Deck the Hounds: An Andy Carpenter Mystery

by David Rosenfelt

  “Mrs. McMaster, you testified during the prosecution’s case that you and your husband did not have the perfect marriage. You said that ‘Steven made some mistakes.’ Do you recall saying that?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did you mean by mistakes?”

  “There were other women.”

  “He had affairs? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Yes. But we were past that at the time … when he died.”

  “But you did not make similar mistakes?”

  “No.”

  She’s keeping up that lie. Laurie dug up enough information that I could challenge her even without Kimble testifying, but I’m not going there. If I’m going to accuse her of murdering her husband, then I’d rather she was a woman wronged, rather than someone in an open marriage.

  “Did you resent him for it?”

  “At first, but we got by it,” she says.

  “Did you have a prenuptial agreement?”

  “Yes.”

  “Based on that agreement, how much money would you have gotten if you had divorced?” I ask.

  “It’s complicated.”

  “Then simplify it for us and give us a ballpark figure as to how much you would have received.”

  “Five million dollars and our Manhattan apartment.”

  “But upon his death you inherited his entire estate, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know how much that is worth?” I ask.

  “Not precisely.”

  “Public filings say in excess of two hundred and fifty million dollars. Does that sound about right?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “You testified earlier that on the night of your husband’s death, you had reason to believe he was having an early dinner. What was your reason?”

  “He had dinner with Craig Kimble, a mutual friend of ours. I think Craig mentioned it to me.”

  “On the telephone?”

  “Yes.”

  “There is no record of his having called you that night, or you having called him.”

  “Maybe it was earlier that day, or maybe the day before. I don’t remember. Steven might even have been the one to tell me. At the time it wasn’t very important.”

  “We have heard testimony about two men, one named Ernie Vinson and the other Yuri Ganady. Each has been recently killed. One was murdered in a Connecticut hotel, and the other was killed in the process of trying to enter my home. Have you ever met either of these men?”

  “No. Never.”

  “Ever spoken to them?”

  “No. Never.”

  I introduce her phone records into evidence. Then I say, “According to these records, Mr. Vinson phoned you two days before your husband’s death, and Mr. Ganady phoned you the night of his death.”

  “I swear I never spoke to either of them.”

  I let her off the stand, reasonably pleased with how things went. I established money as a motive, raised questions about her actions that night, and connected her to two dangerous criminals, both of whom have recently been killed themselves.

  That will put reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors.

  Or it won’t.

  “I’ve been doing this for a while, ladies and gentlemen,” Tasker says.

  “Longer than I care to admit. I’ve spent my professional life trying to make criminals pay for their crimes.

  “A lot has changed over the years in the way police conduct their investigations. As technology has advanced, so have the tools law enforcement has been able to utilize. But believe me when I say that the absolute best advancement, far and away, is the advent of DNA.

  “DNA simply does not lie. Even eyewitness testimony can be shaky, because it involves humans, and humans can be wrong. DNA cannot be wrong. It seems that every week we hear that a cold case, often decades old, is solved because of a DNA match. I’ve prosecuted some myself, and it has given me great pleasure.

  “Mr. Carrigan’s DNA was found at the scene. He dropped his hat in the darkened garage when he accosted Steven McMaster, minutes before he brutally broke his neck. But he had other things on his mind; he was there to rob everything of value that he could find. So he forgot to retrieve the hat.

  “And he kept one of the stolen items with him. He locked it in his locker so no one could get to it. But someone did get to it, the police got to it, and it is one of the pieces of evidence that has brought him to justice.

  “It took a while to find Mr. Carrigan; he was living off the grid, so conventional investigative techniques took time to work. But he turned up, ironically because of a robbery attempt on him, and here we are.

  “And what about a murder weapon? That’s easy, ladies and gentlemen.” He points to Carrigan. “There’s the weapon right there, his hands. He was taught to kill by our government, as a member of the Special Forces.

  “But he was taught to kill, not to murder. There’s a big difference. You and I can make the distinction, but apparently Mr. Carrigan cannot. Or chooses not to.

  “I would like to apologize for something. Jaime Tomasino sat before you and lied about his alleged conversations with Mr. Carrigan. He came to us with this story, and we confirmed he had access to Mr. Carrigan, that they ate at the same homeless shelter.

  “We had no way of knowing that his story was not true, and we have absolutely no way of knowing why he lied. But he did, and for that I do apologize. Sometimes we hit, and once in a while, very rarely I hope, we miss. We’re human … we missed once.

  “The last thing I want to talk to you about is Mr. Carrigan’s capacity to have pulled off this crime. You’ve heard about the lack of rental car contract, the lack of apparent spending of the proceeds of the robbery, and so on.

  “We have never said, and never will say, that Mr. Carrigan did not have an accomplice. It is likely that he did. That accomplice could have brought him to the scene and made off with the profits. He or she may well have used Carrigan for his deadly skills.

  “Mr. Carpenter has implied that perhaps Mrs. McMaster arranged for and directed the murder of her husband. I have no evidence of that; if I did, she would be on trial. But could she be the accomplice? There is that possibility.

  “But the fact that we haven’t brought the accomplice before you does not exempt Mr. Carrigan from punishment. The evidence against him is compelling and establishes proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

  “I know you will do your job. Thank you.”

  Hatchet calls on me to give my summation, but I’m actually finding it hard to catch my breath. I think that Tasker’s closing argument, particularly two phrases that he used, may well have told me everything I need to know.

  He meant them in a different context, but they jumped out at me, and suddenly everything makes sense.

  “Off the grid.”

  “We’re human … we missed once.”

  Thank you, Mr. Tasker.

  It’s going to be hard to concentrate on my summation.

  The thoughts going through my mind have very little to do with what I am going to say. In fact, I am going to make an argument I do not believe in. I am going to point the finger for this crime at Karen McMaster, but I now think it’s unlikely that she deserves it.

  I’m maybe crossing some ethical lines in the process; I’ve never been in a situation like this before, so I really don’t know. But I’m going to do it simply because it is the only chance I have to get my innocent client to not be convicted.

  So basically I am going to have to focus like I have never focused before. Because all I can think about are those phrases that Tasker used.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your service.” I start by saying this because it puts me one “service thank” ahead of Tasker. Since the trial is over, I have won that particular competition.

  “off the grid”

  “I’m going to cut straight to the chase; the evidence against my client has been planted. He didn’t leave that hat at the murder scene, and he didn’t
place that ring in his locker.

  “Now that is easy for me to say, but I have to give you some evidence to support my belief. It’s not enough for me to tell you that I have come to know Don Carrigan and understand that he could not do such a thing.

  “We’re human … we missed once.”

  “Which brings me to Jaime Tomasino. He lied in an attempt to get you to convict Mr. Carrigan. That in itself is enough to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that someone would break the law in order to get you to vote guilty. And if you believe that Mr. Tomasino acted on his own, I would like to play poker with you, any time, anywhere.

  “The only plausible explanation for his testimony is that he was paid to lie. His entire lifestyle changed around the time he was on that witness stand, so to think otherwise defies credibility. But what if he wasn’t paid? What if somehow there was some other motivation, and at the same time he happened to cash a lottery ticket? The point is that there were forces out to get Donald Carrigan.

  “off the grid”

  “For a while I thought Mr. Carrigan was picked at random to be the patsy, but I don’t think so anymore. I think he was chosen because he was hidden from society, as homeless people are. And I think the real killers knew his military background, and performed their killing in a manner that would point at him, because of his Green Beret training. It was a horrible, cynical way to take advantage of a veteran who had served us all so well.

  “So with all that in mind, is it not reasonable to think that someone stole his hat while he slept, and placed a ring in his open locker? Might Mr. Tomasino have even placed the ring? He had access; if he was willing to commit perjury, ring-placing would be a piece of cake.

  “We’re human … we missed once.”

  “So I think we have done enough to make you reasonably doubt Mr. Carrigan’s guilt. But then we went one step further; we told you about someone else who might in fact have been the killer, or at least ordered it to be done.

  “Karen McMaster spoke on the phone with two criminals, two murderers. One two days before her husband died, and one that night. She denied that, but we showed you the records. What were they talking about? The upcoming charity ball? The new opera at the Met?

  “off the grid”

  “She had a husband that she admitted cheated on her, while she claimed to be faithful. Maybe he was planning to leave her; we will never know if that is true. But we do know that his death left her with a two-hundred-and-fifty-million-dollar fortune.

  “And maybe Karen McMaster was not involved, despite all this evidence, in her husband’s death. Hopefully the police will conduct the full and complete investigation they should have conducted back then, and then the truth can be known.

  “Judge Henderson will instruct you as to your procedures and responsibilities. He will tell you that in order to find Mr. Carrigan guilty, you must do so beyond a reasonable doubt.

  “I think you will find that you are swimming in reasonable doubt.

  “Thank you.”

  When I get back to the defense table, Hike gives me a thumbs-up. I never even knew he had thumbs. I must have an intense look on my face, because Carrigan leans over to me and says, “You were great. You okay?”

  I nod, but he doesn’t seem convinced.

  “Take it easy, Andy. You did your best, and your best was outstanding. Don’t view the verdict as all or nothing because the truth is that to me, it’s nothing or nothing.”

  They say that stress can take years off of someone’s life.

  Based on that, with the stress I feel while waiting for a verdict, and the number of verdicts I’ve waited for, I’m pretty sure I’m not going to live past Wednesday.

  At least this time I have things to do … a lot of things to do. My first stop is the Welcome Home shelter to see Sean Aimonetti. I’ve called ahead and asked for a few minutes’ time, just him and me alone in his office.

  I’ve already asked Sam to do some quick research on recent court cases, and gotten back the answer I expected. I’ve also asked him to get a list of the tenants in Karen McMaster’s apartment building, and again we hit a bingo. All of this makes me surer than ever that I am right.

  “Has there been a verdict yet?” Aimonetti asks as soon as I arrive.

  “Is there a place we can talk in private?”

  He leads me into his office, and I close the door behind me. “No. Verdicts are like sudden death overtime. No time limit and it all could end, good or bad, in the blink of an eye.”

  “Doesn’t sound like you like it,” he says.

  “I hate it, but I didn’t come here to complain.”

  “Why did you come here?”

  “To ask you where your other shelters are.”

  “Garfield, Elizabeth, and Newark. But you could have found that out in ten seconds on Google. So what’s your other reason?”

  “Do you have one employee that’s involved in all of those shelters? That would have occasion to talk to patrons in all of them, and most specifically here and Garfield?”

  He thinks for a few moments. “I mean, our accounting people cross over, but for what you’re asking, just James Lasky. You met him when you were here.”

  “I called you recently and asked you to check if Chuck Simmons had ever come to your shelter.”

  “Right,” he says, “and I found out that he hadn’t.”

  “Who did you find out from? Who checked into it for you?”

  “James Lasky.”

  “Did you tell him about my questioning whether a heavy drinker like Simmons could be capable of perfect marksmanship?”

  “Yes.”

  When I leave I extract a promise from him that he will keep our conversation a secret, mentioning it to no one. He promises to do so; I hope he keeps his word. I think he will.

  My next stop is a risky one and is going to take special handling and sensitivity. So I stop at the house to pick up Laurie, who happens to be my Vice President in charge of Special Handling and Sensitivity.

  We drive out to Pomona, which is at Exit 11 off the Palisades Parkway. It is in New York State, though on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. Our GPS takes us to a modest redwood home in a development of similar homes.

  There is a car in the driveway, which is a good sign. We hadn’t called ahead, due to the strong likelihood that we would not be invited to come up. We needed, and need, a face-to-face meeting.

  Laurie rings the bell and about twenty seconds later a pleasant-looking woman, maybe forty years old, opens the door. She has a sadness to her face and the reddened eyes of someone who is grieving. I doubt we’re going to make her feel better.

  “Mrs. Yount?” Laurie says, but we both know that’s who she is.

  She looks at Laurie with some surprise, not knowing what this is about. Then she looks at me and must recognize me, because after a split second, her face gets even sadder, and she sags in resignation. I don’t mention that women have been having that reaction to me for most of my life.

  “We know about your husband. And we know about Craig Kimble.”

  She pauses for a moment and then says, “Come in.” We do just that, and she closes the door behind us.

  “I knew that eventually I would have to tell someone,” Nancy Yount says. “I think on some level Eric felt the same way. Or at least that’s what I choose to believe.”

  “Tell us about it, please,” Laurie says. “In your own way, however you are most comfortable.”

  She smiles. “I’m afraid there is no comfortable way. Kimble came to Eric maybe a year and a half ago. He gave him money, with the promise of much more. He said that at some point he might need a favor, and that point might never come.

  “Eric was a sick man; his cancer was diagnosed four years ago. It went into remission, but no one was confident that it would stay that way. They were right; it came back about a month before Kimble approached him. It was eventually going to kill him.

  “Kimble knew about his illness; Eric thought it was because he o
wned a health services company that had computer access to the details.

  “Eric wanted to provide for me; that was his motivation. He convinced himself that what he was doing was tolerable. He even thought that maybe the ruling he might be called upon to make could be consistent with what his ruling would have been anyway.

  “But then it started to fall apart, and Eric realized what was happening. And so Kimble threatened Eric—really, he threatened to hurt me—and he brought that horrible man to see him, to scare him.” She looks at me. “The one that died at your house.

  “I didn’t know all of this for a long time, but I’m not blind, and I finally confronted Eric. He broke down and told me. And then when poor Lawrence Alexander was killed, pretending they were shooting at Eric … it was all to make sure Eric presided over that case.”

  She starts to cry.

  “We are going to need you to testify to this,” Laurie says. “To save other people from going through what you have gone through. And worse.”

  “It will destroy Eric’s legacy.”

  “I’m afraid Eric destroyed Eric’s legacy,” I say. “One way or another this has to end, and you have the power to end it. Eventually the truth will come out, but it is important that it come out now.”

  We’re back in the car and approaching the George Washington Bridge when I get the call from the court clerk. “Andy, you need to get down here. There’s a verdict.”

  We head west on Route 80 toward downtown Paterson and the courthouse. I call Hike on the way, but he already knows about it. He feels that the fact the jury came to a verdict so quickly is bad news. Had they taken a year and a half to deliberate, Hike would have interpreted that as bad news.

  No matter what happens, Hike remains Hike.

  Carrigan is brought in looking a hell of a lot more calm than I am. “I’m more nervous than I thought I’d be,” he says. “You have any idea what is going to happen?”

  “None whatsoever,” I say. Usually in these situations I am positive we are going to lose. This time I’m more confident, which probably means we don’t have a prayer. Either way, I’m going to keep my mouth shut and let the jury do the talking.