“Has he identified Harper?”
“Close enough. Big black guy struggling with a naked white woman.”
“But has he specifically identified Harper?”
“We’re bringing Harper in. I expect identification will be made at that time.”
“So why are you calling me, Morrie?”
“Because if we get a positive make, we’re going to have to charge Harper. I mean, Matthew, I know it isn’t the strongest of cases...”
“What does the state’s attorney think?”
“He thinks if this guy can identify Harper, we’ve got a case.”
“And if he can’t?”
“We keep looking. Those prints on the can, the fact that he bought the can two days before the murder was committed, the fact that his wife filed a complaint the day she was killed — that may not be enough for a sure conviction, but it’s enough to keep us working. That’s if this guy who was out on the water—”
“A fisherman, did you say?”
“Yeah. Claims he saw them struggling, heard the guy yelling her name. He didn’t pick that out of the air, Matthew. Michelle isn’t that common a name.”
“No, it isn’t. I still don’t know why you called me.”
“If we get a positive make, the state’s attorney will have a whack at him this time, and this time we’ll be charging him, Matthew. So I thought you might want to represent him during the formal Q and A. This is serious this time, Matthew.”
“I’m not a criminal lawyer, Morrie...”
“I know you’re not.”
“But I know damn well what I’d advise him this time. If it’s serious this time.”
“If that guy identifies him, it’s very serious this time.”
“Then I’d advise him not to answer any further questions.”
“That’s what I figured you’d advise him. But shouldn’t somebody be here to tell him that?”
“Me, you mean?”
“Well, you, yes, if you want to come down. It’s just, this fucking Miranda-Escobedo, the law says we’ve got to appoint a lawyer if the man requests one, but we don’t have lawyers just hanging around here at the station house, you know, the law’s got a jawbone but no teeth, do you follow me? So since you already know the man, and did such a good job this afternoon, which by the way I’m sorry I hassled you so much...”
“That’s okay, Morrie.”
“So if you wanted to pick up here where you left off, it might not be a bad idea. For Harper, I mean.’Cause the way I look at it, he’s in bad trouble here, and he’s going to need all the help he can get.”
“When will you have him there?”
“Pete Kenyon’s already on the way to Wingdale. Unless Harper’s skipped, he should be back here within—”
“Do you think he may have skipped?”
“My guess? No, he’ll be there at the house when Pete pulls up. No, I don’t think he’s skipped.”
“So when will you have him downtown?”
“I suppose maybe five minutes, unless he gives Pete trouble.” Bloom paused. “Pete didn’t go alone, Matthew. I sent two cars with him. If Harper murdered his wife—”
“If,” I said.
“Well, I know, that’s what we’ve got to prove. But if we get that positive ID, we’ll have enough to charge him, and that’s what we’ll do. Would you like to be here, Matthew?”
“I’d like to be here,” I said. “I like it here, where I am. I like it very much right here.”
Dale blew me a kiss.
“Well, it’s entirely up to you,” Bloom said.
“Don’t ask him anything until I get there,” I said.
“Would I do that?” Bloom said.
“No, but some of those guys in the State’s Attorney’s Office can be very cute.”
“No questions, I promise.”
“And you understand, don’t you, that I’ll advise him to remain silent?”
“Sure. Exactly what I would do.” Bloom paused. “So are you coming down?”
“Yes,” I said, and sighed.
“Thank you, Matthew,” Bloom said, and hung up.
I looked at Dale.
“One of these days,” she said dreamily, “I’m going to buy myself a flesh-colored vibrator.”
3
Benny Weiss is perhaps the best criminal lawyer in all Calusa. My partner Frank says that this is because Benny himself looks like a criminal. I don’t know what criminals are supposed to look like. I once thumbed through a psychological text in which there was a series of photographs, some of which were of schizophrenics, others of normal people like Frank and me. When these photos were shown to real-life schizophrenics who were asked to pick out the ones they preferred, they invariably picked out the pictures of schizophrenics like themselves. I don’t know what the test was supposed to prove.
But assuming Frank is correct about Benny looking like a criminal, then perhaps this accounts for the great number of criminals who seek his services when they run afoul of the law. I personally think Benny looks like a cocker spaniel. He is a smallish person — five feet eight inches at the outside, I would guess — slight of build, with a narrow face and soulful brown eyes and unruly brown hair that he rakes with his fingers every three or four minutes. He smokes incessantly. In his office that Wednesday morning at 10:30 A.M., he sat alternately smoking and raking his hair. He looked as if he had not slept much the night before. That was because I’d dragged him out of bed at 11:00 P.M. and asked him to meet me downtown, where a man named Luther Jackson — the fisherman who’d been anchored just off the Whisper Key beach on the night Michelle was murdered — had positively identified George Harper as the man he’d seen struggling with her. The identification had been made from a lineup of six men, all of them black, five of them policemen working for the Calusa PD The state’s attorney had questioned — or attempted to question — Harper soon after the identification was made. Both Benny and I had advised him to remain silent.
At nine this morning, I had accompanied Harper to court for what is known as a “first appearance hearing,” normally held on the morning after an arrest, to request bail for him. Ever since last November, when Florida’s Supreme Court had made its new ruling, even a person accused of a capital crime was entitled to bail. The ruling stated that before release on bail could be denied, proof of the crime had to be evident or presumption of the crime had to be great; it was the state’s attorney’s burden to oppose bail by showing that the evidence he possessed was legally sufficient to obtain a verdict of guilty. The court, in its sole discretion, had the right to grant or deny bail.
The County Court judge presiding over the hearing immediately informed me that I would have to take the matter before a Circuit Court judge who would later have trial jurisdiction. The Circuit Court judge hearing me could have set an impossible bail like half a million dollars, but he chose instead to deny bail completely, citing as his reason (not that he needed any) the particularly heinous nature of the crime. George Harper was taken to the Calusa County jail to await the grand jury’s decision as to whether it would indict or dismiss. The grand jury was scheduled to meet on the following Monday, November 23.
“Let me tell you something about the practice of criminal law,” Benny said, and dragged on his cigarette. “Criminal law involves guilt or innocence. You may argue that divorce also... or is that a touchy subject?”
“It is not a touchy subject,” I said.
“In which case, you may argue that divorce — at least in many states of the union — also involves guilt or innocence. But a man or a woman seeking a divorce, even if one or the other of them has broken the sacred vows of marriage...” (and here Benny, a confirmed bachelor, looked heavenward and smiled) “...is in no particular jeopardy, unless one considers onerous alimony a peril.”