by David Ellis
Jackson had several scars on his forehead, followed by braided hair pulled tightly over his skull. Uneven facial hair straggled along his jaw line. His eyes were small and cold, and fixed on me from the moment he walked in the room.
One guard—unarmed—bolted Jackson’s handcuffs to the metal clip on the table while another armed guard observed from a safe distance. The protocol had been established a couple of decades ago, after a manacled inmate managed to lift the handgun out of a guard’s holster during this very process. The guards left us, closing the thick metal door. They could monitor us from a camera posted in the corner of the room but they couldn’t listen—allegedly.
Throughout this entire process, Jackson never took his eyes off me, not showing a trace of emotion. He had raped and killed. He had no hope for release. His life would be spent in this Darwinian hellhole, where the only hope for survival was to be meaner and tougher than everyone else.
Arrelius Jackson hated me. He hated every man associated in any marginal way with the criminal justice system, with authority, a cop, a lawyer, a judge, the people who felt entitled to lock him in a cage. Undoubtedly he hated his own lawyer, part of the same system, in his mind probably equally corrupted, in cahoots with the prosecution all along. Given the chance, he would come over the table right now and pummel me, smash every tooth in my mouth, use my skull for a punching bag, probably piss on my dead corpse.
Usually that didn’t happen until people got to know me.
I leaned back in my uncomfortable chair and stared back at him. I wasn’t going to speak first. It was his dime. His call.
“Bitch,” he said, then he chuckled to himself, amused.
That cleared up any minute possibility that he was seeking my legal assistance. He was here to intimidate me. Smith had reached this guy. I had a pretty good idea of his sales pitch from here on out.
“Is that what your mama used to call you?” I asked.
“Say again?”
“I mean, Arrelius—that’s a girl’s name, right? Did your mama dress you up in pretty pink doll outfits and call you ‘bitch’?”
He didn’t engage. His face balled up in rage, then eased. His mouth was a tight, straight line.
“Your brother,” he said. “Nice white boy like that. Nice little bitch. Be my bitch, he come here. Don’t matter where, man. Be someone’s bitch. We’ll be sure a that. Time we’re done, he be beggin’ for the blade.” He made a motion, a finger tracing across his throat. “We gonna slice that white boy wide open,” he said.
I had expected this. I’d prepared for this. Still, it was all I could do—it took every mental muscle I could flex—to look disinterested, bored, unaffected, as this lifer inmate threatened to commit every conceivable felony on my brother. Smith was telling me he had a wide reach. He could get to Pete inside. Pete would never make it out of the penitentiary, and his time inside, while still alive, would be worse than death.
I bottled the rage, ignored the hammering inside my brain, and slowly nodded at Arrelius Jackson. “Is that it? Anything else?”
He took a moment, then smiled at me. “I’ll keep a spot warm for him, man.”
I got up and picked up my briefcase. I walked past Jackson and stopped behind him, positioning myself so that, chained as his hands were to the table, he could not reach me. I leaned into him and whispered into his ear.
“Redgrave Park,” I said. “That’s where your brother lives, right? Arrelius, one thing happens to my brother, I’ll castrate yours. And I’ll send you a picture.”
I left him, straining against his restraints, unsure of whether I was bluffing or telling the truth.
I drove away from Reynard Penitentiary with electricity flowing through my limbs. I told myself to focus on solving the problem but couldn’t stifle unimaginable images, courtesy of Arrelius Jackson. As a prosecutor, you hear that prison rape happens but not as often as they say. Still, a scrawny, good-looking white boy like Pete? He wouldn’t stand a chance.
Solve the problem.
Smith’s people had connections, all right. He’d managed to frame Pete and to get an inmate to threaten Pete’s well-being inside. He was flexing his muscle for me, and it was working.
“McHenry Stern on South Walter,” I said to the automated voice. I was driving back to my office, calling information on my cell phone. “Connect me,” I answered when the robot asked me my preference. I was all for technological advancement, but Christ, can’t I get a human being on the phone once in a while?
A woman answered the phone and spoke so quickly, I wasn’t even sure I had the right number. “I’m looking for John Dixon,” I said. “He works in the mail room.”
“Please hold for the mail room.”
Apparently the mail room was in another country, because it took a painfully long period of time to connect me, to the point that I was about to hang up, call information again, and start over with the speed-talking receptionist, when a gruff male voice answered. “Yeah.”
“Looking for John Dixon,” I said.
“He’s—hang on.” The man moved the phone from his mouth and called out behind him, but I had no trouble hearing him. “J.D.’s off this week, right?”
“—be off for a while—”
“—visit his family or something—”
“He’s not here,” the man said, returning to me. That was a bit more succinct than the dialogue I’d just overheard.
“Do you know when you expect him back?”
“No.”
“Will he call in for messages?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can I leave a message with you?”
“Um—we don’t really do that.”
“You’ve been a tremendous help.” I closed the cell phone.
So J.D. had taken a powder from work for the time being. Maybe this had been some time off he’d been planning, but I’m not a big believer in coincidences.
The Buick came back into my focus, several car lengths behind me. I drove to my parking garage, across the street from my office building, where I have a monthly pass. I approached the entry gate, which popped up when its sensor clicked with the module attached to my dashboard, and found a place to park on the fourth floor. I took the elevator down and slowly walked across the street to my building—slow enough for anyone watching to see me. I didn’t actually see the Buick or its occupant and didn’t want to be obvious in looking. I had to assume that they didn’t know I was on to them.
The building has a north and south exit. I figured they had someone on each side, should I choose to move on foot, with the Buick positioned to be near the parking garage if I were to travel by car.
In my building, I took an elevator, but it was an elevator down. Shauna, who had rented space in this building for a few years now, had become eligible for in-building parking, meaning she got to park her car underground. I found her fancy foreign car where she’d described it to me and used the spare key she’d lent me. From my briefcase, I removed a baseball cap and windbreaker. I replaced my suit coat with the jacket and threw on the cap. None of Smith’s people would be looking for a two-door Lexus, but the light cover gear would help in the event they happened to glance at the car, anyway.
It seemed like I made it out of the building, up the ramp, and toward the highway without incident. I had to be prepared for the possibility that Smith’s people were following me now. In the end, while I preferred to conduct my investigation without his knowledge, I was going to do it either way. I agreed with Joel Lightner—I couldn’t assume that Smith wanted Sammy to win his case. I had to make it happen on my own.
Griffin Perlini had been convicted of molesting two girls in the summer of 1988, crimes which had landed him in the penitentiary until 2005. The girls had enrolled in a summer program run by the city’s park district. The two families were from a south-side neighborhood. According to my files, one of the families still lived in the same house and the other had moved to a nearby suburb.
I started with the people who hadn
’t moved. Robert and Sarah Drury lived in a modest home in the middle of a very clean, well-kept, middle-class neighborhood. It was dusk by the time I reached the house, and the temperatures had fallen sharply with a promise of snow. The cold and early darkness of winter lent an appropriate cast to this visit. I was going to talk to these people about the man who molested their daughter some twenty years ago.
Robert answered the door in a sweater vest, khakis, and loafers. My gut told me this late-fifties guy was more likely to host a bingo game at a church fund-raiser than kill a pedophile. Then again, I’d prosecuted harmless-looking people who raped and murdered.
He showed me in and I met his wife, who was possibly a tad younger than him, somewhat overweight and graying. They didn’t know why I was here. I’d only told them I was an attorney.
I trust my gut, my first impression, and what I’d hoped to do with these people was inform them of Griffin Perlini’s death and monitor the reaction. But the news accounts of the bodies found behind Hardigan Elementary had stolen my best line. They obviously would have heard the news.
“I’m representing Sammy Cutler,” I said.
It only took a beat before Robert’s genial expression hardened. He lifted his chin slowly. “Yes, all right.”
Sarah looked at her husband, then at me. “How is he?”
“As good as someone can be, staring at life in prison.” I looked at each of them, alternatively. “You know Sammy?”
“We talked once,” Robert said. “Before the trial started.” He meant Perlini’s trial, for molesting his daughter. “We knew about his sister, and—I guess I can’t say why—we wanted to meet him.”
That wasn’t uncommon. Victims of a common perpetrator often form bonds.
“You want us to testify?” asked Sarah.
That wasn’t why I was here. I was auditioning them for the part of Griffin Perlini’s killers, someone to show the jury. So far, the only audition for which they could compete would be as the parents in a 1950s sitcom. I began to hear the musical theme to Leave It to Beaver.
“I’m trying to get some background,” I explained. “I’m painting a picture here.”
The husband’s eyes narrowed. “Char was five when it happened,” he said. “She was scared and confused while it was happening. She thought she was doing something wrong. Later, after we discovered what had happened and that man was arrested, Char seemed moody, prone to anger. But she developed into a very ambitious and successful student and woman. Is she still scarred by what happened? Probably. But she’s moved on. She’s getting a master’s at Oregon State.”
“Great.”
“We’ve moved on,” said Robert. “And we’d prefer to keep it that way. But if we have to testify to help Sammy Cutler, then we’ll do it.”
“Did you ever have contact with Perlini after his conviction?”
“No, of course not.”
“Did you testify at Perlini’s parole hearing in 2005?” I asked.
“No.” He shook his head. “I mentioned it to Char, but she was in Oregon, and she didn’t want to come back. And I wrote a letter but never sent it.” He looked at his wife. “I think Archie might have testified.”
“I think he did,” she agreed.
They were talking about Archie Novotny, father of the other victim in that park district summer program. Perlini was convicted of crimes against both the Drury and Novotny daughters in the same trial. Archie was next on my list.
“I know of five victims, not counting the bodies discovered at the school,” I said. “There was Sammy’s sister, though he wasn’t convicted of that crime. Your daughter and Jody Novotny were the two involving actual—actual contact. There were two girls earlier in time, in the late seventies, but as I understand it, it was just lewd exposure. There was no physical contact.”
“That’s my understanding as well,” said Robert.
And those victims—well, their families had had plenty of opportunities to kill Griffin Perlini before he was charged with the Drury and Novotny abuse. I could think of no particular reason that those two families would suddenly seek vengeance, so much later in time, when they didn’t feel the need earlier.
And I didn’t see the Drurys as plausible suspects. No chance.
That left me with only one other possibility—my next stop, Archie Novotny.
27
SOMEWHERE IN TIME after his daughter was molested by Griffin Perlini, Archie Novotny had moved to Marion Park, a southwest suburb. As I drove through MP, I noted the difference in the town since I’d last visited during my childhood. The Latino influence, nearly nonexistent during my youth, was obvious from the storefront signs and billboards. The gangs had moved in, too, something I knew full well from my time as a prosecutor. The rise in crime notwithstanding, what remained of the middle class still found Marion Park a nice enclave just outside the city proper.
Archie Novotny lived in the older part of town, the smaller homes bunched together on streets bordered by cul-de-sacs. The realtors would say that the circular blocks of concrete at the end of each block promoted slower vehicles, safer for children to ride their bikes and play in their streets. The truth was, their purpose was to discourage drive-by shootings.
It was near six o’clock now, and I needed to get back to the office with Shauna’s car, so she could leave work, and so I could leave in my own car. The later in the day it got, the more Smith’s people might come to realize they’d been blown off. It was important that they think their surveillance was working just fine.
I rang the doorbell and stood, bouncing on my toes, on the front porch.
“Door’s open!” called a voice from inside.
It felt like old times, a different era, when people kept their doors unlocked and invited people in, sight unseen.
I opened the door and stood at the threshold on a dingy black-and-white tile floor. “Mr. Novotny, it’s Jason Kolarich.” I closed the door behind me. To my left was a winding staircase. Straight ahead were a hallway and a small room. To my right was a coat closet, open, with a full rack of coats and windbreakers, caps and mittens and scarves on a top shelf, boots and shoes on the floor.
“Call me Archie,” said the voice.
Okay, Archie, but I wasn’t going to head upstairs without an invitation.
I waited a good five minutes, enjoying the comparative warmth of the home. Finally, a man bounced down a few stairs into my view.
“Come on up, Jason.”
My first take on the guy, wearing a flannel and cords, was Paul Bunyan on Social Security. I made it up the stairs to the second level—the living room and kitchen, finished hardwood, green furniture, and small windows—and found Novotny in the corner of the room, unplugging a floor sander.
“Put in the hardwood last week,” he told me, brushing dust from his hands. “Got a little extra time on my hands these days.” Novotny was a union guy, a painter with the electric utility.
“Hard finding work?”
“Has been, lately. Yeah. Working at Home Depot in between jobs.” He nodded to the corner. “They let me steal the sander for the week.”
I took a seat across from him and adjusted my initial impression. He had an outdoorsman’s face, weathered and rugged, matching his large hands. I figured mid-fifties. He looked like a guy who used to be powerful and who had finally softened physically but not mentally. He looked me square in the eye, a hint of amusement in his expression.
“Can I do you for?” he asked. “A lawyer wants to talk to you, your mind runs wild.”
“Sure, sure.” I raised a hand. “Archie, I represent Sammy Cutler.”
He didn’t look surprised. “Sure, Sammy. Heard about what happened. He gonna be okay, you think?”
“I hope. I’m doing everything I can.”
He seemed to be sizing me up. “Including talking to me.”
I smiled at him.
“Why?” he asked. “You want me to tell the jury that Griffin Perlini was a sick, low-life piece of garbage?
That he deserved what he got?”
Everything about him changed in an instant, the heat to his face, the clenched fists, the stiffening of his shoulders. My radar was inconclusive at this point. If a guy had molested my daughter, I don’t care how much time had passed, it would light a fire in me.
“Name the time and the place, if that’s what you want,” he said.
This felt promising. Something made me think I needed to prompt him.
“You testified at the parole hearing,” I said. I wasn’t sure about that but the Drurys had thought so, and it seemed a better idea to state it as a fact. A trick we learned as prosecutors, when interrogating witnesses.
“I sure as hell did. They gave him twenty-five and he shoulda served twenty-five.”
I’d need to get a transcript of that parole board hearing. Again, for now, I’d bluff.
“You spoke in very strong terms,” I said.
He played with that for a while, rubbing his hands together, clenching his jaw. “My daughter cried herself to sleep for years afterward. You know what that’s like? Jody couldn’t sleep in the dark. Ten years later, she was still having nightmares. You know what you do as a parent? Are you a parent?”
I choked on that one. I went with “No.”
“Well, you will be. Your job is to protect the innocence of your child for as long as you can. And this man—this monster—he stole her innocence at the age of seven. She never got a childhood.”
“I under—”
“My wife died, three years after this happened. Did you know that?”
“No,” I said.
“Jody was having night terrors, she couldn’t make friends, she was always crying, and my wife died thinking that this was all Jody would become.”
I didn’t answer. I was trying to keep this on a clinical level. I was trying to see if this was my guy. I’d come to one conclusion already—I might be able to sell him as a suspect to the jury. But I hadn’t yet decided if I could take the route, adding insult to deep, deep injury.
Was this guy working with Smith?
“Hey,” he said.
I looked up at him.