Regina's Song (33 page)

“Anyway, that’s when the cops showed up, and there were a lot of flashlights sweeping around in the fog. Renata saw them, so she kept on swimming until she got to Woodland Park. It was below freezing that night, so she left a trail through the frost on the grass. I picked up that trail and followed her. She went through the park and directly to Saint Benedict’s Church. She may have had some idea that the church was a sort of sanctuary. Father O’Donnell says it doesn’t work that way, but Renata’s head wasn’t really working anymore. She went inside the church and hid in one of the side chapels.”

I realized that I was going to have to be very careful here, so I paused to take a deep breath.

“Father O’Donnell and I were near the altar,” I continued, “and we could hear her whispering to herself.
I
think she was talking with Regina, and both sides of the conversation were coming out of
her
mouth. I’m positive that the alternate persona Dr. Fallon mentioned is Regina, and now she’s right there in front of Renata—except that Renata’s the only one who can see and hear her. The fugue is over now because Regina’s finally tracked down the guy who killed her, and she’s taken her revenge—and he knew who she was and why she was doing it. Now that he’s dead, the twins are back together again—even closer than before, really, since the two of them are both inside Renata’s body. Everyone else in the world is blocked out, but that doesn’t matter. Their conversation will probably go on for as long as Renata’s still alive. That’s about all there is, Your Honor—except that if Regina hadn’t got to him first, I might have taken a shot at Fergusson myself.”

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, Mr. Austin,” Judge Compson said disapprovingly. “Do you have any other witnesses, Mr. Rankin?”

“No, Your Honor. I think I’ll close my case right there. Mr. Austin’s covered just about everything.”

“Your witness, Mr. Fielding,” Judge Compson said.

Fielding was staring at Renata, and he looked almost as if he was ready to break down and cry—either out of sympathy or because he knew for certain that he’d just lost the case. “No questions, Your Honor,” he said in a barely audible voice.

“I’ll need copies of Miss Greenleaf’s freshman English papers and Miss Cardinale’s case history—along with those tapes.”

“They’ll be in your hands by five o’clock, Your Honor,” Rankin promised.

“There’s another tape you might want to hear, Your Honor,” I suggested. “Renata used to listen to it for hours on end, and that moaning sound Officer Murray and the other policemen heard on the night when Mr. Fergusson was killed was pretty much an imitation of that tape. It involves a woman singing with a pack of wolves.”

“I believe I
would
like to hear that tape. Thank you for mentioning it, Mr. Austin. Oh, you may step down, by the way.”

I nodded and returned to my regular seat.

Judge Compson looked troubled. “I’d like to remind everyone here that this matter is still strictly confidential. If anyone here starts talking about what has transpired here, I’ll find him in contempt of court. I’ll advise counsel when I reach my decision. Court’s adjourned.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

I felt drained as we followed Mr. Rankin out of the courtroom. I tried not to rehash my testimony in my mind. I knew that would lead to endless “wouldas, couldas, and shouldas” that wouldn’t accomplish much of anything—except to make me feel even worse than I already did.

“Excellent job, Mark,” Rankin told me. “You definitely gave Judge Compson a lot to consider.”

“I hope so,” I said. “Do you think Renata’s papers and Sylvia’s tapes will be enough to persuade the judge that we weren’t trying to pull off some elaborate scam? People don’t like it when some rich kid gets off easy because the parents can buy off whole bunches of witnesses.”

“I don’t believe Judge Compson’s very interested in public opinion, Mark,” Rankin said. “She bases her judgments on the facts, not on the evening news.”

“At least we cut the ground out from under Burpee,” Mary said with a certain satisfaction.

“We did that, all right,” Charlie said with a wicked smirk. “There were a couple of times there when I thought he was going to strangle Fielding. Every time Fielding said ‘no questions,’ Burpee’s blood pressure seemed to ratchet up a little higher.”

“That was something I didn’t understand,” Sylvia said then. “After Dr. Fallon’s testimony, Fielding seemed to lie down and play dead.”

“The young fellow appears to have a conscience,” Rankin replied. “I think Miss Greenleaf’s behavior in the courtroom persuaded him that he was on the wrong side in this case. He shows promise. My partners and I might just poach him from the district attorney when this is over.”

“What do you say we get out of here?” I said then. “This place is starting to give me the whim-whams.”

“I already have copies of Miss Greenleaf’s papers and Sylvia’s tapes,” Rankin told us. “I
will
need that tape you mentioned to the judge, though, Mark.”

“I’ve got copies back at the boardinghouse,” I told him. “When we get home, I’ll grab one and bring it to you.”

“Good,” he said. “Let’s not keep the judge waiting.”

Word had evidently leaked out that the sanity hearing was over, and the front yard of the boardinghouse was swarming with reporters and TV cameras again. I’m not sure what they thought they were going to get out of us—the gag order was still in force, so we weren’t allowed to say anything even if we’d wanted to.

We got out of the station wagon, and James bulked up his shoulders again as he led the way toward the front porch. The rest of us said interesting things to the reporters in assorted languages they didn’t understand. Then one shrill female reporter, apparently acting on the assumption that her gender gave her certain privileges, grabbed Erika by the arm, demanding answers.

That was a
real
mistake. Erika had her key ring in her hand, and there was that cute little attachment in among the keys. The pushy reporter fell back, choking and trying to cover her face as Erika gave her a heavy dose of pepper spray at close range. Trish might have used logic; and Sylvia would probably have fallen back on emotion; but Erika relied on chemistry.

The rest of us followed her example and did a quick draw with
our
key rings.

The reporters got the message almost immediately, and they backed off.

When we reached the porch, Erika took it one step further. She smiled sweetly at nervous reporters. “This has been absolutely lovely,” she told them, “and we’ll have to do it again one of these days—real soon.”

I went upstairs and grabbed a copy of Renata’s favorite tape. Then James, Charlie, and I went back to the station wagon to ferry it downtown to Mr. Rankin’s office.

The reporters had all left, for some reason.

At about five o’clock that evening, one of the TV channels ran footage of Erika’s performance—but they only ran it one time. Evidently some producer woke up to the fact the pepper spray response to questions might gain some popularity if it showed up on the tube too often.

The incident out front had brightened our day a bit, but at the supper table things got gloomy again. “I’m almost certain that Judge Compson will rule in our favor,” Trish told us. “Mr. Rankin presented a very good case, and Renata’s behavior in the courtroom demonstrated that she wasn’t even aware of what was happening. I’m positive that the prosecution will try to hold out for incarceration in an institution for the criminally insane, but it’d make more sense if the judge just returned Renata to Dr. Fallon’s sanitarium. It’s not a great solution, but it’s probably the best we can hope for.”

“Maybe not, Trish,” I disagreed. I looked around at the rest of the gang. “This doesn’t go any further, right?” I said.

“What are you up to now, Mark?” Sylvia demanded.

“It’s not me, babe,” I said. “Father O’Donnell’s got an alternative, and he’s already put it in motion. His bishop owes him a favor, and Father O called it in. He says there’s an obscure order of cloistered nuns who are dedicated to caring for older sisters who’ve slid over the line into senility—or Alzheimer’s, or whatever else you want to call it. They’ll also accept rich, usually elderly Catholic ladies with the same problem. The nuns are gentle, and they spend a lot of time tending to their charges—and their cloister’s somewhere out in the boonies here in western Washington. Father O’s convinced that it’s the best possible solution.”

“It
would
be better than Dr. Fallon’s place,” Sylvia agreed.

“ ‘Get thee to a nunnery’?” Charlie asked.

“It beats hell out of the alternatives,” I said. “Anyway, Father O’s bishop pulls a lot of weight with some higher-ups in city government, and he’s got them slipping around making suggestions. I’m pretty sure that word of this has reached Judge Compson by now.”

“What’s the name of the order?” Sylvia asked me.

“Father O would rather that I didn’t mention it,” I told her.

By the end of the week, it was fairly clear that Judge Compson was taking her time. The delay was making me very edgy—I really wanted to put an end to this.

“Calm down, Mark,” Trish told me at the supper table on Friday. “Judge Compson has to get all her ducks in a row on this one. If she rules that Renata’s mentally incompetent to stand trial, the district attorney could very well appeal that ruling. She’s never had one of her rulings overturned, and she’s probably digging precedents out of every law book she can get her hands on and consulting with whole platoons of psychiatrists to make sure that Renata won’t suddenly ‘recover’ after a year or so. There were a number of cases several years back where the defendant put on a good show and got off with a brief stay in a mental institution and then walked away after a ‘miraculous’ recovery. That’s what clouded up the insanity defense. A lot of people were getting away with murder, and the appeals courts go over insanity rulings with a fine-toothed comb to make sure that the presiding judge hasn’t been hoodwinked.”

“Come on, Trish,” Charlie protested. “Twinkie’s at
least
as crazy as the Son of Sam killer or that guy who used President Reagan for target practice.”

“I’m sure Judge Compson realizes that, Charlie,” she said patiently, “but she doesn’t want some hard-line appeals court to overturn her decision. We wouldn’t want that either, would we?”

“Maybe you’re right,” he conceded. “If she
does
rule in our favor, I’d be a whole lot happier if her decision’s cast in cement. Let’s get Twinkie inside that convent and keep her there.”

“Doesn’t that raise another possibility?” James suggested. “If there’s an appeal pending, wouldn’t Renata have to be available? They could keep her under guard in the psych ward at the university medical center almost indefinitely while this meanders its way through the court system, couldn’t they?”

“In theory, I suppose they could,” Trish admitted. “
Or
they could transfer her to some other facility.” She frowned. “That
might
have been Fielding’s strategy right from the start. If they move her from the U.W. Medical Center to a state institution for the criminally insane, the prosecution could stall their appeal for years. That would be a
de facto
win for the prosecution.”

“I’m glad I’m not a lawyer,” Charlie said. “There’s
way
too much ifsy-andsy in the legal system for my taste. I like things to be simpler. When I push the button on a rocket, it either takes off or explodes on the launching pad. I know immediately if I’ve done everything right.”

“ ‘The mills of the gods grind slow, but exceeding fine’,” James quoted. “It appears that the mills of the legal system grind even slower.”

“Why are you two picking on me?” Trish complained.

“We’re only teasing, Mama Trish,” Charlie said with an impudent grin.

Now I had something
else
to worry about in addition to all the roadblocks the prosecutor could throw in our way. It wasn’t a very enjoyable weekend.

Then on Monday morning Trish got a phone call from Mr. Rankin. She talked with him for a few minutes, then came into the kitchen. “Today’s the day,” she told us. “Judge Compson’s made her decision, and she’ll issue her ruling at one o’clock this afternoon.”

“Did the judge give him any hints at all?” Sylvia asked. She sounded tense.

“Not Judge Compson,” Trish replied. “She
never
tips her hand.” Then she grinned at us. “This afternoon’s session
will
be closed, the same as all the others have been, and the court record will be sealed.”

“Can she get away with that?” Charlie asked.

“She can get away with almost anything,” Trish assured him. “Unless an appeals court overrules her.”

“Absolute dictatorship? Wow!”

“It comes close. The legal system goes all the way back to the Dark Ages. Didn’t you know that?”

“I make a point of not getting tangled up in the legal system, Mama Trish,” he replied.

“I wonder why,” Erika murmured.

We went to the courthouse before noon that day—by eleven-thirty we were all wound pretty tight.

Mr. Rankin and Les Greenleaf joined us at a quarter to one. “We’re getting some help from city hall,” Rankin told us. “It’s pretty low-key, but there’s been a fairly attractive offer floating around for the past several days.”

“The convent?” I suggested.

He blinked. “How did you find out about that, Mark?” he demanded.

“I have me sources, dontcha know,” I replied with a fake Irish brogue.

“I should have guessed,” he said ruefully. “Did you tell the others?”

“Not in any great detail,” I replied. “I was told to keep my mouth shut about the ins and outs. Do you think Fielding will hold still for it?”

“Fielding will do what he’s told to do,” Rankin said, “and I wouldn’t be surprised if the district attorney’s been receiving phone calls from some high-ranking officials in city and county government. Frankly, I’m a little baffled by all this behind-the-scenes maneuvering. I’d give a lot to know what’s set this all in motion.”

“You already know,” I told him. “I told you about it quite some time ago.”

Rankin was sharp—I could practically see his mind whirring back to the scene I’d described—Regina and Renata together in the darkened church that night. “You mean—?” He broke off.

“Exactly. Why don’t we keep it to ourselves, though? This is messy enough already. Let’s not clutter it up with
that
.”

“What are you keeping tucked up under your armpit, Mark?” Charlie demanded.

“I’ve been told—firmly—not to talk about it, old buddy. And I don’t think you really want to know. You won’t sleep very well if you find out.”

“That bad?”

“It’s even worse, Charlie. It’s making everybody who knows about it
real
nervous.”

“He’s probably right,” Rankin sided with me. “We don’t want any word of this leaking out. One hint of it will trigger news stories all over the known world. Why don’t we just leave it at that?”

Judge Compson entered the courtroom at one o’clock on the dot. She looked haggard, and I was fairly sure I knew why. Evidently, Father O’Donnell’s bishop had a long reach, and he could put a lot of pressure on various officials to get what he wanted.

The judge rapped her gavel more firmly than usual. “It is the decision of this court that Miss Renata Greenleaf is mentally incompetent to stand trial at this time,” she announced. “Moreover, the court record shall remain sealed until further notice.”

Fielding came to his feet. “Exception, Your Honor,” he protested.

“Exception noted,” she replied.

“May the prosecution inquire as to what arrangements have been made for the defendant’s confinement?” Fielding pressed.

“No, Mr. Fielding, the prosecution may not. The arrangements are still pending, and this court will
not
interfere—and neither will the prosecution. Sit down, Mr. Fielding.”

“You can’t just turn her loose!” Burpee exploded, coming to his feet.

“Remove that person from this courtroom!” Judge Compson sharply instructed the bailiffs. “And hold him until we adjourn.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” the head bailiff replied.

There were three bailiffs in the courtroom, and they homed in on Burpee with grim determination.

Judge Compson’s sealing of the court record caused a near explosion in the ranks of the Seattle media, and the screams of protest were probably heard in San Francisco and British Colombia.

The Tuesday morning newspaper had two full pages of letters to the editor, most of them bitching and complaining about this “unlawful violation” of their right to drool and slobber about something that was really none of their damned business in the first place.

Then, along about noon, the regular programming on one of the major network TV channels was interrupted. We were just sitting down to lunch in the breakfast nook, and the kitchen television set happened to be tuned to that channel.

The reporter seemed to be fairly excited, and then the camera panned to—guess who?—dear old Lieutenant Burpee.

The reporter briefly introduced him, and then Burpee started to read a prepared statement in a wooden voice. He didn’t read out loud very well, and after a minute or so, he crumpled the pages he was reading, threw them to the ground, and launched into a diatribe of shrill-voiced denunciation.