“It’s out there,” Stafford replied, his tone very serious. “I know it’s out there. Because in here,” he thumped his chest, “I know Swyteck’s guilty.” He rose quickly from his chair and started for the door, then shoved his hand in his coat pocket and stopped short, as if he’d suddenly found something. “What the hell’s this?” he asked, clearly overacting as he pulled a plastic bag from his pocket.
McCue smiled. He knew his old friend was up to something.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Stafford as he smacked his hand playfully against his forehead. The Cheshire-cat smile he’d been holding inside was now plastered from ear to ear. “I almost forgot to tell you the best part, Wilson. You see, nobody heard any gunshots at the time of Goss’s murder. Doesn’t seem possible, really, that nobody hears nothin’ in a building like that-unless, of course, the man who plugged Goss had a silencer on his thirty-eight-caliber pistol. Which is why this is so important,” he said as he raised the plastic evidence bag before the prosecutor’s eyes.
“And just what is this?”
“A silencer,” Stafford said smugly, “for a thirty-eight-caliber pistol.”
“Where’d you get it?”
“Underneath the front seat of Jack Swyteck’s car.”
McCue’s eyes widened with interest, then concern. “Hope you had a search warrant?”
“Didn’t need one. This came to us via Kaiser Auto Repair-Swyteck’s mechanics. Seems our favorite lawyer brings in his Mustang every other day for something-it’s a real Rent-A-Wreck. Thursday morning, he leaves his car to get the convertible top fixed. A few hours later, the owner of the shop catches one of his mechanics stealing things from the customers’ cars and calls us. One of the cars the grease monkey robbed happened to be Swyteck’s. And what do you suppose shows up in the guy’s loot?” Stafford gave a huge grin. “One silencer.”
“That’s a pretty strange coincidence, Lonnie, that some punk was rifling through Swyteck’s car. You sure it happened that way?”
“Shop owner will back me up a hundred percent,” he said, giving McCue an insider’s wink.
McCue sat back in his chair, folding his hands contentedly on his belly. “Lonnie,” he said with a power grin, “now we’re on to something.”
Chapter 19
“You had forty-three press calls, Governor,” Harry Swyteck’s secretary reported, trailing at the heel of the candidate-by-day/governor-by-night as he rushed into his spacious office. “And that’s just in the last hour.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” the governor groaned as he tossed his charcoal suit coat onto the couch, loosened his tie, and plopped into the high-back leather chair behind his carved mahogany desk, exhausted. Before the campaign, he found it relaxing to nestle into his position of power between the state and American flags, amidst the brass chandeliers, white coffered ceilings, and big arching windows with red velvet drapes that reminded him he was indeed governor. But now that the campaign was in full swing, the opulent surroundings were stark reminders that he had to be re-elected to keep these trappings of power for another four years. “Who did I insult this time?” he asked, only half kidding.
“No one,” his secretary assured him as she placed his hot cup of tea with lemon on his desk. She served without a smile, her expression all business. With her gray hair pulled back and a white silk scarf wrapped tightly around her neck, she had all the warmth of a nun on a vow of silence. When it came to political staffers, however, personality was a small sacrifice for eighteen years of efficiency and undivided loyalty. “I’m sure they’re all trying to get the scoop before the six o’clock news,” she said, “that’s all.”
The governor froze as he brought his teacup to his lips. Even after all these years it still bothered him that Paula always seemed to know everything about late-breaking news before he knew anything about it. “The scoop on what?” he asked with some trepidation.
Her look was more somber than usual. “Your son, of course.”
His trepidation turned to concern. “What about my son?”
“Campbell’s on his way up,” she said, avoiding the question. “He’ll explain.”
Moments later the door flew open, and the governor’s chief aide, Campbell McSwain, rushed into the office, nearly mowing down Paula on her way out. Campbell was a handsome, thirty-eight-year-old Princeton graduate who looked as if he wouldn’t know a blue collar unless it was pinpoint Oxford cloth, but his uncanny ability to portray Harold Swyteck as a regular Joe to the average voter had gone a long way toward winning the election four years ago. Campbell wore his usual Bass loafers, khaki slacks, and a Brooks Brothers blazer over a white polo shirt, but his wide-eyed expression was far less understated.
“Sorry, sir,” Campbell said as he gasped for breath. He’d run all the way to the governor’s office. “I just got off he phone with the Dade County State Attorney’s Office.”
“The state attorney?”
“It’s your son, sir. Our sources tell us he’s the target of grand jury investigation. He’s the prime suspect in the murder of Eddy Goss.”
The governor’s mouth fell open, as if he’d just been punched in the chest. “Goss is dead? And they think Jack did it? That’s preposterous. It’s impossible. Jack is no murderer. It has to be a mistake.”
“Well, whether it’s true or not, Governor, this is a terrible setback for us. Until a month ago, no one thought a former state insurance commissioner would be a serious challenge to a popular incumbent like yourself. But he’s making a damn good showing. He made quite a name for himself rooting out fraud, and he had the good sense not to push so hard that big business wouldn’t open its wallets when the campaigning got under way. The polls have you up by just four points at last tally. This, however, could change everything. The press is already pouncing all over it. Forty-three calls, Paula said.”
The governor leaned forward in his chair and glared at is aide. “This is my son we’re talking about,” he said angrily. ‘We’re not talking about bad press, or about points on an opinion poll.”
Campbell stood in check. “I’m sorry, Governor,” he said quietly. “I mean-it’s just that, I know you and your son haven’t been close. At least not as long as I’ve known you. I guess I should have been more sensitive.”
The governor rose from his chair, turned, and walked slowly to the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the garden in the courtyard. “It’s true,” he said, speaking as much to himself as to his aide, his voice trailing off as if he were retreating deep into his innermost thoughts. “Jack and I have not been as close as I’d like.”
Campbell watched with concern, searching for something to say. “Your son is only a grand jury target-a suspect,” he said. “The lawyers tell me there’s at least a theoretical possibility he might not actually be indicted.”
Harry nodded appreciatively at Campbell’s attempted consolation. But in his mind he could already see the chilling accusation: “John Lawrence Swyteck did with malice aforethought knowingly commit murder in the first degree.” Sometimes he couldn’t help wondering if fate meant him to be separated from Jack, if the alignment of the stars foreordained a rift between them. But he knew that was a cop-out, an attempt to deny his own complicity in the shaping of Jack’s. . what were they? Neuroses? Problems? Confusion, certainly. With a deep sense of guilt, Harry thought back to the first time his son was accused of murder-when he was five years old. .
Harry had pulled into the driveway around supper time and walked briskly up the sidewalk to the front door. He could see his young son peering sadly out the bedroom window as if he were being punished for something. Before Harry had even closed the front door and stepped inside, Agnes was screaming at him about Jack and the crucifix he’d found. Harry tried to calm her but she was determined to have it out. He rushed to the kitchen and closed the door, so Jack couldn’t hear, but the bitter argument continued.