Murder at Ford's Theatre Page 21

  “Stop asking questions,” he said. “Jesus, all everybody does is ask me questions. I didn’t do nothing to her. I swear.”

  “Where have you been?”

  “Hangin’ out at a friend’s house.” He jumped to his feet, went to the windows, and pulled the drapes aside in order to see the street. She came up behind and placed her hand on his shoulder, causing him to start. He turned and looked at her with eyes she hadn’t seen since he was a small child, pleading, frightened eyes glistening with moisture. “What am I gonna do?” he asked. “You have to help me.”

  She hesitated, then wrapped her arms about him and pulled him close. “We’ll take care of it, darling. I promise.”

  He stepped back; she checked the lapel of her jacket for stains from his tears.

  “I don’t want to go to jail,” he said, resuming his seat on the couch.

  “And you won’t have to.”

  The housekeeper entered the room.

  “Not now, Isabella. Not now! Please, go to your room and leave us alone.”

  Clarise joined Jeremiah on the couch.

  “Mac Smith is very worried,” she said softly. “He says the court allowed you to go free only if you lived with Daddy.”

  “Mac Smith!” he said scornfully. “He doesn’t care what happens to me. He’s one of them.”

  “No, no, Jeremiah, he’s not. He has your best interests at heart. He’s my friend. He wouldn’t do anything to anger me. I promised him I’d call if I heard from you.”

  “No, you can’t,” he said. “Please, don’t call him. Don’t call anybody.”

  “What do you want me to do then? What do you intend to do?”

  “I just need a little time to think, that’s all.”

  “But Mr. Smith and—”

  “No!” His voice was strong and emphatic, as though it carried physical weight. “I just want to stay here for a while.”

  Her brow furrowed. “I don’t know,” she said. She glanced at a grandfather clock in a corner of the room. “All right,” she said. “I have to be somewhere, but I’ll be back as quickly as I can. You stay here. Don’t answer the phone or the door. Do you understand?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “But only for a little while, Jeremiah. Maybe overnight. Then, tomorrow, we’ll talk to the right people and make this whole nightmare go away.”

  “Okay.”

  She went to the door, where she stopped, turned, and said, “Mr. Smith told me they had a warrant for your shoes. Is that right?”

  “Yeah.” He shook his head. “Really stupid, huh?” He looked down at his sandals. “My friend’s. He lent them to me.”

  As though struck by a sudden thought, she crossed the room, leaned down, kissed him on the forehead, and left the house.

  “WE’RE BRINGING HIM IN,” Hathaway said to Klayman and Johnson.

  “LeCour buys it?” Johnson said.

  “Yeah. But he doesn’t want us to take him from the senator’s house. Lerner’s image and all that. He’s getting ahold of the kid’s lawyers, Smith or Becker, and offering to have them surrender him here at headquarters.”

  “Rank does have its privilege,” Johnson said.

  Hathaway laughed. “We can’t ruffle a senator’s feathers.”

  “Think they’ll do it?” Klayman asked.

  “Sure, why not?” Hathaway replied. “I don’t know much about Becker except by reputation, but Smith is wired in all over town. He’s too savvy to not play along.”

  “So, what do we do now?” Johnson asked.

  “I wait to hear from LeCour. You two go to the senator’s house and keep an eye on it in case the kid tries to run. Stay out of the way, low-key. Keep your distance. You’ve done a good job lining up those two witnesses who say Lerner was dating the victim. And you, Klayman, you with the shoes. What are they called, Eccos?”

  “Right.”

  Hathaway shook his head. “Sometimes you get lucky,” he said. “A pair a’ high-priced shoes. Who’d have thought? Nice job, guys.”

  ANNABEL WAS SPENDING that Saturday visiting Annapolis galleries with a friend, and Mac took advantage of her absence to catch up on reading at their Watergate apartment. He was in the midst of his papers when the call came.

  “Mr. Smith? U.S. Attorney LeCour.”

  “Yes. How are you today?”

  “Just fine, sir. We have a warrant for the arrest of your client, Jeremiah Lerner, on charges of murder.”

  “I see.”

  “We’re sensitive to the family situation, Mr. Smith, and don’t wish to inflict any undue pain on the senator or Jeremiah’s mother, Ms. Emerson.”

  It sounded to Smith as though LeCour were reading a prepared statement.

  “I’m sure that will be appreciated,” Mac said.

  “We’ll give you and your client the opportunity to surrender voluntarily at First District headquarters, Mr. Smith, rather than send officers to make the arrest at the senator’s home.”

  Smith heard the words, but was thinking of other things, namely how to finesse the fact that Jeremiah wasn’t available to turn himself in. He wouldn’t blatantly lie to LeCour, but he needed to buy some time, any amount of time, in the hope Jeremiah would return to his father’s house of his own volition within the next few hours.

  “You understand,” Smith said, “that I’ll have to confer with my client.”

  “There’s not much to confer about,” LeCour said. “Either you bring him in, or we go get him.” This didn’t sound scripted.

  “I’m an attorney, Mr. LeCour. I don’t make decisions for my client. My assumption is that he’ll agree to what it is you’re suggesting. But I’ll need time to”—he almost said “locate him,” but caught himself in time—“I’ll need time to explain your offer, which I might add is generous. He’ll need time to put some things in order before surrendering. Nine o’clock tomorrow morning?”

  There was silence on the other end, and Smith heard LeCour speak with another person, the words not clear. Obviously, that someone else was superior to the U.S. Attorney and would be the one to agree to Smith’s suggestion.

  LeCour came back on the line. “Nine o’clock sharp,” he said.

  Smith added, “Give me until six this evening. How can I reach you to confirm that my client agrees to this?”

  LeCour started to respond, but Smith said, “And if he doesn’t agree, you can come and arrest him.”

  “I’ll be here at six, Mr. Smith.” He recited the number. “Let me just say that if, at six, you call and tell me your client does not agree to voluntarily surrender, officers will immediately be dispatched to Senator Lerner’s house.”

  “I understand. You’ll hear from me at six. And thank you for your courtesy.”

  Smith’s priority was to attempt to reach Clarise and Bruce Lerner in a last-ditch effort to find Jeremiah. His call to Lerner’s home was again answered by the housekeeper. The senator was away on official business and wasn’t expected home until the next day. He tried two numbers at Lerner’s senate office, finally reaching a staff member who was reluctant to give out a way to contact her boss.

  “Look, Miss,” Smith said, “this is extremely important. It has to do with the senator’s son. I assure you that the senator will thank you for putting me in touch with him—and will be very unhappy if you don’t.”

  She absented herself from the phone for what seemed a long time. When she returned, she asked Smith for a number at which he could be reached. “The senator will call you there,” she said.

  “Thank you. And please tell him to do it fast.”

  Lerner called within a minute of Smith hanging up.

  “Sorry to disturb you, Senator,” Smith said, “but this is urgent. The police are about to arrest Jeremiah for Nadia Zarinski’s murder.”

  “That’s absurd.”

  “Maybe it is, and it doesn’t necessarily mean they have a sufficient case to indict. But they’ve offered to have me surrender Jeremiah voluntarily to avoid having cops swa
rming all over your house. I have until six to get back to them. Have you any idea, any notion, where he might be?”

  “Not a goddamn one, Mac. Not a one. Have you tried Clarise?”

  “Yes, earlier. She came up blank, too.”

  “So, Counselor, what do we do now?”

  Smith found the use of “we” to be inappropriate. As far as he could see, the only person doing anything was himself.

  “Senator,” Smith said, “I’m way out on a limb here. As an attorney, I have a code of conduct that doesn’t include lying to the authorities about the whereabouts of my client. I asked to have until six in the hope Jeremiah would return. Obviously, that’s not about to happen. I have no choice but to call the U.S. Attorney handling the case and tell him Jeremiah has violated the court order, and is not available to be surrendered. That’s my obligation as an officer of the court.”

  “I know all about that,” Lerner said. “I’m a lawyer, too.”

  You gave up law years ago, Mac thought.

  “Can we meet to discuss this, Mac?”

  “Of course.”

  “Will you come to the house tonight? Say, seven?”

  “All right. But I must call LeCour, the U.S. Attorney, at six and tell him of Jeremiah’s disappearance.”

  “If you tell them he’s not there, they won’t have to come, will they?”

  Mac managed a small laugh. “I’m not sure they’ll believe this attorney about that, Senator. They’ll want to see for themselves.”

  His was a pained sigh. “Well, do what you can, and know I appreciate your efforts. Damn him! He must be sick in the head.”

  Mac was tempted to say that too many people were labeled “sick” when they behaved badly, giving legitimate mental illness a bad name. The truth was, Jeremiah Lerner was a surly, rudderless young man, and it didn’t matter what made him that way. If he’d murdered the young woman, he’d have to pay for that, although he was entitled to the best possible defense if charged and brought to trial.

  They ended the conversation and Smith went to the terrace, Rufus at his side. It had clouded up; rain was imminent, which was good. Washington and its environs had been in a drought all summer, unusual for a city whose summers were characterized by wet, humid, heavy, hot weather.

  He realized he was conflicted at that moment, reminiscent of that period of his life when he came to the conclusion that he no longer wished to practice criminal law, and had resigned his partnership and abandoned what had been a love for many years. It hadn’t been the reality of the criminal justice system that he enjoyed as much as it was a reverence for the law and his country’s system of jurisprudence, as flawed as it sometimes was.

  He’d spent time in London at its Old Bailey, where he engaged in long talks with British attorneys and judges. The U.S. legal system, which Smith revered, had been based upon the British model, although he’d pointed out to his British counterparts that there were some aspects of their approach that unfortunately had been ignored. The prepping of witnesses before trial, a common and, Smith thought, flawed practice, was anathema in England. Any attorney doing it there faced severe censure. On the other hand, there were English legal practices that he felt were best left behind, particularly the rule under which an English judge summarized for the jury the evidence as he or she saw it.

  Mackensie Smith loved the law and its importance in creating and maintaining the American democratic system. Had his wife and son not been killed, he perhaps would have continued practicing, although that tragedy had coincided with a fear that he was becoming burned out, and that the time had naturally come when it was time to shift gears in his life.

  At the same time, the more mundane, less stressful life of college professor did not always provide the brand of stimulation to which he’d been accustomed. That, he knew, had been at work when Clarise had drawn him into Jeremiah’s troubles with the law. And Annabel knew the signs, too, recognized when her husband was restless and craving the sort of action and challenge that only the adversarial structure of the criminal justice system could provide. For other men, it was driving fast or engaging in some athletic activity, climbing a mountain or diving off a charter boat in the Bahamas. For Mac Smith, it was standing up to the formidable resources of prosecutors and fighting for a client, using every bit of knowledge, experience, and skill he possessed. Despite his initial reluctance when contacted by Clarise, he knew that by taking that first step and representing Jeremiah the night of his arrest, he’d made a commitment. He was in for the duration, and reminded himself as he stood on the terrace that late Saturday afternoon that he owed his best to his young client, as unpleasant and unattractive as he might be.

  “Mr. LeCour, please.”

  “LeCour.”

  “Mac Smith, Mr. LeCour.”

  “You’re early.”

  “Yes. My client, Jeremiah Lerner, hasn’t been available to me since you called.”

  “Oh? Why not?”

  “He’s not at his father’s home.”

  “He’s supposed to be. Where is he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Smith knew he’d placed himself in a precarious position. Although he’d known about Jeremiah leaving since the previous day, he was under no legal obligation as his attorney to inform the authorities. But when told that the interest in his client had been elevated from assault and resisting arrest to murder, he’d been evasive to LeCour, leading the U.S. Attorney to assume, by inference, that Jeremiah was still at his father’s house. Not exactly a lie, but not exactly truthful, either.

  LeCour then asked the question Smith hoped he wouldn’t.

  “When did he leave the house?”

  “Late yesterday afternoon.”

  “You knew that?”

  “I didn’t know he’d absent himself overnight. He and his father had an argument, and he left in anger, took his father’s car. The assumption was that he’d cool off and return. He didn’t.”

  “I should have been notified.”

  “Why? The judge didn’t specifically state that he couldn’t leave the house. He was free to go to the store and buy a newspaper and a cup of coffee.”

  LeCour’s pique entered his voice. “He’s wanted for murder, Mr. Smith.”

  “As of this afternoon,” Smith said, his momentary questioning of his legal culpability now gone. “Last night he wasn’t wanted for murder, Mr. LeCour. Now, concerning his whereabouts: You’ll obviously want to send officers to verify that he isn’t at Senator Lerner’s house, and that’s fine. But I’m meeting there at seven with the senator. I’m certain your previous offers of courtesy to the senator can be carried over for a few more hours. There’s nothing to be gained by turning a search of the house into a circus.”

  Except, Smith knew, that prosecuting such a high-profile case, and reaping the publicity fallout, wouldn’t be unappealing to LeCour—or to any U.S. Attorney, for that matter.

  “Send those two detectives who were there previously. Give me an hour with the senator. Make it eight. All right?”

  “Absolutely not, Mr. Smith. We want Jeremiah Lerner. He’s already gone, who knows where, maybe out of the area. I’ll be honest with you. I consider your decision to not be forthcoming to be a breach of legal ethics.”

  “You’re entitled to your opinion, Mr. LeCour. And you’re entitled to take whatever action you choose regarding sending officers to the house. We’ll be speaking again soon.”

  TWENTY-FIVE

  SOL WEXLER HEADED his own CPA firm in Washington, and listed an impressive roster of politicians and business leaders as clients. He was, of course, sought after by a number of nonprofit D.C. organizations and agencies to lend his financial knowledge to their boards, and managed to deftly turn down most of them. But he’d been an aspiring actor early in his life—before reality trumped youthful dreams—so when asked to join Ford Theatre’s board of trustees, he’d readily accepted. Naturally, he ended up chairing its finance committee, and had become close to Ford’s producing
director, Clarise Emerson, as well as other trustees, including Annabel Smith.

  Clarise’s brief confab with the director of philanthropic programs for American Express had gone well. The company pledged to continue its support for the theatre’s productions, and entertained Clarise’s suggestion that it up its pledge. She went directly from that meeting to one with the producers and the director of Festival at Ford’s. Everything was proceeding as planned, she was told, no hitches.

  Now, she huddled with controller Bernard Crowley in her office. The independent auditors had been there all day poring over the books and reconciling income and expenditures. They seemed pleased, Crowley said.

  “It’s going smooth as silk,” he told her after the auditors had departed, taking with them additional records needed to complete the audit.

  “That’s no surprise,” she said. “I can’t tell you what a relief it is for me to not have to worry about finances. I—”

  A phone call interrupted.

  “Hello? Yes, how are you? . . . What? . . . I see. . . Yes, of course . . . All right . . . See you then.”

  “A problem?” Crowley asked after she’d ended the call.

  “Problem? No, no problem.”

  “You looked concerned.”

  She smiled. “It’s all this nonsense with Jeremiah. You’ve heard, of course, that the media is reporting that he’s a suspect in that girl’s murder.”

  “Yes, Clarise. I didn’t mention it because—”

  “Because you are a gentleman, that’s why, and I appreciate it.”

  “He’s still with Bruce?”

  “Ah, yes. He’s still with Bruce.”

  Crowley looked quizzically at her.

  “Now you look concerned,” she said.

  “I am, Clarise. I know you. You’ll take on everything yourself, never seek help, and overload your system. When they question Jeremiah, I’m sure they’ll realize that they’re barking up the wrong tree.”

  “And I’m sure you’re absolutely right.”

  Crowley swiveled in his chair, which he overflowed, and looked out the window. Clarise took the opportunity to observe him.