Added to this branch of his investigation, Levin could find little to confirm that Mary Alice Windsor had been one of the unreported victims of the rapist. She had granted us an interview and agreed to testify about her secret tragedy but only if her testimony was vitally needed. The date of the attack she provided fell within the dates of the documented assaults attributed to the Real Estate Rapist, and Windsor provided an appointment book and other documentation showing she was indeed the realtor on record in regard to the sale of the Bel-Air home where she said she was attacked. But ultimately we only had her word for it. There were no medical or hospital records indicative of treatment for a sexual assault. And no police record.

Still, when Mary Windsor recounted her story, it matched Roulet’s telling of it in almost all details. Afterward, it had struck both Levin and me as odd that Louis had known so much about the attack. If his mother had decided to keep it secret and unreported, then why would she share so many details of her harrowing ordeal with her son? That question led Levin to postulate a theory that was as repulsive as it was intriguing.

“I think he knows all the details because he was there,” Levin had said after the interview and we were by ourselves.

“You mean he watched it without doing anything to stop it?”

“No, I mean I think he was the man in the ski mask and goggles.”

I was silent. I think on a subliminal level I may have been thinking the same thing but the idea was too creepy to have broken through to the surface.

“Oh, man…,” I said.

Levin, thinking I was disagreeing, pressed his case forward.

“This is a very strong woman,” he said. “She built that company from nothing and real estate in this town is cutthroat. She’s a tough lady and I can’t see her not reporting this, not wanting the guy who did it to be caught. I view people two ways. They’re either eye-for-an-eye people or they are turn-the-cheek people. She’s definitely an eye-for-an-eye person and I can’t see her keeping it quiet unless she was protecting that guy. Unless that guy was our guy. I’m telling you, man, Roulet is evil. I don’t know where it comes from or how he got it, but the more I look at him, the more I see the devil.”

All of this backgrounding was completely sub rosa. It obviously was not the kind of background that would in any way be brought forward as a means of defense. It had to be hidden from discovery, so little of what Levin or I found was put down on paper. But it was still information that I had to know as I made my decisions and set up the trial and the play within it.

At 11:05 my home phone rang as I was standing in front of a mirror and fitting a Dodgers cap onto my head. I checked the caller ID before answering and saw that it was Lorna Taylor.

“Why is your cell phone off?” she asked.

“Because I’m off. I told you, no calls today. I’m going to the ballgame with Mish and I’m supposed to get going to meet him early.”

“Who’s Mish?”

“I mean Raul. Why are you bothering me?”

I said it good-naturedly.

“Because I think you are going to want to be bothered with this. The mail came in a little early today and with it you got a notice from the Second.”

The Second District Court of Appeal reviewed all cases emanating from L.A. County. They were the first appellate hurdle on the way to the Supreme Court. But I didn’t think Lorna would be calling me to tell me I had lost an appeal.

“Which case?”

At any given time I usually have four or five cases on appeal to the Second.

“One of your Road Saints. Harold Casey. You won!”

I was shocked. Not at winning, but at the timing. I had tried to move quickly with the appeal. I had written the brief before the verdict had come in and paid extra for expedited daily transcripts from the trial. I filed the notice of appeal the day after the verdict and asked for an expedited review. Even still, I wasn’t expecting to hear anything on Casey for another two months.

I asked Lorna to read the opinion and a smile widened on my face. The summary was literally a rewrite of my brief. The three-judge panel had agreed with me right down the line on my contention that the low flyover of the sheriff’s surveillance helicopter above Casey’s ranch constituted an invasion of privacy. The court overturned Casey’s conviction, saying that the search that led to the discovery of the hydroponic pot farm was illegal.

The state would now have to decide whether to retry Casey and, realistically, a retrial was out of the question. The state would have no evidence, since the appeals court ruled everything garnered during the search of the ranch was inadmissible. The Second’s ruling was clearly a victory for the defense, and they don’t come that often.

“Man, what a day for the underdog!”

“Where is he, anyway?” Lorna asked.

“He may still be at the reception center but they were moving him to Corcoran. Here’s what you do. Make about ten copies of the ruling and put them in an envelope and send it to Casey at Corcoran. You should have the address.”

“Well, won’t they be letting him go?”

“Not yet. His parole was violated after his arrest and the appeal doesn’t affect that. He won’t get out until he goes to the parole board and argues fruit of the poisonous tree, that he got violated because of an illegal search. It will probably take about six weeks for all that to work itself out.”

“Six weeks? That’s unbelievable.”

“Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.”

I sang it like Sammy Davis did on that old television show.

“Please don’t sing to me, Mick.”

“Sorry.”

“Why are we sending ten copies to him? Isn’t one enough?”

“Because he’ll keep one for himself and spread the other nine around the prison and then your phone will start ringing. An attorney who can win on appeal is like gold in prison. They’ll come calling and you’re going to have to weed ’em out and find the ones who have family and can pay.”

“You always have an angle, don’t you?”

“I try to. Anything else happening?”

“Just the usual. The calls you told me you didn’t want to hear about. Did you get in to see Glory Days yesterday at County?”

“It’s Gloria Dayton and, yes, I got in to see her. She looks like she’s over the hump. She’s still got more than a month to go.”

The truth was, Gloria Dayton looked better than over the hump. I hadn’t seen her so sharp and bright-eyed in years. I’d had a purpose for going down to County-USC Medical Center to talk to her, but seeing her on the downhill side of recovery was a nice bonus.

As expected, Lorna was the doomsayer.

“And how long will it last this time before she calls your number again and says, ‘I’m in jail. I need Mickey’?”

She said the last part with a whiny, nasal impression of Gloria Dayton. It was quite accurate but it annoyed me anyway. Then she topped it with a little song to the tune of the Disney classic.

“M-I-C…, see you real soon. K-E-Y…, why, because you never charge me! M-O-U-T-H. Mickey Mouth… Mickey Mouth, the lawyer every -”

“Please don’t sing to me, Lorna.”

She laughed into the phone.

“I’m just making a point.”

I was smiling but trying to keep it out of my voice.

“Fine. I get it. I have to get going now.”

“Well, have a great time… Mickey Mouth.”

“You could sing that song all day and the Dodgers could lose twenty-zip to the Giants and I’d still have a great time. After hearing the news from you, what could go wrong?”

After ending the call I went into my home office and got a cell number for Teddy Vogel, the outside leader of the Saints. I gave him the good news and suggested that he could probably pass it on to Hard Case faster than I could. There are Road Saints in every prison. They have a communication system the CIA and FBI might be able to learn something from. Vogel said he’d handle it. Then he said the ten grand he gave me the month before on the side of the road near Vasquez Rocks was a worthy investment.