Cutwork

by Monica Ferris

  Rattled now, Betsy found that no matter how carefully she counted, she kept making mistakes. The others were happily snipping threads while she was still working on the doggone outline of the heart.

  “Oops,” said Godwin. “Rats.”

  “Also,” Char pointed out, taking Godwin’s project from him and holding it out as an example, “you have to be careful to cut the proper side of the kloster block, which Godwin has done. Good for you. But not to cut beyond it, which he also has done. That’s why I recommend a really good pair of little scissors.”

  Char had brought along several pairs to lend, but Shelly, holding out her piece admiringly, said she thought she’d buy a pair. Bershada, also smiling, said, “Me, too.” Betsy pulled two pairs from a spinner rack of accessories. Shelly set to clipping with hers. Shelly paused long enough to look at the price and sigh, but she didn’t give them back.

  By the end of the class, everyone but Betsy and Godwin had finished pulling threads, and he was in the process of making his first snips. Shelly, who was halfway through a second heart, wanted to know how to make the little lace-like pattern in some of the squares on Char’s big piece, but Char said that was for a later class. Betsy was thinking of getting another piece of fabric and starting over. She’d pulled her thread out so often the weave of her fabric was becoming distorted.

  At eight-thirty, the class broke up. As the others filed out, Char lingered. Betsy, tired after a long day and frustrated by her first attempt at Hardanger, hoped Char wouldn’t remember she had not asked the question she started to earlier.

  But she did. “Betsy, I really need to talk to you.”

  “What about?” asked Betsy as politely as she could.

  “Did you see the Channel Four news tonight?”

  “No, I didn’t have time. I am hoping to stay awake long enough to watch at ten—but I’m awfully tired.” Hint, hint.

  But Char was determined. “Did you see where they arrested a juvenile for the murder of that artist at the art fair?”

  “Was it on the news? Someone told me about it.”

  “Yes, I heard that Jill told you.” Char either didn’t see or ignored Betsy’s wince. “Betsy, the boy they arrested is my nephew. My sister and brother-in-law are frantic, as you can imagine.” Char took a strengthening breath and said, “They want to know if you can help.”

  Betsy didn’t want to say yes to anything that would add to her burdens right now. “I don’t know how I could help. I don’t know any of the people involved in this. And Sergeant Malloy is sure he’s got the right person.”

  “Yes, I know he’s sure. That’s what’s got Faith and Greg so frantic. You see, Mickey’s been in trouble ever since he was eleven. He’s been arrested half a dozen times for stealing bicycles and shoplifting, for getting in fights, and for smoking marijuana at school. But he’s never done anything like this; this is murder. He’s sixteen and the police told Greg that when it’s a homicide by a sixteen-year-old, the county attorney automatically petitions that he be tried as an adult.”

  Betsy said, “That’s too bad. I’m so sorry.”

  “Yes, and you know Malloy, he’s as sure as he can be he’s got the person who did it, so he’s not even looking at any other possibility. Mickey swears he didn’t do it, but he’s scared and angry and so he’s acting out, which isn’t helping a bit. Please, Betsy, won’t you just talk to him?”

  “To who? Mickey’s father? I’m not sure that’s a good idea; he may think I’m willing to help, but I don’t know if that’s true.”

  Char said, “No, they want you to talk to Mickey.”

  “Why? Do they think I can make him behave?” Betsy really was tired.

  “No, no, no. Listen to me, please. They don’t think he’s guilty—”

  “I’m sure they don’t. Parents always want to believe their children are good and obedient creatures.”

  “Betsy, they know better. I’ve told you that Mickey is a very troubled young man. But what if he didn’t do this?”

  Betsy couldn’t think of an answer. Her reputation was for clearing the innocent of criminal charges. “Is he out on bail?”

  “No, they’re not going to let him out. For one thing, he’s run away from home twice in the past six months, so he’s what they call a flight risk. But even if he weren’t, he’s charged with murder while committing a robbery, which makes it automatically first degree, so if they set bail, it’s going to be an enormous sum, which his parents won’t be able to raise. Betsy, if he gets convicted, they’ll send him to prison for life. Mickey’s parents really, really need help. Could you just please talk to him?”

  “How? I mean, is he allowed visitors?”

  “His attorney says he’ll take you with him if you will go. Please, Betsy. Maybe if he talks to someone who isn’t his family and not a police investigator or a lawyer, someone who’s coming in as a friend, he’ll say something helpful, instead of mouthing off and denying he was anywhere near The Common that morning.”

  “Was he in the park?”

  “He says he wasn’t. But they found a pair of shoes his size in a Dumpster behind the food vendors, and Faith says a pair just like them is missing from his closet.”

  Betsy sighed. “This doesn’t look good, you know.”

  “I know.”

  “If I get involved in something like this, I may have to drop out of your class,” she warned, a last-ditch plea.

  “Fine,” said Char, and she hugged Betsy hard.

  So Betsy didn’t get to go shopping on Thursday, her day off. Which was annoying, since she needed new underwear and there was a sale at Penney’s.

  It was a beautiful Minnesota summer morning, the temperature just approaching eighty and not much humidity. She drove with her windows down to the eastern edge of downtown Minneapolis, where the new Juvenile Detention Center on Fifth and Park was. She parked in a lot between the Center and the Metrodome; the Twins were out of town, so the lot was half empty.

  The Center was a modern building of large, dark bricks. The main entrance was in the middle of the building, its tuck-in entrance marked with fat concrete pillars.

  A short young man, his light brown hair cropped close, stood just outside the dark glass door. He wore a nice lightweight suit, very modern eyeglasses, and an expensive new briefcase. There was an aggressive set to his mouth. He gestured impatiently as Betsy walked up and opened the door more to encourage her to keep moving than to be polite. “Glad you could make it,” he said as he nimbly stepped ahead of her to open a second door into a small, diagonal lobby and again to show her to the window with a tray under it and a man in Dockers and a blue polo shirt behind it.

  “I’m attorney Gerald Wannamaker,” he said to the man.

  Betsy thought for a moment to give a false name just to wipe that too-confident look off Wannamaker’s face, but only said, “I’m Betsy Devonshire.”

  The man behind the glass queried his computer and found they were authorized for a visit. He issued them each a plastic pass on a lanyard and told them to wear it “visibly at all times,” and they obediently hung them around their necks. While they waited for yet another door to be unlocked, Betsy said, “Thank you for arranging for me to come with you to see Mickey.”

  “No problem,” he said, managing to indicate in those two words that it had been a problem, which he had solved with his usual skill.

  A man in khaki trousers and a green polo shirt came to unlock the door. He led them down a broad corridor to a metal door set with a thick glass window that had chicken wire in it. He unlocked the door to let them into a tiny room with concrete block walls painted cream and a dark cafeteria-style table. Two dark chairs were on either side of the table. The napless gray carpet of the corridor continued in here.

  Wannamaker sat down facing the door, gesturing briefly at the chair beside him, and put his briefcase on the table. He opened it and lifted out several legal-size documents, stapled to blue backs, and photocopies of official-looking reports.


  Betsy, old enough to be affronted by this continued lack of manners, sat down in the chair indicated.

  “Do you know Mickey’s parents?” she asked.

  “You mean personally? No.”

  “What do you think about this case?”

  “Open and shut.”

  “You mean you can get him off?”

  He stared at her, momentarily nonplused. “You’re kidding, aren’t you?”

  Before Betsy could reply, the door’s lock rattled and it opened to admit yet another man in polo shirt and khaki trousers—this shirt was red—leading by the elbow a short young man with narrow shoulders, a trace of mustache, and a surly scowl.

  “Mickey Sinclair,” announced the polo shirt. “Knock when you’re finished,” he added and left, locking the door behind him.

  Mickey had dark brown hair shaved to a shadow on the sides and grown into unruly curls on the top. His pale blue eyes were half veiled behind the lids. His hands were very large but delicately formed, neither knobby nor work-thickened. He wore gray scrubs that hung off his shoulders and were too short in the legs.

  Wannamaker indicated one of the chairs on the other side of the table and Mickey took it a little too casually. He folded his big hands loosely and studied the thumbs.

  “Mickey, I’m Betsy Devonshire,” said Betsy, since Wannamaker apparently was not going to do the honors. “Your parents asked me to come and talk to you. Did they tell you about me?”

  “Yeah,” said Mickey with a rude glance up and down her.

  “We need all the help we can get, from whatever source,” said Wannamaker, agreeing with Mickey, by his tone, that she wasn’t much. “You are in very serious trouble.”

  “They can’t convict me,” sneered Mickey. “I didn’t do it!”

  “They found your shoes in the park—” began Wannamaker.

  “They aren’t my shoes,” said Mickey.

  “They found money hidden in your bedroom, an amount that matches what was taken from the cash box at the scene of the murder.”

  “No, it don’t, not exactly. Anyhow, money’s money. It’s my money, and I didn’t steal it.”

  “You have a job?”

  “No, I saved it up out of my allowance, plus some aluminum cans I collected. I didn’t steal it. Plus I didn’t kill anybody. They can’t put me in prison for something I didn’t do.”

  “Do you ever watch the news on television?”

  He gestured dismissively. “News is boring.”

  “Then you may have missed those stories about people sentenced to death row, people who were later found innocent.”

  Mickey stared at him, and some kind of idea came to him. “Yeah, wait a minute, I did hear about that. It was a DNA test that proved they were innocent. That’s a kind of blood test, right? They took some of my blood already, could they give it that kind of test?”

  “It wouldn’t help you,” said Wannamaker.

  “Why not?”

  “DNA will tell them whether you left some skin under the fingernails of Mr. McFey.”

  “Which I didn’t,” Mickey interjected.

  Wannamaker kept going. “It will tell them if you raped Mr. McFey. It will tell them if you are the father of Mr. McFey’s baby.”

  “Dammit, quit making fun of me! Tell them I want a DNA test.”

  “They’re already doing one. Now, listen a minute. Whose skin or hair will they find on Mr. McFey’s body? Yours or someone else’s?”

  “Not mine! I never touched him! And he never touched me! So you see? That could prove it, couldn’t it?”

  Mickey seemed in earnest, but Wannamaker sighed and consulted one of the reports. “Now, they found a pair of shoes in a trash container behind the food vendors.”

  Mickey threw his head up in an angry gesture. “So what? Everyone wears shoes, don’t they?”

  “Yes, but these shoes seem to match a pair you own, and your own shoes have gone mysteriously missing.”

  “Someone took them,” mumbled Mickey. He was staring hard at his thumbs.

  “Why would someone steal a ratty old pair of shoes?”

  “’Cause they were really good Nikes? Anyway, maybe they didn’t steal them, maybe I loaned them to someone.”

  Wannamaker didn’t even bother to ask for the name of a possible borrower. “Do you ever wear those shoes without socks?”

  Mickey thought a few moments, trying to think what Wannamaker was getting at so he could choose the least damaging reply. “Hardly ever,” he guessed.

  “So there may be little traces of skin inside them. They are looking for little traces of skin in the shoes they took out of the Dumpster. Skin has DNA, and they are testing scrapings from the inside of those shoes, to see if your DNA is in them. They are also doing a DNA test on the blood that was on the outside of those shoes. They already know the blood type is Mr. McFey’s, not yours. If they find your DNA inside the shoes and Mr. McFey’s DNA on the outside, that will put those shoes on your feet at the scene of the crime.”

  Mickey threw his arms up and Betsy leaned backwards and sideways, sure he was going to reach for Wannamaker. But he was only giving himself room to fill his lungs and yell, “I thought you were on my side!”

  Wannamaker, unafraid, barked, “Shut up!” Mickey dropped his arms. “I am on your side,” continued Wannamaker. “I’m only stating the facts. Let me ask you this: When the DNA test results come back, will they help you or the prosecution?”

  “I wasn’t there,” Mickey grumbled doggedly. “I wasn’t in the park, I was supposed to but I changed my mind, and I didn’t go.” He said it as if saying it often enough would make it so.

  “You’re a fool to stick with that story.”

  Mickey sat back with an unhappy sigh. “What else can I do?”

  “We should talk about your options. There are at least two eyewitnesses who saw you running up Lake Street wearing socks but no shoes.”

  “They’re lying, they hate me, everyone hates me. They saw someone else, someone who looks like me.” This was said with no conviction at all. He rubbed one eye sleepily. “All right, you’re supposed to be my lawyer. What do you think I should do?”

  “I think you should consider a plea bargain.”

  Faint hope dawned. “Yeah, I did that once before. I didn’t have to say I did it, even. Can we do that again? Last time I got probation. Can we get that same kind of bargain?”

  “Not a chance. But maybe we can do the kind that has you home in eight or ten years.”

  Mickey came out of his chair as if lifted by a rope. “Ten years?!” He pirouetted on one foot, arms spread. “What kind of a lawyer are you? Ten freakin’ years! I don’t think so! I didn’t kill him! Ten years, when I didn’t freakin’ kill him!”

  “Sit down,” Wannamaker said quietly.

  But Mickey’s face suddenly twisted with hatred. “You’re just like everyone else, you aren’t here to help me! I tell you I wasn’t there, I didn’t kill him, but you don’t believe me. You don’t want to help me, you want me to go to prison!”

  “I said, sit down.” Wannamaker spoke no louder than before, but something in his voice was not going to permit argument.

  The boy sat. “I’m done talking to you, you’re no help to me. Why don’t you just freakin’ leave? And don’t come back.”

  “Fine, I’ll do that. And I’ll tell your parents you don’t want me to represent you anymore.” Betsy thought this an obvious ploy, but Wannamaker underlined it by beginning to sort the papers he’d laid out on the table into two stacks.

  Mickey sneered, “Go ahead, quit. You’re no good anyhow.”

  Wannamaker picked up a stack of papers and bumped them lightly on the table to align them. Without looking at her, he asked Betsy, “Do you want to ask this loser anything?” He didn’t think so, his behavior suggested, he opened his briefcase and put the stack into it.

  So Betsy, tired of being treated as a nuisance at best, said, “If you don’t mind.” She turned to Mickey. “Despite al
l the evidence against you, despite the bloody shoes, despite the money they found, despite the eyewitnesses, what if I told you I believe you did not murder Robert McFey?”

  He stared at her, unable to speak, then his face suddenly rumpled in all directions, his eyebrows going up and drawing in, his eyelids turning down at the corners, his mouth twisting oddly, as he struggled not to burst into tears.

  “Yeah, right,” growled Wannamaker, and as suddenly as it rumpled, Mickey’s face pulled smooth, then twisted with anger. He proceeded to show that while the young are fluent in all manner of scatology and pornography, they often lack imagination.

  Well before he was finished, Wannamaker went to the door and rapped sharply on it. The man with the key appeared so promptly that Betsy suspected a hidden microphone or camera.

  “That’s enough, Mr. Sinclair,” the guard said, and Mickey subsided at once, not even offering a parting shot at Wannamaker as he passed him on his way out.

  “Sorry about that,” sighed Wannamaker.

  “Are you going to withdraw as his attorney?” asked Betsy.

  “No, that was an empty threat. He’s not the one who hired me,” said the lawyer, amused. He consulted his watch and used what he saw as an excuse to hustle out ahead of her.

  On her drive home, Betsy growled to herself about the rude attorney, and then about the dreadful young man whom she was supposed to help. But as she cooled a bit, she recalled the brief but utter transformation of Mickey’s attitude when she offered to believe his denials. She’d blindsided him with that offer, so his reaction was very likely honest. Could it possibly be that he was, in fact, innocent?

  She decided to talk to his parents.

  5

  The Sinclairs lived in a modest brick house on a small lot fronted by a hedge that needed trimming. A corner of the lot was cut off by one of Excelsior’s ubiquitous diagonal alleys that once had served as fire lanes. This one was unpaved, and had a slight curve punctuated by mature trees. Early pink peonies and the many colors of bearded iris thrust between the slats of backyard fences. The yards without fences marked their borders with lilac bushes or bridal wreath, the latter so heavy with white blooms the branches dipped to the ground as if caught in a fragrant blizzard. The lilacs were in their brief purple glory, the scent of them and bridal wreath and—What was it? Yes, mock orange—heavy in the air.