Here, on a Thursday afternoon, there was no peace. No reporters, no other people. A comfortable clutter amid recycled school desks and old pitted library tables.
But Hardy's main interest wasn't in Lightner's diagnosis of Jennifer. "It still doesn't mean she killed anybody."
Lightner was sitting forward on one of the tables next to the slatted window. "No, it doesn't of itself, but I'm telling you now… I'm afraid she did kill her husband."
"You're sure of that? She tell you?"
"No, but I know."
"And her boy?"
"I don't know how that happened. It could have been a mistake. She might have thought he was Larry."
"A seven-year-old boy? Her own son?"
"I said I don't know how it happened. The boy might have gotten between them, the gun went off, I don't know, some terrible accident."
Hardy didn't like to admit it, had in fact avoided this conclusion each time it had surfaced before now, but Lightner had a point. Every day people got killed by mistake with firearms. You put a gun in the picture, you got the possibility of an accident. Hardy could invent half a dozen scenarios himself that might have resulted, accidentally, in Matt's death.
"Except she denies it," Hardy said. "But, for the sake of argument, how do you know? Why?"
Finally, an open question. Lightner pushed his well-tailored bulk back onto the table. Sunlight cut steeply through the motes by the one window, fell across the psychiatrist's face, highlighting reds in the handsome beard.
He sighed, his fists clenched. "The simple answer," he said, "is to stop Larry from beating her."
Hardy was cramped into the seat of a one-piece, old-fashioned school desk, complete with built-in inkwell, around which he was running his finger, leaning back, legs stretched out straight in front of him, crossed at the ankles. "She says he didn't beat her. She says they fought like everybody else but-"
"Of course, she says that. But it's not true."
"It's not true," Hardy repeated. "How do I know it's not true?" He held up his round-the-inkwell hand. "No, I'm not starting in again. I'm asking if you've got any proof, any corroboration. Jennifer's admission? Anything? I presume you're telling me this to give her an out, an excuse that might clear her if she did it."
Lightner nodded. "Yes, but I'm on very tenuous ground here, Mr. Hardy. I know that. Well, I've persuaded myself, that I can tell you some of what I know, things you might find out from other sources given enough time. But I'm afraid I can't tell you how I know it."
It took a moment before Hardy said, "Privilege."
There it was, that familiar double-edged sword. Lightner's head inclined a bit. "Without my input, there still should be records that point to it. She never said, but I believe she must have switched physicians. They're mandated to report."
He was right about that, Hardy knew. When the same person, a woman, say, or a child, visited a doctor with burns, contusions, abrasions, bruises, saying they fell of their bicycle, down the stairs, walked into a door, whatever – if it looked suspicious the physician by law had to notify somebody in law enforcement. There was compelling reason to suspect abuse.
Hardy asked the obvious question. "But you knew Jennifer was being beaten. Why didn't you report it?"
Lightner was still on his hands, an unhappy look on his face. "We're exempt from the mandate. She refused to let me. She was my patient. I was her psychiatrist. It was her right."
"So she changed her doctors so they wouldn't suspect. Or report it. Anything else?"
"Neighbors might know. How many times have they moved? Sometimes that's a clue."
Hardy pointed out that all this might be fine, but Jennifer herself was the most likely source of corroboration about whether or not she was a battered wife, and she was denying it. "You'll agree," he said, "this poses something of a problem for us."
"I see that, yes, of course."
"Well?"
"I just thought you had to know. As you said, "It's got to be her defense. It's why she did it."
Hardy tried to straighten up in the tiny chair. He put his elbows on the desk. "Dr. Lightner, I've got to remind you, she denies both battery and that she killed anybody. We went over this again and again this morning and she isn't going to go with any battered wife defense – not with Freeman, not with me, not with anybody. And this leads me to the question… Why in the world wouldn't she just admit to being battered? As you said, people are increasingly getting off on this defense these days. The precedents are in place. We told her that. So why, since it's got a good chance, maybe the best chance, to save her life, won't she agree to it?"
"She's embarrassed."
For a second, Hardy thought he'd heard wrong. "Say what?"
"She's embarrassed. She doesn't want anybody to know that she's the kind of person who could live with being beaten. Why wouldn't she just leave?"
"Exactly."
Now Lightner leaned forward, into it. "But don't you see? That's the problem. They can't leave! I know this might come across as socialized slaptrap to you, but in some cultures, it's more socially acceptable than in others to take this kind of domestic abuse, but it's not among upper-class whites in our culture."
"Well, now she herself is upper class. She's made it and she's not going back."
"What if she's convicted? What's she got?"
"She's still got her self-image."
"And you're telling me that's more important than her life?"
"I don't think she's ever faced that."
Hardy realized that Lightner could be right. Stuffed into the tiny desk, his posture was getting to him. He wedged himself out, standing.
"So Jennifer won't admit she was beaten… battered, essentially because she's embarrassed."
"That's right. Embarrassed may be too weak a word. Mortified is better, that she was battered, almost ritually beaten and, unbelievably, maybe even to herself, stayed around to take it." Lightner slid off the table.
Hardy was rubbing his shoulder. "I don't mean to offend here, doctor, but is any of this psycho-babble? I mean, how many of your conclusions, assuming I independently discover some facts, can I depend on?"
Lightner didn't appear offended. He nodded. Maybe he thought it was a good question. "All of them, I'd say."
11
In the morning daylight the Witt home was impressive. The previous night, when Hardy and Frannie had driven by, there had been a sense of solidity to Olympia Way, high up on Twin Peaks. Most of the street bordered the Midtown Terrace Playground. It had been quiet, almost ghostly. Working street lights cast their beams through the early spring foliage of the trees that overhung the street. Hedges seemed trimmed and full-grown.
In sunlight the feeling of sheltered enclave was even stronger. Hardy got out of his car and stood looking at Jennifer's home, two lots from the park, from the south side of the street. To the west, the Pacific glittered, and just north, Sutro Tower stretched its rusted arms to the sky. Hardy thought some of the two- and three-story houses could sit comfortably on Embassy Row – landscaped and majestic, these were the homes of people who might not miss three hundred thousand dollars if it disappeared slowly enough.
The Witt's hedge – at perhaps three feet – wasn't as tall as some of the others, though it was as well kept as any. A white picket fence fronted it. The gate to the fence was shut, but the hedge turned ninety degrees up both sides of the straight brick path to the front door.
Hardy had to remind himself that until two days ago Jennifer had lived here, coming and going, apparently unaware that the grand jury was deciding that there was sufficient evidence to indict her for murder. It was an unsettling thought.
But no more unsettling than when he turned the key. A dog from somewhere nearby barked and kept barking. Hardy stood waiting for its owner to come and quiet it down, check to see what had set it off. That didn't happen. In fact, nothing happened, and the barking continued. Hardy could have been a burglar with a sledge hammer instead of a lawyer with a key and no one – apparently – would have questioned him.