School Days (3 page)

T
HE
D
OWLING POLICE STATION
looked like a rambling, white-shingled Cape. The Dowling police chief looked like a Methodist minister I had known once in Laramie, when I was a little kid. He was tall and thin with a gray crew cut and a close-cropped gray moustache. His glasses were rimless. He wore a white shirt with short sleeves and epaulets and some sort of crest pinned to each epaulet. The shirt was pressed with military creases. His chief's badge was large and gold. His black gun belt was off, folded neatly and lying on the side table near his desk. His gun was in the holster, a big-caliber pearl-handled revolver.

“I'm Cromwell,” he said. “Chief of Police.”

“Spenser,” I said.

“I know your name,” Cromwell said. “Sit down.”

I sat.

“Real tragedy,” Cromwell said, “what happened over at that school.”

I nodded.

“We got there as soon as we heard, contained it, waited for backup and cooperated in the apprehension of the perpetrators,” Cromwell said.

I nodded.

“You ever been a police officer, Spenser?”

“Yes.”

“Then you know how it goes. You do the job, and the press looks for some way to make you look bad.”

I waited.

“We got some bad press. It came from people who do not know anything at all about policework. But it has stung my department, and, to be honest with you, it has stung me.”

I nodded.

“We played it by the book,” Cromwell said. “Straight down the line. By the book. And, by God, we kept a tragedy from turning into a holocaust.”

“Should I be taking notes?” I said.

Cromwell leaned back in his chair and looked at me hard. He pointed a finger at me, and jabbed it in my direction a couple of times.

“Now that was a wiseassed remark,” Cromwell said. “And
you might as well know it right up front. We have zero tolerance for wiseasses around here.”

I liked the
we.
I wondered if it was the royal
we
, as in
we
are not amused. On the other hand, it still seemed in my best interest to get along with the local cops. I looked contrite.

“I'll try to do better,” I said.

“Be a good idea,” Cromwell said. “Now what we don't need is somebody coming along and poking around and riling everybody up again.”

I was back to nodding again. Cromwell liked nodding.

“So, who hired you?” Cromwell said.

I thought about that for a moment. On the one hand, there was no special reason not to tell him. Healy knew. DiBella already knew. On the other hand, it didn't do my career any good to spill my client's name to every cop who asked. Besides, he was annoying me. I shook my head.

“You're not a lawyer,” Cromwell said. “You have no privilege.”

“When I'm employed by an attorney on behalf of a client, there is some extension of privilege,” I said.

“Who's the lawyer?” Cromwell said.

“I'm not employed by a lawyer,” I said.

“Than what the hell are you talking about?” Cromwell said.

“I rarely know,” I said.

I smiled my winning smile.

“What's our policy on wiseasses around here?” Cromwell said.

“Zero tolerance,” I said. “Except for me.”

Cromwell didn't say anything for a time. He folded his arms across his narrow chest and looked at me with his dead-eyed cop look. I waited.

Finally, he said, “Let me make this as clear and as simple as I can. We don't want you around here, nosing into a case that is already closed.”

I nodded.

“And we are prepared to make it very unpleasant for you if you persist.”

I nodded.

“You have anything to say to that?” Cromwell said.

“How about, Great Caesar's Ghost!” I said.

Cromwell kept the dead-eyed stare on me.

“Or maybe just an audible swallow,” I said.

Cromwell kept the stare.

“A little pallor?” I said.

Cromwell stared at me some more.

“Get the hell out of here,” Cromwell said finally.

I stood.

“You must have screwed this up pretty bad,” I said.

“If you're smart, you son of a bitch,” Cromwell said, “you won't be back.”

“I never claimed smart,” I said, and walked out the door.

At least he didn't shoot me.

F
RESH FROM MY TRIUMPH
with the Chief of Police, I thought I might as well go and charm the kid's lawyer, too.

Richard Leeland had an office in a small shopping center, upstairs over the village grocery. From his window you could look at the eighteenth-century meeting house which lent New England authenticity to the town common, so you wouldn't get confused and think you were in Chicago.

“Wow,” he said, “a private eye. We don't run into many private eyes out here.”

“Your loss,” I said.

“I'm sure,” Leeland said. “May I ask you a question?”

He was a tall, slim man with a well-tanned bald head. He looked like he'd be good at tennis or bike riding.

“Sure.”

“Who hired you to try and clear Jared?”

“You don't know?” I said.

Leeland smiled.

“It's why I'm asking,” he said.

I thought about it for a minute. It made no sense that he didn't know, and it made no sense for me to keep secrets from my client's lawyer.

“His grandmother,” I said.

“Oh, God,” Leeland said, “Lily.”

“Oh, God?” I said.

“She means well,” Leeland said, “but she's beginning to show her age.”

I nodded. Leeland was silent, his left hand at his mouth, looking at me, squeezing his lower lip between his thumb and forefinger. I waited.

After a while he said, “Jared confessed, you know.”

I nodded.

“The Grant kid says Jared was with him.”

I nodded.

“Doesn't that seem like you really have no case?” Leeland said.

“I have a case,” I said. “I just don't know the outcome.”

“The boy's guilty,” Leeland said.

“Mrs. Ellsworth thinks otherwise.”

“For God's sake, Spenser. She wouldn't believe it if she saw him do it.”

“So you're going to plead him?”

“Guilty, see if we can bargain.”

“How about insanity?” I said.

“He knew what he did was wrong,” Leeland said.

“Irresistible compulsion?” I said.

He shrugged.

“Won't fly,” he said.

“You have a shrink talk to him?” I said.

“We have the Dowling Academy consulting psychologist.”

I nodded. “Name?”

“Why do you want to know?” Leeland said.

“I want to talk with him or her.”

“I don't know if I should tell you,” Leeland said.

“You think I can't find the name of the Dowling Academy consulting shrink?” I said.

Leeland shrugged.

“Her,” he said. “Dr. Blair, Beth Ann Blair.”

“See,” I said, “how easy that was?”

“Mr. Spenser,” Leeland said. “The boy is guilty. I know it, his parents know it, everyone knows it.”

“Except Mrs. Ellsworth,” I said.

Leeland ignored me.

“My job,” he said, “quite frankly, is to try and soften the consequences the best way I can.”

I nodded.

“Have you ever tried a murder case?” I said.

“Not really.”

“Not really? How do you not really try a murder case?”

“I guess I meant no, I haven't,” Leeland said.

“Do you know who's prosecuting?”

“Bethel County District Attorney's office.”

“Know the prosecutor?” I said.

“His name is Francis Cleary.”

“Be interesting to know how many murder cases their guy has tried.”

“I'm a damned good lawyer,” Leeland said. “I resent what you're implying.”

I nodded. Spreading good will wherever I went.

“No offense,” I said. “Did you get him a deal for copping?”

“Excuse me?”

“Did he get anything from the prosecution for confessing.”

“He confessed without coercion or enticement,” Leeland said, “to the Chief of Police.”

“Cromwell,” I said.

“Yes. You've met him.”

I nodded.

“Fine law officer.”

I nodded.

“How about the other kid,” I said, “Grant. He get any kind of deal for fingering Clark?”

“I don't represent him,” Leeland said.

“Who does?”

“Firm in Boston—Batson and Doyle.”

“Who's the attorney?” I said.

“Alex Taglio.”

“You and he talked?”

“We have,” Leeland said. “We don't entirely agree.”

“What's his plan?”

“I'm afraid that's confidential among attorneys.”

“Sure,” I said. “How's the kid doing?”

“He seems very withdrawn,” Leeland said.

“I can see why he might,” I said. “I'll need to talk with him.”

“He really doesn't have much to say,” Leeland said.

“Maybe he will,” I said, “if he talks to someone who can at least entertain the possibility that he's innocent.”

“I'd prefer not,” Leeland said.

“You won't set up a meeting?”

“His parents have requested that he see only them and me,” Leeland said.

“They think he's guilty, too,” I said.

“They have taken him at his word,” Leeland said.

“Trust is a wonderful thing,” I said.

R
ITA AND
I
browsed the food stands that lined both walls in Quincy Market in midafternoon, selected our lunches, and I paid for them. We took our food to the rotunda and sat among the tourists and suburban teenagers to dine.

“We may be the only residents of this city in the building,” I said.

“I know it's not hip,” Rita said. “But I kind of like it here. It's very lively, and there's lots of stuff to see.”

“Yeah,” I said.

There were old people—almost certainly retired, they had the look—and white kids from Littleton and Plymouth
wearing three-hundred-dollar sneakers and sloganed T-shirts and hats at odd angles, trying hard to look ghetto. There were harried-looking young men and women with strollers. There was a scattering of suits, mostly young, and noticeable numbers of solemn Asian tourists.

“There's not much to know,” Rita said, “about Richard Leeland. Comes from money. Yale Law School. Joined his father's law firm. His father also comes from money. Nobody has to work very hard. Father's semiretired. Richard does the heavy lifting.”

“Which is?” I said.

“Real estate closings, wills, that stuff,” Rita said. “No criminal experience. You know who the prosecutor is?”

“Francis Cleary,” I said.

“Oh, Jesus,” Rita said. “He'll eat your guy alive.”

“He's good?”

“Not only good but zealous. He started life as a Jesuit priest, then left and became a lawyer. He's the chief AD in Bethel County.”

“Not driven by greed,” I said.

Rita smiled. She had a slice of pizza, from the pointed end of which she took a small bite.

When she had chewed it and swallowed, she said, “He believes in good and evil.”

“One of those,” I said.

“One of those.”

“He says there's no insanity defense.”

“He got a shrink?”

“School psychologist.”

“You talk to him?”

“No.”

“Well, even if the shrink is good, and sometimes they're not,” Rita said, “oversimplified, an insanity defense is going to go something like this:

“
Expert:
Because of a flopp to the fanottim, the defendant suffers from irresistible compulsion.

“
Cleary:
How do you know he has a compulsion?

“
Expert:
I've interviewed him.

“
Cleary:
And he told you he had a compulsion.

“
Expert:
Yes.

“
Cleary:
How do you know it's irresistible?

“
Expert:
He acted on it. He couldn't help himself.

“
Cleary:
So if somebody commits a crime, and claims compulsion, the commission is proof that the compulsion was irresistible?

“
Expert:
Well . . .”

I held up my hand.

“Got it,” I said.

“A good defense lawyer and a good expert, or maybe several, can shape this, make it work better than I've described,” Rita said. “But there's no reason to think this guy is a good defense lawyer. If the kid is a credible witness on his own behalf, it would help.”

“I haven't seen him yet, either.”

“You sound like you're getting stonewalled,” Rita said.

“Local police chief doesn't want me around. I figure that's because he botched the thing badly and doesn't want attention called.”

“So why doesn't the kid's lawyer want you around?”

“Doesn't want me screwing up the kid's plea, if I had to guess.”

“Which you do,” Rita said. “Not having anything in the way of facts.”

“He doesn't want me talking to the kid,” I said.

“Bethel County Jail?”

“Yeah.”

“I know people out there, you need any help.”

“Healy can get me in there,” I said.

“I'm sure he can,” Rita said.

“You talked to the parents yet?”

“Not yet.”

“That might be interesting.”

I nodded.

“Know a lawyer named Alex Taglio,” I said, “works for Batson and Doyle?”

“Alex Taglio, yes. Used to be a prosecutor in Suffolk County before he decided to make money.”

“Not unlike others,” I said.

“I was a prosecutor in Norfolk County before I decided to make money. There's a huge difference.”

“I can see that,” I said. “He any good?”

“Yes. Alex is a good lawyer. Works hard. Who's he represent?”

“The other kid,” I said, “Wendell Grant.”

“He and Leeland get along?” Rita said.

“Leeland indicated no,” I said.

“Perfect,” Rita said. “They being tried separately?”

“I don't know,” I said.

“Probably not. Same crime. What's Grant's defense?”

“Don't know yet,” I said.

“What do you think of Grandma?”

“Smart,” I said. “Tough.”

“Not old and losing her grip?”

“No. Leeland sort of implied that, but I don't believe him. She seemed right there when I talked with her.”

“Why would the parents want to discourage an attempt to find their son innocent of multiple murder charges?”

“Don't know,” I said.

“You don't know shit,” Rita said, “do you?”

“No,” I said. “But it's okay, I'm used to it.”