Glass House (37 page)

Waldoch was experienced enough with trials
to know that he typically wouldn’t be the first one up on the next
day. Not under normal circumstances. Megan ordinarily would
cross-examine Kathy Landry instead, questioning the witness to
challenge her testimony or point out holes or suggest that things
couldn’t have been the way she said.

Under normal circumstances.

The first hour of Megan’s prep session with
Waldoch was her convincing him that they should delay Landry’s
cross-examination. It was, Megan told him, what made sense. The
cross-examination had holes, the seventeen-thousand-dollar earrings
chief among them, and going through it now risked emphasizing the
plaintiff’s story while pushing Waldoch’s own farther back. If need
be, she assured, they’d re-call and question Landry when presenting
their own case, after McCallum rested. But in the meantime, Waldoch
would be able to testify and state his side of things, and Megan
would follow with her own examination of him, to boost that
testimony.

That tactical decision led to Megan’s
statement at the start of day three – the defense had no
questions for Ms. Landry at the present time. And it led to
McCallum, surprise on his face and in his voice, calling Jeremy
Waldoch to the stand.

McCallum’s questioning was to the point and
was delivered with, Megan thought, about the right amount of
indignation, at all the right moments. A little disbelieving
headshake here, a small
Really?
or
I see…
there. That
was the advantage of knowing what to expect and of writing a script
of questions to get it laid out.

It went as the deposition had gone. McCallum
drew out Waldoch’s view of Kathy Landry and her allegations, while
stressing each thing that was favorable to her and that Waldoch had
admitted or denied in the depo – he gave the earrings, he said
they didn’t have a relationship, he knew Lora Alexander, he said he
didn’t give her any gifts. Megan objected at the mention of Lora’s
name, but, mindful of a jury’s hatred of objections and its desire
to hear everything, she folded on it quickly and took her seat when
the objection was overruled.

There was, she noticed, no mention of the
woman’s death. At least not yet.

The structure and content of McCallum’s
examination gave its purpose away. He was fencing Waldoch in,
getting concessions on certain points that were bad for him and
setting up Jeremy’s anticipated destruction through commitments to
statements McCallum clearly thought he could later prove were
lies.

No surprises. Not in any of it. Not the
content of what was being said, and not the tactics behind it.

McCallum finished Waldoch’s examination in
two hours, an admirable and wise amount of time, long enough to get
the information down and not so long that the jury stopped paying
attention or, worse yet, decided they actually liked the man. The
attorney came to the point of no further questions, and the judge
asked Megan if she wished to examine at this time.

That was the point when she was studying the
mural on the ceiling. It was an idle look, a casual check of the
world, pen at her lips, as though she were contemplating the
possibility with great thought and weight.

Megan looked down from the painting of
Kansas. Down from the gilded cords and silver wheat. Down to
Waldoch, with a “Yes, I do, Your Honor” to the judge. She stood and
started toward the witness stand, to question her client.

Riding Bucephalus

“Mr. McCallum asked you a number of
questions, on a number of things, and I’d like to touch on some of
those.”

Megan was a walker, an attorney who moved
around while she questioned a witness. You have to get permission
to do that, and before the trial started, she’d asked the judge if
she could step away from the podium and counsel tables during
questioning. He’d let her. So she stood, centered among the witness
stand and the judge’s bench and the jury box, alone in the middle
of the room. She didn’t hold any notes in front of her. She had no
outline, and she didn’t need one. She knew where she was going.

“That’s fine,” Waldoch answered.

“There was some discussion about gifts, do
you remember that?”

“Yes.”

“Specifically, a pair of earrings.” Megan
touched her ear in an incidental gesture, a seemingly unnecessary
indication of what she meant.

“Yes, I –”

For a second it wasn’t possible to tell what
Jeremy Waldoch’s next word was supposed to be. He was lost, his
eyes fixed on Megan’s ears. Her right one, in particular. The one
she touched. Anyone who was close enough, the judge or Megan or
perhaps a few jurors nearest to him, saw him squint slightly, as he
focused on what he saw there.

“You … what?” Megan prompted.

“I remember that testimony,” Waldoch
finished.

“Well, my question is this. Have you ever
given gifts to other people who worked for you?”

Waldoch’s face cleared. Familiar ground,
with a familiar answer. He looked more directly at Megan.

“Of course.” The answer was confident.

“What kind of gifts might those be, for
example?”

“I gave Teddy Wallander a shooting rifle
once. He’s a hunter, grouse. Loves to go out, and I came across
this antique rifle. Beautiful thing.”

“Very generous,” Megan said, sounding
impressed. “How much did that run?”

“I don’t remember.” The statement was casual
because it had been practiced. Waldoch thought on it in an equally
practiced gesture. “There was a pistol that matched, and the seller
didn’t want to break the set. They were about four thousand
together, I think.”

“And Mr. Wallander is…?”

“Was, actually. He was our accountant for a
while. Outside accountant for three or four years, then in-house
for another two, two and a half. One year he saved us a bundle on
taxes, and I wanted to get him something for that.”

“What happened to him?”

“We fired him, come to think of it.” They’d
outlined this set of questions and answers, working them for thirty
minutes the night before, but Waldoch was good enough that
parallels to Landry only seemed to dawn on him as he said the
words. “In fact, we did do that. We fired him.”

“For what?”

“Work force reduction. Teddy’s a great guy.
We still talk, and we get together for lunch every couple of months
or so. But we didn’t have a spot for him. He pays me back by always
sticking me with the lunch tab.”

“Did he sue you?”

Waldoch laughed, more warmly than Megan ever
had heard. “No,” he said. “I wouldn’t buy the lunch if he had.” He
chuckled again at the end. Megan could hear a couple jurors join
him.

“Anyone else?”

“Sure. I covered a deck addition to Sue
Haroldson and her husband’s house. She did stellar work one year.
Just great, great work. And let’s see…. Nice watch for Bill
Paratto. A couple other things, I’m sure.”

“You don’t keep track of gifts?”

“I don’t think gifts are given to keep track
of.”

“You’re just a generous man.”

McCallum objected, but the answer was out
before the judge sustained him. Waldoch was saying, “That’s right,”
as Megan responded to the interchange between McCallum and the
judge.

“I’ll rephrase it,” she said. “Do you reward
good work?”

“I do.”

“But earrings for Ms. Landry?”

Megan touched her ear again, the left one
this time, and she was certain on Waldoch’s reaction. He studied
her, his eyes checking left side and right side, back and forth.
His head tipped and his body twisted, both slightly, as he angled
himself better.

The question went unanswered. Megan waited,
the judge and McCallum waited, the jury waited. And Waldoch looked
for a few seconds more, then slowly sat back.

She was wearing the earrings. The day
before, while Waldoch had been sitting next to Megan in the
courtroom, Finn was listening to the tumblers in Waldoch’s office
safe fall into place, then, with the safe door open, was grinning
broadly as he cleaned out the jewelry from inside it.

Megan had to admit the earrings were
fabulous. A Tahitian pearl in each one, two light red diamonds
under them, all in a platinum setting, just like the ones McCallum
described in the deposition questioning. Megan had carried them in
her pocket since taking them from Finn, and she slipped them in at
the last break, combing her short hair forward as much as she could
to keep them out of sight until Waldoch was on the stand.

Still no answer. Waldoch was staring at the
earrings. His eyes widened at first, Megan was certain of that as
well, but they tightened to thin, analytical slits. His lips
pursed. His chest rose out once, heavily, as he breathed
deeply.

“Mr. Waldoch?” the judge prompted.

Megan thought he’d confess it. For a moment,
right before the narrowed gaze, she thought he would simply point
at her and say,
Yes, those earrings right there are the ones I
gave her
.

But he coughed and shifted. The judge leaned
over the side of the bench.

“Are you all right, sir?” he asked.

“I’m fine.” Waldoch didn’t look up at the
judge. He coughed again. A dry, choked sound. “I didn’t give Ms.
Landry any earrings.”

“Did you have sex with her?”

“Absolutely not.”

“You say that unequivocally.” Megan could
hear McCallum twisting in his seat behind her, no doubt torn
between objecting to a leading question and sitting still while
Waldoch tied himself even more to his testimony.

“I do,” Waldoch replied. “I say it
unequivocally.”

Unequivocally
is an unusual word. A
rare word, without any wiggle room. By its very meaning, it’s
unchangeable once used.

It was Megan’s word, delivered to her client
in the prep session the night before, through sheer repetition as
they worked over the questions she wanted to ask. She used it so
much she knew he’d adopt it, and he didn’t disappoint her.

A new topic. Megan turned and stepped back
to her table. She thumbed some pages while she looked over the
pew-like benches in the gallery at the back of the room.

Civil trials don’t get crowds of watchers.
Absent some dramatic case, the few who attend invariably are the
press, anyone with real interest in the outcome, or hobby watchers,
people who show up to fill some time. This trial was no
different.

The seats in the gallery were mainly empty,
but the door was opening. As Megan started to turn to Waldoch once
more, the door squeaked softly at the rear of the room, and Finn
appeared. Claire Alexander was beside him, Finn’s hand floating at
her back, not touching her but guiding her helpfully. His head was
bent to her ear, and he was whispering.

Megan hesitated, watching as Finn walked
Lora Alexander’s mother to an empty spot on one of the gallery
benches. He whispered something else, the words lost even in the
stillness of the room, and Claire nodded to him. Finn sat beside
her.

Megan faced the witness stand. To her
immediate left, she saw the judge looking at Waldoch and only at
Waldoch. And behind her, off her left shoulder, with their view of
the witness carefully preserved by Megan, the jury shuffled.
Megan’s right hand went to her collar, her elbow cupped in the
other hand.

“Mr. McCallum asked you some questions about
at least one other woman, Mr. Waldoch, and I’d like to follow up on
those questions, too.”

He wasn’t listening. He was staring at
Claire, sitting in the viewing area behind Megan.

“Mr. Waldoch?”

He looked at her then. “Yes?”

“Mr. McCallum’s questions about another
woman you worked with. Do you recall those?”

“Of course.”

“I’d just like to clarify then,” Megan said.
“Have you ever had a relationship with any woman you worked with? A
sexual relationship?”

“No, I haven’t.”

“Did you give gifts to women you worked with
because you were in sexual relationships with them?”

“No.” A glance, quickly, at Claire Alexander
before finishing the answer. “I didn’t.”

“And you say that unequivocally, as
well?”

“Unequivocally, yes.” Waldoch straightened
in his seat.

“Mr. McCallum specifically asked you about
Lora Alexander. Did you have a sexual relationship with Ms.
Alexander?”

“I did not.” Waldoch’s eyes went to the
gallery, then back to Megan.

Her hand came down from her collar. She
dragged a necklace as she did it, pulling it smoothly from under
her blouse and laying it out delicately. It dangled just above the
top of her suit.

“He also asked you about a necklace. Did you
purchase a necklace for Lora Alexander?”

Waldoch’s eyes didn’t widen this time. His
face set at the question, his features hard, his gaze focused on
Megan. She stood without moving in front of him, her back turned
slightly to the jury, who still watched over her left shoulder. Her
necklace –

– 
Finn found that in your safe, too,
you son of a bitch
, Megan thought –

– barely sparkled in the courtroom’s
high light. The gold, the white and pink diamonds, the platinum, it
all looked ordinary in a sense. Just a pretty necklace, to anyone
but Claire Alexander and Jeremy Waldoch, who knew that it was
Lora’s.

Megan listened to the soft tick and whir of
the transcription machine as it recorded her last question and fell
silent. But before Waldoch could answer, Megan heard the squeak of
the door again.

Hanley
, she thought, not looking away
from Waldoch. She saw his glance at the door and the way he watched
as the FBI agent came in, and she followed Hanley’s movements in
Waldoch’s fix on him. Up the short aisle between the seats. Over to
where Finn and Claire already were sitting.

Waldoch turned to Megan, but she could see
how those faces in the crowd were drawing him. He wanted to watch
them, not her. He wanted to see them. Not her.