Perri O'Shaughnessy - Unlucky in Law

Nina said, “You hired Mr. Wyatt?”

“Yes.”

“You asked him to dig up a grave at El Encinal Cemetery and told him it was your father’s grave?”

“Yes.”

“You offered to pay him five hundred dollars to do it?”

“Yes.”

“Thank God,” Stefan said loudly enough for the jury to hear. He held his hands over his eyes. Klaus put an arm around his broad shoulders and whispered to him.

“When was this?”

“Two days before Christina was murdered.”

“Did you know what day this job was to take place?”

“I asked him to do it on Friday night, April eleventh.”

“The night your sister was murdered.”

“I didn’t know she would die that night! The two events are unrelated, I promise you.”

“But we know he didn’t dig up the bones on that Friday night, don’t we?”

“When I went to pick up the bones and they weren’t where they were supposed to be, I called him again. He said he hadn’t gotten around to it. As if I had asked him to mail a letter or something! He promised to do it Saturday night instead. April twelfth.”

The jury, provoked out of lethargy at hearing lies exposed, leaned forward, looking eager. Even Nina felt eager. At last, a breakthrough with this obdurate, deceitful witness. How long they had waited for this information. “Now, you have claimed your sister, Christina, gave you Stefan’s name, haven’t you?”

“Yes.”

“You had no other personal knowledge of Mr. Wyatt?”

“No. I didn’t recognize his name. I know that a woman named Wanda cleaned house for us occasionally a very long time ago.” Disquiet and amazement sneaked into his voice. “But I had no reason to connect things up.”

“All right. Now let’s hear it, Mr. Zhukovsky. Why did you want to dig up your father’s grave?”

He gave her a look he might give his surgeon on the morning of a root canal, like a man anticipating severe postoperative pain. “To persuade my sister not to do something incredibly foolish,” he said. “To protect her from public humiliation. To save my father’s name and myself from ridicule. To protect her from crackpots. I wanted his bones dug up for the sake of my sister.”

The jury looked as puzzled as Stefan, but Nina felt again that aggressive joy as the case opened in front of her like a croc opening its jaws and showing her its big teeth. She couldn’t wait to wrestle with it, clamp the massive jaw of it, get it under control now that she had finally identified what kind of animal it was. Klaus tugged at her sleeve and she bent down. “Ask him: who was he named for?”

She didn’t know why he wanted this, and she didn’t want to do it, but Klaus had that look, and she realized she would not be able to escape what amounted to an order. “By the way, Mr. Zhukovsky, who were you named for?”

“So,” Zhukovsky said. “You knew all the time? Christina made a lot of it. She considered it another good piece of evidence.” He said something in Russian.

“I couldn’t get that down,” the court stenographer interrupted.

“Sorry,” Zhukovsky said. “It’s a long story, and an incredible one. We’ve kept quiet about it for such a long time…” He stopped to fumble with a handkerchief, which he used to wipe his hands. “Should I go on?”

“Be my guest,” Nina said, hardly able to hear her own voice over the roar of her tension. She wanted to jump up there and squeeze the whole thing right out of him. She couldn’t wait another minute. On the other hand, she was fully aware courtroom surprises were sometimes dangerous, even lethal to a case.

Everyone in the courtroom sensed the importance of this moment. The room got noisy momentarily as people repositioned their bodies for comfort, settling in for a good quiet listen. Klaus held Stefan by the arm, whether to steady himself or to steady Stefan, Nina couldn’t tell. The judge’s eyes narrowed to turtle slits. He would let things in a little at a time, and cogitate at his leisure. Jaime, as anxious as she was, sat back in his chair, arms behind his head, a picture of confused hope. He was holding himself in check, secretly praying for a narrative that would present him with an opportunity for ambush.

“This all started several years ago. Christina met a man…”

A phone rang in muted tones on the bailiff’s desk. He spoke softly into it. Then he was out of his chair, whispering to the clerk, then the judge. Salas pounded his gavel. “Clear the courtroom immediately. Stay calm and proceed outside. We have a bomb threat.”

Like a deer smelling hunters on the wind, Salas took flight, leaping down from the dais to rush past Nina. The astonished audience rose with him and pushed for the doors. The bailiff ran over, weapon in hand. He pushed Stefan facedown on the table. Somehow he cuffed him, then pulled him up again by his shirt and joined the crowd pouring out the exit. Nina helped Klaus up, grabbing the crucial files. They were at the back of the crowd.

Paul pushed up until he was next to her. She took Klaus’s hand. They spilled outside, herded along with hundreds of other people.

The entire courthouse was cleared. Bewildered clerks clustered along the street at a safe distance from both the parking lot and buildings. People who had gone in to pay tickets, lawyers, and the family involved in the custody hearing next door all poured out. Police cars skidded up and uniformed cops jumped out and started directing the crowd.

Nina, Paul, and Klaus took up positions across the street. “I left my purse!” she said. She felt through her briefcase and, relieved, found her wallet there. Klaus, crimson-faced and bleary-eyed, was breathing too hard. “Should I call a doctor?” Nina asked.

He waved her away. “No, no. I’ll sit down.” Paul helped him to a spot under a tree.

Nina looked around. On the courthouse facade, the concrete faces looked stolidly down upon the chaos. Stefan had disappeared with the bailiff. Paul was scanning the street alertly. By now they were several hundred feet from the courthouse, watching, waiting for it to blow up. Their eyes strained as the fire trucks came down the street and bullhorns came out. “What’s happening?”

Paul squeezed her arm in a familiar gesture. “We’ll know soon.” He got on his cell phone.

Nina bent over Klaus. “Are you sure you’re okay? How are you feeling?”

“He never answered the question,” the old man said, stroking his beard as though he was still sitting at the counsel table.

Paul snapped his phone closed. “They got a phone-in bomb threat. That’s all anyone seems to know at this point. A bomb squad’s on the way.”

“Miss Reilly. Mr. van Wagoner.”

“What is it, Klaus?” Nina said.

“There’s no bomb. It’s perfectly safe. We can walk right back in there. Sit in Salas’s chair and render half-baked judgments on his behalf until the official all-clear comes and he skulks back.”

They stared at him.

“Don’t you see, they’re after Zhukovsky!”

“Who is after him?” Nina asked.

“The Russians? Possibly them. Possibly someone else.”

“I think I have some fresh water here somewhere,” Nina said, feeling around her briefcase for the bottle she thought she had put inside it that morning.

“Don’t patronize me, girl! Call the police! Where are your brains! Think!”

She found the bottle and offered it to him. He pushed it away. “He was about to tell us!” Klaus screeched.

“It is a quick way to stop a trial, Nina,” Paul said, “calling in a bomb threat. And the timing was… opportune. He seemed on the verge of saying something really big, didn’t he? Did you see Zhukovsky leave the stand or see him on the way out?”

“No,” Nina said. “Are you saying this bomb threat was to shut Alex Zhukovsky up? Klaus, what is going on?”