Compelling Evidence (25 page)

"Sure," she says. "It'll take a couple of minutes."

I give her the file number on Talia's case, and she from the other end of the line. Talia's friends may Cl selves in confidence, but those who post premium on., their interest in the defendant a matter of public record. something likely to go unnoticed by Nelson and his Judy is back to the phone. She is whistling, a ru between spaced teeth. "Don't see many this big:' she Talia's bond. "Bad ladyt' she asks. "Vase of mistaken identity," I tell her. "Oh." She laughs again, like "rell me another."

"Defendant posted the premium for her own bail," All this means is that Talia and her ffiriends did a h banking, probably a quick deposit, cashier's check to en acceptance by her bank before Talia wrote the check and premium. "And who guaranteed the balance?" I ask. "Let's see,"

she says, searching the file. "Here it is, name of Tod Hamilton."

CHAPTER 18.

IT is a middle‐class neighborhood, quiet tree‐fined streets, a beavy canopy of leaves that nearly meet over the center of winding intersections. Two‐thirty‐nine Compton Court is an underanted white brick colonial, with a little trim of wrought iron War the front door, and neatly edged ivy in place of a lawn. A :,quaint hand‐painted sign near the door reads: THU CAMPANFLUS, JO AND JIM. She still lives here, though Jim has been dead for two years. I ‐ring the bell and wait. There is no sound from within. I punch J1 4ain. Then, from a distance, I can bear the increasing register ,of footsteps making their way toward the door. The click of #*Wbolt and it is opened, but I can't we the figure inside, louded in darkness beyond the mesh of the wire screen door.

Taul. How good to see you." There is excitement, a little Iness in this familiar voice, the signal that I am welcome. N, "I was in the neighborhood and thought I'd stop by to say '@V'Well, absolutely," she says. She unlatches the screen door and yns it open wide for me. "It's been such a long time. Please, in," she says. "It's so good to see you."

Ann Campanelli has one of those faces that has never _.A good. Hair streaked with gray from an early age, she @"es like a basset hound, Jong drooping bags under each. are a few rollers in her hair, like coiled haystacks in .%‐.The net holding them in place is something from the Ais case the sad face belongs to a warm spirit. If Potter, Skarpellos could ever have been said to have a soul, Campanelli was its embodiment. She ushers me toward the living room and turns on a fl to give the place some light. "It has been a while," I say. "I didn't have a chance to you at Ben's funeral." So here I stand, at the thre her front room, trawling for information. It has been a question that has eaten at me since I finished our surve state's case against Talia. Why was there no statement Ann, Ben's secretary?

She's leaning over the couch, reaching for the draws the curtains, to let a little daylight into this cavern. She and bathes us both in bright light. "Oh dear, that is better, isn't it? I spend so much tim back of the house, it seems I never use this room anymon you're alone you don't do much entertaining," she sa3 many people come by. "You were asking about. the funeral," she says, reme where we were. "I went later, after it was over, to his be alone with him for a while."

"Ah." I nod, like I can understand such sentiment. "Who wants to be subjected to a crying old woman?" s

"How's practice? You're looking

good."

She is uneasy topic of Ben's death, anxious to move on to another. "It's going well," I tell her. "Yes, I see you on television," she says. "That shame with Talia, Mrs. Potter. They should have their heads e She could no more kill Ben than I could."

"I agree," I say. "But circumstances make victims of times. I'm afraid we've got our work cut out."

"Oh, I don't believe it. They can't have a case?"

"I wish I could say no." I tell her without getting into that the evidence against Talia is not a happy sight. "Then they're wearing blinders," she says. "I wish I could put you on the jury," I tell her.

She laughs. Then mirth fades from her face. "This w makes no sense. The suicide." She utters a fleeting p herself under her breath, like this is utterly unbelievable. She shakes her head. "I'll tell you," she says,

"if theyl@ to me, I'd have set them straight."

"That's what I thought," I say. ""What?" ‐They never interviewed you?"

‐No." She says it with some indignation. "How about a cup of coffee.

I've got some already brewed." It's an invitation to exchange more dirt.

"If it's no trouble."

"No trouble at all. Do you mind the kitchen? It's just so much more comfortable than out here." ,Lead the way."

It's a cheery room, yellow wallpaper, little flowers on the diagonal above white, wood wainscot. A copper teapot on the stove, a dozen photographs of grandchildren, nieces, and nephews litter the walls along with a series of plaster‐cast geese. "Regular or decaf?" she asks.

"Regular‐black."

"Good," she says. "None of that sissy stuff for you." She reaches for the carafe in the coffee maker, still piping hot. Jo Ann is a coffee hound. There were always three cups in various places in the office, half full, with her name on them. 1here's a certain organized clutter in this room, the kind that neat,people engage in. There is a sense that everything can be swept into an out‐of‐the‐way cupboard or closet on a single sortie. The kitchen table is a tangle of heavy brown twine laid out in the loose weaving of a hanging macrame flower‐pot holder, the knots not quite fight. An unfinished landscape with twisted tubes of acrylic paint sits on an case] in the comer, near the window. Jo Ann, by either choice or necessity, has become a woman of leisure. "Please sit down." She pushes the twine toward one comer of the table. It disappears into a drawer that she slides, closed ‐Imderneath. I pull out a chair and sit. @ "It's good to have company," she says. "Breaks up the day a little. Here." She puts a mug of steaming, dark mud in front of me. NOW

I remember her coffee from the firm. Ben wouldn't touch it, Wd it was her way of telling him she didn't do coffee‐‐except '‐ir herself. She brings her own cup and takes a chair catercorner V mine. "So how's retirementt' I ask. "Has its moments."

"But You miss the office?"

"IS it that obvious?"

I make a face. "Well, I suppose it gave my life a certain structure, so pose, especially after Jim passed away. Though I have ti it would never have been the same after Ben died."

"You're right," I say. "I've seen the place."

"Don't go back myself. I don't think I'd be welcome." this leaning back in her chair smiling a little, like there's she's ready to impart. "Why did you leave?"

She laughs, not hearty, but cynical. "It wasn't by choi to hire a lawyer to get my retirement," she says. "Skarpe guy's lower than the nipples on a snake." She bites off & "Ben wasn't cold yet. He called me in and told me to c MY desk. Had a security guard stand over me while I di( kind'of trust you get after twenty years on the job." She with bitterness. I don't say anything, but give her a took, like

"Tell me The aroma of the

coffee is making its way to my senses. I tasted it, but the smell is a little like hydrochloric acid. "I forgot, you weren't there," she says.

"Most of it after you left. The place was an armed camp." Jo is de the firm in the days before her departure. "Tony knew w loyalties rested."

"He and Ben were at oddst' I say it matter‐of‐factly, these pitched battles between them. "An understatement," she says. "The partnership was apart at the seams."

That surprises me. While they had a history of fightir of it ever lasted more than a day. They could scream other at the top of their voices and forget the reason by morning. "Jealousy," she says. "Skarpellos was green, It was bad that Ben was leaving, but it set like a burr under Tony' that he was going to all that glitter in Washington. He complaining for a year that Ben wasn't carrying his share partners told him it was gonna be a gold mine for the fi mer partner on the U.S.

Supreme Court. The prestige bring in a dozen new clients. Tony at high tea with the you see itt' This brings a little chuckle from both of us.

She takes a sip of coffee and lets it flow like molten I her throat. The pack of cigarettes was on the table now. "Mind?" she says. I shake my head. I have become the stand‐in for a carping coffee breaks that Jo has missed since leaving the firm. "Ainyway," she says, The bottom line was getting the clients. And Tony was petrified that with Ben gone the clients would slowly drift away. Everybody knew it was Ben who kept the traffic coming through the door. Skarpellos had taken a free ride for years, It was about to come to an end." She's lighting up. I know that this was true. lbough Tony did his share of milking money from corporate clients, it was Ben who kept the cash cow in alfalfa. "When Ben got back from Washington, his last trip, they had a lu)u," she says. Between words she emits a Or= of forced smoke from one side of her mouth toward the ceiling. A little hardness. "it was a hurridinger," this argument between Skarpellos and potter, she says. "You could hear 'em yelling all the way out to reception." I'm all cars. "Funny thing," she says. "NNWLE

Tony had his nose in a snie'smoke followed by little bits of tobacco stripped from her tongue punctuate this monologue‐‐‐‐@"Ben leaving and all, it was Ben who started the whole thing, the argument."

"Over whatt, "Money. Seems the trust account was a little light." She smiles and looks toward the ceiling, Re

"What else."

"Lot me guess," I tell her. "Ben caught Tony taking a loan?"

She nods. "Bingo,' she says. "And Ben was spitting fire." I am not surprised. There had been little skirmishes over die Greek's indiscretions with the client trust account on previous occasions, before I left the firm. He used it like a private slush fund, always just a half jump ahead of complaints by clients to the state bar. On two occasions that I know of, Ben had to smooth ruffled feathers over dinner and fine wine with clients who'd caught the Greek with his fingers in the till, borrowing &ek retainers. l1is time," she tells me, "it had gone too far. Skarpellos had lbkn more than petty cash. And a client had in fact filed a Inplaint with the bar. It ended with Skarpellos storming out Ben's office, after Ben had delivered an ultimatum." FACCORDING to Jo Ann, Potter gave Tony forty‐eight hours to ftstore the money to the trust account, two or three hundred thouvad dollars, she can't remember the exact amount, "borrowed" @Y the Greek for one of his "business deals," to cover his interest in some glitzy real estate development. It seems that S had one of his perennial cashfiow problems. With the state bar already nosing around, Ben had Jo A two letters, a succinct one‐pager to the Greek confinmni demand that he repay the money, in forty‐eight hours, and to the disciplinary authorities at the bar, so that there wou question as to who was responsible for this trust imbalan, first letter was delivered to Tony in a sealed envelope. The was post‐dated, to be mailed two days later from Washin Skarpellos did not correct the problem. Whether Ben would have actually followed through threat to send die second letter neither of us can say. I know Skarpellos, he was sweating bullets. In a hand of hig poker, Potter could always buffalo the Greek. "Ben was mad as hell," she says. "He took it very YX that Tony would act this way just at a time that federal were crawling all over the office getting background info on the Supreme Court appointment."

I now realize that Potter, on his return from Washing more on his mind than my fling with Talia. He had a partner who was threatening to damage his reputation. of embezzled trust funds are not conducive to high courl nations. Senate confirmation would take months and wo over every rock in Potter's life. Politicos in Washington w likely to spend the time to consider which of the partne culpable and which were the innocent victims in such The mud would spatter far enough to hit Ben. "Surely Ben must have discussed this with the other p She shakes her head between gulps of coffee. ' nobody else he could confide in." Nobody but her is w saying. "None of the partners wanted to take sides. They Ben was leaving, and they'd be left to face Tony‐alone happy prospect," she says. An understatement. In any balls‐to‐the‐wall office sh the Greek would have eaten any one of them for lunch. proven on a dozen different occasions that he could co collectively and individually‐‐except for Ben. "What's more to the poine‐‐she takes a long drag cigarette‐"the letter of complaint to the bar, the one I for Ben to sign, it disappeared. The file copies, the origin trace of that letter is gone.

Even the backup on the dri computer," she says, "all gone."

This interests me, and she can read it in my face. "The day after Ben died," she says, I looked for it in the directory. I tried to puff it up and read it back using Ben's confidential code. But it was gone.

Somebody had erased it. And there's no hard copy," she adds. "Ben didn't want it floating around the office." . The significance of this correspondence has not been lost on jo Ann, and I wonder aloud why she hasn't gone to the cops. "And tell 'em what? I have no proof," she says.

"But it gets worse. I went to Mr. Edwards. Told him about Ben's concerns regarding the trust account. He said he'd check into it. The next day he came back, very friendly." Jo Ann smiles like some innocent. "Told me that the account was solid, that there was no trust imbalance. No imbalance." She repeats this to herself, nodding with purpose as if to show how inane she'd been to ask. "I got the axe an hour later."

I could have told her, like O'Mally owns the Dodgers, Tony owns Tom Edwards. They are partners in name only. But there is little point in rubbing this salt into the wounds now. "Why didn't the police interview you?"

She shakes her head. I was in England for four months, visiting relatives. Been wanting to do it for years. Getting canned gave me the opportunity."

TIOS explains it. The cops weren't breaking their backs chasing leads or sources. Succumbing to a little convenient myopia, they swrted with one suspect and back‐filled their case against Talia. In no time she found herself buried up to her shoulders, relying on Skarpellos to help her out. Suddenly it all makes sense, the inept Mr. Cheetam, Tony waiting in the wings to inherit Ben's estate, leading Talia to the precipice. Like fingers in a glove it in fits. "Would you testifyt' I ask her. "Sing like die little old wine maker," she says. "What have I to lose?" Then she pauses. "There's just one problem. Without 90030hing more than my word, the tune may sound a lot like sour 11 4(@ *4 @ .0 .1 4@ / .1 1