David Kessler - Mercy

“That’s right, he wasn’t. He’d moved out into a condo. But he didn’t take all his stuff with him. I mean, he took the important stuff, but he didn’t go through everything.”

“And one of the things he left behind was the gun?”

“Like I said, things had changed. I guess he wasn’t so paranoid by then. Or maybe he just forgot it ‘cause it was at the back of a closet. At any rate, for whatever reason, he didn’t take it.”

“And Dorothy found it?”

“Found it. Looked for it. Knew it was there. Whatever. The following day she came to my room with the gun and told me she was going to kill Burrow.”

“So what made her kill your father instead?”

“Did I say she did?”

“Well he died, didn’t he? And the cause of death was gunshot wounds from his own gun. Or are you going to tell me that it really was suicide?”

“I wanted to stop her.”

“What?”

“I didn’t want her to do it.”

“Why not? You hated Burrow. He beat the crap out of you. And now he’d raped your sister.”

“I didn’t give a shit about Burrow! But I didn’t want Dorothy to get into trouble for it. I may have only been a kid but I knew that people who commit crimes like that usually get caught. Rape you can get away with because rapists can always say the girl consented. But amateur murderers usually get caught. And she was an amateur. I knew that if she killed him she’d get caught.”

“And what? You thought you could do it and get away with it?”

“Hell, no! I knew that with my luck I’d’ve botched it big time. I may have been a bit hot-headed but I knew my limitations.”

“So what did you do?

“I persuaded her to give me the gun. I told her that we should think about it and plan it properly. I was going to put it back.”

“But you didn’t put it back, did you?”

“Not back in our house, no. You see, I knew that if I put it back in the closet or wherever — the way she was feeling — she might take it again and kill him and get caught. So I decided to take it to my dad’s place.”

“And what? Just give it to him without an explanation?”

“I didn’t exactly have a clear plan. I just knew I had to get the gun out of the way — to stop Dorothy using it. When I got to his place, I told him I missed him and wanted to see him. He invited me in. He was usually happy to see me. He never treated me badly the way he did with Dorothy. Then, when he went to the bathroom, I crept into his bedroom and tried to hide the gun in a closet there. But he caught me and demanded to know what I was doing. He accused me of snooping. He could do that, you know, go from being friendly one minute to being angry the next. He didn’t usually do that with me, but he did with Dorothy and he knew that Dorothy and I were close. Then he saw the gun.”

“And what happened? Did he grab it?”

Jonathan hesitated for a second and his lips twitched upward. It was nearly a smile — but not quite.

“I wish I could latch on to that excuse. But he didn’t. Instead he just demanded to know what I was doing with it.”

“And what did you tell him?”

Jonathan took a deep breath.

“I told him the truth.”

“The truth?”

“Yes. Everything. I told him I was putting the gun there so it would be out of Dorothy’s reach. And I told him why.”

“You told him about the rape?”

“ Yes, I told him about the rape !” Tears were now welling up in Jonathan’s eyes. “And you know what he did? He laughed .”

Jonathan choked back his tears.

“Laughed?”

“And he said…” Jonathan swallowed the lump in his throat. Even after these years, the memory evidently still pained him. “He said: ‘With any luck it’ll cure that bull-dyke bitch.’”

He broke down in tears. Alex hated to press him, but he had to know the rest.

“And then what happened?”

“Then what happened? I… I just snapped at that point. I swung the gun round to his head and he turned away in fear. It all happened too quickly: I just didn’t think.” Alex said nothing. As a lawyer, he knew that this was not the time to put words into someone else’s mouth. “I … I pulled the trigger. The next thing I knew, his brains were splattered all over the wall.”

Alone in the office, Juanita was getting worried. Nat still hadn’t come back and she couldn’t reach Alex on the phone. If Nat was really trying to get the clinic to send the papers, then wouldn’t he have done it by now? What was taking him so long?

And where was Alex?

Time was running out and so were their options. One by one the doors had been slammed in their faces and it felt like they were boxed in on all sides. Unless they could come up with something fast, Clayton Burrow would be dead in less than two hours.

Juanita wanted to have another try with the medical center herself. They had evidently faxed over something, according to the journal, so someone at the center must have been cooperating with them. The problem was that she didn’t know what Nat had been doing in the meantime and she didn’t want to step on his toes. If she phoned them up and contradicted something that he said, it would be disastrous.

But the problem was she couldn’t call Nat either. If she asked him about his progress with the medical center then she would have to admit that she knew what he was doing. This would be all right if she was correct. But what if she was wrong? She still couldn’t be sure. And, if she was wrong, then she was just wasting time by holding off.

She knew what she had to do. She couldn’t wait any longer. If he had called them in the guise of Dorothy Olsen’s legal representative, it would be to tell them to give the information to Alex Sedaka’s law firm. And if that was the case, then there was no reason why she shouldn’t call them as Alex Sedaka’s secretary and ask them for the information again.

She dialed and tapped her fingers nervously while she waited for an answer.

“Finchley Road Medical Centre.”

“Hallo, my name is Juanita Cortez. I’m calling from the law offices of Alex Sedaka in San Francisco.”

“Oh hi, I spoke to you earlier.”

“Yes, you’re not Nurse White, are you?”

“No, like I told you, she’s off duty.”

“Listen, it’s not actually Nurse White I need to speak to. It’s the administration. As I explained to Nurse White, we desperately need that information about Dorothy Olsen.”

“And, as I explained to that man who called earlier, we cannot release that information without authorization.”

Juanita got angry.

“You do understand that this is a matter of life and death, don’t you? You do understand that we have a client who’s scheduled to be executed in less than two hours for the murder of Dorothy Olsen unless we can prove that she was alive after the date he’s supposed to have killed her!”

“I can’t give out that information without permission. It would be more than my job’s worth.”

“Well in that case, can you let me speak to someone in authority — someone who can make a decision?”

“The best person to talk to would be Stuart Lloyd. He’s the Chief Administrator.”

“So can I talk to him?”

“Well he isn’t here yet. I mean, it’s only six twenty. But he should be here by eight o’clock.”

“But that’ll be too late! Our client is scheduled to die at one minute past midnight.”

“Well that’s plenty of — ”

“I mean our time! That’s eight o’clock in the morning your time!”

“Look, there’s nothing I can do. If you like, you can give me your number and if he comes in early then he can call you.”