting her own emotions. “But that’s inevitable,” she said softly. “And at some point, when the child is older, the inevitable becomes fitting.”

  Betty’s jawline seemed to tighten. “This world is different than the one we grew up in. The drugs are worse, the random violence is worse, the random sex—rape included—possibly fatal. Who would hurry to push a daughter into that world before her judgment is fully formed—”

  “But how,” Caroline snapped, “does she form it? By being tied to her parents? Or, more accurately, to a rigid old man who’s frightened of anything or anyone he can’t control—”

  Betty spun on her. “Do you think James Case was better? Would you have liked your daughter to be with a worthless, selfish boy who had turned her on to drugs, who had ‘promiscuous’ written all over his smug face, and who didn’t give a damn about anyone but himself? Would you want her to throw her talents and her past away for a promise that had no future?”

  Caroline kept her temper in check. “But who makes these decisions?” she asked. “Brett, or you? Because from experience, I can tell you just how well the last works out….”

  “And you think this worked out?” Betty’s own voice was quiet now. “You think Brett made this decision, don’t you? That she was capable of murder—at least with the help of James’s drugs.”

  Caroline considered her answer. “For someone else to have killed him,” she said at last, “he or she would have had to follow them to Heron Lake. Or, at least, to know where they were going.”

  Betty’s eyes met Caroline’s. “Are you at least considering that?”

  “I’ll consider anything that might help. But there’s little sign that they were followed—no tire tracks on the trail, no other cars spotted.” Caroline watched her sister’s face. “As for knowing they’d be at Heron Lake, the question becomes ‘who?’ And, I suppose, ‘how?’”

  Betty stood, walking to the edge of the porch. Silent, she gazed out at the distant village. “What about this girl?” she said. “The one that claims James was breaking it off with Brett that night.”

  “It seems far-fetched to me.” Caroline remained in her chair, unable to see Betty’s face now. “Did Brett ever talk about her?”

  “No. She wouldn’t have.” The weariness of failure entered Betty’s voice. “I still don’t even know her name.”

  Caroline stood, moving next to Betty. “In some ways,” she said, “the less you know the better. Because nothing Brett or I can say to you is privileged.”

  Betty turned to her. “They wouldn’t call me to testify against her, would they?”

  “As to what?” Caroline put an edge in her voice. “Is there something else I need to know? At least that the police are capable of knowing?”

  Quickly, Betty shook her head. “No … Of course not. It’s just how they can twist things, like the fights we had about James—”

  “But how would that hurt Brett?”

  “It wouldn’t, I suppose.” Betty paused. “Except if they tried to make her seem—I don’t know—more volatile.”

  Caroline was quiet for a moment. “I wouldn’t worry,” she answered. “I doubt that Jackson would want to give the jury too much time with Brett’s agonized mother. Regrettably, he has better things to do.”

  The front door opened behind them. But when Caroline turned, expecting her father, it was Larry who appeared.

  His face was grave. “Hello, Caroline.”

  Betty went to him. “Have you checked Father?”

  “Yes. He’s up now.” Larry turned back to Caroline. “This has been a strain on him. He’s usually up at six, but he’s seemed so tired. Still, when it’s close to nine, and no one’s seen him…” He paused, shrugging.

  Caroline nodded. “I’m sorry,” she said to Larry. “But there’s something I need to ask you.”

  Larry turned to her, his face tired and wary. “What is it?”

  “This student—the witness against Brett. Her name is Megan Race. I was wondering if you knew her, or have a faculty friend who does.”

  “Megan Race?” Larry repeated. He shoved his hands in his pockets, staring down at the porch as Betty watched him intently. “That’s the woman James was seeing?”

  “Yes.”

  His eyes seemed to narrow. “Do you know what her major is?”

  “Not offhand. Is there any way I could get my hands on her file?”

  “No legitimate way…”

  “I’m not asking you to do that. Just for any information you can come up with.”

  Larry seemed to exhale. “I’ll have to think about it,” he said. “Very hard.”

  When Caroline returned to the inn, there were two messages.

  The easiest to return was from Walter Farris. She placed the call, waited on hold for ten minutes, pacing the room. By the time that Farris took her call, she was certain that he would tell her the nomination had been withdrawn.

  “Caroline,” he said brusquely. “I’ve spoken to the President.”

  She felt herself tense. “And?”

  “And we reserve the right to withdraw the nomination if this trial goes on too long, or if there’s any problem in what you’re doing up there. By that I mean any problem as we down here define it.” Farris paused for effect. “But, as of now, your nomination is still alive.”

  Caroline sat down on the bed. “Thank you.”

  “Thank the President, who has more compassion than I would.” His voice grew softer. “Please, Caroline, don’t misunderstand this. You’re on your own now. Any misstep, and I’ll pull the plug myself.”

  The second message, from Joe Lemieux, required two calls to his beeper.

  “I have her schedule,” he said. “No grades, but at least you can see what she was taking. For whatever it might be worth.”

  “It’s a start. We can see what professors might know her, who else might have been in her classes. How did you get it, incidentally?”

  “The school’s computer system—the student can punch in for class schedule, registration, and a bunch of other stuff.” Lemieux laughed softly. “The computer age presents an unlimited potential for invasion of privacy—in this case, all I needed was Megan’s student number, which wasn’t that hard to come by. But I wouldn’t mention this to anyone.”

  Caroline took a deep breath. “I won’t, believe me. And please, check with me before you do anything else like this. I’m not interested in coming up on ethics charges, thank you.”

  “I understand.” He sounded faintly nettled. “Look, do you want this stuff or not?”

  Caroline paused for a moment. “Yes,” she said. “I want it. But don’t fax it over. Drop it off by hand.”

  She hung up and went to Carlton Grey’s office. For the next two hours, she read statute books and talked by phone to experts—a serologist, a criminalist, and a doctor who treated drug and alcohol addiction. So that it was perhaps three-thirty before she returned to the inn and found the manila envelope beneath her door.

  Caroline opened it. Megan was a senior now; Caroline reached the first trimester of her junior year before she stopped, staring at the schedule with what she wished were disbelief.

  The telephone rang again.

  She was slow to answer. “Caroline,” Larry said, “there’s something I have to tell you.”

  “Yes,” she replied. “I know.”

  Seven

  Caroline found him in his office at the English Departme
nt, sitting at his desk. He seemed too distraught to look away.

  Caroline sat facing him and then said softly, “You should have told me sooner.”

  Larry stared at her. “What must you think of me?” he asked with a certain dignity. “I didn’t know who the witness was until this morning, and I thought my confession could do without Betty. Given that your presence would complete her humiliation.”

  Caroline’s eyes met his. “She doesn’t know?”

  “Not to a certainty, and definitely not who.” He stood abruptly. “There’s something wrong with her.”

  “Megan, you mean?”

  “Of course Megan.” His hands gripped the chair. “First getting involved with Case, and now as the key witness against Brett. It’s like she’s had a plan to destroy my daughter….”

  “Somehow, Larry, I doubt she counted on James Case dying.”

  Larry stiffened. “How do you know Megan didn’t kill him? This can’t be some coincidence—”

  Caroline held up one hand. “I’m not saying that, either. Only that you brought this woman to Brett’s doorstep.”

  He blanched. “But wouldn’t that mean Brett’s innocent?”

  Caroline tilted her head. “No. But what it may mean is that the key witness against her is damaged goods.” She paused for a moment. “In addition to whatever it does to your marriage.”

  Larry’s gaze was bleak. “There’s no help for that,” he said at length. “Like so much else, Caroline, it’s far too late.”

  Slowly, Caroline nodded. “Then tell me about you and Megan. Considering that you’re the only one who seems to know her. Besides James Case.”

  Eyes averted, Larry walked to the door of his office, closing it tight, and then went to the window. He stood there, watching the late-afternoon sun fall softly across the redbrick buildings and rolling campus.