Dr. Campbell walked me down the maximumsecurity corridor inside Lorton Prison. Inmates glared out at us as we passed by. I glared back. I'm a good glarer, too.
Finally, we arrived at the cell block where Gary Soneji/Murphy was still being kept.
Soneji/Murphy's cell, the entire corridor, was welllighted, but he squinted up from his cot. It was as if he were peering out from a darkened cave.
It took a moment for him to recognize me.
When he finally did, he smiled. He still looked like this nice, small-town young man. Gary Murphy. A character out of a nineties remake of It's a Wonder ul Life f I remembered his friend Simon Conklin telling me how.Gary Murphy could play any role he needed to. It was all part of his being in the Ninety-ninth Percentile.
“Why did you stop coming to see me, Alex?” he asked. His eyes had an almost mournful look now. “I had nobody I could talk to. Those other doctors don't ever listen. Not really, they don't.”
They wouldn't let me see you for a while,“ I told him. ”But it's worked out, so here I am."
He looked hurt. He was nibbling on his lower lip and staring down at his canvas prison shoes.
Suddenly, his face contorted and he laughed loudly. The sound echoed through the small cell.
Soneji/Murphy leaned closer to me. “You know, you're really just another dumb bastard,” he said. “So fucking easy to manipulate. Just like all the others before you. Smart, but not smart enough.”
I stared at him. Surprised. Maybe a little shocked. “The lights are on, but there's nobody home,” he commented on the expression that must have been on my face.
“No. I'm here,” I said. “I just underestimated you more than I should have. My mistake.”
“Caught up with reality, have we?” The terrible smirk remained across his face. “You sure you understand? You sure, Doctor-Detective?”
Of course I understood. I had just met Gary Soneji for the very first time. We had just been introduced by Gary Murphy. The process is called rapid cycling.
The kidnapper was staring out at me. He was gloating, showing off, being himself for the first time with me. The child-murderer sat before me. The brilliant mimic and actor. The Ninety-ninth Percentile. The Son of Lindbergh. All of those things and probably more.
“You okay?” he asked. He was mimicking my earlier concern for him. “You feeling all right, Doctor?” 161,m just great. No problem at all," I said.
“Really? You don't seem okay to me. Something's wrong, isn't it? Alex?” Now, he seemed deeply concerned.
“Hey, listen!” I finally raised my voice. “Fuck off, Soneji. How's that for reality testing?”
“Wait a minute.” He shook his head back and forth. The wolfish grin had disappeared just as suddenly as it had appeared a moment before. “Why are you calling me Soneji? What is this, Doctor? What's going on?”
I watched his face, and I could not believe what I was seeing.
He'd changed again. Snap. Gary Soneji was gone. He'd changed personas two, maybe three times in a matter of minutes.
“Gary Murphy?” I tested.
He nodded. “Who else? Seriously, Doctor, what's the matter? What is going on? You go away for weeks. Now you're back.”
“Tell me what just happened,” I said. I continued to s at him. “Just now. Tell me what you think just happened.”
He looked confused. Totally baffled by my question. If all of this was an act, it was the most brilliantly awesome and convincing performance I had ever seen in my years as a shrink. “I don't understand. You come here to my cell. You seem a little tense. Maybe you were embarrassed because you haven't been around lately. Then you call me Soneji. Completely out of the blue. That's not supposed to be funny, is it?” Was he serious now? Was it possible he didn't know what had happened less than sixty seconds ago?
Or was this Gary Soneji, still play-acting with me? Could he be slipping in and out of his fugue state so easily, and so seamlessly? It could be, but it was rare. In this case, it could create an unbelievable mockery of a courtroom trial.
It could even get SonejilMurphy off.
Was that his plan? Had it been his escape valve right from the beginning?
Along Came A Spider
CHAPTER 56
HEN SHE WORKED with the others, picking fruits nd vegetables on the side of the mountain, aggie Rose tried to remember how it had been back home. At first, her “list,” the things she remembered, was basic and very general.
Most of all, she missed her mother and father so much. She missed them every minute of every day.
She also missed her friends at school, especially Shrimpie. She missed Dukado, her “fresh” little boy kitten. And Angel, her “sweet” little boy kitten. And Nintendo games and her clothes closet. Having parties after school was so great.
So was taking a bath in the third-floor room over the gardens.
The more she thought about home, though, the more she remembered, the more Maggie Rose, improved her memory list. She missed.the way she sometimes would get between
297 her mother and father when they hugged or kissed. “We three,” she called it.
She missed characters her father had enacted for her, mostly when she was little. There was Hank, a big Southem-drawling father, who loved to exclaim “ Whooooo's talkin' to you?” There was “Susie Wooderman. ” Susie was the star of anything Maggie wanted to be in her father's stories.
There was the primal ritual whenever they had to get into the car in cold weather. They would all holler at the top of their voices, “Yuck chuck-chuck, chuck-a, chuck-a, yuck chuck-chuck.”
Her mother would make up songs and sing them to her. Her mother had sung to her ever since she could remember.
She sang, “I love you so much, Maggie, there's nothing I wouldn't do for you. Nothing in the whole wide world.” Maggie would sing, “Will you take me to Disneyland?” Her morn would answer, “I would do that, Maggie Rose.” “Would you give Dukado a big kiss on the mouth?” “I'd do it for you, Maggie Rose. There's nothing I wouldn't do.”
Maggie could remember whole days she had spent in school, going from class to class. She remembered Ms. Kim's “special winks” for her. She remembered when Angel would curl up in a chair and sweetly make a sound like “wow.”
“I'd do anything for you, dear, anything, 'cause you mean everything to me.” Maggie could still hear her morn singing the words to her.
“Would you please, please come and take me home?” Maggie sang inside her head. “Would you please, please come?”
But no one sang anything. Not anymore. No one ever sang to Maggie Rose. No one remembered her anymore. Or so she believed in her broken heart.
Along Came A Spider
CHAPTER 57
ET WITH SONEJIIMURPHY half-a-dozen times over the next two weeks. He wouldn't let me get close to him again, though he cldirned this wasn't so. Something had changed. I'd lost him. Both of him. on the fifteenth of October, a federal judge ordered a stay, temporarily halting the commencement Of the kidnapping trial. This was to be the final of several ,delaying tactics by soneji/Murphy's defense lawyer,
Anthony Nathan.
Of
Within one week, lightning speed for this kind complex legal maneuvering, Judge Linda Kaplan had ,denied the defense requests. Requests for injunctions and restraining orders to the Supreme Court were also denied. Nathan called the Supreme Court “a very organized lynch mob” on all three TV networks. The fireworks were just beginning, he said to the press. He'd established a tone foe the trial. On the twenty-seventh of October, the trial of the State v. MurphY began. At five minutes to nine that
300 morning, Sampson and I headed for a back entrance into the Federal Building on Indiana Avdnue. As best we could, we were traveling incognito.
“You want to lose some money?” Sampson said as we turned the corner onto Indiana.
“I hope you're not talking about wagering money on the outcome of this kidnapping and murder trial?”
“Su
re am, sweet pie. Make the time pass faster.”
“What's the bet?”
Sampson lit a Corona and took a victory puff. “I'll take... I say he goes to St. Elizabeths, some hospital for the criminally insane. That's the bet.”
“You're saying that our judicial system doesn't work. ”
“I believe it in every bone of my body. Specially this time around. ” “All right-I'll take guilty, two counts kidnapping. Guilty, murder one.” I Sampson took another victory puff. “You want to pay me now? Fifty be an acceptable amount for you to lose?”
“Fifty's fine with me. You got a bet.”
“Get it on. I love to take what little money you have. ”
Out front on 3rd Street, a crowd of a couple of thousand surrounded the main courthouse entrance. Another two hundred people, including seven rows of reporters, were already inside. The prosecutor had tried to bar the press, but it had been denied.
Somebody had printed up signs and they were everywhere: Maggie Rose Is Alive!
People were handing out roses at the trial site. Up down Indiana Avenue, volunteers circulated with free roses. Others sold commemorative pennants. Most popular of all were the small candles that people burned in the windows of their homes as remembrances of Maggie Rose.
A handful of reporters were waiting at the back entrance, which is reserved for deliveries, as well as for a few shy judges and lawyers. Most veteran cops who come to the courthouse, and don't appreciate the crowds, also choose the back gate.
Microphones were immediately pushed at me and Sampson. TV camera lenses gawked. Neither instrument fazed us anymore.
“Detective Cross, is it true that you were cut out of the case by the FBI?” “No. I have an okay relationship with the FBI.”
“Are you still seeing Gary Murphy at Lorton, Detective?” “That makes it sound as if we're dating. It's not that serious yet. I'm part of a team of doctors who see him. ”
“Are there racial overtones to this case, as it relates ,to you?”
“There are racial overtones to a lot of things, I guess. There's nothing special here.”
“The other detective? Detective Sampson. You agree, Sir?” a young dude in a bow tie asked.
“Well, Sir yourself, we're going in the back door, aren't we? We're the back-door men.” Sampson grinned for the camera. He didn't take off his shades.
We finally made it to a service elevator, and tried to keep the reporters out of the same car, which wasn't -easy.
“We have a confirmed rumor that Anthony Nathan is going for a temporary-insanity plea. Any comment on that?”
“None at all. Ask Anthony Nathan.”
“Detective Cross, will you take the stand to say Gary Murphy isn't insane?”
The ancient doors finally shut. The elevator started to rumble up toward the seventh floor, “Seventh Heaven,” as it's known in the trade.
The seventh had never been quieter, or more under control. The usual train-station scene of policemen, young thugs and their families, hardened crooks, lawyers and judges, had been stemmed by an order re- stricting the floor to the single case. This was the big one - “Trial of the Century.” Wasn't that the way Gary Soneji wanted it?
In the absence of chaos, the Fed Building was like an elderly person rising from bed in the morning. All the wrinkles and bruises were visible in the early-morning light that streamed from cathedral windows on the east side of the floor.
We arrived just in time to see the prosecutor enter the courtroom. Mary Warner was a diminutive thirtysix-year-old U.S. attorney from the Sixth Circuit. She was supposed to be the courtroom equal of defense lawyer Anthony Nathan. Like Nathan, she had never tasted defeat, at least not in any significant case. Mary Warner had a glowing reputation for tireless preparation, and faultless, highly persuasive courtroom demeanor. A losing opponent had said, "It's like playing tennis with somebody who always hits it back. Your best spin shot-back it comes. Your gamer-it comes back. Sooner or later, she beats you into the ground. Supposedly, Ms. Warner bad been handpicked by Jerrold Goldberg, and Goldberg could have had any prosecutor he chose. He had chosen her over James Dowd and other early 'favorites for the job.
Carl Monroe was there, too. Mayor Monroe couldn't stay away from the crowds. He saw me, but didn't come over, just flashed a patented smile across the broad concourse.
If I hadn't known exactly where I stood with him, I ,did now. My appointment to divisional chief would be my last upgrade. They'd done that to prove I had been a good choice for the Hostage Rescue Team, to validate their decision, and to cover up any possible questions about my conduct in Miami.
Leading up to the trial da ,y, the big news around Washington bad been that Secretary of the Treasury Goldberg was working on the prosecution case himself. That, and Anthony Nathan being the defense attorney.
Nathan had been describ ' ed in the Post as a “ninja warrior in court.” He had regularly been making frontpage news since the day he'd been retained by Soneji/ Murphy. Nathan was a subject that Gary wouldn't talk to me about. On one occasion, he'd said, “I need a good lawyer, don't I? Mr. Nathan convinced me. He'll do the same for the jury. He's extremely cunning, Alex. ” Cunning?
I asked Gary if Nathan was as smart as he was. Gary smiled and said, “Why do you always say I'm smart when I'm not? If I were so smart, would I be here?” lie hadn't strayed once from the Gary Murphy persona in weeks. He'd also declined to be hypnotized again.
I watched Gary's super-lawyer, Anthony Nathan, as he obnoxiously swaggered around the front of the courtroom. He was certainly manic, widely known for infuriating witnesses during cross-examination. Did Gary have the presence of mind to select Nathan? What had drawn the two of them together?
In one way, though, it seemed a natural pairing-a borderline madman defending another madman. Anthony Nathan had already publicly proclaimed: “This will be an absolute zoo. A zoo, or a Wild West frontier justice show! I promise you. They could sell tickets for a thousand dollars a seat.”
My pulse was racing as the bailiff finally stood before the assemblage and called the room to order.
I saw Jezzie across the room. She was dressed like the important person that she is in the Service. Pinstriped suit, heels, shiny black attacb6 case. She saw me, and rolled her eyes.
On the right side of the courtroom, I saw Katherine Rose and Thomas Dunne. Their presence brought even more of an aura of unreality. I couldn't help thinking of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh and of the worldfamous kidnapping trial that had taken place sixty years before.
Judge Linda Kaplan was known as an eloquent and energetic woman who never let lawyersget the best of her. She had been on the bench for less than five years, but had already handled some of the biggest trials in
Washington. often, she stood during entire proceedings. She was known to rule her courtroom with corn plete authority.
Gary Soneji/Murphy had been quietly, almost suffeptitiously, escorted to his place. He was already seated, looking well behaved, as Gary Murphy always did.
Several well-known journalists were present, at least a couple of them writing books about the kidnapping.
The opposing lawyer teams looked supremely confident and well prepared on the first day, as though their cases were invincible.
The trial began with a small flourish, opening-bell theatrics. At the front of the courtroom, Missy Murphy began to sob. “Gary didn't hurt anybody,” she said in an audible voice. “Gary would never hurt another person.”
Someone in the courtroom audience called out, “Oh, give us a break, lady!”
Judge Kaplan smacked her gavel and commanded, “Silence in this courtroom! Silence! That will be enough of that.” Sure it will.
We were off and running. Gary Soneji/Murphy's Trial of the Century.
Along Came A Spider
CHAPTER 58
VERYTHING SEEMED to be in perpetual motion and chaos, but especially my relationship to the original investigation and the trial. After court that day, I
did the one thing that made total sense to me: I played flag-foothall with the kids.
Damon and Janelle were whirlwinds of activity, Cornpeting for my attention throughout the afternoon, smothenng me With their need. They distracted me from unpleasant prospects that would stretch on for the next few weeks.
After dinner that night, Nana and I stayed at the table over a second cup of chicory Coffee. I wanted to hear her thoughts. I knew they were coming, anyway. All during the meal, her arms and hands bad been twirling like Satchel Paige about to deliver a screwhall.
“Alex, I believe we need to talk,” she finally said. When Nana Mama has something to say, she gets quiet first. Then she Wks a lot, sometimes for hours.
The kids were busy witching Wheel of Fortune in the
307 other room. The game-show cheers and chants made for good domestic background noise.
“What shall we talk about?” I asked her. “Hey, did you hear that one in four kids in the U.S. now lives in poverty? We're going to be the moral majority soon. ”
Nana was real composed and thoughtful about whatever was coming. She had been preparing this speech. I could tell that much. The pupils in her eyes had become brown pinpoints.
“Alex,” she said now, “you know that I'm always on your side when something is important.”
“Ever since I arrived in Washington with a duffel bag and, I think, seventy-five cents,” I said to her. I could still vividly remember being sent “up North” to live with my grandmother; the very day I'd arrived in Union Station on the train from Winston-Salem. My mother had just died of lung cancer; my father had died the year before. Nana bought me lunch at Morrison's cafeteria. It was the first time I ever ate in a restaurant.
Regina Hope took me in when I was nine. Nana Mama was called “The Queen of Hope,” back then. She was a schoolteacher here in Washington. She was already in her late forties, and my grandfather was dead. My three brothers came to the Washington area at the same time that I did. They stayed with one relative or another until they were around eighteen. I stayed with Nana the whole time.
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