Indefensible (10 page)

“So,” he says.

“So,” I answer.

“Interesting piece on the wire today,” he says, “the wire” being TMU's term for the Internet. “State court judge in Minnesota or Montana or Missouri—one of those states—he got blown to smithereens right in his own home.”

“You mean shot?”

“No. Blown up. Some kind of bomb. They're investigating. What's the latest on the Phippin murder?”

I tell him, which doesn't take long, because I've been sending daily updates. He pretends to be interested. I wrap it up quick. “So.”

“So.”

“So, Crutchfield has announced his retirement.” TMU's lips twitch with a painful attempt to keep from grinning. I wait. Crutchfield is one of the judges on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Speculation about his stepping down has been rampant.

TMU outwaits me, and I finally say, “Is your name in play?” This is the polite question, not to assume anything. I already know the answer.

He chuckles happily. “Oh, that's rich!” he says.

I do my best to look innocent. Of course his name isn't in play. Nobody would gain a thing getting Harold Schnair appointed to the circuit bench. He's elderly, his health isn't particularly good, and though he's honest, hardworking, and brilliant, his nomination would serve no strategic purpose.

“Pigshit,” he says. “I want to retire myself. What the hell am I going to do with a lifetime appointment?”

I wait.

“No, my boy, I'm talking about younger blood. New generation and all of that. Pass the torch, as young Jack said.”

“If you're talking about me, Harold, I'm fifty-three. Hardly a new generation.”

“But a youthful fifty-three,” he says. “Think about it. Who better than you? I know Leslie wants it, that unimaginative pontificating bully”—(he means his predecessor in this office, Leslie Herst-good)
—“and other than her, it's just Two Rivers and all the assholes who've spent careers in twentieth-floor glass offices without a clue how the world works. I tell you, you're the one, Nick. You've put in your time, kept a clean nose, made friends, done good work.”

“What should I say?”

“Say yes.”

“Yes.”

“Good. I can't promise you'll get it, but I sure as shit guarantee you'll be on the list that goes to the president. Now scram. I need to get busy.” He cackles, then he's at his desk and on the phone before I'm out the door.

Harold Schnair is the fourth TMU since I've had this job, and he is my favorite. I call us friends. He's a loud, witty former city councilman, state prosecutor, and law school dean. He's single and, according to rumors that he himself encourages, is quite a man about town.

I don't know if TMU is blowing hot air about the circuit court. While there are a thousand reasons I wouldn't stand a chance, there are also a few reasons I would. And what's in it for TMU? He'll probably come up with explanations of devious ways it works to his advantage—how it will realign the political chessboard in his favor—but that's not it. He's almost out of the game anyway. He just wants to make something happen. Somebody's protégé will get the slot, so why not his. He wants to play in one more game, and this should be a good one.

Circuit court judge. That would be okay. The circuits are one step below the U.S. Supreme Court. They don't have trials, it's all appeals. The judges spend most of their days writing decisions in quiet, pandered-to eggheadedness. I might like that.

L
izzy is with me this week. On our way to school, I say stupidly, “So how are you feeling about things, Liz?”

“What things?” she says with undisguised annoyance.

“I don't know. Your summer. The ugly stuff. All that.”

She exhales loudly, the message being that I might as well flap my arms and jump from the roof. No chance of finding that soft spot today.

We pull up in front of the school. Liz grabs her pack and is out, no kiss, no goodbye, door closed.

I believe that objectively, Lizzy knows there is no connection between her having blabbed about events at the reservoir and Cassandra's death. Through extensive interviews and investigation, we've established that, in errantly telling her tale, Lizzy did not use Cassandra's name nor any other identifying information. And none of the people she spoke with could have passed the information on. So there was definitely a more efficient and malicious snitch, and Lizzy's indiscretion had no real effect. But what the objective self knows and what the mischievous subconscious conjures can be different things indeed.

As for me, it's not a matter of my subconscious inventing facts for the purpose of validating my own feelings of guilt. I know what I know. If I had overruled the idea of dangling Cassandra as bait, albeit anonymously, she might still be alive. And my reason for not objecting: I wanted the excuse to stay in touch with her. Oh, how we are punished for our hubris.

•  •  •

Late in the afternoon, my intercom bleeps: “Kendall Vance on three.”

“Take a message, Janice.”

And later, “Captain Dorsey of the state troopers, Nick, line three.”

I connect. “Gimme some good news, Captain.”

“I have info on Seth Coen.”

“Hang on.” I transfer the call and go into Upton's office. We listen on speaker.

“Three items,” Dorsey barks into the phone. “First, we've confirmed that it was Mr. Coen in the freezer. Second, it was all there—he was—the body. Nothing missing. Third, we found Scud Illman's prints in the apartment.”

“I love you,” I shout.

“Not so fast. The prints were confined to the kitchen area. Apparently, whoever did the dirty work wore gloves.”

“So we know Scud was there at the murder, but we can't prove he participated. Right?”

“Wrong. Scud's prints could have been left before, after, or during the murder, but at least we have Coen and Illman verifiably linked. That's something.”

Upton has his feet on the desk, rocking in his desk chair. His office is less homey than mine. He has a wall of legal texts and one framed photo from his football years. There is a bookcase behind his desk where he has pictures of his kids and wife. They face me, the visitor, instead of sitting on the desk facing him. It's quite formal that way, but on the desk, as always, is the sports page from today's paper, opened to the scores and rankings, and I see that several items are circled in red.

“What else?” I ask Dorsey.

“The mud from Coen's boots: It's a match with the soil at the reservoir. I have this report from the state lab that talks about feldspars and pollen load composition, blah, blah, blah. Bottom line: It is verifiably from the Slippery River Valley and within a, quote unquote, reasonable proximity of the burial site.”

“What the hell is a reasonable proximity?” Upton says.

“It's okay,” Dorsey's voice soothes over the phone, “these guys are pros. We've had them on the stand before. I'll talk to them.”

“Good. It's all good,” I say. “We've got Scud in Coen's apartment,
we've got Coen at the reservoir, we've got Scud's car coming back to town that morning. We're almost home. Anything else, Dorsey?”

“Coupla things. The freezer meats, venison, rainbow trout, all of that, they seem to be what the packages say they are. As for the victim, he suffered a single gunshot to the back of the head. Dismemberment took place in the shower stall, by the way. Professional. No usable prints anywhere in the bathroom or freezer area. Hardly even any blood remaining.”

“Is that it?”

“Well, that tattoo on Coen's hand. The medical examiner says part of it was recent, and parts were older, like it had been touched up or added to.”

“Ever seen it before, Dorsey? Does it mean anything?”

“Like a gang thing?”

“Hold on one,” I say. I put Dorsey on hold, beep Tina's extension, and ask her to come in for a minute. Then I put Dorsey back on speaker. Tina shows up. “You ever seen this tattoo?” I ask her, showing a drawing of the four-pane window. Tina's specialty in drug crimes brings her into contact with a lot of gang-type offenders.

“Never seen it,” she says.

“Okay, I just thought—”

“It's not like I pay a lot of attention to their artwork.”

“We were just—”

“But if you really need to know, I know a guy,” Tina says.

“What guy?”

“An offender. Old guy, Fuseli, doing life for a bank withdrawal he tried to make at age seventeen. Felony murder. They left two dead on the floor. He's a mentor now, counsels the newbies, works on paroles. He hates the drugs and gang culture in there, so he's a good contact for what's happening inside. The Bureau uses him. And he's an artist. Most of the body art coming out of there, the good stuff, it's his work. Your guy with the window, Seth Coen, was he in Ellisville Max?”

“No,” Upton says, “he was down south in Alder Creek.”

“Even so,” Tina says, “Fuseli might know if it means anything. Do you have some reason to think it's significant?”

Dorsey says, “I was saying, the ME thinks it was touched up or altered recently. Kind of strange for a guy in his late thirties. So we're curious. But otherwise, no, no reason to think anything.”

Tina taps her lips with a finger. I'm still thrown off by her hair—the menacing wedge. At first I thought of Tina as sweet and a bit innocent. Then came her haircut and her perpetual rime of anger. Then we took that helicopter ride together, with her hand resting reassuringly on my knee. Now I don't know who she is.

“Well, if you're interested,” she says, “Fuseli would be the one.”

We sign off with Dorsey.

“If there's nothing else,” Tina says, and she leaves.

Upton and I sit with our feet on his desk. “How are the girls?” I ask.

He exhales and shakes his head.

“What?”

“Like they're juggling grenades with the pins halfway out.”

“Growing up?”

“They're babies,” he says, “they think it's a big joke. Butt cracks and navels on display. And here.” He gestures breasts in his sweet, fatherly inability to use the word.

“You're just old-fashioned,” I say. His girls are both in high school, a year apart. In the portraits on his bookcase, they look like porcelain dolls. In real life, they're giggly, and Lizzy isn't crazy about them. Walking mannequins, she calls them, not because they're inanimate but because they're always wearing something fashionable.
Gag me!

“You wait,” Upton says, “you'll have your turn soon enough.” He laughs.

I shrug. He's wrong. Lizzy is different.

“And speaking of babes,” he says, “you could do worse.”

“Worse than what?”

“Heeheehee.”

“Tina?”

“I see things.”

“Hallucinations,” I say, and I feel my face redden. “Let's get a search warrant for Scud's place. We'll execute first thing tomorrow morning when his stepkid is in school.”

Upton's cell rings. He looks at the number, and his perpetual grin suddenly looks striven for. He glances up at me: “I have to . . .” Then he answers: “Hello, Mr. Jones . . . well, I'm with a colleague at the moment . . . yes, let's talk later on . . . okay, then.” He closes the phone. “Okay, where were we?” he asks.

“Search warrant.”

“Right. Tomorrow.”

I leave. I'm dying to know what the phone call was about, but since he didn't volunteer anything, I don't ask.

E
ight-forty-five in the morning. A few of Dorsey's men cover the back and sides of Scud's house, and three others knock at the front door. The door opens and they go inside.

We wait a couple of minutes, then Dorsey radios that it's all secure, we can go in.

Scud's street is an old GI Bill subdivision of starter homes and finisher homes. Some yards are tidy; some have dead cars rising from the dirt like topiary. Scud's is one of the tidy ones. Flowers are planted along the front wall and the concrete walk. The front door has three glass panes in a stair-step pattern.

The house is bland and spotless inside. The furniture is the kind of generic stuff you buy when you have enough money and don't know what else to buy. The kitchen is small. There are two bedrooms. The dining table is empty, and there are no unwashed dishes in the sink.

In the living room a woman and a young boy sit on the couch. The boy is crying. His mother is on the phone.

“You scared?” I ask the boy, and naturally, he doesn't answer, so I say, “I'd be scared, too. But you know what? These guys, they're just looking for some things. They won't hurt you.” I look at the mother, expecting her to tell me to leave him the hell alone, but she seems not to notice I'm there.

“Five of them, I think,” she says into the phone.

“What's your name?” I ask the boy, who is looking from his mother to the officer who guards them, then back.

“How the hell would I know?” the mother says into the phone. “Come home and ask them yourself.”

An officer in a flak jacket walks through the living room carrying a computer.

“Our computer,” the woman says.

“Mommy?” the boy says, looking up at her for comfort, but she doesn't notice him. She's in her late thirties. She isn't sitting on the couch so much as giving up to it; everything about her—shoulders, cheeks, voice—seems to be slumping inward. She's hard to get a fix on. Curled bangs, oversize T-shirt, sweatpants, weary, slow-moving eyes: It all seems to be a husk where she no longer lives. She's watching the officer guarding her.

“How old are you?” I ask the boy.

“Seven.”

“Seven! What's your name?”