“And what was that, Sergeant West?”
“Curare, Mr. Fielding.”
“And what exactly is curare?”
“I’m no chemist, Mr. Fielding. As I understand it, though, some Indian tribes in the Amazon smear it on their arrows to paralyze game animals. It has the same effect on humans, I understand. That was what kept the victims quiet—the killer drove a hypodermic needle into their throats for a quick dose of curare before the cutting started.”
“Wouldn’t curare be quite rare in this part of the world?”
“No. Doctors use it when a patient is having a seizure—or so the coroner tells us. I understand that it’s available in any well-stocked pharmacy.”
Fielding went back to the exhibit table and picked up a hypodermic needle with a small yellow tag tied to it. “The tag on this syringe has your name on it, Sergeant West, and it’s dated February tenth. Would you tell the court who found it, and where, and what the significance is?”
“That was found in Miss Renata Greenleaf’s purse by the staff of the University of Washington Medical Center after she’d been brought to the emergency room by ambulance. The linoleum knife was in there as well, along with a couple of sets of rosary beads.”
“And the syringe was tested for any chemical residue?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And what chemical, if any, was found in that residue?”
“Curare, Mr. Fielding.”
“If it please the court, the prosecution will designate this syringe as ‘Exhibit B,’ ” Fielding said to Judge Compson.
“So ordered.”
Fielding turned back to Bob. “Were any further tests performed on Exhibits A and B, Sergeant West?”
“Yes, sir. They were tested for blood residue.”
“And what were the findings?”
“The lab confirmed that the blood on the knife was Mr. Fergusson’s. There wasn’t enough blood on the hypodermic to do a DNA test, but the blood type did match Fergusson’s.”
“Does this evidence confirm the probability that Miss Renata Greenleaf should be considered the prime suspect in the murder of Mr. Walter Fergusson, and of a number of other murders as well?”
“The MO is consistent. Curare and a linoleum knife appear to have played a part in many recent murders.”
“And was there in your opinion sufficient probable cause to place Miss Greenleaf under arrest?”
“There’s no question about that, Mr. Fielding.”
“And did you arrest her.”
“No, I did not.”
Fielding lost it right there. “You didn’t ? Why not, for God’s sake?”
Judge Compson rapped her gavel. “That’s enough of that, Mr. Fielding,” she told him firmly.
“I’m sorry, Your Honor,” Fielding apologized, then turned back to the witness. “Would you please explain to the court why you chose not to place Miss Greenleaf under arrest, Sergeant West?”
Bob pointed his finger at Renata. “That’s why, Mr. Fielding. Step over a little closer and listen to her. I had probable cause, right enough, but she was delirious. When we arrest somebody, we’re required to read them their rights—and we have to be certain that they understand those rights. I placed her in protective custody instead of arresting her because she didn’t even seem to realize that I was there. If I understand the law correctly, protective custody is as far as we can go at this point. We can’t arrest her in her present condition. I checked with her doctor, and he told me that she wouldn’t understand anything I said to her.”
“What if this is just some clever ruse, Sergeant West?” Fielding demanded, sounding desperate.
“We aren’t allowed to use ‘what-if’ when we make an arrest, Mr. Fielding,” Bob told him. “We have to be sure.”
“The witness is correct, Mr. Fielding,” Judge Compson told him, “and Sergeant West stayed within the strict limits of the law in a difficult situation.”
Fielding got her point. He didn’t like it, but he was smart enough not make an issue of it. “And is Miss Greenleaf currently being held in custody at any recognized facility?” he asked lamely.
“Yes, sir,” Bob replied. “She’s confined in the psychiatric ward at the University of Washington Medical Center, and there’s a police officer stationed at her door at all times. She’s physically present in this courtroom right now, but I don’t think she’s aware of it.”
“No further questions, Your Honor,” Fielding said, sounding somewhat deflated.
“Your witness, Mr. Rankin,” the judge said then.
“No questions, Your Honor,” he replied.
“Wise decision, Mr. Rankin,” she said almost absently.
Renata continued to whisper to herself in twin, and Judge Compson looked troubled as she listened to those sibilant whispers. Finally, she shook her head slightly. “You may step down, Sergeant West,” she said softly.
Charlie gave his brother a quick, triumphant thumbs-up gesture as Bob returned to his seat. Bob shrugged and sat down. He obviously wasn’t very happy.
“Call your next witness, Mr. Fielding,” Judge Compson said quietly.
“The prosecution calls Dr. Hiroshi Yamada,” Fielding announced.
The nervous doctor hurried to the front of the courtroom to be sworn in.
“You are Dr. Hiroshi Yamada?” Fielding asked.
“Yes, Mr. Prosecutor,” Yamada replied.
“And you have served as a forensic pathologist on the King County Coroner’s staff for the past eight years?”
“Yes, Mr. Prosecutor.”
“And you performed an autopsy on the body of a Mr. Walter Fergusson on the twelfth of February of this year?”
“Yes, Mr. Prosecutor.”
“And what were your findings?”
“Mr. Fergusson was a male Caucasian of early middle age. The cause of death was the loss of blood caused by multiple knife wounds inflicted upon his body—mainly on the upper torso—some fifty hours prior to the autopsy. Chemical analysis revealed the presence of curare in his bloodstream, as well as traces of cocaine. His blood alcohol level was point oh-five.”
“Could you tell the court how many knife wounds had been inflicted upon the body of the deceased?”
Yamada checked some papers on a clipboard he’d carried to the stand. “Ah—eighty-three, as closely as we were able to determine, Mr. Prosecutor. Many of the wounds were in the same general vicinity, and it was difficult to be precise. The groin area was particularly mutilated.”
“Can you confirm that samples from the knife found in the possession of the defendant were indeed the blood of the deceased?”
“Yes, Mr. Prosecutor. The DNA match was well over ninety percent. There was some minor contamination by other DNA. The implement carried some residue from previous uses.”
“Could you estimate how long it took the deceased to die from blood loss after the initial assault.”
“I couldn’t be precise, Mr. Prosecutor. The ambient temperature was well below freezing that night. If the assault had taken place in the summertime, I’d estimate ten to fifteen minutes. It was the last wound inflicted that finally proved fatal. That wound was in the victim’s throat, and it severed both carotid arteries.”
“Then, in layman’s terms, the initial wounds were located in areas highly sensitive to pain, but the killer finished the victim off by cutting his throat from ear to ear.”
“Approximately, yes, Mr. Prosecutor.”
“No further questions, Your Honor,” Fielding said then.
“The court appreciates that, Mr. Fielding.” Judge Compson had a slightly squeamish look on her face. “Your witness, Mr. Rankin.”
Rankin was leaning back in his chair, listening as Erika whispered to him across the little railing that separated the defense table from the courtroom.
“Are we in there, Mr. Rankin?” Judge Compson asked.
“Sorry, Your Honor,” he apologized. Then he rose and approached the witness stand. “Would you please tell
the court if you happened to compare Mr. Fergusson’s DNA with samples taken from other sources, Dr. Yamada?” he asked.
Yamada threw a quick glance at Erika, and she nodded.
“This goes back just a bit, Mr. Rankin,” Yamada said, “but I think it might have some bearing on this case.”
“We’ll take all the help we can get, Dr. Yamada,” Rankin said with a faint smile.
“There’s been an investigation under way for the last six or eight years, Mr. Rankin. Identification by DNA matching is a fairly new procedure, but it’s turned out to be extremely valuable for pathologists. Over the past several years there have been a number of rapes followed by the murder of the rape victim in the Puget Sound area, and the body fluid samples taken from the victims have been preserved. Testing has indicated that the perpetrator in all those cases was the same individual. Pathologists in every hospital in the region have been advised of this, and we’ve been instructed to be on the alert for any possible matches. The Snohomish County Coroner advises that the same individual committed a 1995 murder in his jurisdiction. The DNA tests have positively confirmed the fact that Mr. Fergusson was indeed the rapist in the King County incidents, as well as the 1995 murder in Snohomish County.” Yamada seemed quite excited.
“Objection, Your Honor!” Fielding protested. “This is irrelevant.”
“Overruled, Mr. Fielding,” Judge Compson told him. “The court finds Dr. Yamada’s testimony highly relevant. Please go on, Mr. Rankin.”
“And what was the name of the Snohomish County victim, Dr. Yamada?” Rankin asked.
Yamada checked his clipboard. “Ah—Greenleaf, Mr. Rankin. Regina Greenleaf.”
Judge Compson called a recess and asked the lawyers to come to her chambers.
Erika was so jubilant that I almost thought we’d have to tie her down. “It worked!” she crowed. “It actually worked! It slid right past that nincompoop prosecutor! I love it!”
“Calm down, Erika,” Sylvia told her. “How did you know about all those other rape-murders?”
“Dr. Yamada made a big thing about it in a class I took from him last fall,” Erika replied. “He’s very excited about DNA identification. He’s positive that it’s going to replace fingerprints before very long. He used that series of rape-murders as an example, and he just now cracked those cases. He’s probably spraining his arm patting himself on the back right now.”
Rankin had a triumphant look on his face when he and Fielding returned to the courtroom. Fielding looked anything but triumphant.
“All rise,” the bailiff said, and Judge Compson returned to the bench with a no-nonsense look on her face. She rapped her gavel and then spoke to the court reporter. “Let the record show that Miss Greenleaf is to remain in protective custody within the confines of the University of Washington Medical Center. She is to be held over for a hearing to determine her competency to stand trial.” Then she looked sternly at those of us sitting on both sides of the aisle in her courtroom. “I remind everyone present that there is to be no discussion of this matter with the news media or anyone else not immediately involved in this case. And I also remind you that a violation of this order will be seen as contempt of court.” She paused. “Do you read me, Lieutenant Belcher?” she demanded in a belligerent tone. “Zip your mouth shut!”
Then she raised her gavel—almost as if it were a club. “Court is adjourned until Tuesday, March tenth at ten A.M.” And then she banged her gavel down.
I glanced over at Burpee. He was scowling at the judge like some kid who’d just been sent to his room without any supper.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The reporters were still clogging the hallway outside the courtroom, but once again James ran interference for us—James had a gift for nonviolent intimidation. The reporters uneasily gave way to let us through to the elevator. One enthusiast, however, shouted a question at Charlie as we waited for the doors to open. Charlie gave him a blank look and replied, “Nicht verstehen. Haben sie Deutsch?”
The reporter blinked and backed off.
“Oh, that was clever,” Erika said admiringly at Charlie.
“If you got it, flaunt it,” Charlie replied.
The elevator door opened, and we all entered briskly. James stood in the doorway—ominously—to keep any of the media geeks from joining us.
There weren’t any reporters in the parking garage. Either it was a standing rule or Judge Compson had been issuing more orders. We climbed gratefully into the station wagon, and James drove us back to the boardinghouse.
There was a mob scene, complete with TV cameras, waiting for us when we got there, and we treated them to a linguistic circus when we started for the front door. Trish and Erika answered—or declined to answer—the reporters’ questions in Swedish; Charlie quoted Schiller’s An die Freude extensively; Sylvia responded in Italian, probably laced with obscure obscenities; and James delivered an oratorical announcement in Latin.
I felt obligated to uphold the honor of the English department, so I recited the opening stanza of Beowulf—in West Saxon. All right, I was showing off. Everybody else was doing it; why should they have all the fun?
We managed to maintain our serious expressions until we got inside and closed the door behind us. Then we all started laughing. “Did you see their faces?” Charlie howled. “What a blast!”
“What on earth was that language you were using, Mark?” Erika asked me.
“English,” I replied innocently.
“It didn’t sound much like English to me.”
“It’s an older variation,” I told her.
“How much older?”
“Oh, thirteen hundred years—or so.”
“Far out,” she murmured.
“Hey,” Charlie said then, “I’d say our side won today, huh? We got that sanity hearing Rankin wanted.”
“Let’s hold off on the victory celebration, Charlie,” Trish told him. “I think we’re staring right down the bore of permanent institutionalization for Renata. About the best we can hope for is a private mental institution. Fielding will probably try to hold out for a state-operated institution for the criminally insane—a penitentiary with padded cells.”
That took a lot of the fun out of our day.
The media geeks were really up in arms about Judge Compson’s closed courtroom and her gag order. Channel surfing through the length and breadth of the assorted TV stations produced whole bunches of tediously pious recitations of the first amendment.
The boardinghouse gang continued the foreign language ploy. One station hired translators, but the fellow who converted Sylvia’s remarks into English almost got the station in trouble with the FCC—Sylvia’s choice of terms turned out to be very colorful. After that, they finally gave up and left us alone.
I was reading Faulkner on Saturday morning, and about ten o’clock, Trish yelled up the stairs that I had a phone call. I laid my book aside and hustled down to the living room.
“Mark?” It was Father O’Donnell. “If you’re not too busy, could you come by the church sometime today?”
“Sure,” I said. “What’s up?”
“I’ve got a bit of good news for you.”
“God knows I could use some,” I replied.
“Yes, He probably does.”
“Sorry, Father—that slipped out. I’ll come over right now.”
Father O was waiting for me near the altar, and he led the way back to his office—as if I couldn’t find it on my own by now. He closed the door and we both sat down. “As I understand it, the judge who’s presiding over Renata’s case is conducting a sanity hearing,” he said.
“How did you find out about that?” I was a little surprised.
“I have me sources, dontcha know?” he said with a slyly exaggerated brogue. “What’s going to be the probable outcome of this sanity hearing?”
“It’s hard to say, Father,” I replied. “Renata isn’t really in there anymore, but that happened after Regina’s murder too, and s
he came out of it that time. The judge might order her to be held indefinitely in some mental institution. Then if she ever manages to recover enough to be able to speak a language people can understand, she could be yanked out of the asylum and tried for murder—several murders, actually.”
He frowned. “Wouldn’t that just postpone the case indefinitely?”
“Trish tells us that it’s happened a few times before. There’s one guy in the funny farm over at Medical Lake who’s been in ‘temporary custody’ for almost twenty years now.”
“That wouldn’t do at all,” he said. “We need a permanent decision that’ll put her beyond the reach of the courts.”
“Sure, except that she could very well wind up in an institution for the criminally insane, and she doesn’t really deserve something like that.”
“There is an alternative,” he told me. “I was able to persuade the bishop that he owed me a favor. I promised him that I wouldn’t mention what you and I saw in the church that night, and he was kind enough to have a word with the mother superior of a cloistered order of nuns that very few people know about.”
“Oh?”
“They’re called The Sisters of Hope—though there’s not really much hope for the women in their care. For the most part, the sisters provide shelter and care for elderly nuns who’ve crossed the line into senility. They also care for ladies of our faith who aren’t nuns, but have a certain social standing.”
“Money, you mean?”
“That does enter into the arrangements, I’m told. I’m certain that if Renata’s father just happened to make a sizable contribution to the order, the mother superior would look favorably upon an application for admittance for Renata.”
“Let’s see if I’ve got this straight,” I said. “You blackmailed the bishop; he bullied the mother superior; and now Les Greenleaf has to pay a bribe. Is that more or less the way it goes?”
He winced. “That’s an awkward way to put it, Mark.” he chided me. “Accurate, perhaps, but a trifle blunt. The advantage is that Renata will be well cared for in a safe environment. That will be far, far better for her than being committed to any secular institution.”
Regina's Song Page 36