‘Well, it would-’
‘Yes or no, Sergeant. Isn’t that true?’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
‘And having collapsed in this unnatural position with his legs under him, might his arm have fallen in such a way to knock over the whiskey bottle we’ve heard about that was under the table?’
‘It might have, but-’
‘Is that a yes, Sergeant? Yes, it might have?’
Parini hated it, but he nodded. ‘Yes.’
Hardy took a breath. ‘All right, one last point. You’ve testified that the syringe and vial were left sitting on the coffee table. Would you describe for the jury in what way, if any, these implements show any evidence of a struggle, or haste, or violence?’
Parini studied his lap for a moment, then met Hardy’s eyes.
‘There was none.’
‘And the lamp in the room, Sergeant, had it been knocked over?’
‘No.’
‘Had the glass been knocked off the table?’
‘No.’
‘Was the table itself knocked over?’
‘No.’
Hardy nodded, walked over to the exhibit table, and picked up a handful of Polaroids. ‘Sergeant Parini, as we’ve seen, these photos show dozens of objects in this room, do they not? Was any one of them broken, or out of place, or disturbed in any fashion that you could tell?’
Parini’s scowl was profound. ‘No.’
‘So would it be fair to say that your opinion that this scene shows a struggle is based entirely on the position of the body and a whiskey bottle out of the place on the floor?’
Parini hesitated, but couldn’t think of anything else to bolster his testimony. ‘That’s right, I suppose.’
‘You suppose, I see. And you’ve already said that both the position of the body and the whiskey bottle can be explained without reference to any alleged struggle, isn’t that true?’
Hardy felt he couldn’t have scripted Parini’s reaction any more perfectly. The sergeant crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in the witness chair. Intransigence incarnate. Or, Hardy thought, bullheaded stupidity.
‘Well, counselor, it’s my opinion there was a struggle.’
‘Precisely,’ Hardy said. ‘That’s your opinion.’ Hardy hadn’t said a word about the safe, about all the evidence of Graham’s presence. There were a dozen areas into which he could have wandered, but only one that did his client any good. He’d damned well rebutted the argument that two grown men had left any sign of a struggle in the apartment.
This didn’t mean that Sal Russo hadn’t been cold-cocked from behind with the whiskey bottle and fallen like a lump – which Hardy believed was what had transpired – but that there was no evidence to support that theory. He’d leave it at that.
29
Sarah was next. The prosecution might have a secretly hostile witness in the female inspector, but she couldn’t do anything about the cards she held. They were excellent for Graham’s enemies. Directly after the midafternoon recess, after stretching and coffee or cigarettes, the men on the jury were especially unlikely to lose interest with a pretty woman on the stand.
She wasn’t in one of her cop suits, which were purposely formless and without style. Knowing that she’d be testifying, Sarah thought she should look as good as she could. So she was wearing a red silk blouse that showed no skin but shimmered tantalizingly over her breasts with each breath, with the beating of her heart. A short combed woolen skirt and low pumps flattered her good legs. Her hair was off her face, falling to her shoulders.
When she came through the bar rail, Hardy put a hand over his client’s arm, squeezed hard enough to draw blood. ‘Look down,’ he whispered. ‘She catches your eyes, you’re both done for.’
Inexplicably, perhaps ominously, Art Drysdale rose and walked to the center of the courtroom. Hardy caught a worried glance from Sarah but, like his client, could make no sign that it meant anything. He looked across to Freeman, who shrugged again, but beneath the nonchalance Hardy detected a note of concern. Could they have found out? Would Drysdale, in his homespun way, hang Sarah out to dry?
If so, there was no immediate sign. Drysdale quickly introduced himself to the jury and to Sarah and started in. As he was going along with it, Hardy began to see the logic behind choosing Drysdale for this witness. Endlessly affable, he would remain the same calm and reassuring inquisitor as he drove home lie after lie after lie.
Soma, on the other hand, by about the fifth lie, would have his adrenaline running. Unable to stop himself, he would speed up. And this was evidence to be savored, lingered over.
This was a lovely young woman putting stake after stake into the heart of a handsome man. It would have been a very difficult Q & A, even if she’d had no feelings for him, and no one would suspect that she did. The more her answers seemed wrung from her, the more devastating they would be.
‘Inspector Evans, you’ve had a great number of opportunities to interview the defendant personally, have you not?’
Sarah nodded, then spoke, her voice a tempered contralto. ‘Yes, sir, I have.’
‘When did you first speak with him?’
‘At his home, on the day after’ – she paused and searched for a neutral phraseology – ‘the victim’s death.’
‘That was a Saturday, was it not?’
‘Yes.’
‘And did you ask the defendant if he’d seen or talked to his father the day before?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘And what did he say?’
Sarah looked over at Graham. Hardy thought he saw a flush creeping into her complexion, but in a moment she was back at Drysdale. ‘He said no. He hadn’t seen or talked to his father the day before.’
And so it began. To get to most of the answers Drysdale had to use the same approach he’d used on the first question. ‘Did you ask?’ ‘What did he say?’
Throughout, Sarah managed to retain her composure. Hardy had coached her that her testimony would not ultimately affect the verdict. She should tell the truth, and he’d explain the falsehoods in his closing statement.
But Hardy had to admit that listening to this almost unbelievable litany of lies was more than disheartening. He prayed that the jury would buy his version of why Graham had lied, but perhaps he’d underestimated how much people valued the truth. He saw it in the eyes of almost all the jurors.
Say what one will about evidence, juries were often helped along in their deliberations by a perception of the kind of person who was charged with the crime. And Graham, with this testimony, looked very, very bad.
Under Drysdale’s patient and meticulous examination, the jury learned that Graham had lied to the police about being close to his father, about knowing what was causing Sal’s pain, about the number of phone calls he’d received from Sal, about the morphine supply and the doctor who’d supplied it. He’d lied about giving the shots themselves.
He’d lied to his own brother about the existence of the money, to his sister about the baseball cards.
He’d denied knowing about his father’s safe, professed ignorance of his own bank, to say nothing of his safe deposit box, denied that he and Sal had ever talked about money to pay for doctor bills.
It was four-twenty and Drysdale had to be getting to the end. Hardy couldn’t even remember any more lies that Graham had told him, although he was sure that given time he could come up with some. Finally he heard those magic words, ‘Your witness.’
Freeman reached over, around Graham, and touched Hardy’s sleeve. ‘Let me take her,’ he whispered.
Graham, joking, poked him with an elbow. ‘She’s mine,’ he said, and Hardy told him to shut up again.
Freeman didn’t let go. ‘I can undo it. Soma sat down for her and let Drysdale do it. You can sit down and let me.’
Hardy wasn’t sure what Freeman had in mind, but the old man had a well-deserved reputation in the courtroom. He shook things up, often with great success. Indeed, this was precisely the reason Hardy had agreed to let him sit in with them. And now he wanted to play.