Snow White and Rose Red

2

“All was done in strict observance of the statute,” Mark Ritter said.

Like a giant white Buddha he sat behind his desk in the corner office of Ritter, Randall, and Goldenbaum, on Peachtree and Blair, not six blocks from my own office. It was my contention that Mark Ritter never allowed the sun to touch any part of his body. I had seen him waddling about the tennis courts swathed like an Arab, only his eyes peering out from a burnoose that covered his entire head and face. He was dressed completely in white now: rumpled white suit, sweat-stained white shirt, food-stained off-white tie, soiled white buckskin shoes. Monday-morning sunlight glanced through the window to the east and twinkled in the modest platinum tie tack that fastened his tie to his shirt. Mark Ritter resembled nothing so much as a beached, blanched, and bloated sea slug.

“How deep is your interest in this, anyway?” he asked.

I had the feeling he already knew how deep my interest was.

“I’ve taken on Sarah Whittaker as a client,” I said.

“Toward what end?” Mark asked.

“I’m afraid that’s confidential,” I said.

“Oho, listen to the big attorney with his privileged-communication bullshit,” Mark said. “Are you trying to spring her from Knott’s, is that it, Matthew?”

“Do you think she should be sprung?” I said.

“As I told you on the phone last week, the girl is nuttier than a Hershey bar with almonds.”

“Is that your opinion, Mark? Or the opinion of a mental health professional?”

“He’s been studying the Baker Act, has our young friend Matthew.”

“Let’s say I’ve been browsing through it.”

“If by ‘mental health professional,’ ” Mark said, “you mean an individual licensed or authorized to practice medicine or osteopathy under the laws of this state, and who has primarily diagnosed and treated mental and nervous disorders for a period of not less than three years—”

“I know the statute, Mark.”

“Good. Then I can assure you that Dr. Nathan Helsinger qualifies as a mental health professional under the definition in Section 394.455.”

“Was it Dr. Helsinger who executed the certificate that had her removed from her home to the Dingley Wing at Good Samaritan Hospital?”

“All in accordance with the statute.”

“Within the forty-eight hours preceding her emergency admission?”

“Matthew, please. We’re not amateurs here.”

“I didn’t think you were.”

Mark sighed. Watching Mark sigh was rather like watching a whale spouting.

“Matthew, Matthew,” he said. “Helsinger examined the girl after her mother phoned him to say she’d tried to slit her wrists. He signed the certificate that authorized a law-enforcement officer to take Sarah into custody and deliver her to the nearest available receiving facility for emergency examination and treatment All by the book, Matthew.”

“You seem to know the statute by heart.”

“I do.”

“Sarah tells me she was never examined by anyone before her admission to Dingley,” I said, and watched his eyes.

“Sarah, as we all know, is a paranoid schizophrenic with suicidal tendencies.”

“Was that Dr. Helsinger’s diagnosis?”

“His, yes, and also the diagnosis of the examining psychiatrist at Good Samaritan. Who, need I add, is another qualified ‘mental health professional.’ ”

“His name?”

“Dr. Gerald Bonamico.”

“When did the examination take place?”

“Which one?”

“Dr. Helsinger’s.”

“At seven o’clock on the evening of September twenty-seventh, approximately one hour after young Sarah Whittaker tried to take her own life.”

“When was the certificate executed?”

“The very same day.”

“Sarah tells me they broke into her room shortly before midnight.”

“Broke in, Matthew? Come, come.”

“She says she was in bed reading—”

“She was.”

“—and that you and her mother, accompanied by a police officer—”

“That’s all true.”

“—came into the room—”

“After knocking politely on her door.”

“—and dragged her away in handcuffs.”

“She tried to assault the officer. She spit in her mother’s face, screamed at her like a banshee, hurled obscenities at her. Matthew, the girl had tried to kill herself not six hours earlier. What the hell did you expect us to do?”

“How long was she kept in Dingley?” I asked.

“Three days. The statute calls for an outside limit of five days,” Mark said, and paused. “As I’m sure you know.”

He made it sound as if I didn’t know.

“And were proceedings for involuntary placement started at that time?”

“They were.”

“On what date, Mark?”

“The first of October.”

“Who filed the petition?”

“Sarah’s mother. Alice Whittaker.”

“Who else? The statute requires affidavits from two other—”

“The alternate requirement is that the petition can be accompanied by a certificate from a mental health professional stating that he examined the patient within the preceding five days—”

“I’m assuming this certificate—”

“Helsinger, correct.”

“And it stated, did it, that she was mentally ill—”

“The wording in the statute is ‘may be mentally ill.—”

“—and required placement in a mental facility for full evaluation?”

“The evaluation had already been made. At Dingley.”

“Who presided at the hearing?”

“Judge Albert R. Mason of the Second Circuit Court.”

“Who represented Sarah?”

“A court-appointed attorney.”

“His name?”

“Jeremy Wilkes.”

“Here in town? I don’t know the name.”

“He’d just begun practicing in Calusa at the time. He’s since moved.”

“Oh? Where to?”

“California someplace.”

“Convenient.”

“What is that supposed to mean, Matthew?”

“She’s represented at the hearing by an inexperienced attorney—”

“He’d been practicing law for seven years before he came to Calusa.”

“Inexperienced in Florida. Where’d he come from?”

“Louisiana.”

“And now He’s practicing in California?”

“I don’t know what He’s doing in California. I only know that he moved there.”

“When?”

“I have no idea.”

“Where in California?”

“I have no idea.”

“So this hearing takes place—”

“On the third of October.”

“And the result—”

“Four things could have happened, Matthew, as I’m sure you know. One, she could have been unconditionally released. Two, she could have been released for outpatient treatment at a community facility. Three, she could have given express and informed consent to placement as a voluntary patient. Or — four — proceedings for involuntary placement could have been initiated.”

“Which is what happened. She was involuntarily—”

“Yes. Because — on all the evidence — Judge Mason was satisfied that the person before him was nuts.”

“Uh-huh. Tell me, Mark, would you happen to know the name of the cop who broke into her bedroom that night?”

“There are those words again, Matthew.”

“Would you know his name?”

“How can I be expected to know the name of an anonymous policeman discharging his duty as—”

“Never mind, I’ll find out. Thank you, Mark. Appreciate your time.”

I’m sometimes glad I’m not a tourist in the city of Calusa, Florida.

If I were a tourist here, I wouldn’t know where to find a police station. In Chicago, Illinois — from which Second City I migrated long before the rush to the Sun Belt started — it was simple to find a police station whenever you needed one. Admittedly, there is less crime in Calusa than there was (and is) in Chicago, but it would be nice if a police station here looked like a police station.

In Calusa, it isn’t even called a police station, it’s called the Public Safety Building, and I happened to know where it was only because I’d had opportunity to visit it in the past. The Public Safety Building looks like a bank, of which there are many in Calusa. I’m glad there are a lot of banks in Calusa, because most of my law practice revolves around “closings.” If you practice a lot of real-estate law, closings are good. If you are in the business of producing plays, closings ain’t so hot. If you are looking for a police station and you wander into a bank, that ain’t so hot, either. In Calusa, nothing is very hot except the months of August and September, at which time it is possible to melt into a blot on the sidewalk outside the Public Safety Building, which is probably a misdemeanor that will run you afoul of the law. You can only occasionally melt into the sidewalk in April, which may be the cruelest month, but not in Calusa.

I was here on the sidewalk outside the Public Safety Building at eleven o’clock on the morning of April 15 because I wanted to talk to Detective Morris Bloom about the uniformed police officer who had barged into Sarah Whittaker’s bedroom at a little before midnight last September 27. The pittosporum bushes flanking the brown metal entrance doors were in bloom, their white flowers bursting like tiny stars against the deep green of the leaves. The leaves themselves partially obscured the words POLICE DEPARTMENT on the building’s tan brick walls, rather less conspicuously noticeable than the larger white letters affixed to the low wall surrounding a bed of gloxynias that bloomed in riotous purple confusion. What you saw first — if you were coming to report that someone had broken your head and stolen your purse — were the words PUBLIC SAFETY BUILDING. Only after you had climbed the steps and opened one of the bronzelike doors did you know you were also entering a police station; Calusa is a very discreet town.

I found Morrie Bloom on the third floor of the building.

He looked harried.

Maybe that was because the police had just discovered a body in the river.

“The Sawgrass,” Bloom said, “that runs through the bird sanctuary.”

He was leafing through the Polaroid photos the Criminalistics Unit had taken at the scene. The pictures showed — in full color — the badly decomposed body of a woman who had been in the water a long time. I knew it was a woman only because the corpse was wearing a dress. Aside from that, it was impossible to tell from the hairless skull and macerated flesh on the limbs and face.

“Alligators ate both her feet,” Bloom said. “Guess they didn’t like the taste or they’da done the whole job, huh? No ID on her or anywhere around the site. God knows how long she’s been in the water. Nice to come into the office on a Monday morning and find this on your desk, huh? I’m heading over to the morgue, you want to come with me?”

“No,” I said.

I had been to the morgue with him on one previous occasion, when he was investigating what he still referred to as “the Beauty and the Beast case,” although I thought of it as the George Harper tragedy. I could still remember the smell of the morgue. For weeks afterward I kept washing my hands and rinsing out my nostrils with salt water. I did not want to visit a morgue again as long as I lived. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to visit one when I was dead.

Bloom seemed in the pink of condition. He was drinking again after his recent bout with hepatitis, and I guessed He’d gained a good fifteen pounds. The weight sat well on his huge frame. I’m an even six feet tall, and I weigh 170 pounds. Bloom is a good inch taller than I, and I suspected he now weighed in at a solid 220. He kept staring mournfully at the photographs of the dead girl; Bloom always looked as if he were ready to burst into tears. In his wrinkled blue suit, he also looked as if He’d just been paroled from a penitentiary someplace. He had the big hands and oversize knuckles of a street fighter, a fox face with shaggy black eyebrows, brown eyes, and a nose that appeared to have been broken more than once. I wondered if he had any tattoos. I was willing to bet he had a tattoo or two.

He tossed the pictures onto his desk. “What brings you here?” he asked.

“The night of September twenty-seventh last year,” I said. “A uniformed cop went to the Whittaker mansion on Belvedere Road, took into custody a woman named Sarah Whittaker, and escorted her to the Dingley Wing at Good Samaritan Hospital.”

“So?” Bloom said.

“I’d like to talk to the arresting officer.”

“You’ll have to see Lieutenant Hanscomb,” he said. “He’s in command of the blues. You sure you don’t want to come to the morgue with me?”

Lieutenant Roger L. Hanscomb (the plaque on his desk informed me) was busy on the telephone with the man in charge of searching the crime scene out at the bird sanctuary. I gathered from Hanscomb’s end of the conversation that they were still looking for anything that would lead to a positive identification of the woman who’d washed ashore on the southern bank of the Sawgrass at six o’clock this morning. The search party, it seemed, wasn’t overly eager to work this particular spot because a family of alligators had taken up residence in the mangroves, and all of the men knew that the unidentified woman’s feet had been chewed off. Hanscomb kept telling the man on the phone that it was his job to search that site for any clues to the woman’s identity. He told the man that he didn’t give a damn if an alligator chewed a big piece out of his ass; all he wanted was the job done.

He was somewhat red in the face when he slammed the receiver back onto the cradle. But Bloom had told him on the phone to expect me, and in deference to his colleague he became immediately polite and accommodating. He called in his secretary — a big redheaded girl wearing a tight black skirt, a scoop-necked white blouse, and high-heeled black patent-leather pumps — and asked her to bring him the call-and-response file for last September 27. (Actually, he called it the C&R file. I learned only later that it was a list of calls made to the police, together with an accompanying list detailing the disposition of those calls.) The secretary came back some ten minutes later with a manila folder containing a sheaf of computer printouts. Hanscomb leafed through the file, zeroed in on the printout for September 27, and then ran his finger down the page until he came to the eleven-thirty-to-midnight time slot.

“The Whittaker place, you say?” he asked me.

“Yes, sir.”

“Yeah, here it is. Response at eleven-forty-five, call clocked in at eleven-thirty-two. Complainant... well, just a second now. This wasn’t a telephone complaint, the man came here personally. A Dr. Nathan Helsinger with a certificate for emergency admission under the Baker Act. He spoke to Lieutenant Tyrone, who verified the authenticity of the certificate and then dispatched Officer Ruderman to the scene. Dr. Helsinger accompanied him in the car. They arrived at the Whittaker place at eleven-forty-five, as cited, and Ruderman made the arrest — if you want to call it that — at a little before midnight. That what you’re looking for?”

“Would it be possible to talk to Officer Ruderman?” I asked.

“Well... let me find out where he is right now, okay?” Hanscomb said.

He called in the secretary in the tight clothes, who checked with the dispatcher’s office and reported back that Officer Ruderman was on his lunch break. I looked up at the wall clock. It was twenty minutes past eleven; the police in Calusa apparently took their midday meals a bit earlier than the rest of us did.

“Tell the dispatcher to bring Ruderman on home,” Hanscomb said.

“Yes, sir,” the secretary said, and unexpectedly smiled at me.

I smiled back.

“Will Mr. Hope be waiting here for him, sir?” she asked.

“We’ll both be waiting here for him,” Hanscomb said.

“Aren’t you going out to the sanctuary, sir?”

“Am I supposed to be going out to the sanctuary?”

“that’s what you told Captain Jaegers, sir.”

“Then that’s where I’ll be,” Hanscomb said, and rose from behind his desk. “Make yourself comfortable, Mr. Hope, you can talk to Ruderman right here in my office, if you like.” He came around the desk, took his braided, peaked cap from a bentwood rack, shook hands with me, and went out. The redhead waited until she heard the outer door closing.

“Homicides make him nervous,” she said, and smiled.

“I would guess so,” I said.

“My name is Terry,” she said, and smiled again. “Terry Belmont.”

“Nice to meet you,” I said.

“What’s your name?” she asked. “Your first name, I mean.”

“Matthew,” I said.

“that’s a nice name. Matthew. that’s from the Bible,” she said.

“Yes,” I said.

“You want a cup of coffee or something? The uniforms, when they’re on their lunch break, it sometimes takes a while to get them back home.”

“No, thanks, I’m fine.”

“People keep telling me I have great coloring,” she said. “Peaches and cream, they tell me. The red hair and the fair complexion. And the blue eyes, I guess. Did you notice I have blue eyes?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Your eyes are brown,” she said.

“Yes.”

“I’m twenty-seven years old,” she said. “How old are you?”

I debated lying.

“Thirty-eight,” I said.

“that’s a good age,” she said.

“Uh-huh.”

“I hate these young kids who don’t even know how to undo a bra,” she said.

“Uh-huh.”

“You sure you don’t want some coffee or something?”

“Positive.”

“What’s your favorite color?” she asked.

“Blue... I guess.”

“I wear green a lot,” she said. “Because of the red hair. They go good together, red and green. Like Christmas, you know? I have a lot of green lingerie. that’s rare, green lingerie. I mean, you can’t find too many green panties and bras in the stores. I send away for mine. There’s this shop in New York, it can get you lingerie in any color you want. I sent away for a pair of gray panties once, this very sexy, lacy pair of panties, you know? Cut very high on the leg? But they looked dirty when they got here. I don’t mean sexy dirty. I mean dirty dirty, like grimy, you know? that’s because they were gray. I thought they’d look good, you know? Gray? I have a gray dress I look very good in, so I thought the panties would look good, too. But they only looked dirty. I didn’t even want to put them on, they looked so dirty.”

She shrugged.

“Gray is a difficult color,” I said.

“Oh, you’re telling me,” she said. “Do you have trouble with gray, too?”

“I rarely wear gray,” I said.

“Me neither, except for this one dress I have. I don’t wear gray panties, that’s for sure. In fact, I hardly ever wear panties at all down here. It gets too hot for panties down here. What’s your favorite flower?”

“Gardenias,” I said.

“They remind me of funerals,” she said. “I like roses. Tea roses.”

“they’re nice, too, yes.”

“Because of the smell, is that it?”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Gardenias.”

“Oh. Yes,” I said.

“They do smell nice,” she said. “Do you like the Police?”

“Some of them.”

“Huh?”

“I like Detective Bloom,” I said. “And Lieutenant Hanscomb seems—”

“No, no, not the police,” she said. “The Police.”

I looked at her.

“The group,” she said.

I was still looking at her.

“The rock group,” she said. “The Police. that’s their name. I absolutely adore the Police, don’t you?”

“I don’t think I’m familiar with them,” I said.

“Oh, they’re really terrific,” she said. She smiled again. She had a nice smile. “We seem to like all the same things, don’t we?” she said.

A knock sounded on the door.

“Oh shit,” she said, “just when we were getting to know each other.”

Police Officer Randy Ruderman was perhaps twenty-six years old, a squat, barrel-chested man with a shock of wheat-colored hair hanging on his forehead under the peak of his hat. He took off the hat the moment he came into the room, and stood at attention inside the doorway, as though expecting departmental reprimand.

“This is Matthew Hope,” Terry said. “Lieutenant Hanscomb would like you to answer any questions he has.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Ruderman said.

“If you need anything,” Terry said to me, “you know where to find me.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“I live on Broderick Way,” she said, and went out.

Ruderman was still standing at attention.

“Why don’t you sit down?” I said.

“Thank you, sir,” he said, but he remained standing.

“I’m an attorney,” I said.

“Yes, sir,” he said.

“I have nothing to do with the police department,” I said.

“that’s good, sir,” he said. “I mean—”

“Sit down, why don’t you?” I said.

“Well, yes, sir, thank you, sir,” he said, and took a seat near the door, his hat perched on his lap.

“Officer Ruderman, can you remember back to last September?”

“I don’t know, sir,” he said. “That was a long time ago.”

“I’m talking about the twenty-seventh of September, along about eleven-thirty at night. A Dr. Nathan Helsinger came here to present a certificate for emergency admission to—”

“Oh yes, sir,” Ruderman said. “The Whittaker girl.”

“that’s what I’m referring to.”

“Yes, sir, I remember the case.”

“Did you accompany Dr. Helsinger to the Whittaker house?”

“Yes, sir, I did.”

“Got there at a little before midnight, did you?”

“About a quarter to twelve, yes, sir.”

“Who was there when you arrived?”

“When we got to the premises, we were greeted by the girl’s mother and the mother’s attorney.”

“Would that have been Alice Whittaker—”

“Yes, sir, that was the woman’s name.”

“—and her attorney, Mark Ritter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What happened when you got there?”

“They told me the girl was upstairs. I already knew... Dr. Helsinger had already told me while we were on the way... in the unit... what I was expected to do.”

“And what was that?”

“Remove the girl to Good Samaritan Hospital for examination and observation.”

“What happened next?”

“We went upstairs—”

“Who went upstairs?”

“Me, Mrs. Whittaker, and her attorney.”

“Dr. Helsinger did not accompany you?”

“No, sir, he stood downstairs.”

“The three of you went up—”

“Yes, sir.”

“—to Sarah’s room, did you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Was the door to her room closed?”

“Yes, sir, it was closed.”

“How did you gain entrance to the room?”

“The mother knocked on the door, and the girl asked who it was, who was there, something like that, and the mother said it was her, and she said ‘Come in,’ the girl did, and we went in.”

“Who went into the room first?”

“Mr. Ritter did.”

“And then who?”

“The mother. Mrs. Whittaker.”

“You were behind them?”

“Yes, sir, they had said something about not wanting to upset her, she had tried to slit her wrists. They didn’t want the first thing she saw... they thought seeing a policeman would upset her, if that was the first thing she saw.”

“Did she get upset when she saw you?”

“No, sir, not at first. She didn’t know what was going on, you see.”

“What do you mean? Did she seem disoriented or—”

“No, no, nothing like that. I mean, she didn’t know why we were there at first. She asked if there’d been a robbery or something. She meant burglary, of course, lots of civilians, they don’t know the difference between robbery and burglary. She thought the house had been burglarized or something, you see. She thought that’s why the police were there.”

“Who told her why you were really there?”

“Mr. Ritter.”

“What did he say?”

“He said... well, do you want the exact words?”

“As nearly as you can recall them.”

“He said something like... well, let me see... he said, ‘Sarah, this gentleman is here to take you to the hospital.’ He meant me. I was the gentleman he was referring to.”

“Did she make any response to that?”

“She said, ‘Hospital? I’m not sick, why should I go to a hospital?’ Or something like that, I’m not sure of the exact words. What she was saying was that she was feeling fine, so why should we be taking her to the hospital? that’s what she was saying.”

“In those words?”

“No, sir, I told you I’m not sure of the exact words. But that’s what she meant.”

“Did she appear sick to you?”

“I’m not a doctor, sir.”

“Nonetheless, was she behaving in a manner that seemed strange or confused or disoriented or—”

“She seemed confused, yes, sir.”

“About why you wanted to take her to the hospital, do you mean?”

“Yes, sir. And also about why a police officer was there. She kept asking why a cop was there. I tried to calm her. I told her we had a doctor’s certificate saying she had to be taken to the hospital, and she wanted to know what certificate, what doctor, she was becoming agitated by then, sir.”

“What do you mean by ‘agitated’?”

“Well, she got out of bed—”

“What was she wearing?”

“A nightgown, sir. One of those baby-doll nightgowns with panties.”

“She was ready for bed, then?”

“Yes, sir. Well, she was in bed when we went into the room.”

“And she got out of bed, you say—”

“Yes, sir, and began pacing the room and asking over and over again why she had to go to a hospital when she wasn’t sick. I said something like, ‘Come along now, miss,’ or something like that, trying to calm her, and all of a sudden she took a swing at me.”

“Tried to hit you?”

“Yes, sir, threw a punch at me.”

“All you’d said was, ‘Come along now, miss—’ ”

“ ‘Come along quiet now,’ something like that.”

“And she swung at you.”

“Yes, sir. Came at me like a bat out of hell.”

“Did she, in fact, strike you?”

“No, sir. I took evasive action, sir.”

“Meaning?”

“I sidestepped the blow and grabbed her arm and twisted it up behind her back. Because she was getting violent, you see.”

“Is that when you put the handcuffs on her?”

“No, sir, not at that very moment.”

“When did you restrain her?”

“Well, sir, I was sort of holding her — I had one arm behind her back, you know, which I could have hurt her if I yanked up on it — and her mother came over to her and said we were only doing this for her own good, or something like that, and she spit in her mother’s face and said... Do you want her exact words, sir?”

“Please.”

“She said, ‘You fucking whore,’ and then she tried to pull away from me to get at her mother. I was holding her by the right wrist, you see, I had her right arm behind her, and she clawed the fingers of her left hand and tried to go for her mother’s face.”

“Is that when you put the handcuffs on her?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You handcuffed her wrists behind her back?”

“Yes, sir. According to departmental regulations, sir.”

“And took her out of the room?”

“Removed her from the premises, yes, sir.”

“In her nightgown and panties?”

“That is what she was wearing, yes, sir.”

“Is that how she was delivered to the hospital? In nightgown and panties?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did anyone make any attempt to see that she was suitably clothed before she was taken from the house?”

“She had the handcuffs on, sir. It would have been extremely difficult to dress her in anything but what she had on. It would have meant removing the handcuffs and risking further attack.”

“Tell me, Officer Ruderman — when you entered the room, did you make any search for a razor blade?”

“I did not.”

“Are you sure you didn’t?”

“Not a formal search, sir. I may have looked around — they told me she’d tried to slit her wrists, sir — I may have looked around to see if there was a potential weapon on the premises, but I did not make a formal search, no, sir.”

“didn’t open any drawers or closets—”

“No, sir. Just looked around on the dresser and the end tables by the bed, that’s all, sir.”

“And saw no razor blade?”

“There was no razor blade there that I could see, no, sir.”

“Or any other cutting instrument?”

“No cutting instruments, no, sir.”

“No knives—”

“No, sir.”

“—or scissors—”

“Nothing like that, sir.”

“Did you detect any bloodstains in the room?”

“None that I could see, sir.”

“Did you look for bloodstains?”

“It crossed my mind that if she’d tried to slit her wrists, there might be bloodstains, yes, sir.”

“But you didn’t see any.”

“No, sir. It was not my prime consideration, sir, looking for bloodstains. But as I say, I did glance around to see if there were any, yes, sir.”

“And saw none.”

“Saw no bloodstains, that’s right.”

“No bloodstains on the sheets—”

“None.”

“—or on the pillowcases—”

“No, sir, none.”

“Or anywhere else in the room?”

“No place in the room.”

“What happened then?”

“I took her down to the unit and drove her to Good Samaritan.”

“Did the others accompany you?”

“They followed along in Mr. Ritter’s car.”

“Did Miss Whittaker say anything to you on the drive to the hospital? You were alone in the car, as I understand it...”

“Alone in the unit, yes, sir.”

“Did she say anything to you?”

“Yes, sir, she did.”

“What did she say?”

“She said her mother was after her money. She said her mother was doing this to get her money.”