Part 24 (2/2)

Quietly Dr. Minick said, ”Alex?”

”I'm here,” Alex said. ”It's okay.”

”I called Bailey, and he's on his way,” Frank said. ”Mrs. Feldman, our team has a lot of work to get to during the recess. Will Thaxton has kindly offered to take you and Mr. Feldman to lunch, and escort you back later.”

Will Thaxton blinked; he had made no such offer, but he nodded. ”That's right,” he said. ”Let's get out of here before a reporter starts pus.h.i.+ng a mike in our faces.”

”No-” Dolly started, but her husband took her by the arm, and said, ”Let's go with Mr. Thaxton. You're into real estate and trust funds, I understand,” he said to Will, who turned to glower at Barbara behind their backs as they walked out.

Then they formed their human s.h.i.+eld around Alex and walked from the courtroom, out to the corridor, where reporters with microphones were waiting. Frank and Dr. Minick in the lead never slowed their pace, and no one spoke as they left the building with Alex between Sh.e.l.ley and Barbara, out to Dr. Minick's van, which would hold all of them. Bailey had already brought it to the curb.

”My place,” Frank said.

They would order food sent in, and have relative quiet for the next hour and a half. Bailey and Alan would keep the media away, and that's how it would be for the next few days. Will would try to keep Dolly away from the media, and the rest of them would try to keep the media away from Alex.

32.

When they resumed, Novak called the deputy who had been the first officer to arrive at the scene. Thomas Monk was twenty-eight, blond and blue-eyed, and not comfortable on the witness stand. He fidgeted and kept eyeing the sheriff as he recounted his actions. He had been at the school when he was called on his cell phone; these days they always had a deputy on hand when there was a big event. He had entered the kitchen, had taken one look around, then retreated to the back porch, where he stayed until the sheriff arrived. Then he had been sent to the road and the driveway to make certain that only official vehicles drove in.

Barbara asked him the same questions she had asked Bakken and Wilberson: had he touched anything, or moved anything? He said no emphatically. He never glanced at Alex. It was interesting how seldom the witnesses looked toward the defense table, Barbara thought, almost as if they were unaware of the defendant sitting there.

When the sheriff took the stand, he glanced once at Alex, then never looked toward him again. He testified that everything the deputies had done was standard procedure, routines that were to be carried out without specific orders, such as securing the premises, ascertaining if anyone was in the house or the outbuildings or on the property, and so on. He had looked at the remains, then had gone to the porch to wait for the homicide unit.

Barbara started her cross-examination. ”Sheriff Wilc.o.x, I understand that all the deputies who responded to that call are answerable to you. Is that correct?”

”Yes, ma'am.”

”So if some of those deputies are not in court today, not called as witnesses, you can answer for their actions and take responsibility for them. Is that correct?”

”As far as standard procedure is concerned, that's correct.”

”I see. Was Deputy Roger Ames one of the deputies who responded to the 911 call that day?”

Sheriff Wilc.o.x consulted a notebook, then nodded. ”He was.”

”Is it standard procedure for a deputy to notify the next of kin in the case of a homicide?”

”Objection,” Novak said then. ”This is immaterial in the case we are trying.”

”Your Honor,” Barbara said quickly. ”Apparently some of the deputies took it upon themselves to act outside the boundaries of standard procedure. I would like to pursue this line for a short time.”

Judge Mac gazed at the sheriff for a moment, then nodded. ”Overruled. You may continue.”

”Do you recall the question?” Barbara asked the sheriff.

”Yes. That is not standard procedure.”

”Did anyone authorize Deputy Ames to go find Mrs. Marchand and tell her that her husband had been killed?”

”No, ma'am. He took it on himself to tell her.”

”Was Deputy Calvin Strohm one of the deputies who responded to the 911 call?”

”Yes.”

”Is it standard procedure for a deputy to visit a neighbor of the victim to ask questions?”

”No, it isn't.”

”Was Deputy Strohm authorized to call on Dr. Minick and demand to know if Alex Feldman was at home?”

”No, ma'am. He took it on himself to do that.”

”Sheriff Wilc.o.x,” she said, walking back to her table to stand and face him, ”the call to 911 was recorded at two minutes after seven. The first deputy arrived at seven minutes past seven. Three more arrived in the next few minutes, and you got there at seven-forty-two. In the thirty-five minutes before you took charge, do you have any way of knowing precisely what your deputies were doing?”

”I have their reports,” he said stiffly.

She shrugged, then said, ”I have no further questions.”

The last witness of the day was the lead detective of the investigatory team, Lieutenant Russell Whorley. He was a somber, longfaced man with a receding hairline; although only fifty, he was very wrinkled, his brow creased with deep lines. He ignored Alex completely, Novak had him recite his credentials and years of experience, and then asked him to tell what his team had done that evening when they arrived at the Marchand house.

Whorley was an experienced witness; his account was brief, without a wasted word. The criminologists had collected evidence. They had photographed the crime scene; after the medical examiner had come and gone, and the body had been removed, they had fingerprinted the crime scene. The fingerprints were all of family members and Mr. Bakken and Mr. Wilberson. They had searched the house and outbuildings, and looked around the yard. There had been no sign of a break-in or of a disturbance anywhere else in the house or on the property.

The crime-scene photographs were identified and admitted as state exhibits.

”Lieutenant Whorley, from your observations, can you reconstruct what might have occurred in the Marchand kitchen that evening?”

”Objection,” Barbara said. ”That's speculation.”

”Your Honor,” Novak said smoothly, ”Lieutenant Whorley has had years of experience at reconstructing crimes. It's part of his job to do so in order to have a starting point for his investigation.”

She was overruled.

”The way we put it together,” Whorley said then, ”is that Mr. Marchand finished a repair job on the porch and entered the kitchen. He put the hammer on the table, then washed his hands.”

Novak held up his hand to stop him. ”How did you ascertain that he put the hammer on the table?”

”We found traces of linseed oil on the table. The hammer handle had been treated with linseed oil.”

”How do you know he washed his hands?”

”He didn't have any linseed oil on his hands.” He hesitated until Novak nodded, then he continued. ”He went to the stove and turned it on under the skillet, and then someone entered the kitchen. He crossed the kitchen to the table. When he turned his back on the murderer, he was struck in the back of his head and fell to the floor. The killer wiped off the handle of the hammer on a dish towel; there were traces of linseed oil on the towel. He dropped the hammer near the body, and exited the kitchen, closing the door after him. He wiped the doork.n.o.b when he left, or possibly he held the k.n.o.b with something covering his fingers. Mr. Bakken's prints were the only ones we could recover from the doork.n.o.b. Between fifteen and twenty minutes later, the smoke alarm went off, and a few minutes later Mr. Bakken and Mr. Wilberson discovered the body.”

”How can you be certain when he turned on the stove, or when the smoke alarm went off?” Novak asked.

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