“Come on in, hotshot!” says the voice in more of a drawl than a yell.
Since I’m the only hotshot in the doorway, I enter and walk into the office. I turn a corner and see a person I presume to be Calvin sitting on a chair, feet up on another chair, scaling baseball cards into a wastebasket. This could well be my kind of guy.
“Help yourself to some coffee,” he says without looking up.
I look to the side and see a pot of coffee, about a third full. I pour a cup, which takes a while because it’s so thick. “You sure this isn’t kerosene?” I say.
“It ain’t Starbucks fancy, but it drinks good going down,” he says. “I’d have my secretary make a fresh pot, but she quit in July.”
I walk over to him, coffee in my left hand, my right extended in an offered shake. “Andy Carpenter, visiting hotshot.”
“Calvin Marshall, grizzled, cantankerous small-town attorney” is his response as we shake hands. He’s probably in his late fifties, gray-haired but not particularly grizzled. At least that’s not what I notice; what I notice is that he’s missing his left leg.
Unfortunately, I do more than notice the missing leg; I stare at where it would be if it weren’t missing. He catches me on it. “I used to climb mountains for fun,” he says. “I got trapped in a landslide… a boulder pinned me down. Had to cut my own leg off to get free.” He shakes his head at the memory. “Sort of took the fun out of mountain climbing.”
“What an awful story,” I say.
He nods. “And it’s also bullshit. I had bone cancer when I was twelve years old.”
I can’t help but laugh out loud at the blatant lie.
“You think bone cancer is funny?” he asks.
“I think it’s funny that for no reason you told me a totally bullshit story thirty seconds after we met,” I say. “Why exactly did you do that?”
“It’s the way I test new people,” he says.
“And did I pass?”
“I don’t know… I haven’t graded it yet.”
I tell him that I’m here to talk about the Jeremy Davidson case, but Richard has already briefed him fully about my purpose. He doesn’t quite understand it. “You live in civilization, you like to win cases, yet you travel to the middle of nowhere to get involved in a sure loser. Now, why is that?”
“Richard and his wife adopted Jeremy when he was an infant. I knew his real parents very well. They died in a plane crash. I was… I am… Jeremy’s godfather.”
He looks at me strangely. “Bullshit story?” he asks.
I smile. “One hundred percent. Not bad, huh?”
He laughs. “Not bad at all.”
Having established a relationship supported by a sea of bullshit, we get down to business. Calvin really does see the case as an almost sure loser. “I’m not saying he did it, but the evidence is sure saying it.”
“What’s your gut?” I ask.
“My gut doesn’t trust anything that comes out of Center City,” he says. “Not even two murder victims.”
“I stopped there on my way in.”
“Friendly place, huh?” he asks.
“Everybody was in some kind of meeting, except a cop. He questioned me like I was Osama bin Laden.”
He nods; what I am saying is no surprise. “It wasn’t a meeting; it was a religious service.”
I can’t conceal my surprise. “What religion is that?”
“They call themselves Centurions.”
“And the town is named Center City?” I’m seeing a pattern here. “Is the town named after the religion, or the religion named after the town?”
He shrugs. “Sort of one and the same. They have some kind of longitude/latitude formula which shows that the piece of ground the town is on is the spiritual center of the universe, and everything else comes off it like spokes on the wheel. That wheel runs their lives, and has been for over a hundred years.”
I don’t know what he’s talking about when he says that the wheel runs their lives, but now is not the time to analyze their religion. “How does all this relate to the murders?” I ask.
He shrugs again. “Probably doesn’t. But the pressure on that girl not to marry outside the religion would have been overwhelming. People born in that town stay in that town, and nobody from outside moves in. That’s just the way it is.”
We talk some more about the case, but the local prosecutor has not yet handed over much material in discovery, so Calvin doesn’t know that much about it yet. He does know Jeremy Davidson, though, and has known his family for years, and he doesn’t believe him to be a brutal murderer. “It doesn’t compute,” he says. “These girls got stabbed maybe ten times each. I just don’t think this kid is capable of that, no matter how pissed off he might have been.”
His feelings pretty much mirror Laurie’s, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that people are not always what they seem and that you find murderers in the strangest places, shapes, and sizes.
The arraignment is going to be today at eleven-thirty, and Calvin invites me to sit in on it. Afterward I’ll be able to meet Jeremy and hear his side of it. “You think you’re going to jump in?” Calvin asks, referring to my taking on the defense.
“I honestly don’t know.”
“You’re going to have to decide soon. This thing is going to move quickly.”
I nod. “I know. If I do come in, will you stay on as second chair? I’m obviously going to need local help.”
“Whoever handles this is going to need all kinds of help,” he says. “Yeah… why not? Count me in.”
• • • • •
C
OURTROOMS ARE THE
nation’s common denominator. They have the same feel wherever you go. North or South, rural or urban, it doesn’t matter. When you walk into a courtroom, you feel like something important is going to happen. It’s the one place where society seems to have a right to take itself seriously.
Not that they all look alike. This particular courtroom could be Findlay’s tribute to
To Kill a Mockingbird
. My guess is that it looks exactly the same as it did fifty years ago, with the notable exception being the laptop computer sitting atop the judge’s bench.
Calvin is sitting at the defense table when I arrive, but he is not the focus of my attention. George Bush, Angelina Jolie, and Shaquille O’Neal could be dancing a naked hoedown on the table and I would barely notice, since in the far corner of the room, talking with three other people, is Laurie. She looks the same as always, which is disappointing. I had hoped she would have gained thirty pounds and had her face break out in pimples since I saw her on TV.
She doesn’t see me, so I pretend I don’t see her. I walk down toward Calvin, shake his hand, and try to get myself under control. He can tell something is going on. “You nervous?” he asks with some surprise.
I fake a laugh. “Yeah. I’ve never been in a courtroom before.”
He points toward the prosecution table. “That’s where the bad guys sit.”
I don’t want to look in Laurie’s direction, so I might as well make conversation. “Which one is the prosecutor?”
“Lester Chapman. He’s not here yet, the prick.”
“Let me guess… you don’t like him,” I say.
“He’s an okay lawyer, but he’s covered with about ten layers of bullcrap. He’s maybe five feet tall… without the bullcrap he’d be four foot three.” Calvin says this loud enough so that a woman at the prosecution table can clearly hear him, though she pretends not to.
He notices this as well, which prompts him to up the ante and the volume. He points to the woman. “That’s his assistant, Lila Mayberry. Word is that Lester and Lila are making sticky sheets. Course, I myself don’t believe it. I mean, look at her. Lila’s tall… she could eat watermelons off Lester’s head.”
At that moment a man who could only be Lester enters and walks to the prosecution table. Calvin was right: Lester is no more than five feet tall. “See what I mean?” Calvin says. “He spends his life looking up at the world.”
Lila takes Lester’s arm and talks softly to him, occasionally glancing at Calvin as she does so. My guess is, she is updating him on Calvin’s insulting monologue.
“Hello, Andy.”
I look up knowing exactly who I am going to see: Laurie. She has a smile on her face and her hand extended. “I didn’t know you were here.”
“Hi,” I say, my crackling wit coming to the fore. I shake her hand, wishing mine weren’t already shaking on its own. “I just arrived last night.”
“Hello, Calvin,” she says, and he returns the hello.
“All rise,” says the bailiff, and Laurie quickly retreats from the table, lightly touching my arm as she does so. Calvin watches her go and then whispers to me, “I got a feeling there’s more going on here than meets the eye. You want to let me in on it?”
“No.”
Calvin is not the type to take “no” for an answer. “You’re here two days and you got something going on?” he asks. “I’ve been here since the Eisenhower administration and I can’t get arrested.”
“Calvin…” is my feeble attempt to get him to drop it.
He shakes his head in probably mock disgust. “You two-legged people really have it made.”
The bailiff, not privy to Calvin’s monologue, continues. “Findlay County Court is now in session, the Honorable Matthew Morrison presiding.”
Judge Morrison comes striding into the room and takes his seat at the bench. He is maybe sixty years old, a large imposing man who packs a good two hundred thirty pounds onto his six-foot-two- or three-inch frame. He could stand to lose ten or fifteen pounds, but not much more than that.
He instructs the bailiff to bring in the defendant, and moments later Jeremy Davidson is brought into the room and sits on Calvin’s left, while I’m on Calvin’s right. Jeremy is slightly shorter and thinner than his father, hardly the fearsome presence that one would think everyone is here to deal with. Calvin whispers an introduction, and Jeremy and I shake hands. His handshake is weak, and he is clearly petrified. It’s an appropriate feeling whether he is guilty or innocent; life as he knows it is over.
My initial reaction to Jeremy’s demeanor is to want to help him, though that reaction is more emotional than logical. Fear and worry in a defendant are not a sign of innocence; if he were guilty, he’d have just as much or even more reason to be afraid.
Judge Morrison then peers down at the assembled lawyers. When he looks at our table, he says, “I do believe there’s a face I don’t recognize.”
Calvin stands. “Andrew Carpenter, Your Honor. At this point he is a consultant to the defense.”
The judge nods, unimpressed. He must not watch a lot of cable TV. He then turns to Lester. “Talk to me,” he says, and Lester launches into a summation of the dire situation in which Jeremy Davidson finds himself.
Like courtrooms, arraignments are consistent everywhere. Nothing of real consequence ever happens, and no real news is made. Calvin does all the proper things: He has Jeremy plead not guilty and then asks for bail. The judge denies the request without a second thought, or even a first one. Bail in cases like this simply does not happen.
Judge Morrison asks Calvin if he plans to waive Jeremy’s right to a preliminary hearing, and Calvin says that he does not. That hearing will be to determine if the state has probable cause to try Jeremy for the murders. It is a very low threshold of proof for the prosecutor, and he will prevail, but it is still a smart move for Calvin to demand it. In the process he, or we if I take the case, will be able to get prosecution witnesses on the record, which will be helpful in cross-examination at the actual trial.
The preliminary hearing is set for ten days from now, and this session is adjourned. The courtroom quickly empties out, Laurie included. Calvin, Jeremy, and I move to an anteroom, with a guard planted outside the door in case the handcuffed Jeremy attempts an escape.
Jeremy looks shaken but comes right to the point. “My father says you’re the best.”
“He’s only repeating what he’s been told.”
“So you’re not the best?”
“Jeremy, I’m not here to talk about me. I’m here to talk about you.”
He sits back. “Okay… I’m sorry. What do you want to know?”
“When did you see Elizabeth and Sheryl last?”
He takes a deep breath. “I saw Liz the night she died. We met at the Crows Nest… it’s a bar out on Highway 57.”
“So it was a date?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “No, she had already broken up with me. I got her to come out there just to… to ask her to come back.”
“But she said no?”
He nods. “She said no. She was only there maybe ten minutes. And I think her ex-boyfriend was waiting for her in the car.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I saw somebody in the driver’s seat, but it was pretty far away, and it was dark, so I couldn’t make out his face.”
“Could it have been Sheryl Hendricks?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I asked Liz straight out if this was about her old boyfriend. She said that in a way it was, but that there was more to it than that. Then she said they were running away; she seemed really upset.”
“What was the boyfriend’s name?”
“I don’t know. She never mentioned his name. She always told me that she was going to make decisions for herself and that their relationship was a thing of the past.” He shakes his head sadly. “And then I guess all of a sudden it wasn’t.”
“So she told you again that it was over between you. Then what happened?”
“I got mad, and I started yelling at her, saying she was being unfair, making a big mistake, that kind of thing. But she didn’t want to listen to me anymore. She said I just couldn’t understand, and then she just left. I… never saw her again.”
“After she left, what did you do?” I ask.
“I was going to go into the bar and get a drink. I felt like getting drunk, you know? But I had the truck with me, and no other way to get home, so I didn’t. I just went home and went to sleep.”
“Truck?”
He nods. “A pickup truck; that’s what I drive.”
“Were your parents at home when you arrived?”
He shakes his head. “No, they were out of town, visiting my aunt and uncle in Milwaukee.”
“Did you know Sheryl?”
“No, I actually never met her, but she was Liz’s best friend from Center City,” he says. “Liz talked about her a lot.”
Calvin asks, “Why did Liz break up with you?” He’s obviously been over this ground with Jeremy, so if he’s asking this question, it’s an answer he wants me to hear.
“It was because of her religion,” Jeremy says with more than a trace of bitterness.
“You were of different religions?” I ask, though I already know the answer.
He nods. “She’s a Centurion. To be one, you have to be born in that town.”
“People can’t convert to it and move there?”
“Nope. Not according to Liz.”
This is something of a surprise; it’s rare that a religion would turn down members.
“Any idea who might have killed her?”
“No.”
“Was there anybody else she ever mentioned she had a problem with? Something or someone she was afraid of?”
“No… I’ve been racking my brain.”
Jeremy has little more to offer, and the session evolves into an effort by him to get me to take on the case. I don’t commit, and Calvin doesn’t seem fazed by the implied insult that Jeremy and his father don’t seem to think they’re in sufficiently good hands with Calvin.
I leave after telling Jeremy I’ll likely have a decision within twenty-four hours, but that either way he’ll be well represented. I owe that to him and Calvin as well, though in truth I’ve done nothing toward advancing my decision-making process. Calvin gives me some papers relating to the case to go over; he’s prepared a brief summary of the events, or at least his knowledge of them. It’s a professional gesture that I appreciate, and I tell him so. He also invites me to come to his house later for a drink so that we can discuss the case further. He even says I can bring Tara, so I agree to come.
I feel vaguely out of sorts here in Findlay, and I certainly don’t have a feel for the case. It’s disconcerting, though on the positive side I haven’t thought about Laurie for almost an hour, which represents a record for me.
Right now I just want to go home, and the closest thing to that is Tara, waiting at the hotel. The man behind the desk in the lobby tells me that they have the TV ready to install, but they were afraid to do so with “that dog” in the room. Little do they know that “that dog” is probably smart enough to have installed it herself.
Tara is beyond thrilled to see me and just about drags me to the elevator. We go for a long walk, maybe an hour, which pretty much covers all of Findlay. I mentally guess which houses could be Laurie’s, but it’s not that challenging a game, and my thoughts switch to the case.
Jeremy doesn’t seem like a young man capable of slashing two coeds to death, but I certainly can’t be anywhere near sure of that. I’ve never seen him enraged or rejected or distraught, and I have no idea what those powerful emotions might do to him. Or cause him to do.
The bottom line is that this is probably a case I would take if the murder were committed in North Jersey. It has the elements that can make what’s left of my legal juices flow. But I have to look at this on a personal, perhaps selfish level. A murder case takes an enormous amount of time and energy, and I really don’t want to turn my life upside down for the duration. It’s a good case, but it’s in little danger of being referred to as the trial of the century.
My level of guilt at the selfishness of my approach is pretty low. Calvin is probably competent to give Jeremy a good defense, but that will be a decision Jeremy and his father can make. If they have the money to hire me, they have the money to hire pretty much anybody they want, so my departure will not mean he will have poor representation.
Basically, it comes down to this: I want to stay in my own house, I don’t want Tara stuck in a hotel, I want to go to Charlie’s with Vince and Pete when I feel like it, and I don’t want to worry that every time I go somewhere I could run into Laurie. Or worse yet, Laurie and some boyfriend.
As my mother would have said, “Why do I need the aggravation?”