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The next night was a tiny bit better. I still wouldn’t pull down my clothes or accept any food because I didn’t want the door to open but I had begun to hate everyone who had a hand in sending me to jail. I alternated between pacing my cell and dozing fitfully on the urine-damp bench—planning, plotting, and hating.
The first thing I had to do was wipe any feelings of self-pity from my mind until the real murderer was exposed. Next, I had to take charge of my own case. No matter what Keith Williams said about letting him handle everything, there was no way I was going to do that. His job was to find a case for reasonable doubt and keep me out of Bedford Hills. I wanted more. I wanted my name cleared and if the police weren’t going to look for the murderer, I would do it myself.
And then there was Miss Nixon.
I hated Tiffany Nixon.
If it were not for her horrible columns, the district attorney would not have been under so much pressure from politicians and the public to lock me up.
I knew her type.
What she had done to me was not personal. It was to curry favor with the dominant culture and win her a prize for outstanding crime reporting if I was indicted and brought to trial. Whether I was convicted or not, she would forever be known as the Black reporter who didn’t let any sense of racial solidarity get in the way of her duties to the entity which paid her. Such a label for a Black professional in any industry was as good as gold when it was time for prizes and promotions.
But she wasn’t going to get away with it unless I was held without bail and sent away to prison without ever walking the streets of New York again.
That meant I had to get out and Paul was just one egg in a real shaky basket. The police owed me a phone call and I decided to use it to call Elaine Garner.
If Paul didn’t come through and she could find away to get me out, I would start feeding her the inside story on my relationship with the dead heiress, Keith Williams, the murder investigation, and my unauthorized search for a killer. It was a guaranteed best-seller that she might be able to use to leverage herself into a publisher’s chair. The tiny number of people who held those seats wielded a tremendous amount of power. It was they who ultimately decided which manuscripts the editors were allowed to buy and turn into books.
No African-American had ever held one of those seats at a major publishing house. Maybe Elaine would be the first.
What could be more Harvard than that?
25
PAUL
I finally reached the courtroom for arraignment on Monday morning. I was conscious of being led out of the darkness of my cell into a brightly lit courtroom where men and women in conservative business suits were running to and fro waving sheaves of paper at the judge.
There were rows of people seated, anxiety on their faces, watching the door I’d just emerged from. There was a wooden bar separating the prisoners from their audience. Mama, Keith, and Paul were sitting in the front row, and I waved to show my awareness of their presence.
A clerk called my name and Keith’s, plus a string of sentences that were legalese for second-degree murder. Keith stepped up to the plate. He was wearing a different Armani suit than the sodden one I had last seen him in. He looked smooth and dapper.
The judge asked me, “How do you plead, Ms. Blue?”
“Not guilty,” I replied.
Keith gave my hand a reassuring squeeze.
A very tall, painfully thin woman who looked like Olive Oyl gave me a look of disgust and a flash of the Thin Pink Line as she joined us in front of the judge. As she presented her case against bail, I realized that her name was Ruth Champ and she was from the district attorney’s office.
Champ said, “Your Honor, this was a vicious, unprovoked crime. The defendant has wealthy associates and that makes her a significant flight risk. I hereby request a denial of bail in this case.”
Keith responded in a voice laced with sarcasm. “Your Honor, this is absolutely ridiculous. My client was born and raised in this city. She has an elderly mother here who is her only family. What is more, the case against my client is entirely circumstantial and without any merit. My client does not have a secret trunk of gold hidden somewhere that can yield enough money to set up some luxurious lifestyle in another country at the drop of a hat. I hereby request that my client be released on her own recognizance.”
Champ hissed. “No bail? That would be outrageous.”
The judge held up a hand to silence them both and set bail at $250,000.
I looked around for Elaine Garner, but she was nowhere in the room.
Keith pulled me aside. “This is wonderful.”
“Wonderful? I don’t have $250,000!”
“You only need ten percent of that amount to walk out of this courtroom, and Paul Dodson has agreed to put up his home as collateral.”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw that Mama was sitting alone. “Where is he?”
