Life Sentence

by David Ellis

  “All right, Senator, but Mr. Soliday remains on the state payroll, doesn’t he? He’s still on your staff?”

  “He is, yes.”

  “Do you think the taxpayers should be required to pay the salary of Mr. Soliday simply because you believe he’s innocent?”

  “I think a man wrongly accused should not have his job taken away from him until the prosecution has proven he’s guilty. Which they won’t do.”

  Jackie Norris turns to the camera. “We’ll be back with more from the Democratic candidate for governor, Senator Grant Tully.”

  “Dammit.” I knock my head against the pillow, the one I haven’t already tossed at the screen. He should put me on leave. Or fire me. The senator can’t maintain a tough-on-crime posture—essential to this election—while opposing capital punishment and having an accused murderer in his inner circle.

  For all practical purposes, I’m a murderer. I’m innocent and I’ll prove it. But that’s window dressing. I’ve been irreparably tarnished. I will always be the guy who was charged with murder. Murder suspects who are acquitted are almost always viewed with some taint, at a minimum. This will follow me forever.

  He stood up for me. He didn’t apologize or rationalize or even hide behind something as technically accurate but practically unsatisfying as the presumption of innocence. “He’s innocent,” he said. It’s the proper thing to do politically—as long as he keeps me around, what else can he say? But the point is, he does believe it, and he’s keeping me around at considerable political cost. He’s even promised me the spot as chief counsel if he’s elected, a job that, a month ago, I would have taken for granted.

  What the hell am I doing? This guy has stuck his neck out for me not once, but twice. The first time almost involuntarily as a teenager, reacting to my plight swiftly and without hesitation. And this time, inescapably after consideration to his political future, he has once again taken my side.

  I look over at Jake, who has taken up residence on the couch next to Maggie. “Think we can make it on a grocery clerk’s wages?” Both of them are at attention now, heads cocked, wondering if I’ve invited them for a walk or an early dinner.

  It’s not like I have a wife or a family to support. Or that I’m without resources. The senator could do something for me, under the radar. A nice in-house position maybe, a governmental affairs post at a corporation. I won’t lobby; my face won’t be too welcomed. But I could steer anyone through the myriad of hurdles awaiting them on their way to legislative success in our capital.

  I blow out a sigh, try to shake off the tremble in my limbs. I never thought it would come to this. But in public life, when it comes, it comes fast.

  So that’s that. I will continue to stay on leave with the firm and serve as some kind of consultant to the senator—after all, it was more or less a condition of my bond. But when this case is over, my career with my best friend is finished.

  31

  THE COFFEE SHOP down the street from my law firm is filled with college-age kids with laptops and mugs of expensive java on little tables with fancy art designs. The place is humongous—the shop took over some empty neighboring space and converted the place from a quaint little coffee hut to an Internet java warehouse.

  I’m a little early, so I take a seat in the corner and jealously guard my space. I sit in a plush velvet high-backed chair and ask myself, for the three hundredth time, the question.

  Isn’t it possible that Gina Mason did overdose? She passed out after I left, vomited, and choked herself. That’s possible. Right?

  Sure it is. Of course. We had consensual sex and then she passed out, maybe before I left, maybe after.

  But then how does Lyle Cosgrove come in? Is it merely a coincidence that the man who provided me an alibi in 1979 happened to have been released from prison just before Dale Garrison was murdered, and just around the time I received a cryptic blackmail note?

  Bennett Carey catches my eye and waves. I shake out of my trance. Time to leave my former problem and visit my current one. Ben points to the bar, I mouth “Black,” and he buys us some coffee. He comes to the table with the coffee and his briefcase slung over his shoulder by the strap. In the side pocket, a single manila file is jutting out with the words “Lyle Cosgrove” peering at me.

  Ben places two steaming mugs on the table and takes his seat. I bravely take a quick sip, unsurprised to find that the liquid is about as hot as molten lava.

  “Lot to discuss,” he says. He draws a legal pad from his briefcase and sets it on the table.

  “Hi, Ben.”

  He smiles. “Cause of death, Jon.”

  “We have something.”

  “Something. Not everything. But something.” He nods his head. “My guy downstate has a theory.”

  “Dale choked himself?” I ask.

  “Natural causes, smart guy.” He taps his pad. “More or less, he could have suffered a blood clot in his neck.”

  “Your guy will say that?”

  “Well…” Ben winces. “If you put a Bible under his hand, he’d say best bet is strangulation. But we can argue a theory. It’s a hell of a lot better than nothing. And maybe I can get the county coroner to agree with me.”

  “That would be something.”

  “Stranger things,” says Ben.

  “Okay. What else?”

  “We have subpoenas out,” he says. “Dale’s phone records, bank accounts. The records should come back next week.”

  Bennett reaches back into his briefcase and removes a small case. “Computer diskettes,” he says, dropping them with an echo onto the wooden table. “Everything from Dale’s hard drive.”

  “My assignment?” I ask.

  “Thought it would be a good use of your time. Pull up the documents and take a look at them. See if anything comes up.”

  “Prosecution’s looked at them?”

  “Who knows?” Ben shrugs. “Yeah, if they have half a brain. They’re looking for evidence of blackmail.”

  “They haven’t found it on his computer. The blackmail letter.”

  Ben shakes his head. “They’d have to tell us, anything they plan on using. I’m thinking more about other people Dale was working with. Cases he was working on. Anything we can come up with, Jon. We may have to throw up a screen.”

  “Who would want to kill a dying old lawyer?” I ask absently.

  “And set you up in the process.”

  “God, I hate the sound of that. I was framed, and Oswald didn’t act alone.”

  “Let’s keep going,” says Ben. No time for self-pity, he’s saying. “Suspects. I’ve had Cal look at some people. This one”—he removes the “Lyle Cosgrove” folder from his bag—“is the most promising.”

  “Who’s that?” I ask, innocently enough.

  “Lyle Cosgrove. I was telling you before, he’s got a violent record. Served twelve years for armed robbery, got out not long before Dale’s death. Appealed his conviction claiming Dale screwed up. So he’s violent and he’s pissed off at Dale.”

  “Anything else in his past?”

  “Oh yeah.” Ben is enthusiastic. “Punched a cop when he was in his twenties. Copped a plea and only got a year and a half because he flipped on the other guy. And a rape charge.”

  I draw up. “Rape,” I repeat.

  “When he was nineteen,” says Ben.

  I close my eyes. The company I kept.

  “He copped to a lesser charge,” Ben continues. “Assault. Spent a little over a year for it.”

  My adrenaline surges. “Anything as a juvenile?”

  Ben shrugs. “That stuff is sealed. Inadmissible in any event, so of no use to us.”

  “Inadmissible.” I try to sound nonchalant. “I didn’t know that.”

  “Yeah, you can’t use that stuff. Plus, the guy’s in his thirties, so it’s been a couple decades, even if there were something to find. Irrelevant. Prejudicial. Let’s see.” He looks through the documents he has. “Only thing as a juvenile is that he lost
his driver’s license. That’s not criminal, that’s public info. This guy had three DUIs in the first six months he had his license. He lost it in ’78 and never got it back.”

  “So he’s a real solid citizen,” I say. I calmly ask to see his file. Ben hands it over to me. I open the file and glance over the two pages. I commit Lyle Cosgrove’s address to memory—4210 West Stanton, Apartment 2D—and show optimism in my expression to Ben. So Ben must have asked Cal Reedy to find Lyle Cosgrove, too, after I did. Cal hasn’t got back to me yet.

  “West Stanton,” says Ben. “That’s subsidized housing. DOC puts a lot of its ex-cons there.”

  He’s talking about the Department of Corrections. The parole division of DOC helps inmates find housing and a job after they’re released.

  Ben points to the file. “Looks like Cosgrove was working that night, the late shift at a convenience store/pharmacy. His shift started at six.”

  “Dale died after seven,” I say.

  “But Cal got a look at the sign-in sheet at the place. It’s just a piece of paper with a pencil. It’s not like you punch a clock.”

  “So he could have lied on it,” I say. “Came in late and acted like he was on time.”

  “That’s possible.” Ben nods. “Cal talked to a couple of the other workers. They said he was there on time. They asked Cal if he was Lyle’s parole officer.”

  “So they could have been covering for him.”

  “Right. That has to be our story.”

  I open the file on Lyle Cosgrove and take another look. My eyes don’t focus on anything in particular. I’m buying time, thinking this through.

  “This guy’s a career felon,” says Ben. “He’s our empty chair.”

  “Say again?”

  “Oh. Just an expression. Always easy to point the finger at the empty chair. Someone who can’t defend himself.”

  “But they could haul Cosgrove into court. Then he could defend himself.”

  “Sure, maybe,” Ben agrees. “We’ll hold off on disclosing him as long as possible. We’ll wait until it’s deep into the case and throw out his name.” He rubs his hands together violently. “I’d like to turn him upside down.”

  “You’d like to,” I query. “But you won’t?”

  “Can’t,” he says. “Not yet. Not like we can search his house or anything.”

  I cock my head. An idea that hadn’t occurred to me. “Because if we asked for a search warrant, we’d be showing our hand.”

  “Pretty much, yeah.” He smiles. “I wouldn’t put it past Cal, if we unleashed him. But we’re not doing that.”

  “No,” I promptly agree. “We’re not breaking into anyone’s house.” Ben nods absently. I clear my throat and ask, “But out of curiosity, how would he do that?”

  “Do what?” Ben looks at me. “Break into his place?”

  “Just out of curiosity,” I say. “I mean, short of an obvious break-in.”

  Ben’s eyebrows rise. He sighs. “I suppose you’d use some kind of ruse. Some of these guys I used to prosecute—” He laughs.

  “What’d they do?”

  “Well, the point being, they always say it’s easier to just walk in the front door and act natural. Flash some phony credentials or something.”

  “Yeah, I suppose.”

  “Actually, I’ve been to some of these housing developments,” says Ben. “Back when I prosecuted, these landlords would open a door for you the minute you said ‘DOC’ or ‘County Attorney.’ These ex-cons get visits all the time from the G.”

  Information I’ll store away. “That must be fun.”

  “But the point here,” says Ben, “is we have to stay on the fringes for now. We can’t get too up-close-and-personal with Mr. Lyle Cosgrove until the state’s resting its case. Then we issue subpoenas, ask to search the premises, go through his records, go after him like all bloody hell.”

  I look up at Bennett Carey. “And if this guy’s innocent?”

  “Then at worst, he endures an unpleasant afternoon with me questioning him.”

  I close up the file and slide it to Ben. “I know how it feels to be wrongly accused,” I say. “I’m not sure I want anyone else to feel that way. The guy’s no saint, I know that. But he drinks and drives when he’s sixteen and he holds up a convenience store twelve years ago—that doesn’t make him a murderer.”

  “For now,” Ben answers, “all we’re doing is looking around. We don’t have to decide this now.”

  “I know, Ben, but—”

  “The only thing we have to decide right now is whether you want to win this case.” Ben does not attempt to lighten the impact. His eyes are directly on me.

  “Hell, yeah, I want to win the case,” I say. I wave at him. “Do it. Look into it.” I grab the computer diskettes and raise my hand to toss them somewhere, but I think better of it. I place the case back on the table.

  “Sorry,” I say. “Sometimes—sometimes the walls close in a little.”

  “I understand that. You have to trust me.”

  “I need to go for a run or something. What—what do you do, Ben? When things don’t seem to make sense?”

  Ben considers me a moment. What’s he supposed to say? How does he help a client who’s going out of his mind with grief and anxiety? He reaches for his wallet. He pulls out some photos in a plastic seal and tosses them across to me. “I think of them,” he says.

  These are his parents, I assume, the ones Bennett lost to a car crash when he was an infant. The father looks like Ben, only not as bulky. His mother is quite attractive in the black-and-white photo, an angular nose and prominent eyes, flowing hair. I shouldn’t be surprised, looking at the man sitting across from me.

  “My parents are deceased, too,” I say.

  Ben nods solemnly. “Do you think about them much?”

  “Every day. Sometimes I talk to them.”

  “Sure.” Ben grips his coffee mug but doesn’t lift it. Men aren’t good at such conversations.

  “Do you remember your parents?” I ask.

  “Not really.” His eyes narrow, peering into his memory. “I have one fleeting vision of them. I’m in the backseat of the car. I can’t see all of their faces. They’re talking about something.” He shrugs. “It’s not much.” He snaps out of his trance and looks at me. “Reason I bring it up is, when I’m nervous about something I think of them. I think of how their lives were cut short. I think of how crazy life can be, but then you die. It just ends.”

  “That brings you comfort?”

  “Yeah, for some reason. It makes me think that we take some of the details too seriously. We don’t see the bigger picture. That calms me.”

  Okay. I see the point, I guess. Bennett Carey and I do not lead the same lives, that much is for sure. “You mind me asking, Ben? What did you do? When they passed.”

  “Bounced around foster families a little while,” he says. “Then I had an aunt who took me in. I hardly even remember those other people. My aunt sort of became my mother.” He draws a pattern on the countertop with his finger. “She had a pretty tough life, too. But she was always there for me. She used to walk me to school, nag at me to do my homework. The normal stuff. When I was fourteen I brought a girlfriend home and she about ran her out of the house.” Ben laughs. “She was pretty protective.”

  “Well.” I don’t exactly know what to say. “I guess you just have to put the bad stuff behind you.”

  “Yeah?” he replies. “I think it’s good to remember what was taken from you. Gives you perspective.”

  “Yeah, huh?” I guess I know what he means. This really sort of explains Bennett Carey. This is a guy with all the tools to have a social, outgoing, full life, who instead retreats. A fear of getting too close again, I imagine.

  Ben nods his head behind him. “Get out of here, Mr. Soliday. Go play with your dogs or run along the lake. Go focus on something good for a change.”

  I take his advice, grabbing his shoulder for an informal thank-you on the way out.<
br />
  “And I’ll focus on the bad guys,” he says.

  32

  TODAY, THE SUN has chosen to appear for the first time this gloomy September, and thus I find myself overdressed in a long-sleeved oxford and trousers. I walk to the Maritime Club and brush past a guy in a uniform. The Maritime Club is where the city elite meets for cigars and drinks and a game of squash. It’s fourteen stories high, with hotel rooms, workout facilities, libraries, banquet halls, and formal dining rooms. Until about fifteen years ago, it was men only, with a weekly lingerie show that, I’m told, packed the house every Friday for lunch. The gender barrier broke when the first female federal judge was appointed in the city. The club extends automatic memberships to the federal judiciary, and they were caught short when the first woman put on the robe.

  It’s more liberated now; the Maritime Club has even elected its first woman president. But it still reeks of old-school, traditional male bonding. Actually, it reeks of cigars.

  Simon Tully breaks from a conversation with two men and finds me across the lobby floor. The senator has been retired for a decade now. Though his involvement in the political moving and shaking of the city has not ended, on a daily basis he is less active. You can almost see the relief in his manner. He has loosened up considerably, even undid his collar button every now and then. Today, he is freshly showered from a workout, in a blue cotton shirt and trousers. His silver hair offsets his tan nicely.

  “Jon.” A firm handshake as always. He greets me with a somber expression. We’ve never really gotten along famously, not since the incident in 1979. It’s telling that I can recall his single moment of warmth toward me since then—ten years ago, when his son Grant won his first primary for Simon’s senate seat, and he wrapped me in an embrace at the victory celebration.

  “Thanks for seeing me, Senator.”

  “Not at all, not at all. Are you a member?”

  “No,” I answer. I’ve been here dozens of times as a guest but I can do without the considerable monthly fee.

  “We’ll have to see about getting you a membership.” It strikes me as quite the gesture on the elder senator’s part—not the offer, of course, but the assumption that I’ll be thinking of things as frivolous as a club membership in the near future. Simon places a hand on my back and directs me to an elevator. We get off on the seventh floor and head for a dining room. On Fridays, he tells me, the absence of coat and tie is excused.