unseemly spectacles as polygraphs and videotapes. Let alone, Lord help us, a living witness to his innocence. The State's priorities are skewed.'
Bond sat back, surveying the lawyers, his expression closed to further argument. 'The interests of the parties,' he admonished Terri, 'are for this Court to balance. Including those of the victim's parents, who have no voice but Mr. Pell, and who would only suffer more from needless publicity and unwarranted delay. And your argument, Ms. Paget, prematurely assumes that your client's next petition will, under the AEDPA statute, prove meritorious enough to be heard at all. Let alone granted.
'Mr. Pell is not attempting to suppress Payton Price's testimony. By order of this Court, you'll have his deposition—two days from now.' He turned to Pell. 'And four days from now, by order of its Supreme Court, the State of California may carry out his sentence.'
'Thank you, Your Honor,' Pell said swiftly, the rote obeisance of an advocate. Terri could not bring herself to emulate the courtesy.
* * *
Afterward, Terri, Rubin, and Pell left Bond's chambers together, silent until they reached the long tiled corridor outside his courtroom. For a moment the only sounds were the click of Terri's heels and the deeper echoes of the two men's hard-soled shoes. 'Tell me,' she asked Pell, 'have you ever witnessed an execution?'
He looked at her sideways, curious. 'Why should it matter?'
'It just seems funny to me,' Terri said. 'Like a football coach skipping the postgame celebration.'
Pell's slight smile was defensive. 'I don't have to see it to believe in it. Have you ever watched a client die?'
'No.'
'Then isn't that like a doctor abandoning her patient because the operation failed?'
'No,' Terri answered. 'It's like a lawyer who's still trying to stop the process you've chosen not to see. I guess it helps your side 'believe' if death remains invisible. So why not put yourself to the test?'
TWENTY-THREE
LESS THAN AN HOUR LATER, TERRI AND CHARLES MONK SAT IN a windowless interrogation room at the Robbery and Homicide Division. 'I flunked retirement,' he told her matter-of-factly. 'Back here part-time, doing special investigations. Chumps who gave me the golf clubs at my farewell party are wanting a refund.'
Terri gave him a perfunctory smile. 'Got time to excavate the past?'
'Whose past?'
'Eddie Fleet. The guy who asphyxiated Thuy Sen while Rennell Price was fast asleep.'
Monk dealt with surprise, Terri realized, by summoning a total absence of expression. But his eyes betrayed his swiftness of thought. 'If Rennell was sleeping, and Fleet still says he wasn't there, that makes Payton your witness.'
'Think about it,' Terri urged. 'You had no witnesses to the murder. So Flora Lewis could mistake Fleet for Rennell, and Fleet could lie to you about him.'
'That'd be a pretty nasty coincidence, counselor. I never told Fleet about Lewis. Their stories jibed without any help from me.'
Terri felt a surge of desperation. 'I have a witness,' she retorted. 'One of the men who killed her. You can't ignore what Payton says.'
Monk appraised her, his expression softening a bit. 'But the A.G.'s Office can,' he said. 'Death row confessions are nothing new to them. You'd better tell me exactly where things stand.'
Eyes still fixed on his, Terri summarized her theory as succinctly as she could. 'Rennell never knew what happened,' she concluded. 'He still doesn't. I'm sure Fleet does. I'm almost as sure that if you kick over enough rocks, you'll find a pedophile who likes forcing children into oral sex, and is going to keep on doing it until somebody stops him. And maybe, if we're lucky, he told somebody sometime how clever he was to frame Rennell.'
'You've got investigators. Why me?'
Terri paused, then chose total candor. 'Because we're striking out. Because there's ten days left for me to save Rennell. And because you've got as big a stake in that as I do.' She softened her voice. 'Maybe bigger. Whatever happens, I'll have done my best to save an innocent man. But if I'm right, his death—and the next child Fleet forces into sex—will be the dark side of your storied career.'
Monk shook his head in demurral. 'I went where the evidence took me. I'm not the prosecutor, or the judge, or his lawyer, or the jury that convicted him.'
'They were all standing on your work,' Terri replied. 'Fleet's story saved his ass; Payton's story seals his execution. Why are you so sure that Fleet didn't play you?'
For the first time Monk looked away from her, eyes narrow in thought. 'Rennell's retarded,' she continued. 'He was too impaired to have a story, and Fleet knew it. That put him one jump ahead of you.'
'Matter of fact,' Monk quietly remarked, 'this room is where he fingered the brothers.' His smile was almost imperceptible, a ghost of deeper reflections. 'What exactly you want me to do?'
'To use all your street contacts—check out Eddie Fleet, a.k.a. Howard Flood. If you find something that troubles you, tell Larry Pell. Soon.'
Wincing, Monk stretched his legs in front of him, reminding Terri of his chronically painful knee. 'Have to tell Pell first,' he responded. 'It's his case now, not mine. But I'll try and see what I can do.'
'Thanks, Charles,' Terri said simply.
* * *
