Death of a Prince

by Susan P. Baker

  Sandra laughed. “You’re not going to fry, Kitty. At least not today.”

  Kitty bit her lip, but when Sandra smiled and squeezed her arm, she relaxed. Sandra felt like her mother.

  Edgar stood beside his chair when he was through talking. The young assistant had quietly departed while Sandra’s back was turned. Edgar said, “The State calls Leslie Carruthers.”

  “Who’s that?” Kitty asked.

  “Bubba,” Sandra whispered.

  The constable went out into the hall again but this time returned with Bubba in tow. Bubba shuffled up the aisle and slung himself into the witness box.

  “State your name,” Edgar said.

  “Bubba Carruthers.”

  “It’s Leslie Carruthers, is it not?”

  “Yeah, but they call me Bubba ’cause I ain’t ever liked Leslie.” He glared at Edgar. He didn’t seem to like Edgar any more than he did Leslie.

  “So Mr. Carruthers, you were Mr. Parker’s aide, is that correct?”

  “Caretaker of his house.”

  “Okay. And your duties were what, exactly?”

  “Taking care of Mr. Parker’s house; His beach house where he was murdered by her.” He pointed to Kitty.

  Sandra jumped to her feet. “Objection.” It caught her so off-guard that she had no grounds ready. “Assuming facts not in evidence,” she blurted, not sure of what else to say.

  “Sustained,” Judge Perez said. “Mr. Carruthers, you must answer only what is asked of you and nothing more.”

  He nodded. “Okay, Judge.”

  “On the day of the decedent’s death, Mr. Carruthers, you were present, were you not?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What were you doing?”

  “You know what I was doing. I told you the other day.” Edgar cleared his throat. “Yes, but now you have to tell the judge.” -

  “I was putting out food and drinks and cleaning up after the party.”

  “Did you serve the police officers who were working security?”

  “Yeah. I made plates for all four of’em. I took ’em cans of Dr. Pepper, too. What of it?”

  “Uh, nothing, Mr. Carruthers. Now tell the judge what happened after the party.”

  “Well, Mr. Phillip, he said I could finish cleaning up in the morning. They were all going to bed. So, I went to The Cantina.”

  “So who was there when you departed?”

  “When I left? Miss Lizzie and Mr. Phillip. Mr. Raymond and her,” he said and nodded in our direction. “And Mr. Stuart and Miss Sandra.”

  He was wrong, but Sandra would have to wait until it was her turn before she could correct him. She noted that on her legal pad.

  “And, Mr. Carruthers, who was there when you returned?”

  “I don’t know.” His voice had grown loud. “They was all asleep. It weren’t until I got up the next morning that I saw that Mr. Phillip was dead on the concrete floor under the house.”

  “And Mr. Carruthers, did Mr. Phillip Parker have on his Rolex watch and diamond pinkie ring when you returned from The Cantina?” Edgar turned to her and grinned.

  “I don’t know, ’cause I didn’t see him. But when I got up the next morning, he sure didn’t.”

  “But he did have them on the last time you saw him alive.” Sandra jumped up. “Objection, leading.”

  “Yeah,” Bubba said, “he did.”

  , Sandra glared at Bubba. “Your Honor, please instruct the witness not to answer when an attorney stands up to make an objection. Request the answer be stricken from the record.” Sandra only made that last request as a formality. She’d always thought it was kind of stupid to ask something be

  stricken from the record when everyone had already heard it, especially in a bench trial. Like the judge would forget he ever heard it.

  Judge Perez frowned. “Mr. Carruthers, you’ve got to stop talking as soon as the lawyer stands to make an objection.” Turning his attention back to them, he said, “Let the answer be stricken from the record. And Mr. Saul, don’t lead.” Edgar stood. “Just trying to expedite matters, Your Honor.” He sat back down. “Mr. Carruthers, what was Mr. Parker wearing the last time you saw him?”

  Bubba frowned. “Well, he was headed upstairs to change his clothes, but he had on his watch and ring and also a gold chain with a piece of eight on it. He was unbuttoning his shirt and Miss Lizzie, she was coming up the stairs behind him.”

  “Thank you.” Edgar stood again. “Pass the witness.”

  The judge nodded in Sandra’s direction. She half stood at her chair. “Thank you, Your Honor. Mr. Carruthers, we’re acquainted, aren’t we?”

  Bubba folded his arms across his chest. “I know you, Miss Sandra.” He stared over her head.

  “In here, I’m Miss Salinsky,” she stated. “Mr. Carruthers, isn’t it true that the watch and ring were on Mr. Parker when you came back from The Cantina?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t even see him then.”

  “Mr. Parker was not lying on the concrete, but was mostly on the grass, isn’t that true?”

  He shrugged. “Half on. Half off. It don’t make no difference. He was still dead.”

  “He was dead when you came back from The Cantina, wasn’t he?”

  “Was he?”

  “He was lying as I’ve described, in a velour bathrobe, mostly on the grass, his face smashed in, and his ring and watch still on his body, isn’t that true, Mr. Carruthers?” “You don’t know, you wasn’t there, Miss Salinsky.”

  “But you were. You came back earlier than you told the police, didn’t you? And you found Mr. Parker dead, didn’t you?”

  “Objection. Compound question, Your Honor.” Edgar was buttoning the second button on his jacket as if he thought he would be on his feet for a while in argument.

  “Rephrase, Judge,” she said.

  The judge said, “All right.”

  “Mister Carruthers, you returned from the bar earlier than you told the police, right?”

  “Who told you that?”

  The judge said, “Just answer the question, sir, and we’ll all get out of here a little earlier.”

  “Remember you’re under oath,” she said as Bubba’s eyes met hers. Sandra suddenly knew the meaning of that old saying, “if looks could kill.”

  “So, what of it?”

  “You found Phillip Parker dead at that time, right?” “Yeah? So what’s the diff if I found him dead then or later?” Bubba turned to the judge. “Judge, who cares when I found him? I didn’t kill him. I didn’t have nothing to do with his dying. I swear.”

  “But you did with the missing ring and watch, right, Mr. Carruthers?” Sandra asked.

  Bubba’s face had grown the same color as the ashes in Erma’s fireplace. He stared at her, his mouth open like a dead fish’s.

  When he didn’t answer, Sandra said, “In fact, when you found Phillip Parker dead, you removed his diamond pinkie

  ring and his Rolex watch and immediately called a fence, isn’t that true?”

  “You’re a liar. A damn liar,” Bubba said.

  “Shall I bring Mr. Fulshear into the courtroom to verify that you called him on the night in question?”

  “But I didn’t take the stuff to him.”

  The courtroom grew as quiet as the morgue.

  Bubba’s gaze went from her, to Edgar Saul, to the judge. “I want a lawyer, Judge. I want a lawyer.”

  Judge Perez unclenched his jaw and said, “Constable, take this man into custody.”

  Bubba stood and looked ready to run, but the constable had taken long strides down the aisle, his huge cell keys jangling at his side, his hand on his sidearm. “Hold it right there, Mister.”

  Bubba’s hands went up into the air and he froze.

  “We’ll take a fifteen-minute recess,” Judge Perez said as he stepped off the bench, his black robe billowing behind him. Sandra could still see him as he reached his small chambers and grabbed the telephone off the hook before ki
cking the door closed.

  Bubba’s earlier glare at her had nothing on Edgar’s now that Sandra met his eyes. She knew he knew that the arrest of Bubba for the theft of the watch and ring weakened the state’s case against Kitty considerably. The most they could get her for now would be manslaughter, a second-degree felony, as opposed to capital murder. Under the facts as Kitty had related them, even if Kitty had caused Phillip’s death, Sandra didn’t think she’d get more than criminally negligent homicide. A state jail felony, the term of years was nominal compared to the other two charges.

  “Sandra,” Kitty pulled on her sleeve like a child on its mother’s. “That was good for our side, huh?”

  Sandra leaned over, her eyes not leaving Edgar’s. “Very good, kid. At the very least they’re going to have to reduce the charges.”

  Kitty breathed out a gust of air. “That’s wonderful.”

  “We’re not through yet.” Sandra bent over the other way. “You want to talk, Mr. Saul?” She tried, but she couldn’t keep the cockiness out of her voice.

  Edgar couldn’t keep the edge out of his. “You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.” But she could tell he was a mite irritated with her.

  “I thought you guys had an obligation to seek the truth,” Sandra said as she pushed back her chair. She took Kitty by the arm and led her down the aisle and outside to the public restroom. Heads turned as they walked out. Stuart and Raymond approached them, but she waved them away. Sandra didn’t want the press or anyone else to say they violated “The Rule” and talked about the case with potential witnesses.

  They took care of their business. Sandra brushed off a female reporter who thought she had them cornered in the ladies’ room. No sooner were they seated back in the courtroom when the judge returned and again told Edgar to call his next witness.

  Edgar stood once more. “At this time, Your Honor, the state calls Officer Robert Earl Bradshaw.” He peered over his shoulder at Sandra as if to gauge her reaction.

  So Bradshaw was out of town, huh? The next time she saw Dennis Truman, she was going to kick his butt.

  The constable held the door open while a vaguely familiar young man who had the brawn of a farmhand came striding through. He spoke to the constable and nodded to the other cops in the gallery as he went past. Sandra was unable to catch his eye as he waltzed down the aisle or after he sat on the witness stand. Edgar Saul had probably instructed the young man to deliberately hide from her. That would be not unlike Edgar.

  “State your name for the record,” Edgar said.

  “Robert Earl Bradshaw.” He swiped at his blond crew cut while keeping his eyes steadily on Edgar.

  “And your occupation, sir.”

  Any fool could see from his uniform that he was an officer of the Galveston Police Department, but the written record wouldn’t show that unless someone verbalized it. Sandra sat mute while Edgar led the officer through that and some other formalities. It wasn’t long before she found out what the big secret was.

  “Were you working extra duty on the night of Phillip Parker’s death?” Edgar leaned forward in his chair. His little head protruded so that he reminded her of a baby bird in the nest, a featherless head wobbling on a long naked neck, chirping through a large yellow beak.

  “Yes, sir. It was my job to guard the entrance to make sure no one came in off the street.”

  “Had you been in Mr. Parker’s employ on a prior occasion?”

  “Yes, sir. Any time I could work for Mr. Parker, I wouldn’t pass it up. He usually fed us and paid us well.”

  “Us?”

  “Sometimes for the larger events, there were three or four off-duty police officers.”

  “And the night in question, how many were there?” “Originally?” He tapped his chin. “Four.”

  “Where were the other three when he was killed?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, sir, they had went home early.” He sat taller in the chair. “I was the only police officer remaining ’cause there was only a couple of folks left.”

  “Okay, now, Officer Bradshaw, on the night of this particular party, did Mr. Parker feed you?”

  “Well, yes, sir. We had plates of roast beef and crab claws and red sauce, stuff like that.”

  “Who brought the food out to you?”

  “Normally it was Bubba.”

  “Was it Bubba that night?”

  “Yes, sir. At least early in the evening. Bubba brought us plates of food and some Dr Peppers.”

  “Did someone else bring you food later in the evening?” Bradshaw fidgeted in his chair. “Miss Lizzie, sir, she brought us some cake.”

  Sandra remembered that cake. She had thought it rather gauche for Phillip to celebrate his asbestosis case victory with a specially-made cake in the shape of a lung. But then Phillip had been nothing if not confident in his cases.

  “Anyone else?”

  “Well, sir, not exactly.”

  “What do you mean not exactly?”

  For the first time Bradshaw looked in their direction. “That young lady over there, sir,” he said, pointing at Kitty.

  “She brought you food?”

  “No sir, drink.”

  “Another Dr Pepper?”

  Sandra knew damn good and well that it hadn’t been a Dr. Pepper, or Edgar wouldn’t be making such a production out of Bradshaw’s testimony.

  “No, sir. Bourbon and Coke.”

  “Bourbon and Coke,” Edgar Saul repeated loudly, in case the judge and anyone else in Galveston hadn’t heard.

  “Yes, sir, but it was more than that.”

  “Why, what do you mean, sir? Was it strong?”

  “Yes, sir. Real strong. What I mean to say, Mr. Saul, is that I believe that Miss Fulton slipped me a Mickey, ’cause it knocked me out.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Sandra heard the door in the back of the courtroom open and turned to see Edgar’s female assistant racing up the aisle like a woman on a mission. She whizzed through the gate and applied her brakes as Edgar stood and addressed the court. “May I have a moment, Judge Perez?”

  The judge nodded, leaned his chair back like a recliner, and closed his eyes. Sandra could practically hear him praying that their hearing would soon draw to a close.

  Edgar and the young attorney conferred for a moment. “Your Honor, may we approach the bench?” Edgar’s voice sounded quite a bit louder than it had been in his direct examinations. When they got up there, he said quietly, “The police have found a body at Elizabeth Haynes’ house, Your Honor. Shot to death. May we have a recess until tomorrow morning?”

  “It’s not Lizzie,” Sandra said. Cold fingers caressed her heart. She was not Lizzie’s greatest fan but did kind of consider them friends. Not Lizzie, she told herself.

  Edgar’s tightly pressed lips turned white. He shook his head. “They don’t know. Does she have any people around here that can make the identification?”

  Judge Perez cleared his throat. “Y’all come back here the same time tomorrow,” he whispered. He banged loudly on the wooden pounding block. “Court’s adjourned till nine a.m. tomorrow morning.” He dropped his voice. “Keep me

  posted, you two,” he said as he turned in his chair and stepped down.

  It’s funny what one hears in times of high stress. Sandra heard a high-pitched buzz from Judge Perez yanking the zipper down on his robe. She watched his back as he trod into chambers, floating as if in slow motion. Her eyes came to rest on Edgar.

  “No. Lizzie has no people as far as I know,” she said.

  “No next of kin?” He stopped throwing things into his briefcase and glanced at her.

  “Phillip Parker was the closest thing.”

  “Well, who’s going to identify the body?” He seemed irritated.

  “Is it a woman’s?”

  “Definitely,” the little assistant said.

  “Reddish-blond hair?”

  “Now that, I don’t know.” She turned to Edgar. “Mr. Saul, they want you at the ho
use . . . uh, now, the lieutenant said.”

  “Lieutenant Truman?” Sandra asked.

  “Yes, ma’am,” she answered. Sandra let that pass. She already knew she was old enough to be the young attorney’s mother.

  “Go with me, Sandra,” Edgar said. From his tone, Edgar was making a request rather than a demand, which was his usual course of behavior.

  The thought repulsed her. It must have been apparent on her face.

  “You could ID the body.”

  “If it’s her, you mean. The only other person I can think of, off the top of my head, is my mother and I don’t think Erma is up to this.” Sandra was thinking aloud. “It’ll be bad enough if it is Lizzie and I have to break it to Mother.”

  Shaking her head, Sandra felt nauseated at the thought. She could only hope that her tough-talking old bird of a mother wouldn’t break down.

  Becoming aware of her surroundings again, Sandra realized that the witness still sat on the witness stand, the constable still stood at the door in the back of the courtroom, and Kitty still waited at counsel table and watched them. Everyone else had cleared out.

  While Edgar spoke to Officer Bradshaw, Sandra explained to Kitty what had transpired, got her briefcase packed up, and led Kitty into the hall, delivering her to Raymond’s waiting arms. “Where’s Stu?” she asked Raymond.

  “Went back to the office. I’m supposed to beep him when I’m called to testify, so he can come back over here.”

  She nodded and started to return to the courtroom. Kitty caught at her sleeve.

  “No one will think I did it, will they, Sandy?”

  Sandra turned back to her. “Now what made you ask that?”

  Kitty stared at the floor. “I’d rather not say at this time.”

  As Sandra gazed at the top of Kitty’s head, she saw a red haze. She grabbed Kitty’s shoulder, wrenching her out of Raymond’s grasp, and slammed her up against the wall. “Now, goddamn you, you tell me what made you ask that. No tears. No hysteria. I want a straight answer from you and I want it now.” Her stomach churned as her eyes penetrated Kitty’s frightened baby blue ones. She wanted to hit Kitty. She wondered, albeit briefly, what the State Bar of Texas did to lawyers who punched out their clients.