The room was in an uproar. I went back through the argument, ticking off the points on the slide that highlighted them.
When they seemed to be caught up with me, I went back to Baladine and his fury with me. How Global first tried to bribe me by hiring me to frame Frenada, and when I wouldn’t play, how Baladine began hounding me, culminating with planting cocaine in my office.
I played the video I’d made in my office. The group was firing so many questions now that I had to play it three times before I could go on.
“I don’t know if Baladine wanted me dead or discredited—” I began, when Murray piped up unexpectedly from the back of the room.
“He was spinning around. I don’t think he could possibly have told anyone he wanted you dead, but when some of us at the Star caught wind of the discussions going on about your involvement in the case, we—uh, made it as clear as we could that if anything—uh—well, a lot of people in Chicago would want to know why you got—uh—hurt. Also, I got the idea that someone high in the Global organization was lobbying for you, although Al—my contacts there—never said who it was. Anyway, I have a feeling—I was not involved in any discussions about you—but I think he—Baladine—thought discrediting you was the viable route. I didn’t know about the drugs. And I was as amazed as everyone else here when you were arrested for kidnapping. And then, why on God’s green earth you didn’t post bail—” He broke off midsentence. “I guess you were being Wonder Woman again. Take us to the limit one more time, Warshawski.”
I blushed but went on with my presentation. “As far as Frenada goes, I think they wanted him dead: he was starting to complain to too many people about Trant taking one of his sample Virginwear shirts. They thought they could discredit him with drugs; they planted some in his shop and planted some data on the Web trying to show he was a high roller. I’m afraid it was something I said that sent him hotfoot out to Oak Brook to try to confront Baladine and Trant the night of June twenty–sixth.”
Morrell ran the footage of Frenada with Baladine and Trant at Baladine’s pool. He stopped it to make sure everyone noticed the date embedded in the film.
“This film doesn’t prove that Baladine and Trant killed Frenada, but it does put the three men together the night Frenada died. Lucian Frenada had told me he couldn’t compete with Global’s current suppliers because his labor costs were too high. He also had other overhead that someone running a factory in a prison doesn’t have to deal with. The state of Illinois paid for the machines that Global gets to use. The state of Illinois pays the rent on the space for the Global factory. You can’t get lower production costs for this kind of operation, even if you go to Burma, because you can’t beat free space and machinery. And you have a labor force that can never go on strike, never balk at the working conditions, never complain to OSHA or the NLRB. It’s a beauty for the bottom line in these days of the global economy.”
There was another barrage of questions about the Global–Carnifice shop. “You’ve been most patient to listen to me for such a long period,” I finally said. “There are only a few more things I want to say. All summer, as Baladine and Trent were boxing me in, I kept wondering what was so important about Nicola Aguinaldo that they needed to find someone to take the blame for her death. It wasn’t she they cared about, but their manufacturing scheme. It had been operating smoothly, no questions asked, for several years; they didn’t want some outsider poking into Nicola’s death to upset it.
“Maybe you’re wondering how they could run that plant as long as they did with no one noticing. For one thing, they were well connected to the Illinois House Speaker, who’s got a lot of power, in and out of Springfield.
“For another, we all assume that whatever goes on behind those iron bars is protecting all us law–abiding citizens—sorry, all you law–abiding citizens; I’m out on bail facing a felony charge.” People laughed more loudly than my little joke merited—they needed some kind of release from the horrors they’d been hearing.
“Some of what goes on may be nasty, but as the corrections officers said to me and my sister inmates many times—like when a woman wasn’t allowed medical care after getting a major burn on her arm in the kitchen”—I nodded and Morrell flipped up a slide of the arm—”Coolis isn’t a resort. Inmates aren’t on vacation. We law–abiding citizens don’t necessarily want prisoners rehabilitated, but we sure do want them punished. And they get punished in carloads full of discipline.”