* * *
AN HOUR AND FIFTEEN minutes later, Dutton left Mike and Lady Grey alone to pursue whatever piqued their interest, with Mike’s pants coming down even before Dutton reached the door.
He entered Marlowe’s room, took one look around, and shook his head with admiration. The American attorney was no fool—she had a rented safe in the room. It was too big to carry away and would take serious explosives to blow it open. No snoopy reporter was going to stick his nose into her files. However, her notebook computer was on the room desk. A security chain from the computer to the desk kept one from walking off with the computer without a bolt cutter. But not from using it.
“Should have put your computer in the safe,” he told the absent Marlowe.
He opened the computer and turned it on. It stopped booting up as a menu came on that demanded a password.
“Son-of-a-bitch.” That was why she didn’t bother putting it in the safe. That might stop the maid from snooping, and even put the skids under your average reporter, but Burn reporters were a special breed of felon.
He called the office and got the tech on the line whose payroll description was computer maintenance but who spent a good portion of his time hacking into other people’s computers for the tabloid.
“Cohn the Barbarian said you’d been fired,” Hacker told Dutton.
“Not a bit of it! That’s a cover story, lad, Cohn got me working undercover on something bigger than the royal killing.”
“There’s nothing bigger than that.”
“Help me crack the code for this computer and you’ll have your place in history.”
43
Tower of London
Philip Hall was waiting with the limo to take Marlowe to the news conference to be held outside Trent’s office when she came out of her meeting with the princess. She got into the back and stared straight ahead as the limo made its way out of the tower compound.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Yes—no. I’m disturbed about my meeting with the princess. I’m having a hard time seeing the forest for the trees.” She didn’t want to discuss it, didn’t want him to know that the princess had become emotional and rushed out of the room. A few minutes later a stone-faced servant told her that the princess would be indisposed for the rest of the day.
“Anything I can help with?”
“I’m afraid I’m a lost cause at the moment. It’s the time that bothers me, it all happened so quickly. She’s chosen as the bride for the prince, they’re engaged, married, she’s pregnant and throwing herself down stairs and into glass cases, all in a very short period of time, only about six months from the stunning wedding until the first attempt on her own life. People don’t usually descend to hell that quickly.”
“Unless they were already there at the beginning.”
“That’s the question, isn’t it? Did she bring a lot of emotional baggage into the marriage?”
He shrugged. “How else do you explain how we go from A to Z in less time than it takes most married people to get to B or C?”
“Maybe he just pushed her harder, and maybe she was just a more vulnerable victim.”
“Which is it?”
“I don’t know, but I do know that I’m not ready for a news conference. Drop me off at my hotel.”
“Anthony will—”
“Be delighted. He and that fossil Lord Bluenose will get along fine with the newspeople. They’d prefer I wasn’t there, anyway.”
She smiled sourly at Hall. “As far as that goes, I’m sure they’d prefer I fell off the end of the earth.”
44
“It’s not working!” Dutton gave the little computer a hit with the phone receiver just in case that might do it. He put the phone back to his ear as Hacker spoke.
“You have to bring it in, it will take hours to break into it, she isn’t using the manufacturer’s code program, she’s got something custom.”
“I can’t bring it in, it’s chained.”
“Break the chain.”
“With my teeth?”
He hung up and thought fast. Maybe he could get Mike the Bellman to borrow a plumber’s tool that cuts pipe. He checked his watch—he’d killed another twenty minutes, but was sure he still had another half hour, yet there was little chance of getting a pipe cutter in that time—he didn’t even know if there was one in the hotel. He’d have to find Mike, too—the assignation with Lady Grey would be over and the transvestite on her way back to theaterland. And he’d have to figure out a way to convince the bellman to risk his job again, only this time just for filthy lucre.
The security chain was held together by a simple key lock. He grabbed a letter opener and started working on the lock. His phone rang.
“She’s on her way up!”
“What!”
“I saw her get in the elevator a minute ago, but the manager called me over and asked—”
Dutton didn’t wait to find out what the manager had asked. He knocked over the desk chair as he shot up and raced for the room door. He heard the lock click before he reached it. Panicked, he pressed himself against the wall where the door would cover him as it opened.
Marlowe stepped in and swung the door closed behind her. She saw her computer open and on. “What the—”
He grabbed her from behind, putting his hand over her mouth, clutching her around the waist with the other hand. She struggled and he exclaimed, “Stop! I won’t hurt you!”
She didn’t stop, but back-kicked his shin. He howled and loosened his grip enough for her to twist out of his grasp. She let out the start of a scream before he threw himself at her, clutching at her mouth as he forced her toward the bed and lay atop her.
“Stop! I’m a reporter!” He glared down at her. “Stop, damn it.”
She stopped struggling. He had one hand on her mouth and another on her breast, holding her down.
“Now, look, I’ll let you go if you promise not to scream. You promise?”
She nodded.
“I’m serious, damn it. I’m a reporter, not a rapist.”
She nodded.
He let her go. She jerked up and butted him in the nose with her forehead. He staggered back, holding his face, and she reared back on the bed and kicked him in the groin.
He screamed and ran from the room, wounded and in pain.
She locked the door behind her and called the police.
45
“I’m well aware of the perversions of this man,” Inspector Bram Archer told Marlowe. “He is known to have sex with the dead.”
Behind him, Sergeant Lois Kramer rolled her eyes.
The three of them were standing in Marlowe’s room.
“Does he kill them first?” Marlowe asked.
“That’s under investigation.”
More eye-rolling.
“I have a special interest in this subject, that’s why I was called when the report came in that he had attacked you.” He pulled a picture out of a leather folder. “Is this the man who attacked you?”
“That’s him.” She hesitated, then said, “I don’t know if you police people here do it the same as back in the States, but I’m used to a photo lineup where witnesses get a six-pack, six pictures of suspects. It usually isn’t legal if the witness is only shown one.” She smiled. “I’m a criminal defense lawyer.”
“Oh, we have the same procedure.” Archer pulled out five more pictures. “Recognize any of these?”
“Uh, yeah, all six are of this man Dutton.”
Lois Kramer was standing behind Archer. She caught Marlowe’s eye and shrugged.
Archer said, “Sergeant Kramer will take down your statement. I’m going to question the hotel staff. There was a lapse in security somewhere, for this maniac to have gotten into your room.”
After he was gone, Marlowe said, “I’ve never seen a photo six pack with six pictures of the same suspect.”
“Neither have I. You have to excuse Archer, he’s getting close to retirement, his
wife is divorcing him rather than face having him around the house twenty-four/seven, and Dutton cost him a promotion that reduces his pension. It seems to have all come and dropped on his head. He’s not been himself.”
“Who is this Dutton character?”
“He works for Burn, the tabloid—it’s the most outrageous paper in the city. Actually, I think he’s freelance.”
“Does he really sleep with the dead?”
“Actually, he said I was the last dead body he gave a poke to.”
“Oh.”
“I’m going to burn his ass for that one, but Archer’s gone around the bend, focusing on Dutton as the cause of all his problems. Dutton’s a first-class bastard, not above a little breaking and entering for a story, but there’s nothing kooky about his sexual appetites. He can still come three times in a night, not bad for a chap past the four-oh.”
“Thanks for sharing,” Marlowe murmured.
“At one time Dutton was a top reporter, the real kind, an investigative journalist who got a prize for bringing down the government when he uncovered the fact that they were sitting on another one of those MI6 double-agent scandals.”
“How’d he go from bringing down governments to peeking through keyholes for a tabloid?”
“He wrote a story that got his girlfriend killed. Shit happens, doesn’t it?” Sergeant Kramer grinned. “I heard that one in a movie.”
* * *
SHE HAD JUST GOTTEN rid of the police when the phone rang.
“Yes.”
“Why did you call the police?”
She took the receiver away from her ear and stared at it for a moment before putting it back.
“Inspector Archer is very interested in talking to you. Why don’t you give yourself up? I think he’s going to take you dead or dead.”
“He’s a nutcase, isn’t he?”
“He’s a nutcase? He wasn’t the one who burglarized my room and attacked me.”
“I didn’t attack you, luv, it was all self-defense. I got the worse of it, didn’t I?”
“You didn’t get half of what you deserve. If there’s anything I plan on accomplishing in my stay in this country, it will be to see you in jail.”
“Been there, done that, but you’re not going to do that, anyway. I’m the best friend you have.”
“You are a sneaky, slimy, repulsive—”
“Self-defense, it was.”
“What was?”
“That’s why she shot him.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about your husband-killing client, the one who put a bullet in the heart of the heir apparent before an audience of millions. It was self-defense. I can give you the goods on it, and in return, you give me the inside line on every major development that comes up. Tic for tac.
“What kind of tabloid bullshit are you trying to sell me?”
“Have a drink with me and I’ll tell you why it was self-defense.”
“Sure, we’ll make it a threesome: you, me, and Inspector Archer.”
“Tsk-tsk, don’t be catty, luv, not to your knight in shining armor. You heard what Sergeant Kramer told you: I’m a great reporter hiding in tabloid clothing—and I hold my ejaculations.”
She stared at the receiver. “You have my room bugged!”
“Not at all, luv.” The adjoining-room door opened and Dutton stepped in with a portable phone to his ear. The adjoining room door was near the door to the hallway. He grinned at her.
She gaped. “How—”
He shrugged and tried to look modest. “There are few limits to my abilities. Now that we’re old friends, let’s have a drink together and I’ll tell you my theory of your case and you can give me a headline.”
Someone knocked on her room door.
She grinned at Dutton. “We’ll need a table for four if your police friends are coming.” She spoke to his retreating back.
Dutton quickly stepped back into his room, closing and locking the door behind him.
She opened her door to find the hotel manager and the head of hotel security, not Archer and Kramer.
She listened to two minutes of apologies before she cut him off. “The person who broke into my room had the adjoining room, but my side was locked when I left. Someone had to unlock it. That makes it an inside job with your employees.”
A quick look into the adjoining room by the security officer revealed Lord and Lady Grey had gone on the lam.
She got rid of the hotel management, letting them know that she was leaning toward a lawsuit but could be diverted from legal action if her hotel bill went away.
After they were gone, she sat on her bed and stared at the now-locked door to the adjoining room. She thought about what Dutton had said about self-defense being the motive behind the shooting. She shook her head. No way, it was the man’s tabloid-rotted brain searching for a headline. She was glad she hadn’t discussed the charge with him. She didn’t need a lamebrained defense like that to appear in the papers with her seal of approval.
There was a fundamental problem with the reporter’s self-defense theory: The princess shot an unarmed man.
The PRISONER IN THE DOCK
Why may not that be the skull of a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his cases, his tenures, and his tricks?
—SHAKESPEARE, HAMLET
46
DEFEND THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR & PUNISH THE WRONGDOER
Marlowe read the inscription carved in Old Bailey’s stone. Noble words, a noble goal. They usually don’t put inspirational inscriptions on buildings anymore, she thought. But they don’t build them intending to last centuries, either. The building appeared old and hallowed even though it was a mere babe in a country that still had vestiges of Roman walls.
High above, standing on a globe atop a great dome, stood golden Justice, a set of scales in one hand, a sword in the other. She liked the representation of Justice as a fighter. She didn’t care for the statues of the goddess that showed the goddess blind. If she had had her way, she’d show Justice with a sword in one hand and an Uzi in another—she knew from her own experience and that of the people she defended that you couldn’t rely upon justice to be blindly handed down, it was something that had to be fought for. Courts are places of law, not fairness—sometimes the Children of the Poor are screwed and Wrongdoers are rewarded.
She recalled that in one of her early trials she had told a judge the case against her client was “not fair.” The judge went volcanic and nearly blew her out of the courtroom, yelling that Marlowe was required to cite legal authority, not value judgments.
* * *
MARLOWE WALKED DOWN A corridor in the courthouse. It was early—the bewigged barristers, suited solicitors, and nervous clients had not yet made their appearance. She had come early to “acclimatize” herself to the hallowed environment in the heart of the English criminal justice system. As she walked down the deserted corridor, she imagined she could hear the murmurings of the great cases that had been decided in the courtrooms—Oscar Wilde, huge beast that he was, pompous, contemptuous, brilliant, and utterly without street smarts, flaunting his homosexuality in an era when it was a hangable offense; Lord Haw-Haw, Nazi, traitor, affecting a proper British accent as he haughtily informed the court it had no authority over him—even as the gallows were being prepared.
Her heels on the hard floor made a hollow sound that bounced off the walls. A numbness gripped her. There were no complex thoughts about the case flying around her head. The numbness froze them.
It was always the same for her on the first day of trial—no obvious nervousness showed, but it wasn’t because she had steel nerves. Her state of icy calm was a defense mechanism that kicked in so she wouldn’t expose her raw nerves. For days, her nerves had been on fire, she thought of nothing other than the case, reading, worrying, thinking, working each piece of evidence, each witness over and over in her mind, seeing if it all added up to a victory for her client—the law was not
about what one knew, but what could be proven.
She had played the case over and over in her mind as a movie, imagining it scene by scene. In an out-of-body view, she saw herself giving an opening statement, looking at herself standing at a podium, moving over to talk face-to-face with jurors, questioning witnesses, watching a movie of them responding to her questions. It was how she always prepared, running the movie in her mind, seeing the trial before she faced it in court.
She built the movie from scenes but left some of it on her mind’s cutting room floor when she realized that she would not be able to move around the courtroom as she commonly did in the States. There were three rows of wooden bench seats for attorneys in the courtroom: the first row for senior counsel, behind them the juniors, while the instructing solicitor occupied the third row. Besides the bench to sit on, in front of the seated attorney was a flat area to use as a writing desk. Because the senior counsels and senior prosecutor would rise to address the court, jurors, and witnesses, they had a small wooden podium to place their papers on. The podium sat atop the flat desk area.
The seniors had to rise from the bench where they sat and speak with the podium immediately in front of them. Marlowe had already discovered that the desktop podium blocked her view and made her claustrophobic. She’d had it removed, but she still was permitted only to stand up and talk without moving away from her bench seat. She hated the lack of mobility. She thought better on her feet, feet that were in motion, not cemented to the floor. But she planned for the lack of movement, the mental movie she used for prep had her addressing the judge and jury with her feet planted. It also had her seated closest to the jury. As a California defense attorney, she was used to the prosecutor being seated closest to the jury, but the English courtroom had a different rule.
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