The Deep Blue Alibi

Nineteen

"Not guilty!" Hal Griffin proclaimed in a strong, clear voice. Exactly the way Victoria had instructed him. They were standing in front of Judge Clyde Feathers in a fourth-floor courtroom of the Monroe County Courthouse, three blocks from the harbor in Key West. With Steve in Miami prepping his father's case, Victoria was flying solo, handling Griffin's arraignment by herself. Happy to be in charge.

She had rejected Steve's advice that Griffin sing out: "Not guilty, not guilty. Thank God Almighty, I am not guilty!" All to the rhythm of Martin Luther King's "free at last." Too melodramatic for Victoria's taste.

Lately, Steve had been fussing around with creative pleas, intended to influence the press and prospective jurors. Once he tried "Innocent as the pure, driven snow," an unfortunate choice in a cocaine trial.

But is Uncle Grif really innocent?

For the past two days, at Steve's suggestion, Victoria had been following "the green path," and she didn't like where it seemed to lead. She'd been hauling down mildewy books in the county's Real Property records room, breaking two fingernails and poring over real estate sales. Now she was sure Uncle Grif had misled her, and she planned to confront him as soon as they got back to the hotel.

"Damn it, Uncle Grif. I told you to be honest with me. I can't help you if you lie."

She had been careful all morning not to let Griffin know she was upset. He needed to appear confident and at ease in his first court appearance. Glancing at him now, she thought Griffin seemed dignified and prosperous in a dark, double-breasted suit. But the suit made him even thicker through the chest-more physically imposing-and Victoria made a mental note to have him dress in something slimming when a jury was impaneled.

She wore a double-breasted suit, too. A mauve, Dolce amp; Gabbana with the extra-wide lapels, a boned bodice, and a fitted skirt. A hip-hugging summer wool fabric made stretchy with a touch of spandex, and no, she didn't need any slimming tricks, thank you very much. Her suede-lined Bottega Veneta woven-leather black purse-large as a satchel-was perfect for carrying a legal file as well as her makeup. What had Sarah Jessica Parker said on Sex and the City?

"Purses are to women what balls are to men. You'd feel naked leaving home without them."

Got that right, girl.

Judge Feathers spent a few minutes with housekeeping details. Victoria waived the formal reading of the indictment. Calendars came out, and the judge set discovery deadlines and a trial date. Then he announced bail would be one million dollars. No problem there. The amount had been agreed upon in advance, and the surety was already posted. Griffin would walk out of the courthouse without ever feeling the shame and discomfort of the orange jumpsuit with the Monroe County jail logo. . unless he was convicted at trial.

A hot blast of muggy air hit her as they left the courtroom, which opened directly onto an outdoor walkway that led to the elevators. Cameras clicked and questions were shouted as Victoria escorted Griffin through the snarling, slobbering, shoving pack of backpedaling jackals and hyenas, aka journalists.

"Any chance of a plea?" one reporter yelled.

"What's your defense?" shouted another.

"Why'd you do it, Griffin?" a particularly rude reporter called out.

"My attorney will answer all questions," Griffin said, serenely.

Victoria put on her lawyer's look for the evening news-confident but not cocky. "We fully believe the jury will conclude this was all a tragic accident."

"Tragic accident."

Steve had given her the tag line and told her to repeat it as often as possible. "Start drilling your theme into the public consciousness and never let up," he'd instructed.

Okay, she had to admit Steve had won a bunch of cases using the technique.

Mistaken identity.

Sloppy police work.

Justifiable homicide.

And now tragic accident. Which would have been a lot easier if Uncle Grif had said he was showing Stubbs the speargun when it accidentally fired. But Griffin stuck to his story: He was on the bridge, and when Stubbs didn't respond to the intercom, he put the boat on auto, climbed down the ladder, and found the man with the spear in his chest. So she was stuck arguing to the jury that Stubbs had been messing around with the speargun and accidentally shot himself.

The spear's angle of entry was crucial to support the theory. So far, Victoria had consulted two expert witnesses: a biomechanics professor from Georgia Tech and a safety engineer from a private firm. The professor told her the accident theory was "not provable to a reasonable degree of biomechanical probability" and the engineer said his tests were similarly inconclusive. Nothing they could use in court. There was another professor, a human factors expert from Columbia University, but his report wasn't prepared yet.

Steve had been toying with the idea of a courtroom demonstration where he would load the speargun, trying to shoot himself in the chest while wearing a Kevlar vest. He did a dry run in the office and managed to fire the spear out the window and onto the balcony across the alley where the Jamaican steel band was grilling chicken and smoking weed. Victoria was fairly certain it would not help their case if they impaled a juror.

Now she guided Griffin by the elbow, steering him toward the elevator. An odd sensation, this role reversal. She could remember Uncle Grif's protective hand on her arm, steering her through crowds at Disney World so many years ago. Now she was the protector. She was all that stood between Uncle Grif and life in prison. At least for the moment. When the trial began, Steve would be alongside, jockeying for position.

For now, though, she enjoyed the spotlight, the attention from the press. Amazing, the instant respect a high-profile murder case seemed to convey. Especially when you sit first chair. No wonder Steve was reluctant to give it up. But she'd laid down the law, Lord's Law.

"Your choice, Steve. You can sit second chair. Or take a seat in the gallery."

"No problem," he'd said. "You're the boss. That's what we agreed."

Steve's unconditional surrender made her suspicious- she half expected him to burst through the courtroom door with some headline-grabbing announcement-but he'd stayed behind while she handled the arraignment and soaked up her fifteen minutes of media fame. Now, as she clawed her way past the reporters to the elevator, she still wondered if Steve wasn't lurking nearby, about to call his own press conference.

"Ms. Lord! Mr. Griffin!" a disheveled young man she recognized as a reporter from the Key West Citizen shouted at her. "What happened on that boat?"

"It will all come out in court." She smiled for the cameras.

Of all the sappy platitudes, she thought. Of course it will all come out in court. She just didn't know what the hell it would be.

"And in due course," she added, "it will be clear that the death of Mr. Stubbs was simply a tragic accident."

Steve would be proud, she thought.

A fine rain was falling now, and Victoria worried about her makeup running. The courthouse, with its open-air walkways, was one of those designs for the subtropics, where you can get sunburned or rained on while technically still inside the building.

Once in the lobby, they passed a mural of a Spanish galleon, buccaneers landing on a sandy beach, pirates engaged in sword fights. An unusual image in a courthouse, she thought, a celebration of the island's distant-or not so distant-lawlessness.

"This way, Ms. Lord!" one photographer screeched, aiming a still camera at her.

"No. Over here, Ms. Lord!" another belted out.

"Will Griffin testify?" hollered a man in dirty jeans and a wife-beater T-shirt.

They were down here, too. Clogging the lobby, scrambling like cockroaches. A bothersome, boisterous, unkempt lot. But feeling a bit like a star on the red carpet, Victoria figured she'd better get used to the attention. The spotlight, she believed, burned bright but was narrowly focused. Wide enough only for one. Even when they're partnered up, lawyers are lone gunslingers. Who remembers the name of Johnnie Cochran's law partner? Or Melvin Belli's? Or Gerry Spence's?

So, yes indeed, a lawyer who makes a name for herself in a big murder trial had better expect the high-wattage lights. And buy some waterproof makeup, too.

SOLOMON'S LAWS

6. The client who lies to his lawyer is like a husband who cheats on his wife. It seldom happens just once.