The Hunt Club

"I wouldn't go that far. Let's just say, he might feel uncomfortable having to explain to the Manions why he was part of having it served on them."

"And you think by the same token that he might be choosing to distance himself from an endeavor that he finds ill-conceived and which he also perceives might infuriate influential and powerful people without guaranteeing any success in the case. Inspector, people in your trade might call that a clue."

Juhle remained silent.

Thomasino nodded and sighed, an aggrieved expression flitting across his features. "Inspector," he said, "since we're being frank and off the record here, let me ask you something else, just between us. Do you feel that besides its natural importance, that there are people at the Hall and in the city at large who view this case as a kind of a test for you personally?"

The import of the question rocked Juhle, but he stood his ground. "Yes, Your Honor, I think I do. But I'm trying not to let that affect my handling of it." He pressed on in the face of Thomasino's skeptical look. "In the past few hours, Your Honor," he said, "I've learned irrefutably that Carol Manion's adopted child was the natural son of Staci Rosalier, the woman killed with Judge Palmer. Mrs. Manion has gone to great lengths over the past eight years to keep these facts hidden. To the extent that when I went to talk to her about this case just last week, she neglected to mention anything about it."

"Did you ask her about it?"

"No, Your Honor, but…"

"But you think she should have volunteered the information?"

"To me it's unimaginable that she didn't, Your Honor. Unimaginable. If only to say, 'I know this is an incredible coincidence, but I think you should know about it.' She couldn't have been unaware of it."

Thomasino considered, fingers templed at his lips. He looked down at the notes he'd scribbled while Juhle had been laying out the whole rather complex scenario. "I may have gotten some details wrong, inspector, and if so correct me. But as I understand it from the way you've outlined it to me here, Mrs. Manion adopted a baby from a Staci Keilly, isn't that so? And if so, why would the name Staci Rosalier prompt her to mention her child to you? If you, in fact, even had that name on Tuesday afternoon when you spoke to her."

Juhle's face went slack. He felt a rush of blood draining from his head. Not that the basic fact of Todd's parentage was any longer in doubt-or at least, he didn't think so-but Carol Manion didn't necessarily know about Staci on Tuesday when he and Shiu had questioned her about her original appointment with Parisi.

The only way Carol could have known Staci's true relationship to her son was if, in fact, she had been confronted with it and killed her. But that was putting the cart before the horse. If she hadn't done that, and there was no evidence at all that she had, then all of her actions since-not mentioning Todd to him and Shiu, buzz-cutting Todd's hair because, after all, summer was coming on-had been blameless.

He also suddenly realized that even he and Shiu had been unable to identify Staci as either a Rosalier or a Keilly until late Tuesday night when they'd met up with Mary Mahoney in the morgue. And what, then, did this mean about the four identifications of Todd Manion this morning?

The judge was still looking over his templed fingers. "Are you all right, inspector? You don't look well."

"No. Fine, Your Honor. I've been taking some pain medication. I just got a little dizzy there for a minute."

Thomasino clearly wasn't so sure that was it, but he let it go and moved on. "So, bottom line, inspector, is that I'm a little bit leery to sign off on what amounts to an open-ended fishing expedition on one of the city's most prominent families. Especially given the fact that this would be the second nearly identical warrant on two different suspects that I'd have approved in about as many days. You can see where it might raise some eyebrows, huh? Where you and I both might be open to accusations of overreaching? Invading privacy without cause? In your case, even launching a desperate vendetta to deflect attention away from a stalled investigation?"

"Yes, Your Honor, although this is not…"

"Goes without saying, inspector, of course. No explanation necessary." Moving on again, adjusting his glasses, the judge lowered his gaze to the pages Juhle had placed in front of him and sca

But Juhle, shaken, wasn't about to take the day off. There were other avenues under the great canopy of due process that he could take with impunity, and now he was going to be forced to explore them. Judge Thomasino may have been right that his request for a search warrant on Carol Manion's house was premature. But as a homicide inspector, Juhle was entitled to interrogate people when and as he saw fit, provided he could get them to talk to him.

Mrs. Manion may not have known on last Tuesday that Staci Rosalier was Staci Keilly, but the fact remained that it would be instructive, perhaps even conclusive, to see how she reacted when he confronted her with this fundamental truth. Juhle had a gut for witnesses-if they were lying, there were a million tells, and he could spot most of them. Then at least for himself, he would know. He would take the investigation from there and slowly, carefully build a case, over months if necessary, which the DA could prosecute and win against any army of high-priced lawyers.

If Carol Manion, in her wealth and hubris, had dared to kill a federal judge on his watch, Juhle would bring her down. And to do that-and right now while the questions he would ask her were all so clear!-what he had to do first was have a conversation with her.

32

In the wide and sun-splashed upstairs corridor of their château in Napa Valley, Carol Manion knocked on the door to her son's bedroom. "Todd."

No answer.

She knocked again. "Todd, please. Your mother wants to talk to you."

"I don't want to talk to her. I'm mad at her."

"Please don't be. I can't stand it when you're mad at me. Your hair will grow back, I promise."

"And meanwhile I look like a geek."

"You don't. You look like what you are, a handsome young man. Would you please open the door?"

"I don't want to."

"But I really need to talk to you."

"What about?"

"Todd. Not through the door, okay? Please. I'm saying please."

"I asked you please not to before you made him cut off my hair. Please, please, please." Punctuating the words by kicking at the door. "It wasn't fair."

"I know it wasn't. I'm sorry. Your father and I just thought it would be a good idea."

"Why?" In three syllables. "It wasn't hurting anything." But the knob turned, and the door came unlatched, although Todd didn't pull it open.

Carol gave it a gentle push.

Todd had crossed to the window seat that overlooked the vineyards, where he'd piled some blankets from his bed and now burrowed into them. Carol walked over and sat so that she felt the contours of his little body up against her. "Thanks for letting me in," she said. "You're a very good boy."