High Crimes

“If you’re machine-gunning eighty-seven people, one hundred rounds isn’t enough, is it?”

“No, it’s not.”

“So you must have seen him reload.”

But Abbott was too well prepared. “He had two belts linked together,” he said evenly. “He didn’t have to reload.” A brief twinkle of triumph seemed to enter his eyes.

“Mr. Abbott, did your unit have muzzle devices called distorters available for your M-60 machine guns?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Why did we have them?”

“Correct.”

“To mask the location of the shooter,” he said, one eyebrow cocked in a deft expression of contempt. “Sometimes it was very important that we not be located.”

“And can you tell me whether Sergeant Kubik had a distorter or a sound-suppressor on his weapon?”

Abbott hesitated. This detail they hadn’t furnished him.

“I believe not.”

“You believe not?” Claire echoed. “Well, isn’t the sound of an M-60 machine gun extremely loud?”

“Yes,” he conceded grudgingly.

“So there’s nothing subtle about it, is there? It would be just about impossible not to know whether an M-60 had a sound-suppressor on it, isn’t that right?”

He shrugged, wary of the trap he suspected she was laying for him. “Perhaps.”

“So, then, is it your testimony that Sergeant Kubik did not use a sound-suppressor or distorter when he fired the rounds that killed the eighty-seven civilians?”

“Right.”

Had he guessed? If so, he was lucky. Abbott was too sharp, or too well briefed, to be shaken from his prefabricated story. She decided it was time to pounce.

“Mr. Abbott, how much business does your company do with the Department of Defense?”

“I don’t really know.”

“Surely you have a fairly good idea.”

“A couple billion, certainly.”

“A couple of billion dollars,” she marveled. “So a good relationship with the Pentagon, and the army in particular, must be important to you and your company.”

He shrugged. “The customer’s always right, I like to say.”

“I’ll bet. And are you currently involved in any contract negotiations with the Pentagon?”

“Yes.”

“For what?”

“That’s a classified matter.”

“We’re in a classified courtroom, Mr. Abbott. Everyone here is cleared, including the jurors and the spectators. You can speak freely.”

“We’re conducting negotiations with the army for the purchase of a new generation of attack helicopters.”

“That must mean quite a lot of potential income for your firm.”

“Yes, it does.”

“And you’re one of the point men in those negotiations, correct?”

“Yes.”

“So that must make you inclined to be cooperative with the army.”

“Is that a question?”

“The customer’s always right, as you like to say.”

He shrugged.

“Mr. Abbott, do you remember the interview we had at the Madison Hotel four days ago?”

“Yes.”

“We met for breakfast, did we not?”

“We did.”

“Did I meet you along with my cocounsel, Mr. Grimes?”

“Yes, you did.”

“How long was the interview?”

“I don’t recall.”

“Does twenty-six minutes sound about right?”

“It may be. I don’t know.”

“Mr. Abbott, at our interview with you at the Madison Hotel, did you tell us you were coached by Colonel Marks, and told what to say in your CID interview?”

Now his eyes were dead again, the flat eyes of a snake. “No.”

“You don’t remember saying that?”

He leaned forward. “I never said it.”

“You never said you were coached before your CID interview?”

“No, I didn’t, and no, I wasn’t.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Are you positive?”

“Objection, Your Honor,” Waldron shouted. “Asked and answered.”

“Overruled,” Farrell said, and took a sip of Pepsi as though he were watching a particularly exciting game on TV.

“I remind you you’re under oath, Mr. Abbott. You never told me that your commanding officer told you what to say to the CID?”

“I never said that, and he never did.”

“Are you aware, Mr. Abbott, that I can move to the witness stand and testify about what you told me?”

“Then it would be your word against mine,” he said blandly. “And you’re not exactly an unbiased witness, are you?”

Claire noticed several jurors watching this exchange with great interest. The foreman, or president of the court, the bespectacled black man, was busily taking notes. “If I told you that’s exactly what I remember, would I be lying?” she said.

“Yes, you would.”

“If I told you that’s exactly what my cocounsel remembers, would he be lying?”

“He most certainly would.”

“If I told you we were tape-recording that interview, would we be lying?” she asked casually and turned toward the defense table. The courtroom stirred. She saw Tom’s eyes gleaming. He was doing all he could not to smile.

Grimes handed her a small stack of papers. She saw Abbott stiffen and clench both hands at his sides. He glared at her fiercely.

“Your Honor,” she said, “may I approach the witness?”

“You may.”

She strolled over to the prosecution table and dropped a stapled sheaf of paper, then placed one on the judge’s bench. Then she handed one to Abbott.