Solomon Vs. Lord - 02 - The Deep Blue Alibi

by Paul Levine

  Leicester went off to college in New England, intending to teach history, but returned home to rescue the business when his father died.

  The powerful gravitational pull of family.

  Her own. Steve's. Maybe Junior Griffin feared the loss of the family fortune, and maybe Leicester Robinson was obsessed with restoring his. But even if that was true, she still had no idea who murdered Ben Stubbs. And as for Leicester Robinson, no idea if he was a poet or a pirate.

  Thirty-six

  MAXIMUM HERB

  Steve lay in wait like an assassin . . . if assassins surveilled their prey from the front seat of the ultramini Smart car.

  He scanned the grassy terrain through binoculars. There was his target, in houndstooth slacks, a black polo shirt, and black leather gloves. Steve could pick him off easily with a scoped M-16. Or pop him in the head with a nine iron. Or just call him on his pager. Reginald Jones was driving a golf cart. Next to him, riding shotgun, some fat-assed business type. The fat guy looked familiar, but Steve couldn't quite place him.

  Earlier that morning, while spooning papaya pulp into the blender with yogurt to make Bobby's smoothie, Steve had scanned the Herald's sports section. The Marlins had been rained out, a seventh-grade soccer coach was caught selling steroids, and there was a charity golf tournament at Doral. Athletes, semi-celebrities, and local politicos would be teeing up. Including Reginald Jones, Chief Clerk of the Circuit Court.

  Before setting out for the Doral, Steve's phone rang, Willis Rask calling. The sheriff had run the name "Conchy Conklin" through the computer.

  "Full name's Chester Lee Conklin," Rask said. "Got the nickname because he's dumb as a conch shell. And that's his friends talking. Guy's got a record. Couple B-and-E's. Couple DUI's. On probation for an ag assault in a bar. Settled an argument with a broken beer bottle."

  "If he's on probation, you gotta know where he is," Steve said.

  "We would, except he missed his last two appointments. Probation officer went out to the trailer he was renting in Tavernier. No sign of him. Neighbors say they haven't seen him or his Harley in a month."

  Rask said he'd start the paperwork for the probation violation, see if they could find Conklin, bring him in.

  Now, with the midday sun high in the sky, the air was muggy with fat, puffy clouds building over the Everglades. Steve was slick with sweat, partly from the humidity, partly from the tension. His car was tucked into a strand of sabal palms along the narrow fairway of the eighteenth hole of the Doral Gold Course. While stalking Jones, he'd cruised past other foursomes, waving as if he were the head groundskeeper in a vehicle only slightly larger than their own carts.

  Jones and his partner both put their tee shots in the middle of the narrow fairway. The eighteenth hole was just a shade under four hundred yards and straight, but with an island green totally surrounded by water. Jones' second shot was a beauty, hitting twenty feet from the pin and dying there, like a quail felled by a hunter. The son-of-a-gun must have been sneaking out of the courthouse early to practice. His chunky partner plopped three shots into the drink and cursed loud enough for Steve to hear every syllable from his camouflaged position.

  The two golfers climbed back in their cart and headed for the green. Steve tore out of the palms after them. The men were nearing the bridge to the green when Steve beeped the horn and overtook them.

  "What the hell!" Jones jerked the golf cart to the right and skidded off the path, heading straight for the water hazard.

  An image came to Steve, his beloved Caddy crashing through the guardrail and plunging nose-down to the bottom of Spanish Harbor Channel. The golf cart slid sideways in the moist grass and splashed to a stop in the shallow water.

  "The fuck! The fuck!" Jones stepped out of the cart and sank up to his knees in mud. Not looking quite as dapper as he did in the framed photos in his office.

  "I'm sorry, Mr. Jones," Steve told him. "But it's the only way I could get to see you."

  Jones waded to the shore, his shoes sucking at the mud. His passenger, the heavyset man, waddled toward Steve, brandishing a sand wedge. "You crazy bastard. I'm gonna scramble your brains—"

  "Hold on, Jack." Jones held up a calming hand then turned to Steve. "You're Herb Solomon's son, aren't you?"

  "Guilty as charged."

  "I know you!" The heavyset man wagged the sand wedge in Steve's face. "You're that ambulance-chasing shyster."

  "Before you call anyone a shyster, I'd like to see your scorecard," Steve shot back.

  "What are you implying?"

  "If you put in for any of the prizes, I'm calling the cops."

  "Mr. Solomon," Jones interrupted, "say hello to Police Chief Jack McAllister."

  All things considered, Steve thought the chief clerk and the police chief were downright hospitable, as soon as he offered to buy them new shoes. After Jones two-putted for a par and the sheriff gave himself a five despite at least nine strokes, not including penalties, Steve sat at the bar in the Nineteenth Hole with the chief clerk.

  "Your father was a mentor to me," Jones declared.

  "He was always terrific with other people's kids," Steve conceded.

  They drank beer and munched burgers. Steve was paying for lunch, too. He was happy he didn't have to pick up their greens fees.

  "I was going to community college part-time when I started clerking for your father. The judge talked me into getting my bachelor's then helped me get a scholarship at FIU for my master's. Government administration. All the while telling me I could be whatever I wanted if I applied myself."

  "Funny, he used to tell me I'd never be half the lawyer he was."

  Jones chuckled. "Half of Herb Solomon is still a helluva lawyer."

  When they'd run out of small talk, Steve said: "I need to know what my father was involved in when Pinky Luber ran Capital Crimes."

  "Judge Solomon was involved in the pursuit of justice."

  "Aren't we all?"

  "All I'll say is this: You keep this up about Herb's Bar license, you're gonna open a can of worms. Just let it go."

  "Not until I know what's in that can."

  Jones sipped at his beer, glanced out the window to where other golfers were finishing up. "You remember the early eighties, after the Mariel boatlift?"

  "I was still a kid. But I remember the Pacino movie Scarface."

  "Well, that wasn't far off. Cocaine cowboys. Shantytown under the expressway filled with Castro's mental patients and criminals. Machine-gun shootouts at the Dadeland Mall. Highest murder rate in the country. Tourism down, businesses leaving."

  "What's that have to do with my old man?"

  "Herb was chief judge of the criminal division. He decided to do something about it."

  "What could he do that he wasn't already doing? Maximum Herb was always tough."

  "Before you can sentence them, you've got to convict them."

  "Meaning what? A judge has to be impartial."

  "If you examine your father's rulings, you'll find he was. The appellate courts must have thought so, too. Lowest reversal rate in the Eleventh Circuit."

  "What aren't you telling me? What the hell do you mean my father decided to do something about all the crime?"

  Jones slid his plate away. "The judge always had a pure heart. And cleaner hands than most."

  "You're talking in riddles, Mr. Jones."

  "And one more thing. Your father loves and respects you."

  "So I'm told." By everybody except him.

  SOLOMON'S LAWS

  10. Choose a juror the way you choose a lover. Someone who doesn't expect perfection and forgives your bullshit.

  Thirty-seven

  WINNING STREAK

  "You win cases in voir dire."

  Steve had told Victoria that when they tried their first case together, defending Katrina Barksdale in a murder trial.

  "Lawyers think they win with closing argument. Wow the jury with their oratory. But it's too late then. Jury selection's the most important
part of the trial. Not opening statement. Not cross of the state's chief witness. And not closing argument. Voir dire! Pick right, win. Pick wrong, lose."

  One of his many lectures. He could be so irritating when pontificating. But he was usually right. Which was even more irritating. Ever since she'd left the State Attorney's Office, Victoria had picked juries with Steve at her side. Now, on a rainy Key West day, she was standing alone. Okay, not quite alone. Her mother was perched like a snowy egret in the first row of the gallery. Virginal white the predominant color of her outfit. The Queen apparently trying to send subliminal messages of purity and innocence to the prospective jurors. A Max Mara skirt with a white jasmine floral design and an asymmetric hem, a white linen jacket with a tie front, and gunmetal sandals. The suede bag with lizard trim picked up the gunmetal color and provided what she called the "accènto."

  The Queen passed the time scribbling her observations about each potential juror, then handed the fine linen stationery to the bailiff, who slipped the pages to Victoria. Her helpful hints were confined to criticizing skirts that were too short, shoes that were out-of-date, and the mortal sin of carrying a knockoff faux-leather Prada handbag.

  Hal Griffin sat at the defense table, trying to smile at each potential juror without appearing obsequious. His son slouched in the single row of chairs in front of the bar that separated the well from the gallery. Junior had warned Victoria that he was likely to fidget, as he was unaccustomed to being cooped up indoors. Would she mind if he dropped to the floor for eighty push-ups in the middle of voir dire? Yes, she would. Not wanting the defendant's son to be seen squirming in his chair, she advised Junior to run up and down the staircase to the ground floor if he started feeling antsy.

  He'd passed her a note, too. Asking her out to dinner. She'd shaken her head and pointed at her briefcase. "Work to do." Junior had given her a sad smile, as if she'd broken his little heart.

  Does he have any idea of the pressure of defending a murder trial?

  With his father in the dock, shouldn't Junior be a little more understanding?

  Now, she was annoyed with both Steve and Junior. Maybe with all men.

  Reporters packed the first two rows of the gallery. Off to one side, the pool TV camera and a single newspaper photographer, all that was permitted under the rules of court. They would share their video and photographs with all the others.

  Victoria forced herself to listen as Richard Waddle, the Monroe County State Attorney, made his introductory remarks to the jury panel. Nicknamed "Dickwad" by defense lawyers, the prosecutor was a jowly man whose pencil mustache combined with seersucker suits gave him a 1940's look.

  "The jury is the cornerstone of justice, the bedrock of freedom," Waddle intoned. "Samuel Adams called the jury the 'heart and lungs of liberty.' "

  Actually, it was John Adams, Victoria knew. His cousin, Samuel, was the patriot who ignited the Boston Tea Party, probably so people would drink his beer.

  Waddle strolled alongside the jury box, pausing at each occupied chair like a train conductor punching tickets. "And when old Ben Franklin wrote the Declaration of Independence . . ."

  Thomas Jefferson, Dickwad.

  "He guaranteed us the right to trial by jury."

  Actually, that's in the Constitution. But close enough for government work.

  When did she become so sarcastic? Victoria wondered. Easy answer.

  When I hooked up with Steve.

  "The jury is what separates us from the uncivilized world," Waddle prattled on.

  And I thought it was pay-per-view wrestling.

  Yep. Definitely Steve's influence.

  "Without you good folks coming on down here, we'd have no justice system. So, on behalf of the state, I say thank you, kindly. Thank you for leaving your jobs and your homes, your friends and your families, putting your lives on hold to see that justice is done."

  Trying to be folksy. Next he'll chew on a piece of straw.

  "To make certain that no crime goes unchecked, no murder—"

  "Objection!" Victoria was on her feet. "That's not the purpose of the jury system."

  "Sustained." Judge Clyde Feathers didn't look up from his crossword puzzle. On the bench for thirty-two years, he had mastered the art of half listening. "I don't mind your speechifying, Mr. Waddle, but save your arguments for closing."

  "Thank you, Your Honor." Waddle bowed slightly, as if the judge had just complimented him on the cut of his suit. Courtroom protocol required thanking the judge, even if His Honor had just chastised you, threatened you with contempt, and called you the anti-Christ.

  "You good folks are the judges without robes," Waddle rambled on, oozing his charm over the jurors like syrup on waffles.

  Victoria concentrated on memorizing the names of the panel so she wouldn't have to look down at her pad when questioning them. Steve again.

  "Let them know you care enough to learn their names and where they live. 'Morning, Mr. Anderson. They fix the road on Stock Island, yet?' "

  "What is your occupation, Ms. Hendricks?" Waddle asked.

  Helene Hendricks, the heavyset woman sitting in seat number four, smiled back. "Dick, you see me driving the skeeter truck out of the county garage every day. You know darn well what I do."

  Small towns, Victoria thought.

  "It's for the record, Helene."

  "I spray mosquitoes for the county. Been doing it twenty-two years."

  "Ever been in trouble with the law?"

  "Willis busted me for DUI a couple times." She looked into the gallery where Sheriff Rask was sitting. He gave her a little wave. "I told him any alcohol I drink is purely medicinal. When I sweat, it cleans out the pores of that damn insecticide."

  An hour earlier, the sheriff had greeted Victoria warmly in the courthouse lobby. "Tell Steve I said howdy. Doesn't seem like Margaritaville without him."

  Victoria said she hadn't seen Steve in several days, though he had called to tell her about the search for Conchy Conklin. She thanked him for the two deputies who'd been hanging around the Pier House, keeping an eye on her room. Then Rask scratched his mustache with a knuckle, lowered his voice, and allowed as how he was sorry if there were problems between Steve and her. "You two go together like whiskey and soda."

  Or a fish and a bicycle, she thought. Remembering her American Feminism course at Princeton and the essays of Gloria Steinem.

  "You tell Steve that Jimmy's been asking about him, too," Rask said. "Wants to chase some bonefish soon."

  Rask walked away humming "Come Monday," the old Buffett song about missing your lover, then getting back together. Lobbying for his pal.

  Now Victoria studied Helene Hendrick's body language. Something else she learned from Steve. Answering Waddle's questions, the woman appeared comfortable, slouching a bit, arms relaxed. If she folded into a protective ball when Victoria stepped up, she'd be spraying mosquitoes by the afternoon.

  "The fact you work for the county," Waddle asked, "would that make you more inclined to favor the government?"

  "They don't pay me that much," Ms. Hendricks said.

  Victoria looked at Hal Griffin's notepad. He'd written a large "NO!" across Helene Hendricks' name. Wrong end of the socio-economic scale for his tastes. Problem was, it's hard to find a jury of peers for a multimillionaire.

  The first people who filed into the box were typical Key West. A retired naval officer, a time-share saleswoman, a cigar roller, a shrimper, a tattoo parlor owner, a pole dance instructor, and someone who called himself a "pharmaceutical tester."

  "That's a new one on me," Waddle said to the young man. "Didn't know there were any pharmaceutical companies in the Keys."

  "There aren't," the man replied. "I just test the stuff my buds make in their garage."

  Then there'd been a "wingwoman," who earned commissions accompanying men to bars and introducing them to women. Or in Key West bars, to other men.

  There was the city rooster wrangler, a man hired to keep the free-ranging chicken
s to a manageable level. Like Ms. Hendricks, he was a government employee. Then there were two failed businessmen, one who went bankrupt with a shoeshine parlor at the beach and another who lost everything with an ill-conceived fast-food restaurant called "Escargot-to-Go."

  Waddle addressed the entire panel. "This case involves circumstantial evidence. That means there's no eyewitness to the crime. No one's coming into court to say, 'I saw the defendant shoot poor Benjamin Stubbs with a speargun.' Now, you may not know this, but eyewitness testimony is notoriously flawed. In fact, circumstantial evidence is the higher-grade testimony. Yes, indeed, circumstantial evidence is sirloin and eyewitness testimony is chuck meat."

  "Objection!" Victoria figured Waddle was testing her. Either that, or he thought she'd fallen asleep. "Misstatement of the law."

  Judge Feathers nodded his agreement. "Sustained. Misstating the law is my job."

  That evening, Victoria was alone in her hotel room, nibbling a Cobb salad and working on her opening statement. Judge Feathers had told everybody to be back at eight a.m. to resume jury selection. Junior had cheek-kissed her good night, saying he'd be at the bar at the Casa Marina if she changed her mind and wanted to join him. Uncle Grif and The Queen were enjoying his-and-her massages at the hotel spa.

  Victoria believed The Queen had lied about her past relationship with Uncle Grif, but what could she do about it? If she fretted over that—or pestered them with more questions—she'd do a lousy job in court.