The Jury (17 page)

"Well, one thing's for sure," I tell him.

"What's that?" says Tash.

"Kalista Jordan's arms and legs weren't severed by a sharp wit or piercing intellect."

This only draws a stone-cold look.

"He would have never threatened her. David doesn't operate that way. He is very controlled. Everyone will tell you this. The fact is, I've never seen him lose his temper. He may have been upset. But even when he's upset, David tends to be understated."

"And you heard all this understatement," says Harry, "from behind a closed door?"

"Mostly her voice," says Tash.

"Some people have that irritating nasal thing.

You know what I mean? She had a voice that tended to carry."

"So you only heard one side of the argument?" says Harry.

Tash concedes the point.

"Without divulging the contents or precise nature of these papers, how important were they?" I ask.

Tash thinks about this for a moment, and measures his answer.

"What I can tell you is that our work here is quite compartmentalized. Different members of the staff work on different aspects of any project. It is designed so that their knowledge and responsibility are limited. Only the project director would be in a position to know how all the elements fit together."

"And that would be Dr. Crone?"

"Correct."

"So what you're telling us is that these papers taken from Dr. Crone's office allowed Dr. Jordan to know more about how all the pieces of the project fit together than she was authorized to know?"

Tash snaps his fingers, still moist with apple juice.

"You got it."

"And this created a big problem?" I ask.

"In a word, yes. How big it was I will leave for others to determine. You have to understand that confidentiality in our work is paramount. There's a great deal of competition, patent rights and sizeable sums of money at stake. It's the reason for all the security."

"Yeah, we noticed it at the door," says Harry.

"First impressions can be deceiving," says Tash.

"If you tried to get into any of our computers, you would find it more difficult than invading the Pentagon.

There are multiple passwords for every level of access and a firewall guarding the entire system from the outside."

"And yet Kalista Jordan was able to walk out of Dr. Crone's office with sensitive materials."

"He didn't think she would steal things."

"Do you know whether Dr. Jordan passed these papers or the information on them to anyone else?"

"How would I know? She could have sold the information to a competing lab for all I know."

"Do you have reason to believe that's what happened?"

"As I said, I don't know. And I really shouldn't be discussing this stuff with you." He's talking about the center's work product.

"One last question," I say.

"If Dr. Crone was the genetics expert and Dr. Jordan was in charge of molecular electronics, who was in charge of the other aspects of the project?"

He considers for a moment, weighs whether he will answer a

question that can easily be sorted out by reference to an organizational chart.

Tash knows this and so he answers: "That would be Bill Epperson."

"Nanorobotics, right?"

Tash doesn't say a word.

chapter ten

Harry and I are alone, mired in our differing assessments of Tash and his story of the moment as the elevator doors slide closed behind us.

It is difficult to get a clear picture of Kalista Jordan. Everyone seems to have a different take, perceptions being what they are. According to Tash, she was a self-serving viper lying in wait.

Harry's view is that Tash might be useful.

"It may be our best defense. Putting the woman herself on trial." Harry is talking about Kalista Jordan.

This is not a novel approach in criminal cases where defamation of the dead seems to thrive. Raise enough eyebrows in the jury box, and murder can become a victimless crime.

"The question is whether Tash's take on her is accurate. An African-American woman and a high achiever, someone with the title of doctor in front of her name. There's certainly nothing in her background that looks bad on paper," I remind him.

"You're thinking there was some jealousy on Tash's part?"

"There is that possibility. She may have been ambitious, but that's not a crime.

We take off after her, and we're going to alienate every

woman on the jury. That's just for starters. We haven't even begun to consider the issue of race."

"You think our friend Tash was troubled by the color of the woman's skin?"

"I don't know. But the way he talked, I think Tannery could make it sound that way. According to Tash, Jordan was predatory, but she's the one who ended up dead. He tells us she was incompetent, but doesn't give us any specifics. If we put him on the stand, Tannery is going to make it look as if Tash felt threatened, jealous of her position and access to Crone."

"Maybe that's not so bad," says Harry.

I look at him, a question mark.

"We could put Tash on the stand and let him twist. The other man," says Harry.

"You think Tash had something going with her?"

"Doesn't matter what I think," says Harry.

"Question is whether we can sell it to the jury."

"The man has the metabolism of a reptile," I tell him.

"Maybe they got it on."

"What? And Crone got between them? Tash got jealous?"

"Maybe," says Harry.

"Stuck his fangs in her. It's better than what we have right now. Listen. Tash is an angry man. Angry with the system. Angry with Kalista Jordan. That anger is rooted in something besides mere loyalty to his boss."

"And your point is?"

"Maybe he's the proverbial angry white male. Maybe he can't deal with a woman.

Particularly a black woman. He sees her undercutting him with Crone."

"So he kills her."

"Stranger things have happened," says Harry.

"And who would have better access to Crone's garage for the tensioning tool, or to his coat pocket for the cable ties?"

"It's all good except for one thing: Tash has an ironclad alibi for the night Jordan disappeared." According to police reports, Tash was at a meeting, a homeowners' association gathering until close to midnight. After that, he went to a local coffee shop with two neighbors where they talked until nearly one in the morning."

"That's just it," says Harry.

"We don't know exactly when she was killed. We only know when she was seen last."

"Without something more, it would be a tough sell to a jury."

From Harry's look, he is chewing on this in silence as the elevator slows to a stop. He takes a step toward the door before I can grab his arm. The light overhead has stopped at two.

The doors slide apart, and Harrys way is blocked by a soaring figure standing in the hall waiting to enter.

Harry looks up at the man with an expression one might use to estimate the altitude of a mountain, smiles and steps back out of the guy's way. The man has to actually cant his head, just a little, off to one side in order to clear the header over the door.

When he looks up he is again smiling under the canister lights of the elevator car. Silent, he looks both of us in the eye, first Harry and then me. His expression is pleasant, passing the time. If I had to guess, I would say that William Epperson doesn't place us.

We have been chasing him for more than six weeks, Harry specifically, trying to get a statement from him, some clue as to what he will say if he is put on the stand. Now fate has placed him in the elevator with us, and I can read it in Harrys eyes, the look of opportunity.

Epperson is barred from the courtroom as a prospective witness, since his name appears on the prosecution's list. In the weeks before trial Harry made several attempts to talk to the man, once at his apartment and two more times outside the D.A."s office, all to no avail. Epperson had been shielded by investigators from the D.A."s staff, and while they couldn't order him not to talk to us, they made it clear that he was under no compulsion to do so.

Under these circumstances, most witnesses decide that the prudent course is silence. And so it is with Epperson. Several months have now passed. If he remembers us, he shows no sign of it.

Once inside the elevator, Epperson works his way to the left side of the car and leans against the wall, his head nearly touching the ceiling. I can see his reflection dancing in the gleaming brass plate that covers the inside of the elevator doors as they close. Harry and I stand there in silence, elevator etiquette, pretending to ignore the giant standing next to us.

Under the canister lights I finally look over and up, studying him, as he looks at me in the reflective doors. We descend.

Epperson is not what you would envision from the hurly-burly of basketball. He is big, a sinuous athletic build, his hair closely cropped. There most of the similarities of size end. He wears his clothes, shirt, tie and neatly pressed suit with a quiet dignity. You would have a difficult time seeing him in the key, jostling with the bad boys of the NBA.

The fine and delicate lines of his face, high cheekbones, look as if they were carved using a sculptor's knife in earth-toned clay. He has a prominent chin that finds its strength below generous, sharply defined lips. These are closed in silence, causing you to guess at the tones that might issue from the voice that lies within. It is the kind of face that would prompt you to listen, the features of some ancient bronze mask. It would not be a reach to imagine that the blood of nobility runs through William Epperson's veins, royalty of some timeless African tribe. He has the bearing and stature of a Tutsi warrior;

perhaps the narrowing genetics of aristocracy that resulted in his stature, and left him with an inherited cardiac condition.

"Nice weather, huh?" Harry can't restrain himself. He breaks the silence, confident that Epperson hasn't made us.

The tall man looks down at him. There is nothing imperious or arrogant, only gentle eyes and a kind of confidence that comes with knowing you are probably the tallest man in this part of the state.

"It has been pretty nice, hasn't it?" His voice fits the image, a deep resonance with no wasted effort.

More silence, and Harry has to work at it. " A regular Indian summer," he says.

"I suppose." Epperson is smiling. Tight-lipped, he looks at Harry.

I'm getting worried that my partner might pull the red button, jerk us to an emergency stop so he can give Epperson the third degree on the spot. Bad heart condition and all, the man could pound both of us through the floor like bent nails.

Harry now looks at him and engages the bigger man's eyes directly.

"Have we met?"

Epperson studies Harry for a brief second.

"I don't think so."

"You're Bill Epperson, aren't you?"

He doesn't answer him, but instead looks at Harry with an expression that says, Who wants to know?

"I saw you play a few years ago. High-school game back in Detroit. You scored forty points if I remember."

"Thirty-four," says Epperson.

Leave it to Harry. Master of the file trivia. He has combed all the documents, including the press clippings that earned Epperson his scholarship to Stanford.

He gets the figures wrong just enough to make it believable.

"You were there?" Epperson leans away from the wall. You can read the gleam in his eye. His feet may be on the floor, but his mind is somewhere in that ethereal moment of fame and lost glory.

"Never forget it," says Harry.

"You don't look like you'd be from Motown."

"Just visiting," says Harry.

"I have a sister back there. Lives in Ann Arbor."

Harry making it up as he goes. Now he has Epperson talking about the old days, his Detroit roots.

"We ended up at the game. Lucky for us," says Harry.

"Really?"

The elevator slows to a stop, and the doors begin to open.

Epperson is still smiling. He takes a step toward the opening.

"Well, it was good meeting you." Epperson heads out the elevator door.

"You know, my son would kill for an autograph." Harry's not going to let the conversation die that easily.

Before Epperson can turn around, Harry is on his tail, pen in hand.

"Would you mind?"

They step outside the elevator into the building's lobby. Epperson is embarrassed. The first graceless moment I have seen. He's not sure whether to take the pen, what to do. He holds his hands out, palms open as if warding off somebody wielding a knife, shaking his head, '< out of his depth.

"No. No. I really don't do that."

"Why not? You don't have to charge me for it," says Harry. ' They both laugh.

"Its just, I'm never asked."

"Well, you are now" Not knowing what else to do, and not wanting to appear rude, Epperson looks at me, then takes Harry's big Mont Blanc.

Suddenly he's all thumbs. Can't get the cap off Harry explains that it is a fountain pen, and shows him how to unscrew it. They're at a loss for something to sign. Finally Harry hands him one of the case files a legal-sized manila folder Fortunately he has the presence of mind to turn it over, so that the tab with the label is facing the other way, the one that reads people v. david crone.

"What's your boy's name?" Epperson is finally regaining some composure. He's willing to personalize it.

This catches Harry flat footed

"What would you like me to say?"

"Just a signature would be great." Let Harry think about it for a minute, and he'll drag Epperson to a stationery store for a clean sheet of paper and have him put his John Hancock on it so that we can type an alibi for Crone above it.

"My boy won't believe that I actually met you," says Harry.

"How old is he?"

"Twenty-six," says Harry.

With this, Epperson actually rocks on his heels. He lifts his gaze in mid-signature to check Harry out, to make sure all the gum balls are still in the machine. Epperson may be flattered, but his ego doesn't match his stature.