Johnson looked through the mesh at the back of Ortiz’s head. Ortiz wanted something. He had a feeling about it. Something he wanted bad enough to break the rules. He’d wait and see what it was. If he could, he’d do what Ortiz wanted; then he would wait for his chance.
“Why you plant that dope, Ortiz?” T.V. asked when they were alone in the interrogation room.
“I didn’t plant any dope on you, T.V. My informant said you’d have it on you and you did. Anyone who watches television knows you’re a notorious pusher. Why wouldn’t you be carrying narcotics?”
“My lawyer gonna tear that story apart. You got no case on me.”
“Oh, yeah? When you talk to your lawyer, ask him how he’s going to do that. A court won’t order me to tell you the name of an informant. It’s the law, T.V.”
T.V. was silent for a moment. His eyes darted nervously from one side of the room to the other, as if looking for some way out of his predicament.
“You ain’t nothin’ but a crooked cop, Ortiz.”
“Try and prove that in court. You think a jury will take the word of a nigger pimp against mine? You’re gonna do ten hard years on this, T.V., unless…”
T.V. looked up from the floor. “Unless what?”
“Unless you tell the truth about what that white man did to your whore friend.”
“You still on that kick?” Johnson asked, surprised.
“The truth, T.V., will set you free.”
“How? How you gonna arrange for me to beat this rap?”
“I found the evidence, I can lose the evidence. You play ball with me, and this case will disappear like one of Houdini’s card tricks. But you fuck with me, and I’ll see you in the penitentiary doing hard time. My word.”
“Your word ain’t worth shit,” Johnson said in a sudden burst of anger.
“Maybe,” Ortiz said with a broad smile, “but it’s all you’ve got.”
Johnson stood up and walked to the far wall. He turned his back on Ortiz. It was quiet in the soundproof room.
“And suppose I tell you what I know? Is that all?”
“No. You tell the jury. You testify.”
“I gotta…I don’t know if I can do that.”
“Well, you better decide fast. The trial starts tomorrow and you don’t have much time.”
2
Afog bank drifted across the sand, obscuring the terrain of the endless beach. Monica stopped, terrified and alone. She turned slowly, looking for a landmark, but the fog had made subtle changes and she felt lost.
The fog lifted for a moment, and a figure, half-shrouded by the mist, floated away from her. She ran after it, lifting her legs high to avoid the sand that clutched at her ankles. She must not fall or the sand would suck her down.
The fog was drifting back and her quarry was slipping into the shadows. She ran faster, the pounding of her heart drowning out the cadence of the incoming tide. Faster. She was losing ground. Faster. She was falling, screaming, flailing helplessly as she hurtled downward into darkness.
Then the beach was gone, and the only part of her dream that remained was the beating of her heart.
Monica looked around the room. It was her bedroom and she was sitting up in her bed, drenched in sweat. The clock read sixA.M. She could try to sleep for another half hour, but she was too wound up.
Monica turned on the light and went into the bathroom. The face she saw in the mirror was pale and had bags under the eyes. Not good, she thought, but it would not get better if she did not get a decent night’s sleep.
She had been exhausted during jury selection, and her opening statement lacked the punch of David’s emotional declaration of his client’s innocence. Monica had watched the jurors as she outlined the evidence she would produce at trial. They had listened attentively, and she was convinced that they were responsible people who would convict Larry Stafford if they believed he was guilty. But would they believe that, or would David fool them?
Fool them. That was an odd way to describe the function of the defense bar, but Monica felt it was an accurate description. When they had lived together, David often talked of himself, self-deprecatingly, as a magician whose job it was to make people see what was not there and to conceal what was there. Monica believed that Larry Stafford killed Darlene Hersch, and she was afraid that David would make her evidence disappear with a wave of his verbal wand.
Monica opened the refrigerator and took out a container of orange juice. She put a kettle of water on the stove and tried to decide between cold cereal and frozen waffles. She settled for two pieces of whole-wheat toast.
Judge Rosenthal had been chosen to preside at the trial, and David did not object, even though Rosenthal had issued the search warrant. Jury selection had taken longer than expected because of the difficulty in finding twelve Portland residents who had not formed an opinion about the “Policewoman Murder.” Monica and David had agreed on a jury shortly before noon on the second day of trial. They had concluded opening statements after lunch, and she had presented the testimony of Dr. Francis R. Beauchamp, the medical examiner, before Judge Rosenthal had called a halt to the proceedings for the day.
The coffee was bitter and Monica grimaced as it went down, but she needed the caffeine. The toast was burned, too. Shit! She felt like smashing something. Not a good way to begin the most important day of the State’s case. She tried to calm down.
Monica was always tense when she was in trial, but it was worse when she tried a case against David. She was a highly competitive woman who enjoyed winning. When Monica tried cases against other attorneys, she thought of them strictly in business terms. She could never think of David that way. Even after all these years she was still a little in love with him, and she knew it, so she overcompensated whenever they were matched against each other, and ended up pushing herself harder than she had to, out of fear that her feelings for him would influence her performance.
There was an added reason for her anxiety this morning: Ortiz and his surprise witness. Last night, after court recessed, she had been making notes on Beauchamp’s testimony when Ortiz and Crosby came into her office. She was in a foul mood and wanted to leave, but the two policemen seemed excited.
“Beauchamp was pretty convincing, I hear,” Crosby said, settling into a chair. Dr. Beauchamp was a frustrated actor with a knack for describing fatal wounds that made them appear more revolting than a color photograph ever could.
“All Beauchamp established was that Darlene Hersch was struck in the abdomen and neck, then had her throat slit. He didn’t establish who did it,” Monica replied testily.
“I don’t think pinning this on Stafford is going to be a problem anymore,” Ortiz said with a confident smile.
“I’m glad to hear that, Bert. I thought we had problems.”
Ortiz’s face clouded over. “Why do you say that?” he asked.
“The case is flimsy. No offense, Bert, but all we have is your ID based on a few seconds’ observation after you had been struck on the head hard enough to require hospitalization. I’m beginning to think we may have moved too fast on this one.”
“You can stop worrying, because I’ve got the man who is going to do it to Mr. Stafford.”
Monica put her pen down and waited for Ortiz to continue. Ortiz had a tendency to be dramatic, and he paused to heighten the tension.
“Remember Ron called you when Stafford was arraigned and asked you to oppose bail?”
“Yes,” she said, turning toward Crosby. “You said that another officer was certain that Stafford had beaten up a prostitute and was going to try to find the police reports. I also recall being put off by you every time I’ve asked you about that report,” she added angrily. “I put myself on the line at the bail hearing because of your assurances.”