The Alibi

Hammond realized that his shirt was sticking to his torso. When had he begun to sweat? He rubbed his forehead, and discovered that it was damp, too. There was a reason for this uncustomary perspiration: He had met with Lute Pettijohn yesterday afternoon in his suite at the Charles Towne Plaza.

Monroe Mason should know that. Now was the time to tell him.

But why make an issue of it?

It didn’t relate to Pettijohn’s murder. Their meeting had been brief. It had occurred before the estimated time of death. Shortly before, but nevertheless…

He saw no reason to tell Mason about it, any more than he had deemed it necessary to tell Steffi when she broke the startling news of the homicide to him. There was nothing to be gained by informing them of this coincidence, and much to be lost.

Wiping his forehead on his shirtsleeve, he said, “I want the case.”

His mentor chuckled. “Well, you’ve got it, boy.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. You had it even before you asked.”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

“Stop sucking up, Hammond. I didn’t make the decision independently. You got the case because the Widow Pettijohn has been calling me every hour on the hour since about ten o’clock last night.”

“What for?”

“She’s requested—make that demanded—that you be the one to put her husband’s killer on trial.”

“I’m grateful for her—”

“Cut the bullshit, Hammond. I can smell it a mile off. Hell, I’m so goddamn old, I think I invented it. Where was I?”

“The widow.”

“Oh, yeah. Lute’s dead, but it appears that Davee’s going to take over where he left off when it comes to throwing weight around. She can make noise in this county. So, to spare our office a lot of grief and bad press, I agreed to assign you to the case.”

This case would impact his career as no other case could. A high-profile murder victim. Media saturation. It had all the elements that cause ambitious prosecutors to salivate. Of course, he would feel better if Mason had assigned it to him without Davee’s intervention, but he wasn’t going to dwell on a minor detail like that. No matter how it had come about, the case was his.

He wanted it, needed it, and he was definitely the man for

the job. He had tried five murder cases before and won convictions in all except one, when the accused had plea-bargained. From the day he had joined the prosecuting side of the law, he had been preparing himself for a case of this magnitude. He had the appetite for it, and he had the know-how to come out the winner. The Lute Pettijohn murder trial was going to catapult his career right where he wanted it to go… the County Solicitor’s Office.

Since he already had the case, the confidence of his superior, and the backing of the widow, he reconsidered telling Mason about his meeting with Pettijohn. He hated to go into a project of this caliber with even the slightest disadvantage. A negligible ambiguity like this could become critically damaging if discovered later rather than sooner.

“Monroe?”

“Don’t thank me, boy. You’re in for a lot of sleepless nights.”

“I welcome the challenge. It’s something else. I…”

“What?”

Following the small hesitation, he said, “Nothing. Nothing, Monroe. I can’t wait to get started.”

“Fine, fine,” he said, then launched into his next point. “You’ll be working with Rory Smilow. Is that gonna be a problem?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“We don’t have to swap spit. All I want is a guarantee that he’ll cooperate with our office.”