Q: And how would he do that?
A: He was going to hang around after he told them he was leaving, maybe make up some excuse, and come back and catch them at it.
Q: And then what what was he going to do?
A: Well, he said he hoped he'd find out Laura wasn't lying, but if he caught them at something, he hoped he could handle it. He said maybe it would be a good idea if he didn't have the gun with him. If he didn't, maybe he wouldn't kill them on the spot. He hoped he wouldn't do that.
Q: He said he hoped he wouldn't kill them?
A: That's what he said.
Although it was clear and sunny outside, it wasn't warm by any stretch. The small visiting room at the YGC felt to Wu like a refrigerator. She was gauging her client's reaction to his friend's testimony, and it seemed to have hit him pretty hard. Andrew was sitting back, slumped in one of the hard wooden chairs at the table this time, one elbow on the chair's arm and his hand over his mouth. Now he wearily dropped the hand, shook his head.
"This is bad."
She nodded. "Correct."
"He told me the cops had come and he'd talked to them, but he never mentioned anything about the gun. You think Lanny would have been smart enough… Nobody had to know about the gun. It's makes it look…"
Wu knew what it made it look like. She asked, "You want to talk about the gun?"
"What about it?"
"Well, the gun's kind of an issue. You bring it to school and show it around…"
"Not around. Just to Lanny."
"Okay, just to Lanny, although he's enough. He'll testify that you said you were thinking about killing Laura and Mooney, and maybe yourself. The gun is what you presumably would have used to do that. So what were you thinking when you took it? It was Hal's gun, is that right?"
His expression grew sharp. "I never said that."
"No, I know you didn't. But another one of the interviews in here"- she patted the folder that held Lanny's transcript-"is a discussion with your stepfather about when Sergeant Taylor asked him if he owned a gun and he said yes, then went to get it and couldn't find it. Didn't Hal ever ask you if you'd taken it?"
"Yeah, he did."
"And what did you tell him?"
Andrew gave her the bad eye.
"Okay, then," she said, "let me tell you. You denied it, maybe even pitched a little fit of indignation that he'd accuse you of anything like that. Am I close?" She leaned in toward him over the table. "Let me ask you this, Andrew. Why didn't you just put it back from where you'd taken it? If you'd done that, and if you in fact hadn't committed these murders, don't you realize that you wouldn't be here right now?"
His eyes weren't quite to panic, but they flicked to the wall behind her, then to the corners of the room before they got back to her. "Why is that?"
She noticed that he didn't bother with the pro forma denial of the crime this time. She let herself begin to believe that her strategy was working- he was getting used to admitting the basic fact of his guilt. "Because if we had the gun, we could test ballistics with the slugs they recovered from the scene and prove that it wasn't the murder weapon." She gave him a minute to digest this critical information, then pressed on. "You told me you got rid of the gun."
"I did."
"Do you think you could find it again?"
"No. I dropped it off the bridge."
"That would be the Golden Gate?"
"Yeah."
Wu checked a laugh. Perfect, she thought. "I don't understand, and I don't think a jury will understand, why you did that if you didn't kill anybody with it."
"I freaked out, is all. I told you. When I got back to Mike's- Mooney's- and saw it there, I figured the cops would be able to trace it back to Hal and I'd be screwed."
"And why is that?"
"I mean, if it was the murder weapon." His miserable look seemed to plead for her to understand. "I had to get rid of it."
"But it wasn't the murder weapon, was it?"
"I don't know. I mean, it might have been."
Wu straightened up in her chair and faced him head-on. "Let me get this straight. Your theory of the crime, and please correct me if I'm wrong, is that while you were out taking a stroll and memorizing your lines, somebody- you don't know who or why- knocked at Mooney's door, saw your father's gun conveniently sitting out on a coffee table, grabbed it and shot anybody who happened to be standing around. That's it?"
"I don't think that."
"Good. That would be a dumb thing to think. But otherwise, why get rid of the gun?"
"I told you!" Andrew again cast his eyes around the walls. Wu could almost feel his panic, searching for escape, any escape. Finally, he exploded, slamming the table between them with the flat of his palm, coming to his feet, turning around, trapped. "I already told you that!" he screamed. Don't you get it? Aren't you listening to me? I was freaked out. I knew it was a mistake the minute I let it go."
Suddenly, his voice broke into an uncontrolled and wrenching sob. He was crying, pleading with her. "I mean, there's Mike and Laura shot dead on the floor. They're dead. My mind goes blank and I can't think of anything except to call emergency." He gulped now for a breath, tears streaking his face. "After that… I don't know what I did, except finally I turn around and there's my gun on the coffee table. I can't leave it there, can I? I didn't think it out, what I was doing. I just did it. Didn't you get that at all?"
Andrew stood across the table from her, hands limp at his side, staring at her. His breath still came in jagged gasps.
It was all she could do to keep from coming around the table and hugging him.
A knock at the door interrupted and Wu crossed to it. The unpleasant bailiff from the detention hearing, Nelson, had heard a noise and was wondering if everything was all right. She noticed he had a grip on his mace, and she held up her hand, palm out. "We're fine."
When the door had closed and she turned around, Andrew was back in his chair, leaning over, his face down by his knees, his fingers laced over the back of his head. She went to his side of the table, boosted herself onto it, folded her own hands in her lap, and waited.
He was still taking deep, labored breaths, but gradually they slowed, and eventually he looked up. Seeing her so close, nearly hovering over him, he pushed the chair back six inches, then hung his head again, perhaps in shame. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm so sorry." He brought his hands to his face, said "Oh God," and broke again, a sob that seemed to sound the death knell to all the hopes of his childhood.
Someone else witnessing the breakdown, hearing the same words, might have reached a different conclusion, but to Wu it ratified all of her preconceptions- she'd been expecting something like this, Andrew's show of remorse for what he'd done. To her, the apologetic words sounded exactly like an admission of his guilt.
She pushed herself off the table and went up beside him, put a hand on his opposite shoulder and pulled the close one against her hip. "It's all right," she whispered. "It's okay."
Through the wired windows, steep shafts of sunlight mottled the floor, struck the backs of both of them. The tableau held for nearly a minute, an eternity in that setting. Andrew's breath became more regular. Wu herself was nearly afraid to breathe, hyper-aware of the possible implications of the scene. This proximity was unprofessional. Prompted at first by a genuine sympathy, she remained out of an awkward desire to appear natural. Some small despicable part of her was also aware that even such a slight physical gesture, a hand on his shoulder, her hip against him, might work to her advantage in the next phase of their negotiation.