“There must be other ways the killer could hold that award without leaving a print. Perhaps the killer wrapped a towel or cloth around his hand. Maybe a handkerchief.”

“But if so, where is it? Again, the police searched the premises and all possible suspects with uncommon thoroughness almost immediately after the body was discovered. Any such cloth or towel would be covered with blood. It should’ve been easy to find, therefore-after all, there was no time to run down to the local dry cleaners. If your hypothesis were true, the implement would’ve been discovered-quickly and easily. But it wasn’t.” He turned toward the jury. “And from that, as a man of science, I can make only one logical inference. That it wasn’t found because it didn’t exist.”

Ben knew he was getting nowhere; worse, by rehashing the evidence and giving Fisher countless opportunities to restate his conclusions, he was drilling it ever more firmly into the jurors’ consciousnesses.

He glanced back at counsel table. Father Beale was losing the poker face they had crafted during all those pretrial prep sessions. The impact of this evidence was hitting him hard.

Well, better to make some point, however unhelpful, than to make no point at all, he supposed. “Granted, we don’t know all the ins and outs of how it was done in this case. Nonetheless, it is possible to hold an object without leaving a print, right?”

Dr. Fisher wasn’t having any. “In general, or in this case?”

“In general.”

“In general, yes. But in this-”

“And if it can be done, then it is possible that it was done here, and we just haven’t figured out how, right?”

“Objection,” Canelli said. “Your honor, it’s not relevant what’s possible-only what happened.”

“I’m allowed to explore alternative theories,” Ben rejoined.

“But this is not a serious theory. This is pure speculation!”

Judge Pitcock pondered a moment. “I’ll allow you to go a bit further, Mr. Kincaid, but I’m more interested in facts than guesswork, and I think the jury will be, too.”

Ben continued. “Dr. Fisher, isn’t it true that it is possible that the assailant held that award without leaving a print and we just haven’t figured out how?”

“No, I’m sorry, but I can’t agree with that. If that were done, I would’ve figured out how. You would probably be spouting a dozen different ways it could’ve been done-if you could think of any. But you can’t. No one can. And as a man of science, I must conclude that if there are no viable explanations of how another person could’ve held that weapon-then there was no other person.”

“But even if you can’t explain it, it’s possible-”

“If you want to take that position, Mr. Kincaid, I suppose it’s possible that a ghost floated into the church and clubbed the poor victim on the head, and that’s why there were no prints. But I don’t believe in ghosts. Do you?”

Ben didn’t answer. What was there to say?

“And I don’t believe football-size awards hurl themselves into people’s heads. And I don’t believe that blow could’ve been caused by anyone on earth-except Daniel Beale.”

As Ben sat down, he tried not to let his feelings show. It was important that it seem to the jury-and to his client-as if nothing major had happened. But he knew better. He knew he had just come up against the first witness he couldn’t crack, not in the least, on cross. The first witness to really make the jury suspect Father Beale might be guilty.

Juries were unpredictable, but before, Ben sensed that they were winning, at least a little bit. That the trial was, for the most part, going their way. But he didn’t have that sense any longer. Now he knew better.

What he didn’t know was that it was only going to get worse.

During the break, Christina flipped her trial notebook to the witness list and showed Ben the score.

“By my count, we’ve run through all the prosecution’s technical or expert types, all the cop witnesses, and all the actual eyewitnesses. All that’s left are a few St. Benedict’s members. So the worst should be over.”

Ben shook his head. “It doesn’t figure. Canelli’s a savvy prosecutor, and he has a great flair for the dramatic. He’ll want to go out with a bang. He must be saving something.”

“But what? More disgruntled vestry members? Who cares? We’ve heard that tune to death.”

“Which is what worries me.” Ben drummed a finger against his lips. “Could it be one of them is singing a song we haven’t heard yet?”

“How could there be anything we haven’t heard?”

“I’d put my money on Ernestine Rupert,” Father Beale said, joining the discussion. “I don’t think she’ll be able to resist the opportunity to trash me in public.”

“Let her do her worst,” Ben murmured. “She’ll go down in flames as soon as I reveal she’s been blackmailing half the church.”

“Maybe it’s this other St. Benedict’s member, Carol Mason,” Christina suggested. “The Sunday school teacher. Maybe she has a complaint we didn’t hear about in our pretrial interview.”

The discussion continued for a good ten minutes, until Judge Pitcock returned and the trial resumed. But despite all the analysis and contemplation, none of them were prepared for what happened next.

“The State calls Marco Ellison to the stand,” Canelli announced.

Ben rose out of his chair, gaping as if he’d witnessed a train wreck. What the-?

“Bench conference,” Ben said, but by that time, he was already halfway there. Canelli fell into place behind him.

“Your honor,” Ben began, “this witness is not on the prosecution’s list.”

“He’s on their list,” Canelli rejoined. “He’s the one they went to all the trouble to add a few days ago, remember? Then they tried to have him yanked. They know all about him. They can hardly claim unfair surprise.”

“It is unfair surprise, your honor. We had no idea the prosecution intended to call him. What’s more, the man is a terminal liar.”

“Which I suppose explains what he was doing on your list in the first place,” Canelli replied.

“No,” Ben said, “it explains why we decided we couldn’t call him. He offered me testimony that would help my client, but I turned it down because I knew it wasn’t true.”

“That’s funny. I don’t think his testimony is going to help you at all.”

“Because he’s changed it! When I wouldn’t put him on the stand, he must’ve changed his story around so that you would!” Ben appealed to the judge. “Your honor, this witness didn’t see anything. He just wants a piece of the action. He wants to be on television. I think he has some crazy idea that being in this highly publicized trial will jump-start his acting career.”

Canelli turned to the judge. “Obviously, your honor, in the course of preparing the witness they realized he had information that would damage their client’s case, so they decided not to put him on the stand. But because Mr. Ellison is a civic-minded gentleman who only wants to see justice done, he came to the prosecution with his information.”

“Civic-minded gentleman? We’re talking about a punk with a pierced tongue!”

“Gentlemen, please!” Judge Pitcock looked at them sternly, his left hand covering the microphone. “I appreciate your concerns, Mr. Kincaid, but what do you want me to do? Given the circumstances, you can’t claim unfair surprise, and I can’t preclude the prosecution from calling a witness who could have relevant information.”

“But he doesn’t, sir. He’s a liar. He’s making it up as he goes along. He told me one story one day, then wanted to change it all around the next.”

“You’ll have an opportunity to demonstrate that on cross.”

“How? There were no witnesses to our conversations other than myself.”

Pitcock shook his head. “I can’t tell you how to try your case, Mr. Kincaid.”