information about a crime.”
“What would Butler’s background have to have been for you to doubt what he said? Maybe time as a Taliban commander? Or a Nazi SS officer?”
Dylan objects and De Luca admonishes me to cut it out. Business as usual.
“Did you check into Butler’s background after you talked to him?”
“I did.”
“Did he graduate high school?” I ask.
“He did not.”
I introduce Butler’s high school records, which include a PSAT combined score of 614, and I point out that in those days one got 400 for signing one’s name.
“In the interview, Butler said that his conscience had been bothering him all these years, and when he saw Mr. Galloway on television as a representative of the U.S. government, it pushed him over the edge. Made sense to you?”
“I had my doubts,” Mulcahy says, surprising me. “But when I checked it all out, I was convinced.”
Mulcahy has opened a door for me, that I was planning to open myself. “Checked it out how?”
“I compared it to the evidence of the fire. Everything Butler said was accurate, and it was information that was not publicly available.”
I introduce as evidence Butler’s records from one of his drug rehabs, and refer Mulcahy to the date on the report. “Is that two weeks after he says Mr. Galloway confided in him?”
“Sixteen days, yes,” Mulcahy says.
I then get him to read a paragraph from the initial statement Butler made to the rehab facility, admitting to heavy drug usage for the two months previously. “So by his own admission, Mr. Butler was using drugs during the period that he claims Mr. Galloway confessed to him?”
“Yes, but not necessarily that day.”
“Maybe it was a drug holiday,” I say. “Or maybe it was Thanksgiving, and he was going cold turkey for the day. But in any event, his recounting of the details of the fire, how it was set, et cetera, all of that proved to be accurate?”
“Definitely.”
“Down to the last detail?”
“Yes.”
“So let’s recap. A man with five felony convictions and extraordinarily low intelligence recounted almost verbatim technical details of a conversation he had six years earlier, when he was taking so many illegal drugs that he would soon be forced into rehab? And all because he was suddenly conscience-stricken. Is that about right?”
“That’s your description,” Mulcahy says.
“Which part of it is inaccurate?” I say.
“You left out the fact that there was no other way he could have gotten the information.”
“There was no other way that you could find,” I say. “Now, you said that Butler was subsequently killed in Las Vegas, and that Mr. Galloway is said to know people there.”
“That’s correct.”
“I also know people there. Are you going to cuff me?”
Mulcahy surprises me with a smile. “I’m tempted,” he says, and the jury laughs.
“Where did he get the money to go to Vegas in the first place? Did he have a job?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe he suddenly came into money? Perhaps for performing a service?”
“If he did, I’m not aware of it.”
“Maybe he just needed a vacation; conscience clearing can be exhausting.”
Mulcahy just smiles, as if these barbs are to be expected from a defense attorney who doesn’t have the evidence on his side. He’s an experienced, excellent witness because of his confidence and lack of fear; the jury thinks that means he’s telling the truth and hiding nothing.
I let him off the stand, having accomplished as much as I could, which is not nearly enough.
“Mr. Mandlebaum, I think you’ll be more comfortable in this chair.”
That’s what I hear Laurie say as I walk into the house. What I see is Laurie, Sam, Tara, Bailey, and five very old people, four of them men.
“Andy, I’ve got some people I want you to meet,” Sam says. “This is Morris Fishman, Leon Goldberg, Stanley Rubinstein, Hilda Mandlebaum, and her husband Eli.”
“Nice to meet you all,” I say. “You’re Sam’s students?”
They all nod their confirmation of my question.
“At what school might that be?” I ask.
“The YMHA in Wayne.”
He’s talking about the Jewish version of the YMCA, meaning it’s the Young Men’s Hebrew Association. Except they aren’t “young” and Hilda isn’t one of the “men.” Perhaps it should just be called the HA.
I ask Sam if I could talk to him in the kitchen before we get started. Once we’re in there, I ask, “Does their age have anything to do with why you wanted to make the meeting early?”
He shrugs. “They’re sharper earlier in the day,” he says. “They usually have dinner around fourish, and then to bed by eight.”
“I’m not sure this is going to work, Sam.”
“They’re up at five in the morning, Andy, so we’ll have a full day. And you should see them on a computer; they’re as good as any students I’ve ever had.”
“How many classes have you taught?” I ask.
“This is my first.”
“Sam…”
“It will be fine; trust me.”
I actually do trust Sam, especially when it’s in the area of computers, so we go back into the other room. Morris Fishman is in the process of telling Laurie she looks just like Esther Fleischmann, his high school sweetheart who cheated on him in 1947 when he went to Rutgers and she stayed home.
“Morris,” Laurie says, “you deserved better.”
Eli Mandlebaum is petting Tara, and Leon is petting Bailey, and they seem quite content about it. Based on their relative sizes, Leon could be Bailey’s jockey. Tara has always been an equal opportunity petting receiver; she is unconcerned about race, religion, sex, or age. Clearly she’s teaching Bailey her open-mindedness.
Sam turns the meeting over to me. I can tell I need to get it over with quickly; it’s getting close to six-thirty, and I think Hilda is starting to nod off.
I explain where we are on the case, as it relates to the cell phone records. “We have all these people that were called. They live in different places and have quite different occupations. The only common thread that we know about is that they were all called at some point by the owner of that particular cell phone.”
“So you want to find out if there are any other connections?” Stanley asks.
“Exactly. We need to dig as deeply as we can into each of their lives, and find out if they are connected in any other way. No matter how insignificant the link might be, I want to know about it.”
“How do we do it?” Leon asks.
“I have no idea,” I say. “Sam is in charge of that. He’ll instruct you on what to do. Right, Sam?”
“No problem.”
“I’m also going to be getting a list of missing persons from around the time of the fire. We’re going to need to track them down as well.”
“We’re on it,” Sam says, and then turns to his team. “We start bright and early at six? The computer room at the Y?”
Everyone nods their agreement, and Hilda says that she and Eli will pick up bagels and lox on the way in. With that, Sam leads the “over the hill gang” out the door.
When they leave, Laurie says, “I hope I’m just like them if I get to be their age. And I hope we’re just like Hilda and Eli.”
