Glass Houses(11)

That was all he needed, Gregor thought, the cardinal archbishop checking up on him. The cardinal archbishop was the second member of the clergy he had ever met, after Tibor, who did not talk in platitudes. What the cardinal archbishop did tend to talk in instead was, well, a little unnerving.

“All right,” Gregor said. “Maybe you’d better send them in.”

Jackman gave him one long last look and went.





2


It wasn’t them who came, only Russ himself, looking mangled and exhausted. He looked more exhausted than Gregor had ever seen him, and Gregor had known him when he was still a police detective. His suit was rumpled. Gregor knew he hadn’t left the house like that. Donna would no more let him leave unpressed than she would drown kittens in her bathtub. Then he thought of Donna in the Ararat, alone, the very first thing this morning.

“Did you get home last night?” he asked.

“No,” Russ said. “Is Donna furious? I don’t like to leave her on her own, you know, with the baby—”

“I thought you hired someone to live in.”

“Zagiri Shoshonian. From Armenia. Father Tibor knew about her. She’s there. But she’s only a girl, isn’t she? She’s only about twenty-five. She can’t do heavy lifting.”

“Why would Donna need to do any heavy lifting?”

“I don’t know,” Russ said. “I realized, the other day, well, awhile back, when we decided to sponsor Zagiri, that I have no idea what Donna does all day. I mean, except go to school, you know, because she wants to get her degree. But other than that, she could be lifting bricks for all I know.”

“Why?”

“I haven’t had any sleep,” Russ said. “I really haven’t. I’ve been up all night arguing with the judge, arguing with the cops, and then doing research; and I know you think I should have waited, but I’m about ready to scream. And then there’s Henry. Who is, let me tell you, his own worst enemy.”

“Where is he?”

“He’s next door. I’ll get him in a second. I just wanted to warn you about something. He’s a world-class alcoholic, and he has been for years. And it shows. He’s not really mentally competent to do anything, never mind make a confession and stand trial. And the idea that he could have killed eleven women by strangling them with packing cords is absurd. I don’t think he could strangle a rat. But none of that is going to matter if he goes on like this, and so far, he’s going on like this.”

Gregor hesitated. “You’re sure,” he said. “In your mind, and otherwise, you’re sure he isn’t the Plate Glass Killer. That’s not a product of your lack of sleep and of your admirable zeal for your client’s interests.”

“I’m sure.”

“You’ll be sure after you’ve gone to bed for a while?”

“I’ll be sure.”

“John Jackman said that he wasn’t sure if Henry Tyder was the Plate Glass Killer, but he was sure that he’d killed a human being once in his life.”

“He said that?” Russ was thoroughly astonished. “I can’t believe that. Henry’s nothing like that at all. You’ll see.”

“I will if you’ll bring him in.”

“I have to have him brought in,” Russ said. “They’re doing that thing where they act as if every single person in custody is Osama bin Laden with a bomb hidden in every orifice. Be right back.”

Russ went, and less than a minute later was back, followed by two police officers flanking each side of an old, broken-down man in handcuffs and shackles. Gregor felt a quick spurt of anger. In his day the only prisoners who were handcuffed and shackled just to get them from their cells to a police interrogation room, or even to court, were killers known to be both dangerous and flight risks. Now they went through this routine with everybody: grandmothers who had done nothing more violent than pass bad checks; white-collar embezzlers who had never so much as slapped another human being in their lives; twelve year olds. Gregor felt embarrassed for the Criminal Justice System. This sort of behavior was over the top and shameful. It damaged not only the reputation of law enforcement but the long-term prospects of men and women who left prison hoping to build new lives. It gave the general public the idea that everybody who had ever spent a day in jail was a wild animal liable to pounce and claw at the first opportunity.

Gregor turned his attention away from reforming America’s police departments—in his opinion, the shackling policy was the result of a lot of men in uniform desperately wanting to seem important and professional—and turned it to the man now sitting down in a chair on the opposite side of the table. At second glance Henry Tyder wasn’t as old as Gregor had assumed. What had seemed like age at first was really decay. There had been too many late nights and too much alcohol in this man’s life, but he couldn’t be more than thirty-five. His body was shaking—there was withdrawal from alcohol as well as from drugs, and just plain alcohol poisoning to explain that—but it was well put together, and Gregor thought it must once have been powerful. He looked down at Henry Tyder’s hands. They were broad and strong, but they were also twitching.