Conviction

by Richard North Patterson

  "How do you know that?"

  Rennell inhaled, inward pain filling his voice. "She always tole me that."

  "Why'd she say that?"

  Rennell's silence was followed by a shrug of resignation. " 'Cause I did stupid things, I guess. Just acted stupid without knowin' I was."

  Terri could feel him sliding into a depression. "When you were a kid," she asked as a diversion, "what did you want to be?"

  Rennell's eyes remained closed. "Maybe a pilot, or a superhero. Like Hawkman. Just fly over everything, where it's safe."

  The poignancy of his last phrase made Terri pause. "What were the best things that ever happened to you?"

  "Don't know." Rennell's voice softened. "Maybe when Payton took me to the store. Or maybe," he amended, "when he sat with me in the cafeteria at school. Sometimes no one else ever sits with me."

  Lane, Terri saw, was still gazing at Rennell's hands. "I guess that made you feel bad," he said. "What else made you feel bad?"

  Rennell's head bent forward slightly. "When it rained."

  "Why don't you like rain?"

  "Can't go outside then."

  "Why'd you want to go outside?"

  Pausing, Rennell seemed to swallow. "Daddy. Rain was like it was at night."

  "And you didn't like night, I guess."

  Rennell shook his head.

  "Why not?"

  " 'Cause I'm afraid. Don't want to go to sleep."

  "Why?"

  Lightly, Rennell touched the side of his face. "Sometimes I wake up crying."

  "Is that what you were afraid of—crying?"

  Silent, Rennell rested his forehead in the chain between his hands.

  "Rennell?"

  "Sometimes I'd hear Daddy, my mama screaming." His eyes shut tighter. "Head hurts so much it's like it's going to explode. Least it keeps me awake."

  "What did your daddy do to Mama?"

  Rennell shook his head, a stubborn gesture of refusal. Gently, Lane took Rennell's hands from beneath his face and laid them on the table, tracing a scar on Rennell's left wrist that Terri had not noticed. Voice still quiet, Lane asked, "When did you try to hurt yourself, Rennell?"

  Once more, Rennell shook his head. No words came out.

  "Okay," Lane said softly. "Okay. We'll just take a rest for a little while, and then maybe you can help me out with something."

  Rennell's eyes slowly opened.

  "Okay." Lane's fingers intertwined with Rennell's. "Stay with me, son."

  Waiting, Terri felt the gooseflesh on her skin, a hollowness in the pit of her stomach. "I want you to remember something for us," Lane told Rennell. "Something hard. Because it's important."

  Rennell's eyes screwed up again. "Your mama stabbed your daddy," Lane said, "when you were nine years old. Terri and I need for you to tell us what you saw."

  Rennell raised his face as though to gaze at the ceiling, save that his eyes remained closed. "Blood," he answered finally and then, with his next few broken words, summoned an image which pierced Terri's heart.

  * * *

  Vernon Price lay on the carpet, eyes wild with shock and fright and hatred, white T-shirt shining with his blood pumping from his chest. Rennell could not speak or move.

  "Want my blood?" Price shrieked at the boy. "Then you come here, you stupid pussy."

  Fear made Rennell's feet move closer to his father. With a spasm of rage, his father grabbed his wrists, drawing Rennell's face close to his. His ragged breath smelled like blood and whiskey.

  "She did this, you son of a whore." Price placed his palm to his pulsing wound, then slowly wiped his blood across the boy's face and eyes. "Only blood of mine you'll ever get."

  A stream of red came gushing from his mouth.

  * * *

  That was all Rennell would say.

  When they were done, Terri stood with Anthony Lane in the parking lot. "It's way too hard on him," she said. "And there's too damned much I know we're missing."

  Lane nodded. "Wish we could talk to Payton. Before they shut him up for good."

  "I've tried. His lawyers say no."

  Lane considered this. "It may seem pointless," he said with resignation, "but Tammy needs to take another run at Mama."

  THIRTEEN

  "WE TRIED WITH THE SEMENM," DR. DAVID LEVY TOLD TERRI. "No soap. It's way too degraded to yield DNA."

  Terri did not know whether to feel disappointment or relief. Telephone in hand, she began to pace, gazing out her office window as Alcatraz began merging in the dusk with the dark waters of the bay. "What about the hairs?" she asked.

  "The so-called Asian-type hairs from the brothers' carpet turn out to be Thuy Sen's—no surprise there." The criminalist's tone turned dry. "As for the hairs from her barrette, it's a classic case of 'good news, bad news.' Which do you want first?"

  "The good news," Terri answered promptly. "I could use a little."

  "It's not Rennell's. The DNA doesn't match with his."

  Terri felt her own slow release of breath. "And the bad?"

  "The DNA's so similar to his that the hair must have come from a very close relative. I guess we can rule out Grandma."

  "Payton," Terri said softly.

  "Pretty much has to be," Levy agreed. "I guess that's not so helpful. But I suppose it still leaves open the question of Rennell."

  Terri thanked him and got off. She did not raise the other question David Levy could not answer: what Yancey James might know about Payton and, she feared, Rennell.

  * * *

  It was past seven at night when Tammy Mattox appeared in Terri's conference room, perusing its table strewn with records from Rennell's past—what Tammy called the bones of the dinosaur. The mitigation specialist looked weary; she plopped herself in a chair and sat flat-footed, the folds beneath her chin compressing as she bowed her head.

  "Well," she said, as much to herself as Terri, "that was a long day."

  "Rennell's mother?"

  Tammy nodded. "My new friend Athalie Price. Mama's still in an asylum. Even if she weren't pretty much bughouse, you have to circle around her defenses a good while." Tammy emitted a sigh of fatigue. "And you never know what may come out. Does she hate Rennell and want him dead? Does she know something no one else does? But you can't just come out and ask that—you have to try and divine it. For a woman with a low IQ, our Athalie's a devious one."

  Tammy, Terri realized, felt the need to tell her story. Settling back in her chair, she inquired. "What's she like?"

  "Which second? Girl's got moods like mercury." Eyeing Terri, Tammy gave her a slow smile. "You had a long day, too, I imagine. So I'll spare you the gibberish and cut to the lucid moments. You don't have my boundless patience."

  * * *

  After an hour, Athalie Price flashed Tammy a sudden, startling grin. "You still here?" she asked.

  Tammy smiled. "Sure," she drawled. "Got nowhere to go, and nothing to do."

  Athalie's smile vanished. "Like me, I guess. Nowhere to go. Been like that ever since I met Vernon, and then Payton got born."

  "Was Vernon your first man?"

  "You mean," Athalie inquired with mild incredulity, "did he teach me sex?"

  "Someone had to, right?"

  "Someone did. Not Vernon, though—my granddaddy." Athalie's tone sounded matter-of-fact. "Used to give me a quarter for stand-up sex, sliding up and down his thing. Vernon just gave me Payton. That and a beating or six."

  * * *

  Tammy poured herself more coffee. "Near as I can make out," she said to Terri, "Vernon was physically and sexually abusive—got hard for Athalie to tell the difference between a beating and a fucking. All as random as the payoff from a slot machine."

  "Did she give a reason for staying?"

  "Does a woman that damaged need one?" Tammy asked. "Sometimes the most powerful weapon an abuser has is sheer unpredictability—you never know when you're going to get it. And in the amazing world of human hope, it sometimes takes damned little to keep a woman coming
back for more.

  "Athalie's just smart enough to know she's not right—not just disturbed but probably retarded. Whereas Vernon was crazy and controlling." Tammy's tone was grim. "And smart enough to know exactly what he had—a woman he could torment till the day he died."

  "What about Payton and Rennell?"

  "The kids were just a sidelight." Tammy placed the cup in front of her. "But with Rennell, if you believe his mama, Vernon started early."

  * * *

  "Rennell?" Athalie repeated with the same sardonic smile. "Vernon didn't even bother waiting for that boy to be born."

  "How do you mean?"

  Athalie touched her face. "Didn't just hit me in the head no more. Used to kick me in the stomach."

  "You mean when you were pregnant."

  "Uh-huh. Said he didn't want this baby to get born." The words were tinged with a brittle triumph Tammy could not fathom. "But he got born, didn't he. He got made, and he got born."

  "What happened to him after that?"

  Athalie did not acknowledge the question. She lay her head back in the worn chair, eyes losing their focus, a deranged woman in a bare, green room in a mental institution, yet suddenly a thousand miles away.

  * * *

  "She'd come and go," Tammy said. "Like she was in a trance, then wake up and see I was still there, and start talking again like nothing had happened. Mostly this Delphic kind of disconnected nonsense, with nuggets of sense."

  Terri scribbled a note to herself, "Prenatal trauma—organic brain damage?" "Still," she said, "a developing fetus is vulnerable to the same abuse his mother gets—a uterine wall is not much more of a barrier to trauma than it is to alcohol."

  "Sure. But try putting Athalie Price on the witness stand. All I can do is claim to have understood her—for whatever a judge may think it's worth."

  "What did she tell you about Rennell?"

  "Disjointed phrases, mainly." Tammy flipped open her notebook. "I made some notes in the parking lot. The words she used were 'sad,' 'slow,' 'clumsy,' 'picked on.' Said he 'couldn't tie his shoes' and 'always took the blame.' String them all together, and it paints a picture. But that's seven and a half hours' worth."

  "What about the abuse?"

  Tammy put down her notes. "Athalie's fine with killing her husband," she answered. "But some things make her feel ashamed."

  * * *

  The subject of abuse to Rennell, it seemed to Tammy, caused his mother to shut down. Her eyes were blank, and it was hard to know how much she still remembered.

  "Back then," Tammy offered, "we didn't know how to protect our babies. Remember the time Rennell fell off the curb and you took him to the hospital? You were trying to protect him then, weren't you?"

  Athalie shrugged—whether out of indifference or avoidance, Tammy could not tell. Softly, she asked, "Was that Vernon's doing, Athalie?"

  Athalie did not answer. "Sometimes," Tammy continued, "things happen to us when we're kids, and we promise ourselves we'll never let them happen to our kids. But sometimes they do anyway. Maybe it was like that being Rennell's mama."

  Athalie said nothing. The only sign that she had heard Tammy's voice was that she turned away.

  "Those burn marks on Rennell's backside," Tammy said, "did Vernon do that?"

  Athalie froze. Studying her silent profile, Tammy briefly thought that tears might have caused her eyes to blink.

  "After he got born," Athalie murmured, "boy always cried at night. Pissed Vernon off so bad he spanked him, and Rennell just a baby in diapers."

  "What did you do?"

  "Put beer in his bottle. Made him sleep better."

  * * *

  "That was how she protected him," Tammy said. "Feeding Budweiser to an infant. Not very good for the cerebrum, I wouldn't think."

  Terri made a note. "But nothing about abuse beyond the crib."

  "Nothing." Tammy gave an ironic smile. "When I tried to push her, something else came out. You could say it's the difference between Payton and Rennell."

  * * *

  How, Tammy wondered, could she get Athalie Price to tell her what she needed?

  The woman before her had receded into the silence of the insane, so profound that her essence seemed to have vanished. The husk who remained, face turned toward the wall, was preternaturally still. "Were you afraid," Tammy inquired gently, "that Rennell might turn out to be like Vernon?"

  At first, Athalie did not seem to hear. Then, to Tammy's astonishment, the woman slowly shook her head.

  "Because Rennell was different?" she asked.

  " 'Cause his daddy was different." Athalie Price turned to her, a tight smile of anger lighting her eyes. "I got my revenge on Vernon Price. Rennell's daddy was a boy from down the street—real slow, but real sweet. Just like Rennell."

  * * *

  Listening, Terri felt a psychic shiver.

  Only blood of mine you'll ever get.

  "She wouldn't give me a name," Tammy concluded. "But if you believe her, Rennell's father was someone else. Maybe retarded himself."

  "We need to try and find him." Terri rubbed her temples. "Athalie thought Vernon didn't know. But for sure he suspected, and Rennell became his scapegoat."

  "If you ask me," Tammy answered, "he still is."

  FOURTEEN

  EARLY MORNING FOUND THE SAME CONFERENCE ROOM OCCUPIED by Anthony Lane, Tammy Mattox, Johnny Moore, Carlo Paget, and Teresa Peralta Paget, the last running on three hours' sleep.

  "So," Terri asked Lane bluntly, "is our guy retarded?"

  Lane rested both elbows on the table. "The state will say no. I need to do more work, but my tentative answer is yes. The biggest problem we've got is Rennell's IQ."

  "Which is . . ."

  "Seventy-two, according to our test. Seventy's the standard, of course. With a standard deviation of five points either way, Rennell's IQ falls within a range of sixty-seven to seventy-seven—"

  "Seventy-two," Carlo interjected, "is dismal."

  "Maybe to you," Lane answered. "But we're dealing with a death row population whose IQ , on average, is in the eighties."

  Carlo shook his head in disbelief. "Are you telling me the State of California's going to execute Rennell Price for being two points too smart?"

  "Not necessarily. Remember that IQ is only one of three indicators. The second is age of onset—there it's clear Rennell had problems from early childhood. As for the last, adaptive functioning, he's got problems in basic life skills all across the board. Which is why Payton looked after him: Rennell's brain just doesn't work right."

  "What about organic brain damage?" Tammy asked. "Mama drank all during pregnancy, and then put beer in his bottle."

  Lane turned to her; in this meeting, Carlo began to notice, his voice and manner were more deliberate, the judicious aura of an expert crafting an opinion on which a life might depend. "Let's start with fetal alcohol syndrome. That's one of the common causes of retardation. And it can affect a couple of capacities: intellectual functioning, where Rennell has real problems, and impulse control." Lane paused to adjust his glasses. "Problems with impulse control could make Rennell more likely to force a nine-year-old girl into giving him oral sex. He could go from idea to execution in a matter of seconds."

  Carlo thought of Flora Lewis's testimony that it was Rennell, not Payton, who had pulled Thuy Sen inside. "Does Rennell seem like that to you—impulsive?"

  "Not particularly," Lane answered. "He strikes me as depressed—the headaches, the fear of sleeping, phobias about rain and darkness, feelings of worthlessness. Not to mention that very troubling scar on his wrist. He's more like a person who had the joy beat out of him."

  "Still," Moore observed, "once you throw in smoking crack, even a slug can have an impulsive moment." Glancing at Tammy, he added, "We've still got no evidence that he ever had sex with anyone, right?"

  "Not so much as a hand job."

  "That's helpful," Lane told Terri. "But it's a problem that Rennell looks normal, except maybe
for impaired coordination . . ."

  "That could be fetal alcohol."

  "Sure. But a judge may see just another sullen murderer, with what the A.G.'s folks will portray as superior lineage: Vernon Price may have been crazy but not dumb. Even Mom's IQ—at least from the hospital records—checks in at seventy-eight . . ."

  "So all I've got to do," Tammy said dryly, "is find his supposed real dad, the nameless slow but sweet one, and blood-test him for paternity."

  Lane smiled. "That would help, yeah."

  A moment passed in silence, the others sifting their thoughts and drinking coffee. "Another problem," Moore said to Terri, "is this pubic hair of Payton's."

  "That's Payton's problem," Terri answered. "There's still no physical evidence directly linking Rennell to a sex act with Thuy Sen."

  Moore stroked his grizzled beard. "But if I'm the A.G., my version goes like this: Payton told Rennell to pull Thuy Sen off the street, then hold her head while she goes down on Payton. Even if Rennell's got no sexual interest in a nine-year-old, his brother does. The semen belongs to Payton. But Rennell's still guilty of felony murder—"

  "But not fit to be executed," Carlo objected. "Isn't a mitigating factor against the death penalty that Rennell acted under the domination and control of Payton? He's retarded, for Godsakes—Payton ran him his whole life."

  "That," Terri answered, "would be the argument." She sat back, her gaze taking in her team. "I still wish we knew what really happened. Whatever it is, I'd work with it."

  Moore frowned. "I'm not so sure, Terri. This may be one case where ignorance is as close to bliss as we'll ever get—"

  The telephone rang.

  Terri stood, her expression of annoyance quickly switching to curiosity. "I told Julie to hold my calls, unless it's the President or the Easter bunny."

  "Maybe," Moore suggested helpfully, "it's Rennell's real father, calling in from Yale. Where he's chairman of the Physics Department."

  With a wan smile, Terri walked over to the far end of the conference room and picked up the phone. "Teresa Paget."

  Carlo watched her expression change to one of taut attention, so complete that she barely seemed to breathe. "When?" she asked and then, a moment later, said simply, "I'll be there."