Blow Out

“Oh God, I don’t know. All right? How would I know what Danny knew and didn’t know?”

“You knew Justice Califano,” Savich said. “Danny must have overheard him talking with someone, or he may have read something Justice Califano left lying on his desk by accident. Something. Think back, Eliza.”

She sat back down on the sofa, clasped her hands between her blue-jeaned knees, and rocked a bit.

Savich’s voice deepened slowly, and he stretched his words out evenly. It was his interview voice, deep and soothing. “I want you to think back to Friday. You’ve just come in. I want you to tell us exactly what Danny did on Friday morning. Don’t leave out a thing. Think particularly about when he had the opportunity to speak privately with Justice Califano. Just relax and think back, Eliza.”

But she wasn’t ready, and said instead, “Danny’s mom, dad, and three brothers live in New Jersey.”

“Yes, they’ve been notified.”

“You didn’t tell them why you think he was murdered, did you?”

“No,” Savich said. “They’d spoken to him yesterday when the news of Justice Califano’s murder hit the airwaves. They wanted to make sure Danny was all right. He reassured them and told them not to worry. Now, it’s time, Eliza. We need you. Danny needs you. You’ve been thinking about Friday for the last three hours. Talk to us.”

“I have, yes,” she said, still distracted. But Eliza Vickers was smart. She turned her eyes to Savich. Sherlock knew what she was seeing—dark fathomless eyes, eyes that held no threat at all, but an invitation to trust, and the unspoken promise of understanding. Sherlock recognized the concentration on Eliza’s face. She sat forward a bit, all her own attention on Justice Califano’s lover and senior law clerk, a woman she wished she could have met under different circumstances, a woman who could have been a friend.

Eliza spoke slowly, her voice cool and steady now. “Friday morning, all the Justices meet alone in the Chief Justice’s conference room, at exactly ten-thirty. Like clockwork. But Stewart seemed to have forgotten about it. I reminded him. He went flying out of his chambers at exactly ten-thirty a.m.”

“When did he arrive that morning?”

“At a quarter of eight. Always the same time. Stewart was very punctual. On Friday, we arrived at the same time, as usual, and had coffee together. He ate his morning sesame bagel while we reviewed several cases before the Eighth Circuit. Every Justice is responsible for supervising one or more of the thirteen Federal Appellate Courts. Stewart supervised the Eighth. We went over the majority opinion Fleurette had drafted for Winters v. Kentucky, reviewed several bench memos Danny had prepared and a postoral argument memo I’d written. Stewart moved through all of this very quickly. Then he said he had some things he needed to do and wanted to be alone for a while.”

“This was unusual?”

“No, not at all. That’s why I didn’t mention it to you this morning. I left him about a quarter to nine.”

“What sort of things, in your experience, would occupy him in the mornings? Matters of the Court, personal things, outside business?”

Eliza’s eyes remained locked on Savich’s. “All of those things. The Court was revisiting the death penalty in the upcoming case on Tuesday. I knew he was chewing on that one, trying to determine if they should overturn the opinion they rendered in 1989.

“Now that I think of it, since we’d been talking about this case for several days, I don’t think he needed more private thinking time about it. No, this had to be something else. Maybe it was about the party Margaret gives every year. She invites all the A-list people, and Stewart has to approve the list. The A-list gets turned on its head whenever there’s a change of party after an election. As both of you know, it’s a crazy town. Only the Justices get to be carried out in coffins, or choose to retire, depending on their personal political leanings, and who is in office at the time.

“Most of the Justices don’t socialize much with politicians, or with the big society hostesses in Washington. They tend to be private. Those who are like-minded or enjoy each other’s company spend some time together socially, but not all that often. They have such different interests, like Justice Xavier-Foxx’s family horse farm. Justice Gutierrez has this incredible instinct for finance. Rich and very private, is Justice Gutierrez. Happily married, lots of kids and grandkids. Good man. Good brain. He loves sailing and crabbing, knows every square inch of the Chesapeake.”

Savich drew her back. “So Justice Califano is in his office thinking about something. From a quarter of nine until ten-thirty a.m.—that’s a long time for him to be alone, isn’t it?”