Final Appeal

“But you saw Armen at the argument. It was him against Galanter.”

“They think that was just for show. He hadn’t voted yet, he was killed before he could. If I don’t turn up something very soon, the investigation is over. Armen’s gonna be smeared in every newspaper in the country.”

“But his killer would go free.”

“I know, and the world will think Armen was dirty. Including his son.”

I feel stunned. It was awful before, and now it’s worse. Now it’s Armen and Eletha, my lover and my friend. Were they still seeing each other, sleeping together? What did she mean to him? What did I mean to him? “I don’t know if I’m still in.”

“I want you out, I told you. You’re in danger.”

“It’s not that.” I tell him about what happened with Maddie, even about my father. He’s a good listener and stays quiet for a minute after I finish; the last man who listened to me that intently was Armen.

“So you’re hurt,” he says.

True. “I always thought he was so honest, so honorable. But here, this place. A child, Malcolm.”

“He would’ve told you sooner or later.”

“I don’t know.”

“Let me take it from here, you’re in way too deep. All I wanted you to do was answer Galanter’s phone. Now you’re breaking into apartments.”

“I didn’t break in, I talked my way in.”

He smiles. “You lied your way in. Not illegal, just immoral.”

It reminds me of Armen, and our talk that night, over Hightower. Law and morality. You can’t separate them, why would you want to? Then I think of his broad back slumped over his desk. Armen was murdered, and murder is wrong. Illegal and immoral. Nothing I’ve learned tonight changes that, and I’m still the only one who has a chance of getting to Galanter. I rise, unsteadily. “Maybe I’m not out, Rain Man.”

Winn takes my elbow. “Aw, come on, Grace. I worry about you.”

“Good. Somebody should.”

“I mean it.”

His voice has a softness I’d rather ignore, at least for the time being. “You want to walk me out or you gonna play Batman again?”

I get no answer, not that I expected one. We end up leaving by the conventional method. He waits for me on the sidewalk while I stop downstairs to return the key. The old woman opens the door carrying the cat, a chubby orange tabby. “I heard you moving the furniture!” she says slyly.

“Moving the furniture?”

She plucks the key from my hand. “You’re a nineties woman, I’ll tell you that!” The woman shuts the door, and the cat meows in belated agreement.

  23

Monday morning I push open the glass door into the courthouse lobby. It’s mercifully clear of reporters and crowds, but it looks like martial law has been declared. There are double the number of marshals, and even the lawyers and court employees have to go through the detectors. I join one of the lines, predictably the slowest moving.

“What gives?” I say to a skinny marshal, when I reach the middle of the line. Jeff stands at his side.

“New rules, on account of that circus last week.”

“A little late, isn’t it?”

“Tell the AO that.”

In front of me in line is an older woman, thin and tall, with marvelously erect posture. Her gray hair is swept into an elegant French twist and the air around her smells like lilac bushes in June.

“Line up, now!” roars McLean, at the head of the line. His booming voice sets the woman in front of me trembling. “All bags on the conveyor belt! All bags on the belt! Sir, sir!” he shouts at a heavyset man in a red Phillies windbreaker.

“Shit,” the man says. He surrenders the wrinkled paper bag to the conveyor belt of the X-ray machine.

“Say what, sir?”

Ray looks over from behind the machine. “Don’t be roughin’ up the Phils fans, McLean. We need ’em all, after last season.”

The marshals laugh, including the fan. But not McLean. “I’m not roughin’ nobody up. I’m doin’ my job.” The fan lumbers through the metal detector, and McLean motions distractedly to the woman in front of me. “You don’t know who’s carryin’ a piece,” he says. “You can’t tell by lookin’.”

The older woman quivers like Katharine Hepburn.

“They still haven’t caught the guy who did those shootings,” McLean continues, watching her place a wristwatch with a black cord band into the bin. “You can pack anywhere, even your boot.” He shouts over her head to the marshal at the monitor, “Billy, you remember that joker, the one with the boot?”

Billy peers over the top of the monitor. “The cowboy.”

“Yeah. Some cowboy,” McLean says. “Put your purse on the belt, ma’am.”

The woman watches with apprehension as her purse disappears into the maw of the machine. As the light turns green, McLean propels her through the metal detector and looks at me. “How’s your head, Ms. Rossi?”

“Fine, thanks,” I say warily.

“Put your purse on the belt. Go when the light turns green.”

“You be nice to her, McLean,” Ray says. “She’s my girl. Grace, you takin’ care of that matter we discussed?”

Damn. I forgot to talk to Eletha about him. How can I broach it now, when I can barely look her in the eye? “I’m workin’ on it, Ray.” I walk through the metal detector, but it explodes in a ringing alarm.

“Come back on through,” McLean says. I walk back through the metal detector and the clamor subsides.

“What’s the deal?”

“Turned up the sensitivity. Have to do our jobs right.” He winks, but it’s not friendly. “Take off your watch and try it again.”

I snap off my Seiko, and it clatters into the bin on the counter. I start through the metal detector, but no sooner do I hit the black rubber carpet than the detector erupts in another cacophonous warning. The people in line break ranks to see what’s going on.

“I think she’s okay,” Ray says, “even if she is a lawyer.” The other marshals laugh.

“No, can’t take any chances. Ms. Rossi’s been a busy lady, checkin’ up, makin’ sure we’re doin’ our jobs.”

I glance at Ray, but he looks as surprised as I do. “I was checking security.”

“I know what you were doing. You wanted to know who was on duty the night Judge Gregorian bought it. Well, you’re lookin’ at him, and I didn’t see nothin’ unusual. Earrings in the box.”

I drop my hoops into the bin. “Do you check the hallways?”

“Sure, I patrol.”

“Did you check our hallway, on eighteen?”

“Sure did. Nothin’ there.”

“At what time?”

“About eleven o’clock, then again around four or so.”

My mouth goes dry. By four o’clock Armen and I were on the couch. “Did you come into chambers either time?”

A smile plays around his lips. “Don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember?”

“Is there an echo in here?”