Injustice (26 page)

I watch Kyle Runion's supporters. Family and friends of a victim usually like to see the defense take a scolding. But this is different. They don't want legal complexities, they want their doubts quieted. I see the woman I assume is Kyle's mother. She watches Tina, listening with her head cocked sideways. She looks like a PTA mom in skirt and blouse, her blond hair showing enough of a wave in front that you can't be sure if it's natural, kept out of her eyes by
a quick comb-through with her fingers, or done at a salon. She is serious-looking, her face revealing that she understands most of what she hears. I have no doubt that she reads everything Gregory Nations sends her and calls him up with questions when something doesn't make sense.

Peggy Devaney sits near me. A striking contrast to Kyle's mother, Peggy is burly, has raw, chapped hands, and the complexion of an old shingle on the side of a barn. Her hair is white and braided. She wears new jeans and two button-down shirts. The inside one is white and buttoned one shy of the top. The overshirt is blue plaid and quilted and opened to the waist, tucked into the jeans, giving her more bulge below the beltline than she can take credit for. She is very much a farm girl. Both women listen as Tina answers the judge's comments, and I wonder if they could ever be friendly. What if Daryl's “conviction” is overturned; what if Henry is legally proved to be the perp? These two have endured such trauma—not just losing a loved one but also the agony of clinging for so long to the most meager scraps of hope. Until Kyle's remains were discovered by Arthur Cunningham a full year after the boy disappeared, his mother clung, no doubt, to the hope that he might yet be found alive. And Peggy Devaney has clung for eight years to the hope of a reversal that will vindicate her brother and set him free. I wonder if, when it's all over, one will ever reach out to the other.

Now Gregory Nations stands to argue. He talks about protecting the finality of verdicts.

The judge interrupts. “But in the case of newfound compelling evidence of innocence—”

“Your Honor, while analysis of this new evidence indicates that it was not Daryl Devaney's DNA, we would argue that the person who kidnapped and murdered Kyle Runion might not be the one who actually left the DNA. Additionally, there could have been a laboratory error in analysis of the sample, or chain-of-custody problems, or contamination of the sample. So if—”

Matsuko interrupts again. “So why not have a trial? Let a jury decide those questions?”

“I'll tell you why, Judge,” Nations says. He squares his shoulders and straightens to maximum height. The message of his body language is obvious: He wants to remind us that he speaks for the people. For
society
.

Gregory Nations is an empty suit. He is unimaginative and unexplored. He is a zealous prosecutor, and he believes that being a prosecutor means he is also philosophical, and wise, and insightful about the human condition. But whenever we get together, our conversation withers the second we get off the subject of current prosecutions. As far as I can tell, he doesn't think about anything besides convicting accused perps, and he doesn't ponder or anguish over the tragedies that we are called upon to redress. It doesn't surprise me that he seems unmoved by the possibility of Daryl's innocence. “It's not about innocence,” I heard him say once, “it's about order and consistency.”

Gregory Nations says in a voice a bit deeper than a moment ago: “As you just pointed out, Your Honor, there was a confession, a guilty plea, a sentence. Mr. Devaney never requested, within the prescribed time frame, to withdraw his plea, and he never filed a timely appeal, and there is no statute or case law specifically allowing a new trial.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Matsuko says, “but I'm not talking about points of law, I'm talking about innocence.
Actual
innocence.”

Gregory shakes his head at the judge's apparent naïveté. “Your Honor,” he says, “do you really want to open your court docket to every convict who claims he didn't do it?”

T
he hearing ends. Judge Matsuko is in no hurry to make a decision. He and Gregory Nations are playing the same game. They want to be certain
somebody
fills the prison cell of Kyle Runion's murderer. They'd prefer it to be the right person, but until they have more confidence in the case against Henry, they don't want Daryl Devaney going anywhere.

At the last hearing, Kyle Runion's people got out of the courtroom as quickly as possible, not wanting to risk an encounter with Tina or me or Peggy Devaney. This time they are in less of a hurry. They're uncertain what to think.

I go to Tina and give her a hug. “Great work, babe,” I say.

She responds with a tepid one-arm hug. “Thanks. I think it went okay.”

Peggy comes and stands with us. She has a small handbag clutched against her waist. It seems incongruously dainty against this hefty woman, whose eyes are comically magnified behind thick lenses. She is different than the last time I saw her. With the DNA results, she has been stunned by the first blinding rays of optimism. It must be terrifying.

I step away to let the two of them talk. Craig is gone from the room. Too bad. I wanted to introduce myself to him. I was going to shake his hand, hold on to it too long and squeeze too hard, and stand too close, holding his hand near my stomach, breathing on him, and being all inside his personal space. But he slipped out. The coward.

Lizzy met with Calvin Dunbar. She calls me up, full of excitement. “He was so nice,” she says. “He explained the whole process to me.
I took civics, like everybody else. I thought I knew stuff. But I guess I didn't know anything about how it really works. Back-scratching. You know? What Calvin said—get this—he said that except for how there's no smoke anymore, the smoke-filled rooms are as smoke-filled as ever, metaphorically speaking. Isn't that great?”

Lizzy chatters on about her meeting. She's as happy as I've heard her in a long time. She feels grown up and useful. She says she'll write up her notes for me. We make a plan to meet for lunch the next day, when she'll “debrief” me.

Chip calls. “I just forwarded you that report,” he says.

“What report?”

“From the SF station. You know, when they investigated Tony Smeltzer?”

Smeltzer. I've scarcely thought of him since the DNA results from Kyle Runion's murder. We had thought he killed Lydia and was after Tina. We were wrong. Now he was just a dead letter. I open the email from Chip. The report comes up with a couple of photos. One is an old mug shot, the other was surreptitiously snapped by the agent who investigated Smeltzer. Doughy face with eyes that are hooded and bulging. He reminds me of the old actor Peter Lorre. The report says Smeltzer got out of Ellisville back in January, showed up in San Francisco in April, and spent some time in a hospital there in June.

The report states that Smeltzer hasn't left the Bay Area since he first arrived. He had surgery for colon cancer this past spring, and his health appears frail. He has a job working in an auto parts store just outside of San Francisco, and he spends much of his free time in a local bar called the Fog City Tap. Occasionally, he'll find a woman to leave with. The reporting agent, a guy named Laird, says he engaged Smeltzer in conversation and they shot some pool together. “The subject makes no bones about being fed up with everyone and everything,” Laird writes. “He makes frequent reference to taking a walk halfway across the Golden Gate Bridge one day soon.” According
to the report, Smeltzer headed for the West Coast after getting out of Ellisville because the feds had nabbed both the stash and the cash when they arrested him years ago. Apparently, some of his old crowd has heartburn about that loss of assets, so Smeltzer figured he'd keep his distance.

Lizzy and I meet at the Rain Tree. The place is packed. We stand inside the door, waiting for a table. Several parties are ahead of us, and within a few minutes, several more come in behind. New arrivals blow warm breath into their hands and stuff woolen hats into overcoat pockets.
Wow! Brrr!

Steve, the owner, comes over in his wheelchair. “Sorry for the wait, folks. We'll seat you as soon as we can.”

He spots me in the crowd and we exchange nods, then he goes over to the hostess and says something to her before rolling away to wherever he came from. A minute later, the hostess comes up to me and says quietly, “Mr. Davis, your table is ready.” Lizzy and I follow her to a table for two over by the windows.

“Geez, Dad,” Lizzy says.

I shrug modestly.

We order a small pot of clams as an appetizer. Steve brings them on a tray balanced across his prosthetic knees. “Davis,” he says. We bump fists.

“Thanks for the table.”

He brushes the comment away with a flip of his hand.

I say, “I'd like you to meet my, um . . .” I glance at Lizzy. She looks professional. She has obviously prepared for this meeting and wants be taken seriously. Her clothes are businesslike, her hair is brushed, and she wears a touch of mascara and muted lipstick. (Who
is
this girl?) She has a black folio in which, I assume, are the notes and the report she has prepared for me. In her left hand she holds a pen, dexterously twirling it through her fingers in a way I've never mastered.

“I'd like you to meet my associate, Elizabeth Davis,” I say to Steve.

“Elizabeth,” Steve says. He holds up a fist and Lizzy bumps it. She smiles, and I try to think whether I'm surprised to see a mouth of even white teeth instead of silvery hardware and colorful rubber bands. The passing of time made more sense to me back when I saw Lizzy regularly throughout the week. Now that she's living full-time with Flora, weeks pass without a meeting in person. I haven't gotten my mind around the new Lizzy.

“Associate?” Steve says. “An associate with the same last name. And it looks like you and her are from the same cookie cutter, different batch.”

“You caught us,” I say. “Lizzy's my big sister.”

“Daddy,” she says, and in her smile, I imagine the ghost of those braces. How many years have they been gone?

“Anyhow,” Steve says, “honored to make your acquaintance, Elizabeth,” and he leaves us.

Steve has done well with the Rain Tree. I hear him mentioned on the radio, and I see bits in the paper about his generosity to nonprofits involved in drug and alcohol rehab, social service projects, and veterans' assistance. But his appearance hasn't caught up with his economic and social standing. If he lingered in his chair on the sidewalk beside a tin can, you'd be tempted to drop coins into it.

We finish the clams. I order a Reuben. Lizzy gets the Thai sesame salad with no chicken.

“So, about Calvin Dunbar,” Lizzy says. “I've written up a report for you, just like a real investigator would.”

“Aren't you a real investigator?”

“I don't have an investigator's license.”