Double Tap

by Steve Martini

  “I’ll bet you would,” says the judge, “after seeing that tape. She can testify, can’t she?” Gilcrest puts it to Templeton like a robber pointing a gun.

  “I don’t know,” says Templeton. “We haven’t planned to put her on for that purpose.”

  “Well, maybe you should,” says the judge.

  “Your Honor …” Templeton tries to stop him before he can rule.

  “Put her under subpoena and find out,” says the judge. “Next item.”

  “Does that mean the tape is out?” says Templeton.

  “It does.”

  “Your Honor, the state takes exception.”

  “I’m sure it does. Let’s move on.”

  What I had hoped for: Gilcrest is our leveling hand.

  The rest of the morning we run through pretrial motions, mostly minor stuff. We win a few, lose a few, until just before noon, when Templeton announces that he has a witness and outside counsel with an interest in the remaining issues. They won’t be available until afternoon.

  Gilcrest decides to take the noon break. Harry and I head to lunch.

  Mac’s is a greasy spoon three blocks from the courthouse, a small sandwich shop, a hole-in-the-wall stuck in the crack between two larger office buildings. Harry and I have made a habit of coming here for lunch whenever we’re in trial. There are four tiny tables against one wall, a counter against the other, and a narrow corridor between the two just wide enough for one person to walk. It is one of the few places within shouting distance of the courthouse where the walls don’t have ears. While the occasional bailiff or clerk may come in for takeout, there aren’t enough tables or space for the courthouse crowd to hang. Whenever the tables are full, Harry and I take sandwiches to one of the benches outside. It’s the nice thing about San Diego: you seldom have to worry about rain, and the last time it snowed, people were still hoofing it across the landbridge from Asia.

  Today we are a little early and Mac’s is empty except for one other guy in a shirt and tie under a dark trench coat who came in just behind us.

  The fare here is sandwiches, but for the few regulars who eat in and who know what’s available off the menu, Mac can turn a wicked Caesar salad, though it takes a few minutes. Harry orders the barbecue beef along with a towel to keep the sauce off his suit, then heads for the john through the closed door in the back.

  I shuffle through a stack of newspapers by the register, find the front section of the morning edition, and grab a table.

  Madelyn Chapman and the “Double Tap Murder Trial” make it into a double column just below the fold on the front page. Speculation that Isotenics, Inc., one of the largest employers in the county, may be drawn into the trial occupies the lead and several paragraphs following it. Apparently some enterprising reporter has heard the flutter of angst from Havlitz and his cronies over the subpoenas I served on his lawyer that day at the office. The fact that Harry and I are trying to burrow our way into filing cabinets out at Software City has the local economic prophets more than a little edgy. While the nationals may love the idea of dragging IFS into the middle of the trial, the local paper is nervous as to the fallout. If the government project is canceled, a lot of county residents—newspaper subscribers who fertilize the economy and justify full-page ads for white sales—could be laid off.

  “I’ll have a Diet Coke.”

  My eyes drift up over the top of the page to the guy in the dark blue trench coat at the counter.

  “In the cooler behind ya. In cans.” Mac is busy cracking an egg into a stainless-steel mixing bowl, adding lemon juice, and beating it all with a metal whisk.

  I’m working my way toward the bottom of the inside jump on the story when the bell over the door jingles behind me. I’m beginning to wonder if Harry has fallen in.

  The customer at the cooler is looking my way. “You want a Coke?”

  For a second I think he’s talking to me, then I realize he’s been joined by whoever it is that just entered.

  “No. Not for me.”

  I flip back to the second page to scan headlines as the footsteps from the door stop at the edge of my table. The guy’s stopped, probably to look at the menu on the wall over the counter. Then that feeling that always comes over you, something radiating from the sixth sense. No, he’s looking at me.

  I look up just as he grabs the chair on the other side and slides it toward the open end of the table in the aisle.

  “You don’t mind, do you?” He doesn’t sit. Instead he turns the back of the chair toward the table and puts his foot on it.

  “I’m waiting for a friend. He’ll be back in a second.”

  “This won’t take that long,” he says. “I just wanted to talk to you, give you a heads-up, before something bad happens. I’m a little worried that some of the stuff you’re getting into over at the courthouse is way off base. To tell you the truth, it’s not gonna do your client any good. And it’s possible that it could cause some real problems for you.”

  The guy is big, six-three, maybe six-four, shoulders like a linebacker. His hair is dark, cut short, almost a buzz, but not quite. He is wearing aviator glasses, straight metal frames with a little clear plastic on the tip ends over his ears. I can make out just enough from the pupils behind the gray lenses to know that they are boring holes through me at the moment.

  “Exactly what kind of stuff is it over at the courthouse that you’re worried about?”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “No. I’m afraid I don’t.”

  “Well, for starters …” He pulls the newspaper out of my hands, leaving little tabs of torn newsprint between my thumbs and forefingers. Leaning with one foot on the chair, he closes the paper to the front page and starts to fold it up into a tight rectangle.

  While he is doing this I’m studying his foot, which is almost in my lap. It must be a size thirteen. The rubber sole, heavy tread, covers the seat of the chair front to back. The high top of the tactical boot now exposed by the raised cuff of his gray polyester slacks doesn’t quite go with the dark turtleneck and the blue blazer.

  When he’s finished folding, he leans down into my face, in close, invading my space, so that as he exhales I can smell his breath.

  “This is what I’m talking about.” He pushes the folded paper into my chest with two fingers of his right hand. Even through the thick paper he somehow gets under my rib cage and triggers something in my diaphragm. Suddenly I’m struggling, trying to catch my breath. The pain is intense but I can’t move. It’s as if I’m paralyzed.

  “I’m only gonna say this once, so listen.” He is down, right in my face now. “You’re nosing around in places you shouldn’t be. Sending out pieces of paper and looking for answers to questions you shouldn’t be asking.”

  He takes his hand away and puts the folded newspaper on the table in front of me.

  I gasp for breath.

  The tight little rectangle of newsprint on the table displays only the headline and the story on Ruiz’s trial. He thumps the crinkled paper with his finger so that it sounds like metal hitting muffled wood. “This is what I’m talking about,” he says. “They say you don’t wanna believe everything you read in the newspapers. But this—this I would take to heart.” He lifts his foot off the chair and looks at his friend. “I think we’re done here.” He turns and walks toward the door.

  His partner leaves a bill and some change on the counter for the Coke and swaggers toward me, his trench coat brushing the tables. “You wanna lean over, put your head between your knees. It’ll feel a lot better. I just hate it when he does that.” He’s smiling as he heads for the door.

  Mac has his back to me as he mixes the salad. He’s missed the whole thing and doesn’t seem to be paying attention to either of them. A few seconds after I hear the jingle of the bell over the front door, Harry emerges from the back.

  “Sorry it took so long.” Harry slides the chair out of the aisle to the other side of the table and sits.

  I’
m breathing again, but sweat is running down my face.

  “Some young guy back there got jammed in the john with a bad leg. Says he caught some shrapnel in Iraq. He was trying to get out the back way to his car. Asked me if I could give him a hand. Clean-cut kid. Big guy. What are you gonna do?”

  So there were three of them, one to stall Harry, the Good Samaritan.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Over lunch I tell Harry about the incident. My ribs are still sore where the guy stuck his fingers, trying to do a cavity search where there is no cavity. After telling Harry, we eat. I pick at my salad in silence and think about the comments made by Ruiz at our first meeting; his theory that Dale Kendal, his original lawyer, had been frightened off the case suddenly doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

  Sore as I am, we don’t have time to dwell on it. Harry wants me to report the incident to the judge, but we have no evidence, not even bruises. The man was an expert with pointed fingers.

  In the afternoon Harry and I hit a rough patch in court. It is strewn with rocks and boulders in the form of Victor Havlitz and his lawyer, Wayne Sims. Sims is joined by three other attorneys from his firm. The press and the public remain locked outside, pieces of brown paper taped over the narrow window slots in each door so they can’t see in. I have asked that Ruiz be present this afternoon. The issues in dispute involve business matters that Madelyn Chapman was working on at the time of her death. They are key to our case, and Emiliano has a vested interest. I want him to know what is going on firsthand. Harry and I are getting desperate for something that we can get our teeth into.

  The door leading from the courtroom to the holding cells opens and the phalanx of guards leads Ruiz like a dog on a leash to our counsel table. He is wearing an orange jail jumpsuit, something that will not be allowed once the trial starts and we are in front of the jury. His hands are manacled in front to a chain around his waist, and he is jingling from his ankles as he walks.

  “Your Honor, I would ask that the restraints be removed from our client, at least while he’s in the courtroom.”

  “Your Honor, may we approach?” Templeton is bounding down from his chair before Gilcrest can respond.

  The judge tells him he can do it from there, since there is no one in the courtroom.

  “I’d prefer it at the bench, Your Honor.”

  “So be it.” The judge motions us forward.

  Harry and I join Templeton and Sims in front of the judge.

  “Your Honor, the defendant is highly skilled in certain martial arts. He has employed these both in training and in combat.” Templeton seems to know more about my client than I do. Ruiz could probably snap him in half by just looking. Maybe this is the reason Templeton wants to do the argument in hushed voices at the bench. More likely it’s because Ruiz knows that Templeton’s information, if not false, is at least overstated.

  “There is considerable evidence in the file regarding his aptitude in these areas,” says Templeton. “The man is highly trained.” In whispered tones Templeton is trying out his argument in front of the judge, my guess is to see just how far Gilcrest will let him wander in the theoretical fields of Ruiz as “trained killer.” For months now the cops have been setting the stage for this as part of a major theme in their case.

  “Your Honor, there is no evidence that Mr. Ruiz has been anything but cooperative during his entire period in jail.”

  “That’s not the point,” Templeton whispers. “What if he decides to become uncooperative? If they take the manacles off, are you prepared to restrain him? If so, I’d like to see your black belt.” Templeton looks up at me, all smiles.

  “Give it a rest,” I tell him. “This is a game, Your Honor. They’re trying to paint Mr. Ruiz as a natural-born killer. If they’re allowed to continue with these antics in front of the jury, the defendant is not going to be able to get a fair trial.” I turn it on Templeton: “What are you going to do come trial? Dress him in a suit and bring him in manacled with his ankles chained?”

  Templeton gins up a smile and tugs on his bow tie. This is exactly what he has in mind. Even if he loses a pitched argument in front of the court, any hint he can make—even the faintest whiff of ether in the air that the jury might pick up on—that Ruiz is dangerous would put us on a steep downhill slope.

  “Mr. Madriani’s got a point,” says Gilcrest. “I don’t want to tell the sheriff how to run his jail, but is there any evidence that the defendant has been a disciplinary problem in the lockup?” Gilcrest has to pull himself toward the front of the bench just to see down far enough to engage Templeton in eye-to-eye contact.

  Templeton turns to look at the defendant, an appraising eye followed by an exasperated expression. “Not in so many words.”

  “There either is or there isn’t,” says the judge.

  “No direct evidence, Your Honor.”

  “Then I think in my courtroom we’ll have the restraints removed during proceedings. After all, you’ve got six guards and the doors are locked.”

  “They won’t be during the trial, Your Honor.” Templeton always tries for the last word.

  “Well, if he can scramble over all those reporters, get through the throng out in the hallway, and hurdle the mass of humanity waiting to get in at the front door, and the guards can’t tackle him or shoot him,” says Gilcrest, “maybe we should just find him not guilty by ordeal the way the Indians used to.” The judge looks up. “Mr. Ruiz,” he intones in full voice now “you’re not going to cause us any problems here in the courtroom, are you?

  Ruiz gives him a mystified look, “Sir? I don’t know what you mean by problems.”

  “I mean a physical confrontation. You’re not gonna try and escape or anything like that?”

  “No, sir. I wouldn’t do that.”

  “Deputy, I think you can take the restraints off of Mr. Ruiz while he’s in the courtroom. I’m going to take you at your word, son.”

  We head back toward the counsel tables. I have known for weeks that Templeton would try to quash most if not all of the subpoenas for documents that I had served on Isotenics. There is no telling what we might find if Harry and I are allowed to root around in the private papers of Madelyn Chapman compiled in the weeks and months before her death. If Kaprosky is right and war was raging between Chapman and the Pentagon over the use of her software—what Harold Klepp referred to as spyware before Karen Rogan shut him down that night in the bar—then anything is possible. What I had not expected was the oblique direction that Templeton’s attack would take, the use of Sims and his client corporation as part of a well-orchestrated ambush.

  It takes the guards a couple of minutes to find the keys and work the locks as Ruiz stands by the defense table, taking it all in. He has a kind of bemused expression. The judge up on the bench is paternal in his black robes as Templeton climbs back up on top of his box on the chair to look at papers and confer with Sims and the other lawyers. I can tell by the look on Emiliano’s face that he is wondering who let the prosecutor in without a jester’s cap, bells hanging from the points.

  As he takes a seat between Harry and me, he leans my way with a broad grin while looking at Templeton. “That’s the DA?”

  Fortunately, at the moment Templeton has his back to him.

  I poke him with an elbow and give him a stern look. “Leave it alone,” I tell him. It wouldn’t be wise to give Larry anything more in the form of personal motivation. He has been busy proving himself to the world for forty-three years, and so far he hasn’t come up wanting.

  Templeton’s motion to quash is based on arguments that I am off on a fantasy looking for pixie dust, anything I can find to flip in the air in an effort to distract the jury. Templeton would like to cut my legs out from under me and leave us with nothing for a defense but Ruiz up on the stand making bald denials. He would carve Emiliano into tiny pieces.

  By now I had hoped for something solid by way of a footing to start building my SODDI—Some Other Dude Did It—defense. As it is, all I have
is hearsay regarding heated arguments between Chapman and the Pentagon, and industry rumors that Satz and Company are running Primis and feeding it information in violation of federal law, neither of which is admissible as evidence.

  Harry and I huddle over a stack of papers that were dumped on us by Sims as we entered the courtroom.

  Templeton claims he had nothing to do with any of this. Still, he makes the introductions while we’re still reading.

  “Your Honor, if the court please, there is a motion, not being offered by the state but by private parties seeking to quash the subpoenas duces tecum served by Mr. Madriani regarding his request for documents from Isotenics, Incorporated. As I understand it, the motion is grounded on the fact that most of the documents being sought either constitute or include information that falls in the realm of commercial trade secrets.”

  “If you’re not making the motion, maybe we should hear from the people who are?” says the judge.

  “That would be me, Your Honor. Wayne Sims of the firm of Hays, Kinsky, Norton and Cline. We represent the petitioner, Isotenics, Incorporated.”

  Gilcrest nods. “How is Charlie Norton? I used to try cases against Charlie when he was with the DA and I was with the public defender’s office.”

  “He’s fine, Your Honor.”

  “Give him my regards.”

  “I will do that. I apologize for the tardiness in our application, Your Honor.” Sims is skilled. He anticipates the problem in an effort to deflate it. “You will find our motion along with points and authorities… .”

  Gilcrest looks around but doesn’t see anything on the blotter in front of him. The bailiff hands up a folder bound with half an inch of paper between the covers.

  “Mr. Sims, I take it you are aware that local rules require ten days’ notice?” says the judge.

  “That’s correct, and we object, Your Honor.” Harry puts our two cents into the pot.

  “I’m aware of that, Your Honor, but under the circumstances, we found it necessary to obtain an order shortening time. Isotenics, my client, is not a party to these proceedings. We did not receive notice as to the closing date for discovery.”