Bark of Night

by David Rosenfelt

  “Off the record?” he asks. “I’m not familiar with that phrase. Is there a third option?”

  I nod. “Yes. Pete and I can have the talk in his office tomorrow, and you can pay for your own food and beer for the rest of your natural life.”

  “Let’s go with B,” he says.

  “Off the record?”

  “Way off,” he says. “Totally off.”

  “Good. It’s a treat to meet a man of principle.” With that I turn to Pete and inform him of Debra identifying George Adams as the man who brought Truman in. “He’s the guy wanted for the murder of his wife in Philadelphia.”

  “This is the same receptionist who supplied the information on the Haley murder?”

  “Yes. Obviously.”

  “Anything else she want to report on? Maybe the Kennedy assassination? Or did she run into John Wilkes Booth in the supermarket?”

  “Pete, as her attorney, this conversation represents her officially reporting what she knows to the proper authorities, although referring to you as a ‘proper authority’ is an insult to proper authorities everywhere. In any event, you can do whatever you want with it. Just so you know, she also called the Philly tip line.”

  “You and your client are model citizens. I’ll alert the Philly cops; I’m sure you’ll hear from them.”

  “You know, if this guy could murder his wife down there, he could also have murdered someone up here, say, on Thirty-ninth Street.”

  “Except the guy who really did it is in jail.”

  “If you arrested him, the chance that he’s actually guilty is close to absolute zero.”

  “You’ve got time on your hands,” he says. “Why don’t you prove it?”

  “I’m afraid I might have to,” I say, because I really am afraid I might have to at least try.

  Vince finally speaks. “I forget, was this on or off the record?”

  Laurie spent most of her career as a Paterson cop; she rose to the rank of lieutenant.

  The fact that she was so well liked, and retains so many friends on the force, is probably the only reason the current Paterson cops haven’t put a hit out on me. As a defense attorney, I am widely and naturally disliked by law enforcement. As a thoroughly obnoxious defense attorney, that dislike reaches rare heights.

  In addition to keeping me alive, Laurie’s law enforcement relationships sometimes help in other ways, and today is another example. She once worked in concert with the Philadelphia Police Department on a case in which a suspect in a murder case had fled there. Laurie had gone down to question the guy, and ultimately to extradite him.

  She worked with Sergeant Jack Rubin, and they have maintained a Christmas/birthday card relationship ever since. We took Jack and his wife out to dinner once when they spent a few days in New York, and I was on my best behavior.

  So I’m calling Jack to see what he knows about George Adams and the murder of Adams’s wife. I’m not sure that her murder has anything at all to do with Truman or the murder of James Haley, but my approach is usually to gather as much information as I can and put off worrying about whether it is valuable or relevant until later.

  This is the way I usually operate on a case, the only difference now being that I’m not really involved in this one. For example, by now I would have extensively interviewed and debriefed my client, something I haven’t done, since I don’t actually have a client.

  I said I was calling Sergeant Rubin, but that is not actually the case. Laurie is calling him and will then put me on the phone. We do it like this because Laurie has certain important qualities that I lack, such as likeability, warmth, and general humanity. It has a tendency to soften people up so that they find me more tolerable.

  This time the softening-up takes about ten minutes, and then she hands me the phone. I chitchat with Rubin for almost ten seconds and then ask him what he knows about George Adams.

  “This about the two killings down here?”

  “What two killings?” I ask.

  “We’ve got a possible serial killer in the making. Homeless men are turning up dead. They’re being shot in the head, executed.”

  “Why would you think I’d be asking about that?”

  “Because you just had a similar murder up there. Clifton is near Paterson, right?”

  “Yes, but I haven’t heard about it.”

  “You sure you’re a criminal defense attorney?”

  “I have my doubts, and proud of it,” I say. “And I make sure not to watch the news. Is Adams a suspect in those two murders?”

  “Not yet, but you never know. He’s a piece of garbage,” Jack says. “No brains, no conscience, no fear. Which makes him valuable to the people who control him.”

  “Who controls him?”

  “Mostly Fat Tony Longo.”

  “Fat Tony Longo?”

  “Yeah,” Jack says. “They call him that because his name is Tony Longo and he’s fat.”

  “He sounds like a heck of a guy. I assume Fat Tony doesn’t run a philanthropic organization?”

  “You assume correctly. But the word on the street is that Fat Tony claims to have no idea where George is, or what the hell he is up to. Of course, the word on the street is rarely correct.”

  “Why did George kill his wife?”

  “Who says he did?”

  “The media.”

  “That’s where you get your information? It’s true—we’re looking for George, although it’s not my case. But if you’re asking me, which I assume you are, I don’t think he did it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, first of all, people who know George have always been amazed at how Denise had him wrapped around her little finger. But that’s not the real reason. He could always have snapped; George has spent his entire life in pre-snap mode.”

  “And the real reason?”

  “It’s not his style; it’s not how George would have done it. He wouldn’t have left her body there; he would have hidden it where no one could find it and gone on with his life. If anyone asked, he would claim she went to live with her long-lost sister.”

  I tell him about the Haley murder and George winding up with Truman. “Doesn’t sound like George either,” he says. “I would think he would just put a bullet in the dog’s head.”

  I understand what Jack is saying, but it doesn’t clear anything up. Why and how did Adams wind up with Truman in the first place? Why not just let him run stray? Why not kill the dog himself if he wanted him dead? These are questions Jack would have no idea how to answer.

  “So, bottom line, what do you think?” I ask.

  He pauses for a few moments, weighing his words. “I think it’s possible that the lady at the vet office is wrong in thinking it was George.”

  “And if she’s right?”

  “I’ll say this. If George had any connection whatsoever to a murder, and this dog would represent a connection, then George is somehow involved in that murder. It doesn’t mean the guy they arrested is innocent, but George is not just a bystander. There aren’t coincidences that big.”

  I’ve got a big decision to make.

  I’ve been hovering around the periphery of the Haley murder case, gathering information but not taking anything approaching an active role. I have no personal involvement yet, beyond a willingness to help Dr. Dowling.

  But he doesn’t really need my help any longer, so it’s time to decide whether to take the key step. There’s no escaping the obvious … if I’m going to make the next logical move in looking into this case, I need to talk to the accused.

  If I do that, it creates the danger of this becoming personal. God forbid I should like the kid, or think it’s credible that he’s innocent. Then I will really be stuck.

  But there’s another aspect to this that’s even worse. There’s a guy out there, George Adams, who may have killed his wife. I can’t be sure of that; in fact, Sergeant Jack Rubin has his doubts. But even he believes Adams is a murderer; that’s part of Adams’s résumé.

>   And no matter what Adams has done or not done to various people, Adams is guilty of the attempted murder of Truman. I’m certain of that, just as I’m certain that I can’t simply let him get away with it.

  I share all of this with Laurie, and her response is, “You want me to go with you?”

  “Where?”

  “To the jail to talk to Joey Gamble.”

  “I haven’t decided to do that yet.”

  “Of course you have,” she says.

  “I’d need to talk to Bulldog and set it up. His people are handling the case.”

  She nods. “I already took care of that. He was thrilled and has already notified the jail personnel. You’re good to go.”

  “So, is it that you think you know me, or that you think you can control me?” I ask.

  “You’re an independent man, Andy. No one can control you.”

  “You’re controlling me now.”

  She nods. “What tipped you off?” Then, “So do you want me to go to the jail with you?”

  “No, I’m an independent, uncontrollable man.”

  I take my independence and head down to the jail by myself to see Joey Gamble. It’s not the quickest and easiest thing to do. As a designated lawyer, I have the right to visit and talk to Gamble in private, but as people who dislike lawyers, the jail personnel have the right to take their sweet time about making it happen.

  When Joey is finally brought in, his appearance surprises me. I’m not talking about the fear in his eyes and face; that is to be expected. He’s had a few run-ins with the law before, but nothing like this. This is a murder charge that he’s facing; it is fair to say that if he is convicted, any meaningful life he might lead is over.

  What surprises me about him is his size. He can’t be more than five foot seven, a hundred and forty pounds. I’ve got him by three inches and twenty-five pounds, and nobody has ever worried about running into me in a dark alley.

  He eyes me suspiciously. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Andy Carpenter. I’m a lawyer.”

  “My lawyer?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “So whose side are you on?” he asks, a perfectly reasonable question.

  “Either yours or nobody’s,” I say, and then explain that I’m helping the Public Defender’s Office at this point. Whether I become involved in the case is still to be determined.

  He looks like he doesn’t fully understand, but finally shrugs and says, “Okay, what do you want?” He’s already exhausted by the process, and the fear, and the worry. At some point he’ll become partially numb to it, but that’s a ways off.

  “I want to know why your fingerprints are all over James Haley’s apartment.”

  “Because I was in there.”

  At least he’s not claiming otherwise; denying clear forensic evidence is a nonstarter. “Why were you in there?”

  “He wanted to ask me questions,” Gamble says. “He had been in the neighborhood, filming stuff, and he wanted me to be in his movie. To talk to him about what it was like in the neighborhood.”

  “Why you?”

  Gamble shrugs. “I don’t know. I was interested in what he was doing, and I was asking questions about it. Everybody else seemed pissed off that he was there. So maybe he thought I’d be willing to talk.”

  “Why was everybody else pissed off?”

  He shrugs again. “’Cause he wasn’t from the neighborhood, you know? What goes on there wasn’t his business, at least that’s what people thought.”

  “So you went to his place and talked to him. What about?”

  “First he was asking general stuff, like was it hard to find work, and did people ever leave, and did I go to school … that kind of stuff. So I answered him, but I don’t think he cared much.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  He shrugs. “Just a feeling I had. I’m used to people not giving a shit what I say.”

  “Were you being filmed during this time?”

  He nods. “Yes—at least he said so. The camera seemed to be on.”

  “You said ‘at first’ he was asking general stuff. That changed?”

  “He started asking me about drug stuff, whether a lot of guys were users, what kind of drugs, things like that. I told him I didn’t know anything about it, and then he asked about…” He hesitates before finishing the sentence. “About Chico Simmons.”

  “Who is Chico Simmons?” He looks at me like I would look at someone who’d just asked “Who is LeBron James?”

  “He’s an important guy in the neighborhood.”

  “A gang leader?”

  He frowns. “He’s got people,” is his grudging response. “He’s got a lot of people.”

  “Are you one of them?”

  “No.”

  “So what did you tell him about Chico Simmons?”

  He laughs a short laugh. “Nothing. Are you crazy?”

  “What did he want to know?”

  “I don’t know. I told him I never heard of Chico. I figure he knew I was lying and wasn’t going to tell him anything, so that was pretty much it. He turned off the camera and said we were done.”

  “So you left at what time?”

  “I think it was about eight thirty.”

  I know that the coroner placed the time of death as between eight and ten, so Gamble’s timeline is not helpful. “Did you leave through the front door or the back?”

  “The front.”

  “Did you see anybody around?”

  “Not that I remember.” Then, “Maybe a neighbor. A guy.”

  “Did Haley have a dog?” I ask.

  “Yeah. He was sitting on a couch the whole time we talked, like he was listening in.”

  “What was the dog’s name?”

  “How the hell should I know?”

  I show him a photograph of Truman. “Does this look like the dog?”

  He nods. “Yeah, could be. I think so, yeah.”

  I next take out a photo of George Adams that we printed off the internet. “Do you know who he is?”

  Gamble looks at it for at least ten seconds and then says, “No, I don’t think so. Should I?”

  I shrug. “I have no idea.”

  I leave without telling Joey Gamble what I might or might not do.

  I do that for two reasons, the main one being that I don’t know what I might or might not do. Laurie is going to want me to take the case, but I just might take a stand and refuse her outright. I also just might be named Miss Congeniality in the next Miss New Jersey contest.

  The other reason I don’t feel obligated to tell Gamble my intentions is that I don’t think he cares one way or the other. He sees me as just another public defender, and I doubt that he feels he has enough information to choose between us.

  He actually thinks another lawyer might be as good as me. That in itself might make him a candidate for an insanity defense.

  I believed what Gamble told me, though it might be more accurate to say that I didn’t disbelieve him. They are both singularly meaningless statements, since I have learned over the years that my instincts in judging guilt or innocence are to be trusted or disregarded, and I never know which until the facts are in.

  I have no desire to embark on a murder trial; it takes total focus and an enormous amount of time and effort. But I’ve been saying that for a long time, and for some reason I keep taking them. Maybe I should spend more time talking to a shrink than to a judge.

  But as much as I would dread the process, my real fear is that I’ll take the case, get heavily into it, and then learn an explanation for George Adams having Truman that has nothing to do with the Haley murder. That would be an unmitigated disaster, because Adams and Truman represent the only reasons I am considering getting involved at all, and the only reasons I am doubting Joey Gamble’s guilt.

  I simply do not want to discover that I am representing a murderer, and there is every likelihood that I would find out that I am after it’s too late to extricate myself et
hically.

  Laurie’s wanting me to do it will be an important factor, but not because I would be loath to say no to her. The truth is that her reason will be the same as mine: the circumstances are such that we want to know what really happened, and we want to see justice done.

  The other truth is that she and I and our team are the only available players that combine the expertise, dedication, and especially resources to make sure the truth will come out.

  Or maybe, despite our expertise, dedication, and resources, the truth won’t come out. We won’t know until we know, and maybe not even then.

  When I get home, Laurie is of course anxious to hear how my conversation with Gamble went, and I promise her I will fill her in as soon as I get back from a walk with Tara and Sebastian. She knows I do my best, and often only, thinking while I walk them, so she doesn’t offer to come along.

  We have two basic walking routes from our house on Forty-second Street in Paterson. One is to walk neighborhood streets on Nineteenth Avenue down to Vreeland Avenue and then come back up on Eighteenth. The other is to head for Eastside Park and then take a slower and more leisurely walk through the park.

  I’m sure Tara and Sebastian prefer the park route, since there are clearly many more smells to savor. And that’s the one we take now, since I want to be able to take the time to think things through.

  As we are finally leaving the park and heading home, I say to Tara, “So what should I do?”

  She turns toward me with a look that says either, “I have no idea what you should do,” or “Andy, go with your gut; I’m sure you’ll make the right decision,” or “I am a dog and don’t understand a single word that you just said.”

  “Thanks, Tara,” I say. “That clears it right up.”

  When we get back to the house, Laurie asks,”What are you going to do?” She knows that the purpose of this particular walk was to make my decision, and for all our joking about it, she respects that it is my decision to make.

  “The son of a bitch paid to have Truman killed,” I say.

  “Yes, he did.”

  “We’ve got ourselves a client.”