Devil's Waltz Part 62

MR. JONES: Her personality-things I noticed.

She'd been acting strange-elusive. And Ca.s.sie always seemed to fall ill after she'd spent time with her mother.

DET. STURGIS: Okay . . . We've also got a puncture wound in the fleshy part of Ca.s.sie's armpit.

MR. JONES: No doubt you do, but I didn't put it there.

DET. STURGIS: Aha . . . what about the Valium you put in your wife's coffee?

MR. JONES: I explained it in the room, Detective. I didn't give it to her. It was for her nerves, remember. She's been really on edge-been taking it for a while. If she denies that, she's lying.

DET. STURGIS: She does indeed deny it. She says she was never aware you were dosing her up.

MR. JONES: She lies habitually-that's the point. Accusing me based purely on what she says is like constructing a syllogism based on totally false premises. Do you understand what I mean by that?

DET. STURGIS: Sure, Prof. Valium tablets were found in one of Ca.s.sie's toys-a stuffed bunny.

MR. JONES: There you go. How would I know anything about that?

DET. STURGIS: Your wife says you bought several of them for Ca.s.sie.

MR. JONES: I bought Ca.s.sie all sorts of toys. Other people bought LuvBunnies too. A nurse named Bottomley-very iffy personality. Why don't you check her out, see if she's involved.

DET. STURGIS: Why should she be?

MR. JONES: She and Cindy seem awfully close-too close, I always thought. I wanted her transferred off the case, but Cindy refused. Check her out-she's strange, believe me.

DET. STURGIS: We did. She's pa.s.sed a polygraph and every other test we threw at her.

MR. JONES: Polygraphs are inadmissible in court.

DET. STURGIS: Would you take one?

MR. TOKARIK: Chip, don't- MR. JONES: I don't see any reason to. This whole thing is preposterous.

DET. STURGIS: Onward. Did you have a prescription for the Valium we found at your campus office?

MR. JONES: (laughs) No. Is that a crime?

DET. STURGIS: As a matter of fact, it is. Where'd you get it?

MR. JONES: Somewhere-I don't remember.

DET. STURGIS: One of your students?

MR. JONES: Of course not.

DET. STURGIS: A student named Kristie Marie Kirkash?

MR. JONES: Uh-absolutely not. I may have had it around from before.

DET. STURGIS: For yourself?

MR. JONES: Sure. From years ago-I was under some stress. Now that I think about it, I'm sure that's what it was. Someone lent it to me-a faculty colleague.

DET. STURGIS: What's this colleague's name?

MR. JONES: I don't remember. It wasn't that significant. Valium's like candy nowadays. I plead guilty to having it without a prescription, okay?

DET. STURGIS: Okay.

MR. TOKARIK: What did you just take out of your briefcase, Detective?

DET. STURGIS: Something for the record. I'm going to read it out loud- MR. TOKARIK: I want a copy first. Two copies-for myself and for Professor Jones.

DET. STURGIS: Duly noted. We'll get the Xerox going soon as we're finished here.

MR. TOKARIK: No, I want it simultaneous with your- MR. JONES: Stop obstructing, Tony. Let him read whatever it is. I want out of here today.

MR. TOKARIK: Chip, nothing's of greater importance to me than your imminent release, but I- MR. JONES: Quiet, Tony. Read, Detective.

MR. TOKARIK: Not at all. I'm unhappy with thi- MR. JONES: Fine. Read, Detective.

DET. STURGIS: That settled? Sure? Okay. This is a transcript of an encoded computer floppy disk, 3M Brand, DS, DD, RH, double-sided, double-density, Q Mark. Further designated with Federal Bureau of Investigation Evidence Tag Number 133355678345 dash 452948. The disk was decoded by the cryptography division of the FBI National Crime Laboratory in Washington, D.C., and was received at Los Angeles Police Department Headquarters, this morning, 6:45 A.M., via government pouch. Once I start, I'm going to read it in its entirety, even if you choose to leave the room with your client, Counselor. In order to make it clear that this evidence was offered to you and you declined to hear it. Understood?

MR. TOKARIK: We exercise all of our rights without prejudice.

MR. JONES: Read on, Detective. I'm intrigued.

DET. STURGIS: Here goes: I'm putting this in code to protect myself, but it's not a complicated code, just a basic subst.i.tution-numbers for letters with a couple of reversals, so you should be able to handle that, Ashmore. And if something's happened to me, have fun with it.

Charles Lyman Jones the Third, known as Chip, is a monster.

He came to my high school as a volunteer tutor and seduced me s.e.xually and emotionally. This was ten years ago. I was seventeen and a senior and in the honors program in math, but I needed help with English and Social Sciences because I found it boring. He was twenty-eight and a graduate student. He seduced me and we had s.e.x repeatedly over a six-month period at his apartment and at the school, including activities that I found personally repulsive. He was frequently impotent and did sick things to me in order to arouse himself. Eventually, I got pregnant and he said he'd marry me. We never got married, just lived together in a dive near the University of Connecticut, at Storrs. Then it got worse.

1. He didn't tell his family about me. He kept another apartment in town and went there whenever his father came to visit.

2. He started to act really crazy. Doing things to my body-putting drugs in my drinks and sticking me with needles when I was sleeping. At first I wasn't sure what was happening, used to wake up with marks all over, feeling sore. He said I was anemic and it was petechiae-broken capillaries due to pregnancy. Since he told me he'd been premed at Yale, I believed him. Then one time I woke up and caught him trying to inject me with something brown and disgusting-looking-I'm sure now it was faces. Apparently he hadn't given me enough dope to put me out, or maybe I'd become hooked and needed more to pa.s.s out. He explained the needle by saying it was all for my good-some kind of organic vitamin tonic.

I was young and I believed all his lies. Then it got too weird and I left and tried to live with my mother but she was drunk all the time and wouldn't take me in. Also, I think he paid her off, because right around then she got lots of new clothes. So I went back to him and the more pregnant I got, the meaner and more vicious he got. One time he pulled a really hysterical fit and told me the baby would ruin everything between us and that it had to go. Then he claimed it wasn't even his, which was ridiculous because I was a virgin when I met him and never fooled around with anyone else. Eventually, the stress he put me through made me miscarry. But that didn't make him happy either, and he kept sneaking up on me when I was sleeping, shouting in my ear and sometimes sticking me. I was getting fevers and bad headaches and hearing voices and becoming dizzy. For a while I thought I was going crazy.

I finally left Storrs and went back to Poughkeepsie. He followed me and we had a real screaming fit in Victor Waryas Park. Then he gave me a check for ten thousand dollars and told me to get out of his life and stay there. That was a lot of money to me at the time and I agreed. I was feeling too down and screwed up to work, so I got out on the street and got ripped off and ended up marrying Willie Kent, a black guy who pimped once in a while. That lasted about six months. Then I got into detox and got my equivalency and got into college.

I majored in math and computer science and did really well and then I got seduced by another teacher named Ross M. Herbert and was married to him for two years. He wasn't a monster like Chip Jones but he was boring and unhygienic and I divorced him and left college after three years.

I got a job in computers but that was pretty noncreative so I decided to be a doctor and went back to school to study pre-med. I had to work nights and squeeze in my studying. That's why my grades and my M-CAT scores weren't as high as they should have been, but I did get straight As in math.

I finally finished and applied to a bunch of medical schools but didn't get in. I worked as a lab a.s.sistant for a year and took the M-CATs again and did better. So I applied again and made some waiting lists. I also applied to some Public Health programs in order to get a related degree, and the best one that accepted me was in Los Angeles, so I came out here.

I sc.r.a.ped by for four years, kept applying to med school. Then I was reading the paper and saw an article on Charles Lyman Jones, Jr., and realized it was his father. That's when I realized how rich they were and how I'd been ripped off. So I decided to get some of what was coming to me. I tried to call his father but couldn't get through to him, even wrote letters he never answered. So I looked up Chip in city records and found he was living out in the Valley and went out to see what his house looked like. I did it at night, so no one could see me. I did it a bunch of times and got a look at his wife. What freaked me out was how much like me she looked, before I gained weight. His little daughter was real cute, and boy, did I feel sorry for the two of them.

I really didn't want to hurt them-the wife and the little girl-but I also felt I should warn them what they were up against. And he owed me.

I went back there several times, thinking about what to do, and then one night I saw an ambulance pull up in front of the house. He came out right afterward, in his Volvo, and I followed him at a distance, to Western Pediatric Medical Center. I stayed behind him all the way to the Emergency Room and heard him ask about his daughter, Ca.s.sie.

The next morning I went back, to Medical Records, wearing my white lab coat and saying I was Dr. Herbert. It was really easy, no security. Later, they beefed things up. Anyway, the daughter: her chart was gone but a card was there listing all these other admissions for her, so I knew he was up to his tricks. The poor little thing.

That's what really got me going-it wasn't just the money. Believe it or don't, Ashmore, but it's the truth. When I saw that card on the little girl, I knew I had to get him. So I went to Personnel and applied for a job. Three weeks later they called and offered me a half-time. With you, Ashmore. s.h.i.tty job, but I could watch Chip without him knowing. I finally got hold of Ca.s.sie's chart and found out everything he was doing to her. I also read in there that they'd had a boy who died. So I looked up his chart and found out he'd had crib death. So Chip had finally murdered someone. Next time I saw Ca.s.sie's name on the A and D sheets, I watched for him and finally saw him and followed him out to the parking lot and said, "Surprise."

He was really freaked out, tried to pretend he didn't know me. Then he tried to put me on the defensive by saying how much weight I'd gained. I just told him I knew what he was up to and that he'd better stop. Also, if he didn't give me a million dollars, I'd go to the police. He actually started crying, said he never meant to hurt anyone-just like he used to do when we were together. But this time it didn't work. I said no dice.

Then he said he'd give me a good-will payment of ten thousand dollars and try to come up with some more, but I had to give him time and it wouldn't be anything near a million-he didn't have that kind of money. I said fifty up front and we finally agreed on twenty-seven five. The next day he met me up at Barnsdale Park in Hollywood and gave me the money in cash. I told him he'd better come up with at least two hundred thousand more by the end of the month. He started crying again and said he'd do his best. Then he asked me to forgive him. I left and used the money to buy a new car because my old one was broken down, and in L.A. you're nothing without a good car. I put Chad Jones's chart in a locker at the airport-LAX, United Airlines, Number 5632-and the next day I quit the hospital.

So now I'm waiting till the end of the month and writing this down as collateral. I want to be rich and I want to be a doctor. I deserve all that. But just in case he tries to renege, I'm leaving this floppy in a locked drawer each night, then collecting it in the morning. There's also a copy in my locker at school. If you're reading it, I'm probably in Dutch, but so what. I've got no other alternatives.

March 7, 1989

Dawn Rose Rockwell Kent Herbert

DET. STURGIS: That's it.

MR. TOKARIK: Are we supposed to be impressed? Decoded hocus-pocus? You know this is totally inadmissible.

DET. STURGIS: If you say so.

MR. TOKARIK: Come on, Chip, let's get out of here-Chip?

MR. JONES: Uh-huh.

DET. STURGIS: Sure you wanna go? There's more.

MR. TOKARIK: We've heard quite enough.

DET. STURGIS: Suit yourself, Counselor. But don't waste your time asking for bail. D.A.'s filing Murder One as we speak.

MR. TOKARIK: Murder One! That's outrageous. Who's the victim?

DET. STURGIS: Dawn Herbert.

MR. TOKARIK: Murder One? On the basis of that fantasy?

DET. STURGIS: On the basis of eyewitness testimony, Counselor. Collaborator testimony. Upstanding citizen named Karl Sobran. You do have a thing for your students, don't you, Prof.

MR. TOKARIK: Who?

DET. STURGIS: Ask the prof.

MR. TOKARIK: I'm asking you, Detective.

DET. STURGIS: Karl Edward Sobran. We've got a windbreaker with blood on it and a confession implicating your client. And Sobran's credentials are impeccable. Bachelor's degree in interpersonal violence from Soledad, postgraduate training from numerous other inst.i.tutions. Your client hired him to kill Ms. Herbert and make it look like a s.e.x thing. Not much of a challenge, because Sobran likes to get violent with women-did time for rape and a.s.sault. His last paid vacation was for larceny and he spent it up in the Ventura County Jail. That's where old Professor Chip, here, met him. Volunteer tutoring-a cla.s.s project his sociology students were doing. Sobran got an A. Old Chip sent a letter recommending parole, calling Sobran graduate-school material and promising to keep him under his wing. Sobran got out and enrolled at West Valley Community College as a sociology major. What he did to Dawn- What was that, Prof? Fieldwork?

MR. TOKARIK: This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard of.

DET. STURGIS: D.A. doesn't think so.

MR. TOKARIK: The D.A. is totally politically motivated. If my client was any other Jones, we wouldn't even be sitting here.

DET. STURGIS: Okay . . . have a nice day. Steve?

DET. MARTINEZ: See y'all.

MR. TOKARIK: Coded disks, the alleged testimony of a convicted felon-absurd.

DET. STURGIS: Ask your client if it's absurd.

MR. TOKARIK: I'll do no such thing. Let's go, Chip. Come on.

MR. JONES: Can you get me bail, Tony?

MR. TOKARIK: This isn't the place to- MR. JONES: I want out of this place, Tony beings are piling up. I've got papers to grade.

MR. TOKARIK: Of course, Chip. But it may take- DET. STURGIS: He's not going anywhere and you know it, Counselor. Level with him.

MR. JONES: I want out. This place is depressing. I can't concentrate.

MR. TOKARIK: I understand, Chip, but- MR. JONES: No buts, Tony. I want out. A l'exterieur. O.U.T.

MR. TOKARIK: Of course, Chip. You know I'll do everything I- MR. JONES: I want out, Tony. I'm a good person. This is totally Kafkaesque.

DET. STURGIS: Good person, huh? Liar, torturer, murderer . . . Yeah, I guess if you don't count those minor technicalities, you're up for sainthood, Junior.

MR. JONES: I am a good person.

DET. STURGIS: Tell that to your daughter.

MR. JONES: She's not my daughter.

MR. TOKARIK: Chip- DET. STURGIS: Ca.s.sie's not your daughter?

MR. JONES: Not strictly speaking, Detective. Not that it's relevant-I wouldn't hurt anyone's child.