For the Defense

by M. J. Rodgers

  Mel thought about that a moment as she folded a circular and handed it to Diana for stuffing into the next envelope. “You’re going to go through their trash?”

  “Every scrap,” Jack said as began affixing another roll of pre-printed labels on the next set of envelopes. “What people throw out can tell you things about them that not even their best friends know.”

  “It’s not against the law to snoop into their stuff?”

  “First of all, we’re not snooping,” Jack said as he handed the finished envelopes to Diana to keep their production line going. “We’re investigators trying to ascertain whether someone possesses the necessary intelligence and understanding to decide the fate of another human being—a very nice human being, I might add. Second, according to the law, whatever someone throws away is no longer ‘their stuff.’ It’s trash and, as such, can be picked up and used by someone else. I’m going to use it to find out about them.”

  “But aren’t you misleading them when you say that you want them to separate out their paper so it can be recycled?” Mel persisted.

  “Not at all. Once I’m finished looking through the important stuff, I’ll be taking the trash to the dump and the recyclable items to the recycle center.”

  “What if they don’t separate their trash as the circular asks?”

  “Then I’ll know two things,” Jack said. “One, they are not the kind of people who will take the time to help clean up the environment. And, two, I’m going to have to wear a really thick mask and gloves going through their trash trying to obtain more clues about them.”

  Mel’s lips curved into a smile at the image. “Can I help you pick up the stuff next Tuesday and go through it?”

  Last thing he expected was that. Jack glanced at Diana for some clue as to how to answer Mel’s question, but she was giving all her attention to stuffing envelopes.

  “I won’t simply be picking up trash on Tuesday, Mel. I will be a trash collector. To be believable, I have to immerse myself in the part. Trash collectors—even those involved in a neighborhood recycling project—don’t have nicely combed hair or respond to questions in well-formed sentences. I’ll have on a scraggily wig, long sideburns, be unshaven and wearing overalls that have old stains on them. But more importantly, I’ll be projecting the attitude of a simple man whose greatest joys in life are a six-pack of cold beer, watching sports on a big-screen TV and one day bowling two-fifty.”

  “You could be married, and I could be your daughter. The man you’re portraying would want his child involved in doing something good for the community, right?”

  “What makes you want to pretend to be a trash collector when you balk at performing a far more sophisticated role in the gifted children’s program?”

  “All I do is die in the play. Here I can be part of the action and do something that’s real and important.”

  She didn’t give up easily. Jack appreciated a tenacious spirit—and a kid who went after what she wanted with logic, not whines. “You’d have to wear stained overalls, old shoes, gloves that fit and be ready to really work.”

  “I have old clothes and gloves. I’m not afraid to work.”

  No, she wasn’t. “Can you be ready to go at 5:00 a.m. Tuesday?”

  Mel nodded eagerly.

  “When you pass out from garbage fumes, are you going to get your mother to sue me?”

  She giggled as she shook her head.

  He shrugged with all the dramatics at his disposal. “Well, all right. But if I decide to drag you to a fast-food restaurant for lunch afterward, you don’t squeal on me to your mother, and I get to eat your French fries with all the bad fat in them. Deal?”

  Mel’s smile was the biggest he’d seen. “Deal.”

  He nodded, looked down at the labels in his hands, concentrated on affixing them to the next batch of envelopes. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the smile on Diana’s lips. It warmed him in places he never realized existed.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  JACK FOUND Craig Sutherland at the city’s Maintenance downtown courtyard, eating lunch. The man was visibly startled when Jack showed him his private investigator’s business card. His unease grew with Jack’s first question.

  “A person in AA has a strict right to privacy, Knight,” he said with obvious irritation. “How did you even know about me?”

  “You’ve told your boss and all your co-workers you’re in AA. You’ve petitioned the court for joint custody of your kids based on nearly five years of sobriety. Didn’t strike me that you were trying to keep your membership a secret.”

  Sutherland shoved his runny jelly sandwich on moldy bread into the brown paper bag on his lap. “What do you want?”

  “To start with, some general information,” Jack said. “Step Five in the Twelve-Step recovery program is admitting to another the exact nature of an alcoholic’s wrongs, isn’t that correct?”

  “Why are you asking me if you already know?”

  Jack ignored the man’s irritated tone. “I understand that when most alcoholics get to Step Five, they select someone within the program in whom to confide rather than a psychologist or counselor because they believe that only another alcoholic can truly appreciate what they’re going through. Is that how it was with you?”

  Sutherland wiped his sticky hands on wrinkled jeans. “That’s my business.”

  Jack had hoped the man would cooperate. Now he knew only a hard line was going to work. “You were Bruce Weaton’s confidant and he was yours.”

  “No, you’re—”

  “There’s no point in denying this, Sutherland. You and Bruce attended meetings on the same night, sat together, left together. I not only know you were his confidant, I also know you’re back to drinking. I showed your picture to the clerk at the liquor store around the corner from your apartment. He tells me you’ve become a regular customer over the past three months.”

  “Please, you can’t tell my ex-wife,” he said in the voice of a man suddenly ready to sell his soul. “I’m begging you. I’ll give you anything I have. My kids mean everything to me. I can’t lose my chance to be with my kids.”

  “You threw away that chance when you started drinking again.”

  “No, you don’t understand. I’ve got it under control. I only drink a little at night to relax me when I get home.”

  “You’re lying to yourself, Sutherland. No alcoholic ever has his drinking under control. You’re going to lose your kids, your job, everything you worked so hard to get back.”

  Sutherland’s head and shoulders drooped. The brown sack fell out of his lap onto the ground. He covered his face with his hands and sobbed.

  Jack felt like a schoolyard bully beating up on a sick kid. Still, for Sutherland’s sake—as well as everyone else’s—he had to do this. He waited until the man had regained some composure before continuing.

  “You have one chance.”

  Sutherland’s head lifted. The defeat on his face was so oppressive, Jack flinched inside.

  “What do you want?”

  “You’re going to tell your boss that a family emergency requires you leave immediately and take the two weeks vacation coming to you,” Jack said. “As soon as you’ve talked to your boss, you’re going to call this man at this number and give him your name.”

  Sutherland took the card Jack held out to him.

  “The man is my brother and is a trained psychologist. He’s going to get you into a very private and intense alcoholic recovery program that takes place out on a secluded island in the West Sound. The boat for that island leaves this afternoon. You’ll be on it.”

  “I can’t afford a—”

  “All of your expenses in the program are covered. During the next two weeks, you will live the life of a sober man. You will also learn things that not even AA has been able to teach you. When the two weeks are up, you’ll attend AA meetings for the rest of your life and remain sober. Because I’ll be keeping tabs on you. And if you so much as sniff another drin
k, I’ll contact your ex-wife and give her everything she needs to make sure you never see your kids again.”

  Sutherland looked at the card in his hands and then at Jack. “You’re not going to tell her I went back to drinking?”

  “Not if you grab this opportunity to get sober for good.”

  The man stared at Jack in disbelief. “Why are you doing this for me?”

  “I’m part of Connie Pearce’s defense team.”

  Sutherland started.

  “Yes,” Jack said. “I’m fighting for that young woman’s life. Bruce told you all about Connie when he confessed the wrongs he had done to her. By keeping silent, you have harmed her as well. You’re going to come forward now and make that right.”

  “I can’t. We pledge never to reveal—”

  “Your pledge to Bruce died with him, Sutherland. You’re on Step Eight now. It’s time to make amends to your kids by getting sober and giving them back their father. And it’s time to make amends to Connie Pearce by telling her attorney everything Bruce told you.”

  “You mean now?”

  Jack stood. “Right now. We’ll meet with Connie’s attorney as soon as you see your boss and make that call to my brother.”

  Jack bent down to pick up the leaky sack at his feet. He dumped its disgusting contents into the nearby garbage container where it belonged. “On the way there, I’ll buy you a decent lunch.”

  AS SOON AS DIANA HAD received Jack’s call that he was on his way to his office with Craig Sutherland in tow, she grabbed her briefcase and headed there to meet them. When she arrived, she found that Harry had set up a video camera in Jack’s office. She appreciated Jack’s foresight in arranging for a visual and auditory record.

  To make sure Sutherland understood the gravity of the situation, Diana brought along a Bible and asked him to place his hand on it. When he did, she swore him in exactly as a court reporter would have done in a formally recorded deposition.

  Sutherland raised a shaky hand and promised to tell the truth. She asked him to repeat his name for the record, and he did so.

  “Mr. Sutherland, please describe your relationship with Bruce Weaton.”

  “We met nearly five years ago at a general AA meeting. You only give your first name at the meetings, but I recognized Bruce. He’d sold my sister and her husband a house. I sat next to him, glad to know someone. We talked, helped each other out.”

  “In what way?” Diana asked.

  “I joined AA because the court ordered me to if I wanted to see my kids again. But it was…hard. Dropout is highest in the first few weeks. Admitting to the problem, putting it in the hands of a higher power—none of that stopped the cravings. You have to distract yourself. Bruce and I, we…used the same distraction.”

  “What was that distraction?”

  “Women. Bruce knew a lot of them. When things got rough, sometimes we’d talk, but most of the time, he’d get on the phone and have a couple come over. They weren’t prostitutes. At least they never asked me for any money or anything.”

  “You used sex as a way of keeping your mind off alcohol?”

  Sutherland nodded. “It worked.”

  “Other than that…distraction, did you and Bruce do anything else together?” she asked.

  “Not much outside attending the AA meetings a couple of nights a week,” Sutherland said. “Truth is, he could be downright cold at times. Not that I was always in the best of moods.”

  “How do you mean cold?”

  “Well, like the time I told him how hard it was for me when my wife walked out and took the kids. He laughed. Said I was being stupid. Said there were plenty of other women out there that I could have kids with if I wanted.”

  “He expected you to forget your feelings for your wife and children?” Diana asked.

  Sutherland shrugged. “Some guys don’t have the stomach to listen to another guy spilling his guts. Maybe Bruce wanted me to shut up. Which I did. Anyway, when the time came for Step Five, we were comfortable enough with each other to get into that baggage.”

  “Would you explain Step Five, please?” Diana asked.

  “It’s the one where we’re supposed to admit to ourselves and another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.”

  “What were the things that Bruce told you?”

  “He admitted to having wronged several people, Ms. Mason. The biggest wrong was to Connie Pearce.”

  When the man paused, Diana leaned forward as encouragement for him to go on. “Please tell me what he said.”

  Sutherland exhaled a long breath as though he were releasing something buried deep inside him. “Bruce was driving drunk five years ago. He lost control of his vehicle, went over the curb and killed Connie’s little girl.”

  “Bruce admitted he was drunk, he was driving and that he killed Connie’s child?” Diana repeated, careful to make sure all points were clear.

  Sutherland nodded. “Of course, he didn’t know whose kid it was at the time. He lit out of there fast. Later, when he listened to the news report, he learned her name.”

  “Did he mention if anyone was in his vehicle with him at the time he killed the girl, Mr. Sutherland?”

  The man shook his head.

  “Did he say anything about where he’d gotten the vehicle he was driving?”

  Again, a shaking head. “Bruce didn’t share a lot about the specifics, only related the bare facts. Whatever feelings he had, he kept to himself. But he did say that killing the little girl was what had forced him into joining AA.”

  “Forced him?” Diana repeated.

  “Someone else knew what he did. He never told me who or how they knew. But I got the impression that if he hadn’t joined AA and stayed sober, that someone would have turned him in for having killed that girl.”

  “Once you knew about the crime, didn’t you feel an obligation to report what Bruce had done?”

  Sutherland squirmed in his chair. “You’ve got to understand, Ms. Mason. Step Five in AA is like talking to your pastor. Everything that’s said is secret. Keeping that secret is like a sacred thing. If it weren’t, no one would be honest and confess their wrongs. Even now that Bruce is dead, I still feel like I’m betraying a solemn oath by telling you.”

  Diana nodded, letting the man know she understood and sympathized with his discomfort. Giving support to a person’s feelings cost nothing.

  “Mr. Sutherland, I understand that Step Eight in the program is listing all persons who have been harmed and making amends to them. Do you know how Bruce Weaton planned to make amends to Connie Pearce for having killed her child?”

  “No, but I do know he was never going to turn himself in,” Sutherland said.

  “He told you that?”

  Sutherland nodded. “Said that would be stupid because it couldn’t bring the kid back. I didn’t argue with him. Each of us has to make restoration in our own way. But, I swear to God, the last thing I ever expected of him was suicide.”

  “Suicide?”

  “Well, what would you call romancing the woman whose child you’d killed and then letting her know what you did?”

  But Bruce hadn’t let Connie know. He’d kept it a secret from her.

  Unless he left Amy’s locket in his garage so Connie would find it? Unless he deliberately ran in front of her car trying to get her to kill him? Had Bruce set Connie up to kill him in retribution for killing her daughter?

  No, Diana rejected the idea. Everything she’d learned about Bruce revealed a man out of touch with feelings of real remorse. He was too cold and ruthless for her to buy the suicide theory.

  Jack’s suggestion that Bruce had planned to marry Connie as a way of making amends made more sense in light of the guy’s twisted psyche. Except, that didn’t feel quite right to Diana, either.

  She had the strong sense she was missing an obvious explanation. What in the hell was it?

  Well, at least she now had confirmation that Bruce—not the woman who had brought him into the E.R.—was driv
ing the vehicle that killed Amy. Sutherland’s testimony along with the forensic evidence would be enough to convince the right jury, no matter how Staker tried to twist the facts.

  Finding Craig Sutherland had been integral to establishing that aspect of her case. Jack had come through for her, as she knew he would.

  “SO, TELL ME ABOUT this role you don’t want to perform,” Jack said as he and Mel drove toward the first address on their trash pickup list Tuesday morning.

  “Five of us are panelists on this TV game show, only we’re not people. I’m Matter. The other four represent the fundamental forces of the universe—the strong Interaction force, Electromagnetic force, Weak force and Gravitational force.”

  “Interesting. You wrote this play, Mel?”

  “The idea and basic content, but the director has made a lot of changes.”

  “They always do. What’s the plot?”

  “During Act One, we panelists answer questions about ourselves that are actually clues to who will be murdered, how and by whom. Since I’m Matter, my answers hint at my being created out of unstable elements. I collapse at the end of the first act. The really good part comes in Act Two when the murderer is unmasked, and I’m not even on stage.”

  Jack understood her disappointment. He’d felt it more than once himself.

  “Mel, have you ever wondered why storytelling is so popular?”

  She shook her head.

  “Whether writer or performer, we have the power to create an imaginary world so full of interesting ideas and feelings that others can’t wait to share it. When you’re able to entice an audience into entering your world, you connect with them in a way that’s magical.”

  “You’ve felt that way?”

  “Even with some of the smallest roles I was given.”

  “How?”

  “By putting all of myself into those roles and making them as real for me as they were for the audience.”

  She was quiet a moment before asking, “Will you come with me to rehearsal this Saturday and show me how?”