Perfect Match (34 page)

“Who was in the courtroom when you brought Father Szyszynski in from the h olding cell?” the prosecutor asks, a few minutes into the testimony. Bobby has to think about this, and the effort is visible on his doughy face . “Uh, well, the judge, yeah. On the bench. And there was a clerk, and a st enographer, and the dead guy's lawyer, whose name I don't remember. And a D A from Portland.”

“Where were Mr. and Mrs. Frost sitting?” Quentin asks.

“In the front row with Detective Ducharme.”

“What happened next?”

Bobby straightens his shoulders. “Me and Roanoke, that's the other bailiff, we walked the Father across the room to his lawyer. Then, you know, I step ped back, because he had to sit down, so I stood behind him.” He takes a de ep breath. “And then ...”

“Yes, Mr. Ianucci?”

“Well, I don't know where she came from. I don't know how she did it. But the next thing, there's gunshots being fired and blood all over the place, and F ather Szyszynski's falling out of his chair.”

“What happened after that?”

“I tackled her. And so did Roanoke, and a couple of other guys posted at th e back of the courtroom, and Detective Ducharme, too. She dropped the gun a nd I grabbed it, and then Detective Ducharme, he hauled her up and took her off to the holding cell in cuffs.”

“Did you get shot, Mr. Ianucci?”

Bobby shakes his head, lost in his memories. “No. But if I'd been, like, five inches to the right, she could have hit me.”

“So would you say the defendant was very careful with how she aimed that weapon at Father Szyszynski?”

Fisher stands beside me. “Objection.”

“Sustained,” Judge Neal rules.

The prosecutor shrugs. “Withdrawn. Your witness.”

As he returns to his seat, Fisher approaches the bailiff. “Did you talk to Ni na Frost the morning before the shooting?”

“No.”

“In fact, you were busy doing your job-maintaining the security of the cour thouse, and dealing with prisoners-so you had no need to watch Mrs. Frost, did you?”

“No.”

“Did you see her pull the gun out?”

“No.”

“You said several bailiffs immediately jumped on her. Did you have to fight Mrs. Frost for the gun?”

“No.”

“And she didn't struggle with any of you when you tried to subdue her?”

“She was trying to see around us. She kept asking if he was dead.” Fisher dismisses this with a shrug. “But she wasn't trying to get away from y ou. She wasn't trying to hurt you.”

“Oh, no.”

Fisher lets that answer hang for a moment. “You knew Mrs. Frost before this , didn't you, Mr. Ianucci?”

“Sure.”

“What was your relationship with her like?”

Bobby glances at me; then his eyes skitter away. “Well, she's a DA. She comes in all the time.” He pauses, then adds. “She's one of the nice ones.”

“Had you ever considered her to be violent before?”

“No.”

“In fact, on that morning, she seemed nothing like the Nina Frost you knew, i sn't that right?”

“Well, you know, she looked the same.”

“But her actions, Mr. Ianucci . . . had you ever seen Mrs. Frost act like this before?”

The bailiff shakes his head. “I never saw her shoot nobody, if that's what y ou mean.”

“It is,” Fisher says, sitting down. “Nothing further.” That afternoon when court is adjourned, I don't go directly home. Risking an extra fifteen minutes' grace before my electronic bracelet is reactivated, I drive to St. Anne's and enter the church where this all began. The nave is open to the public, although I don't think they've found a replac ement chaplain yet. Inside, it's dark. My shoes strike the tile, announce my presence.

To my right is a table where white votives burn in tiers. Taking a stick, I l ight one for Glen Szyszynski. I light a second one for Arthur Gwynne. Then I slip into a pew and get down on the kneeler. “Hail Mary, full of gra ce,” I whisper, praying to a woman who stood by her son, too. The lights in the motel room go out at eight, Nathaniel's bedtime. Beside h is son, on a matching twin bed, Caleb lies with his hands folded behind his head, waiting for Nathaniel to fall asleep. Then, sometimes, Caleb will wa tch TV. Turn on one lamp and read the day's paper.

Today he wants to do neither. He is in no mood to hear local pundits guessing Nina's fate based on the first day of testimony. Hell, he doesn't want to gu ess, himself.

One thing is clear: The woman all those witnesses saw; the woman on that videotape-she isn't the woman Caleb married. And when your wife is not th e same person you fell in love with eight years ago, where exactly does t hat leave you? Do you try to get to know who she has become, and hope for the best? Or do you keep deceiving yourself in the hope that she might w ake up one morning and have gone back to the woman she used to be?

Maybe, Caleb thinks with a small shock, he isn't the same person he once was , either.

That brings him directly to the topic he didn't want to remember, especiall y not now in the dark with nothing to distract him. This afternoon, when Pa trick had come to the conference room to bring them the news of Gwynne's de ath . . . well, Caleb must be reading into things. After all, Nina and Patr ick have known each other a lifetime. And although the guy is something of an albatross, his relationship with Nina has never really bothered Caleb, b ecause when push came to shove he was the one sleeping with Nina every nigh t.

But Caleb has not been sleeping with Nina.

He squeezes his eyes shut, as if this might block out the memory of Patrick turning away abruptly when Nina put her arms around Caleb. That, in and of i tself, wasn't disturbing-Caleb could list a hundred times that Nina touched him or smiled at him in the other man's presence that unsettled Patrick in s ome way . . . even if Nina never seemed to see. In fact, there have been tim es Caleb's even felt sorry for Patrick, for the blatant jealousy on his face the moment before he masks it.

Today, though, it wasn't envy in Patrick's eyes. It was grief. And that is w hy Caleb cannot pull away from the incident; cannot stop picking the moment apart like a carrion vulture going for the bone. Envy, after all, comes from wanting something that isn't yours.

But grief comes from losing something you've already had.

Nathaniel hates this stupid playroom with its stupid book corner and its stu pid bald dolls and its stupid crayon box that doesn't even have a yellow. He hates the way the tables smell like a hospital and the floor is cold under his socks. He hates Monica, whose smile reminds Nathaniel of the time he too k an orange wedge at the Chinese restaurant and stuffed it into his mouth, r ind out, in a silly, fake grin. Most of all he hates knowing that his mom an d dad are just twenty-two stairs up but Nathaniel isn't allowed to join them.

“Nathaniel,” Monica says, “why don't we finish this tower?” It is made of blo cks; they built it all afternoon yesterday and put a special sign on overnigh t, asking the janitors to leave it until this morning. “How high do you think we can go?”

It is already taller than Nathaniel; Monica has brought over a chair so that he can keep building. She has a small stack of blocks ready to go.

“Be careful,” she warns as he climbs onto the chair. He places the first block at the top, and the whole structure wobbles. The se cond time, it seems certain to fall over-and then doesn't. “That was close,” Monica says.

He imagines that this is New York City, and he is a giant. A Tyrannosaurus r ex. Or King Kong. He eats buildings this big like they are carrot sticks. Wi th a great swipe of his enormous paw, Nathaniel swings at the top of the tow er.

It falls in a great, clattering heap.

Monica looks so sad that for just the slightest moment, Nathaniel feels awfu l. “Oh,” she sighs. “Why'd you do that?”

Satisfaction curls the corners of his mouth, blooming from a root inside. But Nathaniel doesn't tell her what he's thinking: Because I could. Joseph Toro looks nervous to be in a courtroom, and I can't blame him. The last time I saw the man he was cowering beside the bench, covered with his own client's blood and brain matter.

“Had you met with Glen Szyszynski before you came to court that day?” Que ntin asks.

“Yes,” the attorney says timidly. “In jail, pending the arraignment.”

“What did he say about the alleged crime?”

“He categorically denied it.”

“Objection,” Fisher calls out. “Relevance?”

“Sustained.”

Quentin reconsiders. “What was Father Szyszynski's demeanor the morning o f October thirtieth?”

“Objection.” Fisher stands this time. “Same grounds.” Judge Neal looks at the witness. “I'd like to hear this.”

“He was scared to death,” Toro murmurs. “He was resigned. Praying. He re ad to me aloud, from the book of Matthew. The part where Christ keeps sa ying 'My God, why bast thou forsaken me?'”

“What happened when they brought your client in?” Quentin asks.

“They walked him to the defense table where I was sitting.”

“And where was Mrs. Frost at the time?”

“Sitting behind us, and to the left.”

“Had you spoken with Mrs. Frost that morning?”

“No,” Toro answers. “I'd never even met her.”

“Did you notice anything unusual about her?”

“Objection,” Fisher says. “He didn't know her, so how could he judge what was and wasn't customary?”

“Overruled,” the judge answers.

Toro looks at me, a bird gathering courage to dart a glance at the cat sittin g a few feet away. “There was something unusual. I was waiting for her to com e in ... because she was the mother of the alleged victim, of course . . . bu t she was late. Her husband was there, waiting . . . but Mrs. Frost almost mi ssed the beginning of the arraignment. I thought of all days, it seemed very strange that on this one, she wouldn't be on time.”

I listen to his testimony, but I am watching Quentin Brown. To a prosecutor, a defendant is nothing but a victory or a loss. They are not real people; the y do not have lives that interest you beyond the crime that brought them into court. As I stare at him, Brown suddenly turns. His expression is cool, disp assionate-one I have cultivated in my repertoire as well. In fact I have had all the same training as him, but there is a gulf between us. This case is on ly his job, after all. But it is my future.

The Alfred courthouse is old, and the bathrooms are no exception. Caleb fini shes up at the long trough of the urinal just as someone comes to stand besi de him. He averts his eyes as the other man unzips, then steps back to wash his hands, and realizes it is Patrick.

When Patrick turns, he does a double-take. “Caleb?” The bathroom is empty, save the two of them. Caleb folds his arms, waits for Patrick to soap his hands and dry them with a paper towel. He is waiting, a nd he doesn't know why. He just understands that at this moment, he can't le ave yet, either.

“How is she today?” Patrick asks.

Caleb finds that he cannot answer, cannot force a single word out.

“It must be hell for her, sitting in there.”

“I know.” Caleb forces himself to look directly at Patrick, to make him unders tand this is not a casual reply, is not even a sequitur. “I know,” he repeats. Patrick looks away, swallows. “Did she . . . did she tell you?”

“She didn't have to.”

The only sound is the rush of water in the long urinal. "You want to hit me ?“ Patrick says after a moment. He splays his arms wide. ”Go ahead. Hit me.

"

Slowly, Caleb shakes his head. “I want to. I don't think I've ever wanted an ything as much. But I'm not going to, because it's too fucking sad.” He take s a step toward Patrick, pointing his finger at the other man's chest. “You moved back here to be near Nina. You've lived your whole life for a woman wh o doesn't live hers for you. You waited until she was skating over a weak sp ot, and then you made sure you were the first thing she could grab onto.” He turns away. “I don't have to hit you, Patrick. You're already pathetic.” Caleb walks toward the bathroom door but is stopped by Patrick's voice. “Ni na used to write me every other day. I was overseas, in the service, and th at was the only thing I looked forward to.” He smiles faintly. “She told me when she met you. Told me where you took her on dates. But the time she to ld me that she'd climbed some mountain with you . . . that was when I knew I'd lost her.”

“Mount Katahdin? Nothing happened that day.”

“No. You just climbed it, and came down,” Patrick says. “Thing is, Nina's te rrified of heights. She gets so sick, sometimes, that she faints. But she lo ved you so much, she was willing to follow you anywhere. Even three thousand feet up.” He pushes away from the wall, approaching Caleb. “You know what's pathetic? That you get to live with this . . . this goddess. That out of al l the guys in the world, she picked you. You were handed this incredible gif t, and you don't even know it's in front of you.”

Then Patrick pushes past Caleb, knocking him against the wall. He needs to g et out of that bathroom, before he is foolish enough to reveal the whole of his heart.

Frankie Martine is a prosecutor's witness-that is to say, she answers quest ions clearly and concisely, making science accessible to even the high scho ol dropout on a jury. Quentin spends nearly an hour walking her through the mechanics of bone marrow transplants, and she manages to keep the jury's i nterest. Then she segues into the mechanics of her day job-spinning out DNA. I once spent three days at the state lab with Frankie, in fact, getting her to show me how she does it. I wanted to know, so that I'

d fully grasp the results that were sent to me.

Apparently, I didn't learn enough.

“Your DNA is the same in every cell in your body,” Frankie explains. “That means if you take a blood sample from someone, the DNA in those blood cel ls will match the DNA in their skin cells, tissue cells, and bodily fluids like saliva and semen. That's why Mr. Brown asked me to take DNA from Fat her Szyszynski's blood sample and use it to see if it matched the DNA foun d in the semen on the underpants.”

“And did you do that?” Quentin asks.

“Yes, I did.”

He hands Frankie the lab report-the original one, which was left anonymou sly in my mailbox. “What were your findings?”