The Right Wrong Thing

by Ellen Kirschman

  “How is the chief doing?” I say.

  He is as constrained as I am by confidentiality. “You can ask her yourself. I’m sure she’ll be relieved to see you in person. And now I’m off to visit Darnell Taylor.” He smiles broadly. “I get to work both sides of the aisle. Darnell Taylor is a lost boy. Falling through the cracks, heading for serious trouble. Someone needs to look after him. I’m blessed that my church has a program to help such troubled young men.”

  * * *

  The chief stands to greet me. “I’ve been concerned. I hope you know I’ve called you several times and left messages.”

  “All over town, apparently.”

  “How are you?”

  “Physically I’m fine. Emotionally, it’s a different story.”

  “Always is,” she says.

  “Why didn’t you tell me Rich Spelling was a suspect? It would have saved Eddie and me a lot of trouble.” I want to bend my head down and show her the itchy bald spot that I’ve tried to cover with a badly teased comb-over.

  “I’m sorry that you and Eddie got hurt. But I need to remind you that no one asked either of you to involve yourselves or put yourselves at risk.” She lets out a long sigh. There are new lines on her face. She looks as if she’s aged years in just the last few weeks.

  There’s a knock on the door. “I’ve invited Captain Pence and District Attorney Herter to join us. I hope you don’t mind.”

  It’s a rhetorical question. The two of them are in the room before I have a chance to object, sputtering about how nice it is to see me looking well. I don’t know what they want or why whatever they want has anything to do with me.

  The chief pushes four chairs together, offers us coffee, and acts as though she’s hosting a friendly meeting between old colleagues. Herter is still as sallow and pinch faced as he was the night he interviewed Randy after her shooting. He’s a particularly unpleasant man and his efforts to be sociable are a transparent failure. He’d be better off if he didn’t try.

  The chief begins. “Rich Spelling is claiming that Randy was determined to kill herself in front of Lakeisha Gibbs’ apartment. Some ritual of self sacrifice or atonement.” I flash back to our struggle in the parking lot. Those are the very words I told him to say.

  “He says that he drove Randy to Ms. Gibbs’ apartment complex, thinking that once they arrived, Randy would change her mind. She didn’t and when he attempted to wrestle her weapon away, it went off and killed her. Accidentally. He panicked and wiped off his and Randy’s fingerprints, hoping to implicate one of our other suspects. He says you will testify to this.”

  “I can’t do that. I wasn’t even there.”

  “In addition, he claims you will testify that he shot Eddie Rimbauer in self-defense.”

  “I couldn’t possibly. I was curled up on the floor with my arms over my head. I didn’t see anything.”

  “Here’s the problem.” Herter glances at the chief, clearly impatient with her methodical delivery. He leans so close to me that I can smell his sour breath. “We don’t believe his story. But without a confession, we have a murder with no witnesses and very little physical evidence. Will you help us?”

  “First I get reprimanded for sticking my nose into police business and now you want me to get Rich Spelling to confess to killing his wife? This is crazy. You can’t have it both ways.”

  Jay Pence moves forward in his chair. “He hasn’t asked for a lawyer yet. He’s waiting to talk to you first.”

  “I’m a psychologist, not a cop, as you, Captain Pence, have reminded me on several occasions. Interviewing suspects is your job. Not mine.”

  “He says you promised to help him.”

  “Of course I did. I would have said anything to save my life. He was going to kill me. I don’t want to talk to him, I hate him. He killed Randy.” So much for therapist neutrality.

  Herter looks at his watch and stands up. “This is getting us nowhere. I need to file charges. Same for Johnson.”

  “Marvel Johnson is here, in the station?”

  The chief nods affirmatively.

  “Why don’t you ask her to persuade Rich Spelling to confess?”

  Herter walks behind my chair. His suit reeks of moldy cheese. “As I understand it, you tried that little scenario and it didn’t work.”

  “It didn’t work because Eddie’s gun fell on the floor and everything went to hell before Rich said anything to Marvel about killing Randy.”

  “Marvel Johnson is terrified of Rich Spelling. I doubt we can persuade her to help us,” the chief says.

  “I’m terrified of Rich Spelling, too. I was the one he was going to kill. Not Marvel. He loves Marvel.”

  Herter keeps pacing. Pence examines the ends of his fingertips.

  “Why should I help you? What’s in it for me?”

  “Maybe you’d like to keep your job?” Pence says.

  “Are you ordering me to do this? Because I’m a consultant. I don’t take orders from you.”

  One corner of his mouth arches toward a sneer and stops. He needs my help. Fighting his own instincts, he’s going to have to be nice to me to get it.

  “Whatever we do, we do it because we owe it to Randy,” the chief says. “I let her down once, as Dr. Meyerhoff has made abundantly clear. I don’t want to let her down twice.”

  A cold prickle runs across my neck and shoulders. The chief isn’t to blame for Randy’s death. If anyone beside Rich is to blame, it’s me. I was wrong not to have paid more attention to him. I was so invested in Randy’s problems, I didn’t see this coming and I should have. Rich was fine when the attention was on him and what he needed. But when Randy was the one in need, he couldn’t go the distance. And now it’s me refusing to go the distance.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  Psychotherapy is more art than science, more intuition than deductive reasoning. Evidence-based treatment has its place, but it will never replace my gut feelings or the images that float up out of my subconscious. The image forming in front of me now is Rich Spelling in the parking lot on Travis Street, the look of desperation on his face as Marvel drove away. The image shifts like a curtain blowing in the breeze. This time he’s a little boy, waiting by himself in a dark schoolyard. All the other kids have long gone home. He’s cold and hungry. Once again his mother has forgotten to pick him up.

  “Let’s go, Doc,” Pence says. “We haven’t got all day. Can you help us or not?” This is beyond ironic, three highly ranked law enforcement professionals are waiting for me, the organization’s stepchild, alternately appreciated and ignored, to help them get a confession.

  Intermittent reinforcement. It’s what keeps people coming back to Las Vegas. Because sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. It’s never the same and it’s never predictable. Intermittent reinforcement is what kept Rich waiting for his mother in the dark. It’s what keeps him tethered to Marvel. And it’s what is keeping me from walking out of the room.

  “Sit down,” I say. “I have something that might work.”

  * * *

  The sky outside is as dark as the mood in our little brainstorming session.

  “Here’s what I suggest. Tell Marvel that you’ll drop all charges against her if she will get Rich Spelling to confess. Give her a detailed description of what her life will be like in prison, with an emphasis on the bad parts. Tell her what to say. I’ll write the script.”

  “I doubt she’s going to prison. Maybe we can charge her for withholding information, interfering with a police investigation, but not much more.” Pence looks from me to Herter for confirmation.

  “Too bad being manipulative, ambitious, naïve and biting off more than you can chew is not considered a crime,” I say.

  “Do you think she helped murder Randy?” The chief looks incredulous.

  “No,” I say. “If she didn’t have the guts to find Randy unfit for duty, I doubt she had the guts to murder her.”

  Herter gives me a look. “So how am I supposed to convince her she�
��ll go to prison if she doesn’t cooperate?”

  “I’m just a psychologist. What do I know? But isn’t it legal for a cop to lie to a suspect to get a confession? I doubt Dr. Johnson knows anything about criminal law. You could tell her the punishment for withholding information from the police was the electric chair and she’d probably believe you.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  We’re standing on the viewing side of a one-way mirror watching Rich Spelling pace around the room under the watchful eye of the largest correctional officer I’ve ever seen. He’s a newly hired lateral from another county with no ties to Rich. Rich is wearing an orange jumpsuit. His feet and hands are shackled causing him to shuffle like an old man.

  It took Marvel forty-five minutes to recover from the shock that someone was actually going to hold her accountable for her behavior. She was two offices away and we could hear her crying and pleading with Herter. By the time she walked out, clutching her Bible and the script I wrote for her, her eyes and cheeks were scorched red from crying.

  Rich is expecting me, not Marvel. A little shock and awe to destabilize him. He’s a jailhouse cop; he knows someone is on the other side of this window observing him. My hope is that once he sees Marvel, nothing else will matter.

  As soon as she enters the interview room, he lets out a howl of joy and pain, pushes out of his seat and stumbles toward her. The CO steps in front of him and warns him that there is no touching allowed. Marvel is shaking. The CO directs her to a chair at the opposite end of the table. She and Rich sit face to face, six feet apart, staring at each other.

  “Why did you leave me in the parking lot?”

  “You were going to kill Dr. Meyerhoff. I’m a Christian. Killing is wrong.”

  “I wanted to scare her. I wouldn’t have killed her.”

  “How can I be sure? You killed Randy, didn’t you?”

  Pence gives Herter an elbow in the ribs. The chief scowls. Rich is now shuffling in front of the one-way window. Looking at us.

  “They’re watching me. Recording everything I say.”

  “If our relationship is going to work, we need to be honest with each other,” Marvel turns her head in our direction. “They want to send me to jail.”

  “It’s me they’re going to lock up. Not you,” he says.

  “Pray with me, please,” she bows her head and places both hands on her Bible. “Dear Lord, help us to redeem ourselves. Give us the courage to go forward, no matter how dark or uncertain the future. Help us in our hour of need.” She lifts her face. There are tears streaming down her cheeks. “They think I helped you kill Randy because I wanted to be with you. They’re going to send me to prison. Tell them I had nothing to do with it. Please.” Now she’s sobbing between words. “I’ll wait for you. I’ll write to you. I promise.”

  Pence and Herter are wiping mock tears from their faces.

  Rich walks back to his seat. “Why should I believe you? You set me up, tried to entrap me. And then you left me.” He is wailing now. His eyes are glossy and the ends of his mouth quiver in an effort to keep back his tears.

  “I didn’t want to. They made me. Told me if I didn’t cooperate I’d go to jail.”

  “Swear on your Bible. Swear you love me, that you’ll wait for me.”

  “Will you accept Christ and confess?” Marvel shoves the Bible across the table. The CO grabs it before Rich does.

  “Sorry, ma’am. You cannot give the prisoner any reading material.” He points to a sign on the wall listing all the things a prisoner may not receive.

  “It’s a Bible. A Bible,” Marvel says.

  “Sorry, that’s the rule,” he says and hands it back.

  “You do it,” Rich says. “I don’t want to hide our relationship anymore. If we have to hide it, it’s not worth having. Swear on the Bible that you love me. “

  “And then you’ll confess? A Christian man would never let a woman be punished for something she didn’t do.”

  “Then swear on the Bible that you love me.”

  Marvel swallows hard, sets her Bible on the table and gently pushes it aside. “I’ll do something even better.”

  She stands and walks to the one-way window, positioning herself right in the middle, her nose up against the glass. I step back. Herter chuckles. Pence lifts his eyebrows. “Not to worry,” the chief says, “she can’t hear us or see us.”

  Marvel is standing ramrod straight. One hand dangling at her side, out of Rich’s view. Her fingers are crossed. “Whoever you are. I love Rich Spelling. Record that.” She scuttles back to her seat.

  Rich rises from his chair. “I knew it,” he says, “You love me. I knew it.”

  Marvel gives him a weak smile and reaches for her Bible.

  “Now?” she says. “Now will you tell the truth?”

  Rich struggles to his feet and turns towards us. He raises his hands. The metal shackles wink in the overhead light. “My name is Rich Spelling,” he announces. “I killed my wife, Randy Spelling. No one else was involved.”

  “Why?” Marvel says. “Tell them why.”

  Now tears pour down Rich’s face. “I didn’t matter. All that mattered was her and her troubles. I wanted a divorce, she wouldn’t listen, didn’t have the time. I felt trapped. I didn’t want to kill her. I felt sorry for her, she was so miserable. But I didn’t have another choice.” He goes back to his seat. Marvel gets up and heads for the door. “I did it for you,” Rich calls after her. “Not for me. Never for me.”

  Pence and Herter do a few high-fives.

  “Thanks for your help,” they say, almost in unison. “Couldn’t have done it without you.” It’s not an Academy Award, but it feels good.

  * * *

  The chief is quiet on the way back from the jail. “I lost the vote of no confidence, did you know that? I’m going to give it another day or two, but I’m fairly certain I’m going to retire. I’ve got more than twenty years on the job. I could collect my retirement today.” We pull into the parking lot at police headquarters. “I thought I had worked through all of my issues about my own incident, but Lakeisha Gibbs’ death brought it all back. I can’t face another incident of this magnitude. I don’t want to face another incident of this magnitude. That’s not the attitude a police chief should have.”

  “That’s the nature of PTSD,” I say. “It bites you in the butt when you least expect it. And it’s hard to avoid.” I think of something my father used to say, “If you want to get hit by a golf ball, baby girl, stand on the golf course.” No way the chief can stay in police work and not continually run into herself over and over. She can try to compartmentalize her feelings, but, like Rich Spelling, it’s inevitable that they will catch up to her.

  “KPD deserves a chief who can give 100 percent of his or her attention and energy to this job. I think Jay Pence can do that. He’s ready. He’s been loyal to me, despite all his anger and misgivings. None of us know what lies in the future. Rich Spelling could recant his confession. Chester Allen is mounting a campaign for a citizens’ review board. I don’t have what it takes to see any of that through. “

  “You wanted to bring more women into the force. Pence hates women. He hates me.”

  “If I’ve learned anything in this business it’s to take the good with the bad. Jay Pence has more good qualities than bad. At any rate, there’s no guarantee he’ll get the job. The city council will have to launch another national search. National searches are expensive; they’ll no doubt need to wait until another budget cycle.”

  “Great,” I say. “That gives him plenty of time to fire me first.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  My next-to-final stop for the day is the Gibbs household. I asked my mother about Charla Bernstein, but all she could remember was a tall, graceful woman of color who wound up marrying a Jewish doctor. And then she said she had to hang up or she’d be late for water aerobics. I couldn’t bear to press her on the subject, but I have no such reservations about confronting Dr. Bernstein.

/>   Bernstein opens the door, barefoot and wearing a loose caftan, her hair flying around her shoulders. No jewelry, no makeup. Her jaw drops slightly in surprise.

  “May I come in?”

  She steps back, opens the door wider, and gestures me toward the living room. The apartment is as it was the last time I was here. The dining table set for four, everything neat as a pin and looking untouched.

  “My daughter is at work and the boys are at football practice. What can I do for you?”

  “Were you telling the truth about your relationship with my father?”

  “I wouldn’t worry about that if I were you. What’s past is past.”

  “You’re not me.”

  “If you’ve come here to get me to promise never to approach your mother you’ve wasted your time. I’m not a cruel woman. I’m a grieving grandmother who would do anything to protect my remaining grandchildren.”

  “That’s what worries me.”

  We’re standing in the hall, not more than a few feet from the front door. It’s clear she’s not going to ask me to sit down.

  “I should be thankful,” she says. “The police surveillance has been removed from the parking lot and my grandsons have stopped complaining that they are being followed around school by plainclothes officers. Evidently you were instrumental in exposing the real murderer.” She shakes her head. Her hair lifts and settles like smoke. “And I understand Darnell Taylor is back in jail. He’s a troubled young man. He needs help and he won’t find it in jail.”

  I’m not buying her concern. She would have thrown Darnell Taylor to the wolves if it would have saved her grandsons.

  “My grandsons may be off the hook, but nothing else has changed. Didn’t you see how easy it was for everyone—the police, the newspapers, the community—to assume that the person responsible for Officer Spelling’s death was a black male?”

  “Isn’t it logical to assume that whoever killed Randy was related to Lakeisha?”