High Crimes

“Well, that sucks,” Grimes said, tucking into an outsized wedge of sour-cream coffee cake. The owners of the shop knew him and obviously liked him. “Panel members, they’re going to eat up Hernandez’s motive for holding back — helping out a buddy, esprit de corps, protecting the army’s good name. Shit, only thing he left out was God.”

Claire sipped a black coffee and looked balefully at the NO SMOKING sign posted on the wall directly above their table. “But it’s a lie,” she said. Embry nodded and took a sip of coffee.

“You think the guy just dreamed up that stuff to spice up his story? Sort of like icing on the cake? Or Waldron told him to suddenly ‘remember’ it?”

Embry put in: “Waldron must have had something to do with it. Hernandez had all the right reasons — it’s not like he tried to claim he’d forgotten.”

“Maybe so,” Grimes said, “but the panel won’t think that.”

“So they’re one up on us,” she said. “You think I should have re-crossed?”

Embry shook his head, puzzled. Grimes spoke first. “Maybe,” he said at length. “I don’t know what I would have done.”

She nodded. “Fair enough. It was a tough call. A criminal trial is a psychodrama — and a crapshoot.”

The owner, or owner’s wife, appeared with a pot of coffee. She was an ample-bosomed, middle-aged black woman who smelled of sweat and Opium. She laid her free hand on Grimes’s shoulders. “Refill, sugar?”

He held out his mug. “Thanks, babe.”

“Anyone else?” she asked. Embry and Claire shook their heads no. “How’s my coffee cake, honey?” she asked Grimes.

“Tastes just like my mamma used to make, before she got arrested.”

The woman stopped short for an instant, baffled. Grimes laughed, ha-ha! “But it’s not as sweet as you,” he said.

“Not like you’d know,” she said mock sternly, and moved on.

“At least we’ve got Mark Fahey,” Embry said.

“One witness to their ten,” Claire said mordantly. “Has he been served with a subpoena yet?”

Embry nodded. “Prosecution’s been notified. Fahey will be here in three days, ready to testify.”

“Wonder what kind of rat hole the government puts him up at,” Grimes said, and shoveled another immense forkload of coffee cake into his mouth.

“What’s up with the transcription?” Claire asked.

“I’ve hired five different transcriptionists,” Embry replied. “This is going to cost big-time.”

“I need to read over Abbott. He done yet?” she asked.

“Close. Maybe by tonight; I’ll call. These women are working ’round the clock. That’s why it’s so expensive.”

Grimes looked up. Crumbs had colonized the lines around his mouth. “You still getting spooky phone calls?”

Claire nodded. “Yeah, but if I let the answering machine get them, he hangs up. Funny, he doesn’t seem to want to leave us a voice sample. Ray says the FBI’s got nothing on the trap-and-trace: the caller moves around to different exchanges; he’s only on for a few seconds.”

“He’ll stop,” Grimes said. “He’s made his point — trying to unnerve you — but it didn’t work.”

“You guys mind if I leave you here?” Embry asked. “I’ve got a boatload of ballistics stuff to go over, and I’m working on an idea.”

“Share,” Claire said.

“When I’ve checked it out,” Embry said, standing up.

After Embry had left, Claire told Grimes about the call from Lentini.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he said. “So he turns up after all. Man, this guy must be in deep fucking cover.”

“For good reason, I’d guess.”

“I want to go with you. We know nothing about him, and I don’t like mysteries.”

“I can take care of myself.”

Grimes seemed to consider this for a moment. “Can I ask you something?”

She looked at him.

“Was that all cooked up — that Post stuff?”

“No,” she admitted.

He nodded slowly. He was silent for a moment. “Shit, Claire,” he said at last, “we all make mistakes.”

“Mistakes?” she said with a bitter laugh.

“We all got skeletons in our closet. Stuff we wish we’d never done.”

She didn’t say anything, embarrassed to be talking about this with Grimes, but he gamely forged ahead. “General Marks said pursuing this case could be hazardous to your career. Guess he meant it, huh?”

“Guess so.”

“You think he, or one of his people, sent out people to dig stuff up?”

“My guess is it came up in the FBI background check. One of my professors at Yale.” She gave his name. Grimes, recognizing the name, nodded. “All it takes is someone in CID who’s friendly to the general.”

“Like just about anyone with ambitions,” Grimes said. “Suck up to the boss. You want to bring this up to the judge, get an investigation going?”

“For what? So he can say no, or, worse, he can order an investigation that goes nowhere? There won’t be any fingerprints on this.”