Open and Shut

“Maybe he was back for one of the school breaks.”

Philip smiles his condescending smile, as if I'm a backwoodsman trying to understand the big city. “I pulled a few strings and checked with Immigration. Their records show he was in London for fourteen straight weeks surrounding that date. If the date is right, then it certainly is not Brownfield.”

This is another piece of distressing news placed on top of the pile I already have. Laurie and I were both sure it was Brownfield, and that his adamant denial came from his involvement in some criminal plot. If he was out of the country, then he loses his connection to the picture and to the date my father got the money. My face must show my disappointment and frustration, because Philip pounces on it.

“Can I make a suggestion?” he inquires. He doesn't do humble real well.

“Of course.”

“Since we don't know what or who is behind this, I suggest that you eliminate the potential dangers.”

“And how should I do that?”

“By giving up the murder case. It can't pay too well anyhow and in any event you no longer have any need for money. And it might be a good idea to stop looking into this photograph. Just in case.”

I'm really annoyed, especially by the suggestion that I drop the Miller case. Does he think this is a video game? Can he not realize and respect that a real life is at stake?

“Philip, if you don't mind my saying so, that is ridiculous. I'm going to see this through to the end. My client is on trial for his life.”

“He's already lost one trial. And you know as well as I do how little chance you have to turn that around. Hell, when I was in the prosecutor's office, I would have begged to handle a case like this.”

I'm sure that's true, since publicity was the only reason Philip was there. I'm about to answer him, but he's still going. “Besides,” he says, “it's Nicole's life that has been threatened, Andrew.”

“Actually, it hasn't. Mine has. But I get your point, and I have already suggested that Nicole go someplace safe until this is over. Maybe you can convince her that I'm right.” We're talking about Nicole as if she's not there, and when Philip is around, she effectively isn't. It makes me sad that the disappearance of the Nicole I knew happened on my watch.

Then Philip delivers his roundhouse right. He tells me that I'm not thinking clearly, that if I were I'd realize that whatever I discover could have a negative impact on my father's memory.

“My father never broke a law in his life,” I say.

He walks over and wraps his arms around my shoulder. I probably dislike shoulder wrapping even more than hugging. “Now look, we're all family here. I'm on your side. But Andrew, your father didn't earn the two million dollars delivering newspapers. If he had he wouldn't have kept it a secret and left it untouched all these years. You've got to face that fact.”

Philip is right about that much, of course, and after he leaves I try to bury that truth in a mountain of paperwork. I don't succeed. So I try and get some sleep, since tomorrow is my first session with Hatchet in his ballpark, and I had better be ready, because he and Wallace certainly will be. But I don't succeed at that either; I can't stop thinking about my father never touching that money.

I can clearly remember back to a time when I was eleven. My bedroom was right off the kitchen, but it was past midnight and my parents believed I was asleep. I wasn't, and the strange tones in their voices, particularly my father's, kept me awake with my ear to the wall.

They were discussing my request, made earlier that day, to go to overnight camp in the upcoming summer. It did not seem an unreasonable request, my two best friends had gone there the year before, and they were returning. But camp cost over two thousand dollars, plus all the equipment and clothing, and it was this financial commitment that my parents were discussing.

“You've got to tell him, Nelson,” my mother said. “He's a mature young man, he'll understand.”

“I know he will,” my father replied. “But I'm just not ready to give up on managing this.”

My mother pointed out that they simply did not have the money now, and that in any event summer camp was an extravagance, not a necessity. Better to save the money for college, which she said was just around the corner.

My father was adamant. His voice cracking, he talked about wanting me to have this experience, wanting me to have every experience he was never able to have. He would somehow figure out a way to make it work.

The next morning, to my undying shame, I did not withdraw my request. I had the time of my life at camp that summer, and I know now that my father, so desperate for me to go that he was in terrible pain, had millions of dollars that he refused to touch.

Money that he did not make delivering newspapers.

HATCHET'S GAVELPOUNDS THE CASE OF NEWJersey v. William Miller to order. Present for the prosecution are Richard Wallace and an assortment of Assistant DAs. At the defense table are myself, Kevin Randall, and Willie Miller.

This is the first time I have ever seen Willie outside of prison. He's wearing prison clothing and has his hands cuffed behind him, but I can still tell that he's enjoying this tiny taste of almost real life. I will get him normal clothing to wear when there is a jury present; prison clothing makes him look like he belongs there.

For some reason they have chosen to put us in courtroom three, which is the most modern and by far the least impressive of the six courtrooms in the building. It is as if the designer was taken to a typical Holiday Inn room and was told, “Give me this.”

There is not much room for the public and press, which may be the intent behind choosing it. Hatchet likes a calm and controlled courtroom; if he could I think he would conduct the trial in a plastic bubble. Personally, I like commotion and disorganization. In this case especially, I want the jurors on their toes and willing to think outside their box.

What I do like about the room is that since it is fairly small, the lawyers are close to both the judge and jury. There is a good chance for interaction, for the little asides that can have a disproportionately large effect. Playing to the jury is going to be difficult with the vigilant Hatchet in charge, but I'm still going to try.

Hatchet gets the names of the attorneys on the record, and then says, “Before we go through these motions, is there anything we need to discuss?”

“Your Honor,” I say, “I would request that my client's handcuffs be removed whenever he is in the courtroom. It is unnecessary, uncomfortable, and prejudicial to the jury.”

Hatchet looks around. “Do you see a jury here, Mr. Carpenter?”

“No, Your Honor. But I expect there will be.”

“Motion denied.” Not a great start.

I persist. “Your Honor, could we at least have his hands cuffed in front of him? I am advised that it would greatly lessen the discomfort, while not providing too serious a physical danger to the members of the court.”

“Mr. Wallace?” Hatchet inquires.

“No objection, Your Honor.”

“Very well. Guard, please adjust the handcuffs so that they are in the front.”

The guard comes over and does just that. When he is finished, Willie leans over and whispers to me. “Thanks, man. You're better than the last lawyer already.”

I just nod as Hatchet shuffles through some papers. “We'll start with the change of venue motion. Mr. Carpenter, I've read your brief. Do you have anything to add to it?”

I stand up. “Yes, Your Honor. We believe that the prosecution, in speaking out to the press about their view of the new trial as the result of an inconsequential technicality, has prejudiced the jury pool, and-”

Hatchet interrupts me. “That's all in your brief. I asked if you had anything more to add.”

“I'm sorry, Your Honor. The brief adequately represents our position, though perhaps understates the passion with which we hold it.”

“I'm suitably impressed,” says Hatchet. “Mr. Wallace?”

“Our response papers are complete, Your Honor.” Wallace is the type who would go up to high school teachers and thank them for a fair and well-thought-out final exam. “We believe that cases with far greater public awareness have managed to empanel impartial juries without much difficulty.”

“I am inclined to agree with that,” Hatchet says.

“Your Honor,” I jump in, trying to stem the tide. “Our papers demonstrate media coverage both inside and outside this community in great detail. We feel-”

He interrupts me. “ ‘Great detail’ is an understatement. I would appreciate it if you would be more concise in the future. But look at the bright side, Mr. Carpenter. Every motion I deny gives you a future grounds for appeal.”

“We would rather get a not guilty verdict in the first place, Your Honor.”

“Then present your best case. What's next?”

“The matter of Robert Hinton, Mr. Miller's so-called counsel in the first trial,” I say.

Hatchet nods and takes off his glasses. He's heard all about this, so he looks at Wallace.

“This can't be true, can it?”

Wallace replies, “I'm afraid our information shows that it is, Your Honor. We cannot find Mr. Hinton, but there is no record that he was ever a member of the bar.”

“How could that happen?”

“We're still looking into it. But it appears that Mr. Miller hired Mr. Hinton independent of the court, and that his credentials were not examined.”

Hatchet turns to me. “Is this consistent with your understanding of the facts?”

I take a quick look at Willie before I answer. “Yes, Your Honor, but our major concern is not with my client's representation, or lack of it, in the first trial, as terrible as it was. That verdict has already been set aside.”

Hatchet seems surprised to hear this. “Then exactly what is your concern?”

Here goes. “Your Honor, we believe this is evidence that a conspiracy existed at the time of the murder, and continues to this day, so as to protect certain powerful interests. We would request substantial leeway to deal with this matter at trial.”

“Do you have any other evidence of this conspiracy?” Hatchet is obviously skeptical, as I knew he would be.

“We are developing it, Your Honor.”

Wallace chimes in. “Your Honor, granting the defense's request would be providing them a license to conduct a time-consuming fishing expedition. The state would suggest that when and if the information is developed that it be presented to the court for admissibility.”

I expect Hatchet to agree with Wallace, but instead he turns to me. “Mr. Carpenter, was Mr. Hinton paid for his services?”

“Not by my client, Your Honor. Hinton represented himself as a public defender, assigned by the court. My client, having never before been charged with a crime, did not have the sophistication to realize that he was the victim of a conspiracy.”

Hatchet seems very troubled by this. “Mr. Wallace, we have here an extraordinary circumstance in which a fraud was perpetrated on the court in a capital case. Since we can safely assume that most lawyers, even fake ones, have at least some financial self-interest, then it seems quite credible to surmise that Mr. Hinton was put up to this by a person or persons, other than the defendant, prepared to pay for his services.”

“It is a long jump from that to evidence of the defendant's innocence,” Wallace says.

Hatchet nods. “That's true, and Mr. Carpenter, I am not going to allow wild Colombian death squad testimony.” This is a reference to the defense mounted in the Simpson case. “But I will be inclined to grant some leeway. We'll take it on an issue-by-issue basis.”

“Thank you, Your Honor.” It's not a victory, but it's a hell of a lot better than I expected, and Wallace looks a little surprised.

Hatchet continues moving things right along, turning to Wallace. “I believe there are DNA issues we need to address?”

“The state has submitted its intentions in this regard. Additional tests are being conducted right now.”

Hatchet nods. “Mr. Carpenter, if you are requesting a Kelly-Frye, I suggest you do so as soon as possible.”

“Your Honor,” I reply, “we respectfully point out that we cannot begin to decide whether to challenge evidence until we see that evidence.”

I've already decided not to ask for the Kelly-Frye, but by delaying announcement of that decision I might give us more time to prepare for trial.

Wallace will have none of this. “Your Honor, the Kelly-Frye, as the defense knows, is designed to challenge the technology itself, independent of the specific case. The results will not be in until almost the date of trial, and if the defense waits until then to decide whether to seek the hearing, the trial date you've set will almost certainly be delayed.”

I chime in. “In the interests of justice, the defense is willing to allow a delay, though we would prefer that our client not have to sit in a jail cell while the prosecution gets its act together.”

Wallace is getting annoyed, which is what I want, but Hatchet refuses to let the back-and-forth continue.

“Mr. Carpenter, your request to delay your decision is denied. Are you requesting a Kelly-Frye or not?”

“No, Your Honor.” Wallace whirls around in surprise. “But the defense reserves its right to challenge the evidence when presented.”

“No objection, Your Honor,” Wallace agrees.

“Very good. What's next?”

“There is the matter of bail, Your Honor,” I say.

“In a capital case?”

“The prosecution has not officially announced its intention in that regard.”

“That's just a formality,” Wallace says. “The paperwork is being prepared now.”

“My client has already served seven years in prison for a crime he did not commit. Every single additional day is an intolerable imposition.”

“Motion for bail denied. Anything else?”

Before Wallace or I have a chance to reply, Hatchet slams down his gavel. “See you at jury selection.”

Kevin and I say our goodbyes to Willie and make plans to meet with him and discuss some specifics of the case. After he leaves, Kevin says, “The judge wasn't as tough as you led me to believe.”

“Just wait,” I say. “Just wait.”

NEW JERSEYHAS ALWAYS BEEN A STATE WITH AN identity crisis. It is essentially divided into three areas: the part near New York, the part near Philadelphia, and everything in between. That middle part includes both fashionable suburban areas and lower-to middle-class towns and farmland. It is in the economically depressed farmland where Denise McGregor was raised, so it is where I am going today.

The trip down the Garden State Parkway is bumper-to-bumper because of beach traffic, compounded by the fact that it seems like there are tollbooths every twenty feet. I switch off to the New Jersey Turnpike and the drive goes much more smoothly. It gives me time to think.

I've learned that Denise's father still lives down here, but I've decided not to call ahead and prepare him for my arrival. It is likely that he will be disinclined to speak to me, since he no doubt believes that I represent his daughter's killer, and I think I have a better chance if I take him by surprise. I really have no preconceived notions of what I might find out from him, but if my theory is correct that Denise's murder was not random and served a purpose, then the more I can find out about her the better.

I soon find myself on a small, mostly dirt road in a very depressed area. I pass a series of small shacks, all with animals and trucks out front. I finally pull up to a ramshackle trailer, which bears the address I have for Denise's father. I'm glad that it's not part of a trailer park, since that seems to be where tornadoes always pick to strike. I don't have time to ponder the meteorological significance of this, because I see an elderly man rocking gently on a rocking chair in front of the trailer.

Sitting next to the man is a large German shepherd, quiet but eyeing me as if lunch just arrived. I pull my car up fairly close and get out, leaving the door open so that if the dog chases me I might have an escape route.

I approach the man, who shows no signs of even being aware that I am there.

“Hello, I'm looking for Wally McGregor.”

“He's the blind guy in the rocking chair.”

I look around to see if the person he is talking about is there, and then I realize with an embarrassed flash that he's talking about himself, and that he's already made an idiot out of me.

“You're Wally McGregor?”

He laughs. “I can't fool you, can I?”

I return the laugh. “No, I'm much too sharp for that. My name is Andy Carpenter.”

“What can I do for you?”

“I want to talk to you about Denise.”

I can see him tense up when he hears Denise's name; there is no statute of limitations on emotions when a parent loses a child.

“Why?”

I've been debating the idea of evading the truth, of not telling him that I represent Willie until I've gotten information out of him. In the moment, though, I can't do it. He has the right to know, as well as the right to throw me out if he so chooses.

“I represent the man that the police say killed her. I believe they have the wrong man.”

He doesn't respond, just rocks slightly back and forth, thinking it through.

“I understand the feelings you must have,” I say. “But I would very much appreciate your talking to me.”

“I heard about the retrial … Mr. Wallace called me. I can't say I'm happy about it.”

He thinks some more, and I wait. “But I want the real killer to be punished, and I can't see how talking to someone can hurt the chance of that.”

“Thank you.”

He invites me into the trailer for a cup of coffee, and I follow him in. His blindness certainly doesn't interfere with his ability to get around, and he gets the coffee up and brewing in a matter of maybe three minutes.

While he's doing so, I look around the place. There are some pictures on the wall. One of them is of a young woman, perhaps twenty-one years old, sitting on a horse. It is the first photo I have seen of Denise McGregor that wasn't taken by the coroner, and it makes the fact of her brutal death all the more horrifying.

“She was a very beautiful young lady,” I say.

Obviously, Wally can't see where I am, so he asks, “Which picture are you looking at?”

“Denise sitting on a horse.”

Wally nods. “She was beautiful, that's for sure. But that's not Denise … that's her mother, Julie. Everybody says how much they looked alike.”

“Oh. Is Julie-”

“Alive?” he interrupts. “Can't say as I know. She left me and Denise when Denise was only a year or so old. Julie wasn't the family type; she couldn't be tied down. So when she found herself stuck with a husband and a child, well, she took off and never looked back.”

Wally McGregor lost his wife, his daughter, and his sight, yet he has the knack of making a visitor feel completely comfortable. It's a great knack to have.

“And you raised Denise by yourself?”

He laughs. “Once I lost my sight, it was more like she raised me. There was nothing Denise couldn't do.”

“Do you have any idea what she was working on at the time she was killed?”

“Sure don't. But Denise used to call me and read me all her articles once they got in the paper. I got such a kick out of that. She was some writer.”

I had read her articles, and he is right. She was a terrific writer.

“And you have no idea why anyone would want to kill her?”

“No. Everybody loved Denise … it don't make no sense … you'd have to ask Miller why he did what he did.”

“So you think it was him?”

He shrugs. “I just know what the police told me. But if you're looking for a reason for Denise to have died, there ain't none.”

He shakes his head and relives the senselessness of it for the millionth time. “Damn, there just ain't none.”

I can see that Wally is starting to get upset, and I give him time to let the pain subside. I know people that have lost children, and they tell me the pain never goes away, it's there twenty-four hours a day, but that after a while you develop techniques that can help to mask it. Wally manages to do that, and we have a conversation that steers clear of Denise.

Later I ask him about Edward Markham, and he tells me that they never met, not even at the funeral. Edward sent a large floral arrangement and a condolence letter, but did not show up personally. Wally doesn't seem particularly upset about the slight; Edward never really had any importance to him. Denise, in fact, had never mentioned Edward.

It's almost time for me to leave, and Wally knows he hasn't given me what I need. He brings it up himself. “So you think it could have been someone else that killed her?”

I nod. “That's what I think. It's not what I know.”

“If you find out something, I want to know. Promise me that.”

“I promise,” I say. It's one I'm going to keep, no matter how this turns out.

It's too late to go back to the office, so I head home. There's a pile of personal matters to attend to, not the least of which is dealing with my father's money. It's financially crazy to just let it sit in the low-interest bonds, but I'm somehow not inclined to touch it yet. Maybe a shrink can tell me why that is, and I can certainly afford Sigmund Freud if he's available. And if I had the time.

Nicole has warmed up considerably, and she greets me with a glass of Chardonnay and a kiss. It feels nice, and I appreciate it, but I know that I'm not going to have the time to pay attention to her, and it gives me a pang of guilt. I talk to her about it and she understands, so after dinner I retreat to the den with Tara and get back to work.

I have to wade through the latest of Kevin's briefs, which argues that the death penalty should not be considered in this case. The main point he makes is the obviously unfair way it has been administered throughout the country. Not only has racial bias been clear, but the number of death row inmates that have been exonerated is staggering. In Illinois alone, over a fifteen-year period, more death row inmates were exonerated than executed.

Once again, Kevin's work is professional and well reasoned, a clear, concise indictment of the death penalty, and I make very few changes. Unfortunately, Kevin and I both know that it is once again destined for failure, at least as far as Hatchet is concerned. He has long been a pro-death penalty judge, and with an election coming up next year we're not likely to change his mind.

I've also given Kevin the assignment of preparing our witness list, as well as the job of going over the witness list that Wallace has provided us. As is the norm, Wallace has given us a voluminous list, with every conceivable person listed on it. There is no way he is going to call even ten percent of these people, but he wants us to use our limited time and resources looking into people that will not appear in court. It's not terribly nice, but it's the way the game is played. I've told Kevin to come to me or even to Willie with anyone on the list whose role in the case we're not sure of, so that we can be prepared for any eventuality.

So much to do, so little time. The trial date is approaching like a freight train, and we are in deep trouble. I fall asleep around two o'clock in the morning, without having accomplished much of anything except making myself even more tired.

THE ALARM GOES OFFAT SIX A.M. DID I go to school to be a lawyer or a dairy farmer? I take Tara for a quick walk, then shower and head for the office.

I'm in full work mode now, able to totally concentrate on the matter at hand. I find that when I'm in this mind-set, I can drive somewhere and not remember anything about the trip. It amazes me that I don't have accidents, but my instinct must take over.

This morning my mind is in total clutter, trying to juggle a million things that have to be done and examined. Kevin is coming in with a jury consultant for a meeting. I've never had much use for them, always trusting my instincts, but Kevin has convinced me to keep an open mind about it. After that, I'm going over to depose Victor Markham at his lawyer's office.

I arrive at my office at eight-thirty, which is too early for Edna to have gotten in, so I'm surprised when the door is unlocked. I'm also concerned that someone may have broken in during the night, but I look around quickly and don't see anything amiss.

A moment later I don't see anything at all, as either a fist or a baseball bat hits me on the side of the head. The rest is more than a little blurry, but I hear myself scream in slow motion, and fall to the ground.

I look up and see a man wearing a ski mask, and since it hasn't snowed in the office in quite a while, I instinctively cover up. That proves to be a good move, as he kicks me in the stomach and then punches me again in the chest and head.

My mind registers the fact that there is no one around to help me, that this monster can continue to kick and punch me for as long as he wants. Fortunately, he stops after a few more well-placed shots, all of which send shooting pains through my body. He leans over and snarls through his mask.

“You'd better learn how to take a warning, asshole.”

I try to respond, but another kick silences me.

“Next time you're dead, asshole. Dead.”

He moves away and out the door, a beautiful, blurry sight if ever I've seen one.

After a few minutes, I stagger to the phone and call the police. I ask for Pete Stanton and tell him what happened. Then I slump down to the floor and wait for the cavalry to arrive.

The first soldier in the door is Edna, who screams when she sees me. She's no beauty early in the morning either, but apparently I look worse. She responds to the crisis terrifically, getting cold rags to apply to my bruises and helping me to the couch.

The place is soon swarming with paramedics and police. The paramedics want to take me to the hospital, but I refuse. Nothing seems to be broken, although my entire body hurts like hell, and I just can't afford to give up the time. Instead they take me into the back office and attend to me, while the police survey the scene.

The paramedics finally finish, and I drag my bruised and bandaged body into the outer office. The only police officer left is Pete, who is on the phone. He signals for me to wait, mouthing that he's on an important call with his office.

I stagger to the couch and sit down, and after a few minutes Pete hangs up. Rather than come talk to me, he makes another call. I'm not paying much attention, until I hear part of it.

“I've got to stop at the cleaners, and I don't know if I'll have time to get the car washed. So figure me for about seven. Right. Goodbye.” I've been waiting for this?

He hangs up the phone and turns to me. “Okay. Talk to me,” he says.

“Talk to you? About what? About some seven-foot-eight, four-hundred-pound monster who beat the shit out of me? I don't think so. I admit it seemed important at the time, but it pales next to the possibility that you won't have time to get your goddamn car washed. That really puts everything into perspective.”

He laughs; this episode doesn't seem to concern him as much as it does me. He tells me that I've got to answer some questions, as well as provide a description of the assailant.

“I didn't see him, Pete. The son of a bitch was wearing a ski mask.”

“There's nothing you can give me? A distinctive voice, maybe?”

I search my recollection, but come up with almost nothing. “He's got big feet.”

“Well now we're getting somewhere.”

I'm really annoyed. “Look, my house has been broken into, I've been threatened, and now I've been beaten up in my office. Any chance you're seeing a pattern, Sherlock?”

“Andy, I see this every day. It happens all the time, and you defend most of the scumbags who do it.”

I shake my head. “This is not supposed to happen to me. I'm a lawyer, for Christ's sake. When I piss people off they're supposed to stand up and object.”

Pete asks me if I see anything missing in the office, or if there seems to be anything that the intruder had gone through.

There is no evidence of that, and I tell him so.

“Hmmmm,” he hmmms.

“What are you hmmming about?”

“Obviously, the intruder was here just to do what he did, beat and threaten you.”

“That makes me feel much better.”

“What time did you get in?”

“Early. Eight-thirty.”

“Are you always the first one in?”

“No. When I'm due in court I sometimes don't come in until the afternoon.”

“Somebody's been watching and following you, Andy. Any idea who it could be?”

“No.”

“Maybe another pimp looking to take over your stable?”

“Kiss my ass.”

“Believe me, right now it's a lot better looking than your face.”

Pete asks me a lot more questions, and I answer them as best I can. Well, maybe not quite that completely, since I neglect to mention the parts about my father and the money and the picture. My shrink and I are going to have a lot to talk about.

Pete heads back to the office, promising to put his best people on the case. He also makes a reference to our next meeting, which is when he will be testifying as a key witness in the Miller case. It'll be my job to attack Pete in cross-examination, which won't be easy.

As Pete's leaving, Laurie arrives. She hasn't heard about the attack, and the first thing she sees is my battered face.

“Oh, my God. What happened?”

“Sort of a pretrial conference,” I say. Hey, I used to sleep with her. I've got to act brave.

She touches my arm, and I can't help it, I wince in pain. “No touching. Please, no touching.”

She's okay with that. I knew she would be.

I call Nicole and tell her what happened, since I'm afraid she'll hear it through the media. She's concerned and upset, though less so than when the house was broken into. I renew my suggestion that she move out until the danger has passed, and again she refuses.

Kevin shows up soon after and shows a hell of a lot more sympathy than Laurie had. We soon get back into the details of the case, and I almost forget the pain I'm in. Almost, but not quite.

The jury consultant shows up for our meeting. Her name is Marjorie Klayman and to my chagrin I take an immediate liking to her. My father brought me up to believe in the old school of trial lawyering, and jury consultancy is part of the new school. Marjorie is in her thirties, unpretentious in looks, dress, and attitude, and totally self-confident in her ability to help me pick a jury.

She explains what she calls the “science” of the process, which consists of conducting polls among sample jury pools, probing with sophisticated questions about attitude and lifestyle. The responses are then correlated with those people's attitudes toward information about the specific case. I'm not knocked out by what she has to say, but then again how many times can I be knocked out in one day? I hire her on the spot, and give her one week to get back to me. This is generous; jury selection begins in ten days.

I ask Laurie to join me for the Victor Markham deposition, and we head over to the office of one Bradley Anderson, Victor's lawyer. I bring Laurie with me because she's smart, and in this case two heads are better than one, especially since one has just recently been punched in.

Bradley Anderson is one of the few attorneys I've ever met for whom the moniker “Esquire” fits. His office is spacious and ornately furnished in an elegant prewar building in Ridge-wood. The conference room would seem more appropriate for a state dinner than for a criminal law deposition, but that is what we're here to conduct.

There is a fruit plate set out for us to sample, along with cheese and crackers, except they are so thin and delicate that they're probably called something a lot classier than “crackers.” There is also a silver coffee urn with cups smaller than your average test tube.

Victor feigns graciousness when we arrive, even expressing sympathy for my bruises. It is as if he has absolutely nothing better to do than have a little chat with us over coffee. Bradley is distant but polite, though my impression is that he feels like he's soiling himself by talking to us. Bradley explains that he does not usually do criminal law, but Victor is a dear friend, so if we can move this along …

Once the stenographer is ready, I ask Victor some preliminary questions about his business and family. Actually, I beat these questions to death with boring minutiae, and I can feel Laurie staring daggers at me, wondering what the hell I am doing.

What I am doing is trying to annoy Victor Markham, to get him out of his glossy little shell and dig under his skin. I accomplish this when I ask him for perhaps the fifth time about his son, Edward's, grades at Fairleigh Dickinson. Victor snarls his response and Bradley threatens to terminate the deposition. I threaten to bring Victor in front of Hatchet for unresponsive-ness. Now that I've achieved the warm tone I've been looking for, it's time to get to the matter at hand.

The goal of a deposition, at least one of an adversarial witness, is not necessarily to accumulate information, and certainly not to trip him up. Rather it is to get the witness under oath, and thereby lock him or her into answers. Those answers then serve as a basis for cross-examination, and the witness cannot come up with a new story when painted into a corner.

“How well did you know Denise McGregor?”

“I didn't know her very well,” Victor says. “But Edward hoped to marry her.”

“Were they engaged?”

“No, I don't believe so.”

“You don't know for sure whether your own son was engaged?”

“He was not engaged.” He's annoyed, snapping out his words.

“Do you know what story Denise was working on when she died?”

“Of course not.”

The questioning moves to the night of the murder. “Why did Edward call you from the bar?”

“As I would assume you can imagine, he was terribly upset. He always turned to his father in times of crisis. He still does. I encourage it.”

“Where were you at the time?”

“At the club.”

“Which club might that be?”

“Preakness Country Club. We have been members for many years.”

“How did he know you were there?”

“It was a Friday night. I am always at the club on Friday nights.”

“So when Edward called you, what did he say?”

“He told me where he was, and that his girlfriend had been murdered. He asked me to come there immediately.”

“And you did?”

He nods. “I did.”

I take out the picture that I found in my father's house. “Can you please point to yourself in this photograph?”

Bradley has obviously been primed for this. He jumps in instantly and advises Victor not to answer on the grounds that it is not relevant to the Miller case. No amount of badgering on my part, not even the threat of Hatchet, can get him to change his mind.

My last question for Victor concerns the current whereabouts of Edward, since Laurie has been unable to locate him.

Victor smiles. “He's in Africa, on one of those safaris. I'm afraid he's simply not reachable.”

I return the smile. “Then we'll just have to talk to him on the stand.”

TEN DAYSFLY BY AS IF THEY ARE TEN MINUTES, AND THE next thing I know the bailiff is intoning, “In the matter of the people versus William Miller, the Honorable Justice Walter Henderson presiding …”

“William” sits at the defense table in a new suit I had Edna purchase for the occasion, and he looks terrific. He also looks calm and collected; he's been a lot lower, and faced a lot tougher, than this and he thinks the momentum has turned upward. He's not thinking very clearly.

There is a special feeling, an excitement combined with queasiness, that hits me every time a trial is about to begin. The only thing I can liken it to is former Boston Celtics great Bill Russell saying that no matter how long he played, he still threw up in the locker room before every game. I don't think throwing up on the defense table is the right way to get on Hatchet's good side, so I control the impulse.

For me trials are about strategy and confrontations. Strategy is one of my strong suits, but in real life I don't do well with confrontations, so I have to deal with that in another way.

My father used to lecture me that a trial is serious business, not a game, but I have come to disagree. For me a trial and the investigation surrounding it is in fact a game. I turn it into one, so that I can handle and thrive in the midst of all these confrontations. In sports, every play between the participants is a confrontation, but I can deal with that because that is the purpose of the game. Once I can put trials into the same category, it becomes depersonalized and I'm home free.

Jury selection is especially difficult and dangerous for the defense in a capital trial. That is because each juror must be death-qualified, which is to say that he or she must be willing to vote for the death penalty if it seems warranted. Such juries are by definition more conservative and more favorable to the prosecution.

The first prospective juror is brought in for Wallace and me to question. Marjorie is at my side as we go through the tedious process, made more so by Hatchet's insistence on throwing questions in of his own.

Number one is a doorman who claims to know nothing about the case. He also claims to have an entirely open mind, to have no predispositions about the police or the justice system, and to be willing to consider capital punishment if called upon to do so. This is clearly a guy who'd rather sit in the jury box for a few weeks than open doors. Marjorie's okay with him, but Wallace challenges, and he's excused.

It takes us two days to empanel a jury of twelve and two alternates. There are seven whites, four blacks, and one Hispanic, five men and seven women. All twelve of them claim to have a completely open mind. I don't think I've met twelve people in my entire life with completely open minds, but I'm reasonably satisfied with this group. Marjorie is positively euphoric, but if she thought we had a bunch of turkeys, it would mean she did a poor job.

The real action in a trial begins with the opening statements. The prosecutor stands up and gives the jury a road map of the trial. He tells them what they are going to hear, what he is going to prove, and what it will all mean. His goal is to sound confident and to convince the jury that he has the goods on this guy, then his task will be to deliver a case that makes good on the promises he's made in the opening statement.

Richard thanks the jury for their willingness to serve, then talks for a while about their obligations under the law. It's all straightforward, boilerplate stuff, until he finally turns to Willie Miller.

“So he got drunk,” Wallace says, pointing to Willie. “Happens to a lot of us, right? But what do you and I do when we have too much to drink?”

He laughs to himself as if remembering past nights at the frat house.

“Well, I have to admit, I fall asleep. Knocks me right out. But I'm a little unusual in that regard. Other people, maybe even some of you, get a little wild, have some fun, maybe even say a few things they shouldn't.”

Most of the jurors are nodding along with him. This is starting to feel like an AA meeting.

Wallace turns serious. “But not Willie Miller. No, Willie handles his liquor a little differently. Willie kills people. And on June 14, 1994, Willie Miller killed Denise McGregor. She was a hardworking, intelligent young woman, a loving daughter, full of life, who is not here today because Willie Miller spent a night drinking and killing.

“Your job is a very serious one, have no doubt about that. But in this case it is not a particularly difficult one. That is because we will prove everything I am telling you about that night. Every single, ugly moment of it. We will show you who Willie Miller is, and what he did. We will present overwhelming physical evidence to you, and you will hear from an eyewitness to the crime. That's right, an eyewitness. Someone saw Willie Miller standing over the body, moments after committing the crime. She will come in here and tell you what she saw. And you will have no doubt that she is telling the truth.

“On behalf of the state, we will prove that Willie Miller is a cold-blooded murderer. We will prove it not just beyond a reasonable doubt; we will prove it beyond any doubt. Thank you.”

Wallace finishes just before lunch, and Laurie, Kevin, and I have two hours to decide whether I should give my opening statement now or wait until after the prosecution's case is finished and it's time to present ours.

I include Willie in our discussions, as I always do with my clients. It makes them feel better, even though I never listen to anything they have to say. Willie thinks I should speak now, since he's just been made to look like a monster by Wallace, and he thinks I'll provide him some vindication. Laurie feels I should hold off, that Wallace didn't go as far as he might have, and that we'll need our best ammunition after his case in chief, which she expects to be devastating. Kevin feels I should go now, since otherwise the jury will think I have nothing to refute what was just said.

My decision is to speak now, since it feels like there could be a steamroller effect if I don't. I want the jury to understand that there is a serious, other side to this argument, and if I don't tell them so right now, I'm afraid they won't get it.

When court reconvenes, I tell Hatchet that I want to make my opening statement now. I stand and face the jury.

“I'm going to start by answering a question that must be on your minds. You must be wondering why, if this murder was committed so long ago, and if Willie Miller was captured so soon after the murder, he is just being brought to trial now. Well, the truth is, he was tried once before, and found guilty. That verdict was overturned, and we're back here.”

I can see Wallace almost getting up, trying to decide if he should object. This is information he should want included, and he doesn't know why I'm bringing it up.

I continue. “Actually, I shouldn't say that we're back here. I didn't represent Mr. Miller last time. In fact, his lawyer was not really a lawyer. He was a fake, brought in to ensure that Mr. Miller would lose. It is convincing evidence of a conspiracy that resulted in-”

“Objection!” Wallace leaps to his feet.

“-my client losing seven years of his life-”

“Objection!” Wallace is going nuts, and Hatchet slams down his gavel.

“Bailiff, remove the jury. I'll see both counsel in chambers.”

I've accomplished my task, the jury has been shaken up and hopefully will now expect to see a fight between two competitive positions. It's put our side on a more equal footing, which is all we can hope for at this point.

Back in chambers, Hatchet doesn't come down on me as hard as I expected. Wallace complains that I cannot go making wild charges about alleged conspiracies, but Hatchet still wants to rule on it step by step as we go along. He knows I'm trying to develop evidence on the fly, and he may well be feeling guilty about rushing me to trial. He says that I can talk about a conspiracy and frame-up in my opening statement, but before I can give further specifics I have to clear it with the court. It's a reasonable decision and elevates my opinion of Hatchet.

Wallace is displeased with the result of this conference, but he and I both know he will be upset often during the trial. My style as a defense attorney is often to ridicule the prosecution's case, to make it look not worthy of serious consideration by the jury.

Lawyers, even those who know it is crazy to personally identify with their respective positions, have a tendency to become their case during the course of a trial. If their side loses, then they lose, and the key for the attorney is to allow objectivity and passion to coexist in his or her mind.

As I try to make Wallace's case look bad, he will have a knee-jerk reaction that I am making him look bad. He's a professional, and it won't destroy the level of his work, but it will be tough to deal with, and occasionally he will erupt in anger. It's unfortunate that I have to bring this out in him, but for me it's just part of the game.

When we return to the courtroom, I continue with my statement to the jury. “The interesting question that you will face is not whether or not Willie Miller committed this terrible crime. He simply did not, and the evidence will bear that out. The proof to which Mr. Wallace refers does not exist, no matter what he claims. He will present a manufactured proof, no doubt one in which he sincerely believes, but an illusion nonetheless.

“But the really fascinating part is why Willie Miller stands before you at all. Because there has been no accident here, no case of mistaken identity. Nothing in this case has happened by chance. Willie Miller has been framed … cleverly, diabolically, and ruthlessly. It is a frame-up that began the night of the murder, in fact well before that night, and which has continued to this very moment.

“Denise McGregor died tragically that night, but Willie Miller is a second victim, and the extent to which he has been victimized will astonish you.”

I take a drink of water from my glass at the defense table, and nod very slightly to Kevin's cousin, sitting in the first row behind the defense table, right where we planted him. The word “astonish” was the trigger, so he gets up and walks the few feet to me, leaning in and pretending to whisper something in my ear. I nod, and he leaves the courtroom through the rear doors.

I turn again and face the jury. “When I finish, the prosecution is going to be presenting their case. I already know what it consists of, and take my word for it, the most significant part of that case is an eyewitness.”

I stop, as if seriously considering the import of such a witness.

“An eyewitness. Sounds pretty momentous, doesn't it? The word almost sounds as if a drumroll should precede it. The average person thinks, well, he might as well plead guilty, because they've got an …”

I beat a drumroll with my hands on the railing of the jury box.

“… eyewitness.”

The jury laughs, which is what I'm looking for.

“Every moment of every day, we are eyewitnesses to what happens before us. Moments ago, a man got up from that chair, spoke to me, and left the court. Since there's not much else to do around here, I assume most of you watched him. You were eyewitnesses to it.”

There is a slight murmuring among the jury, as Kevin reaches under the defense table and picks up a large piece of paperboard. He hands it to me, and I bring it over to the jury, after first registering it as a defense exhibit.

The board has six photos on it of six different men. They all look vaguely similar and are all dressed alike. Any one of them could be Kevin's cousin, as long as no one was watching closely.

“One of these pictures is of the man that just spoke to me. I wonder if any of you could identify him. And if you were to try, would you also be willing to say, ‘I am so sure that was him, that I would send someone to be put to death, based on my certainty.’ ”

The look on their faces clearly reflects the fact that they have no idea which photo is the correct one, and they are afraid that they will actually be called upon to try and pick it out.

“I think not. And remember, there was no shock or excitement connected with this. You were paying attention, but nobody had a knife, no one was bleeding to death in front of you, and you weren't afraid for your lives. Do you think that would have made your job easier, or harder?”

A pause for effect. “I'd guess a lot harder.”

Many of the jurors are nodding along with me.

“Tough, huh? And just think, you were all …”

Again I beat a drumroll on the jury railing.

“… eyewitnesses.”

I don't go on much longer, mainly because I don't want to screw up a good thing. Also, Wallace hasn't gotten deeply into the specifics of the evidence to be presented, so I don't have to go into how I will refute it. If I will refute it.

When I walk back to the defense table and sit down, Willie looks positively giddy. I'm afraid he's going to give me a high five and a chest bump, but he manages to stifle the impulse. I'm going to have to talk to him about looking impassive. My guess, however, is that Lee Strasberg couldn't teach Willie to look impassive.

Hatchet decides that it's too late in the day to start calling witnesses, so he adjourns. As we are filling our briefcases, with the jury already dismissed for the day, Wallace comes up to me, a slight smile on his face.

“Upper right,” he says.

“Excuse me?”

He points to the board with the six pictures on it. “The guy who was in the courtroom is the photo in the upper right hand corner.”

The truth is, I have no idea which is the correct picture. I look to Kevin, who has heard Wallace and who obviously knows which one his cousin is. Kevin nods. Wallace is correct.

I smile. “Lucky for me you're not on the jury.”

He returns the smile. “You got that right.”

MY WAY OF WORKINGWHILE A TRIAL IS in progress is to have nightly meetings with the rest of the defense team, so that we can prepare for the next day's court session. I sometimes have these sessions at my house, but in deference to the Nicole/Laurie situation, we're meeting at the office.

I have to assume that I am still in danger; the people that broke into our house and who attacked me in the office may well strike again, perhaps with more deadly results. I probably should get a bodyguard, but the stubborn side of me is resisting it.

The ironic thing about the threats is that I'm not sure what they are warning me against. It might well be the Miller case, except for the fact that it is illogical to think a lawyer would just give up a case in mid-trial, especially since he would just be replaced by another lawyer.

Besides, if I were someone looking to get Willie reconvicted, I would want this to move along as fast as possible. The more delay, the more attention that is brought to the trial, the more chance to find exculpatory evidence.

The other possibility, of course, is the photograph. I haven't exactly been relentless in hunting this down; all we have done is ask Markham and Brownfield if they are in the picture. If that is enough to trigger this violent reaction, the secret behind the picture must truly be incendiary. Then why is the picture so bland?

I'm still not positive that there's a connection between the picture and the Miller case; but I feel in my gut that there is. If I'm right, it means I have to step up my investigation into the picture before it's too late and Willie is back on death row. And if I do that, I'll likely be in more danger and more in need of a bodyguard. And round and round, “Like the circles that you find, in the windmills of your mind.”

The meeting is short and to the point. Kevin and Laurie give me their impressions of the opening arguments (mostly positive). Kevin correctly believes that we have an uphill struggle ahead of us, and that we should be shooting for a hung jury. Therefore, with Marjorie's help he has isolated two jurors who are most likely to be on our side. One, a twenty-four-year-old African-American woman, is a college teaching assistant. The other, a thirty-four-year-old Hispanic, is an account executive at a direct mail advertising agency. Kevin feels that whenever possible I should speak directly to them, and I agree that, within limits, I'll do it.

Laurie tells me that she has located Betty Anthony, the widow of Mike Anthony, the newspaperman who we believe is the fourth person in the photograph. I had requested that she not make contact with Betty, since I want to do that myself. All I have to do is find the time.

The next morning, Wallace calls his first witness, Detective Steven Prentice. The prosecution always builds their case from the bottom up, establishing all the facts in a way that is incontrovertible. Prentice was a young patrolman at the time of the murder, and he was the first one to respond to the 911 call that Edward made.

“Can you describe the scene when you first arrived?” asks Wallace.

Prentice nods. “Ms. McGregor's body was lying facedown in the alley behind the bar. There was a significant amount of blood surrounding her.”

Wallace introduces some horrific pictures of Denise and the murder scene to buttress what Prentice had said. “And what was the first thing that you did?”

“I cordoned off the area. There were people around, curiosity seekers, and I wanted to make sure that they did not tamper with anything before the detectives arrived.”

“Did you see a murder weapon anywhere?”

Prentice shakes his head. “No.”

“Was there anyone present that you considered a suspect?”

“No, but there was an eyewitness there. She was pretty shaken up. I put her in a room upstairs from the bar to wait for the detectives, so that she could give them a statement.”

“How long did it take for the first detective to arrive?” Wallace asks.

“About ten minutes.”

“And who was that?”

“Detective Pete Stanton.”

Wallace has him explain that once Pete showed up, his main function was over. Prentice obviously did his job professionally and by the book, and there is a limited amount I'll be able to get from him on cross-examination. I start by showing him police photographs taken of the rest of the alley on the night of the murder.

“Detective Prentice, are you married?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Would you be nervous if your wife told you she was going to hang out in this particular alley tonight at around one A.M.?”

“I would advise her not to,” he says.

“Why is that? Do you consider it dangerous?”

He tries to evade the question. “There are a lot of places that are not very safe at night.”

“Thank you for that. Is this one of those places?”

“Yes, I would say so.”

“Was there a homeless problem in the area at the time?”

“I believe there was, yes.”

“In your experience, is one of the reasons for the proliferation of the homeless mental illness?”

“Objection. Mental illness is not an area of the officer's expertise.”

I reply, “I am simply asking the witness to speak to his beliefs based on his experience.”

“Overruled. You may answer.”

“I believe mental illness is one of the causes of homeless-ness, yes,” says Prentice. “There are others as well.”

“Was the back door to the bar locked?”

“No. The bartender said it was always left open when the bar was open.”

“So anyone walking through the alley could have entered the bar through that back door?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

“And if they did, would the first inside door they come to be the ladies’ room where Denise McGregor was?”

“There is a storage closet first and then the ladies’ room.”

“So there was nothing about Willie Miller's job which gave him a unique access to that room?”

Wallace objects. “It is beyond the witness's direct knowledge to make conclusions about the defendant's unique access.” Hatchet sustains the objection.

“But anyone could have entered?”

“Yes.”

“Would you say the alley at the time you arrived was clean?”

“Well, there was a great deal of blood.”

“I understand, but I mean in addition to the evidence of the murder. Did the alley look as if it had been scrubbed recently?”

“No, I wouldn't say so.”

“So the scene was already dirty. Trash, food from the restaurants, animal waste?”

“Yes.”

“Detective Prentice, you said the first thing you did was cordon off the scene. Why did you do that?”

“To prevent people from tromping around on the evidence and contaminating it. To preserve the evidence.”

“Were you successful at that?”

“Yes, I believe that I was.”

“Did any people enter that specific area?”

“Not after I was there. I made sure everyone stayed clear of the scene, so that the forensics people could do their work.”

“I'm not an expert on this kind of thing, so perhaps you can tell me … is there a law of contamination that says it can only take place after the police arrive?”

“Of course not,” he says. “Contamination can take place at any time.”

“Well, was anybody on the scene before you arrived?”

“Yes.”

I feign surprise. “Who?”

“Well, Edward Markham, his father-”

I interrupt. “Edward Markham's father was there? Was this some kind of a family outing?”

“No, he had called his father as well as the police.”

Under prodding, Prentice is forced to admit that there were also a group of people from the bar that had been on the scene.

“So there were at least a half-dozen people walking around that alley before you got there?” I ask.

“Yes,” he concedes.

“Just hanging out, contaminating away?”

He won't concede that, but he doesn't have to. I've gotten the idea in the jurors’ minds, and that's all I was going to manage.

Wallace next calls the on-scene technician who supervised the gathering of the blood and other evidence. She comes off as thoroughly professional and confident that she had done her job well. The most I can get her to admit is that techniques have improved since then, and that DNA was not on her mind when she was doing the collecting. She leaves the stand unscathed.

The next to escape any damage from my cross-examination is Donnie, the bartender. Wallace leads him through his story, and his recollections remain crystal clear. I make little effort to attack him, since his information is factual, but notterribly harmful to Willie. But I need to make some points, so that the jury will remember that we are a force to be reckoned with.

“How long did you work with Willie Miller?”

“About six months.”

“Was he a reliable employee?”

“He was okay. As long as he did his job, we didn't have too much to do with each other.”

“So to your knowledge he was never reprimanded? Never threatened with termination?”

“No.”

“Did you serve liquor at this establishment?”

Donnie laughs. “Of course. It was a bar.”

“Did Willie Miller have access to this liquor? Was it within easy reach for him?”

“Well, sure. I mean, it wasn't that big a place.”

“Did you ever see him drunk before that night?”

“No.” He quickly qualifies it. “Employees aren't allowed to drink on the job.”

“That's a rule?” I ask.

“Yes.”

“So Mr. Miller followed that rule? He did not drink on the job?”

“If he did, I don't remember it.”

“Would he have been reprimanded if he were caught drinking on the job?”

“Sure.”

I switch the focus. “When Edward Markham told you what happened, what did you do?”

“I went out to the back, and I saw the … young woman's body.” Donnie says “young woman” with a wary eye on Laurie. This is a man who has a strong testicle-preservation instinct. “He said he had called the cops, so I just waited with him.”

“When the police came, did you tell them you thought Willie might have done it? I'm talking about before the eyewitness said what she had seen.”

“No.”

“So you had no reason to suspect that he would have committed this murder?”

“No.”

I let him go and turn the momentum back to Wallace. He is doing what he is supposed to do: getting the witnesses necessary to build his case on and off quickly. Each represents a building block for the prosecution, and by the time they are finished they expect to have a house that cannot be blown over by the windbag defense attorney, me.

Next up is Edward Markham, who clearly did not spend his recent trip to Africa on a hunger strike to protest the granting of a new trial to his girlfriend's accused killer. He is at least forty pounds heavier than pictures show him to have been at the time of the murder, and though he is only in his thirties, he's already captured the look of an aging playboy.

“Had you and Denise McGregor been dating long?” asks Wallace.

“About three months. We were pretty intense.”

“Any plans for marriage?”

“I certainly had some,” says Edward. He grins. “But I hadn't gotten up the nerve to ask her.”

Wallace brings him to the night of the murder, and Denise McGregor's fateful trip to the rest room.

“How long was she gone before you started to worry?”

Edward appears to consider this, as if it is the first time he's been asked this question, and he's trying to comb through his memory. I would bet twenty-two million dollars he and Wallace rehearsed every word of this testimony at least twice.

“I'd say about ten minutes or so. And even then I wasn't that worried. I mean, you don't think about something like this. But I thought there might be something wrong.”

“So you got up to check on her?”

“Yes,” says Edward. “I went to the rest room door, and it was ajar, you know, not fully closed. I didn't know if I should go inside, or maybe find another woman to go in and check up on her. I thought she might be sick or something.”

“What did you do?”

“I called into the room a few times, just yelling ‘Denise,’ but there was no answer. So I pushed the door open a little more and looked in.”

“What did you find?”

“Well, at first nothing. I looked around, and she wasn't there, so I started to go back to the table. I really didn't know what to think. Then I saw the blood.”

“Blood?”

“It sure looked like it, and it was still wet. It was splattered on the floor near the phone. And the phone was hanging off the hook.” Edward is doing a good job, he's been rehearsed well.

“What did you do next?” asks Wallace.

“I got real worried … panicky … and I started looking around. I went out into the hall, and I saw that the exit to the alley was right there. So I went out there, and … and … I saw her.”

Edward acts as if he is trying to keep his emotions intact as he relives what happened. “It was the most horrible moment of my life.”

Wallace gives him a few seconds to compose himself; I can use the time to get over my nausea.

“What happened next?”

“Well, I went to her … I touched her to see if she was breathing, but she wasn't. So I went back into the bar and called 911, and then I called my father. And then I told the bartender, and we just waited for everyone to get there.”

Wallace turns Edward over to me. I don't want to do too much with him, because I'm going to call him during the defense case. I just want to put some doubts in the jury's mind, and maybe take away this image of Edward as the grieving near-widower.

I start off on his relationship with Denise.

“Mr. Markham, what is Denise McGregor's father's first name?”

He's surprised by the question. “I … I don't remember.”

“How about her mother's name?”

“I don't know … it's been a long time. I don't think her parents lived near here.”

“Have you seen them since the funeral?”

“No, I don't believe so.”

“Did you see them at the funeral?”

“No, I was very upset, sedated … I've felt guilty ever since about not going, but I was in no condition-”

“You didn't go to Denise McGregor's funeral?” I'm so shocked, you could knock me over with a legal brief.

“No, I just told you, I-”

I cut him off. “Do you know what Denise was working on at the time of her death?”

“No. I know it was a story.”

“Yes, Mr. Markham, that's what she wrote. Stories.” My voice is dripping with disdain. “But you don't know which one she was working on?”

“No.”

“Do you have a favorite story that she ever wrote?”

“Not really. She was a terrific writer. All of her work was great, but she didn't talk about it very much.”

“Tell us about any one of her stories.”

Edward looks stricken, so Wallace objects. “This is not going anywhere remotely relevant.”

“Your Honor,” I respond, “Mr. Wallace took the witness through a soap opera about how close he and the victim were, how he was about to propose. I believe he referred to their relationship as intense. If that was relevant, certainly my demonstrating that it is nonsense is equally relevant.”

“We were close,” insists Edward. “No matter how you try to twist things around.”

Hatchet admonishes Edward. “The witness will only speak to answer questions posed by the attorneys.”

Edward is chastened. “Yes, sir. Sorry.”

“Let's move it along, Mr. Carpenter,” says Hatchet.

“Yes, Your Honor.” I have a little more fun with this area of questioning, and then move on to the night of the murder.

“Was there a great deal of blood near her body when you found her?”

“Yes, it was everywhere.”

“And when you touched her skin, was it cold?”

“No, not really. But I could tell it was terrible … that she was dead. She wasn't breathing.”

“How did you know she wasn't breathing?” I ask.

“I put my hand on her chest … here.” He puts his hand on his sternum, so as to demonstrate. “It wasn't moving at all.”

I nod and walk over to the defense table. Kevin hands me a piece of paper, which I bring over to the court clerk. I introduce it as a defense exhibit and then hand a copy of it to Edward.

“Mr. Markham, this is a police report regarding the night of the murder. Can you read the second paragraph from the bottom out loud for the jury?”

Edward locates the paragraph and begins to read. “Markham's clothing, including shirt, sweater, pants, shoes, and socks, was examined and was found to be free of any traces of blood.”

“Thank you,” I say. “Could you please tell the jury how you managed to walk through the pools of blood surrounding the victim, then put your hands on her skin and chest, and not get any of her blood on you?”

A flash of worry crosses his face, which is strange, because the same lack of blood that is causing his credibility to be questioned provides him a clear defense against being the murderer himself. There is no way he could have stabbed Denise to death in the manner this was done and not have blood on him.

“I don't know … I guess I was just very careful. I've always been really squeamish about blood, so I probably avoided it. Everything was happening so fast.”

“What was happening fast?”

“You know, I found the body, called the police and my father … it just seemed like a dream.”

I nod as if he has just cleared up everything. “A dream where you don't dirty your clothes.”

“Objection.”

“Sustained.”

“No further questions, Your Honor,” I say. “But the defense reserves the right to recall this witness in our case in chief.”

Based on the look on Edward's face, I don't think he's looking forward to being recalled.

BETTY ANTHONYLIVES IN A SMALL GARDEN apartment in Lyndhurst. There are maybe five hundred units in the complex, and if any one is different from any other, it is a very subtle difference. Since I have only an address and not an apartment number, I have absolutely no idea in which specific apartment she lives.

I stop five or six of her neighbors, none of whom has heard of her. I'm forced to go to the rental office, where I wait as the lone agent preaches to an elderly couple the benefits of the tram that goes directly from the apartment complex to the supermarket. This is clearly the place to live.

Finally, the agent looks up Betty's apartment number, and I go there. Betty obviously takes care of her small slice of this earth with loving care; there is a small flower garden in front that looks like it is a very pampered piece of real estate. Betty is not in, and I'm trying to decide whether to wait when I finally catch a break. Her next-door neighbor comes home, and tells me that Betty would still be at Carlton's Department Store, where she sells lingerie.

The lingerie department is on the third floor of Carlton's, and is clearly not a place for males. Female customers look at me as if I am an alien visitor, while a few smile a condescending “isn't that cute, he's buying something for his wife” smile.

The first thing I notice about the place are the mannequins, dressed in flimsy, sexy bras and panties. They are incredibly shapely; if I were a woman concerned about my figure I would throw out all the diet books and find out what they feed these mannequins.

I can't speak for other males, but the hardest thing for me in these situations is knowing who works for the store and who doesn't. Customers and salespeople look exactly alike. I try three people before I hit on an actual storeperson. I ask her if she can help me.

“Unless you want to try something on.”

My guess is that she's used that joke on the last five hundred males that she's encountered in this department, so I smile a semi-appreciative smile, and ask if she knows where Betty Anthony is. She does.

“Betty! Customer!”

Betty is standing at the cash register, finishing a sale, and she motions that she'll just be a minute. I nod that I'll wait, and in a few minutes she comes over. She's in her early sixties, with a pleasant face and a slightly tired smile. She'd like to be off her feet, and she deserves to be.

“Can I help you?” she asks.

“I'd like to talk to you about your husband.”

She tenses exactly as Wally had when I mentioned Denise. That's apparently my mission, to go around the state and reopen old wounds in people that deserve better.

Finally, she nods, slowly, the nod of someone who has been expecting this visit, and who has been dreading it. I instinctively feel that if I can find out why, I'll have found out everything.

Betty agrees to have a cup of coffee with me, and I wait the thirty-five minutes until she is finished with her shift. We go to a small diner down the street, the kind with little jukeboxes on the tables that never work. I tell her that I'm representing Willie Miller, and watch for her reaction.

There isn't any. She has no idea who Willie Miller is, and can't imagine what her husband could possibly have to do with him. It's not good news.

I tell her about the picture, and my suspicion that there is something about it that has changed a great many lives, possibly Mike's included.

She tells me that “Mike had many friends. He was the kind of person that people naturally liked.”

Then I tell her that the woman Willie is accused of murdering is Denise McGregor, and I think I see a small flash of fear in her eyes, which she quickly covers up.

Her response is that “Mike was a wonderful man, a terrific husband and father. He loved his work.”

Platitudes like this aren't going to do it for me; I know I have to somehow pierce this armor. “Look, I'm defending a man on trial for his life. I think you have information that can help me, but maybe you don't. The only way I'm going to find out for sure is by being direct.”

She nods her understanding, but seems to cringe in anticipation. This is not going to be fun.

“Why did your husband take his own life?”

For a moment I think she is going to cry, but when she answers, her voice is clear and strong.

“He was a very unhappy man. Haunted, really.”

“By what?”

“I loved my husband very much,” she evades, “but I couldn't really help him, at least not the kind of help he needed. And now all I have is his memory, and I'm not going to destroy it. Not for you, not for your client, not for anybody.”

Sitting across this table from me is the answer; I can feel it, I know it. I have to go after it, even if it means badgering a woman who is clearly suffering.

“Something happened a very long time ago, something I believe Mike was a part of. But whatever it was, it's over. It can't be changed. My client shouldn't lose his life to protect the secret.”

“I can't help you,” she says.

“You won't help me.”

She thinks for a few moments, as if considering what I'm saying. Then her eyes go cold and she shuts off, as surely as if somebody flicked a switch. The window of opportunity has shut, leaving me to wonder if there's anything I could have done to keep it open. I don't think so; I think this decision was made a long time ago.

“I'm not going to argue with you,” she says. “You're not going to get what you want here.”

One last try. “Look, I know you want to protect your husband's memory … his reputation. Believe me, I want to do the same thing for my father. But a man's life is on the line. I need to know the truth.”

I've lost her. She stands and prepares to leave. “The truth is I loved my husband.” She says that with a sadness, an understanding that her love did not prove to be enough.

She walks away and out of the diner. I guess I'll pay the check.

The next day is devoted to DNA, and Wallace puts on Dr. Hillary D'Antoni, a scientist from the laboratory where the tests were done. She goes through a detailed but concise definition of the process, and then on to the results of the tests done on the skin and blood under Denise's fingernails.

“Dr. D'Antoni,” Wallace asks, “what is the mathematical likelihood that the skin under the victim's fingernails was that of the defendant, William Miller?”

“There is a one in five and a half billion chance that it was not.”

“And what is the mathematical likelihood that the blood under the victim's fingernails was that of the defendant, William Miller?”

“There is a one in six and one quarter billion chance that it was not.”

My cross-examination focuses mostly on not the science but the collection methods. I get Dr. D'Antoni to agree with the “garbage in, garbage out” concept. In other words, the results her lab can achieve are only as good as the samples they are sent. My problem is I have no legitimate basis on which to challenge the samples, and if the jury has one brain among them they will know it. Besides, I'm going to challenge the physical evidence later, in a different context.

“Dr. D'Antoni,” I say, “you raised some very impressive odds concerning the source of the material under the defendant's fingernails. In the area of one in six billion.”

“Yes.”

“You are positive that the blood and skin actually belonged to the defendant, are you not?”

“I am. The tests are quite conclusive.”

“Is there anything in those tests that leads you to believe the defendant was not framed?”

“I don't understand the question.”

“I'm sorry. If I gave you a hypothetical that the defendant was framed, and that the material you tested was in fact planted before it was sent to you, is there anything about your testing which would prove me wrong?”

“No. We test the material we are given.”

“Thank you.”

Wallace's next witness is Lieutenant Pete Stanton. This is not something I look forward to. Pete is an experienced, excellent witness, and what he is going to say will be very negative for Willie. It will be my job to try and rip him apart, something I don't relish doing to a friend. The only thing worse would be not to rip him apart.

Wallace takes Pete through the basics, starting off with Pete's status in the department at the time of the murder. His goal is to show his rapid rise, lending credibility to his abilities.

“I was a detective, grade two.”

“And you've been promoted since then?”

Pete nods. “Three times. First came detective three, then four, and then I made lieutenant two years ago.”

“Congratulations,” Wallace says.

“Objection,” I say. “Did Mr. Wallace bring in a cake so we can blow out the candles and celebrate the witness's promotions? Maybe we can sing ‘For he's a jolly good detective.’ ”

“Lieutenant Stanton's career path is relevant to his credibility,” Wallace says.

I shake my head. “He is not here interviewing for a job. He's presenting evidence of his investigation.”

“Sustained,” says Hatchet. “Let's move along.”

Wallace soon gets to the meat of his testimony, which involves the murder weapon.

“Where was the knife recovered, Lieutenant Stanton?”

“From a trash can about three blocks away from the bar. It was in an alley behind Richie's restaurant on Market Street,” Pete answers.

“Do you know whose knife it was?”

Pete nods. “It was one of a set from the bar where the murder took place, and which was subsequently reported missing by the bartender.”

“Now this knife … what was found on it?”

“Blood from the victim, Denise McGregor. And a clear fingerprint match with the defendant, Willie Miller.”

Wallace asks him some more questions, but the damage has been done. If I can't repair it, nothing that follows is going to make any difference. I stand up to face Pete, who digs in as if he were making a goal line stand.

“Good morning, Lieutenant Stanton.”

“Good morning, Mr. Carpenter.”

Thus ends the pleasantries of this particular cross-examination. From now on it's no-holds-barred.

“How did you happen to focus on Willie Miller as a suspect?”

“He was identified by an eyewitness, who saw him standing over the body before he ran off. Her name is Cathy Pearl.”

“This eyewitness, Cathy Pearl, did she say to you, ‘I saw Willie Miller'?”

“No. She was not familiar with his name. She described him, and the bartender told us that it sounded very much like the defendant.”

“So at that point he became your prime suspect?”

“Obviously, it was very early in the investigation, but he became someone we were interested in finding and questioning.”

“And where did you find him?” I ask.

“He was lying in a doorway about two blocks away from the scene.”

“Did he resist when you took him into custody?”

“No, he was incapacitated from alcohol.”

“So he stood up and walked to the car and you took him down to the station?”

“No, as I said, he was incapacitated from alcohol, so he was unable to walk. We called paramedics, and he was taken on a stretcher to the hospital.”

I'm puzzled. “So he ran away from the scene, but couldn't walk to the car?”

“An hour or so had gone by, so he had time to drink more alcohol during that period.”

“Did you find an empty bottle?”

“There were plenty of empty bottles in that area.”

“Any with Willie's saliva on them?”

“We didn't look for them or test them. The alcohol was obviously in his system; there was nothing to be gained by finding out which bottle he drank from.”

“Lieutenant, when you are assigned a case like this, you develop theories, do you not? You try and re-create, at least in your own mind, what happened?”

“I have theories, but first I go where the evidence takes me. My theories follow from the evidence.”

“Fine. So let's talk about that evidence. We'll start with the knife. Now, you testified that it was from a set of knives at the bar where the murder took place, and where Willie Miller worked as a busboy. Is that correct?”

“Yes, it is.”

“How, exactly, do you know that?”

Pete is becoming impatient. “It was identical to the ones used at the bar, and one was missing.”

I nod, as if that makes sense. Then I tell Hatchet that the bailiff has two packages that I gave him, and that I would like to use as evidence. Hatchet is suspicious, but allows it, and the bailiff gives me the packages.

I open one of the packages and take out a knife. I ask if I can hand it to the witness. Hatchet allows it.

“Detective, the knife you are holding is one of the knives currently used in the bar where the murder took place. Would you examine it, please?”

Pete looks at the knife, warily eyeing me the whole time. I then open the other package, and take out six additional knives, all apparently identical to the first, and show them to Pete as well.

“One of these six knives is from the same set as the first one, and was also used at the bar. Please tell the jury which one.”

Pete of course cannot, and he is forced to admit so.

“So,” I ask, “the fact that one knife seems identical to another doesn't mean they are from the same restaurant?”

“Not necessarily, but it certainly increases the chances, particularly when one is missing.”

I move on. “You testified that you found a knife, wherever it was originally from, three blocks from the bar, where it was sitting in a trash can.”

“That's correct.”

“So let me get this straight,” I say. “Since you just told this jury that your theories follow the evidence, is it your theory that Willie Miller took a knife from where he worked, used it to murder a woman, and then didn't wipe off either her blood, or his fingerprints?”

“Yes.”

“It's rare when murderers are that stupid, isn't it?”

“You don't have to be a college graduate to murder someone.”

“Thank you for making the jury aware of that, Lieutenant. I'm sure they had no idea.” Sorry, Pete, but it helps me if you look arrogant and uncooperative.

He glares at me, but I keep boring in. “Now, Lieutenant, you'll admit it would have to require both stupidity and a poorly developed self-preservation instinct to have done all this?”

Wallace intervenes. “Objection. The witness is not a psychologist.”

Hatchet says, “Overruled. You may answer the question.”

Pete has a ready answer. “When people are drunk they often have a tendency to be careless. And as I said, he was very, very drunk. There is no way he could have been thinking clearly.”

I nod as if he has just cleared everything up for me. “Right. He was smashed. So smashed that he could run from the scene, but not walk to the car. So smashed that he couldn't think clearly enough to wipe off his prints, but sober enough that he could make a conscious decision to hide the knife three blocks away.”

I can see a flash of concern in Pete's eyes; he wasn't prepared for that.

“Murders and murderers aren't always logical.”

“You're absolutely right, Lieutenant. Sometimes things aren't what they seem to be.”

He's getting angry. “I didn't say that.”

“I wouldn't expect you to. Your job is to justify what you've done in this case, no matter how little sense it makes.”

Wallace objects, and Hatchet sustains, instructing the jury to disregard.

“By the way, Lieutenant, how did you happen to locate the knife?”

“A phone call was made to 911. Somebody reported finding a knife with blood on it.”

“Somebody?”

Pete is getting more and more uncomfortable. “A man. He didn't give his name.”

My tone is getting more and more mocking, and I'm making more eye contact with the jury, especially the two people Kevin had picked out. I'm trying to draw them to my side so that we can doubt Pete's credibility together.

“I see. Somebody who didn't give his name called to say he found a bloody knife while browsing through a trash can in the middle of the night.”

“It happens.”

“Apparently so,” I say. “Did this human metal detector touch the knife? Were his own fingerprints found on it?”

“No. No other prints were found.”

I seem surprised, although I knew what his answer would be. “So, somebody was browsing through the garbage, saw a knife with blood on it … by the way, would you describe it as very unusual for a steak knife to have blood on it?”

“Not human blood.”

“Did this mysterious somebody conduct a DNA test on it while it was still in the garbage?”

“Objection.”

“Sustained.”

“Do you think the average person who spends his evenings going through garbage cans can tell the difference between human blood and steak blood? In the dark?”

“Objection. The witness couldn't possibly know the extent of other people's knowledge.”

“Sustained.”

I've made my point. “But this anonymous person was smart enough not to touch the knife, is that right?”

“There were no other prints.”

“So this person wasn't looking to take things from the trash can. He was just making sure that everything was in order. Maybe conducting an inventory?”

“I don't know what his intentions were.”

“Does any of this seem unusual to you, Lieutenant?”

“Unusual, but not impossible.”

“Did you ever think to question any of it?”

“I question everything.”

I've gone as far as I can down this road, so I veer off.

“Then let me ask you a hypothetical question. Supposing this was a frame-up?”

“Objection.” It's becoming a steady chorus from Wallace.

“Overruled.”

I continue. “Just for argument's sake, let's say it was a frame-up. Let's say that somebody wanted you to arrest Willie Miller. In that context, wouldn't all these ‘unusual’ things make sense?”

“No.”

“No?” I'm incredulous. “Is it really no, or is it just that if this turned out to be a frame-up, then it would mean that your entire investigation has been an incompetent joke? That you helped cause Willie Miller to spend seven years of his life in prison for a crime he didn't commit?”

“Objection.”

“Sustained. Jury will disregard. Mr. Carpenter, if I hear a speech like that again, you will be held in contempt of court, a crime which you did commit.”

I apologize and plow on, not wanting to lose momentum. “Isn't it true that you found Willie Miller and said case closed, let's get on to the next one?”

“No,” he says firmly, “it is not.”

“Isn't it true you saw all these clues laid out in front of you and followed them just like you were programmed to?”

Hatchet is in the middle of sustaining Wallace's objection while I'm yelling at Pete, and he tells Pete not to answer. He also admonishes me for being a pain in his ass, just not in so many words.

“No further questions.”

Pete is asked a few questions by Wallace to rehabilitate him, and he stares at me the entire time. My friendship with Lieutenant Pete Stanton just took a shot. I'm not happy about making him look bad; but it's what I do for a living.

I set the evening meeting with Laurie and Kevin at the office for seven o'clock, but only Kevin is there when I arrive. I've come to trust his instincts and judgments. He thinks I did well today with Pete, but recognizes what our problem is. Wallace has a mountain of evidence: the knife, the skin, the blood, the eyewitness, etc. I can attack each one, but if the jury believes any one of them, Willie is finished. Because each one is by itself capable of carrying the day.

Tomorrow Wallace will have his forensics expert on the stand, and Kevin and I set about planning our cross-examination.

Laurie comes in uncharacteristically late, but with very interesting news. Utilizing her contacts, she has uncovered the fact that Edward Markham had two arrests for beating up women prior to Denise McGregor's murder.

At least as disturbing is the fact that, though the records of these assaults have since been expunged, my father should have been aware of them back when he was prosecuting Willie Miller. Yet there is no evidence that he ever followed up on it. Did he think it was unimportant, or was he repaying a favor to his apparent friend Victor Markham, who may have paid him two million dollars? But how could Markham have anticipated a murder trial that wasn't to take place for nearly thirty years after the payment?

Laurie asks if we can use the arrests at trial, and Kevin correctly points out that we cannot, that Hatchet would never let them in. The law is clear; the previous violations, even if they were proven, have to compare almost identically to the offense that is the subject of the trial. These don't.

“Too bad,” says Laurie. “The bastard might have done it himself.”

I do a double take. “I thought you were positive that Willie Miller did it.”

“I was. And now I'm not.”

This is a major concession for Laurie, but I'm not about to lord it over her.

Around ten o'clock, Kevin leaves and Laurie hangs around for a while as I finish my preparation for court tomorrow. As she is getting ready to leave, she walks toward me and says, “You're doing really well, Andy. No one could be doing more.”

I shake my head. “You know,” I say, “my father said I couldn't win this. I think he was right.”

“He was goading you, and he was wrong. Good night, Andy.”

“Good night, Laurie.”

We just stand there, about a foot away from each other. We both know that we are dangerously close to kissing, but after a few seconds the moment passes. She leaves, and I'm alone with my thoughts.

When I was married, or at least before our separation, I did not come close to kissing other women. It sounds corny, but I rarely ever thought about other women, so ingrained in me was the sanctity of the marriage bond. That's now been changed, and I don't think it's going to change back any time soon. What's left for me is to figure out what that says about my marriage or myself.

I'll figure it out after the trial.

NICOLE HAS REALLYBEEN QUITE UNDERstanding about the trial, and the impact it's having on our time together. She waits up for me to come home at night, and gets up every morning to watch me make breakfast. She talks about us getting away after the trial is concluded; maybe to the luxury hotel in the Virgin Islands where we spent our honeymoon. That was in another lifetime, a time and place that I no longer have any connection to at all. I desperately wish I did.

I've been able to put the romantic-emotional aspect of my life on hold while I deal with the Miller case, but I know it's back there, in the dark recesses of my mind, waiting to cause me aggravation. I've always thought a main component of love is wanting, needing, to share things, good as well as bad, with the person that you love. I'm not feeling that with Nicole.

On some level I know that Nicole and I can never recapture what we had, or seemed to have had. I keep hoping that will change, but it doesn't feel like it ever will. I don't believe it is Laurie's presence that is causing this. She is not what is standing between Nicole and me.

Fortunately, I don't have very much time to agonize over these questions. Our whole team is putting in eighteen-hour days, and adrenaline is keeping us raring to go at the nine A.M. start to each court day. Another reason I'm able to be on time each morning is that I no longer even pass by the newsstand on the way to court; it is closed down and a symbol of my humiliation. Today I even arrive a few minutes early, and I use the time to get ready for the next witness, forensics expert Michael Cassidy.

As Henry Higgins would say, Cassidy “oozes smugness from every pore, as he oils his way across the floor.” I find him to be thoroughly pompous and dislikable, and I hope the jury has the same reaction. He is basically there to testify about the material found under the fingernails of Denise McGregor, as well as the scratch marks on Willie that those fingernails obviously caused. Wallace has a lot of ammunition here, and he doesn't leave a single shell unexploded.

There is a large poster board with a full-color shot of a dazed and scratched Willie Miller, taken shortly after his arrest. The only way he could look more guilty in the picture would be if he were holding up a sign saying “I did it.”

Wallace is questioning Cassidy about the photograph, and Cassidy has a wooden pointer, the type teachers used to have in class before they got the Internet wired in.

Wallace asks, “Where were the scratch marks?”

Of course, Stevie Wonder could have pointed to the scratch marks on the photograph, but Cassidy does so as if the jury really needs his help to see them.

“They are here, and here, on the left and right cheeks on the defendant's face.”

Wallace then takes maybe thirty questions to elicit the information he could have gotten in two. Not only were the blood and skin under the fingernails of Denise McGregor that of Willie Miller, but Cassidy has determined that the scratch marks on Willie's face were made by those same fingernails.

Wallace turns the witness over to me. If I can't get the jury to doubt Cassidy, it's game, set, and match.

“Mr. Cassidy, what other foreign material besides Willie Miller's blood and skin did you find under the victim's fingernails?”

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“Which part of the question didn't you understand?”

Wallace objects that I'm being argumentative and badgering. Damn right I am. Hatchet sustains the objection. I restate the question, and Cassidy answers.

“We didn't find anything else.”

I feign surprise. “To the best of your knowledge, was Willie Miller naked when he was arrested?”

“I wasn't there, but I believe he was fully clothed.”

“Is there any reason to think he was naked when he committed the crime?”

“Not that I'm aware of.”

I bore in. “Were there scratches anywhere other than on his face?”

“No, those were the only scratch marks. But there were needle marks on each arm.”

The medical examination of Willie had shown needle marks on both arms, but since a blood test revealed no drugs in his system, the prosecution was precluded from bringing it out in direct examination. Wallace smiles slightly, assuming that I ineptly opened the door through which that information reached the jury.

“Yes, the needle marks, we will certainly hear more about those,” I say. “Now, what was the defendant wearing when he was arrested?”

“Objection,” says Wallace. “The answer is already in the record. His shirt and jeans, with the victim's bloodstains on them, have been submitted into evidence.”

Hatchet sustains the objection, and I bow graciously to Wallace. “Thank you. It's so hard to keep track of all this conclusive evidence.”

I ask Cassidy, “His shirt was cotton, wasn't it?”

“Yes.”

“But there were no traces of cotton under her nails?”

“No.”

“So she went after his face only?”

“It was only his face that she actually scratched,” he says.

“I can't say for sure what she went after, I wasn't there.”

“No. Neither was I. Can I borrow your pointer? It's a beauty.”

He would like to hit me over the head with it, but instead he grudgingly hands it to me, and I walk over to the large photograph of Willie in all his scratched glory.

“By the way, did you find a ruler near the body?”

“A ruler?”

“You know what a ruler is, don't you? It's like this pointer, only smaller, flatter, and straighter.”

Wallace objects and Hatchet admonishes me; business as usual.

“The thing that puzzles me,” I say, “is that I personally cannot draw a straight line, yet the victim managed to scratch two of them.”

I point to the scratch marks on each cheek, which are in fact close to perfectly straight and perpendicular to the ground.

“There are no normal patterns for this. Every case is different.” He's getting more smug as he goes along. It's time to de-smugitize him.

“No normal pattern? Isn't the existence of any pattern at all by definition abnormal?”

“I don't know what you mean.”

“Then let me explain it to you, Doctor,” I snarl. “Here we have a woman who is being beaten and stabbed to death by a drunken man, who must be pretty unstable in his own right. So she's flailing away, desperately trying to defend herself, trying to stop the knife from penetrating her, trying to stop his other hand from hitting her-”

“Objection!” yells Wallace. “Is there a question somewhere in this speech?”

“Sustained.”

I push forward. “Okay, here's a bunch of questions. Why didn't she touch his clothes? Why didn't she touch those hands? Why, in her panic, did she choose to scratch two perfectly straight marks on each side of his face?”

The smugness is gone. “I can't say for sure, but it's possible-”

I interrupt. “It's possible that someone held her hands, after she was dead, and scratched Willie Miller's face, when he was too drunk to even know it.”

Wallace stands again. “Objection, Your Honor. Must we continue to listen to Mr. Carpenter's ramblings about his visits to Fantasyland?”

I turn and address Wallace directly, which is something Hatchet will come down on me for. “If I'm in Fantasyland, you should visit it. Things seem to make more sense here.”

After court is over, I find myself alone with Wallace in the men's room. We exchange typical standing-at-the-urinal small talk, and then I ask him a question which has been on my mind.

“Richard, you were in the office at the time … why did my father prosecute Willie Miller?”

“Come on, Andy. Don't believe your own speeches. There's a mountain of evidence here.”

“No,” I say. “I mean, why did he handle the trial himself? He was the DA by then; he hardly ever went into a courtroom.”

Richard thinks for a moment. “I don't know; I remember wondering about that myself at the time. But he was adamant about it. Maybe because it was a capital case. Maybe with Markham involved, your father wanted to be the one to take whatever political heat would result if the trial went badly.”

I nod. “Maybe.”

Wallace zips up, says goodbye, and leaves me to ponder all the other possible maybes.

Hatchet adjourns for the day and I go back to the office. Nicole has called and left a message reminding me of a promise I had made to go to Philip's estate after the evening meeting at the office. He is throwing a fund-raiser for a local congressional candidate that I wouldn't vote for if he were running against Muammar Qaddafi.

We convene our evening meeting early, at five o'clock, mainly for the purpose of discussing tomorrow's cross-examination of the eyewitness, Cathy Pearl.

Laurie is not coming to the meeting; she has gone to see Betty Anthony, to try and do what I couldn't-get her to talk about her deceased husband, Mike.

Kevin and I go over how I will handle Cathy Pearl's appearance tomorrow, and we believe that we can be reasonably effective. The exciting, nerve-racking, dangerous thing about cross-examination is that there truly is no way to accurately predict how it will go. There is an ebb and flow that develops between all the players in the courtroom that is volatile and can lead in various directions.

The lawyer conducting the cross is most like a point guard in a basketball game. It's his or her job to set the pace, to try and dictate the way the game will be played. But like in a basketball game, the lawyer cannot determine what defense, what tactics, the other side will employ.

Most important, unlike in basketball, it's not a four-of-seven series; there's not another game in two days. Cross-examining a witness takes place once, and it's generally winner take all. It can be scarier than the Lincoln Tunnel.

Kevin has been a little down lately; his enthusiasm has seemed to wane even as we have had some success challenging witnesses. I ask him about that, and he reveals that his conscience is rearing its ugly head. In short, he thinks Willie Miller is probably guilty, and while he wants us to win, Kevin worries that we might cause the release of a brutal murderer out into society.

“So,” I ask him, “you think we might be better than the prosecutors?”

He responds, “I think you might be the best defense attorney I've ever seen.”

That's a subject I could talk about for hours, but I try to keep the focus on Kevin. He's in some pain over this, and I might be able to help. He believes I could be so good that there could be a wrong verdict reached.

“What if we didn't represent him?” I ask.

“Then he'd get someone else.”

“What,” I ask, “if that someone was better than we are? Or not nearly as good as Wallace? Couldn't a wrong verdict result just as easily?”

He nods. “Of course.”

“I'll tell you how I see it. To me a right or wrong verdict isn't a question of accurately judging the defendant's guilt or innocence. To me the verdict is right if both sides are well represented and get their fair day in court.”

“You might feel differently if you were wrongly convicted,” he says. “Or if someone you loved was murdered, and the guilty man went free.”

“I might, but I would be thinking about myself, and not about society. Society needs this system. Look, you're a terrific lawyer, and if you had a hundred cases, maybe you'd get a few guilty people off. But what if you didn't take those cases? A good portion of them would get lesser attorneys, and some of the innocent ones might be convicted.”

He smiles. “But none of them would be on my conscience.”

“Didn't they tell you to leave your conscience in a locker at law school?”

We're not going to resolve his doubts tonight; they've been hounding him for too long. But I think, make that hope, that we've taken a step. Kevin is a hell of a lawyer, and an even better person.

I invite Kevin to go to the fund-raiser at Philip's, but he begs off, since he has to go to the Laundromat and empty the quarters from the machines.

I drive out to Philip's estate in Alpine. He has eleven acres of prime real estate in the most expensive area of New Jersey, all magnificently landscaped and including a huge swimming pool, tennis court, putting green, and, believe it or not, a helicopter pad.

There is also an extraordinary three-bedroom guest house, about a hundred yards from the main one, that would qualify as a dream house to most families. Philip calls this “Nicole's place,” since he built it shortly before she was born, in the hope that she would someday move in.

In fact, back when Nicole and I were about to be married, Philip mounted a campaign to get us to live in this guest house. He correctly pointed out that it was considerably nicer than anything we could afford to buy, and promised that it was separate enough that we would have our privacy. After all, he reasoned, he was in Washington most of the time anyway.

My father cautioned me against accepting the offer, but I was smart enough on my own to turn it down. If we had moved into the guest house, Philip's dominance over us would have been total.

The party tonight is outdoors under the stars, in the area between the guest house and the pool. It is part of a concerted effort by Philip to actively help others in his party. Philip has used his prominent position as head of the crime subcommittee to get himself talked about as a possible vice presidential candidate in the next election, and he earns political markers by raising money for his colleagues.

I arrive, the only male in the entire place, including the staff, not in a tuxedo. Nicole comes over to me, not seeming to notice the fact that I'm underdressed, since I'm sure she is used to it. She takes my arm and leads me to hobnob with the rich, semifamous, and powerful.

We hobnob for about an hour, each minute more excruciatingly boring than the one before it. Finally, I can't stand it anymore, so I tell Nicole that I really need to get home and get some sleep. She seems disappointed, but understands. It hits me that she actually enjoys being here; this is where she is in her element. It's a scary thought.

THE EYEWITNESS, CATHY PEARL, HAS BEEN A single mother since she was eighteen, supporting her daughter by working until one A.M. each night in a run-down diner. That daughter, as Wallace lets her proudly reveal, has just won a scholarship to Cornell University. Cathy is the type of person that juries believe, and very definitely not the type of person they like to see dismantled on the stand.

Wallace takes her through her history, right up to the frightening moment when she saw Willie Miller standing over the bloody body of Denise McGregor.

“How did you happen to be in that alley that night, Ms. Pearl?”

“The diner I work at is on the next block. I cut through the alley on my way home from work. It saves about ten minutes, and at one o'clock in the morning, every minute counts.” Everybody, jury included, chuckles at this comment. Everybody except me.

“Please describe what you saw.”

She proceeds to describe the scene in graphic, stark terms. She saw Willie standing over the body, and he saw her as well, but instead of attacking her he ran off. She thanks God for that every day, and she especially thanks God that she was able to pick him out of a lineup the next day.

Cathy is a very credible witness, and based on the jury's reaction to her I don't know whether to cross-examine her or ask for her autograph.

“Ms. Pearl,” I begin, “was it unusual for you to cut through this particular alley?”

“No, I do it every night.”

“Every night? At the same time?”

“Yes. I got off at one o'clock, and I sure didn't hang around. At one sharp, I was out of there. Every night.”

“So anybody watching your pattern over some time would have known you were going to be there?”

“Why would somebody want to do that? I don't think anybody was watching me.”

“I understand that. But if somebody were watching you, even if you were unaware of it, they would know that you go by there every night just after one o'clock?”

She looks at Wallace for help, but there is none forthcoming.

“I suppose so, yes.”

“Thank you. Now, you testified that you didn't actually see the defendant stabbing Denise McGregor, you just saw him standing over her body. Is that correct?”

Cathy nods a little too hard, pleased that this is something she can agree with. “Right. He was just sort of standing there, looking at me. Not moving much.”

“I would think something like that must have been very scary, particularly at that time of night.”

Another vigorous nod. “Yes, it was.”

“Did you run away?”

“Well, no … not right then … at first I didn't know it was a body he was standing over. It was dark.”

“Dark?”

She quickly tries to correct what she realizes was a bad move. “Not so dark that I couldn't see.”

I nod. “I understand. It was the kind of dark where you could see a face but not a body. That kind of dark.”

“Well …”

“And then the defendant looked at you. Is that right?”

“Right. And he looked weird. Out of it.”

“Maybe drunk?”

“Right. Yes.”

“And what was he doing with the knife?”

“I didn't see a knife,” she says.

I look at the jurors, to confirm that they find this as confusing as I do. They don't, but they will.

“Help me out here. In the kind of dark where one can see faces but not bodies, do knives show up?”

Wallace stands. “Objection, Your Honor. This is badgering.”

“Sustained. Rephrase the question.”

“Yes, Your Honor.” I turn back to Cathy. “So you didn't see a knife?”

“I've said that all along. I didn't see a knife. I'm not saying it wasn't there, I just didn't see it.”

“No doubt he had run three blocks, placed it in the trash with his fingerprints and blood still on it, and returned in time to be there for your one o'clock walk.”

This was aimed at Wallace, but Cathy feels the need to defend herself.

“I know what I saw.” She points to Willie. “I saw him.”

I shake my head sadly. “No, Ms. Pearl, I'm afraid you have no idea what you saw.”

“Objection.”

“Sustained. Watch it, Mr. Carpenter.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” I say, “I will.” So I rephrase: “Now, Ms. Pearl, since it was light enough to see the defendant's face, and since he looked right at you, is it fair to say he could see your face?”

“Sure … I guess.”

“But he didn't try to hurt you? To do to you what you believe he did to Denise McGregor?”

“No, he just ran away.”

“Yet he should have realized that you could identify him, isn't that right?”

“I guess …”

“He would have known you could someday be an eyewitness, just like you are now?”

“I suppose so.”

“Maybe he had nothing to hide,” I say. “No further questions.”

Wallace gets up to rehabilitate her. “Ms. Pearl, when was the next time you saw the defendant after that night?”

“The next morning, at the police station. He was in the lineup. I picked him out right away.”

“With other men?”

Cathy nods. “A bunch of them.”

“And you had no doubt he was the man you saw in the alley the previous night?”

“No doubt. He was the one. I was positive then, and I'm just as positive now.”

Cathy leaves the stand. I definitely did not do enough to damage her. She seemed credible and has no reason to lie. If I were on the jury, I would believe her. And if I believed her, I would vote to convict Willie Miller of murder in the first degree.

I barely have time to reflect on how depressing the situation is when it gets considerably worse. Wallace tells Hatchet, “Your Honor, the state calls Randy Sacich.”

This is not good news; I've never heard of Randy Sacich, and witnesses that I've never heard of are the absolute worst.

“Your Honor,” I protest, “there is no such person on the state's witness list.”

Wallace nods. “We regret that, Your Honor, but Mr. Sacich only came to our attention late yesterday. Our people were questioning him this morning to confirm that he is a reliable witness.”

“Your Honor,” I reply, “I'm not sure our ‘people’ would come to the same conclusion as Mr. Wallace's ‘people.’ In any event, there should not be surprise witnesses before these people.” I point at the jury to show who I am referring to.

Hatchet sends the jury out of the room, and Wallace and I kick it around some more. Hatchet buys his position, and Sacich is allowed in. As the jury comes back into the room, I speak to Willie.

“Do you know who this guy is?”

“Nope.”

With the jury seated, Randy Sacich is brought in, and Willie stiffens in surprise. He leans in to me.

“He's the guy in the cell next to me.”

“Did you tell him anything incriminating?”

“What's that?”

“Bad. Did you tell him anything bad?”

Willie is wounded. “How many times I got to tell you, man? I got nothing bad to say.”

Wallace apparently believes otherwise. He takes Sacich through his connection to this case, which is basically one of geography.

“I'm in the cell next to his.”

Wallace continues, “And from this vantage point, are you two able to talk to each other?”

“Sure,” Sacich says. “Right through the bars.” He says this matter-of-factly, as though they live in suburbia and stop by to borrow cups of sugar.

“Did Mr. Miller ever mention the crime for which he is currently imprisoned?” Wallace asks.

Sacich nods agreeably. “Sure, he talked about it all the time. He didn't talk about nothing else.”

“Did he ever speak to the legitimacy of the charges?”

“Huh?”

Wallace rephrases. “Did he ever say whether or not he had done it?”

Randy responds softly, almost hard to hear. “Yeah, a bunch of times. He said he did.”

“Please speak up so that the jury can hear you, Mr. Sacich.”

As rehearsed, Sacich turns to the jury. “He said he sliced her up and watched her guts pour out.”

The jury recoils in horror from this, and there is an audible rumble in the courtroom. Hatchet bangs his gavel and demands quiet. He gets it.

Wallace finishes with his questioning and Hatchet calls us to the bench. Out of earshot of the jury, he gives me the option of adjourning for the day and starting cross-examination tomorrow, or going ahead right now.

It's a difficult choice. If I delay, the jury sits with this in-controverted bombshell all night. If I go now, I do so without any background information on Sacich and his story. I will be breaking the cardinal sin-asking questions I do not know the answers to.

I consult briefly with Kevin, and he agrees with my assessment. We've got to go ahead now.

“Mr. Sacich, how did you come to live in the same neighborhood as Mr. Miller?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I'm not asking who your real estate agent was, or how big a mortgage you took out on the cell.”

“Objection.”

“Sustained. Mr. Carpenter, less sarcasm and clearer questions would be appreciated.”

“Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Sacich, why are you in jail? What crime were you convicted of?”

Wallace objects as to relevance, and I tell Hatchet that since I had no time to depose this witness, I really need a little leeway. Besides, the offense he has been convicted of might well go to credibility.

Hatchet overrules the objection and instructs Sacich to answer.

“Rape.”

I nod. “Rape. I see. Who did you rape?”

Sacich's eyes dart around the room; he thought he was here to talk about Willie, and now he's being asked to confess to rape under oath.

“I didn't say I did it.”

“Did you do it?” There's no downside to this question. If he says no, he looks like a liar. Yes, and he's a rapist. It's like the old “Do you think I'm fit to live with pigs?”

“No,” is his answer.

I walk over to the jury box. “Did a jury, sitting in a jury box like these people, vote to convict you?”

“Yeah.”

“You wouldn't lie about whether you actually committed the rape, would you? Because if you did, then how could this jury believe anything you say about this case?”

“I'm not lying.”

“So the jury was wrong?”

“Objection. Asked and answered.”

“Overruled. You may answer.”

“Yeah. The jury was wrong.”

“Now, as to what Willie Miller may or may not have told you-”

He interrupts. “He told me he did it.”

“Did anyone else hear him make the confession?”

“I don't know. You'd have to ask them.” He's getting more and more belligerent.

“But when you heard it, when he said it to you, were the two of you alone, or was there anyone else around?”

“We were alone.”

“How long have you been friends with Willie Miller?”

“We just met … we sit there all day and we talk some.”

“Do most people consider you a good listener? Do they have a tendency to confide in you?”

He nods; this is something he can agree with. “I guess so. Sure. I'm a pretty good listener.”

“Do you have any experience in the ministry?” This draws a laugh from the gallery and jury, and an objection from Wallace.

“Your Honor, this is ludicrous.”

“Sustained.”

“Did anyone promise you anything at all in return for your testimony today?”

“No.”

“No talk of a lighter sentence, or of the authorities treating you more favorably in the future?”

Sacich looks toward Wallace, worried about what he is supposed to say. I jump on this. “Do you want to consult with Mr. Wallace? We can take a few moments, and you can get further coaching if that will help you.”

“Objection! This witness has not been coached, and I resent the implication that he has.”

“Sustained.”

“Mr. Sacich,” I continue, “what did the authorities say would result from your testimony today?”

“They told me it would look good on my record.”

“Who reviews that record?”

“The parole board,” he says grudgingly.

It's time to wrap this up. “Okay, Mr. Sacich,” I say, “let's forget about logic and your lack of credibility for a moment, and let's assume this happened the way you said, that Willie Miller told you he had done this crime. Do you believe everything you hear in prison?”

“Depends,” he allows.

“Do you think people ever lie, maybe to make themselves look tougher in the eyes of other inmates, distinguished innocent citizens like yourself? Or do you think that everyone in maximum security prisons is scrupulously honest?”

“Look, I just know what he told me, and he didn't seem to be lying.”

I shake my head sadly. “I'm surprised, Mr. Sacich, because you of all people should know lying when you hear it.”

I dismiss Sacich, and Wallace has only a few follow-up questions for him. Kevin's slight nod to me indicates that he believes we have effectively neutralized Sacich's testimony, and I agree.

Wallace calls Diana Martez, another name I am not familiar with. I am about to stand and object, when Kevin points to her name on the list. It says that she works at Cranford Labs, a company that does work in DNA and more conventional blood testing. We never bothered to interview her because we had planned our strategy in this area, which was to argue about the collection techniques and possible contamination of the samples, rather than about the science itself.

I'm surprised that Wallace is calling Martez at this point in the case, but I'm not worried about it. That changes the moment she walks into the room and I see Willie Miller's face. All he says, very softly, is “Ooohhh, shit.”

All I can do is sit there and brace myself for what is sure to be a disaster, and it is just that. Martez is a twenty-six-year-old Hispanic woman, whose connection to the case has nothing whatsoever to do with the laboratory at which she works. That is a coincidence, and one which Wallace knew he could rely on to minimize the likelihood of our checking her out in advance.

Wallace leads her through her story, which takes place on a June night nine years ago, almost three years before the McGregor murder. Speaking with a heavy Spanish accent, she relates meeting Willie Miller at a bar. He was drinking heavily, but she agreed to go outside with him. He walked her into an alley behind the bar, where he became verbally abusive. When she tried to leave and reenter the bar, he punched and kicked her.

“I screamed. I begged him to stop, but it was like he couldn't even hear me. I thought he was going to kill me.”

“What happened next?” asks Wallace.

“His friends came out and pulled him off of me.”

“Was that easy for them to do?”

“No, it took four people. He was completely out of control. Kicking and screaming profanities.”

“Did you speak to any of them afterward?”

She nods. “Yes, they said he had done this before, that he had a drinking problem he couldn't control.”

Wallace draws out of her the fact that she was treated at a hospital for her injuries, and produces the emergency room record to substantiate her account. He then turns her over to me to cross-examine. I have no idea what the hell to ask her.

“Ms. Martez, did you report this alleged incident to the police?” I ask.

“No, I was not a citizen then, and-”

“You were here illegally?”

“Yes, but now I am an American. I became a citizen two years ago,” she says proudly. Great, next I'll get her to show the flag she's knitted to hang over the courthouse.

She tells the court that she was afraid to report the incident, because she did not want to risk deportation. And she didn't see any coverage of the first trial, because she was in another city living with her sister. It was only when she saw the current media blitz that she recognized Willie and came forward, which she considered her duty as a citizen of America, the country she loves, the land of the free and the home of the brave.

I end my cross, before I do any more damage to my client's case. I do this even though I would very much like to kill my client for not telling me anything about this.

Kevin, Laurie, and I arrange to meet with Willie in an anteroom after the court session, and we sit there talking, waiting for his arrival. Kevin is distraught that he blew it by not following up on Martez's name, but I don't blame him. I blame myself.

“I didn't lay a glove on her.”

“How could you?” Kevin asks.

I ignore that; it doesn't fit in with my self-flagellation. “I'm a lawyer defending somebody on trial for his life. I'm supposed to be prepared.”

Laurie tries to change the subject to the defense's case, which is coming up rapidly. She asks who my first witnesses are going to be.

“Witnesses?” I ask. “You mean I'm supposed to have witnesses that can help my client?”

“Andy-”

I cut her off. “I must have been out the day they went over that in law school. Because I don't have a goddamn thing, and-”

I could go on like this for hours, but I'm interrupted by Willie being led into the room. Thank goodness, the one person I'd rather beat up than myself.

Willie, in an uncharacteristically contrite manner, tells us that the story Diana Martez told is true. He had a drinking problem for over three years, but he became sober at least six months before Denise McGregor was killed.

“You told us you never had a problem with alcohol before,” I say.

“I was embarrassed, okay?”

This man who has been on death row for murder for most of the past decade was embarrassed to reveal that he had a drinking problem, which he subsequently conquered. The mind boggles.

“Are there any more little incidents out there like this that you're too embarrassed to talk about? Were you involved with the Kennedy assassination? Or maybe the Lindbergh kidnapping?”

“Come on, man. There's nothing else.”

“How did you become sober?”

“I joined a program. It wasn't easy, man, but I did it,” he says with some restored pride. He gives us the name of someone in management at the program, and then we let the guard take him away.

Before he leaves, he says, “I'm sorry if I screwed things up.”

My anger has been defused, and I tell him that it's okay, that we'll deal with it, even though we won't.

Laurie, Kevin, and I go back to my office for our evening meeting. I tell Laurie I want her to keep after Betty Anthony. I still have this notion that the answer to everything lies in that photograph, and the answer to that photograph lies with Betty Anthony.

We kick around our plans for the defense's case, and when we're done Kevin is the first to leave. Laurie lingers behind, and we get to talking. I ask her a question that I shouldn't, but which I am psychologically unable to avoid asking.

“How are things with what's-his-name?”

“You mean Bobby Radburn?”

I nod. “That's him. The guy who couldn't throw a baseball through a pane of glass.”

“He's a creep,” she says. “It's a common ailment among men.”

I should be glad to hear this, and I am, but I also feel bad that she has obviously been hurt and disappointed.

“Listen, Laurie … there's something I need to tell you.” I say this without having a clear idea what it is that I need to tell her.

“Don't.” She lets me off the hook.

Before I can get back on the hook, there is a knock on the door. Since this is the same office I was nearly killed in by an intruder, I call out to find out who it is. The response is from Nicole and her father, who had dinner nearby and stopped by to see if I was in the office so he could say hello. I would almost prefer it had been the intruder again.

Nicole and Philip are very friendly, and greet Laurie warmly. Nicole marvels at how many hours we are putting in on the case, but I respond that we unfortunately seem to be running in place and not getting anywhere.

Philip says, “It may not be your fault. Your client just might be guilty this time.”

“That makes me feel much better,” I say.

Nicole and Philip wait while Laurie and I discuss a few more aspects of the case, including the photograph. I tell Laurie that I am prepared when court reconvenes on Monday to go to Hatchet for permission to depose both Markham and Brownfield about it. It will be a fishing expedition, but I think there's a good chance he'll let me do it.

Laurie, obviously uncomfortable with this little family reunion, says her goodbyes. I drive Nicole home, knowing that I'm with the wrong woman. Someday that piece of information may not stay buried, and it might even come out of my mouth.

SATURDAYIS MY DAY OF REST DURING A trial. I try and wipe the case from my mind, at least for most of the day, and do something relaxing. There is time to intensify the preparation on Sunday, and I find that if I take Saturday off, or mostly off, I am to a degree rejuvenated.

Today is a particularly perfect Saturday, since the relaxation God has sent me a Knicks playoff game on television. The Knicks are playing the Pacers in the Garden, with the best of seven series tied at two games apiece. I don't bet on Knicks playoff games, because I don't need a rooting interest, and because I could never bet against the Knicks anyway.

Tara and I sit on the couch, potato chips, peanuts, pretzels, soda, water, and dog biscuits all within arm's and paw's reach. At least I start the game on the couch; by late in the first quarter I am pacing the room and screaming at the television. Tara is calmer and more restrained, only barking when the refs make a particularly bad call.

The Knicks go up by eleven but, as is their tendency, seem to lose their concentration and let Indiana back into the game. With three seconds to go and the Knicks down by two, Latrell Sprewell elevates eight feet in the air off the dribble and nails a three. Jalen Rose then draws rim from halfcourt on a desperation shot at the buzzer. The Knicks have won, and I have gone almost three hours without once thinking about real life.

I'm trying to decide who to bet on in the upcoming Lakers-Blazers game when Nicole comes into the room. I have to do a double take to believe what I see; she is carrying a picnic basket.

“Let's go,” she says.

“Where are we going?”

“To Harper's Point.”

“Are you serious?”

She nods. “Absolutely. You were just going to watch another game anyway, so you don't have to work. And this will give us a chance to be alone and get away from this case. That's something we haven't done in a long time, Andy.”

Guilt rears its ugly head and I agree. I don't bring Tara with me, since I have read reports of rattlesnakes in the area, and I don't want a curious Tara going where she shouldn't and getting bit.

Harper's Point is about twenty minutes west of here, in a small range of mountains. Nicole and I have been here frequently in happier times, and it is an extraordinarily beautiful place. There is a small waterfall and a rapidly running stream, as well as a number of lushly landscaped areas cleared out perfectly for picnics.

When we reach the area, we head for our favorite place. We sit on some rocks, right alongside a stream, with a view of the waterfall. I have forgotten how peaceful it can be here.

“We have a lot of memories here,” Nicole says.

“We sure do. I think I reached my sexual peak on these rocks.”

She laughs. “And it's been downhill ever since.”

I try to deny it, but she's probably right. We lie back, taking in the sun and the incredibly soothing sound of the waterfall. What Nicole doesn't know is that I am lying here trying to decide if this is the moment to tell her that we do not have a future together. I don't want to have that conversation before I am really sure, because once we have it there will be no turning back.

suddenly, despite having decided that this is not the right time, my mouth starts to speak. “Nicole, we need to talk.”

She tenses up. “Don't, Andy. No one ever says ‘we need to talk’ when they're going to talk about something good.”

I can't pull back now. “Nicole … everybody always says marriages don't work because people grow in different directions. But I don't think that's the case at all.”

She is now just waiting to see what I'm getting at, though I think she already knows.

I continue. “I think we were always very different. Sure we've grown, but I think those same differences have always been there. I think that as we get older we notice them more. We're less willing to paper over them.”

“What are you saying, Andy?”

I pause for a moment, because I'm having trouble breathing. I remember there being more air at Harper's Point. “I'm saying that it's over, Nicole.”

Nicole starts to unpack the lunch, as if behaving normally will negate the conversation. “Andy, don't do this. Please. You're making a mistake.”

I feel terribly sorry for her, and for me, but I wouldn't be doing anybody a favor by backing off now.

“No. I'm not.”

She's still emptying the picnic basket, and she drops a fork on the ground.

I lean over to pick it up, and as I do I hear a strange sound. For a moment, I think that Nicole must have dropped something else, and it is the sound of that other item hitting the ground. I look around, but there is nothing there.

I sit back up and notice that Nicole has a strange look on her face. And then I see an expanding dark red spot on her shoulder, coming from what looks like an open wound.

“Nicole?”

“Andy, I …”

It is not until she falls forward into my lap that I truly register what has happened. Nicole has been shot. My mind goes from wild panic to crystal clear focus in an instant, and I realize that I don't know where the shooter is, and that he certainly can shoot again.

I pull Nicole down behind the rocks, hoping that they will shield us, but I can't be sure of that, since I don't know where the assailant is shooting from. I take a look at Nicole and her eyes are rolling back in her head, as if she is losing consciousness. I have no first-aid experience whatsoever, but I have this vague feeling she could be going into shock, and I know that I have to get her help quickly. The question is how.

I peer out from behind the rock and another shot rings out, ricocheting inches from my head. It is clear that we cannot make it to the car, and just as clear that we can't stay here and hope to survive. It flashes through my mind that this is the time in the old Westerns that the hero turns to someone and says, “Cover me.”

I position Nicole so that she is anchored securely and protected by the rocks. I then move along the rocks, keeping them between me and the shooter. When I think I am out of his possible line of fire, I get into the stream. I know from past experience that the water must be very cold, but I don't even feel it.

I let myself be carried along by the current, which is very difficult as the water becomes more turbulent as it goes downstream. About a hundred and fifty yards away, I grab on to a branch and pull myself up to the bank.

I work my way inland, planning to go up the hill and come down behind the gunman. I'm going to have to surprise and disarm him. This is not exactly my specialty, but I have a curious lack of fear. Maybe I'm too scared to be afraid.

As I head to where I estimate him to be, I hear a car engine start. I move quickly toward the sound, and I reach a clearing just as the car is pulling away. It is a late-model BMW, and I am able to see the license plate, CRS-432. It etches itself indelibly in my mind.

I rush back down to the stream where Nicole is still lying. I pick her motionless body up and put it over my shoulder, carrying her to the car. I lie her down in the back seat and quickly apply a cloth to her shoulder, though the bleeding has for the most part stopped. I don't want to let myself think about the possible implications of that, and I speed to a nearby hospital, calling them from my cell phone so they will be prepared for our arrival.

We arrive at the hospital in five minutes that seem like five hours. They are indeed waiting for us, and perform with incredible efficiency from the moment we arrive. The paramedics immediately have Nicole on a stretcher and bring her inside, with one of them having the consideration to tell me that yes, she is still alive.

I am led to a waiting room, where I spend the next two hours totally in the dark about Nicole's condition. I call Philip and leave word in his office as to where I am and what has happened. They tell me he is in Washington, but they reach him and he is going to fly back immediately.

Finally, a young woman comes out and introduces herself as Dr. Summers. She wastes no time.

“Your wife is going to pull through. The bullet did not strike any vital organs.”

It takes a moment for these words to register, so that I can then ask other questions. Dr. Summers tells me that Nicole has lost a significant amount of blood, and they are in the process of finishing a transfusion. Her collarbone is shattered, but it will heal over time.

“When can I see her?”

“I would say in about an hour.”

I thank her and sit back down. The police arrive, and I tell a detective what I know. The only thing I leave out is the most significant fact, the license plate number. Right now I'm not trusting anyone, and I'm going to play my cards close to the vest.

Moments after the police leave, Laurie arrives, though I have no idea how she has heard about what happened. She sees me, comes over and hugs me.

“Andy, God, I'm sorry. How is she?”

I tell her what the doctor has told me, and Laurie asks if I have any idea who was behind this.

“No,” I say, “but I know who they were after. Me.”

Suddenly, the pent-up anger and frustration overwhelms me, and I punch a hole in the wall. Well, a dent in the wall.

“Goddammit! Nicole told me to drop it, and somebody fired a bullet into her body when I wouldn't.”

Laurie puts her hand on my shoulder, but there is no consoling me. This is the closest I have ever come to being out of control, and I have to fight to keep what little composure I have left.

“Andy …”

“Laurie, just before this happened, I told Nicole that things were not going to work out for us. That my heart wasn't in it anymore.”

“Oh, God …”

“And now, because of me … she's lying in there with somebody else's blood being pumped into her to keep her alive.”

Laurie stays with me until the doctors say that I can see Nicole. Before she leaves, I remember to tell her the license plate number of the car that I saw on the scene, and she promises to check it out.

When I walk into Nicole's room, I am jolted by the sight of her. She lies, pale and weak, connected to machines by tubes. Her eyes are open, but she seems groggy.

I try to be upbeat. “Nicole, how are you feeling?”

She looks in my direction, and I watch as her eyes try to focus. She finally realizes that it is me, and she starts to cry softly.

“Andy … oh, Andy.”

I move toward her and hold her, trying my best not to interfere with any of the tubes.

“Calm down … take it easy, now. You need your rest. The doctor said you're going to be fine, as long as you take it easy.”

“It hurts so much, Andy.”

“I know. I know it does.”

“Where's my father?”

“He'll be here soon. He was in Washington, but he's on the shuttle. He's very worried about you.”

She nods softly, obviously very tired.

“Nicole, I'm sorry. You have no idea how sorry. You don't belong in this … you don't deserve this.” But she is already asleep, and she can't hear me. We haven't been able to hear each other for a very, very long time.

Philip arrives about an hour later and completely takes over. He arranges for Nicole to be transferred to a more prestigious hospital near his home, and is already having his personal physician consult with the doctors who have taken care of Nicole.

Philip has very little to say to me, and I can't say that I blame him. He's warned me that something terrible could happen if I didn't back off, and he's been proven right.

OUR DEFENSEBEGINS ON MONDAY MORNING, AND our first witness is Lou Campanelli, the leader of a local drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. Kevin has interviewed him over the weekend, and has reported to me that we have some gains to make by putting him on. Kevin also has come up with a way that we can use Lou to help our theory that Willie was framed.

A lot of people talk a good game about helping people, but Lou Campanelli has devoted his life to it. He is sixty-four years old, and has been helping people deal with their addictions for the past forty-two of them. There aren't enough Lou Campanellis in the world.

After I take him through his background and have him describe the type of program he runs, I ask him if Willie was a member of that program.

Lou nods. “He was an outstanding member. Totally committed to remaining sober.”

“So were you surprised to discover that he was found drunk the night of the murder?”

“I was quite surprised. It's always a possibility, of course, every day can be a struggle. But yes, in Willie's case I was surprised and disappointed.”

“What about drugs?” I ask. “To the best of your knowledge, did Willie ever use drugs?”

Lou shakes his head firmly and emphatically. “No way. Willie lost a sister to drugs. He wasn't just against them for himself; he wouldn't tolerate anybody else using them either. It just isn't possible.”

I nod. “What would you say if I told you that there has been testimony about drug needle marks in Willie Miller's arms?”

“I'd say somebody's lying.”

I go over to the defense table, and Kevin hands me a folder.

“Your Honor, I would like to introduce this as defense exhibit number four. It is the results of the blood test taken at the time, which shows no drugs in Mr. Miller's blood whatsoever.”

I walk back toward Lou, whose face shows something between a grin and a sneer. “I told you.”

I can't help but smile. “Yes, you did, Mr. Campanelli. Now tell me … as an expert on alcoholism … how does one go about getting drunk?”

“What do you mean? By drinking alcohol.”

“Does the alcohol get into the drinker's bloodstream?”

“Yes.”

“Is drinking the only way to do it?”

“Far as I know,” he says.

“Suppose,” I ask, “suppose I were to inject a large amount of alcohol into your arm with a syringe. Would that do the trick? Could you become drunk that way?”

Wallace realizes where I'm going. “Objection. Pure speculation.”

“Overruled. Witness will answer the question.”

Lou shrugs. “I guess it would. Sure.”

“Objection! Your Honor, the witness is not qualified as an expert in this area.”

Hatchet overrules again and Wallace asks for a conference out of earshot of the jury. We go back to chambers, where he again makes the case that I am advancing wild theories that Hatchet should protect the jury's delicate ears from having to hear. Hatchet refuses to do so, and we head right back into the court.

As I stand to continue my direct examination of Campanelli, I notice Laurie coming in the back door and sitting at the defense table.

“Mr. Campanelli,” I resume, “could such a large amount of alcohol be injected into a person's bloodstream that the person could be rendered totally drunk? Smashed?”

“Sure.”

“So that he couldn't remember anything afterward? Including the injections?”

“I guess it would depend on the person, but … why not?”

I smile. “I don't know why not, Mr. Campanelli. I don't know why not at all.”

I go back to the defense table as Wallace starts his cross-examination. I hear him getting Campanelli to speak about how common it is for program members to fall off the wagon and go on binges.

I lean over to talk to Laurie. “Any news on the license plate?”

She nods. “Yes, but you're not going to like it. It's a registered plate, top government security clearance. There is no way to find out who has it.”

This is a stunning piece of news. The goddamn government is trying to kill me?

Campanelli leaves the stand, and Hatchet announces that one of the jurors has a medical situation that needs attention, canceling court for the afternoon. Considering the state of my case, I hope it's a twenty-four-week virus.

Nicole, amazingly, has been cleared to leave the hospital, mainly because Philip is setting up a special facility for her in his home, complete with round-the-clock nurses and a doctor who will check on her twice a day.

Actually, I find out about Nicole's departure from the hospital inadvertently. I happen to call her while she is in the process of leaving. I have the feeling that right now I am not wanted or needed by either her or her father. In Philip's eyes I have committed the cardinal sin of exposing his daughter to serious danger, even after I was warned about the possibility of that danger. To compound the offense, I have also rejected her. His accusations are fair; I am guilty as charged.

Laurie and I go to Charlie's bar to discuss the latest developments. I don't have many options for the defense; my strategy has been to cast doubt on the prosecution's witnesses, to raise the possibility of a frame-up.

The simple fact is that, while I've had some success, it hasn't been enough. Absent a major development, Willie Miller is going to be convicted. And if there's a major development coming, it's news to me.

Laurie asks, “Are you going to put Willie on the stand?”

“How can I? All he'll say is he has no idea what happened. Wallace will have him for lunch.”

As has been my custom during my slide into frustration dementia, I take out the photograph from my father's house and put it on the table. I know every square millimeter of it by heart, but I keep looking at it, hoping that it will jog something in my mind. It never does; the sad truth is I'm no closer to figuring it out than the day I first saw it.

Of course, the list of things that I'm not close to figuring out is as long as my arm. Right near the top is why the person who shot at me and hit Nicole was driving a government vehicle, and a classified one at that.

And then one of those moments happen that are impossible to predict, but have the power to change everything. As we are talking about the license plate, my gaze wanders back to my father's picture, still on the table. Between my eyes and the picture is Laurie's beer bottle. The glass has the effect of magnifying the picture, and ringing a bell inside my head.

“You know something,” I say. “I'm a genius.”

“You've certainly been hiding it well,” Laurie answers.

“Let's go.” I put money down to cover the check and head for the door. Laurie has to hurry to keep up behind me. She calls out to me as I head for the parking lot.

“Where are we going?”

“I'll tell you on the way.”

Vince Sanders is in his office at the newspaper when we barge in. I tell him that we need his help urgently, but I'm not sure he hears me because he can't stop staring at Laurie. He probably thinks she is one of the twins I promised him.

Finally, he acknowledges my presence. “How did you know I'd be here this late?”

“Where would you be? On a date?”

Vince asks Laurie, “Is he always this big a pain in the ass?”

“I can only speak for the last three years,” Laurie says.

Vince shrugs. “Okay, what can I do for you?”

I take out the picture and put it on the table.

Vince sighs. “I already told you, the only guy I recognize is Mike Anthony.”

I shake my head. “I don't care about the people. I care about the license plate.”

All this time I have been focusing on the people in the picture, not on the cars. Now I point to the license plate on one of the cars, the one that is facing the camera. It is certainly too small to be read by the human eye, but I can tell that the letters and numbers are there.

“Can you have this blown up so we can read it?”

He looks at it, squinting as he does. “We can try.”

He stands up, grabs the picture, and takes it out of the room, coming back after only a few minutes.

“We'll know in five minutes,” he says.

He's right, although the five minutes feel like five weeks. Finally, his phone rings and all he says is “Yeah?” then hangs up.

He turns to Laurie and me. “Follow me.”

Vince takes us down the hall and into a room filled with computers. He introduces us to Chris Townshend, a twenty-four-year-old who Vince describes as “the best there is.” He doesn't say at what, and I'm not about to ask. There is only one answer I want, and if I'm really, really lucky, it's about to come on the computer screen.

Chris takes us over to the largest screen in the room. He works a console full of buttons and gadgets like a maestro. Suddenly he pauses, presses a button, and the photograph appears, still far too small to make out the license plate. He starts to zoom in on the plate, each time making it larger and larger. I can feel the excitement building; this is going to work.

After a few more clicks, Chris says, “That's as close as I can get without it becoming too diffuse.” We all peer in to try and read it; it's not easy.

“J … B …” I say.

Laurie points at the letter I have identified as a B. “That's an R,” she says. “Let me do this, I'm younger than you.”

“It's okay with me,” Vince says. “I'm blind as a bat.”

Laurie keeps reading, and I'm writing it down as she does. “J … R … C … 6 … 9 … 3.”

“The last number is a 2,” Chris says.

I say to Laurie, “He's younger than you.”

Laurie stares a quick dagger at me, but it doesn't concern me. “What state is it?” I ask.

Chris responds: “It looks like New Jersey.”

I put the piece of paper in my pocket, and Laurie and I start heading for the door.

“You got what you need?” Vince asks.

“I sure as hell hope so,” I answer.

A LICENSE PLATEFROM THIRTY-FIVE YEARS AGO represents the best clue we have had into the meaning of the photograph. This is in itself a commentary on how little we've accomplished. For instance, the license could well turn out to have been issued in my father's name, which is to say it would be of no use to us.

The next task, of course, is to find out who the plate belonged to. This is not going to be easy, and there is only one person I know who can accomplish it quickly and with the discretion required. Unfortunately, it is the person I attacked on the witness stand a few days ago, Pete Stanton.

I know where Pete lives, so Laurie and I drive out there. It's about forty-five minutes away, in a little town called Cranford.

“I thought cops were supposed to live in town,” I mutter, unhappy with the length of the drive, and dreading Pete's reaction to my arrival.

“You might not want to complain about it to him,” Laurie suggests to me. “He's not going to be that anxious to do you a favor in the first place.”

We are about five minutes away, off the highway, when we pass a sign on the road. It directs the driver to make a right turn to get to the Preakness Country Club.

“That's Markham's club,” I say. “We should sneak in and put shaving cream in his golf shoes.”

Laurie doesn't think that's a very mature idea, so we continue on to Pete's house, a modest colonial in a quiet, unassuming neighborhood. I would love to send Laurie in alone, but my male ego won't let me do it, so I walk with her up the steps and nervously ring the bell.

After a few moments, Pete comes to the door. He opens it and sees me standing there.

“Oh, Christ,” he says.

My plan is to immediately apologize for being so tough with him on the stand. I'm going to talk about the fact that I was just doing my job, unpleasant as it sometimes is. I'll beg for his forgiveness, tell him how important his friendship is to me, and hope that bygones can be bygones.

Unfortunately, my plan goes up in smoke when I see that he is wearing a ridiculous red bathrobe, so comical that I am physically and emotionally unable to avoid mocking it.

“Nice outfit, Pete. Does the whole team have them?” I ask.

For a brief moment he looks as if he is going to kill me, but I think he decides it's not worth doing all the paperwork that would be involved afterward. Instead, he starts to close the door.

I push back against it, holding it open. “Wait a minute! We need your help!”

“Forget it.” We're actually pushing against the door from opposite sides in a weird reverse tug-of-war, and I am not coming out on top.

“Come on, I'm sorry!”

I think he can tell that it was not the most sincere of apologies, because he keeps closing the door.

I yell to Laurie, “Don't just stand there!”

After a brief moment that seems like an hour, she shrugs and says, “I need your help, Pete.”

Pete immediately relaxes and opens the door. He speaks only to Laurie. “Why didn't you say so? What's up?”

I jump in. “We have to run down an old license plate.”

Pete ignores me and again speaks to Laurie. “What's up?”

“We have to run down an old license plate,” Laurie says.

This is starting to annoy me-I mean, all I did in court was my job. “Hey, what am I, invisible?”

“You're lucky you're not dead,” Pete snarls. “You turned me into a goddamned idiot on the stand.”

“You were already a goddamned idiot. I just brought it out into the open.”

This time I'm pretty sure that if he has a gun in that cute red bathrobe he will shoot me. Laurie tells me to go wait in the car, which I think is a wise idea.

From the time I get in the car, it only takes a minute or so. Laurie comes back and gets in the passenger seat.

“Let's go,” she says.

“What happened?”

“He's going to call it in. We should have it tomorrow.”

“See?” I say. “I told you I could handle him.”

I drop Laurie off at her apartment and then head home. Pete's going to get us the information, and then we'll either have something or we'll have nothing. I have rarely felt less in control.

The next morning I ask for a meeting in Hatchet's chambers with him and Wallace. They have heard about Nicole getting shot, and I lay out for them the threats we had received and the attack in my office. I make the case that someone is actively trying to prevent justice from being carried out, and I ask that I be allowed to depose Victor Markham and Brown-field about the photograph.

Wallace seems genuinely sympathetic to my situation, but is obligated to make the point that no significant legal link has been made between the photograph and the Miller trial. He is technically correct, and Hatchet is also technically correct in denying my request. Which he does.

Our first witness this morning is going to be Edward Markham, on whom I am planning to take out my frustrations. Laurie has joined Kevin and me at the defense table for the day's festivities.

As I glance around the courtroom, I see that Victor is there to provide sonny boy moral support. He's going to need it.

Just as Hatchet is taking his seat behind the bench, the door in the back of the courtroom opens and Pete appears. He walks toward me as Hatchet is instructing me to call my first witness.

Pete hands me a small piece of paper and says, “I figured I should deliver this one personally.”

I look at the paper and say, “Holy shit.”

Laurie nudges me. “What is it?”

I hand her the paper; her whispered reaction is more biblical than mine. She says, “Jesus Christ.” She passes the paper down to Kevin, but I can't hear what he mutters.

Hatchet sees all this. “Are we going to pass notes in class today or might we call a witness?”

I stand up. “Your Honor, we call Edward Markham, but a significant development has taken place, and we would request a brief recess prior to his testimony.”

“How brief?”

“The balance of the morning, Your Honor. We would be prepared to question the witness right after the lunch break.”

Hatchet asks Wallace and me to approach. We do, and I tell them that this can be a crucial breakthrough, and that I need the morning to follow through on it. It can change the entire case.

I am shocked when Wallace doesn't object. He knows that his position will not be harmed by waiting a few hours, and he trusts me that this is in fact an important development. What he is doing is putting justice ahead of victory; my father would have been damn proud of him.

Hatchet goes along with it, and I head back to the defense table. I tell Kevin that if I'm not back in time, he is to question Edward for as long as it takes, just making sure that he does not leave the stand before I get there. I don't even wait for an answer; I'm out of the building and on the way to my car.

My trip out to Betty Anthony's is a nerve-racking one. Pete's information has the promise of cracking this case wide open and letting the long hidden secrets pour out, but it will be of no value if I can't get Betty Anthony on my side. And so far I have had no success at doing that.

I try her apartment first, hoping that she is not at work. When I arrive and prepare to ring the bell, I hear the strains of Frank Sinatra singing Cole Porter, coming from inside the apartment. She's home.

Betty comes to the door, and her expression when she sees that it's me is a combination of exasperation and fear. She's fended me off until now, but she's afraid that I'll come at her from an angle that will shake up her world. Which is exactly what I'm about to do.

“Hello, Betty.”

“Mr. Carpenter, I really must ask you to stop bothering me like this. It's not-”

“I know about Julie McGregor.”

The effect is immediate, and it is all in her eyes. First there is the flash of fear, as she starts to process the words she hoped never to hear. Then comes the realization that there is no defense to those words, that resistance is futile. Then her body catches up to her eyes, and she sags noticeably, the fight taken out of her.

Watching her reaction is exhilarating and terribly, terribly sad.

She doesn't say a word, just opens the door wider for me to enter. The apartment is exactly what I would have expected … small, inexpensively furnished, but meticulously kept. There are a number of religious artifacts around, as well as pictures of family members, including many of Mike.

Betty starts to straighten the place up, dusting areas without dust and moving things which do not need to be moved. I suppose it is her way of trying to bring order into what is soon to be a chaotic situation.

“Would you like some coffee?” she asks.

“Yes, thank you.”

She is trying to find something to do. We both know that she is going to speak to me, but I'm helping her put it off at least for a few more minutes.

She makes the coffee and brings it to me. Finally, she says, “How much do you know?”

“Enough to tell the world the story. Not enough to prove it.”

She nods. “He was never the same after that night. He thought it would get better, but it got worse as the years went by.”

“Did you know him then?”

“Yes. We were engaged. But he didn't tell me the full story about what happened until years later.”

A pause, as she struggles with her own guilt. “But I couldn't help him with it.”

“Down deep he had to know it would come out,” I say. “He couldn't keep it inside any longer. And neither can you. Not anymore.”

She sighs. “I know.”

“Tell me about that night.”

She takes a deep breath and lets it out. “They were in Manhattan for a dinner, some kind of awards event for the best students from around the country. A future leaders thing, or something. Most of them never met each other before that night.”

I start to ask her if she knows their names, but I decide I'm not going to interrupt. The story is going to come pouring out of her, and I'm not going to do anything to influence or derail it.

She goes on. “A group of them began drinking at the banquet, and then went to a bar on the Upper West Side. All they were interested in was alcohol and women, but it was late on a slow Tuesday night, so they were having much more luck with the alcohol.

“The bar was about to close, and nothing much was happening, so they accepted the offer of one of their group to go to his house, where they could keep drinking and swim in his pool.

“On the way out into Jersey, they called out to other drivers, yelling jokes and having fun. A few people yelled back, but most just ignored them.

“Five minutes from the house, a young woman that seemed to match their fun-loving attitude pulled up next to them at a traffic light. The fact that she was young and great-looking made the situation almost too good to be true, and they asked her to follow them to the house for a swim, never really expecting that she would.

“But she did follow them, and pulled her car in the driveway behind theirs.”

I already knew that, because her car would later that night be in a photograph, and many years later her license plate would be computer-enhanced and read. Lieutenant Pete Stanton would check that plate number and learn her identity.

The young woman's name was Julie McGregor. Wife of Wally. Mother of Denise.

I finally interrupt Betty to ask her if she knows the identity of the other men with Mike that night.

She shakes her head. “No, Mike would never tell me. I only knew one of them; he was the friend that Mike came to New York with.”

Then she hesitates, as if unsure whether to continue. But she understands there is no turning back now. “There is something else you should know.”

“What's that?”

She's in terrible pain. “That poor young woman. The reporter that was killed.”

“Denise McGregor,” I say.

She nods. “Yes. She was here, tracing what happened. She was piecing it together. I felt so badly for her.”

“How long was this before she was murdered?”

“I think a few months. I didn't find out about her death until much, much later.”

“Had she learned who was there that night?” I ask.

“She only knew about the same two people that I did … Mike and Victor Markham.”

IT'S ELEVEN-THIRTYBEFORE I LEAVE BETTY Anthony's. Court is going to reconvene at two, but I have someplace where I must stop first, even if it means being late. It's not a newsstand, and it's not some superstition that has to be indulged.

I have to go talk to my father.

I get to the cemetery, not swarming with people as it was the last time I was here, only a few visitors paying their respects to those they loved. I find my father's grave, and take a few moments to get my emotions in check.

“Dad, I have something to do today … I don't know how it's going to come out.”

I am overcome by a feeling of closeness to him; I have never really believed in an afterlife, yet I know in the depths of my being that he can hear me.

“I know about the money … and Victor … and Mike Anthony … and now I know what happened that night. But I don't know about you. Were you a part of it, or did you just know about it? Why did you take the money, if you'd never let yourself touch it?

“Dad, I know who you are, nothing can ever change that. But please understand, I need to know what you did.”

A woman walks by, and she speaks to me, hesitatingly.

“Excuse me,” she says. “Were you talking to me?”

Not wanting to look like a complete lunatic, I say, “Yes. I asked you what time it was.”

She looks at her watch. “One o'clock.”

“Thank you,” I say. And then I turn back to my father. “It's time to move on.”

I race back to the courthouse and arrive a little after two. When I enter the courtroom, Kevin is questioning Edward Markham. Obviously Hatchet had not granted him a further delay.

I stay in the back of the room for a while, watching Kevin and deciding exactly how I am going to handle things. Kevin really has nothing to ask Edward; I have not given him any instructions on what I want to accomplish. He is vamping for time, taking Edward through what is basically a rehash of his direct testimony for Wallace.

“So after you found her, what did you do?” asks Kevin.

“As I said previously, I called the police first. I wanted them to get an ambulance there right away, just in case there was any hope. Then I called my father.”

“He was at home?”

Wallace objects, stating the obvious, that all these questions have been previously asked and answered. Hatchet overrules the objection, but his patience is wearing a little thin.

“No, it was Friday night,” says Edward. “He's always at the club on Friday nights.”

Kevin prepares to ask another question he already knows the answer to, when he turns and sees me coming toward him. The look of relief on his face is palpable.

“No further questions, Your Honor,” I say.

“Well, Mr. Carpenter,” says Hatchet. “So glad you could join us.”

“Thank you, Your Honor, nice to be here.”

“Would you like to call another witness, or do you have any more errands to run?”

“If it pleases the court, the defense would like to call Victor Markham.”

Victor does not seem surprised to hear his name called, nor does he seem in any way worried. He's quite willing to take the time from his busy schedule to help further the cause of justice. The bigger they are, the nicer they are.

I approach Victor with a nonthreatening smile on my face, and speak softly. “Mr. Markham,” I begin, “did I have occasion to question you under oath in the office of your attorney a couple of weeks ago?”

“You did.”

“Would you like to have a transcript of that interview so that you can refer to it?”

“That won't be necessary. I just told you the truth about what I know. That hasn't changed any.”

“Do you remember my asking if you knew what story Denise McGregor was working on in the days just before her death?”

“Yes.”

“And what did you say?”

“I told you I had no idea.”

“But you did know her?” I ask.

“I really only knew her casually. She seemed very nice. The important thing to me was that my son liked her. And he certainly did.”

“And she liked him?”

“She seemed to.” He answers quickly, so that Wallace gets to his feet but does not have time to object that Victor could not possibly know what Denise's feelings were.

Hatchet instructs Victor to wait a beat before answering, to give Wallace time to object if he chooses to do so.

“Is it possible that she didn't like him at all, but went out with him for the purpose of finding out information?”

“I can't imagine why she would do that.”

“Perhaps that information would be of help to her in the story she was working on?”

“I'm certainly not aware of any such thing. I don't believe Edward would have had any information that would be useful to a reporter. You might have asked him that when you had him on the stand.”

Victor is good; he must be worried about where this is going, but he doesn't display any sign of it.

I nod. “Maybe I'll be able to help you with that. When your son called you that night, to tell you that Denise McGregor had been murdered and that he had discovered the body, did he seem upset?”

“Obviously.”

“And you shared his distress? You were upset at the news as well?”

He shakes his head slightly, conveying to the jury his frustration with such obvious questions. “Of course I was. A young woman had been murdered.”

“What were you doing at the time?”

“I was in the lobby of my club, chatting with some friends.”

“Which friends?”

A frown. “I'm afraid I really don't remember. This all took place a number of years ago, Mr. Carpenter, and I'm sure the conversations were casual. Besides, I am blessed with a great many friends. We were relaxing at our club on a Friday night.”

I smile my understanding. “But might the conversations have been about golf, the weather, that kind of thing?”

He returns the smile; we're getting to be good buddies. “Most likely about golf.”

“So you're in the lobby, probably talking about golf, and this call comes in. Who called you to the phone?”

“I don't remember. I assume the concierge.”

“Your club has a concierge? Wow.”

“Objection. Relevance.”

“Sustained. Mr. Carpenter, move this along.”

“Yes, Your Honor. So you got the call, Edward tells you he found his girlfriend's body in an alley, and boy, were you upset. Did you rush to your car?”

“Yes. Immediately.”

“By the way, where do people keep cars at fancy clubs like that?”

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“Are they parked out in front? Do you park far away and take a tram to the main building?”

“There is valet parking.”

“Of course, valet parking.” I slap myself in the head, as if to say, “How could I be such a stupid peasant.” The jury laughs.

“So you get this news and you rush out, and you say, ‘Valet parking person, get me my car, and pronto.’ ”

I pause a moment. “Do rich people say ‘pronto'?”

Wallace objects again, effectively getting on my nerves. “Your Honor,” he says, “I fail to see the relevance of this.”

“Your Honor,” I respond with some anger, “I have a certain momentum going here, which is being interrupted by Mr. Wallace's constantly claiming that he doesn't see the relevance in what I am saying. Therefore, I would request two things. One, that the court instruct Mr. Wallace to stop interrupting; and two, that you force him to take a night course in relevance detection techniques.”

Wallace is angry. “Your Honor, that is the most-”

Hatchet's gavel cuts him off. “That's enough, both of you. Mr. Wallace, I'm going to overrule your objection. Mr. Carpenter, I'm also having trouble figuring out where you are going with this, and I have no intention of going to night school. So get to it.”

I promise that I will and turn back to Victor. His attitude has become more hostile, sensing that the jury will agree I am wasting all of their collective time.

“So after you got your car, did you head for the bar where the murder took place?”

“Yes.”

“Is it a bar you frequented yourself, that you were familiar with, or did Edward tell you where it was?”

“He told me. It was not hard to find.”

“Did you drive quickly?”

He nods. “Very. I was quite upset.”

“I know. You've told us that. How far would you say it is from your club to the bar?”

He shrugs. “I don't know. Maybe twenty miles.”

“Actually, it is twenty-nine point seven miles. I drove it. I made it in forty-seven minutes, but I wasn't rushing because I wasn't as terribly upset as you were. How long would you say that it took you?”

“I don't know, but I'm sure it was faster than that.”

“How fast?” I press him.

“I don't know; I had no reason to time the trip. But I was driving quickly.”

“Because you were so upset.”

“Yes.”

“Do you think you could have made it in forty minutes?”

“Maybe … I can't be sure.”

I walk toward him, firing questions almost before he finishes his answers.

“Thirty-five? Thirty?”

He is getting flustered. “I told you, I can't-”

“Twenty-five? Twenty? Fifteen? Do you think you could have made it in fifteen minutes?”

“Of course not,” he says.

“Because according to the police records and tape recordings, the police were at the scene fourteen minutes after Edward's call, and you were already there.”

“So?”

“So Edward testified that he called them first.”

Victor can't conceal the worry permeating his brain. “That's impossible. He must be mistaken about the order in which he made the phone calls. It was a very stressful time. A woman had been murdered.”

“He told this jury that he called the police first. He was quite definitive about it.”

“Well, he was mistaken. People make mistakes.”

“Yes, they do,” I say, “and then they'll do whatever is necessary to cover them up.”

“You're making things up, trying to make something out of nothing. To make my son and me look bad, as if we're lying …”

“You are lying.”

“I am telling you the truth.”

“Mr. Markham, why did you rape Ms. McGregor?”

Wallace jumps up as if he had been in an ejector seat. “Objection, Your Honor, this is crazy! There is absolutely no evidence that Denise McGregor had sex of any kind that night, consensual or otherwise. To accuse Mr. Markham like this is unconscionable.”

Hatchet peers at me sternly. “Mr. Carpenter, if you have any evidence whatsoever to indicate that the victim had sexual relations the night of her death, I suggest you bring it forth now.”

“Oh, sorry,” I say, “I wasn't talking about that night … I was talking about a different night. And I wasn't talking about Denise McGregor, I was talking about her mother.”

The courtroom explodes in slow motion, but Victor Markham alone does not seem excited or agitated by what has been said. His eyes are glued to the back of the courtroom as the door opens, and Betty Anthony comes striding in, immediately lending dignity to the proceedings with her presence. He seems to sag; his dread of the last few minutes has become his certainty.

He knows that I know.

I want to savor the moment, I want him to twist in the wind up there as long as possible. I want him to sit and deal with the fact that justice is about to be realized for Denise and Julie McGregor. So I wait a few moments before continuing, until Hatchet orders me to.

Finally, I say to Markham, “It was thirty-five years ago, but you remember it as if it were yesterday.”

Markham denies everything, and I let him off the stand, subject to recall. I call Betty Anthony as the next defense witness. Wallace objects, accurately claiming that Betty is not on the witness list that we provided for the prosecution.

I ask for a meeting outside the presence of the jury, and Wallace and I head for Hatchet's chambers. I state that Betty had not come forward with information until just this morning, and I lay out in detail exactly what she is going to say.

To his everlasting credit, Wallace withdraws his objection, and Hatchet allows Betty to testify. I believe he would have ruled so anyway, but Wallace takes it upon himself to ensure that he does. Wallace is that rarest of prosecutors, of lawyers, one who believes that finding out the truth is more important than winning. When the truth comes out, everyone wins.

Betty Anthony takes the stand to tell the story that she swore she would never tell, to reveal the weaknesses in her husband that she would never reveal, to right the wrong that she had concluded she would never right.

I take her through a brief discussion about who she is, where she works, and who she had been married to, just enough to establish her as a good and decent, hardworking woman, who certainly would be credible to a jury. Then I lead her to that night, and how Julie met and followed the group back to the house. She is telling the secret that her husband kept for his entire adult life, a secret which caused him to end that life.

“Mike said she wanted to swim, and to drink, and maybe to tease,” Betty said. “But that wasn't what they wanted. They wanted to have sex with her. It would cap off an incredible evening in the big city, one they could tell their friends about for months to come.”

She starts to falter, so I'm forced to prod her. “But it didn't happen that way, did it?” It's a leading question, but Wallace doesn't object.

She shakes her head sadly. “No. They became too forward for her, groping her, and she wasn't too drunk to put a stop to it. She got angry at them, then got out of the pool and started to walk to her car. But I guess the alcohol had increased their courage and decreased their intelligence, so they chased after her and pulled her back. They weren't going to let her spoil their night, not after it had gone that far.”

Betty takes a deep breath, drawing in the strength to continue. “She lashed out, kicking and screaming and scratching two of them. This got them angry, and they attacked her. She screamed and fought, but they were too powerful for her, too far out of control.”

Betty is verbally staggering, having trouble keeping her own emotions in check. “Tell the rest,” I say very gently. “It's time for the truth to come out.”

She nods. “They gang-raped her, taking turns holding her down, paying no attention to her screams. Finally she broke away and ran, but in her panic she slipped and fell on the wet surface near the pool, smashing her head into a cement table. She was unconscious and bleeding, and they didn't know if she was alive or dead. Then one of them …”

“Go on, Betty …” I say.

“One of them … I don't know who, pushed her into the pool with his foot. She went under the water and stayed there.”

The jury and everyone else within the sound of Betty Anthony's voice is spellbound by her story. Even Hatchet seems mesmerized by her as she weaves the tale she has protected for so long.

I look in the gallery and see that Victor has left the courtroom; that's okay, he'll read all about it tomorrow. All that is left now is for me to wrap up Betty's testimony.

“Mrs. Anthony, did you ever have occasion to meet Denise McGregor, the woman whose murder has caused all of us to be here today?”

“Yes. She came to see me.”

“Why did she do that?”

“She told me that she was a reporter, doing a story about a murder that she believed was committed many years earlier. She told me that the victim was her mother.”

“Go on, please.”

“She knew quite a bit about it, about my husband's involvement, and about one other man who was part of the group.”

“Did she say who that was?”

“She did … Victor Markham. I already knew that.”

A rumble goes through the courtroom, which Hatchet quiets with his gavel.

“Thank you, Mrs. Anthony,” I say. “Your witness.”

Wallace dreads this cross-examination, but must go through with it. He gets Betty to admit that she has kept this information a secret all these years, implying that this means what she has to say is somehow suspect. He also brings out that she has no physical evidence of the crime, only the word of her late husband. He does a very professional job in a very difficult situation.

On redirect, I introduce my father's photograph as evidence. It tends to corroborate her testimony by placing the conspirators together with Julie's car. Clearly, though, it does not show any conclusive proof of their guilt.

When I go back to the defense table, Willie leans over to ask if we've already won. He thinks they're going to come over and cut his handcuffs off, and he can go home. I tell him we're a long way from that, and I arrange to meet at seven with Kevin and Laurie at my house.

THE GUEST HOUSEON PHILIP'S PROPERTY has been converted into a small hospital. Nicole has a hospital bed, modern medical machines, a full staff of nurses, and a doctor who does regular rounds. It is an amazing transformation.

Philip is out at a political dinner, a small blessing for which I am grateful. I had called ahead and asked Nicole if I could come over, and she didn't say that I shouldn't. It is not a visit that I am relishing, for obvious reasons, but one that I know I must make.

I tell one of her nurses who I am, and she informs Nicole, who comes right out. She is doing remarkably well, and is wrapped in bandages around her upper body, so as to help her broken collarbone heal. But she is up and around, albeit gingerly, and though she looks pale, it is hard to believe that it's only a few days since she was lying unconscious behind those rocks.

The tension between us is obvious. No sooner do we say hello to each other than I feel a need to change the subject. I look around the house. “I forgot how amazing this place is.”

She smiles. “My father wanted us to live here, remember? He built the house for me even before I was born.”

“Looking back, I can't remember how I had the courage to tell him we wouldn't.”

She laughs. “You made me tell him.”

“Even then I was a man among men.”

“You stand up to him better than most.”

I nod; that's probably true. “How are you feeling?”

“Pretty well. I mean, I don't get shot that often, but I think I'm recovering rather quickly.”

“I'll never forgive myself for letting this happen to you,” I say.

She chooses not to respond to that, and changes the subject. “I saw what happened with Victor Markham on the news tonight. Does it mean you're going to win?”

“Not necessarily, but it certainly helps. Closing arguments are tomorrow.”

She nods. “Have you had your dinner? Would you like something to eat?”

I shake my head no. “Nicole, I'm not sure we finished what we needed to say.”

She tenses up. “Don't, Andy. I didn't need to say anything, and you said a lot more than I wanted to hear.”

“I'm sorry … it's not how I wanted it to end.”

She smiles a slight, ironic smile. “See? We do have something in common.”

I start to tell her again how sorry I am, but she can't listen anymore. She just shakes her head, turns, and goes back to her room. I let myself out of her house and I head back to mine.

Tara is waiting for me at home, tail wagging, to congratulate me on a good day in court. Laurie arrives and shares Tara's enthusiasm, which is tempered by the dose of realism which Kevin soon provides, and with which I concur.

The fact is that Willie Miller remains in a very precarious situation. Nothing has been proven against Victor Markham, and it is unfortunately not up to our jury to ponder or even consider his guilt or innocence. They are empaneled to judge only Willie, and the evidence against him remains overwhelming. Whatever might or might not have happened on that night all those years ago, it does not mean that Willie Miller is innocent of the Denise McGregor murder.

Laurie and I are going over my closing argument, which will follow Wallace's tomorrow. Our thrust will be two-pronged: We will contend that Willie was framed, and we will serve up Victor Markham as the person who framed him. I believe it is a winning strategy, but I've been wrong before.

Pete Stanton calls, asking if we can meet before court tomorrow. He's received a report regarding the Betty Anthony testimony, and he wants to begin an investigation of Victor Markham immediately. We agree to meet for a quick cup of coffee.

Kevin and Laurie leave by ten o'clock, a comparatively early night for this trial. I sleep well tonight; the only time I wake up is when Tara's tail hits me in the face. I reach out and scratch her stomach, and the next thing I know, it's morning.

Pete is pumped to go after Victor Markham, and the prospect of doing so has apparently caused him to at least temporarily forget how much he hates me for attacking him on the stand. During breakfast, I take him through the entire story of the photograph and the money in my father's estate, right up to the present moment. He feels he can build a case against Victor, but we both know it won't be in time to help Willie with the jury.

The press this morning has been filled with news of the trial; Victor Markham's potential downfall has changed it from a big story to a mega story. I'm being cautiously praised by the same pundits who've been calling me overmatched, but they still feel we have an uphill battle ahead of us.

The crowds outside the courthouse are much larger the next morning, and there are far more media present. When Wallace stands to deliver his closing argument before a packed gallery, the courtroom feels considerably more tense than it has at any time during the trial.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you're in the home stretch now. I'm going to make a few remarks, and then Mr. Carpenter will do the same. Following that will come the most important moment of this trial, when Judge Henderson instructs you about your responsibilities under the law. He will tell you a great deal, but the most important thing he will say is that you must follow the evidence.

“So I am here to ask that you not take your eyes off of that evidence, through our statements and through your deliberations. Mr. Carpenter will talk of an alleged murder that took place over thirty-five years ago, a murder for which no body has ever been found. He will also talk of an alleged conspiracy, revealed only through hearsay testimony, and conveniently withheld for all these years, right up until the eve of your deliberations.

“He will try to substitute another villain, Victor Markham, for the one he represents, Willie Miller. But it was not Victor Markham's blood and skin under the fingernails of Denise McGregor. It was not Victor Markham that was seen standing over the victim by a very credible eyewitness. It was not Victor Markham whose fingerprints were all over the murder weapon. And it is not Victor Markham who has a history of attacking women when under the influence of alcohol.

“The only person all that evidence points to is Willie Miller, and that is who you are here to judge. I ask that you find him guilty as charged.”

Wallace offers me a slight nod and the trace of a smile as he sits down. I know that he's feeling justifiably pleased that he's done a fine job, and thoroughly relieved that his job is over. It's now my turn, and it seems like every eye in the courtroom simultaneously shifts to me.

When I took on this case, I convinced myself there was a chance Willie was innocent. I need to do that to perform at a peak level. But back then I only believed in the possibility of his innocence, and I have now reached a certainty of it. It puts far more pressure on me to win, and it is that pressure that threatens to suffocate me as I stand to give my closing argument.

Just before I begin, I glance toward the back of the gallery and see Wally McGregor, in court for the first time, sitting up straight and waiting for justice for his family. This one's for you, Wally.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that Victor Markham was one of a group of men who raped and murdered Julie McGregor many years ago. But on one point I agree with Mr. Wallace: You are not here to decide that case. And that murder, horrible though it may be, is your concern for one reason and one reason only. It became the motive for Victor Markham to murder Julie's daughter, Denise McGregor, who had learned and was about to reveal the truth.

“He took the life of a mother, then waited almost thirty years to wipe out her offspring.

“But you cannot make him pay the price for either of those deaths. That is for another jury to do, and believe me, I will not rest until they have done just that. What you can do is make sure that Victor Markham does not claim still another victim- my client, Willie Miller.

“There is a great deal of evidence against Willie Miller, and Mr. Wallace did an outstanding job presenting it. But every single shred of it can be explained consistent with Victor Markham using his awesome power to frame him for the murder.

“Mr. Wallace talked about what Judge Henderson will tell you. But he left out the most important part. The judge will say that in order to convict, you must consider Willie Miller guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. I would respectfully suggest that you are up to your ears in reasonable doubt.”

I walk over to Willie and put my hands on his shoulders.

“This man has spent the last seven years of his life on death row for a crime he did not commit. All of us can only imagine the horror of that, but he has lived it.

“It is not your fault, you had nothing to do with it, and you cannot erase it. But there is something you can do: You can end it. You can give him back his dignity, and his self-respect, and his freedom.

“Ladies and gentlemen, you can go into that jury room, and you can do something absolutely wonderful. You can give Willie Miller his life back.”

I go back to the defense table, to the whispered congratulations of Laurie and Kevin, and the gratitude of Willie. I'm filled with a fear that I did not do or say enough to make the jury understand, and I want to get back up there and scream at them, to make them see the truth according to Andy Carpenter.

Hatchet gives the jury his instructions. My feeling is that he puts too much emphasis on the jury not considering the guilt or innocence of Victor Markham, but basically I think it's fair.

Actually, I'm pleased with Hatchet's performance throughout; I don't think he showed a preference to one side or the other. All in all, I'm glad he turned down the change of venue request.

Hatchet sends the jury off, and this case is officially out of my control. Before they take Willie away, he asks me what I think, and I tell him what I tell all my clients at this stage.

“I don't think, I wait.”

THE PRESSURE OF WAITINGFOR a jury to finish its deliberations is unlike anything else I have ever experienced. The only thing I could liken it to, and fortunately I'm just guessing, is waiting for a biopsy report to come back, after being told that the report will either signal terminal illness or good health. At that point matters are completely out of the hands of the patient and the doctor. Lawyers experience the same impotence while waiting for a verdict.

Every eccentricity, every idiosyncrasy, every superstition I possess comes out during this waiting period. For instance, I tell myself that if the jury gives us an even chance, we will win. Therefore, I do everything by even numbers. I'll only get out of bed in the morning when the digital clock shows an even number, I'll pump an even number of gallons of gas into my car, I'll only watch even-numbered channels on television, etc., etc.

Additionally, I'll also tell myself that our cause is in the right, which I react to by doing everything right-handed, by making three right turns rather than one left, and so on. There is no doubt about it-while waiting for a verdict, I become a crazed lunatic.

Fortunately for the rest of the world, I also become a hermit. I absolutely prohibit anyone involved with the defense from contacting me unless it is an absolute emergency. I want to be alone with Tara and my thoughts, and I want to do everything I can to try and keep those thoughts away from the case and the courtroom.

The Miller deliberations enter their third day with no word from the jury. They have not asked to have any testimony read back to them; nor have they asked to examine evidence. If they had done either of these things, Hatchet would have had to notify the attorneys, and we've had no such notification.

By accident, I hear a television commentator, a “former prosecutor,” say that the lengthy deliberation is a bad sign for the defense, but I turn it off before I can hear why.

I take Tara to the park to throw a ball, bringing my cell phone along in case the court clerk needs to reach me. We play catch for only about fifteen minutes; Tara seems to be slowing down as she gets older. If there is a God, how come golden retrievers only live until their early teens?

We stop at a caf the way home, where we take an outdoor table. I have iced coffee and an apple turnover; Tara has a bagel and a dish of water. We're just finishing up when the phone rings, and my stomach springs four feet into the air.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Carpenter?”

I have an overwhelming urge to tell the clerk she has the wrong number, but I don't. “That's me.”

“Judge Henderson would like you in court at two P.M. The jury has returned a verdict.”

There it is. It's over, but I don't yet know the ending. The only feeling more powerless than waiting while a jury is making its decision is waiting after they've made that decision. Now the result is even out of their control.