Even before beginning that work—his bread and butter—he saw one possible gap in Terry’s alibi. Arlene Stanhope had seen Frank Peterson getting into the white van with Terry at three. June Morris had seen Terry in Figgis Park, covered with blood, at around six thirty—the girl’s mother had said the weather was on the local news when June left, and that pegged it. That left a gap of three and a half hours, which was more than enough time to drive the seventy miles from Cap City to Flint City.
Suppose it hadn’t been Terry Maitland Mrs. Stanhope had seen in the parking lot of Gerald’s Fine Groceries? Suppose it had been an accomplice who looked like Terry? Or maybe just dressed like Terry, in a Golden Dragons cap and shirt? It seemed unlikely until you factored in Mrs. Stanhope’s age… and the thick glasses she’d been wearing…
“Are we done here, gentlemen?” Gold asked. “Because if you really intend to hold Mr. Maitland, I have a great deal to do. High on the list is speaking to the press. Not my favorite thing, but—”
“You lie,” Samuels said sourly.
“But it may draw them away from Terry’s house, and give his children a chance to get indoors without being hounded and photographed. Most of all, it will give that family a little bit of the peace you have so recklessly stolen from them.”
“Save it for the TV cameras,” Samuels said. He pointed to Terry, also playing for some judge and jury. “Your client tortured and murdered a child, and if his family is collateral damage, he himself is responsible.”
“You’re unbelievable,” Terry said. “You didn’t even question me before you arrested me. Not one single question.”
Ralph said, “What did you do after the speech, Terry?”
Terry shook his head, not in negation but as if to clear it. “After? I got in line with everyone else. But we were pretty far back, thanks to Debbie. She had to use the bathroom, and wanted us to wait for her so we’d all be together. She was gone for a long time. A lot of guys also broke for the johns as soon as the Q-and-A was over, but it always takes the women longer, because… well, you know, only so many stalls. I went down to the newsstand with Ev and Billy and we hung out there. By the time she met us, the line was all the way out into the lobby.”
“What line?” Samuels asked.
“Do you live under a rock, Mr. Samuels? The autograph line. Everyone had a copy of his new book, I Told You I Would. It came with the price of the conference ticket. I’ve got mine, signed and dated, and will be happy to show it to you. Assuming you haven’t already taken it out of the house with the rest of my stuff, that is. By the time we got to the autograph table, it was past five thirty.”
If so, Ralph thought, his imagined gap in Terry’s alibi had just closed to a pinhole. It was theoretically possible to drive from Cap to Flint in an hour, the turnpike speed limit was seventy and the cops wouldn’t give you a second look unless you were doing eighty-five or even ninety—but how would Terry have had time to commit the murder? Unless the look-alike accomplice had done it, and how did that work, with Terry’s fingerprints everywhere, including on the branch? Answer: it didn’t. Also, why would Terry want an accomplice who looked like him, dressed like him, or both? Answer: he wouldn’t.
“Were the other English teachers with you the whole time you were standing in line?” Samuels asked.
“Yes.”
“The signing was also in the big room?”
“Yes. I think they call it the ballroom.”
“And once you all had your autographs, what did you do then?”
“Went out to dinner together with some English teachers from Broken Arrow we met while we were standing in line.”
“Out to dinner where?” Ralph asked.
“Place called the Firepit. It’s a steakhouse about three blocks from the hotel. Got there around six, had a couple of drinks before, had dessert after. It was a good time.” He said this almost wistfully. “There were nine of us in all, I think. We walked back to the hotel together, and sat in on the evening panel, which had to do with how to handle challenges to books like To Kill a Mockingbird and Slaughterhouse-Five. Ev and Debbie left before it was over, but Billy and I stayed to the end.”
“Which was when?” Ralph asked.
“Nine thirty or so.”
“And then?”
“Billy and I had a beer in the bar, then we went up to the room and went to bed.”
Listening to a speech by a noted mystery writer when the Peterson boy was snatched, Ralph thought. At dinner with at least eight other people when the Peterson boy was killed. Attending a panel discussion on banned books when Willow Rainwater claimed to have taken him in her cab from Gentlemen, Please to the train station in Dubrow. He must know we’ll go to his colleagues, that we’ll track down the teachers from Broken Arrow, that we’ll talk to the bartender in the Sheraton lounge. He must know we’ll check the hotel’s security footage, and even the autograph in his copy of the latest Harlan Coben barnburner. He must know these things, he’s not a stupid man.
The conclusion—that his story would check out—was both unavoidable and unbelievable.
Samuels leaned forward over the table, his chin jutting. “Do you expect us to believe that you were with others the entire time between three o’clock and eight o’clock on Tuesday? The entire time?”
Terry gave him a look of which only high school teachers are capable: We both know you’re an idiot, but I will not embarrass you in front of your peers by saying so. “Of course not. I used the john myself before Coben’s speech started. And I went once at the restaurant. Maybe you can convince a jury that I came back to Flint, killed poor Frankie Peterson, and returned to Cap City in the minute and a half it took me to empty my bladder. Think they’ll buy it?”
Samuels looked at Ralph. Ralph shrugged.
“I think we have no further questions now,” Samuels said. “Mr. Maitland will be escorted to the county jail and kept in custody until his arraignment on Monday.”
Terry’s shoulders slumped.
“You intend to go through with this,” Gold said. “You really do.”
Ralph expected another explosion from Samuels, but this time the district attorney surprised him. He sounded almost as weary as Maitland looked. “Come on, Howie. You know I have no choice, given the evidence. And when the DNA comes back a match, it’s going to be game over.”
He leaned forward again, once more invading Terry’s space.
“You still have a chance to avoid the needle, Terry. Not a good one, but it’s there. I urge you to take it. Drop the bullshit and confess. Do it for Fred and Arlene Peterson, who’ve lost their son in the worst way imaginable. You’ll feel better.”
Terry did not draw back, as Samuels might have expected. He leaned forward instead, and it was the district attorney who pulled away, as if afraid the man on the other side of the table had something contagious that he, Samuels, might catch. “There is nothing to confess to, sir. I didn’t kill Frankie Peterson. I would never hurt a child. You have the wrong man.”
Samuels sighed and stood up. “Okay, you had your chance. Now… God help you.”
22