Confessions: The Private School Murders (20 page)

“He was pissed,” J.C. said. “That’s all I can say. He was definitely pissed.”

“At Tamara Gee?”

“Objection!”

“Overruled.”

Philippe sighed.

“Yeah,” J.C. said quietly. “He was pissed at Tamara.”

“I have no other questions,” said Ms. Raphael. She barely hid her look of supreme satisfaction. “Thank you, Mr. Webb.”

Philippe stood, a determined and disbelieving look on his face as he questioned Ms. Raphael’s witness.

“Mr. Webb. Did Matthew tell you he had murdered Tamara?”

“No.”

“Did you see him commit this crime?”

“No.”

“So you have no actual evidence that Matthew lifted a hand to Tamara Gee, do you?”

“No,” Webb said firmly.

“I have no further questions for this witness,” Philippe said.

Like my brother, J.C. Webb was a football hero, and his testimony had seemed believable. But Matthew saying he had to “take care” of Tamara didn’t mean he had. Had Philippe succeeded in pointing that out to the jury?

To be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure he’d succeeded in convincing
me
.

41

Court adjourned for the lunch recess,
during which time the Angel contingent grouped around vending machines and morosely ate cheese crackers and chocolate-chip cookies with very little conversation. Too soon, the doors of Judge Mudge’s courtroom opened and the herd of interested parties stampeded back in.

Harry, Hugo, Jacob, C.P., and I slid into one of the pewlike benches near the front of the room, and within a few minutes, court reconvened.

Nadine Raphael called her next witness.

Troy Wagner was slim, red-haired, wiry, not much taller than me, and looked to be about twenty-five. He
wore a very handsome sports jacket, well-creased pants, and good-quality rubber-soled shoes.

He took the stand, bounced a little as he got comfortable, and then made a tepee with his hands. I noticed that the pinkie and ring finger of his left hand were shorter than normal. In fact, they appeared to have been cut off on a straight line, as if he’d run his hand through a band saw or a food-slicing machine.

Wagner tapped his finger stumps and gave my brother a direct look that I thought might be support, or maybe admiration.

I hoped I was right. Nadine Raphael was overconfident, and she was winning. What we really needed right now was for this guy to throw her the proverbial curveball.

Ms. Raphael advanced on the witness stand and after some preliminary questions asked, “Mr. Wagner, where are you employed?”

“I manage the night shift at the Trattoria in the Village,” he replied proudly.

“Is that the restaurant on the ground floor of the apartment building where Tamara Gee and Matthew Angel lived?”

“Right. The building used to be a hotel. The restaurant has been there since 1946.” Wagner grinned. It seemed like he was enjoying the spotlight.

“Were you working on the night Ms. Gee was murdered?” Ms. Raphael asked.

“Yes,” Wagner said with a nod. “I’m on the eight-
PM
-until-four-
AM
shift.”

“Did Ms. Gee come to the restaurant that night?”

“She did. At just after eight,” the witness replied. “She came to pick up baked ziti and a dinner salad.”

Ms. Raphael cocked her head. “How would you characterize your relationship with Ms. Gee?”

“She was a customer, but she knew I was a Matthew Angel fan. So sometimes we talked about the game or what kind of season Matthew was having.”

I saw a flicker of disapproval cross Ms. Raphael’s face. She didn’t like the fact that this guy was pro-Matty. Ha.

Ms. Raphael continued, “Mr. Wagner. On that last night of Tamara Gee’s life, do you remember what the two of you talked about?”

“Well. She was mad at Mr. Angel, but that wasn’t unusual,” he said, shifting in his seat. “She said Matthew wasn’t the man she thought he was. I said something like, ‘Most men would be p.o.’d, you know, if their girl fooled around on them.’ She said he was abusive and that’s why she fell in love with another man.”

“I see. And what else did you two discuss, Mr. Wagner?”

“I defended Mr. Angel. I don’t remember exactly what I said. I didn’t realize this was going to be important, but words to the effect that he was special, a tremendous athlete, and that this type of guy needs a woman to be very giving and very supportive.”

“Please go on.”

“I knew she didn’t like what I said,” Wagner continued. “She got very tight-lipped, because she was kind of a star herself and, hey, I was just the guy who worked in the restaurant downstairs.

“Anyway, she said she was moving out of the apartment as soon as possible—before Matthew killed her. Then she flipped me off. Last thing she said was ‘Nice knowing you.’ ”

My heart sank.

“You’re sure she said she was moving out
before Matthew killed her
,” Ms. Raphael said, slowly enunciating the last four words.

“Yes. ‘I’m moving out before Matthew kills me.’ That part’s a quote.”

“Thank you, Mr. Wagner. No more questions.”

Ms. Raphael turned around, but before she reached her desk, Troy stood up and shouted, “I should have believed her! I should have done something!” He jabbed his asymmetrical fingers toward Matthew and screamed, “He killed her, and she knew it was coming!”

42

Jacob, my brothers, and
I walked in formation through the front gates of the Dakota, past the liveried doormen, and into the courtyard at the center of the building.

An easel had been set up with a sign reading:

EMERGENCY SHAREHOLDERS’ MEETING TONIGHT AT 7 PM

NORTH COMMON ROOM

REGARDING POISONOUS ANIMALS IN THE BUILDING

—THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Well. There was no way we were missing
that
. But first, we had something to do.

At six, we had an early mac-and-cheese dinner in the living room so that we could watch an unauthorized truTV special on Matthew Angel.

Hugo sat to my left on the sofa, Harry to my right with his hoodie pulled down to his eyes, and Jacob settled into the Pork Chair, which snuffled and squealed under his weight and then went silent as the title came up on the screen.

The Matthew Angel Story, in Progress.

The narrator was Jackie Kam, a young newscaster who had only been on TV for about a year but had covered pretty much every big crime story you could think of. She’d burst onto the scene as the first person to report the whole Whitney Houston thing, and a few months later she covered the Kinsey Killington kidnapping trial.

So of course she’d been right on top of the story when our parents were found dead and all the Angel kids were named as murder suspects. Unlike everyone else who had covered the Angel family saga, however, Kam had been kind. Shown restraint, even. While other people were pawing through our garbage, asking our classmates if they’d ever noticed erratic behavior, even interviewing the regular cabbies on our block to see if they’d ever taken us anywhere scandalous, Kam had stuck to the facts. I just hoped she’d do the same now, for Matthew.

The camera angle was in close on Kam’s pretty face as
she told her audience that in part one of her story, she would interview the football hero who was charged with murdering his glamorous girlfriend and their unborn child.

“The last time Matthew Angel was accused of murder, the charges against him were dismissed,” she said. “But this time, he is going to trial. And it’s looking more and more like Matthew will be found guilty. Coming up, my exclusive interview with the New York Giants’ Matthew Angel, a man accused of a double homicide.”

Cut to: Baxter Street outside the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse, where Matthew’s case was being heard. The narrow side street was lined with small Chinese shops and restaurants and brimming with reporters and interested bystanders.

Cut to: exterior shots of the courthouse; then the camera tracked Jackie Kam as she walked down a very familiar concrete hallway that dead-ended at a Plexiglas cell. Kam perched on the edge of the same folding chair I’d used, and Matthew was escorted into the transparent cage.

Cut to: Kam introducing herself to Matthew. And then the interview began. I held my breath. Everyone in the
room
held their breath.

“Matthew. What can you tell us about the last night of Tamara’s life?”

Angle on Matthew: He looked as though he’d been
sleeping in a shopping cart on the street in the wind. His hair was a bird’s nest and his eyes were red, with purple bags underneath.

“I don’t know what happened that night,” he said. “I was blind drunk when I got into bed. I don’t see how I could have hurt her. I wouldn’t have done it. I loved Tamara. I still do.”

A second camera on Kam: “Let’s say that you did attack Tamara in a drunken rage. What would you have done with the murder weapon, Matthew? How could you have made it disappear?”

On Matthew: “Good try, but I don’t know anything about a murder weapon. Now please, leave me the hell alone.”

On Kam: back in the studio telling us, the audience, “Matthew Angel’s sunny disposition has clouded over. But it’s understandable. He is in The Tombs, a very dark, dank, and hopeless place.”

As Kam talked about what was coming up this week for Matthew, someone knocked on our door. The UFO chandelier sang its famous song as the bell was pushed. None of the Angel kids moved. I wasn’t sure if I could have if I’d tried.

Jacob pushed himself up from the Pork Chair and went to the door. I heard a voice speaking from the hallway.

“Your presence is requested downstairs, sir. This meeting is mandatory. It’s a matter of life and death.”

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