'I've cleaned up a little bit.'
'Have you moved your husband's things? Have you taken his books, clothes, personal effects, and moved them from one room to another?'
Hackett sat up and leaned his elbows on the table. 'What is the possible relevance of this, counselor?'
I ignored him. 'You can answer the question.'
'No. I've left everything where it is. I'm not able to do that yet.'
I looked at Hackett. 'I'd like you to instruct your client to keep everything as it is. I will be preparing a formal demand to enter her premises and inspect the house, and I will have it personally served on you today. We'll be doing that inspection'-I glanced at my watch-'in ten days.'
'There's no reason to inspect her house. This is just to annoy her,' Hackett said, annoyed himself.
I turned to Rachel and whispered in her ear, 'E-mail Braden to prepare a demand to inspect her house.' She nodded and pulled out her BlackBerry.
I continued, 'And if you were sleeping in the same room, when was the last time you had sex with your husband prior to the accident?'
Hackett slapped his hand on the table. 'This is ridiculous. You don't need to ask these questions.'
'Are you making a demand for loss of consortium?'
'Of course. It's part of the standard wrongful-death case.'
'Then I am entitled to find out the nature of the relationship.'
He sat back and huffed, but said nothing else.
'Your answer?'
'The night before.'
'Are you sure?'
'Yes.'
'And before that night, when was the last time you had sex with your husband?'
'I don't know. A couple of days.'
'On the average, how often did you have sex with your husband?'
'It varied. He was gone a lot.'
'When he was home.'
'I don't know. Maybe three times a week, maybe twice.'
Now that I had her feeling uncomfortable and realizing that this was very real, and that this testimony could be used in trial if it came to that, she was much more reserved than she had been when we entered the room.
'Did you understand what I and your attorney were talking about? That we're going to ask that you allow us into your house to inspect it, look at it, videotape it, and have a better understanding of your living relationships with your husband, where he spent his time and the like, you understand that?'
She shook her head. 'I don't understand why you would need to do that to me.'
'What I need from you now, ma'am, is an assurance that you will not change anything materially inside your house that might help us understand your relationship with your husband. Do you give us your word on record that you will not change it any?'
Hackett put his hand in front of her on the table so she wouldn't answer. 'She's not here to make promises. She's here to answer questions.'
I continued to look at her and said, 'I have asked her a question, whether she's willing to give me that assurance. If not'-I turned my head to Hackett-'I will simply ask the court to impose an order that nothing be changed or modified. We can do it either way.'
Hackett said, 'She won't change anything materially.'
'I appreciate that you're willing to give me your assurance. But unfortunately you don't live there.'
I looked at her again. 'Will you give me yours?'
'Yes, there's nothing to change, of course.'
'Fine. Let's go on with some of the other questions then.' I spent the rest of the day asking the questions that you have to ask in a wrongful-death case. It's difficult to probe into a person's life and ask questions that he or she has never been asked by anybody, not even their parents. It's difficult to ask how someone values the death of a spouse. What did her husband mean to her? How different is her life? She told us of the dreams that they had together, the life they had planned after his retirement from the Marine Corps, the mountain home he planned to build in North Carolina, how difficult it had been not to be able to have children. They had grown to love the independent life that they lived, the ability to travel at the drop of a hat. Her ability to go visit him in the places he was stationed, in Japan, in Europe, in ports in the Mediterranean. She had traveled the world and had enjoyed her life. And that had all been snatched from her. She cried, she took breaks, she showed that she cared and that she was vulnerable.
And I wasn't buying it. Ever since she had told me that she and her husband had slept in the same room, I wasn't buying it. It was just fabrication to support the first lie. If it was as she said, how could their lives not be completely intertwined in a wonderful relationship? She was just giving me the answers she had to give. It all sounded too good and sweet.
I ended the day after she was tired and wanted to quit, and after I had implied that we were going to go on for three days. 'Your husband was quite the reader.'
'Yes.'
'I know that you provided copies to us of the books in his den, or rather in your house.'
'Yes.'
'He left margin notes in nearly every book he read.'
'True. He was always writing in the margins.'
'He said what he thought about things in the margins, about the author, or the topic, or something else entirely.'
'I didn't really read his notes.'
'It would be strange for him to say things he didn't mean in those notes, wouldn't you agree?'
'I'm sure he meant every word. He was never one to say something he didn't mean. It was one of his pet peeves, when other people would say things to please others, or to be better regarded.'
'Did he have any particular interest in the international policies of President Adams? And Asia, in particular?'
____________________
I walked to my car in the parking garage in the basement of Hackett's building. I thought the deposition had gone reasonably well and checked my BlackBerry for messages. I had an e-mail from Frank Flannery. He was ready to meet. I said to Rachel, 'You want to go meet the mystery witness?'
She looked at her watch. 'It's almost six. But I guess so, yeah.'
I pulled out of the garage and headed directly for Flannery's office. We parked in the cramped garage underneath his office building on M Street and took the elevator up to the lobby, then to his law office. The office of the well-known firm was stately. People were leaving, and the receptionist was shutting down her computer when we arrived. We told her we were there to see Flannery. She asked us to wait and he would be with us shortly.
Flannery came up and I stood to greet him. I introduced myself and Rachel, and he escorted us into a glassed-in conference room next to the reception area. He closed the miniblinds to block the view into the conference room from the reception area and told us how the meeting would proceed. Just a meeting, the witness would say whatever he wanted. After the meeting we would all figure out what we were going to do.
The door from the back of the conference room opened and the witness walked in. He wasn't at all what I expected. He was dressed poorly, had a bad haircut, and obviously did not eat well or exercise. He wasn't exactly fat, but he was lumpy. He had the hands of a workingman, and the eyes of someone who could anger quickly, particularly when intoxicated, which I guessed was often. He sat next to Flannery across the table from us.
'Good evening, I'm Mike Nolan and this is Rachel Long.'
The man sat silently and stared at us. His attorney responded, 'He would love to tell you his name, but we are not to that point yet. The purpose of this meeting of course is to discuss whether or not you're interested in the information that he has, and whether you are willing to meet his terms to obtain that information.' Flannery paused as he searched for exactly the right words. 'I am taking no position on the appropriateness of his demands. He has asked me to put this meeting together, to protect his identity, and to make sure he crosses no boundaries. I have done that, and he is here. You may ask him questions, to which he will respond as he deems appropriate.'
I wasn't sure where to start. An uneasy tension was in the room. 'You have some information about the accident that you think we might want to know. I believe that's why you called me.'
'Yeah. I called. I have information that will blow the case wide-open.'
'In what direction?'
'In all directions. Case over.'
' 'Case over' meaning what exactly?'
'I can't go into it until we decide whether you're going to meet my terms.'
'I'm not even going to consider your terms until we find out what information you have, at least in general. Do you know why this helicopter crashed?'
'I know what happened to the helicopter before it flew. And it will end the case.'
'How? How did you gain access to this knowledge?'
'I was there.'
'Meaning what?' I watched him as he considered how to answer.
'I'm not going to say. You might figure out who I am.' He sat back in the leather chair. He looked uncomfortable.
'If I don't know how you got your information, let alone what it is, how can I recommend that you get paid?'
'You have to tell me that you're willing. You have to give me your word. Then I'll tell you.'
'Will it be admissible? Can I get it into evidence at trial?'
'I don't know anything about that.'
'And what if your information is all crap and you don't know anything?'
