The voice was Jamie’s, the words came from behind the closed door to the captain’s office. A pained look came onto Ehrenberg’s face as he turned and began walking heavily toward the door, as though Jamie’s outburst was not entirely unexpected, but was nonetheless an additional problem that had to be dealt with. As he approached the door, Jamie shouted, “I’ll kill you!” and Ehrenberg responded to the threat instinctively and immediately. He seemed almost about to thrust his massive shoulder against the door in imitation of movie cops breaking into a suspect’s apartment. He grabbed the knob and did indeed use his shoulder, but only as a forceless battering ram, opening the door and throwing it wide, and then releasing the knob and rushing into the room, directly to where Jamie and Michael were struggling in front of the captain’s desk.

  Jamie’s hands were on his son’s throat. His face was ashen, his mouth skinned back over his teeth, his eyes red with rage. Michael danced a jig at the ends of his father’s arms, stepping again and again onto the photographs of the black girl that had earlier been on the captain’s desk and were now strewn on the floor. His face was flushed, he was choking under the tightening pressure of his father’s fingers. Ehrenberg clamped his left hand onto Jamie’s shoulder and spun him back and away from his son. I thought for certain he was going to smash his fist into Jamie’s face. It seemed the logical one-two action, spin the man around with your left hand, hit him with your right. But instead of hitting him, Ehrenberg reached out with his right hand to grab hold of the lapels of Jamie’s leisure suit, his fist twisting into the material. Effortlessly, he pushed him back against the paneled wall. Very calmly he said, “Now let’s just relax, doctor.”

  “I’ll kill him,” Jamie said.

  “No, you’re not going to kill anybody,” Ehrenberg said.

  “Kill the bastard,” Jamie said.

  Across the room, Michael was still gasping for breath. “You okay?” Ehrenberg asked, and Michael nodded. “Then I’d like to talk to you now, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Yes,” Michael said. “Okay.”

  “You monster,” his father said.

  7

  * * *

  THE INTERVIEW room was a five-by-eight rectangle with a small table and three armless chairs in it. There was a mirror, on the wall facing Michael. I suspected it was a two-way mirror, and asked Ehrenberg if it was. He readily admitted that it was, and then assured me that no photographs were being taken and that none would be taken until Michael was officially charged with a crime. He said this while fiddling with the tape recorder he’d carried from the squad room into the interview room. I knew that “interview” was a euphemism for “interrogation,” but I made no comment. I was fully cognizant of the fact that Michael Purchase was determined to make a statement to the police, and that if I said anything or did anything to annoy him he would simply ask me to leave. Moreover, I was thoroughly convinced that Ehrenberg had done nothing to jeopardize Michael’s constitutional rights, nor would he do so at any time during the interview, or interrogation, or whatever he chose to call it. I had the feeling he preferred the word “interview.” I had the feeling that everything about police work, and especially about this case, troubled him. I visualized him as an antiques dealer in some New England town. I visualized him as a man running a nursery someplace, selling potted hyacinths or gloxinias. The room was air-conditioned, but Ehrenberg was perspiring as he spoke a few test words into the recorder, played them back, and reset the machine for taping.

  Into the microphone he said, “This will be a recording of the questions put to Michael Purchase and of his responses thereto made this first day of March at…” He looked at his watch. “....twelve twenty-seven P.M. in the Public Safety Building of the Calusa Police Department, Calusa, Florida. Questioning Mr. Purchase was Detective George Ehrenberg of the Calusa Police Department. Also present was Mr. Matthew Hope of the law firm of Summerville & Hope, Carey Avenue, Calusa, attorney for Mr. Purchase.”

  He hesitated, looked briefly at Michael and me, as if to make certain he’d mentioned all the people sitting at the table, and then said, “I know you’ve previously been informed of your rights, Mr. Purchase, but I’d like to go over them again, for the record. In keeping with the Supreme Court decision in Miranda vs. Arizona, we are not permitted to ask you any questions until you are warned of your right to counsel and your privilege against self-incrimination. So first, you have the right to remain silent. Do you understand that?”

  “Yes, I do,” Michael said.

  He went through the rest of the obligatory recitation, making certain that Michael understood all of his rights, ascertaining that Michael was willing to have me present as his attorney, and then asking him his full name, soliciting from Michael the information that he was living at present on a boat called The Broadhorn, which was docked at Pirate’s Cove, and that a girl named Lisa Schellmann—

  “Would you spell that, please?” Ehrenberg said.

  “S-C-H-E-L-L-M-A-N-N.”

  —was living with him, had been living with him for the past two months, in fact. He asked Michael how old he was, asked if Dr. James Purchase was his father, asked if Maureen was his stepmother and Emily and Eve his half sisters, and then took a deep breath and said, “Will you tell me, please, as best you can recall, what took place on the night of February twenty-ninth, that would have been last night, Sunday the twenty-ninth of February.”

  “Where do you want me to begin?” Michael asked.

  “Were you in the vicinity of Jacaranda Drive on Sabal Shores at any time last night?”

  “I was, sir, yes, sir.”

  “Where on Jacaranda?”

  “At my father’s house.”

  “At the home of Dr. James Purchase?”

  “Yes, sir, my father.”

  “Why did you go there?”

  “To see him.”

  “To see your father? Could you speak up, please? And into the mike, please.”

  “Yes, sir, I’m sorry.”

  “Why did you want to see your father?”

  “I needed some money. For a repair on the boat.”

  “What sort of repair?”

  “She’s leaking drive oil into the engine pan.”

  “And you went there to talk to your father about it.”

  “Yeah, to ask him if I could borrow some money to have it fixed. It’s going to cost six hundred dollars.”

  “Did you go to his house directly from the boat?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did you drive from Pirate’s Cove to Sabal Shores?”

  “No, I don’t have a car. I got a hitch from some people coming out of the restaurant there. They dropped me off on the corner of Jacaranda.”

  “What time was this?”

  “Was what? When I got to Jacaranda?”

  “Yes.”

  “About a quarter to twelve, I guess. I don’t have a watch.”

  “Did you walk up Jacaranda directly to the house?”

  “Yes, directly to the house.”

  “Were there lights on when you got there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Outside lights? Inside lights?

  “Both.”

  “What did you do when you got to the house?”

  “I went to the front door and rang the bell.”

  “Did your father answer the doorbell?”

  “No. Maureen did.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She seemed…ah…she was surprised to see me. It was close to midnight, I guess it was late to be paying a visit.”

  “Did she say anything about it being late?”

  “No, no.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She just…ah…said my father wasn’t home.”

  “Did she say where he was?”

  “No. Just that he wasn’t home.”

  “Do you know where he was last night, Mr. Purchase?”

  “No, sir, I do not.”

  “When you went to the house, did you know he wouldn’t be home?”

  “Well…no. I expected him to be there.”

  “You didn’t know Sunday night was his poker night.”

  “No, I thought he’d be home. I was going there to see him.”

  “But now that I remind you of it, do you recall that your father customarily plays poker every other Sunday?”

  “Yes, I guess I know that.”

  I wanted to stop the questioning then and there, but I hesitated. Ehrenberg wasn’t trying to trick Michael, it wasn’t that, nor was he putting words in his mouth. His job was to get the facts, and he was simply doing his job. But he knew that once this session was finished, the police would have to charge Michael, and what Michael said in the next little while would largely determine the nature of the charge. I had not looked at the state’s criminal statutes since the time I’d been studying for the Florida bar exams, but I knew well enough that to charge Michael with first-degree murder, there had to be a reasonable assumption of “premeditated design.” Ehrenberg was trying to find out whether or not Michael went to that house with the express purpose of killing Maureen and the two girls. He had just admitted that he now remembered his father played poker every other Sunday night. I knew what Ehrenberg’s next question would be, and I wanted to stop it before he asked it. But I was afraid Michael would then request that I be kicked summarily out of the room. My situation was a delicate one. I waited, hoping Ehrenberg wouldn’t ask the anticipated question. He asked it.

  “Mr. Purchase, did you in fact know your father wouldn’t be home last night when you went—”

  “Michael,” I said, “as your attorney, I think I should advise you to stop answering any more questions at this point. Mr. Ehrenberg, I think you can realize the position—”

  “I want to answer the questions,” Michael said.

  “You’ve been warned that anything you say here can be used as evidence against you. The purpose of an attorney—”

  “I want to,” Michael said, and then answered the question in a way that still left the matter of premeditation unresolved. “I really didn’t know where he’d be,” he said. “I didn’t know whether he’d be at the house or not. That’s the truth.”

  “But when you got there—”

  “He wasn’t there.”

  “This was at a quarter to twelve?”

  “Around then.”

  “What time would it have been exactly?”

  Ehrenberg was going after facts again. An autopsy was mandatory in a murder case, that much I knew. If he did not already have the information in his possession, Ehrenberg would soon have from the coroner an approximate time of death. If the coroner said Maureen and the girls had been killed sometime between eleven and midnight, for example, and Michael now stated he’d got there at…

  “It would have been about a quarter to twelve, maybe a little later,” he said. “I told you, I don’t have a watch.”

  “So at a quarter to twelve, you rang the doorbell—”

  “Yes.”

  “And your stepmother answered it.”

  “Maureen answered it, yes, sir.”

  “What was she wearing?”

  “A nightgown.”

  “Just a nightgown?”

  “Yes…ah…a pink nightgown.”

  “She opened the door wearing just the nightgown.”

  “Yes.”

  “A long nightgown or a short nightgown?”

  “Long.”

  “Did it have sleeves?”

  “No, no sleeves.”

  “Can you tell me anything else about the nightgown?”

  “I think…yes, there was a sort of a little rosebud thing here at the…where the…the neck, this part of the gown.”

  “You’re indicating an area…oh, midway on your chest.”

  “Yes.”

  “Where a woman’s breasts would be.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you say there was…a rosebud, did you call it?”

  “I don’t know what it’s called, it’s a little sort of…the fabric is gathered, it looks like a flower.”

  “Would you mean a rosette?”

  “Yes, that’s right, a rosette.”

  “What color was the rosette?”

  “Pink, same as the gown.”

  “What else was your stepmother wearing?”

  “That’s all, I think.”

  “Slippers?”

  “No.”

  “Jewelry?”

  “A wedding band.”

  “Anything in her hair?”

  “No.”

  He had just described exactly what Maureen was wearing. I’d heard this same description from Jamie two hours earlier, when he was telling us about walking into that bedroom and finding his wife in the closet. Even the rosette, Michael had just described even the goddamn rosette. I had to make another try. This time, I directed my plea to Ehrenberg.

  “Mr. Ehrenberg,” I said, “on behalf of my client, I’d like to protest strongly this continuing interrogation after I’ve advised him to—”

  “Listen,” Michael said, his voice rising, “you just shut the fuck up, okay?”

  “Everything you say is being taped—”

  “I know it is.”

  “And can be used later as—”

  “Damn it, will you please let me—”

  “Mr. Ehrenberg,” I said, “can you stop the tape a minute?”

  Ehrenberg immediately pushed the STOP button.

  The room went silent.

  “Michael,” I said, “I’m going to ask you just one question. If you answer yes to it, I’ll keep still for the rest of this interview, you can say whatever you like, I won’t interrupt, I won’t try to stop you. But if you say no—”

  “What’s the question?”

  “Do you want to go to the electric chair?”

  “Yes.”

  Ehrenberg visibly flinched. I don’t think he was expecting Michael’s affirmative reply; I know I wasn’t.

  “So can we please get on with it?” Michael said.

  Ehrenberg looked at me, waiting for my permission to continue. I said nothing. He nodded helplessly and pressed the RECORD button. His voice was softer when he began questioning Michael again. “Would you tell me what happened next, please?” he said.

  “Maureen told me my father wasn’t home, and ah…asked me if I wanted to come in.”

  “Did you go in?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Through the front door?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where did you go? What part of the house?”

  “Well…ah…first we went into the kitchen.”

  “Yes, go on.”

  “We sat down in the kitchen.”

  “Yes.”

  “There’s a table there in the kitchen.”

  “Go on.”

  “And while we were sitting there…it’s hard for me to remember all this.”

  “I know it is. But while you were sitting at the kitchen table…”

  “I guess I saw the knives.”

  “What knives?”

  “There’s a rack on the wall. In the kitchen. It’s a magnetic rack, there’re four or five knives on it. You know, different kinds of knives.”

  “What happened when you saw this rack with the knives on it?”

  “I guess I…ah…got up and grabbed one of the knives from the rack.”

  “Which knife?”

  “It had to be one of the big knives.”

  “Can you describe the knife more particularly?”

  “No, I don’t really remember what it looked like. One of the big ones on the rack. I just…I just reached up and grabbed the…nearest knife.”

  “But you don’t remember which knife it was.”

  “I know it was one of the big ones.”

  “How many big ones were there on the rack?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “But you reached for one of them.”

  “Yes.”

  “Reached how? Can you show me where the knife rack was in relationship to the table here in this room?”

  “Yes, it was…it would have been to the right. I got up, and I walked to the right, and I took the knife off the rack.”

  “What did Maureen say when she saw you doing this?”

  “Nothing. I don’t remember.”

  “What were you talking about before you reached for the knife?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Well, was it a pleasant conversation?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Would you remember why you got up and reached for the knife?”

  “I just got up and grabbed it from the rack.”

  “What did you do then?”

  “I stabbed her.”

  “Were you still in the kitchen when you stabbed her?”

  “Yes. Well, no, actually, we were…it was in the bedroom.”

  “How did you get to the bedroom?”

  “I don’t remember. I guess she ran in there.”

  “And you followed her?”

  “Yes.”

  “With the knife?”

  “Yes.”

  “In which hand were you holding the knife?”

  “My right hand.”

  “Are you right-handed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Were you holding the knife in your right hand when you stabbed her?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did she scream?”

  “Her mouth.”

  “What about her mouth?”

  “It was open.”

  “She was screaming, is that it?”

  “No.”

  “But her mouth was open?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did she say anything to you?”

  “No.”

  “Where was she when you stabbed her?”

  “On the…near the…she was…in the…in the…I didn’t see her at first, she was…there was…”

  “All right, Mr. Purchase, calm down now. Calm down, please.”

  “Yes, I’m sorry.”

  “Would you like a glass of water?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “Just try to…”

  “Yes.”

  “Compose yourself.”

  “Yes.”

  “When you’re ready to continue—”

  “I’m ready now.”

  “Just tell me again what happened in the bedroom.”

  “I stabbed her.”