Dead In The Water

CHAPTER 11

Stone sat her down and talked to her. "I don't have time to be gentle about this or pull any punches, so here's your position as I see it. This Sir Winston Sutherland has it in for you, apparently because he thinks it will help him politically. He somehow engineered an open verdict in the coroner's jury, which gave him a legal basis for charging you with Paul's murder. Now you're going to be tried, and there's nothing I can do to stop it."

"Surely any reasonable jury will acquit me," Allison said. "I don't really have anything to worry about, do I?"

"Allison, I don't know if we're going to have a reasonable jury. The judge picks the panel, and no objection from me is going to stand; the jury may be all or mostly black, and they may or may not be more likely to convict a white person, I don't know. All I know is that this is a capital offense."

"You mean I could get the death penalty?"

"Yes, and the way things apparently work on this island, if you're convicted there's no other penalty you could expect to get."

Allison stared at him, her mouth open. "Are you serious?" she managed to ask.

"Perfectly serious. What's more, there's no lengthy appeals process available; the only appeal is to the prime minister, and he apparently acts on appeals very quickly."

"How quickly are we talking about?"

"The appeal must be lodged within twenty-four hours after the trial ends, and he normally acts on it within twenty-four hours after that."

"Let's look at the worst case," she said. "I'm tried on Monday-how long is that likely to last?"

"The way things are done here, no more than a day, possibly two."

"Then if I'm convicted on Monday, the appeal has to be filed on Tuesday, and the prime minister would either grant or deny it on Wednesday. If he denies it, then I would be… How do they do it?"

"Hanging."

"I could be hanged…when?"

"The day after the prime minister acts."

She swallowed hard. "So by a week from Thursday I could be dead?"

"Worst case."

She put her elbows on the table and her face in her hands."What can we do?"

"Put on the best defense we can, in the circumstances. I had wanted to bring in top barrister from London, but the judge has precluded that by making Leslie Hewitt the counsel and me his assistant,"

"Isn't there anything else we can do?"

"There are two ways we can go: I've already said that we have to put on the best defense that we can, and I've got somebody in New York working on that now. He's leaving for the Canaries right away to see what he can find to help us there. Did you make any friends while you were there? Someone who might testify as to your relationship with Paul?"

"No, not really; we pretty much stayed to ourselves. What's the other thing we can do." "Well, we know that Sir Winston somehow finds it politically desirable to try you On this charge; what we might be able to do is make it politically undesirable for him to convict you, or, if he should, to make it desirable for the prime minister to uphold your appeal."

"How do we do that?"

"By letting the press know about your predicament."

"On this island? What press?"

"Not here; in New York, in London; wherever people read newspapers or watch TV."

"You want me to become famous?"

"Yes."

She shook her head. "I just don't see how that's going to help."

Stone spread a hand as though he were tracking a headline. "BEAUTIFUL BLOND AMERICAN GIRL LOSES HUSBAND AT SEA! CONNIVING POLITICIAN CHARGES HER WITH MURDER IN BACKWATER ISLAND NATION!!! It's called marshaling public opinion; it might bring pressure to bear."

"How do we accomplish this?"

"I'll call New York and get a public relations firm involved. Can you afford that?"

"How much?"

"I'm no expert at this, but I should think fifty to a hundred thousand dollars would go a long way toward accomplishing what we want. Woodman and Weld would hire and instruct them, and you'd have to pay their fees, too. Will the insurance money cover it?"

"Yes," she said, but she looked doubtful.

"What's the problem?"

She shrugged. "I just don't know if I want to be that kind of celebrity. I'm really a very private person."

"Allison, let me put this to you as strongly as I can. If we don't do something you're going to be a very dead private person. In St.Marks, Sir Winston holds all the cards; he's in control. But he can't control the rest of the world. This island subsists mostly on tourism; if he wants to become prime minister he's not going to want somebody telling the world's tourists that if they come to St.Marks they're liable to be arrested, tried, and hanged on spurious charges. That translates into a lot of empty hotel rooms and a catastrophic loss of revenue for the government."

She wrinkled her brow. "Why don't I just get the hell off this island? There must be a way."

"Didn't you listen to His Lordship this morning? If you try that and they catch you, it's tantamount to conviction; they could hang you before the week is out. Even if you made it off the island, they could come after you, maybe extradite you; then you'd be worse off than you are right now; you'd be guilty."

She shrugged and said nothing, but she seemed to be imagining something terrible.

"Will you let me get this PR campaign in gear?"

"All right," she sighed.

"Good. I suggest you get a hundred thousand dollars sent to Bill Eggers at Woodman and Weld as soon as possible. Nobody's going to want to extend credit to you in the circumstances."

"All right; I'll call my bank in Greenwich; the insurance money is supposed to be deposited there soon."

"Allison, speaking of insurance, did you mention to the investigator that you had been charged with the murder of the insured? That might make them reluctant to pay."

"It never came up," she said.

"Hello, Bill, it's Stone."

"What's happening?"

"Allison Manning is sending you a hundred thousand dollars from her Greenwich bank tomorrow."

"How nice! Do I have to do anything for it?"

"I want you to get ahold of the hottest PR firm you can find and have them start a campaign in the media to get Allison Manning released."

"I believe I get the picture," Eggers chuckled. "Barbaric islanders persecuting American blonde?"

"You're a quick study, Bill."

"How much does she want to spend?"

"I told her I thought fifty thousand would do the job; spend more if necessary.By this time the day after tomorrow I want this island overrun with wild-eyed reporters, photographers, and television crews. See if you can get 60 Minutes interested, but tell them they have to move fast; she goes on trial on Monday, and she could be strung up by the middle of next week. It's this Sunday night, or nothing."

"They'll want as much background on her as possible."

"Call Bob Cantor." He gave Eggers the number. "He's researching her husband; tell him to copy you on anything he finds. Paul Manning was a well-known writer, so lots of people should have heard of him. Try to be careful what you release to the PR people; don't let anything unfavorable get into the mix."

"I get the picture."

"The firm has got a lot of Washington connections, right?"

"Right."

"Find out who her congressman is in Greenwich, get ahold of him and both Connecticut senators and tell them they're about to lose a voter. Get them to get on to the State Department and tell them an American abroad is being railroaded. There's no consulate here, but there's bound to be one on a neighboring island. Have them issue the strongest possible protest to the St.Marks government."

Eggers was laughing now. "Why don't we get the president to send a cruiser down there to drop anchor in the harbor, with her guns pointed toward the capitol building?"

"Send a fucking aircraft carrier, if you can."

"Are there any communists in the St.Marks government? That always helps, especially in the Caribbean."

"Let's assume there are, for the moment; we can always apologize later."

"Call me tomorrow."

"Right." Stone hung up and walked downstairs, where Thomas was getting the bar ready for lunch. "Thomas," he said, "you'd better prepare for some business. Maybe we can even make up for the New York blizzard."

"Sounds good to me," Thomas said, laughing.