Baby, Would I Lie?

17

“This is so prejudicial, Your Honor,” Warren Thurbridge said, the strong vibrato of his rich voice barely under control, “I’m going to ask for a mistrial right now.”

Judge Berenice Quigley looked both irritated and baffled. “Counselor, the trial hasn’t begun. You can’t have a mistrial before the trial.”

“The police action this morning,” Warren said, “has poisoned the entire jury pool.”

Buford Delray snorted. “I would think, sir,” he said, his fat-boy envy of Warren Thurbridge’s accomplishments rising around him like heat waves, “I would think your own client’s activities have done all the poisoning around here. Though poison does seem one of the few methods he does not favor.” And Delray beamed fatuously upon his hanger-on, the British reporter, who beamed fatuously back.

They were in judge’s chambers, all seated, though Warren managed to sit in such a fashion as to look as though he were pacing, probably waving his arms, even possibly pushing distracted fingers through his hair. Across from this kinetic Warren, Judge Berenice Quigley, a heavyset, stern-looking woman in her mid-forties who was well known to have gubernatorial cravings in her future, sat at attention behind her large polished desk, trying to look evenhanded, though she was possibly the most prosecution-favoring occupant of the entire Missouri bench.

To Warren’s right sat prosecutor Buford Delray, looking like a butterball turkey that has just been basted, and beyond Delray, on a sofa off to the side, sat the British reporter, whose presence here Warren didn’t understand and certainly didn’t approve. He switched to that sore point, letting the original sore point rest a moment, saying, “Your Honor, I don’t see how we can have this conversation with a reporter in the room.”

“Mr. Fernit-Branca is not a reporter,” Delray said, voice dripping with condescension. “He’s a writer with The Economist, a respected London publication.”

“I know The Economist,” Warren growled, and glared at the Englishman. “Fernit-Branca,” he mused. “I know that name.”

“I suppose you’ve seen my byline,” the fellow said, and smiled fondly at Warren.

Judge Quigley said, “Mr. Delray asked that this one representative of the press be present. As he’s not a daily journalist, not an American, not taking notes, and not intending to print anything until the trial is completed, I saw no reason to refuse the request. There are precedents for such things.”

“In those precedents,” Warren pointed out, “the defense has been consulted in advance and has agreed.”

Judge Quigley’s face could become very cold. “I didn’t feel that was necessary,” she said.

“Evidently.”

“Now,” she went on, “as to this new charge.”

“Another thing I don’t understand,” Warren told her.

“It’s very simple,” Delray said, so smug you just wanted to slap his face. “Last night, a body was found in a car in Lake Taneycomo. It had been driven off a cliff on the south side of the river, east of Hollister. The body was identified as one Robert Wayne Golker, who had disappeared just after the murder of Belle Hardwick. Golker was a musician in your client’s employ. After his disappearance, Jones put it about that Golker had left to take a job in California.”

“Golker himself told people that,” Warren objected, “for weeks before he went.”

“If you have witnesses to substantiate that,” Delray said, smiling in mock pity, “I’m sure you’ll bring them forward. In any event, Golker had been drinking heavily, or perhaps had had a great quantity of alcohol forced on him. He was then hit on the head, placed in the car, and the car pushed off the cliff into the lake.”

“Drunk, he drove over the cliff,” Warren said, “and hit his head when the car hit the water.”

“If you have forensic witnesses to offer that theory,” Delray said, “I’m sure you’ll hire them to testify. In any event, Golker died within twenty-four hours of the death of Miss Hardwick. Golker and Miss Hardwick knew one another.”

“They worked in the same theater,” Warren said.

“Of course. And both knew Mr. Jones. It is the state’s contention that Mr. Golker learned of Mr. Jones’s murder of Miss Hardwick, either through something Mr. Jones said or some error he made, and that Mr. Jones then murdered Mr. Golker to protect his secret, attempting to make it look like a drunken accident.”

“It was a drunken accident.”

“If you have witnesses you can pay to suggest that possibility, I’m sure you’ll parade them before the court.”

Judge Quigley tapped her palm on her desk blotter, in lieu of a gavel. “All of that will be decided at trial,” she said. “There’s no need to discuss it here.”

“The discussion,” Warren said, “should be about the state’s methods this morning. A public arrest, grandstanding—”

Delray interrupted to say, “We take murder seriously in Taney County, Mr. Thurbridge.”

“They take grandstanding seriously in the Bar Association,” Warren told him.

Judge Quigley said, “Mr. Thurbridge, it was not Mr. Del-ray’s decision to arrest Mr. Jones; that was a police decision. If you have a complaint regarding the state police of Missouri, this is not the forum for that complaint.”

Warren looked thoughtful. “Will the Missouri Bar Association believe the state police would take such an action without prior consultation with the public prosecutor? Be interesting to see.”

“The point, Mr. Thurbridge,” Judge Quigley insisted, “is the current matter before the court, which is the capital case against Mr. Jones in the death of Miss Hardwick.”

“I don’t see how we can proceed,” Warren said, “not after this morning’s circus.”

“We can, of course, postpone, if you wish,” Judge Quigley told him. “You may request a change of venue, if you wish. If we postpone, and if the state requests that the matter of Mr. Golker’s death be added to the matter of Miss Hardwick’s death, I would probably be in favor.”

“Never!” Warren snapped. “If the Golker situation is so much as mentioned in front of the jury during the trial, you may count on it, I will be before the appellate court that day.”

“You will have your say, of course,” the judge agreed. “On another matter, if we decide to postpone, I’m sure the state will request that we revoke the bail under which Mr. Jones is currently free, and I would—”

Warren almost did leap to his feet at that point. “You wouldn’t revoke bail!”

“Given the fact that there are now two serious and savage murder accusations against Mr. Jones, were we to have a delay of several weeks during which he could decide to flee the country — I believe Mr. Jones is a fairly wealthy man — I would be very much inclined to revoke bail, yes.”

Warren considered, keeping himself calm. “You want to go forward, as though nothing had happened.”

“That might be best,” the judge told him. “I’ll let you decide.”

“Perform a little circus in front of the potential jurors and then go on as before. If I agree with that, Ray’s bail continues.”

“Of course.”

“If I refuse, you’ll lock him up until the trial.”

“To assure his appearance, yes.”

Warren said, “Your Honor, you don’t appear to be interested in even the appearance of evenhandedness here.”

“Be careful, Mr. Thurbridge,” she warned him. “Whatever treatment you may be used to in other states, we in Missouri can be quite severe in the face of wild accusations. Take care.”

Warren gave her a level look. “In a well-publicized and important case like this,” he said, “I think we’ll all be careful, don’t you?”

She shrugged that off. “What’s your decision, Mr. Thurbridge?”

Warren brooded. Judge Quigley looked stern and unmoving. Buford Delray looked like the cat that raped the canary. In the little silence preceding Warren’s capitulation, the Englishman, Fernit-Branca, said, “Fascinating, American justice, all in all.”