27
Inside the old YMCA building that served now as the district attorney’s offices, I pulled at my lower lip to expose the gap in my teeth. Beth, sitting next to me, grimaced at the sight. Mia Dalton leaned over her desk to get a better view.
“It’s gone, all right,” said Mia Dalton. “What’s the brown gunk in the hole?”
“A dressing. I accidentally removed the scab and exposed the bone.”
“Does it hurt?”
“It did, like someone jabbing a red-hot knife into my chops. But not anymore. My dentist took care of that.”
“He any good?” said Detective Torricelli, standing behind Dalton’s desk. “I might be in the market for a molar masher.”
Detective Torricelli was short and round, with the pug nose and swollen eyes of an angry porker. He had looked at my display with enough interest, and he was running his tongue along the inside of his cheek with enough determination to indicate that he might indeed have dental problems of his own.
“Oh, he’s terrific, Detective, absolutely,” I said, putting on my most trustworthy expression. “And painless, too.”
“Painless?”
“Oh, yes. Painless. Such gentle hands. You should give him a try.”
“Tell me why I don’t swallow the painless part, Carl?” said Torricelli.
“Because you are a cynic with an irrational fear of dentists.”
“I might be a cynic,” said Tommy Torricelli, “but ain’t nothing more rational than my fear of dentists.”
“Do you mind if we get down to business?” said Beth. “We want to know if you’ve given any consideration to a plea offer for François.”
“What are you looking for?” said Mia Dalton.
“Something that would take into account the constitutional violation that underlay his prior conviction,” said Beth, her voice stellar with righteous indignation, “that would take into account the years he spent in jail as a result of the unjust conviction only a few days ago reversed by Judge Armstrong, that would recognize the price he has paid and allow him to walk out of jail with a sentence of time served.”
“Yeah,” I added, “something like that.”
As Beth spoke, Mia Dalton began hunting around her office, as if she had misplaced an item of great importance.
“What are you searching for?” said Beth with some impatience.
“The reporters that must be hidden here. Or why else would you be giving me a speech.”
Torricelli snorted. Beth’s features collapsed with disappointment.
“You’re not going to let him plea his way out of jail?” she said.
Mia leaned back, crossed her arms. “Look at my face.”
We both did. Mia Dalton was short and stocky, with the sharp eyes of a fighter. She had worked her way up the ladder in the district attorney’s office, from municipal court bench trials to homicide, based not on her flirtatious manner, because it wasn’t, or her pleasing personality, because she was more sandpaper than silk, but instead on her sheer willpower and dogged determination to prevail. The cops all hated working for her, because she worked them as hard as she worked herself, but they still fought to have her assigned to their cases, because she would invariably give them a win. In the hard-knuckled world of criminal law, nothing succeeded like success, and Mia Dalton was still rising. She was honest and smart and generally intolerant of fools, which was why I always felt a little uncomfortable in her presence.
“Do I look like François Dubé’s fairy godmother?” she said.
“I don’t see a wand,” I said.
“Then there you go. Second-degree murder, twenty years, out in thirteen, three of which he already served. Let me know within forty-eight hours.”
I turned to Beth and raised an eyebrow.
She shook her head. “I can let you know right now. He won’t accept it. He wants out now.”
“Then I guess we’re going to try this puppy,” said Dalton, not visibly displeased. “In all the time I’ve known Victor here, we’ve never gone up against each other in front of a jury. It should be interesting.”
“We’ll need to examine the physical evidence as soon as possible,” I said. “That is, if you haven’t lost it after all these years.”
“It’s all there,” said Torricelli. “Good to go.”
“You both are welcome to examine it at your leisure,” said Dalton. “Everything that was let in in the last trial will be presented here.”
“Except for Seamus Dent,” I said, “your crucial eyewitness.”
“Not so crucial, but still, nice job on that, I must say. I was almost impressed.”
“We aim to please.”
“And, Beth, your argument was quite solid. I spoke to the boss about you. We have an opening in the law department if you’re interested.”
“And leave Victor? I couldn’t do that.”
“Silly me, I thought leaving Victor here was the main inducement of the offer.”
“Speaking of Dent,” I said. “What’s happening with Detective Gleason?”
“Nothing sweet,” said Torricelli. “You lit him up but good, Carl. They took away his gun, put him on the front desk at the auto squad until Internal Affairs finishes its investigation of the shooting. Don’t know if he’ll weather it. The dead guy’s mother just filed a civil suit against the city. Wrongful death.”
“Of course she did.”
“I was shocked when I saw the pleading,” said Mia Dalton, a smile slipping onto her face. “Shocked that your name wasn’t on it, Victor. You’re slipping. Time was, you would have been the first one knocking at her door, contingency fee agreement at the ready.”
“I’m getting old,” I said. “Or maybe I believed the detective when he said he had no choice. He tried to do something good for that kid, Dent. It didn’t work out, but still.”
“Without the eyewitness,” said Mia, “we’re going to concentrate more on the motive evidence. The prickly divorce. The fight over custody and assets. The girlfriends.”
“Excuse me?”
“Detective Torricelli has been busy. Your client had a number of affairs. It will be detailed in our trial memo.”
“You care to give us the names now?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Darcy DeAngelo?” said Beth. “The girl from the restaurant?”
Dalton’s eyes widened.
“He told us about her,” said Beth. “He told us everything, including that he didn’t kill his wife.”
“Well, it won’t be the first time,” said Torricelli.
“The first time for what?” I said.
“The first time a client pulled your chain,” he said.
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“Anything else?” said Mia Dalton.
I took a document out of my briefcase, gave it a quick scan, and then tossed it across her desk. “I have a question about this.”
She looked it over. “An inventory of what was seized during the initial search of Mr. Dubé’s apartment. The search was done with the defendant’s consent and incident to a valid arrest. What of it?”
“What happened to my client’s stuff?”
Torricelli stepped forward and took hold of the document. “Everything we wanted, we took and inventoried,” he said. “Besides the gun, the bloodied shirt, the bloodied boot, there wasn’t much else of interest. We just left it there. I assume your sleazeball client took care of it.”
“Apparently the landlord sold it off,” I said. “But some stuff appears to be missing, even in your initial notation of what you found in the apartment. There’s computer cables but no computer. There’s a full-size video camera, with a tripod and lights, but no videotapes. And there are no toys.”
“Toys?”
“Yes, toys.” Mrs. Cullen had mentioned toys outside the courtroom, but none had been found in Dubé’s apartment. Not even kid toys for the daughter.
“I don’t know about no toys,” said Torricelli. “Maybe he wasn’t a toy kind of guy. Maybe he pawned off what he had to raise biscuit for his legal beagles.”