At nine-fifteen Morris saw Schmidt leave the halfway house, huddled in his plaid lumber jacket. Five minutes later the lights on the first floor of the halfway house blinked out. And five minutes after that Vulpes slid open the side window in the kitchen, slipped over the sill, and dropped silently into the shrubs beside the house.
Stenner had never seen Vail this edgy. He had double-checked everyone in the Wild Bunch to make sure they were protected. He was jumpy about Naomi going to the meeting at the University of Chicago until he was assured she was in capable hands. And he insisted that Parver, Flaherty, and Meyer, who lived alone, stay together for the night.
'Why don't I take you home,' Stenner said to Vail. 'Vulpes is tucked in watching a movie on TV.'
'I have a nudge,' said Vail. 'The kind of nudge Harvey gets. And you, too, only you call it instinct.'
'I got a nudge, too,' said St Claire. 'Had it ever since we got to the office.'
'What kind of nudge, Harve?' Flaherty asked. St Claire said, with a touch of annoyance, 'How many times I gotta tell ya, Dermott, if I knew, it wouldn't be a nudge, it'd be a reality.'
'Last time you had one of your nudges, you turned up the Linda Balfour case,' Stenner said.
'The last time you had a nudge, we turned over Poppy Palmer,' St Claire countered.
'I agree with Abel, let's go home,' Venable said to Vail. 'But I want to talk to you for a minute before we leave.' Surprised at how serious she seemed, Vail led her into his office and closed the door.
'Something got your goat?' he joked.
'I have to tell you something,' she said. 'And this isn't about Aaron Stampler.'
'So… tell.'
'I went to Delaney's apartment. Out of a sense of duty, I suppose. Wanted to experience the scene of the crime. And I discovered something. There's a hidden compartment built into the closet in the bedroom.'
'What kind of compartment?'
'It's about two feet deep and five feet long. It's a hiding place for Delaney's toys.'
'What kind of toys?'
'Whips, handcuffs, garter belts - '
'And a .38-calibre Smith and Wesson. It's on the floor. Looks like it was just thrown there. I didn't touch any of it.'
'The gun is in this room?'
Venable nodded. 'I assume it's the murder weapon.'
'How did you find it?'
'Probably only a woman would have noticed it - women are very conscious of closet space. I was sitting on the bed, staring at the closet, and I realized that it's lopsided. I mean, there's a lot more room on one side than the other. So I snooped around and couldn't figure out why. And I snooped around some more and felt the door give. And I kept snooping. To open it, you unscrew the hanging rod and take it out. There's a button recessed in the fixture it screws into.'
'That's very sneaky, Venable. You want a job?'
'I have a job - defending Edith Stoddard.'
'If this is going to be a bargaining session I'd like to bring Shana in on it, it's her case.'
'We're not going to bargain, Marty. We're going to trial.'
'Janie, you probably turned up the murder weapon. That's all we need to burn this lady.'
'She was a victim for almost ten years, Martin. He degraded her and she took it so she could keep her job. Then he tossed her over for a younger model and ruined her life. I can make that add up to a walk.'
'On what grounds?'
'Name it. How about the McNaghten Rule. Namely that Stoddard was labouring under such a defect of reason, caused by the circumstances, that she didn't know the nature and quality of the act she was committing. Then we have the concept of irresistible impulse - she was so distressed she couldn't control her actions. Or how about temporary insanity? She was degraded and humiliated and finally thrown away like a piece of garbage.'
'Save your closing statement for the jury,' he said. He lit two cigarettes and handed her one. 'And you're forgetting we have
