Topper snorts. “Your honor, I’m not even sure what all this means, but I’m pretty sure, we’re going to have to object. If only on the grounds that Shakespeare over there is wasting our time.”
“I mean to say that any reasonable person would recognize that what Mr. Windsor is doing is opening the gates for the barbarians. If we allow him to win this suit, then the worst elements in our society will be free to drag down our highest exemplar, Excelsior.”
“Vague objection overruled. But counsel is instructed to use a mode of speech originating in this century,” cautions Judge Perkins.
“Of course, Your Honor. So we’re going to decide this matter on the preponderance of evidence. Preponderance. Which means, what does most of the evidence indicate to a reasonable person like you? Excelsior has devoted his entire life to preserving and defending people like you and I. To protecting our way of life. Years of service. And suddenly, he’s going to throw that all away, for some irrational vendetta? Why would he do such a thing? Why, that sort of thing, just doesn’t seem reasonable. And that’s exactly what we’re going to show.”
Chapter Forty-Nine. Get Him to Pop
“Call Eustace Eugene Rielly the 3rd.”
Edwin turns his head and sees that Eustace has not given up on his dreams of supervilliany. For an instant, pity almost enters Edwin’s hard heart. Despite his injuries, Dr. Loeb struggles to the witness box under his own power. One leg appears to be pinned in several places and a brace is screwed into his skull to keep his apparently broken spine from moving. He wears a cream suit with a Neru jacket, and tries to fix the courtroom in a gaze of terrible intensity. For all his dreams of true hate, his eyes are nothing more than large, moist spotlights of pathos. He is as threatening as a wounded puppy.
“Did Excelsior really do all that damage, or did you stage that?” Edwin asks Topper.
“As your lawyer, I advise you not to answer that question. He looks great doesn’t he?”
As the bailiff struggles to help Eustace into the witness’ stand, he gouges large chips from the polished woodwork with his metal neck brace. Dr. Loeb lets out a few high pitched moans. And it is when Dr. Loeb is at his most pathetic, that the hint of Edwin’s sympathies snap off sharply. The only reason Dr. Loeb is in this mangled state is that he failed to follow Edwin’s advice. He has so clearly reaped what he had sown.
“State your name for the record.”
“Dr. –"
Topper slams his hand down on the table and coughs.
“Eustace Eugene Rielly,” the words come out slowly, squeezing their way through a jaw that has been wired shut, “the Third.” His headdress clatters as Eustace struggles to get his hand past his bolts and restraining arms and onto a bible. He sounds like a snake as the oath to tell the “truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” hisses out between clenched teeth.
“Mr. Rielly, I realize that you are in a great deal of pain, so I will try to keep this brief. I hope that the defense will be kind enough to do the same. Clearly, you’ve suffered enough already,” says Topper. “Are you a client of Mr. Windsor’s?”
“Yessssssssssss,” he says.
“How were you injured?”
“I was assaulted,” Eustace says. He has to try three times, to make it over the deep glottal gorge of the “au” that lurks in the middle of the word assaulted.
“Is the man who assaulted you in this courtroom?”
“Yesssssss.”
“Can you point him out to the court?” Eustace raises his arm and points at Edwin. Then he bends his hand so that the tip of his finger points directly at Excelsior.
“I’m sorry Mr. Rielly, it’s unclear who you’re pointing at.”
“Sssss- sssssORY. Can’t turn.”
“That’s okay. For the record, whom are you indicating?”
“Him. Eck, Eck, ACK! ACKcelsior!”
Edwin has to admit, it is impressive to watch Topper work. In his personal life, Edwin found Topper to be abrasive and ill-mannered, often thoughtless and sloppy and given over to an excess of all appetites — but that is only one side of the volatile equation that is Topper Haggleblat, world’s most dangerous attorney at law.
Inside the courtroom Topper’s manic energy is channeled and not a drop is wasted. For here, under the scrutiny of the judge and jury, every reaction, or overreaction or lack of reaction sways the case to one side or the other. Of course there are facts. Perhaps an objective reality exists, but here in the arena, where argument is pitted against argument, it is the way a fact is delivered that means everything.
When the defense makes a remark calculated to get into Topper’s head, he ignores it. When he thinks he has something to gain, Topper rages as if the defense attorney is a monkey who has flung poo in the face of God himself. He pushes right up to the point of a contempt citation.
He works the judge back and forth across his patience until the old man sags in his robes like an exhausted prize-fighter. Topper pushes hardest and is the most annoying only when it will turn out that he is so solidly in the right, the Judge’s own conscience will prohibit him from taking the other side. So it is that the short man radiates power and is a kind of giant in the chambers of the law.
As they leave the courtroom at the end of the day, Once again, Topper struggles to keep up with his long-legged friend. Edwin walks with his hands clasped behind his back and lowers his head slightly. He is in thought.
“Edwin, I’m concerned.”
“Hmmm,” says Edwin.
“Yes, as your lawyer I’m concerned.”
“About what,” Edwin asks, not really wanting to know the answer.
“I think we’re in trouble. In the case.”
“Your argument has been excellent.”
“Oh, why thank you. Thank you very much. But that’s not the point. Before the trial, I had a talk with Judge Perkins. At the time I thought he was just a crotchety old bastard, but I think he was right.”
“About what?,” Edwin asks, paying Topper as little attention as he possibly can.
“He said we couldn’t win.”
Edwin stops so abruptly that Topper takes three steps past him. “So the problem is that you have said something to upset the judge?”
“No, no, no,” Topper says, gesturing wildly. “Well, probably, but that’s not my point. It’s not Old Judge Bastard. He’s not the problem. The problem here is the jury.
“Look, we’ve got a good argument. Hell, we’ve got a great argument. We’ve even got (and it’s not often I get to say a thing like this) the Truth on our side. Yeah Truth. The one with a capital tits ‘T’. But they’ve got Excelsior. A hero. In fact, THE friggin hero — right? So all he has to do is just sit there. Just sit there and look like a hero. He keeps his mouth shut and the jury just basks in his glow. And the longer he sits there, the more they’re gonna bask. And then, after they’ve basked long enough, they’re going to decide in his favor.”
“But he clearly did the wrong thing.”
“Edwin,” Topper says, shaking his head and chuckling a little, “I love you. I do. But you gotta understand, this isn’t about the facts. It only seems like it’s about the facts. Look, this is a trial. Which means we make the best case we can. If we do that well, we earn a chance of winning. It’s kind of like buying a ticket to a Justice raffle. Except this time our odds of winning are so bad, that it’s more like a Justice Keno ticket.”
“The problem is the jury.”
“Yes, the jury. A jury of your peers. But Excelsior doesn’t have any peers. And neither do you. So we get what everybody gets. A jury box filled with people who were too stupid to get out of jury duty. Hell, we’d be better off with a judge. Even Justice would be better off if the judge just decided the case. And we’d be better off. Hell, if it was anybody else but Perkins, we could just bribe the bastard and be done with it. But juries, juries are brutal. Hah! And they call justice a system.”
“You are saying we should rig the jury?”
; A wistful look crosses Topper’s face. “Ah, if only. But we can’t do that. You see these are ordinary people. Just regular jerks. They’re not professionals. No code. They won’t stay bribed. A crooked judge, he’ll stay bribed. Because if word gets out that he won’t stay bribed, then nobody can trust him and the bribe money dries up. And then he’s no damned good to anybody. That's a sure-fire recipe for getting caught. And then you wind up with a 10-minute scandal that nobody pays attention to. But whatever, whatever, I’m preaching to the choir.” Topper concludes with a lot of hand-waving.
Edwin is upset. Topper isn’t making any sense. “So what do you suggest we do.”
“The only way is to get Excelsior to pop.”
“Pop?”
“Pop, right there in the courtroom in front of everybody. He’s got to lose his shit. So they can see that he’s not perfect. Look, even if we prove everything, if he sits there with that bullshit midwestern football hero 'aw, shucks' charm. Well, then the jury is going to bask in his glow and think to themselves, ‘Yeah, maybe he didn’t do the right thing, but he’s just folks. And he makes mistakes from time to time, but his heart’s in the right place’ and they’ll let him right off the hook.
“Sure, years later, when somebody else tears down the guy’s facade, they’ll think back and wonder if they did the right thing. But on the day, in the room, when it matters? They’ll let him right off the hook. They'll bask in him so much they’ll get a friggin’ sunburn — and they won’t even notice when their skin peels off due to his nuclear vision or whatever it is!”
“I’m afraid you’re taking this a little too personally.”
“Well of course I’m taking it PERSONALLY. That’s how were going to stick it to this tall bastard. I hate to lose. You know how I hate to lose.”
“Hmmm,” says Edwin.
“Come on Beanpole, you gotta help me think of something.”
“Hmm,”says Edwin, resuming his stride.
“Hmm? What hmm? What does hmm mean?”
“I have an idea.”
Chapter Fifty. Gus in the Hospital
Edwin has never killed a man. In his professional life he has almost always advised against it. The motives that lead one to murder are ill-informed. Justice and its darker cousin revenge are ill-served by murder. And crimes of passion are always, always more expensive than they first appear.
The way he sees it, if your object is to cause someone pain, then killing them is suboptimal, because they cannot feel pain after death. If you truly wish to revenge yourself upon another, then the thing to do is to force them to live in a set of unbearable circumstances. Oepdius is a good starting place. Arrange for a man to unwittingly kill his father and marry his mother, then reveal it to him. That is revenge. By comparison murder is simply pedestrian, ill-informed and wasteful.
And especially wasteful. When you kill a man you forfeit the benefit of his labor and expertise. Even slavery, as ruinously expensive as it is, is better than murder.
What Edwin rarely explains is that there are certain cases in which the benefits of killing a person greatly outweigh the costs of keeping them alive. Why else would political assassination exist?
And right now, Edwin is faced with one of those rare cases in which killing someone is the best thing to do. But that’s what he thinks, in the safety of his logical abstraction. This is what he does:
Gus is outside the courtroom. He puts a cigarette in his mouth, but before he can light it, he is overcome with a coughing fit. It’s the kind of fit that might make a person think that killing Gus is a waste of time. He’s clearly half-dead already. In fact, he might even drop dead before he stops coughing.
Edwin places his hand on Gus’ back. “Are you all right?” asks Edwin. Still coughing, Gus looks over his shoulder. When he sees who it is, he jerks away from the contact.
“Get your hands off me you shifty bastard.”
Edwin is nonplussed by this insult. He offers Gus his handkerchief. “I thought you might need assistance.”
“Even if I do, I’m not taking help from the likes of you.”
Then Excelsior is there. He puts himself between Gus and Edwin. “You stay away from him,” says Excelsior. Edwin raises his hands as if to suggest that he means no further harm. Excelsior ushers Gus away from the courthouse.
Edwin stands with his hands at his side and watches Excelsior and a dead man walk away. Very carefully, Edwin opens his right hand. A small needle drops to the ground. The needle is tipped with ricin, a deadly poison derived from the shell of castor beans. Even a few microns are poisonous. The needle itself is so delicate that it will soon be ground into oblivion by the shoes of the unsuspecting. The unsuspecting always make such wonderful accomplices.
Edwin nods to a photographer who has been snapping pictures of the whole exchange. The photographer has no idea why what he has photographed will be important, useful or even desired. Why would anyone want a photograph of a chance meeting with an old man? He doesn’t know. And neither do we.
Hours later, Excelsior is awakened by the angry squawk of the pager. He drags himself out of bed. What is it this time? Can’t these emergencies wait until the morning? He squints at the vile plastic box. He blinks twice as he tries to make sense of the message. Then he is gone. He doesn’t even bother to don his costume. He just grabs a pair of pants and shirt and flies out the window, without bothering to open it.
Within minutes he is standing in an Intensive Care Unit. The figure in the bed is obscured by tubes and wires. A variety of machines cluck and beep and suck as they wrap Gus in a cold embrace of mechanical concern. Excelsior feels awkward, and powerless. Gus looks withered and weak. With his eyes closed lying helpless in the bed, he seems both a thousand years old and as innocent as a child.
But innocent he is not. Where the blanket has fallen off his chest, Excelsior can see the crisscross of scar tissue. He wonders what it would be like to have scars, for the world to leave its mark upon your flesh in pain. He re-covers his oldest and only friend with the blanket.
A doctor enters the room. “Is it… Cancer?” Excelsior asks.
The doctor snorts. “Yeah it’s cancer. He’s had lung cancer. But that’s not what put him here. He’s had a massive stroke. Hits just keep on coming.”
“Is he going to be okay?”
“Be okay? How should I know? I’m just a doctor. I would have told you he should have been dead 6 months ago. But he wasn’t. As for the stroke, we’ll have to see. There’s some brain damage. How long it will last? How much of him will come back? We’ll just have to wait and see.”
“Wait and see? That’s the best you can do?”
“I’m sorry, I’m just a doctor. I don’t have superpowers.”
The Doctor leaves. Excelsior doesn’t know whether to sit or stand, to cry or remain stoic. He wishes that Gus’ stroke was a giant monster he could punch. But of course it isn’t.
His grief and confusion are interrupted by a small coughing noise. Excelsior does not turn. Then he hears it again, louder.
“Heh-HEM”
Excelsior turns to see a man whom he does not remember meeting. The man is small and vaguely piggish. This man knows so much about Excelsior he thinks he owns him. He opens his mouth and noise comes out.
He had intended to say, “I am Director Smiles. For the time being, I will be your liaison with the government.” But what actually comes out is, “I am Directasquee—”
Smiles is scared shitless.
“I think you have the wrong room,” Excelsior says, summoning what little patience he has.
“No,” the Director says, sweating profusely, “I am Director Smiles, I will b-b-b-b-b-” As Smiles struggles with the future tense, Excelsior is sucked in by the suspense of his stutter. What is he trying to say? Will he make it past the second letter of the alphabet this time?
“b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b”
In the midst of his terror and motorboat impersonation, Director Smiles decides that this ‘b’ is unass
ailable. He gives up on the sentence and tries another one.
“I am in control of you now,” says Director Smiles. He is pleased that he has gotten this sentence out in such good voice, with a real tone of authority. But when Excelsior’s face collapses into a frown, Smiles realizes he may have made a mistake.
“You do NOT control me!” Excelsior picks the little man up by the front of his cheap suit. “I control you! You get it?” Excelsior twists his wrist and turns Director Smiles upside down. As small change falls out of the Director’s pockets, Excelsior whispers, “I can end you any time I want. And if you don’t leave me alone with my friend. I am going to end you.”
“Government!” Smiles squeaks by way of protest.
“Wait outside, we’ll talk about it when Gus wakes up.”
Excelsior stands a vigil over his friend. Smiles sits outside on the couch frantically messaging people from his phone. He is praying, to whatever committee of dark gods bureaucrats pray to in their secret, inefficient hearts, that Gus will pull through.
As the first fingers of dawn claw their way through the heavily louvered blinds, Excelsior raises his head. The lack of sleep hangs under his eyes. He looks to Gus. “It’s a new day old man. It’s a new day and I have to go. But you rest easy, I’ve got it from here.”
Director Smiles awakes with a jerk. He realizes that Excelsior is watching him. Smiles is afraid before he can even fully wake up. “I have to go to court,” says Excelsior. Smiles nods. “Is it your fault that I have to go to court?” Smiles nods again. Excelsior frowns. “Rule 1 — no more court cases.” Smiles nods. “Rule 2 — You don’t pick and choose the emergencies anymore. You send me everything, I choose what I’m going to help with.”
“But you can’t possibly—” Smiles protests.
“I can. And I will. Send me everything. If Gus wakes up, it takes priority.” Smiles nods again. He opens his mouth to speak, but Excelsior is gone.
How To Succeed in Evil Page 24