Although Conroy denied it, I knew he had an army of policemen loyal to him combing the streets trying to locate the Mouse, the cop who was going to be the chief witness against him. I tried, too, but they had the Mouse tucked nicely away.
The prosecutor provided me with a list of witnesses, which I went over with Conroy.
Mostly, they were city officials whose only role was to say that the confiscated cash had been handled by Chief Conroy in a way forbidden by regulations. The Mouse would say that Conroy stole the money, or so I assumed.
A Mary Margaret Tucker was listed as a witness.
“Do you know her?” I asked Conroy.
“She was a civilian employee in the department,” he said. “She worked as my secretary.”
“Why would they call her as a witness?”
Conroy didn’t answer at once, but paused, then spoke. “This is somewhat embarrassing.”
“Girlfriend?”
He nodded. “It happens, Sloan.”
“How long did the affair go on?”
“A year or so.”
“When did it end?”
“It didn’t, or at least I didn’t think it had. She stopped seeing me just before they dropped the net. I suppose, now that I look back, she was trying to break the thing off for some time.”
“She must have some connection with the missing money, or the prosecutor wouldn’t call her. I can keep her off the stand if his only intention is to embarrass you.”
“She didn’t have anything to do with the witness fund. In fact, she hasn’t worked for the department for the past month.”
“Where does she work now?”
“She doesn’t,” he said, dropping his voice.
“Were you taking care of her? Giving her money?”
He paused. “More or less.”
“It’s either one way or the other.”
“She’s living in a building I own. She’s a senior in college. As soon as she graduates, she’s going on to law school. I was, well, sort of financing her education.”
“How much a month?”
“Depends. Usually about a thousand, give or take.”
I looked at him. “Did your wife know?”
He shook his head. “No. She’s very busy. Works all the time. I don’t think she even suspects.”
“This is going to give you some problems at home.”
He sighed. “What’s to be is to be.”
“Did you give her money, or did the Mouse?”
“I did.” He hesitated. “Once in a while I’d give money to the Mouse to give to her. It depended on how busy I was.”
“You’ve got problems, Chief.”
“I know.”
“Everyone will think the money came from the secret fund.”
“Do you?” he asked.
“As I told you in the beginning, it doesn’t make any difference what I believe. Can you show the money came out of your personal accounts?”
He shrugged. “Maybe. I had to do some bookkeeping magic so my wife wouldn’t suspect. I opened a special account. It got complicated.”
“Complicated or not, you had better start thinking of proving the money came out of your own pocket.”
“I’ll go to work on it,” he said, but without enthusiasm.
“When was the last time you talked to Mary Margaret?”
He thought for a moment. “A week or two back before all this went down. Later, when she didn’t answer the phone, I went over to the house. Some of her things are still there, but not her clothes. It looks like she’s skipped, too.”
“Like the Mouse?”
He nodded. “Like the Mouse.”
“Do you believe in prayer?”
“That bad?”
“I think so. We’ll find out more at the examination.”
He left the office. If he was worried, he didn’t show it.
But I was worried.
Now the snow was really coming down. “Be careful driving back to the city,” I said.
I had two more clients before the day ended. An elderly couple wanted a will. They had one child, a son. The purpose of the will wasn’t to see that the son got everything, quite the opposite. They wanted to ensure that he never got a cent. They were angry over a family matter. I tried to persuade them to wait, to cool off before making that kind of decision, but they wouldn’t hear of it.
I took down the facts I needed and told them the will would be ready in a few days. I hoped by that time they would reconsider. It didn’t take much to split a family forever.
The other client was a man who wanted to incorporate a small business he owned. He operated a pizza restaurant and was about to start a delivery service. Someone told him incorporation might limit his personal liability if his drivers hit someone. They were right. As I’d done with the couple before him, I took down the information I needed and told him it would take a couple of days.
My secretary had left, so I escorted him to the door. The snow was slowing now, but a few inches covered the ground. It looked pretty, pure white against the dark river.
I went back inside and dialed Sue Gillis at her office. It was her night for dinner. Sometimes she cooked; sometimes we went out. I liked her cooking best, if the choice was mine alone.
I called the familiar number, then swung around and watched the dark river.
“Gillis.”
“It’s me,” I said. “I’m starved.”
“Bad news, Charley. I’m going to be working late tonight.”
“How come?”
“We’ve just been given a murder. A kid. They found the body up on Clarion Road. I’m going over to the medical examiner’s now.”
“Sex crime?”
“They don’t know yet. But I’ve been asked to work along with Homicide, just in case.”
“Shall I wait for you? You have to eat at some point.”
“Don’t wait. This may be an all-nighter. I’ll grab a sandwich someplace.”
“Would you like me to bring you one? I know where the medical examiner’s office is.”
“That’s sweet, Charley, but no. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“You’re not off the hook, Sue. It’s still your turn tomorrow.”
“So much for chivalry,” she said as she hung up.
I turned out the office lights and continued to watch the river. The snow had stopped so that the lights of Canada were visible again. It was a good feeling, just watching, not thinking about anything.
Then my stomach reminded me that I was hungry.
I didn’t want to go to a restaurant solo. Sue had spoiled me. Dining alone, even at a hamburger joint, seemed just too lonely.
I decided that I would go to my apartment, pop in a frozen dinner, and watch some television. The road was now covered and slippery, so I drove very slowly.
The fried chicken dinner, complete with mashed potatoes and corn, came out of the microwave looking like the illustration on the package and tasting like the cardboard. I ate about half and tossed the rest away.
I fell asleep in front of the television until I was awakened by the insistent ringing of the telephone.
I don’t know what kind of dream I was having but I remember being grateful at being jarred back to consciousness. I glanced at my watch. It was just a few minutes after one o’clock.
I presumed it would be some husband or wife in the midst of a domestic dispute. Reluctantly, I picked up the phone.
“Yes?”
“Charley, it’s Sue. Can I come over?”
“Are you in trouble?”
“No. Nothing like that. I just need to talk. I know it’s late.”
“Never too late to see you. Come on over.”
“I’m really sorry to be a nuisance.” Her voice had a sad, keening tone, the kind of sound she got after a few drinks.
“I can pick you up,” I said.
“No. I’m a block away, calling from a pay phone. I’ll be right there.”
I put on some coff
ee while I waited.
When she arrived, we kissed. I could smell the gin, but she wasn’t drunk. She held me in a long embrace before letting go. I thought I felt her tremble.
She took the coffee I poured and sat down. “I feel like a fool, Charley, barging in at this hour.”
“You’re not. Bad case, eh?”
“In a way yes, but in a way no.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
She sipped the coffee and smiled weakly. “I suppose that’s apparent, isn’t it?”
“Tell me about it.”
“A little boy,” she said slowly. “There was identification on him. His name was Lee Higgins, a kid from Hub City. Eight years old. He didn’t come home from school. His parents had called the Hub City police and they had taken a report, but that sort of thing happens often—kids stay at friends’ and forget the time, so no one except the parents really got excited.”
“How was he killed?”
“Asphyxiation. The medical examiner thinks he may have been suffocated with a pillow. There were no marks or bruises. The blood work won’t be back until tomorrow, but the doctor thinks he may have been sedated. There was no sign of a struggle. Just a dead boy, a beautiful boy. He looked like a sleeping angel.”
“Raped?”
“Apparently not. There were no signs of sexual abuse. He was a small little boy. No anal penetration. Nothing to suggest oral contact, although it’s possible.”
“No murder is gentle, but this one sounds relatively shock free. How come it shook you up so?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know, honestly. I think it was that he was so beautiful and so young. The parents, of course, were in shock, but they described him as a perfect little kid.”
“How did they find him? I would have thought the snow would have covered him up?”
“A motorist saw him on the side of the road. Whoever dumped him must have done so just minutes before. The motorist stopped and walked all around the body. Other people stopped to see what happened. Tire tracks, footprints, everything is pretty much screwed up, although we’ll get some.”
“There are a lot of crazies out there, Sue.”
She nodded. “This one especially.”
“Why do you say that?”
“The medical examiner says whoever murdered the boy washed the body and the clothes afterwards, then redressed the dead child. He was wrapped in plastic wrap, the kind you buy at any grocery store.”
“I suppose the killer was counting on the snow to cover up what he had done.”
“Not really. The body was set out there on the roadside as if the killer wanted him found.”
“Well, don’t worry, Sue. The sick ones usually are the first caught.”
“Sometimes.” The word was just a whisper.
“You’ll get this guy, whoever he is.”
She stood up. “Hold me, Charley?”
“Sure.”
We ended up in bed, but not for sex. She fell asleep almost instantly, her arms wrapped tightly about me. Her breathing, at first troubled, became even.
It was the first time since I’d known her that a case had affected her so deeply. I wondered if she was upset because her cop instinct told her this was the beginning of something, and not the end.
She had given me something to think about, too. The name Higgins and Hub City had clicked in my memory. A couple of years ago I’d handled a routine matter for a couple in Hub City named Higgins. Frank Higgins and his wife, Betty. Lying in bed, I remembered it had been a real estate closing; they were buying a big old place right in Hub City. They had kids, of course, enough to make the purchase of an eight-room house reasonably practical. I suspected, and feared, that one of those kids was named Lee.
In the morning Sue went back to her own place to shower and dress. I selected my clothing with more care than usual. I’m of average height and build, but there is something about my body that seems to make my clothes look instantly rumpled. I try to dress to stop this process, but it never really works. Juries, in the main, like well-dressed lawyers. And I had a jury case.
I drove to the courthouse and took the stairs to the second floor, the floor housing our three circuit judges. It wasn’t a famous case, so the courtroom was nearly deserted. Just a few policemen, the prosecutor, myself, and my client.
The facts were simple. My client, Ernie Barker, had a small roofing company, consisting chiefly of himself and his cousin. They specialized in tarring flat roofs, usually commercial buildings.
Ernie was coming back from a job in Detroit. It had been hot, gooey work and he needed a shower and a few quick beers. So he was in a hurry and drove that way. A Kerry County sheriff’s deputy clocked him at seventy in a fifty-five-mile-an-hour zone and pulled him over. The policeman asked to see Ernie’s truck registration and when Ernie opened the glove compartment to get the document, a .38-caliber pistol fell out.
The policeman asked if the gun belonged to Ernie. Ernie said no, he was just holding it for a friend named George. He didn’t know George’s last name.
Ernie got the speeding ticket and was arrested for carrying a concealed weapon. This weapon, loaded, had its serial number filed off and the presumption was that it was stolen or had been used in a felony. There were several possible charges. The police were content with bringing the felony charge of carrying a concealed weapon.
Ernie confessed to me that he had bought the gun in Detroit on the street for fifty bucks and that he only stuck the pistol in the truck when he had to drive in the dark and dangerous streets of Detroit. He had no record except for an old conviction for driving under the influence. The prosecutor would not agree to a plea. Guns had become a political issue in Pickeral Point, so no pleas were being accepted, except in rare circumstances.
Which brought all of us to the courthouse on a sunny morning, so sunny that the snow of the night before had already begun to melt.
Jury selection went quickly. The prosecutor excused a man who was a longtime member of the National Rifle Association, and I kicked off a lady who said she hated guns and anyone who owned one. Otherwise, the jury was run-of-the-mill, all Pickeral Point people who lived and worked in our small community. Both sides said they were satisfied.
Ernie Barker, a man in his late thirties, looked uncomfortable in what I suspected was his only suit. Ernie’s world was not populated by people in suits. He associated with men like himself, people who worked hard and asked very little of life except a friendly bar, beer, and hamburgers.
The idea of prison frightened Ernie, and sitting next to me at the counsel table, he looked ready to faint. He kept sneaking glances at the jury, the twelve people who would decide if he was to return to tar roofs, or something much more confining.
The deputy who arrested Ernie spoke in a quiet but firm voice. He was experienced, and it showed. I pretended that I didn’t believe the gun fell out of the glove compartment, but he ignored me and answered in a way that denied me the opportunity to raise the question of illegal search. I sensed the jury believed him, too, so I let the matter drop. Ernie had told me that the gun, indeed, had fallen out, just as the policeman said.
The policeman was the prosecutor’s case. The gun was introduced into evidence, and the prosecutor tried to make Ernie appear like the progeny of Al Capone by commenting on the missing serial number.
Then it was my turn. He would make a nervous witness, but he had no major record, so I put Ernie on the stand. I led him through the preliminary questions, quickly establishing who he was and what he did for a living.
“You told the police you got the gun from a man named George,” I said. “Is that true?”
He sadly shook his head. “Not exactly, no.”
“Where did you get the gun?”
“I bought it from a colored guy in Detroit. I think his name was George, but it was the only time I saw him. I was working on a job when this guy comes up and asks me if I wanted to buy a gun. He showed it to me and said it would cost fifty
bucks. Bullets included.”
“And what did you do, if anything?”
He hesitated, glanced over at the jury and then back at me. “I do a lot of work in Detroit. It’s a dangerous place. I myself have seen two gunfights, honest to God. Anyway, this guy said everyone in Detroit carried one and that I should, too, just to even up my chances of survival. Like I say, it’s a dangerous place, so I bought it.”
“Did you always carry it in the truck?”
He shook his head. “No. Just when I had to go into Detroit.”
“Ever fire it?”
“No.”
“Did you ever tell anyone you had it?”
“Show it off, you mean?”
“Whatever.”
“No. Even my wife didn’t know I had the damn thing.”
“That’s all I have,” I said to the court.
The prosecutor tried to make a lot about the filed-off numbers. Ernie told him he didn’t know about that. He didn’t know much about guns, period. It was a good answer and it shut up the prosecutor. Then we argued. The prosecutor, who has the burden of proving guilt beyond reasonable doubt, went first. He made a standard argument. If the jury didn’t convict Ernie, he said, it would send a signal to the street and soon Pickeral Point would be alive with gunfights and gunfighters. His summation was more political than legal, although he did mention they had proved every essential point needed for conviction.
Of course, they had, which made things a bit difficult for me. I abandoned the facts and argued that anyone who worked in the dangerous streets of Detroit needed to be armed.
The prosecutor tried Ernie Barker.
I tried the city of Detroit.
Frankly, I thought I did a better job.
The jury must have thought so, too. They came in with a compromise verdict, finding Ernie guilty of possessing an unregistered gun, misdemeanor.
The judge sternly lectured Ernie about the evils of pistols, which was a little hypocritical since I happened to know the judge carried a small chrome automatic at all times.
He gave Ernie six months’ probation and a three-hundred-dollar fine and ordered the gun confiscated.
I thought Ernie was going to lick my hand.
I hurried back to my office.
The jury trial had been a good way to warm up for the Conroy examination. While just a handful had been present to witness Ernie Barker’s case, it seemed that scores of the curious and the press of the entire western world had turned up for a look at Deputy Chief Conroy. The local contingent was out in strength, but also in attendance were camera and press crews from the New York tabloids and even a writer for one of the big British newspapers. Big-city graft, big-city cops—it was a strong brew. Dope money taken and stolen. It was the kind of thing where the headlines practically wrote themselves.
The Judgment Page 5
