Jonathan Kellerman - Devil's Waltz

MR. JONES: Get on with it. I want out of here, posthaste.

DET. STURGIS: Yes, sir, massah sir.

MR. TOKARIK: Detecti—

MR. JONES: Shut up, Tony.

DET. STURGIS: Everyone ready? Okay. First of all, we’ve got you on videotape, trying to shoot insulin into—

MR. JONES: Wrong. I told you what that was about. I was just trying to see what Cindy was up to.

DET. STURGIS: Like I said, we’ve got you on videotape, trying to shoot insulin into your daughter’s intravenous line. Plus video logs of the cameras at the entrance to Western Pediatric Medical Center confirming that you didn’t enter the hospital through the front door. One of the keys on your ring has been identified as a hospital master. You probably used it to sneak in through the—

MR. TOKARIK: I obj—

MR. JONES: Tony.

MR. TOKARIK: I request a brief conference with my—

MR. JONES: Cut it out, Tony. I’m not one of your idiot sociopaths. Go on with your fairy tale, Detective. And you’re right, I did use one of Dad’s keys. So what? Whenever I go to that place I avoid the front door. I try to be inconspicuous. Is discretion an egregious felony?

DET. STURGIS: Let’s go on. You bought two cups of coffee from a hospital machine, then took the stairs up to the fifth floor. We’ve got you on video up there too. Out in the hall where Five East meets Chappell Ward, carrying the coffee and looking through a crack in the door. What it looks like to me is you’re waiting until the nurse on duty goes into a back room. Then you go into room 505 West where you stay for fifty-five minutes until I come in and find you jabbing that needle into your daughter’s I.V. line. We’re going to show you all those videotapes now, okay?

MR. JONES: Seems eminently superfluous, but suit yourself.

DET. STURGIS: Action, camera.

Tape off: 8:22 P.M.

Tape on: 9:10 P.M.

DET. STURGIS: Okay. Any comments?

MR. JONES: Godard it’s not.

DET. STURGIS: No? I thought it had a lot of vérité .

MR. JONES: Are you a fan of cinéma vérité , Detective?

DET. STURGIS: Not really, Mr. Jones. Too much like work.

MR. JONES: Hah, I like that.

MR. TOKARIK: IS that it? That’s your evidence, in toto?

DET. STURGIS: In toto? Hardly. Okay, so now we’ve got you jabbing that needle—

MR. JONES: I told you what that was about — I was testing it. Checking the I.V. inlet to see if Cindy’d already injected Cassie.

DET. STURGIS: Why?

MR. JONES: Why? To protect my child!

DET. STURGIS: Why did you suspect your wife of harming Cassie?

MR. JONES: Circumstances. The data at hand.

DET. STURGIS: The data.

MR. JONES: Exactly.

DET. STURGIS: Want to tell me more about the data?

MR. JONES: Her personality — things I noticed. She’d been acting strange — elusive. And Cassie always seemed to fall ill after she’d spent time with her mother.

DET. STURGIS: Okay... We’ve also got a puncture wound in the fleshy part of Cassie’s armpit.

MR. JONES: NO doubt you do, but I didn’t put it there.

DET. STURGIS: Aha... what about the Valium you put in your wife’s coffee?

MR. JONES: I explained it in the room, Detective. I didn’t give it to her. It was for her nerves, remember. She’s been really on edge — been taking it for a while. If she denies that, she’s lying.

DET. STURGIS: She does indeed deny it. She says she was never aware you were dosing her up.

MR. JONES: She lies habitually — that’s the point. Accusing me based purely on what she says is like constructing a syllogism based on totally false premises. Do you understand what I mean by that?

DET. STURGIS: Sure, Prof. Valium tablets were found in one of Cassie’s toys — a stuffed bunny.

MR. JONES: There you go. How would I know anything about that?

DET. STURGIS: Your wife says you bought several of them for Cassie.

MR. JONES: I bought Cassie all sorts of toys. Other people bought LuvBunnies too. A nurse named Bottomley — very iffy personality. Why don’t you check her out, see if she’s involved.

DET. STURGIS: Why should she be?

MR. JONES: She and Cindy seem awfully close — too close, I always thought. I wanted her transferred off the case, but Cindy refused. Check her out — she’s strange, believe me.

DET. STURGIS: We did. She’s passed a polygraph and every other test we threw at her.

MR. JONES: Polygraphs are inadmissible in court.

DET. STURGIS: Would you take one?

MR. TOKARIK: Chip, don’t—

MR. JONES: I don’t see any reason to. This whole thing is preposterous.

DET. STURGIS: Onward. Did you have a prescription for the Valium we found at your campus office?

MR. JONES: (laughs) No. Is that a crime?

DET. STURGIS: AS a matter of fact, it is. Where’d you get it?

MR. JONES: Somewhere — I don’t remember.

DET. STURGIS: One of your students?

MR. JONES: Of course not.

DET. STURGIS: A student named Kristie Marie Kirkash?

MR. JONES: Uh — absolutely not. I may have had it around from before.

DET. STURGIS: For yourself?

MR. JONES: Sure. From years ago — I was under some stress. Now that I think about it, I’m sure that’s what it was. Someone lent it to me — a faculty colleague.

DET. STURGIS: What’s this colleague’s name?

MR. JONES: I don’t remember. It wasn’t that significant. Valium’s like candy nowadays. I plead guilty to having it without a prescription, okay?

DET. STURGIS: Okay.

MR. TOKARIK: What did you just take out of your briefcase, Detective?

DET. STURGIS: Something for the record. I’m going to read it out loud—

MR. TOKARIK: I want a copy first. Two copies — for myself and for Professor Jones.

DET. STURGIS: Duly noted. We’ll get the Xerox going soon as we’re finished here.

MR. TOKARIK: No, I want it simultaneous with your—

MR. JONES: Stop obstructing, Tony. Let him read whatever it is. I want out of here today.

MR. TOKARIK: Chip, nothing’s of greater importance to me than your imminent release, but I—

MR. JONES: Quiet, Tony. Read, Detective.

MR. TOKARIK: Not at all. I’m unhappy with thi—

MR. JONES: Fine. Read, Detective.

DET. STURGIS: That settled? Sure? Okay. This is a transcript of an encoded computer floppy disk, 3M Brand, DS, DD, RH, double-sided, double-density, Q Mark. Further designated with Federal Bureau of Investigation Evidence Tag Number 133355678345 dash 452948. The disk was decoded by the cryptography division of the FBI National Crime Laboratory in Washington, D.C., and was received at Los Angeles Police Department Headquarters, this morning, 6:45 A.M., via government pouch. Once I start, I’m going to read it in its entirety, even if you choose to leave the room with your client, Counselor. In order to make it clear that this evidence was offered to you and you declined to hear it. Understood?

MR. TOKARIK: We exercise all of our rights without prejudice.

MR. JONES: Read on, Detective. I’m intrigued.

DET. STURGIS: Here goes:

I’m putting this in code to protect myself, but it’s not a complicated code, just a basic substitution — numbers for letters with a couple of reversals, so you should be able to handle that, Ashmore. And if something’s happened to me, have fun with it.

Charles Lyman Jones the Third, known as Chip, is a monster.

He came to my high school as a volunteer tutor and seduced me sexually and emotionally. This was ten years ago. I was seventeen and a senior and in the honors program in math, but I needed help with English and Social Sciences because I found it boring. He was twenty-eight and a graduate student. He seduced me and we had sex repeatedly over a six-month period at his apartment and at the school, including activities that I found personally repulsive. He was frequently impotent and did sick things to me in order to arouse himself. Eventually, I got pregnant and he said he’d marry me. We never got married, just lived together in a dive near the University of Connecticut, at Storrs. Then it got worse.