murdered. She collapses to the floor in anguish. After a few moments of dazed reminiscence, she goes into the bedroom to prepare for her rendezvous with the police, and what does she do? She dresses, and packs, and stuffs her red Coach purse behind a desk drawer, stuffs it in so cleverly that a team of Crime Scene Search technicians executing a search warrant don’t find it. That told me all I really needed to know about the guilt of Julia Denniston.
I should give it to the cops, without delay, turn it over like a good and honest citizen, an officer of the court. Yes, I should. Except that Julia wanted desperately to keep it from their prying eyes. It was one thing to answer questions truthfully and then wash my hands of her, it was quite another to voluntarily turn over evidence to those trying to imprison her for the rest of her life. I am a defense attorney as much by instinct as by choice.
I picked up the purse, felt its weight, a few ounces maybe. I rubbed my thumb across the leather and felt something underneath, something hard and cylindrical, like a fancy pen. But what pen was worth hiding from the police? Montblanc? It would benothing to unzip the purse, peek inside. It would be nothing to uncover the secret she was trying to maintain.
I drew my hand away, shook my head. I should give it to her lawyer, Clarence Swift. She wanted to keep it from the cops, and by giving it to Swift I would be facilitating that choice. Then it would be up to Swift to decide what to do with it. He could examine it closely, learn its secret, decide what to turn over, what to keep hidden. With him it would have protections of the attorney-client privilege that it could never have with me. Except that if Julia wanted Swift to have it, he would already have come knocking. She had hidden it from him, too.
I reached my hand once again toward it, gently rubbed the tips of my fingers over its supple red finish. It was worn and soft, like flesh. Like Julia’s flesh in those few rare moments before the cops came knocking, warm and yielding, hungry, ecstatic.
Stop, I told myself. Toss it, burn it, chop it with an ax and drown it in the Schuylkill River. If I did it right, no one would be the wiser. Whatever was inside, whatever evidence, whatever clues to the murder of Julia’s husband or the state of Julia’s soul, would disappear right along with the supple leather.
Yet even as I plotted on how to rid myself of its dangers, I could feel it drawing me toward it. I leaned close and smelled its scent, an aphrodisiacal combination of leather and expensive French perfume. For a moment I lost myself in the erotic promise of the bouquet. Hints of fine oil, champagne, the French Riviera, balsamic and vanilla, musk and passion. And as I breathed it in, as deep as my lungs would allow, I knew, quite simply, that I wouldn’t give it to the cops, or give it to Clarence Swift, or render it unto ash. I had thought our old-lovers’ tango had reached its sordid conclusion, but of course, as usual I was dead wrong.
Whether I liked it or not, I was in the middle of Wren Denniston’s murder. My neck was on the line, and the more I knew, the more I found out, the safer I would be. I wasn’t the type to let evidence disappear, to let secrets lie fallow, to let the soul of an oldlover remain hidden from my view when there were clues right in front of me. No, I wasn’t the type. But it wasn’t only that.
Did I still have feelings for her? had asked McDeiss. Of course I did. Old love doesn’t disappear; it is too potent an elixir for that. Instead it burrows deep into bone, like a parasite, waiting until just the right moment to reassert itself and sabotage your life. It arises like an ache in the middle of the night. It crawls up your throat with the taste of bile when you kiss someone new. It grips your soul and shakes you senseless.
It turns you stupid.
I picked up the small Coach purse, gently grasped the red leather pull of the zipper, yanked it
I should give it to the cops, without delay, turn it over like a good and honest citizen, an officer of the court. Yes, I should. Except that Julia wanted desperately to keep it from their prying eyes. It was one thing to answer questions truthfully and then wash my hands of her, it was quite another to voluntarily turn over evidence to those trying to imprison her for the rest of her life. I am a defense attorney as much by instinct as by choice.
I picked up the purse, felt its weight, a few ounces maybe. I rubbed my thumb across the leather and felt something underneath, something hard and cylindrical, like a fancy pen. But what pen was worth hiding from the police? Montblanc? It would benothing to unzip the purse, peek inside. It would be nothing to uncover the secret she was trying to maintain.
I drew my hand away, shook my head. I should give it to her lawyer, Clarence Swift. She wanted to keep it from the cops, and by giving it to Swift I would be facilitating that choice. Then it would be up to Swift to decide what to do with it. He could examine it closely, learn its secret, decide what to turn over, what to keep hidden. With him it would have protections of the attorney-client privilege that it could never have with me. Except that if Julia wanted Swift to have it, he would already have come knocking. She had hidden it from him, too.
I reached my hand once again toward it, gently rubbed the tips of my fingers over its supple red finish. It was worn and soft, like flesh. Like Julia’s flesh in those few rare moments before the cops came knocking, warm and yielding, hungry, ecstatic.
Stop, I told myself. Toss it, burn it, chop it with an ax and drown it in the Schuylkill River. If I did it right, no one would be the wiser. Whatever was inside, whatever evidence, whatever clues to the murder of Julia’s husband or the state of Julia’s soul, would disappear right along with the supple leather.
Yet even as I plotted on how to rid myself of its dangers, I could feel it drawing me toward it. I leaned close and smelled its scent, an aphrodisiacal combination of leather and expensive French perfume. For a moment I lost myself in the erotic promise of the bouquet. Hints of fine oil, champagne, the French Riviera, balsamic and vanilla, musk and passion. And as I breathed it in, as deep as my lungs would allow, I knew, quite simply, that I wouldn’t give it to the cops, or give it to Clarence Swift, or render it unto ash. I had thought our old-lovers’ tango had reached its sordid conclusion, but of course, as usual I was dead wrong.
Whether I liked it or not, I was in the middle of Wren Denniston’s murder. My neck was on the line, and the more I knew, the more I found out, the safer I would be. I wasn’t the type to let evidence disappear, to let secrets lie fallow, to let the soul of an oldlover remain hidden from my view when there were clues right in front of me. No, I wasn’t the type. But it wasn’t only that.
Did I still have feelings for her? had asked McDeiss. Of course I did. Old love doesn’t disappear; it is too potent an elixir for that. Instead it burrows deep into bone, like a parasite, waiting until just the right moment to reassert itself and sabotage your life. It arises like an ache in the middle of the night. It crawls up your throat with the taste of bile when you kiss someone new. It grips your soul and shakes you senseless.
It turns you stupid.
I picked up the small Coach purse, gently grasped the red leather pull of the zipper, yanked it
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