Mistaken Identity (60 page)

“Our father what?” Connolly turned and looked directly through the bars at Bennie. Her eyes were so angrily blue, Bennie drew back. “Our father who art in heaven?”

“Winslow.”

“Winslow? Who knows if he’s our father?” The sudden sharpness in Connolly’s voice echoed throughout the hollow cells.

“I went to his house, in Montchanin. He was away, but I found his clippings. Of me, of my career. There’s books of them.”

“So maybe he’s a freak, ever think of that?” Connolly didn’t wait for an answer. “There’s a lot of freaks out there. They hear voices, they think the FBI is following them. They think they’re married to rich guys. They think they’re Mel Gibson. They think they’re friends with Steven Spielberg or that he’s their real son. You don’t know about these people, girl, but I do. You don’t live in that world. I do.”

Bennie shook her head, no. “There’s that picture you gave me, of him holding two babies.”

“So maybe one was a friend’s baby, for fuck’s sake, or maybe both. Do they look alike to you? You can’t tell a friggin’ thing from that photo. I don’t believe the guy for a minute. I thought he was a crackpot.”

“I found a Dear John note, from our mother, leaving him. He even came to her funeral.”

“So what? So maybe she left him when she had you. It doesn’t mean we’re twins. Maybe you’re his kid, not me.” Connolly grew louder, almost shouting in the cells. “Or maybe it’s the other way around, huh? Maybe he’s some freak and I’m his real daughter, but I grew up to be a dope dealer. So one day he’s watching the TV and he sees you, a big success. We look alike and he gets it into his head that I’m like you. That I’m really your twin. That we’re both his kids, his twin girls. So he comes to me and tells me my twin will help me.”

Bennie tried to wrap her mind around the situation. When they’d first met, Connolly had tried to convince Bennie they were twins. Now that Bennie had finally come around, Connolly was trying to convince her they weren’t. The reversal made her head spin. “Why are you saying this?”

“What?”

“You’re trying to convince me I’m not your twin.”

“I’m just saying I don’t think we’re twins, is all.” Connolly’s features returned to their familiar lines, and her tone went cold. “I don’t need a twin. I don’t want a twin. If I get off when this is over, I don’t want a twin. Got it?”

There was a loud rap at Bennie’s door and the guard’s face loomed at the bulletproof window. “Will the real Miss Rosato please stand up?”

“I’m Rosato.” Bennie stood up as the guard slid a key into the locked door to her cell.

“Judge wants you in the courtroom. Said you don’t need no cuffs.”

“What a guy.” Bennie walked out into the hallway, which was barely wide enough to fit one person and flooded with harsh fluorescent lighting. The guard moved next door and unlocked Connolly’s door with an expert twist of the wrist.

“This could be my big chance, Rosato,” Connolly said loudly. “I could tell the guard that I was really you. Then you’d be the one on the hot seat, and I’d go free no matter what the verdict.” Connolly stepped into the tight hallway and offered her wrists for cuffing. “How about it? Would you trade places with me now? Would you bet your life on this case?”

“That’s enough of that talk,” the guard said gently, but Bennie felt too stricken to speak.

Would you bet your life on this case
?

Bennie felt like she already had.

As soon as the door to the courtroom opened, Bennie caught sight of Judge Guthrie, who had evidently regained his judicial temperament, for his features seemed composed and his manner calm. The jury was sitting in their paneled box, and a chagrined Dorsey Hilliard was in place at the prosecutor’s table. At the bar of court, Carrier and DiNunzio sat on the edge of their chairs, visibly concerned.

Bennie entered the courtroom, and the gallery reacted instantly, fidgeting in the pews for a better look. Reporters wrote furiously in their skinny notebooks, next to sketch artists who drew so deftly they appeared to be scribbling. Mike and Ike sat wedged among them, unhappy as linemen benched in the playoffs.

“Ms. Rosato,” Judge Guthrie said, “please approach. Mr. Sheriff, please escort the defendant to her seat at counsel table.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Bennie said, her tone professional as she faced the dais and looked Judge Guthrie in the eye. Behind her, Connolly was escorted to counsel table.

“Ms. Rosato,” Judge Guthrie began. “The Court found you in contempt for disobeying my order during your closing argument. However, after vigorous argument by one of your associates, the Court finds it would be in the interests of justice for the matter to proceed.” The judge nodded grimly in the direction of Carrier and DiNunzio, and Bennie thanked God for Carrier. “You are hereby released from your incarceration and fined a sum of five hundred dollars. Your associate has already paid the sum on your behalf, to the Clerk of Court. Are you finished with your closing argument?”

“I am, Your Honor.”

“Then take your seat, counsel, while we continue this final phase of trial. Mr. Hilliard, you may have rebuttal.”

Bennie returned to counsel table and checked the jury’s reaction. They seemed subdued as a group; the librarian didn’t look at her, and even the lively videographer seemed impassive.
Would you trade places with me now? Would you bet your life on this case
?
Bennie had felt the
click
during her closing, but she’d been wrong before.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury” Hilliard said from the podium, and began his rebuttal, repeating that the jury couldn’t infer a police conspiracy from the absence of the murder weapon. He concluded quickly and when he was finished the jury looked somber. Bennie wasn’t certain what conclusion to draw from their grave faces; in her experience, jurors usually grew serious when the time of decision was at hand. She wished she could argue again, but the defense didn’t get the second shot the Commonwealth did.

Judge Guthrie proceeded immediately to charge the jury, reading them a lengthy recitation of the relevant points of law both sides had submitted, while Bennie sat quietly, only half-listening, slowly realizing that the case was ebbing out of her control. Usually it came as a relief to Bennie when the power, and the ultimate responsibility, shifted from her to the jury. In the past it had meant her job was finished, and after the verdict, she could return to her life. She’d loll around in bed with Grady, then get up and work on the house. She’d visit with her mother, sit with her in the elegant hospital until she’d dozed off.

But when this trial ended there would be none of these things. Nothing but a vacuum, and that was the best-case scenario. What if they lost? Bennie shuddered as the jury filed out to begin deliberations, disappearing through the paneled door. Departing to decide Connolly’s fate, leaving Bennie with nothing but emptiness, and fear.

T
he lawyers awaited the verdict back at the office, and Bennie helped the associates gather the trial exhibits and return them to the file. It wasn’t the type of clerical task she usually performed, but she knew they’d need her help and part of her wasn’t ready to let go of the associates. Trying this case together had brought them closer, like soldiers in the war, and Bennie knew this war wasn’t over yet. If Connolly were convicted, there was still the penalty phase of the trial to go, with Bennie putting up the expert and fact witnesses that would be Connolly’s last hope. “You got the psych expert lined up, right, Carrier?”

“All taken care of. Ready on phone notice.”

“Good. You got the assistant warden?”

“Only the assistant’s assistant. She’ll say that Connolly was the model inmate, conducted the computer class, and showed rehabilitation potential.”

Bennie kept her own counsel. With what she knew, eliciting that testimony would be like suborning perjury. She turned to DiNunzio. “Any luck finding anybody who knew Connolly growing up?”

“No. I made a bunch of calls and got zip.”

“No family left at all? Not even cousins or something?”

“None.”

Bennie considered the implications. She and Connolly were all each other had left. “You checked on family friends and neighbors?”

“I found an acquaintance who knew her from high school. She said Connolly was always an outsider. Maybe that would help. She said she’d testify. If we need her, I can take her.”

“You’ll do the direct exam, DiNunzio? No jitters?”

“Not after my contempt argument.”

Bennie smiled, surprised. She had assumed that Carrier had handled the argument. “You mean
you
argued that, to Judge Guthrie?”

“Yes,” Mary said, and couldn’t hide a proud smile. “I got you out of jail. Almost free.”

“How’d you handle it? Were you nervous?”

“It didn’t kill me, so I must be stronger.”

Judy nodded happily. “She was awesome. She had the case law ready as soon as they took you away. It only made sense for her to argue it, not me.”

Bennie didn’t get it. “You had contempt cases ready? Why? How?”

“I thought you might get into trouble down the line. I would have, in your position. As nuts as my twin makes me, she’s still my twin. So I found a few cases this morning.”

Bennie laughed, a brief break from the tension. “Well, thanks. You done good.” Then her thoughts returned to Connolly. “So we don’t have much for the penalty phase, is what I’m hearing. Wonderful.” Bennie thought of trying to contact her father. He could tell the story of how he had abandoned Connolly, help her in a way he’d never helped before. She shook it off, then unaccountably, thought of Lou. “You didn’t hear anything from Lou, did you?” Bennie asked, and Mary shook her head.

“No, not since this morning.”

“He hasn’t called in?”

“I checked the messages.”

Bennie’s mouth made a grim line. “I don’t like the sound of that. He should be here. Did he tell you where he was going when he left court?”

“No, he didn’t say.” Mary frowned, and locked eyes with Bennie.

“Five more minutes, I call his house again.”

Mary nodded. “I’ll remind you.”

“Where do you want these?” Judy asked, holding a file of trial notes.

Bennie looked up from her work. “Stick ’em in the last folder.”

Judy wedged the manila folder into the last red accordion file. Fifteen accordians sat in three rows of five on the conference room table, their manila folders straight. Almost all of the exhibits and transcripts cluttering the conference room had found their way into one of the accordians. Bennie wondered if anything else in her life would come back together so easily.

“How long do you think the jury will be out?” Judy asked, stuffing the correspondence file away.

“Not tonight, either way.” Bennie checked the small desk clock sitting behind the telephone. 4:32. Only five minutes since the last time she’d looked. “They haven’t been sequestered that long, so they’re not that antsy, and it’s a major case. They’ll sleep on it, then decide tomorrow or the next day.”

“Sunday? You think they’ll go ’til Sunday?” Judy rubbed her neck. “It’s not like there’s a lot of physical evidence to go over. Either they believe the cops or they don’t.”

Mary nodded. “People don’t like to work on Sundays. I bet they’ll come back tomorrow, then go home and rest on Sunday.”

Judy squinted outside the large windows of the conference room. The sky was gorgeous and sunny, the humidity mercifully low. “It’s supposed to be a nice weekend. They get the weather report, don’t they?”

Suddenly the intercom buzzed on the credenza, startling Bennie, who reached for it. The associates froze where they stood. It would be Marshall, the receptionist. “Rosato,” Bennie said when she picked up. “Are they back?”

“No, relax,” Marshall said. “Turn on the TV. The news is on Channel 10, and we’ve been getting tons of calls. Something’s happening out there.”

“Thanks.” Bennie hung up and leaned over to switch on the small color Trinitron in the corner of the conference room. “It’s not the jury, it’s the TV.”

“What?” Judy said, as she and Mary gathered around.

“Jesus H. Christ,” Bennie said, turning up the sound.

On the screen flashed a series of still photos of police officers hurrying from a cemetery. A voice-over said, “The funeral service of Officer Lenihan was disrupted by reporters today, and Philadelphia’s top cop has requested that immediate action be taken against members of the press.” The next scene was a head shot of the Police Inspector, his distinguished features marked with undisguised scorn. “I’m shocked by what I heard happened today,” he said. “It is an absolute abomination that Officer Lenihan’s family was disturbed in their most difficult hour, by a media that seems to know no bounds and have no decency.”