Verdict in Blood - By Gail Bowen Page 0,3

looked down at the detective, I could see that she had missed neither Robert Hallam’s derisive smile when he mentioned Alex’s rank nor the exaggerated care with which he pronounced Alex’s surname. She shot him a glance that would have curdled milk, then, with great deliberation, she walked to the end of the couch farthest from him and sat down.

The flush spread from Robert Hallam’s neck to his face. He stood, grabbed his chair, and took it to where Hilda was sitting. Then he perched on the edge and pulled out a notepad.

“I’ll need your full name, home address, and telephone number,” he said tightly.

After Hilda gave him the information, he narrowed his eyes at her. “How old are you, Ms. McCourt?”

“It’s Miss McCourt,” Hilda said. “And I don’t see that my age is germane.”

“The issue is testimonial capacity,” he snapped. “I have to decide whether I can trust your ability to make truthful and accurate statements.”

Hilda stiffened. “I assure you that you can,” she said. “Detective, if you have questions, I’m prepared to answer them, but if you wish to play games, you’ll play alone.”

Detective Hallam’s face was scarlet. “How did Mrs. Kilbourn’s phone number get in the dead woman’s jacket pocket?” he rasped.

“Justine Blackwell put it there herself,” Hilda said. “Yesterday I drove down from Saskatoon to attend a party celebrating her thirtieth year on the bench. Afterwards, at Justine’s invitation, I went to the hotel bar and had a drink with her. Before we parted, she asked for a number where she could reach me. I gave her Mrs. Kilbourn’s.”

“How would you describe your relationship with Justine Blackwell?”

“Long-standing but not intimate,” Hilda said. “She rented a room in my house in Saskatoon when she was in law school.”

“And you’ve kept in touch all these years?”

“We exchanged holiday cards. When either of us visited the city in which the other lived, we had dinner together. But as I said, we were not intimate.”

“Yet you drove 270 kilometres on a holiday weekend to come to her party. That’s a long drive for a woman your age.”

Hilda’s spine stiffened with anger, but she didn’t take the bait. “I came because Justine Blackwell telephoned and asked me to come,” she said.

“How was Judge Blackwell’s demeanour at her party?”

Hilda didn’t answer immediately. Robert Hallam leaned towards her, and when he spoke his tone was condescending. “It’s a simple question, Miss McCourt. Was the judge having the time of her life? Was she miserable? In a word, how did she seem?”

Hilda sipped her tea thoughtfully. “In a word, she seemed contumacious.”

Detective Hallam’s head shot up.

Hilda spelled the word slowly for him so he had time to write it in his notepad. “It means defiant,” she added helpfully.

“She was defiant at a party celebrating her accomplishments?” Detective Hallam was sputtering now. “Isn’t that a little peculiar?”

“It was a peculiar party,” Hilda said. “For one thing, Justine Blackwell threw the party herself.”

Robert Hallam cocked an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t it have been more natural for the other judges to organize the tribute?”

“In the normal run of things, yes.” Hilda said. “But Madame Justice Blackwell’s thinking had taken a curious turn in the last year.”

“Describe this ‘curious turn.’ ”

“I can only tell you what Justice Blackwell told me herself.”

“Shoot.”

“Justice Blackwell had come to believe that her interpretation of the law had lacked charity.”

“After thirty years, this just came upon her – a bolt from the blue?”

“No, she’d had an encounter with a prisoners’ advocate named Wayne J. Waters.”

Detective Hallam narrowed his eyes. “That man is lightning in a bottle. What’s his connection here?”

“Justine told me he’d accosted her after a young man she’d sentenced to prison committed suicide. Mr. Waters told her that he held her personally responsible for the man’s death.”

“I suppose the lad was as innocent as a newborn babe.”

Hilda shook her head. “No, apparently there was no doubt about his guilt. But it was a first offence and, in Mr. Waters’ opinion, Justine was culpable because she had failed to take into account the effect the appalling conditions of prison would have upon a sensitive young person.”

“Justice without mercy,” I said.

My old friend looked at me gratefully. “Precisely. And according to Mr. Waters, that particular combination was Justine’s specialty. He told her that her lack of compassion was so widely recognized that prisoners and their lawyers alike called her Madame Justice Blackheart.”

“That’s a little childish, isn’t it?”

Hilda nodded. “Of course it is, and considering the source, the appellation didn’t bother Justine. She’d been called worse.