False Witness (11 page)

At thirty-three, she had the shining brightness of a clever twelve-year-old girl. She was small, compact, with a softness of voice and a gentle, quizzical manner that were sometimes mistaken by the defense for timidity or ineptitude. In actuality, she was a steely avenging angel in full pursuit when a case aroused her sense of justice, and she left behind her in many a courtroom an unexpectedly convicted defendant and a stunned, defeated defense attorney who had totally underestimated her.

She had volunteered to spend the midnight-to-eight shift at the bedside of Sanderalee Dawson. The assignment couldn’t have been in better hands. Lucy Capella would remain alert, listening, watchful, expectant, ready and able to discern the slightest change in breathing pattern, bodily position or atmosphere within the room.

Lucy still dressed like a parochial schoolgirl. She greeted us in a plaid skirt, Peter Pan–collared white shirt, open navy blue cardigan sweater. On more than one occasion when she had ventured from the room for a five-minute break, she had been scolded by some nurse or administrator: Little girl, where are you going?

“She seemed restless earlier this evening, Lynne. It’s logged in the case book at about six
P.M.
The police officer on duty heard some strange noises and she caught what sounded like ‘Help me.’ Then nothing at all, until a half hour ago, when I called you. She’s quiet now, but I thought you’d want to come over.”

The room was dreary-dark, restful, soundless except for Sanderalee’s raspy breathing and an occasional echoing sound from down the hall. The hospital still hadn’t come alive with the morning staff. Bobby stood quietly to one side, reading the hourly reports. I leaned over the bed and tried to see Sanderalee Dawson.

It was difficult to find the human being beneath the wrappings and trappings that were being used to preserve and restore her. Her reattached left hand, positioned on a pillow, was held firmly in place by a semi-cast halfway up her arm and clean white gauze down to the last joints. The fingers, swollen and shapeless, curled toward the palm and were motionless.

Sanderalee Dawson was located somewhere beneath all the swelling and distortion. Her jaws were wired shut into place so that the broken bones could knit properly. Her nose had been broken. Each breath seemed to cause her great effort and was accompanied by a whistling, wheezing sound. Her mouth was ripped naked down below the gum line. The lower teeth, thus exposed, seemed too long for a human being. Some of them were broken off and jagged. A dental problem to be dealt with later, along with the plastic surgery to create a new lower lip. There was a long way to go for Sanderalee.

“Has a doctor been in to see her since you’ve been here? Does anyone know that she’s starting to come out of it?”

“Since I’ve been on duty, no doctor. The night nurse checks, but she just pops in and out every so often. I read the chart through. Earlier in the evening, Dr. Cohen and Dr. Waverly, the microsurgeons, stopped by to check her hand. The police officer told me that Sanderalee seemed aware of them. She started to moan, to cry out. Sounded like ‘Help me.’ The doctors noted her condition on the chart and said it was a good sign: that little by little she’d be coming out of it from now on.”

Sanderalee began moaning and Lucy leaned close to the bed and spoke softly and rhythmically. “It’s all right, Sanderalee. We’re here with you. You’re not alone. We won’t leave you. And Lynne is here too.” Lucy motioned for me to go around to the other side of the bed. I did, and reached out for Sanderalee’s right hand and applied a slight pressure. Her head rolled toward me.

“It’s Lynne Jacobi, Sanderalee. From the District Attorney’s office. I’ve been on your show a few times. Lynne.” I got a sudden flash. “Your birthday twin, Sanderalee. April twenty-fourth Taurus. I’m here to help my astrological twin.”

Lucy stared at me, puzzled, but there was a definite returning pressure from Sanderalee’s hand in mine and I leaned closer to her face.

The only living aspect of her was her eyes: they burned and stared from behind swollen lids, making contact, registering an awareness. She was awake; she was listening; waiting.

“Sanderalee, I saw Alan Greco this evening.”

Her hand tightened and relaxed: she understood what I told her.

“Alan sends you his love. He loves you very much and wants you to know he’s just waiting for when you want him to come.”

Slight pressure from her hand. Her eyes closed, then snapped open. She groaned and seemed suddenly terrified. Her hand struggled from mine. Lucy looked up sharply.

“Bobby, please wait outside,” she said. Bobby, who had approached the bed, glanced at me, then back to Lucy, shrugged and left the room. Lucy whispered softly to me, “No men. They seem to frighten her. Even when the doctors come, she seems agitated.”

I nodded. “Sanderalee? Do you know who I am? Lynne Jacobi, from the District Attorney’s office.” I took her hand again and felt the pressure. She was hearing me; understanding; but to what extent, I couldn’t say.

“Hurts.” The word was whispered through her wired jaws.

“Yes. We know it hurts. It will get better from here on. This is the worst it will be; it can only get better from now on.”

That was what my mother used to tell me when I had strep throat.

“Help me. Please.”

“Yes. That’s why we’re here. Lucy and I. No one will hurt you anymore. Can you talk to us a little, Sanderalee? Can you tell us what happened to you?”

Her hand pulled from mine; her eyes closed tightly. We could see her withdraw into herself. Deep into herself. Locking us out.

But again, the thin voice said, “Help me.”

Lucy’s fingers gently stroked Sanderalee’s forehead; soothingly, hypnotically tapping and brushing.

“She’s asleep again. That’s how it’s been since a few minutes before I called you. It’s going to take time, Lynne. There is no way we’ll be able to question her for days. We don’t want to bring her back into the attack yet; not until she’s stronger, and has a more definite idea of where she is, and that she’s safe. God, we don’t want to shove her back to the attack yet.”

We heard a sound from between the locked jaws. I leaned my head down, my face close to hers. The odor of medication was powerful and sickening, mixed as it was with the remnants of fear and horror. If I were Sanderalee, I wouldn’t be in any hurry to wake up and face this awful reality either.

“Regg Morris,” she said in a thin, wavering voice.

Regg Morris.

T
HE BUREAU OFFICE, AT
seven of a Saturday morning, had that standard municipal-building gray feeling. All the black rubber-topped grayish green metal desks were deserted; all the standard five-drawer file cabinets were locked. The large room had been swept and dusted by the middle-of-the-night crew of cleaning women who were apparently required as part of their union contract to remain invisible at all times.

My office was no different from the rest of my people’s: it was just larger, with a window behind my desk that fronted on a slash of Foley Square. Just enough view to tell if it was raining, snowing or doing something wet: no sunshine could ever be detected because of the permanent arrangement of shadows. My desk had been dusted, my floor vacuumed, my wastebasket emptied, my memos neatly aligned along the edge of my desk blotter.

Call Glori Nichols. I had forgotten. To call, not the name. I had checked with Jhavi, since he knew everyone.

“Be very careful, Lynne.” Jhavi had warned. “She’s made of steel nails and she has her own reasons for doing things. Don’t come on too cooperative with her. Let her work for whatever it is she wants and make sure your interests are protected.”

Wonderful. I was about to get myself involved in a situation that required alert self-protection at all times.

I dug through the thick standup file in my bottom drawer and pulled out Lucy Capella’s report headed
Regg Morris, Ph.D.
and subtitled
Ongoing Report.
Lucy, who seemed to have broken through the exhaustion barrier, was wide-awake, alert and very definite about her decision to continue on duty at Sanderalee’s bedside. I felt pretty good about that. I count very heavily on Lucy. She would monitor and record the slightest sound, gesture, word or reaction from Sanderalee. She would catch what most others would miss.

Bobby Jones was on his way down to Regg Morris’s home: a very large, expensive brownstone located on—check out Lucy’s report: 44th Street between Third and Second avenues. I backtracked and read her report straight through:

Regg Morris, born July 12, 1935, in Doctor’s Hospital, NYC. Mother: Eleanor Wesley Morris, age 30, occupation high school English teacher; Father: Alexander Sedgewick Morris, age 34, occupation lawyer/owner-operator of Morris Funeral Homes, Inc., 120th Street and Lexington Avenue.

No previous births; no subsequent births.

Education: First Baptist Church nursery school, 1939–40; Horace Mann 1940–52; Columbia University Teachers College—graduated with B.S. in Education, 1956; Emory University—Master’s Degree in Education, 1958. President and Founder: Educational Research Center, Inc., established 1960; funded privately; specialized in studies re educational methods for minority children; 1961–62 Peace Corps volunteer (not specified); 1964: Ph.D. in Education, Berkeley, Calif. (thesis re: special educational needs of Third World children—wherever found); 1965–70: Educational Research Center, Inc., operating on grants from the UN; U.S. Federal Government; internships provided by both State and City of New York—graduate students from Columbia, CCNY, Brooklyn College on work-study grants; supervised by Dr. Regg Morris.

1974: Dr. Regg Morris founded and incorporated and is chief owner of the “Wider World School”; located at 344 East 44th Street: the first three floors of Dr. Morris’s brownstone, which is also his legal residence.

School is staffed by young, energetic, well-educated, political-activist graduate students, who are—more or less—working under U.S. government grants and internships. This is an elite private school whose student body, by and large, is made up of the children of UN personnel from so-called Third World countries. Although provision is made for these children at the UN’s own international school, more and more interest is being aroused by Dr. Morris’s school. Some parents have withdrawn their children complaining that they did not send them for “indoctrination of a political nature”; but each vacancy is immediately filled from a long waiting list of potential students. This is a very expensive secondary school. Admittance rate to Ivy League colleges is high; however, it should be noted that such admittance is not based largely on the academic achievements of UN children; they are admitted through a special quota system, which is not publicly admitted. Although many of the graduates do score very high on the SATs, one bursar from Ivy League (who will not be quoted by name) stated to undersigned that “these kids are more prepared to engage in empty, repetitive political rhetoric than in historical fact. They are being indoctrinated rather than educated.” (Note: same complaint of parents who withdrew kids.)

For last several years, Dr. Regg Morris has been a regular on the “college lecture tour” scene. He earns somewhere between $20,000 and $40,000 on the lecture tour—exact figures not readily available.

He is unmarried; inherited his father’s funeral business, of which he is a silent partner; net worth somewhere over one million dollars. Exact financial standing not known.

For last two years, it has been an open-secret fact that Dr. Regg Morris and Sanderalee Dawson are not only romantically involved but are in a kind of student/teacher relationship. He is identified with Third World, PLO causes. They have traveled and vacationed together although they maintain separate living quarters in NYC. He is scrupulous about not bringing women to his brownstone, because of the school’s being located there.

Investigation re background continuing.

Lucy Capella, Investigator

Besides Lucy’s report, I had read about him in the newspapers; read articles he had written in various magazines; had seen him on the television talk shows, had listened to him on late-night, all-night radio shows; but still, I was not really prepared for the face-to-face presence of Regg Morris.

He towered over me and was a few inches taller than Bobby Jones. His handshake was firm, enveloping, a warm, two-handed, friendly, sincere greeting, which took enough time for him to get oriented to his surroundings.

He stood graciously beside the chair in front of my desk until I was seated behind my desk; waited until he saw I was settled, glanced at Bobby Jones, who was already slumped in one of my two visitor’s chairs. He allowed himself a slow, sliding, taking-it-all-in glance around my office: there was nothing special to take his attention, although he did seem to note my framed law degree. He played with his Phi Beta Kappa key with long, slender fingers until he was sure both Bobby and I knew he had it. He sat straight and tall, his full attention now focused on me. The force of his stare was physical; it eliminated our surroundings; it created an intimacy that was at once startling and inappropriate and yet somehow comfortable and familiar. His black eyes were lover’s eyes; they were one source of the tremendous power that emanated from him. His body, long and lean and covered by beautifully tailored clothing, was in the center of a highly magnetized field of tension and energy: he was the most totally sexual person I had ever encountered. A little more time went by than I had intended: I was supposed to be establishing the ground rules for this meeting, not him.

“Dr. Morris, I want to thank you for agreeing to come to our office this morning. I hope it wasn’t inconvenient for you?”

He smiled slowly and spread his hands. There was something mocking, cynical just beneath his soft-spoken words. “In the interests of justice, my convenience is secondary.”

“Do you have any idea at all who might have assaulted Sanderalee Dawson? Do you have any suggestions or information that might aid us?”