J. Jance - Until Proven Guilty

Work was a tonic for me that day. I worked like a fiend. I dove into every statement and every file with absolute concentration, finding comfort in the necessary discipline. Anne had said she had nothing to do with Angela Barstogi. I wanted to prove it to the world and to myself. There was nothing I wanted more than for Peters’ suspicions to be dead wrong.

I put in a call to United. They said they’d call back with the information I needed. They did eventually, confirming Anne’s arrival in Seattle. It proved the point as far as I was concerned, but the rest of the world needed more convincing. I had to lay hands on Angela Barstogi’s killer. That was the only way to clear Anne once and for all. Who the hell was Uncle Charlie, and where was he? How could I find him?

It had been just over a week, but already Angela Barstogi’s file was voluminous. I read through it all — statements, medical examiner’s report, crime lab report — searching for some key piece that would pull the entire puzzle into focus. I had moved on to the Faith Tabernacle file when Peters came back about four o’clock.

“How’s it going?” I asked. It was a natural enough question, but I felt strange after I asked it. I didn’t know whether or not Peters would answer me. I didn’t know if I wanted him to.

“Maxwell Cole is a jerk,” he said. That was no surprise. It was something that found us in wholehearted agreement. Peters peered over my shoulder at the files. “Any luck?”

“Yeah. All bad.”

He waited, expectantly, but I didn’t volunteer any information. I wanted to see if he would ask. “What did she say?” he inquired finally.

“That she didn’t have anything to do with it.”

He shook his head. “And that’s good enough for you, I suppose?”

“As a matter of fact, it isn’t. If it were, I wouldn’t be going blind reading these reports, and I wouldn’t have called the airlines.”

Peters settled on the corner of my desk. “Did you say you met Ralph Ames?” he asked.

“The attorney. Yes, I met him.”

“How did he strike you, hotheaded maybe? Prone to fly off the handle?”

“No, just the opposite. Of course, he could be schizo. Who knows?”

“I put a little pressure on Cole. He gave me the name of the girl he talked to in Ames’ office. I called right after I left Cole. Ames fired her fifteen minutes before that, for talking to Cole. That surprise you?”

“No. When I tried calling there I went through a screening process. It strikes me that Anne is a valued client.”

“Valuable, certainly. The lady’s loaded.” He paused. “I’m going down there, Beau, to Arizona.”

“Why?”

“I’ve picked up some information, enough to warrant the trip.”

I stifled the desire to demand the information, to get Peters in a hammerlock until he came clean. But I knew he was doing his job, holding out on me until he had something concrete. He was right, of course.

“You’ve told Watty, then?” I could feel my heart pounding in my chest.

“No. I’m going on my own nickel. It’s the weekend, and I want to get away from this drizzle. I’m feeling a yen for sunshine.”

It took a second or two for me to understand the implication behind what he was saying. Gratitude washed over me like a flood. “Peters, I—”

“Don’t thank me, Beau. You may not like what I find.”

There was more than a hint of warning in his tone, but I ignored it. I chose to ignore it because I didn’t want to hear it. “When’s your plane?”

He glanced at his watch. “A little over an hour and a half. Want to take me down and keep the car?” He thought better of it. “Wait a minute. My plane gets in late Sunday evening. That’s probably a bad time for you to come pick me up.”

“If you’re thinking about the wedding, we may go for a stay of execution.”

He grinned and tossed me the keys. “Good,” he said. “Let’s go.”

Late Friday afternoon traffic taxed my limited current driving skills. I had gotten out of the habit of fighting the freeway jungle. I had forgotten what it was like. Living downtown had liberated me from the tyranny of Detroit and Japan as well, to say nothing of Standard Oil. Peters winced at a tentative lane change.

“I don’t get much practice driving anymore,” I explained.

“That’s obvious.”

I dropped Peters in the departing-passenger lane and drove straight back to town. I didn’t know what to think. There was no way to anticipate what I might find at the Royal Crest. My best possible guess was an empty apartment with or without a note.

If Anne Corley did nothing else, she consistently surprised me. She was waiting in the leather chair. A glass of wine was in her hand. A MacNaughton’s and water sat on the coffee table awaiting my arrival. Anne was wearing a gown, a filmy red gown.

“Hello,” she said. “You look surprised to see me.”

“I am,” I admitted. I examined the gown. I was sure I had seen it before, but I couldn’t imagine where. At last it came to me — the hallway dream with Anne disappearing in a maze of corridors. I had dreamed the gown exactly, I realized, as the odd sensation of déjà vu settled around me.

“I’m a very determined lady,” she said softly. “Anybody else would have thrown in the towel after this morning. You didn’t want me to go, did you?”

I sat down on the couch cautiously, tentatively. I tested my drink. “No, I didn’t want you to go.”

She took a sip of her wine. “You asked me this morning if I’d had anything to do with Angel’s death. Does that mean I’m under suspicion?” I nodded. “And I’m being investigated?” I nodded again.

“That first afternoon we were together you said something that made me think Brodie was responsible. Yesterday the newspaper mentioned a man in a black van. Today you seem to think I did it. It reminds me of a game of tag with you standing in the center of a circle and pointing at people, telling them they’re it.”

“I have to prove they’re it,” I interjected. “In a court of law, beyond a shadow of doubt. That’s a little different from pointing a finger.”

“What if you make a mistake?”

“The court decides if they’re guilty or innocent. That’s not up to me. Where’s all this going, Anne?”

She held up a hand to silence me. She was working her way toward something, gradually, circuitously. “How do you feel about those people afterward?”

I laughed, not a laugh so much as a mirthless chuckle. “In the best of all possible worlds, the innocent would go free and the guilty would be punished. In the real world, it doesn’t always work that way.”

“Supposing…” she started. She paused as if weighing her words. For the first time I noticed a tightness around her mouth. Whatever she was working up to, it was costing her. She had been looking out the window as she spoke, uncharacteristically avoiding my eyes. Now, she turned away from the window, settling her gaze on my face. “Supposing someone was guilty of something but the court set them free. How would you feel about that?”

“If the court sets them free, I have no choice but to respect the court’s decision. My feelings have nothing to do with it.”

“That’s not true, they do!” She jumped up quickly and hurried to the kitchen to replenish the drinks. I watched in fascination. Her movements were jerky, as though she changed her mind several times in the course of the smallest gesture. Where was her purposeful manner, her fluid grace? She came back with the drinks.

“Have you ever been around someone who’s retarded?” she asked?

The question was from way out in left field. “No,” I replied, “I never have.”