“I’m telling you, I have no idea about no body.”
She toughened her demeanor and prepared herself for a more military attitude, one that Hall might understand. She took a deep breath of the room’s sour air and said, “Listen, mister, when I ask you a question I expect more than an answer, I expect the truth. If the truth is too much for you, then we have no business here, you and I. Do you hear me, Mr. Hall?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Good. Now I will tell you what they found down in that crawl space other than a pile of bones. And in return for this favor you will tell me the truth-for a change-and maybe, just maybe, I can save your sorry ass from Sergeant Boldt, who would just as soon send you down to lockup and never see you again. You think that Sergeant Boldt cares about your side of the story?”
“No, ma’am.”
“That’s correct. He does not. His desk is covered in open murder investigations, and as far as he’s concerned this one is cleared. You’re just a number to him. As far as he’s concerned, the next stop for you is a court, a jury, and death row.” She tapped the papers violently, summoning an anger that she expressed as an unrelenting and penetrating stare. “Do we understand each other?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’m getting a better feeling about this, Nick. I believe we’re beginning to understand one another. Is that your assessment as well?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Look me in the eye, Nick. That’s better. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“They found your fingerprints in that crawl space, Nick. Where they found the dead woman.”
He wore a paralyzed expression, part shock, part realization.
She explained, “There is absolutely no question about this. Do you understand? That is what we call evidence. Proof. The stuff that puts you away for life.” He couldn’t get a word out. She watched as he relived some incident, his eyes suddenly blank.
He said hurriedly, “No, listen. You don’t understand.”
She told him, “No, I don’t. But Boldt thinks he does.”
“You got this wrong.”
“What I got,” she said, “is you, on tape, telling me that you had never been to that residence prior to tonight. Never been in that house before. You gotta believe me,” she said, reading her interrogation notes. “So I believed you. Now I don’t believe you, and neither does Sergeant Boldt.”
“No, I had been there.” He attempted to correct himself.
“I think we’re pretty clear on that, Nick.”
“Last week,” he said.
“You’re saying you just happened to be in the crawl space last week? Oh, well,” she said sarcastically, “that explains it! Certainly fills in all the blanks for me.” She straightened her posture and ran her fingers through her hair. She felt bone tired and yet almost high at the same time. This was the stuff she lived for. “There’s no accurate way to date latent fingerprints. Did you know that? Last week, last year…. It’s all the same to the lab guys. All the same to a jury.” She fixed her eyes on to him and said, “Help me here. What the hell were you doing there, Nick? How do we explain this to Boldt? Did you kill that woman?”
“No, no, no,” the suspect said, shaking his head violently and gently slapping the table with that paw and its ungainly three fingernails.
“Talk to me.”
“I was at the airport,” he stated, breaking out of the dark and into the open ground of truth for the first time.
Confessions came piece by piece, by disassembling the fabricated truth and allowing the real truth to take its place. To her it felt like digging in wet sand as the waves came in-remove the sand, allow the water to fill the hole.
“You weren’t alone there,” she said.
He shook his head, the handcuff chains rattling on the tabletop.
“Help me out here, Nick.”
She stood, leaned onto her outstretched arms. “A person can’t dance alone. Boldt’s way of doing this?” she asked. “He’ll misplace you for a couple days. Place you ‘accidentally’ in the wrong lockup, in with the guys the screws call the soapies-the soap droppers. For you it’s a few days of sitting on the toilet and screaming, a few months of wondering if you’re carrying the disease or not.
“Who cares about capital punishment,” she continued, “when there’s the disease? It’s free. No one pushes a button. That’s Boldt’s way for justice,” she lied. “He’s of the old school. He’ll tell you he cares, but he doesn’t. He wants a good, solid clearance rate. That’s how his success is measured. You’re a number to him. They made the arrest, now they want to clear the case. Take a good long look, Nick. This is your life walking out the door.”
She stood and walked slowly toward the door, each step a lifetime: Dorothy Enwright, Melissa Heifitz, Connie Branslonovich. She reached for the doorknob deliberately, took her time in turning it. Pulled open the door. The air smelled better, felt cooler.
“It wasn’t drugs,” Hall admitted in a hushed voice.
Daphne turned, reentered the room, and pulled the door shut behind herself. Suddenly that dreary, claustrophobic room smelled a lot sweeter.
“I was doing some business, you know? Some punk kid ripped me for five bills. Stupid asshole drops his wallet in my truck. First time I went there, he hid from me in the crawl space.”
“You roughed up the stepfather.”
“We tangled. I wanted my fucking money! Second time-tonight-I took the money. And that’s the God’s truth.”
Daphne’s pulse quickened, she felt warm in the small of her back. She focused on his body language and his facial expressions, searching for the signs. She measured his eye movement, waited for him to begin licking his lips-a dry mouth tipped off lying-watched keenly for how much eye contact he sought-eye avoidance often indicated insincerity.
After a long silence she asked, “What kind of business?”
“A phone call now and then. The guy knew more about my base than I did. I swear that’s the truth.” He checked her again. He was made nervous by her silence, which was exactly what she wanted, so she didn’t change a thing. “I never met him.”
Her skin crawled. A second person. No one would want to hear this, she realized. He looked over at her with the vacant eyes of a man on death row. “I don’t know nothing about him.”
She caught herself gnawing at the inside of her right cheek. She was full of questions but as yet unwilling to voice them, hoping instead to pressure him with silence, the most effective of all interrogation tools.
“I don’t know his name,” he declared solemnly. “I don’t know what he looks like.” He squinted and placed his pink paddle onto the table instead of hiding it below the lip as he had been. “A buck twenty a month. That’s the disability pay our fine country sees fit to give me for this: a hundred and twenty a month. And what kind of job am I supposed to get? Tell me that. A typist?” He twisted his wet lips into a grin that caused her to shiver and made him feel dangerous. Was he looking to vent his rage? she wondered. She sat straight up and met his eyes, and silently told him not to try anything with her.
“It wasn’t drugs,” he repeated.
“Something available on the base,” she replied.
He nodded. His mandible muscle locked up as big and firm as a chestnut. His eyes went wide. He was terrified. Of the military or the man with whom he had dealt? she wondered.
“What was it you sold, secrets?”
“Hell, no, I ain’t no traitor!”
“What then?”
He answered, “I had access that he didn’t have. Let’s just leave it at that.”
Her voice rose to a shout. “Leave it? I don’t think so. Have you been listening, Nick? We’re trying to build a credible story here. I don’t know what you were selling, but it’s not going to bring you death row. The murder charge will!”
His eyes hardened. His mandible muscle knotted again. “I want me a lawyer.”
“We’ll arrange one, of course, if you
insist, but I should warn you that you’ll regret it. You like me,” she said. “We understand each other, you and I. But Boldt and the prosecutor? You think they care?”
“I’m not answering any more questions.”
“Then I won’t ask any more questions,” she informed him. “Just tell me what was going on in that parking garage at Sea-Tac. Try the truth, in a way I can believe, and you may walk out that door with the charges dropped.”
“Bullshit.”
She stood. “You don’t want the murder charges dropped? What am I doing trying to help you? You think I have time for this?” she complained. “You think I have nothing better to do than sit in this stinky little room listening to you bitch and whine? You want Boldt, you got him. You want the soapies, you got ’em. You want death row, it’s all yours.”
Her second false exit was less successful. She was mad at herself for trying it too soon. His chains rattled, but he did not speak up. No matter how many times she heard that sound, it gave her chills.
She could not be seen to give in. The temptation was to turn around and give him another chance, rather than let Boldt have him for a while, but there were no second chances to be given. The finality of his position was all-important. And besides, she thought, it was embarrassing to have the mark settle on a request for an attorney during her turn at bat. Hall had the look of terror. Better to give him a few minutes and let Boldt go at him for a while. But she gave him up reluctantly, like a pitcher coming off the mound in the early innings.
“Okay, here’s the shit,” John LaMoia said, approaching Boldt, who stood on the other side of the one-way glass watching Daphne debate her exit.
Boldt didn’t like being interrupted, not even by LaMoia, to whom he granted an unfair amount of liberties. “I’m busy here, Detective,” he said sternly.
“The … rocket … fuel,” LaMoia said slowly, reminding Boldt of the way he talked to Miles when he wanted to get a point across. “The … suspect. That … suspect,” the detective continued, pointing through the glass.
Boldt’s mind wandered from fatigue. He spoke to Liz each night and some mornings. Though grateful at first for his efforts to protect his family, she was increasingly angry at him for her isolation at the cabin. She had spent nine days up there, and he had forbidden her to tell any friends or bank associates where she was, even though a close friend could guess immediately. The Sheriff’s Department had two men assigned to her twenty-four hours a day, one guarding the road, one watching the cabin. She was feeling captive. He told her little of the investigation, just as she said nothing of the bank, with whom he knew she was in touch.
They ended up discussing social engagements, as if it were any other week in their lives. She sought the comfort of familiarity. He allowed it. There was a dinner party being thrown by one of her vice-presidents that she felt they were obligated to attend. Boldt hated these bank dinners, having little in common with the country club set. She then pressed him about the upcoming Fireman’s Ball, a downtown gala fund-raiser they attended each year, again, Boldt reluctantly.
He softened and agreed to both, at which point she dropped the real bombshell. “I have to be back in the city on Tuesday. No questions asked, I have to be.” Jealousy welled up within him and he nearly confronted her, but whereas confronting a suspect was easy for him, confronting his wife had never been simple. It was far easier for him to attempt a noncommittal statement such as, “We’ll see,” but he knew it wouldn’t carry the day. He wanted to corner her into explaining the urgency, and yet he didn’t want to know. He ended up procrastinating-putting off agreeing with her until another call.
LaMoia’s voice brought him back. “What I’ve found out is this: The Air Force, in all its wisdom, decommissioned the Titan missile program in phases. The rocket fuel back then was either two liquids, or a liquid and a solid, that when combined self-ignited. No need for an igniter. Part A meets part B and kablaam! — fire, controlled burn. The chemical reaction produced its own oxygen, making it perfect for burns that continued up into space. The term is hypergolic: binary self-igniting rocket fuel. There’s a whole family of them. But the point is, it takes the two parts to tango. They moved the two parts to separate locations, keeping them as far from each other as possible. The Minute Man program took its place. There was evidently talk of disposing of the two parts, but some fucking genius decided we might be able to sell the stuff abroad and make back some of the taxpayers’ investment. It probably cost more money to ship it and store it than it did to make it,” he snapped sarcastically. “So they didn’t destroy it. They stored it. Part A went to Idaho, part B to California. Part A went to Texas; part B to Nevada. Keep brother and sister far apart. And then the base closures began. Base inventories were moved around like chess pieces. Some of that goes here, some of that goes there. Things get a little fuzzy at this point, but it would appear that either by just plain old government stupidity, or-if you accept the rumors-because a potential buyer came on the scene, parts A and B were moved onto nearby bases here in Washington. But if that’s true, the buyer must have fallen through, because parts A and B ended up here to stay, at which point, of course, we entered the second round of base closures, the second round of moving inventories like chess pieces, and-lo and behold! — parts A and B end up in separate storage facilities but both on the same base: Chief Joseph Air Force Base.”
Boldt said, “Which was closed down in round three.”
“But round three was not full closure for a lot of the bases. They reduced them to something called maintenance status. They maintained inventory but shut down barracks-it was a pork-barrel scheme to maintain the bases in an election year; no one had to say the bases were being closed, just scaled down. Fluff. The result was, a few administrators stayed on at each of these bases, a few MPs to watch the place, guard the gates. But for all purposes there was no one left. And the security details are less than twenty-five percent of what they were at full operation.”
“Vulnerable.”
“Exactly. Especially to an inside job.”
Boldt speculated, “Nicholas Hall was an MP at Chief Joseph.”
“That he was. Whether he figured it out himself or was paid off to do an inside job, who knows? But Mr. Paddle Paw in there skimmed off a little juice and cashed in his retirement plan.” Looking through the one-way glass at the suspect, LaMoia said, “I wonder if he’s considered a career in Ping-Pong.”
Boldt exhaled loudly said, “Good work, John.”
“Damn right. I’d say it earns me ten minutes with him, right, Sarge?”
Daphne stepped out of the Box at that moment and, overhearing the request, objected. “Let’s give him a rest. Please. Then the sergeant will go back at him.”
LaMoia had proved himself incredibly effective in past interrogations. Boldt thought of him as his wild card. He knew few boundaries. He could be a suspect’s instant friend, or worst enemy. Boldt told his detective, “Don’t touch him.”
Daphne, knowing Boldt’s mind was made up, advised LaMoia, “Don’t ask any questions. Just statements, John.”
“Matthews,” LaMoia said, “have I told you lately that I like you?”
She repeated, “No questions. Push him with statements.”
LaMoia moved to the Box, pulled up his pants at the waist, and opened the door. Facing Boldt, he whispered, “You might want to turn off the tape.”
He walked in with a swagger-in his trademark pressed jeans.
Boldt and Daphne watched and listened. Through the speaker mounted below the one-way glass they heard LaMoia say, “I bet you’re a killer at handball, Nicky.” He kicked the empty chair away from the desk and sat down in it, craned forward on the edge. “You could always get a job as an inspector at a mitten factory. You know: Inspected by number thirteen. That kinda shit.”
LaMoia stared for a moment.
“What was life like out at Chief Joseph once everybody left?”
The suspect paled noticeably.
He a
sked this, breaking Daphne’s request immediately. No answer from the suspect.
“What else?” he asked. “You could play bass drum in a marching band. Direct traffic! Hey, what about that? You could be a traffic cop, Nicky. Pay sucks, and the company you keep isn’t so great, but you always have the fact that you’re working for the betterment of society, you know?” Then he said, “You could drive a pickup truck, I bet. One-handed, but so what? You could sell out your country. You could probably shove that thing up your cell mate’s ass, with a little help.
“You know who I am, Nicky? I’m the one you’ve been worried about. I’m the one you’ve been thinking was going to come through that door. You met me in boot camp. You see me in some of your nightmares. I’m the one that those guys”-he said pointed to the glass-“can’t control. I’m the one who doesn’t give a shit. Boldt and Matthews, they’re on a break. But not me. I’m the one who does the dirty work around here. You know football at all? I’m the safety, the last guy on the field between you and the end zone. Safeties are always the crazy motherfuckers, you know? Stand in the way of a three-hundred-pound running back. You gotta be crazy, right? So what?” LaMoia slapped the table so loudly that the speaker went fuzzy. “You worked security at Chief Joseph. You decided to make a few bucks. Don’t shake your fucking head, pal, because I know what I know. And I know all about you. You know I do. You want to nod, that’s okay. But don’t lie to me. Don’t fuck with me. Matthews, she’s the exception to the rule around here. And that makes me the rule. You’re going to live with that, or you’re going to die with that-I don’t give a shit. But you’re not going to lie to me. Under no circumstances are you to lie to me.
“Maybe I need a little introduction,” LaMoia continued. “I’m the guy who knows everybody. Ask anyone. I’m the guy who tells the screw to put you with the soapies and he does it; I’m the guy who says to put the roaches in the soup, and the cook does it. I have friends. I make friends easily. Like with you, right, Nicky? Buddies, right? Let’s have a little nod, Nicky.”
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