Hell (32 page)

‘Thank you,' she said. ‘This is very hard for me.'

‘Take your time,' the judge told her.

She nodded, composed herself. ‘I saw some news items around the time that Jerome Cooper, the murderer, was arrested.'

‘The alleged murderer,' Judge Brazen corrected her.

‘Yes, Your Honor,' she said. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘Don't worry about it,' he said.

She shook her head. ‘I'm trying to keep things in chronological order, but it's hard. I was trying to help my parents deal with my brother's death, and then suddenly questions were being asked about Richard that had nothing to do with him having been killed. People talking about his car, wanting to see his computer, search his apartment.'

‘Go on,' Wagner prompted her, gently.

‘Detective Samuel Becket, in particular, came to visit my parents just a few days before Richard's funeral, because I think he was hoping he might persuade them to let him see the computer. I'm afraid I became very angry. Too angry to listen properly to what he was saying.'

‘What was Detective Becket saying?' Wagner asked.

‘He was saying that he thought my brother might have been used by Jerome Cooper.'

‘And you felt that was untrue?'

‘Of course I did. I felt – I knew – that the real reason behind his visit was that he was trying to get his wife off the hook for killing my brother.'

Wagner waited a moment.

‘And has anything altered since then, Ms Bianchi?'

‘Yes.' Her voice was softer.

‘I'm sorry, Ms Bianchi,' Judge Brazen said, ‘but you will need to speak more distinctly.'

‘Of course,' she said. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘We understand how difficult this is for you,' Wagner said.

‘Just let the witness continue,' the judge said.

Wagner nodded, waited.

‘The day before my brother's funeral,' Gina Bianchi went on, ‘I turned on his laptop computer partly because I wanted to see if there were any people who still had to be contacted, and partly because I felt a need to read some of his work. Richard wrote short stories among other things, and I thought it might be a way of feeling close to him.'

Wagner waited a moment, but the young woman was looking at her parents. Her mother was pale, her father strained.

‘Did you notice something else on Mr Bianchi's computer?' he asked finally.

‘Yes.' She paused. ‘Some unusual websites in the search history.'

‘What kind of websites?'

‘I didn't look at them,' she said, ‘but their names indicated they had something to do with organ transplantation.'

‘Did that strike you as strange?' Wagner asked.

‘Not especially,' she said. ‘I assumed they were research for his writing.'

‘Was your brother writing about organ transplantation?'

‘Not that I knew of,' she said. ‘But that was what I assumed at the time.'

‘And now?' Wagner asked. ‘Do you still assume that?'

The young woman looked sick at heart.

‘No,' she said, softly.

‘Why is that?'

‘I found other things, after that,' she said. ‘Not that day. Some time after the funeral, when I turned on the laptop again.'

‘What did you find then, Ms Bianchi?'

She took a moment. ‘I found some material that Richard – or someone else using his computer – had downloaded from the Internet.'

‘What kind of material?'

‘It was about heart surgery,' she said. ‘In particular, it was about heart excision for transplantation purposes.'

Now Wagner took a moment.

‘You were kind enough, Ms Bianchi,' he said, ‘to email me a copy of that material shortly before this hearing.'

‘Yes,' she said.

‘Were you aware that it is the exact same material that was found, in printout form, on the houseboat called the
Aggie
, on which Jerome Cooper was arrested?'

There was a stirring in the courtroom, murmurs and what sounded like the tapping of fingers on laptops, or might have been the court reporter, but Grace did not look around, just sat, frozen, waiting for Gina Bianchi's reply.

‘No,' she said. ‘I had no way of knowing that.'

‘What else did you find, Ms Bianchi?'

There was a pause.

‘Ms Bianchi?' Wagner prompted.

‘I found an email confirmation of a purchase of surgical instruments.'

Grace, unaware that she had been holding her breath for several moments, took a sudden intake of air that sounded to her own ears like a gasp, which, in turn, made her cheeks flush. And she wanted to look at Sam, but she didn't dare to move, did not want to do anything that might risk halting the momentum of what was happening.

‘Go on, Ms Bianchi,' Judge Brazen said.

‘I remembered then that, among other things, Jerome Cooper had been arrested in connection with those “heart murders” – the horrible story of the heart that a child found in a pool at a hotel.'

‘Was there a date on the email confirmation of the purchase you told us about?' Wagner asked.

‘You know there was,' she said. ‘I sent it to you this morning.'

‘Please could you answer the question.'

‘Yes,' she said. ‘March eleventh.'

‘March eleventh of this year?' Wagner checked.

‘Yes.'

‘And did you make any connection between your brother's purchase of surgical instruments and those terrible crimes?'

‘I don't know that it was my brother's purchase,' she said. ‘Someone else may have been using his computer.'

‘Jerome Cooper, perhaps?'

‘I don't know,' she said.

‘Do you know of anyone else who might have used his computer?'

‘No,' she said. ‘But that doesn't mean they did not.'

‘Did the email confirmation specify the method of payment?'

‘I believe it was a credit card of some kind.'

‘I have to tell you,' Wagner said, ‘that while it has still to be confirmed, preliminary communications with the company who sent that email to your brother's address point to the purchase having been made using a credit card belonging to Richard Bianchi.'

Gina Bianchi grew paler and swayed a little, and over in the public benches, Josephine Bianchi stared into her husband's eyes.

‘Would you like to stop for a while, Ms Bianchi?' Wagner asked.

‘No,' she said. ‘I'm OK.'

‘Would you like a glass of water?' Judge Brazen asked.

‘Yes, please.'

A glass of water was swiftly poured by Wagner's assistant, brought to the witness box, and as she took the glass and held it to her lips, her hands were trembling.

‘Are you all right to go on?' the judge asked. ‘We could take a break.'

‘I'd rather go on,' she said.

‘Ms Bianchi,' Wagner said, ‘what else did you find of particular note in your search of Mr Bianchi's laptop computer?'

‘I found some notes that were hard to understand.'

‘Why was that?' Wagner asked.

‘They were in a journal I hadn't noticed the first time I'd looked, and they were kind of cryptic. Mostly, they seemed to be blocking off dates, the way you do when you have something specific to do that could take time, but all that had been typed on those days was “The Boss”.'

‘Did your brother have a boss at the time? An employer?'

‘Not to my knowledge. So far as I know, Richard was self-employed.'

‘Anything else?'

‘What seemed to be shopping lists,' she said.

‘What was on the lists?' Wagner asked.

‘All kinds of things. Food, pain medication, cleaning stuff, all kinds. I can't remember.'

‘Why did you notice them at all?'

‘Because they were in a file named “The Boss”.'

‘All of them?' Wagner said.

‘No,' she said. ‘One of the lists was headed with some initials.'

‘What were the initials?'

‘T.O.H.' She paused. ‘It was a capital “T”, then a capital “O”, then an apostrophe, then a capital “H”.'

‘Did those initials mean anything to you, Ms Bianchi?' Wagner asked.

‘Not until I went back and checked some of the newspaper articles about Jerome Cooper's arrest.' Her voice was growing huskier from strain. ‘And I saw that the boat he was arrested on was registered to a man named O'Hagen.'

‘Tom O'Hagen,' Wagner said.

‘Yes.'

‘And what, if anything, have you concluded from all these discoveries?'

Gina Bianchi's eyes seemed filled with pain.

‘That when Detective Becket said he thought my brother might have been used by Jerome Cooper, he might have been right,' she said.

‘Thank you, Ms Bianchi,' Wagner said.

‘Is that all?' Judge Brazen asked the attorney.

‘I do have one further question for the witness, Your Honor.'

‘Ask it,' the judge said.

‘Are you aware of any physical resemblance between your late brother and Jerome Cooper?'

‘No,' Gina Bianchi said.

‘What was your brother's natural hair color, Ms Bianchi?'

‘Brown,' she answered.

‘But at the time of his death,' Wagner said, ‘his hair was a silvery blond, wasn't it?'

‘Yes,' she said. ‘It was.'

‘Do you know how long it had been that color?'

‘I don't,' she said. ‘I hadn't seen Richard for some time.'

‘What color was his hair the last time you saw him prior to his death?'

‘It was brown, as it had always been.'

‘So your brother was not, to the best of your knowledge, in the habit of tinting his hair different shades?'

‘Not that I knew of,' she said.

‘Were you surprised then when you saw his hair after his death?' Wagner paused. ‘I am very sorry to ask you what must seem a very insensitive question.'

‘It's damned insensitive,' the judge said.

‘I don't mind answering,' Gina Bianchi said. ‘I was surprised, yes.' For the first time since entering the witness box, there were tears in her eyes. ‘Though I did have other things on my mind.'

‘Of course you did,' Wagner said. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘Get to the point, Counselor,' Judge Brazen said.

‘Are you aware, Ms Bianchi, that Grace Becket stated that she believed, when your brother came toward her car in a threatening—'

‘Objection.' Elena Alonso was on her feet.

‘Sustained.'

‘Mrs Becket says that she believed your brother was Jerome Cooper, Ms Bianchi.' Wagner paused. ‘And the last time he had been seen, his hair had been dyed silver.'

‘Millions of men have silver hair.' Alonso was up again.

‘But they were not all there that evening, coming at Mrs Becket's car in a taunting and threatening manner,' Wagner said.

‘Objection,' Alonso said.

‘In a manner perceived by Mrs Becket as greatly threatening,' Wagner amended.

‘I don't know what you want me to say,' Gina Bianchi said.

‘Of course you don't,' Judge Brazen said.

‘I have no more questions for you, Ms Bianchi,' Wagner said. ‘But I would like to thank you for coming forward. It must have taken great strength.'

In the witness box, Richard Bianchi's sister let go for the first time, leaned forward, buried her face in her hands and wept.

‘Court is adjourned,' Judge Brazen said. ‘One hour.' He paused. ‘At which time, I think I'd like to hear a little summing up of exactly where both counselors feel they stand after all we've just heard.'

‘What just happened in there?' Cathy asked Saul out in the hallway.

‘I'm not exactly sure.' Saul looked at Daniel. ‘What do you think?'

‘I hardly dare say what I think,' Daniel said.

‘Me neither,' Claudia said.

‘Where's Sam?' Cathy asked.

‘He went someplace with Grace and Mr Wagner,' Saul said.

‘What do we do now?' Mike asked.

‘I promised to call Dad and Mildred,' Saul said.

‘And then I guess we all wait,' Claudia said.

‘Anyone hungry?' Robbie asked.

No one answered.

‘I could use a cup of coffee,' Magda said.

‘There's Sam,' Saul said.

Walking slowly toward them. No clues in his expression.

‘What's happening?' Cathy asked.

‘I have nothing to tell you,' Sam said. ‘Except Wagner and Ms Alonso are talking.'

‘Jerry must have told you something,' Cathy said.

Sam put an arm around her. ‘I'm the last person anyone's going to talk to right now.'

‘Is Grace with them?' Claudia asked.

Now Sam's face showed a little of his strain. ‘We had a moment together, but now I think they've given her a room to rest in.'

‘Not a cell?' Cathy's anxiety was mounting again.

‘No way,' Sam told her.

Not that he knew that for sure.

Cathy drew away from Sam, leaned against the wall.

‘What just happened has to be good, surely?' Claudia said.

‘You'd think,' Sam said.

Finding it hard to speak now.

‘What do you mean?' Cathy asked.

‘Hey,' Daniel said softly, checking out Sam's expression, seeing how close he was to the edge. ‘It has to be good, but there's no way of knowing how good, so we'll all have to wait it out now, sweetheart.'

Sam caught Daniel's eye, nodded thanks.

It seemed to him that Grace's brother-in-law just got better with time.

He made a mental note to tell that to Grace.

When today was over.

For better or worse.

When Elena Alonso rose to address the court after the recess, it was to state that in view of the morning's developments, she wished to ask the judge's indulgence in allowing the defense attorney to speak first.