“Just Jim,” I say.

“Well . . . what can you tell me about Jim?”

The way Cromartie says Jim, it’s like he’s dealing with a little kid who is obviously lying.

“He . . . he has red hair,” I say. “He’s big, muscular. He wears glasses. He has a paunch, like, a gut.”

Bradley stops the recording. “Jason, who did you mean by ‘Jim’?”

“He was someone who came to my office. It would have been very early this summer. I want to say the first full week of June.”

“What was his name?”

“He gave the name James Drinker. He said his name was James Drinker, that he worked at Higgins Auto Body here in the city, and that he lived in an apartment building at the intersection of Townsend and Kensington in Old Power’s Park.”

Roger Ogren and Katie O’Connor are scribbling feverishly, trying to keep up.

“Can you describe this individual from a physical standpoint?”

“He was a very odd-looking person. He had long, kind of curly red hair. Thick black glasses. He was very muscular, like a weight lifter. And he had a big protruding stomach, a beer gut, I guess. Just like I told Detective Cromartie.”

“What did you two discuss?”

“I can’t answer that,” I say. “When a client comes in and tells me something, I’m sworn to confidentiality under the attorney-client privilege.”

“What if you, as an attorney, think this client is kind of shady? Up to no good?”

“That makes no difference. The privilege sticks.”

“What if it turns out he’s lying to you about his true identity?”

I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. If the attorney-client privilege were broken every time a client lied to his lawyer, very few clients would have the privilege. Plenty of clients have lied to me over the years, Bradley, on big things and small things. It doesn’t eviscerate the privilege.”

“Does the privilege always apply, no matter what?”

“Basically, yes. The only exception is if the client tells me—I mean, literally tells me—that he or she is going to commit a crime. If I hear them say that, I have a duty to report them.”

“Did that happen here?”

“No, it did not. I may have had my suspicions—well, I did have my suspicions. I can’t give you the details of what we discussed, but he never said he was a killer, much less that he was planning to kill again. So I had to keep it all confidential.”

“Let me jump forward in the police interview, Jason.”

Bradley, who knows computers better than I ever will, dials up the next passage, skipping a handful of questions.

“Did this . . . Jim tell you that he was going to hurt Alexa?” Cromartie asks. “Or you?”

I shake my head. “Not in so many words. I wish he had. If he had, maybe I could have done something.”

“I don’t understand what that means,” Cromartie says.

Stop tape.

“Detective Cromartie said he didn’t understand what you meant by that, Jason. Can you tell us what you meant?”

“Well, it’s just what I explained. He was my client, for the purposes of the privilege, the moment he entered my office. If this individual had told me that he was going to hurt Alexa, or me, or anyone else, for that matter, I could have done something. I could have reported him. That’s why I said, ‘I wish he had’ told me that. I didn’t know he was going to hurt Alexa. It never occurred to me.”

“Objection,” says Ogren. “We’re assuming facts not in evidence, and there’s no foundation for that statement. There’s absolutely no evidence in the record that this unknown man of mystery did anything at all to Alexa Himmel.”

“I’ll sustain that objection,” says the judge, “but let’s limit the speeches, Mr. Ogren.” The judge has the court reporter read back my answer and strikes the last two sentences.

“Well, Jason, regardless of what this man calling himself James Drinker may have done, did he ever give you any indication that he was going to hurt Alexa?”

“No, he didn’t.”

“Very good. This man, ‘James Drinker.’ Did you confirm that there was, in fact, a man named James Drinker who worked at Higgins Auto Body and who lived at 3611 West Townsend, here in the city?”

“I did confirm that, yes. So I assumed he was on the up-and-up.”

“How many times did you speak with this man?”

“Twice at my office, in early June.”

“Any other time?”

“Well, in a manner of speaking, yes.”

“Explain that.”

“In very late June, let’s say that . . . well, a crime had been committed that concerned me. By that, I mean, I was concerned that my client had committed that crime. And I wanted to discuss it with him.”

“Did you call him?”

“I couldn’t call him. He left no home phone and no cell phone. On rare occasions, I would speak with him by phone, but it was always him calling me, and it was always on one of those disposable phones you buy at the convenience store with a blocked phone number. So I had no way of calling him.”

“So what did you do?”

“I went to his house. I believe it was a Saturday. The last Saturday in June. His apartment at 3611 West Townsend, in Old Power’s Park. I think his apartment number was 406.”

“Did James Drinker answer the door?”

“Yes, he did.”

“Describe his appearance.”

“The same general characteristics. Long curly red hair, big muscles, black glasses, a big gut. Still funny-looking. But it wasn’t the same person.”

“Can you explain that?”

“The person living at that apartment, James Drinker, had all the same general features as the man who came to my office. But it was clearly a different person. Different eyes, without the glasses on. Different nose. Different voice. I apologized to the guy and I left.”

“So, Jason. What did this mean?”

“The man who came to my office gave me a bogus name and wore a disguise.”

Roger Ogren actually chuckles a bit, then raises his hand in apology.

“That’s okay, I thought it was crazy, too,” I say. “Why would a client come to you, for a confidential discussion, and wear a disguise and give a fake name?”

“And did you come to discover an answer to that question?” Bradley asks me.

“Yes,” I say. “Because he was afraid I would recognize him. And because he wanted to mess with me.”

“Objection,” says Roger Ogren. “Foundation.”

“Sustained.”

“Okay, you need to explain that,” Bradley says, as if he’s just as curious as the jury, and the prosecution, and my brother, Pete, sitting in the gallery, must be. “Did you come to learn this person’s true identity?”

“I did. This person’s name was Marshall Rivers.”

Roger Ogren looks like he’s about to drop his pen.

Annnnd there, he drops it.

“And who was Marshall Rivers to you?”

“About eight, nine years ago, when I was a prosecutor, I took a confession from Marshall Rivers on a gun charge. Possession of a firearm. We were also looking at him for trying to forcibly abduct a woman and her child.”

“And you said you took his confession?”

“Yes, I was the prosecutor assigned to the police station where he was brought in after his arrest.”

I begin to provide the details from that night, as best as I can remember them. I recall the big picture, but not the small details. The whole thing doesn’t particularly stand out in my mind, because I dealt with dangerous criminals like him every day, and because the mind games I used on Marshall were the kinds of methods I employed on a daily basis during Felony Review.

Before I get too far, Roger Ogren objects and asks for a sidebar with the judge. I’m not privy to the conversation between the judge and the lawyers in the far corner of the courtroom, but I know Bradley is arguing that the details of my interrogation of Marshall Rivers are very relevant.

The judge overrules the objection. Bradley walks me through that entire sequence of events. I wish I didn’t have to emphasize what I did to Marshall, because it shows the jury a side of me that is less than forthcoming, even devious. But the details show why Marshall was pissed off at me. It shows his motive to do what he did to those women and, in his mind, to me.