Freeman was shaking his head. "No, Jennifer. They'll hold it until you're finished with this. If you're found guilty, they won't pay."
Hardy couldn't believe it, was she actually trying to smile? "But you'll keep them from finding me guilty."
Freeman shook his head. "I'm afraid I don't gamble with my own money, Jennifer." Hardy was thinking that his partner hadn't lied – he didn't do suave. "So let's leave that aside," Freeman was saying. "What else? I mean, besides the insurance."
They had lived in their house for five years, she said, but they had bought high, just as the market was slowing down. Equity was probably at seventy thousand, or a little less. Providing she could sell it. The house account was around twenty thousand. They had had some stocks, another sixty-five thousand. Furniture, some jewelry, two cars. Garage sale prices, Freeman figured.
"What happens if you get bail and… what do they say?… jump it?" Jennifer asked. Then, at Freeman's glare, "I mean in theory."
"Don't even think about it. And don't let anybody hear you ask about it. In fact, don't talk to anybody here in jail about anything? That's good free advice. Now, if you jump – first, you lose the money you put up. All of it, and then they will catch you, believe me, they will. You'll never ever get a bondsman again. Finally, you've got the entire judiciary A, convinced you're guilty and Two-"
"B," Hardy interjected.
"And Two, prejudiced like hell against you. It's a bad, bad idea. Don't even think about it."
"Not that she's got any bail to jump anyway," Hardy reminded him.
"Do you guys rehearse this?" she asked.
Freeman was scribbling on his pad. He looked up. "Here's what I get – even if you don't do the bail appeal and if you sell your house and completely tap out, you're still short. We want to help you, but I'm afraid I'll have to tell the judge we're withdrawing-"
Jennifer faced them. "There's more," she said. "There's another account."
Freeman stopped gathering his papers. Hardy pulled a chair around and straddled it. "What do you mean, another account?" Freeman asked.
Jennifer looked down, swallowing. Obviously nervous. "Sometimes… I just didn't think Larry and I were going to make it, you know? And I thought, well, if I had to go out on my own, with Matt, I mean…" She looked from one man to the other. "I mean, I just felt I had better have something of my own for Matt and me. Just in case…"
"Just in case what?" Freeman was staring at her.
"Well, you know, like I said, in case it didn't work out. In case I had to get away or something-"
"Get away from what? " Freeman was remembering what the psychiatrist Lightner had said about abuse.
"Are you saying your husband beat you?" Hardy asked. "You never…"
Jennifer brought her hand up to her face, as though feeling for remembered bruises. "No, he didn't, not really, but, you know… still, if I really needed it…"
She stammered it out. She had been squirreling money away for some nine years. In spite of Larry's tight grip on everything, she had found ways to take "a little from here, some from there," pad about what she spent on Matt, toys, clothes, make-up, decorating, anything she could manage. The amounts had grown to almost a thousand a month, and she had learned to invest it in high-risk stocks so that the account now totaled close to three-hundred-thousand dollars, unencumbered and liquid.
"Well," said Freeman, allowing himself a smile, "if you still want us, Mrs. Witt, you've got us."
Hardy did not smile. Jennifer's revelation, however justifiable she might make it seem, still bothered him. He'd rather not have known, to tell the truth.
6
"Tell me about Larry Witt."
Jennifer and Freeman sat across the table from one another. Hardy was a fly on the wall against the inside of the door. Freeman had produced a thermos of coffee from his briefcase, and three styrofoam cups now steamed on the table.
"What do you want to know? About him and me?"
"I want to know everything." Freeman had his coat and one arm draped over the back of his chair. He slouched, his shirt was half untucked. "But I suppose we should start with how often he beat you up."
Jennifer blinked, then recovered. Her eyes widened, went to Freeman, then settled on Hardy. "I said we were fighting, not that Larry beat me."
Freeman put out his hand, back toward Hardy, keeping him from responding. He spoke soothingly. "But he did beat you?"
"I don't see why that would matter."
Freeman kept his voice low, persuasive. "It matters, Jennifer, because it gives you a defense. It gives the jury something they can hold onto." Hardy couldn't help noticing this was not what Freeman had told Dr. Lightner downstairs when he had characterized the battered-wife defense, given the death of Matt, as a hard sell to the jury. "In fact, though, he did beat you?"
She took a moment, the muscle in her jaw working. "I didn't kill Larry, Mr. Freeman. I don't care what reason you come up with why I might have, I didn't… What about Matt? My God, are they going to say I killed Matt too?"
"They're already saying that, Jennifer."
Her laugh was so brittle it broke. "And what's their reason? For me to do that? Have you thought about it? How are they saying I killed my son?"
Freeman kept his voice flat, quiet. "Matt's not what we're talking about, Jennifer. Right now we're talking about Larry."
"I don't care about Larry." Jennifer slapped the table. "I didn't kill Matt. Don't you understand that?" She looked up at Hardy.
He felt he had to answer her. "They're going to say that Matt just showed up by accident, that you panicked or he got in the way of you shooting Larry."
She closed her eyes, breathing heavily now. "But… but if it was an accident it's not first degree murder, is it? I mean, it didn't happen, but if they say it did, it's not the same as Larry…" Her face was deathly pale.
Hardy was tempted to explain it as Drysdale and Powell had put it to him. He resisted, but it worried him some that she had even asked, followed by a quick denial.
At the same time, as though he had just confirmed something to himself, Freeman nodded, straightened himself and sat forward, cradling his hands on the table. His voice, again, was carefully modulated, but it was a master's instrument, and this time, beneath the soothing tone, thrummed a hint of a threat. "I want you to be very clear on something here, Jennifer. I am not accusing you of anything. But you should know that I will neither believe nor disbelieve anything you tell me. Anything. Whether you did it or didn't do it. Why or why not."
"But I didn't-"
Freeman held up a flat palm. "You must believe me that if your husband, in fact, did hit you, the prosecution will hammer that point again and again as one motive for you to have killed him. Now, if one time you and Larry had a fight and he struck you, that isn't going to satisfy most juries that he gave you a reason to kill him. But if we can come back and show that this was a recurring event in your marriage, that you were living in a state of constant fear and stress, then at least we've countered their argument. Regardless of whether or not you killed him-"
Jennifer was shaking her head. "I didn't kill him, but if I did I was justified? Is that it?"
Hardy straightened up. He had been thinking the same thing, that you could not have it both ways. Reason or no reason, either she killed him or she didn't.
Jennifer understood and cared about this distinction. Good, Hardy thought. But then, he had to face another countering thought… an embezzler with a logical mind, capable of long-range planning and execution? Was Jennifer Witt the kind of person who might just get away with murder?
But Freeman wasn't backing away. "We're going to find some defense out of all of this, but we'd damn well better be prepared for all the arguments, and to just keep repeating I didn't do it will not, I'm afraid, be effective."