by Paul Levine
“You might be able to wing it,” she said, “but I need to prepare for cross.”
“You'll be fine.” He turned the Caddy into the driveway of her building, pulled to a stop under the portico. “See you tomorrow, Vic.”
“Hey, you.”
“What?”
“We won a murder trial today.” Wanting to talk. Not wanting the night to end.
“How's it feel?”
She shrugged. “I don't know. I'm exhausted, emotionally drained. And…”
“A little let down?”
“Yeah.”
“It's always that way. If you win, the high's not high enough. If you lose, the low is lower than you thought possible.”
“We should celebrate.” Even as she said it, something struck a dissonant note.
Celebrate how? Just the two of us? Invite Bruce? That didn't sound like much fun.
“Sure thing,” Steve said.
“Katrina says she'll have a check for us by Friday. A big one.”
“Great.”
But he didn't sound great, Victoria thought. “Just what you wanted, Steve. A case to put you in the big leagues.”
“Yep.”
Since when did he become Mr. Monosyllabic?
“And I almost forgot, Katrina's planning a victory party,” Victoria said. “Everyone's supposed to dress as cops and convicts.”
“You can be the cop.”
“Actually, I'll be away. On…”
“Your honeymoon.”
“Maui.”
“Nice.”
“Bruce says they have some avocado-growing techniques he'd like to study.”
“A tax-deductible honeymoon. The Bigster is one savvy fellow.”
That seemed to drain the juice from the conversation. She wanted to ask him to come up, share some tequila, relive their victories. But Bobby was snoozing in the backseat, and it was late, and-an ever bigger reason-this was not the man whose ring she was wearing. Not the man to whom she was betrothed, the man she'd soon promise to love and to cherish till death did them part… and the man whose prenuptial agreement she needed to read before morning.
Steve drove home wishing she had asked him to come in for a while. He could have carried Bobby upstairs and put him on the sofa-the kid could sleep in a bowling alley. Steve wanted to talk to Victoria. Not about the two of them. He'd come to accept the fact that she was gone. No, he wanted to talk about what was gnawing at him like rats in the basement. At first, he had vowed never to tell her that he had bribed Janice to flip her testimony in the guardianship case. Now, guilt-stricken, he felt a need to confess. But how could he?
She wouldn't understand. He barely did himself. Why had he paid off his sister? Did he have so little confidence in the system? Or in Victoria? Or in himself? They were winning Bobby's case without cheating. He should have just let it play out. He'd cut corners before, but never anything like this.
An hour ago, Steve had listened as his father spoke so proudly.
“My son's got integrity.”
What would his father say if he knew about the bribe? Steve would never be able to face him if the truth came out.
“He's a fine role model for my grandson.”
Right, I teach him baseball and bribery, Steve thought. And what about Bobby's testimony? So strange, seeing his life through his nephew's eyes. Models and mojitos. God, was he really that shallow and immature?
Dark thoughts were swirling in his mind. By the time he swung the car past the Cocowalk shops for the drive down Grand Avenue, the doubts had morphed into borderline paranoia.
What if Janice is setting me up?
She could have been wearing a wire when he gave her the money, their cars parked side by side on the Rickenbacker Causeway. Maybe Pincher and Zinkavich had him under surveillance. Had there been a white van with darkened windows pulled under the trees near the first bridge? He couldn't remember.
When Steve turned onto Kumquat Avenue just before midnight, with a mockingbird hooting in a neighbor's tree, he was certain that disaster would strike tomorrow. A phalanx of police officers would storm the courtroom. He would be led away in handcuffs as Zinkavich gobbled Krispy Kremes and Pincher cackled with laughter.
What was it Pincher had said to him in Judge Gridley's chambers the day of the bird trial? “I'll have the Florida Bar punch your ticket.”
Yes, of course, they'd set him up. Pincher and Zinkavich must have arranged to snatch Bobby off the street. The whole stinking thing was a setup to entrap him.
He would lose his license.
He'd go to jail.
But worst of all, he'd lose Bobby.
BARKSDALE WIDOW GOES FREE
Suicide, Not Murder, Pincher Declares By Joan Fleischman
Herald Staff Writer
In a stunning courtroom reversal, murder charges were dismissed yesterday against Katrina Barksdale, the widow accused of strangling her husband, construction magnate Charles Barksdale. Following a closed-door hearing, State Attorney Raymond Pincher announced in open court that he was dismissing all charges. “The due diligence of my office has uncovered irrefutable proof that Charles Barksdale's death resulted from suicide, not homicide,” Pincher said. Posing for photos on the courthouse steps, Mrs. Barksdale, 33, said she might write a book about her ordeal, but not until she celebrated with a trip to the Bahamas. “That's the way my husband would have wanted it,” said the widow. “He was a good-time Charlie, not a gloomy Gus.” At a posttrial press conference, Pincher shrugged off suggestions that his office acted too hastily in securing a murder indictment against Mrs. Barksdale. “Had defense counsel done their job, the case never would have gotten this far,” Pincher said. “Because of our tireless efforts, justice has been served.” Defense lawyers Stephen Solomon and Victoria Lord rushed from the courtroom and could not be reached for comment.
Fifty-one
THE HUNDRED-THOUSAND- DOLLAR QUESTION
His milky gray complexion tinged with pink spots like a poisoned oyster, Jack Zinkavich said: “We have a serious crisis, Judge.”
“Is there any other kind?” Judge Althea Rolle said.
Steve sat quietly at the Petitioner's table, letting the little drama play out. Next to him, Victoria watched, notepad in hand.
“What now?” the judge said. She wore baby blue robes, the collar of a white silk blouse visible at the neck. It was just after nine A.M. With the Barksdale case over, they were back on a normal schedule.
“Rufus Thigpen, our first witness, is missing,” Zinkavich said.
“Then call your second witness.”
“But, Judge, that interrupts my order of proof.”
“Don't be so anal, Z.”
“I am concerned there may be foul play afoot.”
Foul play afoot? Steve thought.
Like Sherlock-fucking-Holmes.
“How so?” the judge asked.
Zinkavich shot a look at Steve, who instantly put on his angelic Bar Mitzvah boy face. Victoria cast a sideways glance at him, too.
Does she suspect something? Or is it just my guilty conscience?
Victoria seemed tired, he thought, her eyes bloodshot, her hair not quite up to its usual standards. Sleepless night? Not sharing her bed, he didn't know. The fatigue-if that's what it was-softened her edges, made her more vulnerable, and, if possible, even more desirable. She was wearing a brown double-breasted pinstripe jacket with a wide collar and a matching below-the-knee skirt. To Steve, it had an expensive, handmade by nuns in the Swiss Alps look.
Zinkavich said: “I call upon the Petitioner to disclose if he knows the whereabouts of Mr. Rufus Thigpen.”
Steve kept quiet. He had a lawyer to take the heat.
“Judging from Mr. Thigpen's rap sheet,” Victoria said, “he's probably in jail somewhere.”
Yes! Exactly what he would have said, Steve thought, if he were counsel instead of a litigant. He was proud of Victoria. She'd come so far so quickly.
“Just call a witness, Z, so we c
an move this along,” the judge said.
Zinkavich frowned. “In that event, Your Honor, the state calls Janice Solomon.”
Hearing his sister's name sent creepy crawlies up Steve's spine. Thigpen's disappearance was part of the bargain, part of what he'd paid for. But Janice could still double-cross him on the witness stand.
His sister frumped her way into the courtroom, avoiding Steve's gaze. She wore a shapeless print dress that stopped just above her ankles and white socks with sandals. She carried a soft leather purse big enough to hold twenty kilos of hash. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and was held in place by a psychedelic orange scrunchy. Behind her granny glasses, her dark eyes seemed distant, as if focused on a place her body had left but her mind had lingered. The overall impression, Steve thought, was of a woman who ate too many Cheetos and drank too many Cokes, between bouts of inhaling, injecting, and smoking an array of exotic substances.
After Janice was sworn in, Zinkavich took her through the preliminaries. She was Steve Solomon's sister, two years older. Grew up on Miami Beach, expelled from high school for repeated drug use, attended a combination school-and-dairy-farm for troubled kids in rural Pennsylvania. Tossed out for growing marijuana in an alfalfa field and running a semipro brothel in the barn. Arrested a dozen times for drugs, larceny, and disorderly conduct, plus once for criminal mischief when she squatted on the roof of a police cruiser and peed on the windshield. She didn't really know who fathered Bobby. It could have been this crackhead in Ocala who used to beat the shit out of her. Or this trucker who gave her a lift to Pensacola in return for spreading her legs at a rest stop just off the Loxley exit of the I-10.
Hanging out all the dirty laundry on direct examination. It was the only way to keep your opponent from smearing your witness on cross, Steve knew. Though he was a pompous prick with a vicious mean streak, Zinkavich was not stupid, and so far, he was doing everything right.
Steve stole a glance at Victoria. Ordinarily poker-faced in the courtroom-just as he'd taught her-she seemed both astonished and disgusted at his sister's life story. Judge Rolle never blinked. The judge had heard far worse, Steve figured. But at the same time, he wondered whether some maternity-ward nurse had screwed up thirty-seven years ago. Maybe his real sister was a distinguished researcher with a PhD, working in a lab somewhere, on the verge of curing cancer.
Zinkavich waddled close to the witness stand. “What facilitated your appearance here today?”
“You facilitated my butt out of jail,” Janice replied.
“Did I make any promises to you in return for your testimony?”
“You said you could get me time served and early parole.”
“On what condition?”
“If I told the truth,” Janice said.
Steve tried to relax but could not. Any second, she could torpedo him.
Zinkavich pointed a chubby finger at him: “Does your brother, Stephen Solomon, have a history of violence?”
“A long history,” Janice said.
Oh, shit. Here it comes.
She had taken his money. Now she was going to bury him with it.
“Please elaborate, Ms. Solomon,” Zinkavich said.
“When I was fourteen, Arnie Lipschitz called me a ‘fat whore,' and Stevie kicked the living piss out of him.”
“Not quite what I meant.”
“I wasn't fat then.”
“Forget Arnie Lipschitz. Did your brother ever strike you?”
“He wouldn't have the balls.”
Zinkavich seemed surprised. “He never beat you up?”
“I've carried a blade since I was twelve. I woulda circumcised him a second time.”
Zinkavich stared a long moment at Janice. This couldn't have been the way they had practiced it. Steve eased out a breath, but just a bit. With Janice, you never knew when the blade would come out.
“What about drug use?” Zinkavich asked. “Did you ever see your brother use illicit drugs?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Zinkavich smiled. Back on script. “When was that?”
“About the same time as the deal with Lipschitz. I gave Stevie some pot, and afterward he ate like half a gallon of pistachio ice cream and threw his guts up.”
“Anything more recent?”
“Nah. That cured him. He never even smoked a cigarette after that.”
Zinkavich's tongue flicked over his upper lip. Something had happened between rehearsal and opening night. “Drawing your attention to last January, Ms. Solomon, were you living on a farm in the Panhandle?”
“A farm?” Her smile displayed stained teeth. “Yeah, me and my friends were growing a cash crop there.”
“Did there come a time when your brother removed your son from your care and custody?”
“You mean, did Stevie take Bobby? Yeah.”
“And did your brother do so by force and violence?”
Janice shrugged, her fleshy chin jiggling. “I was like totally wasted that night.”
Though his feet were planted on the floor, Zinkavich swayed back and forth, like a rabbi praying at the Wailing Wall. “Come now, Ms. Solomon. Are you saying you don't remember that night?”
“I remember it was sleeting that day, froze my ass off.”
“And that night, what happened when your brother showed up?”
“I don't know, man. I was in the house doing Ecstasy. You'll have to ask Rufe.”
“That would be Rufus Thigpen?”
“Yeah, Rufus the Doofus.”
“Where is Mr. Thigpen today?”
“I think he went up to Delray to score some Special K. You know, ketamine.”
Zinkavich forced a smile, as if all state witnesses skip court to indulge in illegal activities. “What did Mr. Thigpen tell you about his encounter with your brother that fateful night?”
“Objection, hearsay,” Victoria said.
“Sustained,” the judge said.
“Your Honor, if I could voir dire the witness,” Zinkavich said, “I believe the evidence can come in under the excited utterance exception.”
“Knock yourself out,” the judge said.
“Ms. Solomon, without telling us what Mr. Thigpen said, what was his condition when you spoke to him that night?”
“Rufe's skull was split open.”
“Aha,” Zinkavich said. An opening.
“Hasn't made him any smarter, I can tell you that,” she continued.
“And you saw Mr. Thigpen in this injured state after his encounter with your brother?”
“Yeah.”
“Did Mr. Thigpen speak to you?”
“Yeah.”
“And when he spoke, was he excited, agitated, or angry?”
“He was pissed.”
“Did he raise his voice?”
“As much as he could. He was bleeding like a stuck pig.”
Zinkavich turned toward the judge. “I believe we've met the threshold for the excited utterance exception to the hearsay rule.”
Victoria started to object, but Steve placed a hand on her arm. “Let it go,” he whispered.
“Why?”
Steve gave her his innocent shrug, but she looked at him with cold suspicion.
“Hearing no objection,” Judge Rolle said, “I assume the Petitioner is as curious as the Court to hear the next exchange. Proceed.”
Zinkavich lowered his voice into what he must have considered his profound tone. “Just what did Mr. Thigpen say to you, as he lay there, bleeding like a stuck pig?”
“Rufe looked up at me and said, ‘You stupid cunt. You locked the kid in the dog cage but never padlocked the shed.'”
Zinkavich's mouth dropped open wide enough to inhale a Krispy Kreme. Judge Rolle cocked her head toward Janice as if listening a second time to something she didn't believe she'd heard the first time. The only sound in the courtroom was the whir of the ventilation system.
No one moved.
Not Victoria.
Or Zinkavich.
&n
bsp; Or Judge Rolle.
Steve shot glances at each of them. People with their own lives. Bills to pay, cars to service, doctors to visit. The whole mundane routine of daily life. But in this moment-frozen in time, like a fossil preserved in amber-their minds focused on the same image. An image, he was sure, that would come back to them, as it had to him, time and again.
An innocent child locked in a dog cage in a shed.
Finally, the judge said: “You say there was sleet that day?”
“Turned the yard into a skating rink,” Janice said.
The judge chewed on the eraser of her pencil. “How was your son dressed?”
“Underpants and a sweatshirt. I guess.” When the judge stared hard at her, Janice added: “I was pretty messed up those days.”
“That shed have any heat?”
Janice shook her head.
“Judge, I object to your taking over my questioning,” Zinkavich said.
“Sit down and stay down. You're done.”
Steve knew that the judge had heard tales of children disciplined with lighted cigarettes, starved in homes with full pantries, and subjected to sexual torture. Judges, cops, medical examiners see horrific wrongs, and after a while, he supposed, their minds create buffers to protect them from psychic pain. But do you ever really lose the ability to be shocked and sickened by cruelty to children?
“Now, cutting through the bullshit,” the judge continued, “your brother came to this farm where you were high on drugs and your son was confined like an animal, unclothed and freezing. There was an altercation with Mr. Thigpen, who is also a drug abuser, after which your brother took your son to his home, where he's raising him in apparent comfort and safety.”
“Yeah. That's about right.”
“Your Honor, I must protest,” Zinkavich said.
“Then do it somewhere else.” The judge leaned toward Janice. “Ms. Solomon, I want you to put yourself in my place for a moment.”
“Not if I have to wear that blue schmatte you got on.”
“Between making your son a ward of the state or giving your brother guardianship rights, what would you do?”
The question of the day, Steve thought.
The hundred-thousand-dollar question.
