False Witness (33 page)

He surprised me. When we parted at the airport, he embraced me, held me against him for a brief moment, pulled back, studied me with sharp, clear, unexpected knowledge of my loss. We had never spoken about it, yet he knew. Somehow, I knew this knowledge was not from Glori Nichols; it was from his knowledge of me.

His hands tightened on my arms, a friendly reassuring squeeze.

“You’ll be all right, Lynne,” he said. And then, typically, pontifically, but appropriately, he told me, “This too shall pass.”

As all things do.

I checked into the office for a brief hour to make sure everything would run smoothly while I was gone. Without Bobby Jones, with Lucy still laid up, I had a brief conference with two of my other assistants, set up a loose chain of command. Everything would hold; nothing would fall apart more than it already had.

One of the young interns—I never could tell them apart—brought over a soft, loosely wrapped package that had arrived for me. I left it on my desk while I sorted out assignments.

Jameson called to tell me what I had already heard the moment I arrived at the office. The Corporation Counsel’s office had informed him that a six-million-dollar lawsuit had been filed on behalf of Dr. David Cohen against the City of New York, the Office of the District Attorney of New York County, District Attorney Jameson Whitney Hale, Assistant District Attorney Lynne Jacobi, Assistant District Attorney Lucy Capella, and the estate of the late Chief Investigator Michael Bobby Jones. That worked out to a million dollars per defendant.

Another thought for me to take along to Eleuthera.

After the phone call, alone in my office, I opened the package. Tore open the loose brown wrapping paper and let the shoe drop on my desk.

It was a well-worn, dark blue, custom-made, right-foot running shoe stained all over with what was probably dried blood. Definitely dried blood. I know dried blood when I see it.

I held the shoe carefully by the frayed shoelace for a moment, then placed it on the center of my desk blotter and stared at it. It was very familiar: an older version of a custom-made running shoe we had seen before.

I smoothed the wrinkled brown paper in which it had been wrapped. I didn’t have to be careful about handling it: God knows how many fingers had grabbed at it, tossed it one way or another. It would be virtually covered with meaningless fingerprints.

The package had been addressed to me as Miss Lynne Jacobi. My name was written in a large, fragile, clear and spidery handwriting: an old-fashioned, schoolteacherish hand. The kind of writing one was used to seeing on the blackboards of one’s childhood. The words “First Class Mail” were written in the same spidery, old woman’s careful, still elegant hand and were underlined several times for emphasis.

And there was this shoe: this damn familiar running shoe, with the custom-made arch built in to allow for a deformity of a right foot or leg.

I buzzed for my young intern and told him to get an evidence bag large enough to accommodate the shoe, then had him stand by to witness what I was doing.

I carefully folded the wrinkled brown wrapping paper into a packet small enough to fit inside the shoe, stuffed it in without handling the shoe except by the frayed shoelace. Then I put the shoe into the standard evidence bag, sealed it, dated it, signed it and had my assistant countersign as witness. He looked a little surprised when I told him to make out a card and then to mark this evidence bag with a corresponding number and place it in the open file of the matter concerning Sanderalee Dawson, but he did what I told him without comment.

I felt a sudden urgency to get out of the office. I waved as I walked through my staff’s office; told them to keep up the good work; that I’d think of them toiling away as I lounged in the golden sunshine.

The cab I had ordered was waiting right outside the building, and I didn’t need the driver’s help with my suitcase: I travel light. After asking my permission, he surprised me by singing a soft, melodious repertoire of the latest hit songs from Broadway shows, and we made it out to Kennedy in plenty of time for me to catch my plane for Eleuthera.

H
E KNELT BEFORE HER
chair and held her hands. He spoke softly, ignoring the uncomfortable, muscle-straining position he had taken in order to be certain she was looking directly at him.

“Mother, I’ve come with good news. Are you listening? Do you understand?”

He searched her face for some reaction to the news he had brought. It was all over. Finished. Done. He had been cleared. The true culprit was dead.

As he spoke, he was aware of his growing tension, his nervousness, the dryness of his mouth, the dampness of his hands. He felt a slight movement of her left hand in his. It was an attempt to withdraw from him. He looked from her hand to her face. He looked into her eyes. They were no longer blank. They were luminous, mesmerizing. He could not look away. It was impossible.

“Mother? What?”

He looked down and saw her large yellow pad for the first time. It was resting on her knees and her left index finger tapped rhythmically.

“You’ve written something, Mother? Did you write something for me, is that it? A message?”

He pulled himself to his feet, rubbed his eyes briskly with his fingertips, replaced his glasses and turned toward the window for better light. In the center of the page was her message, written in the large, spidery, shaky letters she had accomplished with her left hand.

YOU HAVE DESTROYED MY FAMILY. GO AWAY. NEVER RETURN.

“Mother!”

He ripped the page from the pad and crumpled it into a tight ball. He leaned toward her, reached out but stopped his hand in midair, then let it fall to his side as her eyes engaged his for one split second of total clarity.

I know. I know.

Then, she closed her eyes and slowly, deliberately, opened them again. She no longer saw him. It was as though he were not there. She did not acknowledge his existence. She had canceled him out forever.

There was a humming sound from his beeper.

He shoved the ball of paper into his jacket pocket. He looked at her once more: the only person in the entire world besides himself who truly knew what he had done.

“Goodbye, Mother,” he said softly, but she did not respond. She was already gone.

Dr. David Cohen went down the hall to check with his service.

Dorothy Uhnak (1930–2006) was the bestselling, award-winning author of nine novels and one work of nonfiction.

Uhnak was born in New York City, where she attended the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Before she turned to writing, Uhnak spent fourteen years as a detective with the New York City Transit Police Department, where she was decorated for bravery twice. Her memoir,
Policewoman
(1964), chronicles her career in law enforcement, and was written while she was still on the force.

The Bait
(1968)
,
Uhnak’s first novel, won the Edgar Award for Best First Mystery Novel, and introduced NYPD detective Christie Opara, who appeared in Uhnak’s next two novels,
The Witness
(1969) and
The Ledger
(1970)
.
All three novels were adapted for television and eventually became the series “Get Christie Love!” starring Teresa Graves. Uhnak followed the Opara trilogy with
Law and Order
(1973)—a novel about three generations of Irish American police officers—which earned critical praise and was considered her breakout novel. Next came
The Investigation
(1977), another blockbuster. Both of these were also adapted for television.

Uhnak has been credited with paving the way for authors such as Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, Patricia Cornwell, and many others who write crime novels and police procedurals with strong heroines. Additionally, she was hailed by George N. Dove as “an experimental writer who . . . tried new approaches with each undertaking.” Her books have been translated into fifteen languages. Uhnak died on Long Island in 2006.

Dorothy Uhnak, around age one.

Uhnak, age four, holding a childhood pet.

A teenage Uhnak pictured with Mildred Goldstein, her only sister. Throughout her youth, Uhnak enjoyed doing odd jobs at the 46th Precinct station house on Ryer Avenue in the Bronx, near her family’s home.

Sixteen-year-old Uhnak at the beach, around 1946.

Uhnak, age twenty-four, poses with her husband Anthony “Tony” Uhnak. (Photo courtesy of Harold Ellis.)