It was not quite true, of course. Chris's parents were unloving and alcoholic socialites whose wasted lives had ended in a car wreck. Carlo had been the by-product of an affair, the miserable and unloved son of a single mother who despised Chris too much to let him raise Carlo—until the moment, fearful that the stunted seven-year-old child would become a damaged adult, Chris had given her no choice. It was this sense of life's underside that had given Chris the capacity to understand, at least as much as he could, what it was like for Terri to grow up in a household where her father raped and brutalized her mother, indifferent to what their daughter saw or felt. That this experience had led her—with whatever emotional crosscurrents—to comprehend the lives which so often created death row inmates, and to feel that representing them was recompense for her own escape, was something that Chris still strove to understand; that their law firm would subsidize her efforts, and that Chris would help, was a given. Which was why Carlo—preserved in his idealism, Chris wryly remarked, by an absence of student loans—had chosen to join them.
They drank iced tea; though it was close to the Pagets' accustomed cocktail hour, the conversation was too purposeful for that. "Still," Chris ventured, "it's a strange crime."
Only after a quick glance at Terri did Carlo turn to him, and she was acutely aware of the sensitivity toward her that, for a moment, delayed his question: "Strange in what sense?"
"That it would involve both brothers. It's a matter of shame—if you put a nine-year-old boy on the fifty-yard line at Notre Dame stadium, and packed the seats with pedophile priests, none of them would move. Child molesters tend to act alone."
This remark, with its echoes from her daughter Elena's past, reminded Terri that walling herself off from the nature of Rennell Price's alleged crime might be far more difficult than she had made herself believe. Then Chris reached across the table and touched her hand. Quietly, he said, "You don't have to take this case, you know."
Pensive, Terri curled her fingers in his. "The Habeas Corpus Resource Center is jammed, and they're out of volunteers. So it's me or no one." She faced Carlo. "About child molesters," she told him baldly, "your dad's right. Elena could tell you that. But Rennell Price still claims he's innocent. That's where we have to start—and quickly."
This settled the matter, as Terri had known it would. After another glance at his father, Carlo nodded.
"So," she continued, "we have to look at the facts as if no one ever has before. Review the police reports, the physical evidence, the witness statements, the trial transcript. Track down the key witnesses—could they have been mistaken, we'll want to know, or have had a motive to lie? Both happen more often than you'd think."
"What about the cops?"
"If they're willing. Same with the prosecutor and Rennell's trial lawyer—we'll want to know why they made the choices they did. That will be far more touchy for defense counsel."
Carlo raised his eyebrows in inquiry. "Because we'll second-guess him?"
"More than that," Chris told him. "We have to prove that Rennell Price's trial lawyer was so incompetent that his client was denied the effective assistance of counsel granted by the Sixth Amendment. It won't be easy, given that some courts have ruled that even sleeping through your client's trial is not enough to qualify. Damned few lawyers will admit they were worse than that."
"If we can prove Rennell Price is innocent, why should it matter?"
Terri suppressed a rueful smile: framed against the panoply of sailboats, his crew-neck burgundy sweater carelessly draped over his shoulders, Carlo still seemed innocent himself. But so had she been.
"Later on," she promised, "I'll induct you into the wonderland of death penalty jurisprudence. For now, take my word that the State of California can claim that even compelling new proof of this guy's innocence doesn't bar his execution—at least, taken alone. If the trial was fair, then they'll say his execution is constitutional. Even if the verdict may well have been wrong."
"How can innocence not matter?"
"Because that's the law—you'll find out soon enough. Rennell Price was convicted of an awful crime, and fifteen years later, he's still alive. He's become an overdue debt to the victim's parents, and the State of California is determined to collect on their behalf."
Saying this reminded Terri of how solitary Rennell was—and of why she must distance herself, as much as possible, from the fact that the victim had suffered a death which caused Terri to cringe with guilt at what her own daughter still was forced to live with.
"So we'd better hope he is retarded," Chris remarked to Carlo. "That's the good news, if there is any. While you were holed up cramming for the bar exam, the Supreme Court decided in Atkins v. Virginia that we no longer execute the mentally retarded. The trick, if Terri's right, is proving that she's right with respect to Rennell Price. Otherwise," Chris added sardonically, "or so the argument goes, we'll be flooded with claims of retardation filed by crafty middle-aged inmates who suddenly can't tie their own shoes.
"That means we need to show who Rennell was at age eighteen, and how he got that way—his parents, relatives, brother, friends, home, neighborhood, educational and medical histories, mental profile. Everything that ever happened to him, an entire social history in fifty-nine days."
The task was so daunting that Carlo, feigning a careless shrug, simply inquired, "So where do we start?"
Restless, Terri stood. "By going to the office," she told him with faux good cheer. "Right now. We'll start by reading reams of paper, then tracking down the cops."
Now Carlo looked genuinely startled. "What if I have a date?"
Chris laughed aloud. "Ask her to come to your place late," he suggested helpfully, "and hope that she'll stay over." Abruptly, his eyes grew serious and, in his wife's appraisal, a little sad. "Until you save Rennell Price, or the State of California kills him, life as you know it is over. After that, it will merely never be the same. I know that from living with Terri."
THREE
"KIDS," CHARLES MONK SAID SOFTLY. "TO ME, THEY WERE ALWAYS the worst. Never quite got used to it."
Fifty-seven days to go. Perhaps that was why, Terri thought, Monk's words had a valedictory tone; perhaps it was just the reflective melancholy of a veteran homicide inspector who, freshly retired, had the freedom of acknowledging emotions which for too long had been a luxury. Then she wondered if the melancholy was her own, more about the daughter she knew than the children Charles Monk had seen.
They sat at a sidewalk café in North Beach, the early morning pedestrians—tourists and schoolkids and office workers headed for the Financial District—passing by their table. The morning was bright but a little chill; Monk stiffened, a wince briefly disturbing the granite angles of his seamed brown face, and then stretched one leg in front of him. "Knee," he told her with resignation. "Vietnam."
"Want to go inside?"
Monk slowly shook his head. "Not if I can help it. Just make me feel like an invalid. Worse than that—retired."
Terri smiled. They had been adversaries, sometimes bitterly so, but never enemies. Monk was smart and honest, a legend on the street; he seemed willing enough to talk with her, maybe because he was bored, more likely because he was satisfied with the integrity of his work. For Monk, the execution of Rennell Price was a given—the recompense, too long delayed, for what he had seen fifteen years before.