Romance, p.26
Romance, page 26
“There it is,” Kling said, and reached into the cabinet.
He rattled the container to see if there were any pills still in it, and then pried off the lid with his thumb. They were looking at possibly a dozen capsules of Dalmane.
“All right,” Andrea said, appearing behind them in the bathroom doorway, “my lawyer’s …”
“You’re under arrest,” Carella said.
13
SHE CALLED HER LAWYER AGAIN FROM THE SQUADROOM, TO let him know she was now in a police station, and he promised to get there immediately. It was now almost ten P.m. and he still wasn’t there. They asked Andrea if she’d like a cup of coffee or something, and she told them to go to hell. They had already recited Miranda to her and presumably she now understood her rights, which is why she refused to say anything but “Go to hell” until her lawyer got here. She’d already told them his name was Hollis Foley, and that he’d be bringing with him a criminal lawyer whose name she didn’t know, so they should be expecting two attorneys to show up at any moment.
“Meanwhile, just leave me the hell alone,” she said, which was a rough equivalent of “Go to hell” again.
Kling went to his desk to call Sharyn. He was still on the phone when Andrea’s attorneys arrived at ten twenty-five, both of them brusque and businesslike, her personal attorney immediately asking Andrea if she was all right. The criminal lawyer introduced himself to the detectives—his name was Felix Bertinotti—and then asked why his client had been arrested. Carella explained that they planned to charge Miss Packer with second-degree murder, and the lawyer at once advised Andrea not to answer any questions. Andrea wanted to know if that wouldn’t look bad for her, and Bertinotti counseled that her silence could in no way be considered prejudicial if or when this specious case ever came to trial. He was already spouting “Innocent Client” talk even though there wasn’t a television camera in sight. Andrea insisted that she hadn’t done anything and therefore had nothing to fear from the police, so why couldn’t she answer whatever questions they had? The cops stood by, saying nothing. The decision was for Andrea and her attorney to make. As Carella had mentioned earlier, this was America, after all.
“May we please talk to Miss Packer privately?” Bertinotti asked, at which point Carella and Kling and Lieutenant Byrnes—who had come in when he’d learned of the arrest—debated whether or not they should get the D.A.’s Office in on this right now, or wait until they were sure they had real meat here. They decided to wait. Andrea and her lawyers did not finish deliberating till a quarter past eleven.
“Miss Packer has decided to answer your questions,” Bertinotti announced, which came as a surprise to Carella. He could never understand why it was always the hardened criminals who took full advantage of Miranda and refused to give you even the right time, whereas the amateurs always figured they could beat you at your own game. Or maybe Andrea figured this was the role of a lifetime and was now relishing the opportunity to give an Academy Award performance that would prove she was something more than just another pretty face. Besides, she had two attorneys here with her to call off all bets if the going got rough, so maybe she figured she had nothing to lose. Though her personal attorney clearly knew nothing about criminal law and would be as useful to her as an onstage telephone that didn’t ring when it was supposed to.
They read Andrea her rights yet another time and ascertained that she understood them and was willing to answer their questions. She was still in the clothes she had worn to rehearsal, blue jeans, loafers, and a lemon-colored T-shirt. Her long blond hair was pulled back into a ponytail and she was wearing no makeup. Carella wondered if they should offer her a lollipop.
“Miss Packer,” he said, “I wonder if you can tell us where you were last night at about this time?”
The clock on the wall of the interrogation room now read eleven-eighteen P.M. Andrea sat at the head of the long narrow table, her attorneys flanking her right and left. A police stenographer was sitting alongside Bertinotti, taking notes. Kling was sitting beside him and across the table from Byrnes. Carella was standing. He worked best on his feet.
“I was home,” Andrea said.
“Home is where?” Carella asked.
“Home is where you barged in earlier tonight,” she said angrily, and snapped a look first at him and then at Kling.
“There was a search warrant,” Carella told Bertinotti, and smiled. “No doors broken down, Counselor.”
Bertinotti did not return the smile. Instead, he shrugged as if he didn’t believe Carella. He was wearing a dark blue suit, as was Andrea’s other attorney, and it looked as if he had freshly shaved before coming over here. Carella guessed he was expecting TV cameras outside, though at two hundred pounds and some five feet eight inches, one would have thought he’d try to avoid such exposure.
“What I was asking for was your address,” Carella said pleasantly. “For the record.”
“You have my address.”
“Would it be … ?”
He picked up the arrest form.
“… 714 South Hedley Avenue, apartment 4C?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. And you were there last night between what time and what time?”
“I got home from rehearsal at eight. I didn’t go out again after that.”
“Was Charles Madden at that rehearsal?”
“He was. He’s our stage manager.”
“Was your stage manager,” Carella corrected, just to keep this thing in perspective.
“Yes.”
“Did he go home with you from the theater?”
“No.”
“But you were living together, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“How long had he been living in your apartment, Miss Packer?”
“Since the beginning of March.”
“Since the first of March?”
“No, the sixth, the seventh, around then.”
“Where did he live before then?”
“He had an apartment on River Street. Still had it until … well.”
“Until the time of his death?”
Again, to keep it all in perspective.
“Yes,” Andrea said.
“Which was last night at eleven-thirty.”
“That’s when I understand it happened,” Andrea said, and looked down at her hands in her lap.
This was something actresses did, Carella noticed. Lowered their eyes like nuns when they wished to appear virtuous or innocent. It was highly effective. He would have to watch movies more closely from now on, see whether the good actresses ever did it.
“You didn’t happen to be in his apartment at that time, did you?” he asked.
“No, I …”
“Really, Detective,” Bertinotti said. “She just told you …”
“Yes, but I was wondering if she might be able to clear up something that’s puzzling me.”
“What’s that?” Andrea asked.
“Miss Packer,” Bertinotti said, “you’re not required to help Detective Carella with his befuddlement.”
Andrea’s other lawyer, apparently excited by all this cops-and-robbers shit, actually chuckled at his colleague’s remark. Bertinotti seemed pleased. Andrea seemed pleased, too. All three of them were very pleased all at once, as if they’d already been to trial and won an acquittal.
“Well, I hate to see him puzzled, really,” Andrea said, smiling. “What is it you’d like to know, Mr. Carella?”
“Do you use the prescription drug Dalmane?” Carella asked.
“You know I do,” she said, still smiling. “You found a bottle of it in my medicine chest.”
“Did Mr. Madden ever use Dalmane?”
“I have no idea.”
“Because, you see, we found Dalmane in his bloodstream.”
This was clearly news to Andrea. Maybe she didn’t know you could take blood samples from a blob on the sidewalk, or maybe she didn’t think the police would have bothered testing a man’s blood when he’d obviously fallen to his death.
“Who’s we?” she asked.
“Toxicology Department at the lab.”
Andrea gave a slight shrug as if to indicate she didn’t know how this information was in any way pertinent to why she was here in a police station.
“I’m assuming,” Bertinotti said, “that you have this …”
“Yes, Counselor, we have the report.”
“May I see it?”
“Sure,” Carella said, and gave his own little shrug as if to indicate that surely the learned attorney didn’t think he was inventing a goddamn toxicology report. Handing him the sheet of paper, he turned to Andrea and casually asked, “Did Mr. Madden ever use any of your Dalmanc?”
“Yes, I think he may have,” Andrea said, recovering quickly. She now knew they had Dalmane in Madden’s blood and Dalmane in her medicine chest. Carclla figured the trick she had to perform in midair was getting the Dalmane out of her bathroom and into Madden’s blood without making it seem she’d put it there.
“When you say you think he may have …”
“I seem to remember him asking me … I don’t even remember when this was … but I think he once asked me if I had anything that could help him sleep.”
“But you don’t remember when?”
“No, I don’t. I’m telling you the God’s honest truth,” she said.
Sure, Carella thought.
“Do you think he may have helped himself to some Dalmane last night?” he asked. “To take to his apartment?”
“He may have, I can’t say for sure. He knew I had Dalmane, you see …”
“Then again, you say he didn’t go back to your apartment from the theater.”
“That’s right, he didn’t.”
“So if he did take any from the bottle in your bathroom, he must have done that before he left the apartment for the day.”
“I would guess so. I really don’t know what he did.”
“Because we didn’t find any Dalmane in his apartment, you see. Or any empty bottles that might have contained Dalmane. Which is odd, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know if it’s odd or not. I don’t know what he took or didn’t take last night. Or anytime yesterday, for that matter.”
“Well, he took Dalmane, that’s for sure. It showed in his blood work this morning.”
“I don’t know anything about blood work.”
“Neither do I, actually,” Carella lied. “What I’m wondering—out loud really—is how that Dalmane could possibly have …”
“If you’ve got anything to ask my client,” Bertinotti said, “please ask it. No wondering, please. Wonder is for sliced bread. Stick to the questions.”
“Certainly, Counselor. Question, Miss Packer. Did you go to Mr. Madden’s apartment at any time last night?”
“No, I did not.”
“You didn’t go there with him directly from the theater, did you?”
“No.”
“Or at any time later?”
“I didn’t go there at all. I was home last night. All night.”
“Did you know where Mr. Madden was?”
“Of course I did. He told me he was going to the apartment to work on his play.”
“Told you that when?”
“When we were leaving the theater.”
“After rehearsal.”
“Yes.”
“At which time you went home, and he went to the apartment on River Street.”
“Yes. He used it as a sort of office.”
“I see.”
“After he moved in with me. He would go there periodically to work on the play. He was writing a play with Jerry Greenbaum.”
“So I understand.”
“The Wench Is Dead.”
“Christopher Marlowe,” Carella said.
Andrea looked surprised.
“Do you think Mr. Greenbaum was there with him last night?” Carella asked.
“You would have to ask Mr. Greenbaum.”
“We already have.”
“Was he?”
“No.”
“Then he couldn’t have pushed Chuck out that window, could he?” Andrea said, and smiled.
“I guess not,” Carella said. “But someone did. Because a sleeping man can’t drag himself out of the bedroom and into the next room, you see.”
“He could if he was only half asleep,” Andrea said. “Maybe he took a Dalmane, as you say …”
“Which he may have got from your medicine chest that morning …”
“Well, I don’t know whether he did or not …”
“But if he did.”
“I only said he might have. I didn’t follow him around to see if he was snitching sleeping pills from the medicine chest.”
“Of course not.”
“Miss Packer, I feel I should warn you,” Bertinotti said.
“I’m only saying if he did,” Andrea said, “as you seem to think he did.”
“Well, it was in his blood,” Carella said. “I was simply repeating what’s in the toxicology report. But what you’re suggesting is he may have been wandering around in this drugged state, and just accidentally …“
“Exactly.”
“That’s something I hadn’t thought of,” Carella said. “He could have taken the Dalmane… ”
“Sure.”
“… and then was … well … walking around the apartment before he went to bed, and all of a sudden he got drowsy and just fell out the window.”
“As an actress, I can see that happening,” Andrea said.
“Pardon?” Carella said.
“A scene like that.”
“Oh.”
“It would play.”
“Him falling out the window in a half-stupor, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Miss Packer,” Bertinotti said, trying to warn her again that this smart-ass detective was closing in and she’d better watch her onions, “I think ...”
“We know there was a woman in that apartment with him last night,” Carella said.
“It wasn’t me,” Andrea said. “Anyway, how do you … ?”
“Miss Packer,” Bertinotti said again, more sharply this time. “I think we …”
“We have vaginal stains,” Carella said. “From the sheets on the bed.”
Andrea looked at him.
“What I’d like to do,” he said, “even though I’m certain we can do this under Miranda without a court order …”
“Do what?” Bertinotti asked at once.
“Have a vaginal smear taken, Counselor.”
“You’d damn well better get a court order before you invade her privacy that way!”
“I intend to do that, sir.”
“Good, go do it. Meanwhile, the questions are finished.”
“Counselor,” Carella said, “if Miss Packer wasn’t in that bed with Mr. Madden last night, she’s got nothing to worry about. But if we come up with a DNA match, then we’ve got her there with him before he went out that window. You might want to discuss this with her in private.”
Bertinotti looked at her.
“Give us fifteen minutes alone,” he said.
He was back in ten.
“Is there a D. A. on this case?” he asked.
Nellie Brand got uptown at two minutes past midnight. Officially it was Palm Sunday, but she wasn’t dressed for church. They had caught her at a dinner party, and she was wearing her basic black and pearls with high-heeled black patent pumps. She apologized for her improbable appearance, talked to Carella to find out what they had, and then went in to talk to Andrea’s lawyers.
Foley just sat there with his finger up his ass.
Bertinotti did all the bargaining for their client.
Nellie knew her evidence wasn’t overwhelming, but she wasn’t ready to let Bertinotti plead her down to a stroll in the park. The very fact that he was willing to bargain at all told her that Packer had been in Madden’s apartment on the night he’d taken the plunge. But she knew she had nothing that really tied Packer to the Cassidy murder. Even so, she told Bertinotti she was going for Murder Two on both cases, under the theory that Packer had acted in concert with Madden on the Cassidy murder. Murder Two was an A felony that carried a lifetime sentence. Bertinotti knew she was being ridiculous, otherwise why were they here talking?
He told her he’d agree to Man One on the Madden case, if she forgot the Cassidy case entirely. She told him that was out of the question, the two cases were irrevocably linked, and if she couldn’t wrap both, she wasn’t going to deal at all. He reminded her that she already had somebody in jail for the Cassidy murder …
“Please, Counselor,” she said. “You’re not suggesting I send an innocent man to prison, are you?”
“Perish the thought,” Bertinotti said.
Foley, the jackass, actually chuckled.
“I was merely positing the notion that perhaps the voracious appetite of the public for mystery, intrigue and revenge would be sated if you dropped the A felony on the earlier murder …”
“No way.”
“… and substituted for it a B felony, to wit Conspiracy to Commit.”
“Eight and a third to twenty-five on each,” Nellie said.
“I was thinking two to six on the conspiracy.”
“No way. The max on both.”
“Concurrently.”
“Consecutively,” Nellie said.
“I can’t accept that.”
“Then get your client ready for the stirrups.”
“Mrs. Brand, she’s twenty-one years old …”
