Overruled

by Hank Davis

  His gun discharged into the air, and his arm shook with fresh pain from the recoil.

  He could see the Accused was as wrought up as he was. He clutched his forearm with his left hand and steadied down. Before she could fire again, his gun burst into life, throwing her backward and down to the ground. She was obviously dead.

  He took a deep, shuddering breath. The gun started to fall out of his weak fingers, but he caught it with his left hand and dropped it into its holster.

  The world around him slowly filtered back into his senses. He became aware of angry shouts in the crowd of people, and of attendants struggling to hold them in check. There was a knot of people clustered around a family box, but before he could investigate that, he felt Kallimer put an arm around his waist and hold him up. He hadn’t even realized he was swaying.

  “We can’t worry about the crowd,” Kallimer said in a peculiar voice. It was urgent, but he sounded so calm under it. There was no hysteria in him, and Joyce noted that to his credit.

  “Did you see who threw the gun?” Joyce demanded.

  Kallimer shook his head. “No. Doesn’t matter. We’ve got to get back to New York.”

  Joyce looked up at the bench. Blanding wasn’t in sight, but Pedersen was hanging by his hands, dangling down over its face, and dropping to the plaza. He bent, picked up the briefcase he’d thrown down ahead of him, ripped it open, and pulled out his gun.

  That was idiotic. What did he think he was doing?

  “Joyce!” Kallimer was pulling at him.

  “All right!” Joyce snapped in annoyance. He began to run toward Pedersen before the fool could disgrace himself. As he ran, he realized Kallimer was right. The three of them had to get back to New York as quickly as possible. The Bar Association had to know.

  * * *

  Pedersen sat far back in his corner of the train compartment, his eyes closed and his head against the paneling as though he was listening to the sound of the trolley running along the overhead cable. The Messire only knew what he was really listening to. His face was pale.

  Joyce turned stiffly toward Kallimer, hampered by the sling and cast on his arm. The Associate was staring out the window, and neither he nor Pedersen had said a word since they’d boarded the train, fifteen minutes ago. At that time, there had still been noise coming from the plaza.

  There’d been a twenty-minute wait for the train. That meant more than three-quarters of an hour had passed since the start of it all, and Joyce still did not understand exactly what had happened. He had only disconnected impressions of the entire incident, and, for the life of him, he could find no basic significance behind it, although he knew there had to be one.

  “Kallimer.”

  The Associate turned away from the window. “What?”

  Joyce gestured, conscious of his sudden inability to find the proper phrasing.

  “You want to know what touched it off. Is that it?”

  Joyce nodded, relieved at not having to say it after all.

  Kallimer shook his head. “I don’t know, exactly. Somebody in the crowd felt strongly enough to throw her the gun. One of her relatives, I suppose.”

  “But—” Joyce gestured inarticulately. “It…it was a legal execution! Who would interfere with justice? Who’d take the risk of eternal damnation by interfering with The Messire’s obvious will?”

  Pedersen, in his corner, made a very peculiar sound. Kallimer shot him a cryptic glare. He turned back to Joyce and seemed to be searching for words.

  “Joyce,” he said finally, “how do you imagine The Messire would reverse a verdict of ‘Completely Guilty’?”

  Joyce frowned. “Well…I don’t know. My gun might jam. Or I might fire and unaccountably miss.”

  “You don’t know for certain, because it’s never happened. Am I correct?”

  “Substantially.”

  “Now. How many reversals have there been on verdicts of ‘Apparently Guilty’? When the Accused was given a gun with one cartridge in the chamber.”

  “A few.”

  “But it’s never happened to any Justice you know, has it?”

  Joyce shook his head. “No, but there are recorded cases. A few, as I said.”

  “Very well. What about ‘Possibly Guilty’? Many reversals on those verdicts?”

  “An appreciable number.”

  “Almost had a few of those yourself, didn’t you?”

  “A few.”

  “Very well.” Kallimer held up his hand, bending one finger for each point. “Now—first we have the case in which the Accused is weaponless. No reversals. Next we have the case in which the Accused has one shot to fire. A few reversals. And finally we have the case in which the Accused has as much of a weapon as the Presiding Justice. An appreciable number of reversals.

  “Does it not seem to you, Justice Joyce, that this series of statistics might well occur without the intervention of any Divine Will whatsoever?”

  Joyce stared at him, but Kallimer gave him no chance to reply.

  “Furthermore, Joyce; do the people have the right to bear arms? That is to say, can you imagine an Accused who was acquainted with the firing and aiming of an automatic pistol? The answer—you asked, now hear me out—the answer is No.

  “More. Have you ever heard of The Messire reversing a verdict of ‘Not Guilty’?”

  Joyce bridled. “There aren’t two of those a year!”

  Kallimer’s mouth hooked. “I know. But they do exist. Explain this, then; how do you reconcile Divine Will with the curious fact that verdicts of ‘Not Guilty’ and ‘Completely Guilty’ are never reversed, and never have been reversed, though Messire knows we came close this afternoon? Are you claiming that in those cases, every Justice who ever lived was right every time? Are you attempting to claim, for mortal men, the infallibility which is The Messire’s particular province?”

  Kallimer’s face was tense with emotion, and Joyce received a distinct impression that the Associate was speaking with excessive violence; actually his voice was still under control.

  “Mr. Joyce, if you can’t see the point I’m driving at, I am sorry. But, rest assured, somebody in that crowd of people finally realized it, after all these years. Somebody wasn’t afraid of The Messire.” Kallimer turned his head sharply and looked out the window at the Hudson, running silver far below as the train swung over to the east shore. “I’m not sure Pedersen wasn’t right in drawing his gun. And, Mr. Joyce, if what I’ve said hasn’t shaken you, it certainly should have.”

  Kallimer took a deep breath and seemed to calm down a little.

  “Mr. Joyce,” he said softly, “I believe there’s something you haven’t thought of. I imagine it’ll make you unhappy when I tell you.

  “Talking in your terms, now—you don’t have to give an inch, Mr. Joyce; in fact, you have to hang on to your beliefs with absolute rigidity to appreciate the full impact—looking at it from your point of view: You can’t imagine how The Messire would go about reversing an unjust verdict of ‘Completely Guilty.’ But The Messire is omniscient and omnipotent. His ways are complex and unknowable. Am I correct? Well, then, how do you know that what happened today wasn’t a hint of how He’d manage it?”

  The blood drained out of Joyce’s face.

  * * *

  Late that night, Emily looked at him in surprise when she answered her door.

  “Sam! But you never—” She stopped. “Come in, Sam. You surprised me.”

  Joyce kissed her cheek and strode nervously into her apartment. He knew what had startled her. He never called on nights following trials; in the fifteen years they’d been together, she would naturally have noticed that. He considered the problem while on his way over, and the only thing to do, he’d decided, was to act as though nothing unusual were taking place. He reasoned that a woman, being a woman, would shrug her shoulders over it after the first few minutes. Probably, after a short time, she’d even begin to doubt her memory.

  “Sam, what’s the matter with your arm?
”

  He spun around and saw her still standing by the door, wearing a dressing gown, with her hair in curlers.

  “Trial,” he bit off shortly. He paced across the room, took a pear out of a bowl, and bit into it. “I’m hungry,” he said with false vigor.

  She seemed to collect herself. “Of course, Sam. I’ll put something on the stove. It won’t be more than a few moments. Excuse me.” She went into the kitchen, leaving him standing alone in the semidarkness surrounding the one light she’d switched on near the door. Impatiently, he snapped the switches of the other lamps in the room and stood in the middle of it, chewing the pear and bouncing it in his palm between bites.

  He heard Emily put a pan on a burner. He moved abruptly and strode into the kitchen, stopping just inside the door and dropping the pear down the disposal chute.

  “Finished it,” he said, explaining his presence. He looked around. “Anything I can do?”

  Emily looked up at him, a look of amused disbelief on her face, “Sam, what’s gotten into you?”

  Joyce scowled. “Anything wrong with coming up to see my girl?”

  Saying it made the scowl disappear. He looked down at Emily, who was bent over the stove again. Fifteen years had touched her hair, and put little lines on her forehead and the corners of her mouth. They added a good bit to her hips and waist. But there was an earthly, commonsense comfort in her. He could put his key in the door at any time of night, and she’d hear the sound and be there to meet him.

  He reached down and pulled her up. His arm twinged a bit, but that was unimportant at the moment. He folded his arms around her and cupped the back of her head in one palm. The warmth and security of her made his clutch tighter than he’d intended at the start. Suddenly he found himself wishing he’d never have to go back to his own ascetic flat.

  Emily smiled faintly and kissed his chin. “Sam, what did happen? I heard the trial results over the radio this afternoon, and all they announced for Nyack was a successful conclusion to a verdict of ‘Completely Guilty.’ Was there some trouble they didn’t want to talk about?”

  His mood burst, and he dropped his arms.

  “What kind of trouble?” he asked sharply.

  Her eyes opened, and she looked at him in fresh surprise. “I didn’t mean anything by it, Sam. Just ordinary trouble…you know, a lucky shot by the Accused—” She looked at the light cast on his arm. “But that couldn’t be it, with an unarmed Accused—”

  Joyce took an angry breath. “I thought we had that clear between us,” he said in a voice he realized was too angry. “From the very beginning, I’ve made it plain that your province is yours and my province is mine. If I don’t tell you about it, you can assume I don’t feel you should know.”

  Emily stepped back and quickly bent over the stove again. “All right, Sam,” she said in a low voice. “I’m sorry.” She lifted the lid of a pan. “Supper’ll be ready in a minute. It’ll be pretty busy in here when all these pots come to a boil at the same time.”

  “I’ll be waiting in the living room.” Joyce turned and walked out.

  He paced back and forth over the rug, his lips in a tight line, conscious now of the pain in his arm.

  One more scar. One more objection from The Messire. All safe in the end, but one more objection, nevertheless, and what did it mean?

  And the Bar Association.

  “A hearing!” he muttered. “A full hearing tomorrow!” As though his report hadn’t been adequate. He’d told them what happened. It should have been enough. But Kallimer, with his allegations that there was more to the incident—

  Well, all right. Tomorrow he’d see about Kallimer.

  Emily came into the living room. “Supper’s ready, Sam.” Her voice and expression were careful to be normal. She didn’t want to provoke him again.

  She was hurt, and he didn’t like to see her that way. He laughed suddenly and put his arm around her shoulders, squeezing. “Well, let’s eat, eh, girl?”

  “Of course, Sam.”

  He frowned slightly, dissatisfied. But there was no point in trying to patch it up and only making it worse. He kept still as they went into the dining room.

  They ate silently. Or rather, to be honest with himself, Joyce had to admit that he ate and Emily toyed with a small portion, keeping him company out of politeness.

  The act of sitting still for twenty minutes quieted his nerves a bit. And he appreciated Emily’s courtesy. As he pushed his coffee cup away, he looked up at her and smiled.

  “That was very good. Thank you, Emily.”

  She smiled faintly. “Thank you, Sam. I’m glad you liked it. I’m afraid it wasn’t much. I hadn’t planned—” She broke off.

  So, she had continued to wonder about his calling tonight. He smiled ruefully. And now she thought she’d offended him again. He’d been pretty grumpy tonight.

  He reached out and took her hand. “That’s all right, Emily.”

  * * *

  After she’d washed the dishes, she came in and sat down beside him on the couch, where he was slumped with his feet on a hassock. His ankles and calves were aching. It was all right as long as he kept moving, but once he sat down the ache always began. He smiled at her wanly.

  Smiling back, she bent wordlessly and began to massage his calves, working the muscles with her fingers.

  “Emily—”

  “Yes, Sam?”

  “If…Nothing, Emily. There’s not much point in talking about it.” He found himself caught between the desire to speak to someone and the urgent sense that this afternoon was best forgotten. He stared down past his feet without looking at anything. Perhaps there was some way to maneuver her into telling him what he wanted to know, without his having to tell her about it.

  Why was he reluctant to talk about this afternoon? He didn’t know, exactly; but he couldn’t bring himself to do it, no more than he could have discussed some character defect he might have accidentally observed in a lady or gentleman.

  “What else did they say over the radio?” he asked without any special intonation. “About Nyack.”

  “Nothing, Sam, except for the bare results.”

  He grunted in disappointment.

  Perhaps there was some better angle of approach. “Emily, suppose…suppose you knew of a case involving a people’s girl and a family man. Suppose the girl had come up to the man on a public street and addressed him by his first name.”

  He stopped uncomfortably.

  “Yes, Sam?”

  “Uh…well, what would you think?”

  Emily’s hands became still for a moment, then began working on his calves again.

  “What would I think?” she asked in a low voice, looking down at the floor. “I’d think she was very foolish.”

  He grimaced. That wasn’t what he wanted. But did he know what he wanted from her? What was the answer he was looking for? He tried again.

  “Yes, of course. But, aside from that, what else?”

  He saw Emily bite her lip. “I’m afraid I don’t understand what you mean, Sam.”

  A tinge of his earlier anger put a bite in his voice. “You’re not that unintelligent, Emily.”

  She took a deep breath and looked at him. “Sam, something drastic went wrong today, didn’t it? Something very bad. You were terribly upset when you came in—”

  “Upset? I don’t think so,” he interrupted quickly.

  “Sam, I’ve been your mistress for fifteen years.”

  He knew his face was betraying him. In her flashes of shrewdness, she always did this to him. She’d put her finger exactly on the vulnerable truth, disarming his ability to cover up.

  He sighed and spread his hands in a gesture of resignation. “All right, Emily. Yes, I am upset.” The irritation welled up again. “That’s why I want some help from you, instead of this evasiveness.”

  She straightened up, taking her hands off his aching legs, and half-turned on the couch, so that she was looking directly into his eyes. She held his ga
ze without hesitation.

  “Maybe you’re asking too much of me. Perhaps not. This is important, isn’t it? I’ve never seen you quite as troubled as this.”

  She was tense, he realized. Tense, and apprehensive. But he saw, as well, that she had decided to go ahead, despite whatever her private doubts might be.

  “Yes,” he admitted, “it’s important.”

  “Very well. You want to know what I think about that girl? Suppose you tell me what you think, first. Do you believe she did it out of spite, or malice, or impulse?”

  He shook his head. “Of course not! She was in love with him, and forgot herself.”

  Emily’s eyes welled up with a sudden trace of tears. Joyce stared at her, dumbfounded, for the few seconds before she wiped one hand across her eyes in annoyance.

  “Well?” she asked in a low voice.

  “I’m afraid it’s my turn not to understand,” he said after a moment. He frowned. What was she driving at?

  “What distinguishes me from that girl, Sam? A few years? What do you expect me to think?”

  “It’s not the same thing at all, Emily!” he shot back in honest anger. “Why…why you’re a mature woman. We’re—”

  He couldn’t really point out the difference, but he knew it was there. She’d never said or done anything—

  “Emily, you know very well you’d never do what that girl did!”

  “Only because I’m more conscious of the rules,” she answered in a low voice. “What real difference is there between her and myself? It is that it’s you and I, rather than two other people; rather than any one of the scores of similar couples we know? What distinguishes us in your eyes? The fact that we’re not a case for you to try?”

  “Emily, this is ridiculous!”

  She shook her head slowly. “That girl broke the law. I haven’t. But I haven’t only because I realized, from the very start, just what kind of tightrope I’d be walking for the rest of our lives. I couldn’t leave you and go back to the people, now; I’ve grown too used to living as I do. But I’ll always be no more than I was born to.

  “Suppose I were a People’s man—a mechanic, or perhaps even an engineer if I’d bound myself to some family. I’d know that all my skill and training wouldn’t be of any use if I were accused of some crime in a court of law. I’d know that addressing my patron in public by his first name would be a crime—a different kind of crime than if I were my patron’s mistress, certainly, but a crime, nevertheless. Let’s assume that, as my patron’s engineer, I overrode his will on the specifications for whatever product my patron manufactured. Or that I attempted to redesign a product or develop a new one without first getting his approval and suggestions; that would be legally analogous to what the girl did, wouldn’t it?”