Desperate Measures

47

Stone and Dino met at their club, known to its members as the Club, and to hardly anyone else. The Club occupied a double-width townhouse in the East Sixties, and also had a garage, which allowed its members to enter the building discreetly.

They had a drink at the bar first and subtly gawked at their fellow members — senators, moguls, athletes, and the occasional movie star, in town to do publicity on his or her new film.

“I’ve got news,” Dino said, taking care not to be overheard.

“I hope it’s good news,” Stone said.

“It’s sorta good news,” Dino replied.

“How sorta?”

“About seventy-one percent.”

“Seventy-one percent of what?”

“Seventy-one-percent chance of being a hit.”

“A hit record?”

“A hit print. The crime scene people went back to Cilla’s apartment, which is still an official crime scene, and went over the kitchen with an extremely fine-tooth comb. They came up with a partial print on the wall phone.”

“That’s fantastic!” Stone enthused.

“Not yet.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, we don’t know yet when he touched it, but the computer that compares prints with our arrest database says the partial has a seventy-one-percent chance of belonging to Donald Trask.”

“Couldn’t it be encouraged to change that to ninety-nine percent?” Stone asked.

“You don’t encourage computers, and they don’t have a sense of humor, either.”

“Well, seventy-one percent is a lot better than it might be.”

“Yeah? Alfie Goddard is going to tell the jury that there’s a twenty-nine percent chance that the print belongs to one of the other millions in the national crime database, and that constitutes reasonable doubt.”

“Then put an expert on the stand who’ll testify that a score of seventy-one percent is a near-certainty, and there’s no room for reasonable doubt.”

“Then Alfie will put his expert on,” Dino said, “and when he gets through, the jury will be so screwed up that their own confusion will constitute reasonable doubt.”

“Well, at least it’s a hundred-percent certainty that it’s not my fingerprint,” Stone said with some satisfaction.

“Well... no, sorta,” Dino replied.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean they also found a print on the phone that the computer says is one hundred percent yours.”

“But...”

Dino raised a hand to stop him. “But you used that phone to call nine-one-one, didn’t you?”

Stone slapped his forehead. “I should have used my cell phone.”

“No, you did the right thing. Now they have a recording of the call with a time stamp on it, which, along with your fingerprint, backs up your story.”

“Well, I suppose that should be a relief,” Stone replied.

“Not really,” Dino said.

“Why is it not a relief?”

“Because Alfie is going to tell the jury that, while the partial has only a seventy-one-percent chance of belonging to his client, the police have a full print on the phone that has a hundred-percent chance of being yours. How do you think the jury is going to react?”

“They’re not going to convict me,” Stone said.

“Maybe not, but every defense attorney in a homicide case is looking for an alternative suspect to his client, and even if they won’t convict you, they won’t convict Donald Trask, either.” Dino put down his glass. “Let’s get some lunch, you’re looking a little pale.”

“I am not pale,” Stone protested, following Dino to a table where waiters held chairs for both of them.

“Just be glad you’re not on the stand testifying right now,” Dino said, sitting down and snapping open his heavy linen napkin and then addressing the waiting maître d’. “I’ll have the seared foie gras and the strip steak, medium rare.” He indicated Stone. “He looks as though he’d like just the clear broth.”

“I’ll have the bruschetta and the spaghetti carbonara,” Stone said quickly.

“If you’re sure you can keep it down,” Dino responded.

“You know,” Stone said, “if you had two detectives on this who were as smart as Muldoon, instead of just one, they would already have cleared this case.”

“Well, Calabrese is young, but he’s not stupid,” Dino said.

“I’ll tell you what they need to do,” Stone said. “They need to drag Donald Trask downtown and put him in a lineup so the Phoenix driver can point him out.”

“That’s a big risk because the driver has already said he probably couldn’t identify his passenger. If he fails to pick out Trask, then Alfie Goddard will have another point for the jury to consider. Why don’t you come up with an idea that helps us instead of Alfie?”

“Okay, how about getting the two bartenders at P. J. Clarke’s who were on duty that night at the lineup, too. They’ll fail to pick Trask because he wasn’t there that night.”

“Trask’s story is that he sat at a table, not the bar, and ordered his beer from there,” Dino said. “And not picking somebody out of a lineup is not incriminating.”

“How many waiters were working that night?”

“Twelve, and they were run off their feet that night.”

“They could have picked out you or me, if we had been there,” Stone said.

“That’s because we’re in there twice a week and we tip well,” Dino pointed out. “Trask says he’s there, maybe once a month. You know how many people go in and out of that joint in a month?”

“No, how many?”

“I’ve no idea,” Dino replied, “but Alfie Goddard will find out, and he’ll use it against us at trial.”

Their first course arrived, and Stone ate only half of his bruschetta.

“What’s the matter?” Dino asked, pointing at the other half of the bruschetta.

“I’m on a diet,” Stone replied.

Dino speared the remaining piece with his fork and ate it in two bites.

“You’re a pig,” Stone said.

“Yeah, and I’m a hungry pig,” Dino replied.

“You know, Dino, you sound like you’re more on Trask’s side than mine.”

“I’m on the side of the firm of Muldoon and Calabrese,” Dino replied, “and every time your name comes up, they look hungrier and hungrier.”