“Billy’s drug use or otherwise has no bearing on the case.”
“The prosecution obviously thinks it has some bearing.”
“That’s because they have no case,” Leslie Lose said confidently. “A fact I will abundantly prove tomorrow when we start Billy’s defense. Please try not to worry, Mr. Hamlin. I know what I’m doing.”
The prosecution took two days to present its case, which consisted of a thorough hatchet job on Billy Hamlin’s character. Much was made of the toxicology report, and Billy’s “substance abuse problems.” Still more was made of his promiscuity, with various girls from Camp Williams tearfully admitting under oath to being “seduced” by the charming carpenter’s son. Combined with Billy’s admission, backed up by Toni Gilletti’s evidence, that he had been in charge of the boys that day, the consensus was that the district attorney’s office had done enough to prove involuntary manslaughter. But for second-degree murder, they needed more. They needed negligence on a gross scale, and they needed malice.
“The defense calls Charles Braemar Murphy.”
Billy shot his attorney a puzzled look. Had they discussed this? Charles had never exactly been Billy’s biggest fan.
“Mr. Braemar Murphy, you were present at the beach on the afternoon that Nicholas Handemeyer died, were you not?”
“I was.” Charles nodded seriously. In an immaculately cut Halston suit and pale yellow silk tie, with his dark hair neatly parted to the side and a Groton class ring glittering on his little finger, he looked handsome, sober, and conservative—everything that the jury had been led to believe that Billy Hamlin was not.
“Tell us what you remember.”
Charles took a deep breath. “I’d been on my parents’ yacht for the day. I’m afraid I’d had a couple of glasses of wine, but I took one of the tenders over to the beach anyway, which was a stupid thing to do.”
Toni watched the faces of the jurors, who were all listening intently. It was astonishing how forgiving they seemed to be of Charles’s self-confessed drinking, in contrast to their disgust at Billy’s supposed drug taking. Was alcohol just more socially acceptable? Or was it Charles’s educated, upper-class manner that won them over?
Charles went on. “I was going at quite a clip, when I suddenly saw a rowboat directly in front of me, out in the shipping lanes. I swerved to avoid it and that’s when I hit Billy. Not head-on, obviously. I’d have killed him. But I clipped him on the shoulder. I wasn’t expecting to see a swimmer so far out.”
“Where were the children at this point?”
“On the beach, playing,” Charles said firmly.
That’s odd, Toni thought. I’m amazed he even noticed the boys from that distance and after the shock of what happened out in the lanes.
“Was Nicholas Handemeyer with them?”
“I think so. Yes. There were seven boys, so he must have been.”
A surprised murmur ran through the court. The Handemeyer parents exchanged distressed glances. Nicholas’s elder sister, a pretty, dark-haired girl in her early teens, gripped her mother’s hand. If Nicholas was safe and alive so late in the afternoon, whatever happened to him must have happened very quickly. Moreover, it probably happened when Billy Hamlin was on the beach, receiving medical attention. A mitigating circumstance if ever there was one.
“So your memory is that the children had been safe while in Billy Hamlin’s care that day, until Billy himself was injured by your speedboat.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you, Mr. Braemar Murphy. No further questions.”
It was all Jeff Hamlin could do not to punch the air in triumph. Good old Leslie knew what he was doing after all.
“A couple of questions, Mr. Braemar Murphy.” The prosecutor was on his feet. “I understand that you and Miss Gilletti were dating at the time of these events. Is that correct?”
“It is.” Charles sounded perplexed. The question hardly seemed relevant.
“Other counselors at Camp Williams have testified that Miss Gilletti and Nicholas Handemeyer had a close bond. Is that correct?”
“All the boys adored Toni.”
“But Nicholas Handemeyer especially?”
The furrow in Charles’s brow deepened. “I guess so, yes. He wrote her these little love poems. It was sweet.”
Toni dug her nails into her thigh so violently she drew blood. She did not want to think about Nicholas’s poems, scrawled on slips of paper and pushed hopefully under her cabin door. Her heart might shatter.
“Mr. Braemar Murphy, did you consider William Hamlin to be your rival for Miss Gilletti’s affections?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Were you concerned that Mr. Hamlin was attracted to your girlfriend?”
“Not concerned, exactly, no.”
“Really? You knew the two of them had slept together?”
A disapproving murmur rippled through the court.
“Yes. But it was a one-night stand. It didn’t mean anything.”
From the dock, Billy Hamlin glared at Charles murderously. How dare the smug bastard say that what he and Toni had meant nothing? His fists were clenched and he looked fit to burst, but he managed to contain himself.
“So you weren’t worried?” the prosecutor continued.
“No.”
“Not even after Billy Hamlin made threats against your life?”
The jury jerked to life as if awoken from a deep slumber. Toni Gilletti sat bolt upright. From the dock, Billy glanced anxiously at his father.
“Several other Camp Williams counselors have given statements that the night before Nicholas Handemeyer’s death, Billy Hamlin was vocally declaring his love for Miss Gilletti at a camp party and threatening to, quote, annihilate, unquote anyone who dared come between them. Wouldn’t that include you?”
“Billy didn’t mean that,” said Charles. “He was high.”
“Indeed.” The prosecutor paused meaningfully. “As the court has heard. But I put it to you, Mr. Braemar Murphy, that Mr. Hamlin did mean it. I put it to you that William Hamlin was wildly, violently jealous of anyone whom Miss Gilletti loved. That his drug use merely unleashed feelings of rage and obsession that, in his more sober moments, he managed to keep hidden.”
Belatedly, Leslie Lose got to his feet. “Objection! Conjecture.”
The judge waved him away. Like the rest of the room, he wanted to see where this was going.
“I’ll allow it.”
The prosecutor continued. “I put it to you that Mr. Hamlin’s violent jealousy was such that he even resented the affection shown to Miss Gilletti by a small boy.”
A look of pain crossed Charles Braemar Murphy’s face. Then, to Toni’s astonishment, he said. “That may be true.”
What? Of course it isn’t true!
“Billy may have resented Nicholas.”
“Indeed he may have! In William Hamlin’s paranoid, drug-warped mind, Nicholas Handemeyer wasn’t an innocent, seven-year-old child at all, was he? He was a threat. Just like you.”
“Maybe.” Charles shook his head, as if willing it not to be so.
“A threat that needed to be disposed of. Neutralized. Annihilated.”
“I hope not.” Charles shuddered, as if the idea had never occurred to him. “Good God, I hope not.”
Bastard! Toni thought. Billy would never have hurt Nicholas and Charles knows it. He’s just trying to get back at Billy for coming on to me.
“Billy’s a good guy.” Charles twisted the knife. “But he was out of his depth at Camp Williams.”
“In what way?”
“In every way. Socially, economically, educationally. The truth is, I felt sorry for him. We all did. He couldn’t stand the fact that Toni chose me over him.”
This was too much for Billy.
“Liar!” he shouted, jumping to his feet. His face was red with anger and the veins on his forehead and neck protruded as if they were about to explode. “Toni loves me, and I love her!”
The jury
was not impressed. Billy looked like a madman, his hair a mess, arms gesticulating wildly, the flames of his obsession with Toni burning in his eyes. Toni felt like crying. Charles had provoked him, and Billy had fallen right into his trap. Worse, his lawyer had fallen with him.
“And that’s without drugs in his system,” the prosecutor said, sotto voce, accurately voicing the jurors’ thoughts. “Thank you, Mr. Braemar Murphy. No further questions.”
The next two days were about damage control.
Leslie Lose wheeled out various witnesses from Billy’s former life to attest to his good character: teachers, coaches, neighbors. The consensus was that the Billy Hamlin they knew would not knowingly have hurt a fly.
Jeff Hamlin pleaded to be allowed to take the stand, but Leslie Lose wouldn’t allow it.
“You’re too emotional. It won’t help.”
“Then let Billy speak for himself. He needs a chance to show people what he’s really like.”
That had been the original plan—for Billy to be his own secret weapon, for his affable charm and natural humility to change hearts and minds. But after Charles Braemar Murphy’s evidence, that ship hadn’t so much sailed as sunk without trace.
“The less Billy says the better,” said Leslie. “From now on we focus on facts.”
The facts were still in Billy’s favor.
Had Billy Hamlin been negligent in taking his eye off a seven-year-old boy at the beach? Yes, he had.
Was he wrong to have used drugs and alcohol while working as a camp counselor responsible for young children?
Of course he was.
But had William Hamlin murdered Nicholas Handemeyer? Had he willfully caused the boy’s death? Notwithstanding his disastrous outburst of jealous rage earlier, there was no proof that he had. There wasn’t even any compelling evidence to suggest it.
Leslie Lose finished his summing-up with the words:
“Billy Hamlin isn’t a murderer. Nor is he a monster. He’s a normal teenage boy and a loving son. Let’s not allow one family’s tragedy to become two.”
As he sat down, the lawyer was aware of Senator Handemeyer staring at him. His skin prickled uncomfortably beneath his wool suit.
He prayed it was enough.
The court adjourned for the night. Walter Gilletti spoke to his attorney outside the courtroom.
“What do you think?”
“Acquittal. No question. He didn’t help himself with his outburst, but the prosecution hasn’t proved a thing.”
Listening in from a few feet away, Toni exhaled with relief. Her father’s attorney was the best money could buy. Billy would be a free man by tomorrow. Of course, once he got out she’d have to talk to him about this marriage nonsense. Toni was fond of Billy and she owed him a lot, but matrimony was distinctly not on her agenda. Still, these would be good problems to have.
Her father was still talking.
“Good.” Walter Gilletti’s voice reverberated with authority. “If it’s a done deal then I’d like to leave tonight. The sooner we’re out of this circus the better.”
“I can’t leave, Daddy,” Toni blurted. “I have to stay for the verdict. Billy needs me here.”
Walter Gilletti turned on his daughter like a snake about to strike. “I don’t give a damn what Billy Hamlin needs. We go when I say we go,” he snarled.
In the end, the Gillettis stayed another night in Alfred.
On balance, Walter Gilletti decided it might look bad for business if they didn’t.
Chapter Seven
Superior-court justice Devon Williams took his seat, surveying the sea of faces in front of him. A big man in his early seventies with a neatly clipped, white beard and a snowy ring of hair around the tonsurelike bald spot on the crown of his head, Judge Williams had presided over many difficult cases. Thefts. Assaults. Arson. Murders. But few were as harrowing as this one. Or, in the end, as futile.
Nicholas Handemeyer’s death was a tragedy. But it was plain to Judge Williams that no murder had been committed. Here, clearly, was an example of a case where public hysteria and outrage, fueled by one family’s private grief, had gotten the better of common sense. Senator Handemeyer wanted heads to roll—the Hamlin boy’s head in particular—and truth be damned. Once the emotion was stripped away, however, what mattered in this case—in every case—was the law. And the law was clear: if Billy Hamlin was guilty of murder, Judge Devon Williams was a monkey’s uncle.
Of course, the law could not be taken in the abstract. It must be interpreted by the twelve men and women of the jury. Judge Williams watched them now as they filed back into court two. Ordinary men and women: ten white, two black, mostly middle-aged, mostly overweight, a snapshot of the great American public. And yet today these ordinary people bore an extraordinary responsibility.
Normally Judge Williams enjoyed the challenge of predicting a jury’s verdict. How would this juror respond to that witness, or that piece of evidence. Who would react emotionally and who rationally. Whose prejudices or personality would carry the day. But as he called on the foreman to address the court, he felt none of the usual excitement or tension, only sadness.
A little boy had died. Nothing could bring him back. And now the unedifying spectacle of a murder trial that should never have made it to court was about to come to an end. It was obvious which way the coin would fall.
“Have you reached a verdict?”
“We have, your honor.”
Ruth Handemeyer squeezed her daughter’s hand. She was so tense she was barely breathing. Beside her she could feel her husband’s anger and hatred coiled inside him like a spring. She had no idea how to defuse it, or what to say to comfort him. Since Nicko’s death, they’d become strangers, separated by an ocean of grief.
The teenage girl squeezed back.
“Whatever happens, Mommy, we’ll always love him.”
Ruth Handemeyer stifled a sob.
Jeff Hamlin looked to his right. Leslie Lose gave him an encouraging smile.
It’s going to be okay, Jeff told himself for the hundredth time. He blamed himself for sending Billy to Camp Williams in the first place. How foolish he’d been, thinking his son would be able to make connections there to better himself! When the chips were down, the rich, educated classes stuck together. Old Mrs. Kramer, the Gilletti girl’s family, even the Handemeyers, were all birds of a feather, looking for a sacrificial lamb to atone for a child’s death. And who better than a carpenter’s son?
Billy’s in that dock because he’s not one of them.
From the dock, Billy Hamlin looked at Toni Gilletti with eyes full of love.
Tonight he would be a free man.
Tonight it would all begin.
Toni’s stomach was churning. She felt guilty thinking it, after everything Billy had done for her, but the way he looked at her was starting to creep her out.
I have to talk to him right away. I can’t let him leave here thinking we have a future together.
Whatever Toni Gilletti had once found attractive and exciting about Billy Hamlin had died along with poor Nicholas Handemeyer. From now on Toni would always associate Billy with that day. With terror and anguish. With tragedy and regret. With blood and with water. With death.
There could be no going back.
Judge Devon Williams’s powerful baritone cut through the tension in the room like a power drill.
“And on the charge of second-degree murder, how do you find the defendant?”
Billy Hamlin closed his eyes. It was over at last.
“Guilty.”
Chapter Eight
Toni ran down the corridor, quickening her pace. Her father was yelling at her to come back, but she didn’t listen.
I have to see Billy. I have to tell him I’m sorry.
How had the jury found him guilty? It was impossible, ridiculous. The judge had clearly thought so too. You could see it in his eyes when he passed sentence: twenty years, with parole at fifteen, the minimum allowed for second-degree m
urder but still a lifetime.
“Sorry, miss.” A court officer blocked her path to the holding cell. “Official visitors only.”
“But he needs to see me!”
“Like hell he does.”
Before Toni knew what was happening, Billy’s father had grabbed her by the shoulders, throwing her back against the wall so hard she felt the breath leave her body.
“It was you, wasn’t it? It was you! You let my boy take the fall for you, you rich, spoiled little bitch.”
“Take your hands off my daughter.”
For once, Toni was glad to see her father. Walter Gilletti was a slight man but he radiated authority.
“I understand you’re upset,” he told Jeff Hamlin. “But Toni had nothing to do with this.”
“Yeah, right.” Jeff Hamlin backed away with tears in his eyes. “Your daughter’s shit don’t stink. They gave my Billy twenty years. Twenty years!”
Walter Gilletti shrugged. “If he keeps his nose clean, he’ll be out in fifteen.”
The rich man’s nonchalance was the last straw for Jeff Hamlin. Launching himself at Walter Gilletti with a mighty roar, he lashed out wildly with his fists as the policeman tried vainly to pry the two men apart. Seizing her chance, Toni bolted down the stairs toward the holding cell, but within seconds, another cop grabbed her.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, young lady? You can’t just barge down here without authorization.”
“It’s all right, Frank. The boy asked to see her.”
Leslie Lose seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. He looked white-faced and serious. Clearly the verdict had shocked him too.
Reluctantly, the guard stepped aside.
“Thank you,” Toni said to Billy’s lawyer.
“Please. It’s the least I can do.”
“It wasn’t your fault, you know.”
“Yes it was,” Lose said quietly.
Billy lit up when Toni walked in.
“Thank God. I thought they might not let you come.”
Sidney Sheldon's the Tides of Memory Page 5