“Two days. Tomorrow and Wednesday. Today is shot already and a good part of tomorrow we’ll be in court. I don’t even know where to start. I don’t know anything at all about Riccio. Not even who his friends were.”
“Sam Corwin would know.”
“Sam?” I asked, wondering. I hadn’t thought about Sam at all. It was strange that I’d forgotten about him. He and Nora had been married about a year after our divorce. I’d seen him at the house several times when I’d brought Dani back from her visits with me. He’d always been polite and friendly.
“Yes, Sam. Poor Sam. He knew what Nora was like when he married her, but he thought he could change her. But after she met Riccio, I guess even Sam gave up. It was because of Riccio that Sam divorced her and was able to enforce a strict community property split.”
“Then Sam must have had something on her?” I asked.
“He had something on both of them.”
The door behind her opened and the maid came into the room. “Dinner is served, ma’am.”
We got to our feet and the old lady smiled at me. “Will you give me your arm, Luke?”
I smiled back at her. “I’d be proud to.”
2
__________________________________________
For the first time I approached the front entrance of the building. The parking lot was filled up and I’d had to leave my car several blocks away. I walked up the curved path leading to the entrance from the street. A gardener in work clothes was busy clipping the neat hedges that lined the walk. He looked up at me as I walked by. I could see the heavy beads of sweat on his forehead from the morning sun.
I looked at the glass doors. There was lettering in gold leaf.
STATE OF CALIFORNIA
SAN FRANCISCO COUNTY
Juvenile Court
Probation Dept.
California Youth
Authority
I went in and found myself in a large lobby filled with reporters and cameramen. A few flashbulbs went off and several reporters pressed around me. They were much less pushy than they’d been the other day.
“Is there anything you can tell us about plans for your daughter’s defense, Colonel Carey?”
I shook my head. “No, I can’t. It’s my understanding that under the laws of this state there is no such thing as a trial for a minor. This is merely the first of a series of custodial hearings.”
“Will you attempt to get custody of your daughter?”
“That’s up to the court to decide. I feel sure the best interests of my daughter will be the primary consideration.”
“Have you seen your daughter?”
“I visited her on Sunday afternoon.”
“Was her mother with you?”
“No, her mother was ill.”
“Has her mother visited her at all?”
“I don’t know. But I do know that there were packages from her mother.”
“Do you know what was in them?”
“Clothing, books, candy.”
“What did you and your daughter talk about?”
“Nothing much. Father-and-daughter talk, I guess.”
“Did she tell you anything more about what happened Friday night?”
I looked at the man who asked that question. “We didn’t talk about that at all.”
“Did you learn anything that might throw more light on what happened?”
“No,” I said. “I know nothing beyond what I heard at the coroner’s inquest yesterday. I believe most of you were there. Now, if you’ll be good enough to let me through—”
They opened a path for me.
Juvenile Court was off to the left of the entrance hall. I followed the arrow down a long corridor and around the corner. Another pointed down a flight of stairs. I went down and came out opposite a glass-enclosed waiting room. I passed through the waiting room and opened the door to the Juvenile Court.
It was a small courtroom with a raised platform at the far end of the room. In front of the judge’s desk was a long table with several chairs around it. Slightly to the side of the table, between it and the bench was a small desk and chair. The walls were painted an official-looking tan and brown, and there were four large windows in the long wall. The rest of the space was taken up by extra chairs and benches.
As I stood there a man entered from one of the doors behind the judge’s desk. He stopped when he saw me.
“Is this where they’re holding the Dani Carey hearing?” I asked.
“Yes, but you’re early. Court doesn’t convene until nine o’clock. You can wait outside in the reception room. You’ll be called.”
“Thank you.”
There were several benches in the waiting room. I looked at my watch. It was eight thirty-five. I lit a cigarette.
A few minutes later another man came in. He looked at me, lit a cigarette and sat down. “Judge not in yet?”
I shook my head.
“Damn,” he said. “I’ll bet I lose another half-day’s pay. Every time I come down here it costs me. They never get to my case until late.”
“Do you have a child here?”
“Yeah,” he said, jerking his head. The ashes from his cigarette fell on his dirty work shirt. He paid no attention to them. “They got my kid down here. She’s nothing but a whore, that’s what she is. I told them the next time they picked her up they could keep her. But no, they get me down here anyway.”
He peered at me. “Say, you look familiar,” he said. “I seen you down here before?”
“No. This is the first time.”
“Brother, you’re in for it. They’ll keep you coming back and coming back until you agree to take your kid home again. That’s what they done to me. She’s only a fifteen-an’-a-half-year-old girl, they say. You got to give her a chance, they say. So I do, and what happens? Two days later she’s shacked up in a hotel taking on all comers for five bucks apiece. The cops get her and here I am again.”
He squinted up through his cigarette smoke. “You sure I didn’t see you here before?”
I shook my head.
He stared at me for another moment, then snapped his fingers. “I know you! I seen your pitcher in the papers. You’re the guy whose kid knocked off her mother’s boyfriend!”
I didn’t say anything.
He leaned toward me, his voice a confidential whisper. “Ain’t it a bitch? What kids get into nowadays! Tell me, the guy banging her too? It wouldn’t surprise me at all if he was. The papers don’t give you half the story.”
I felt my fists clench. I forced my fingers to loosen. There was no sense in getting angry. This was just something I had to get used to. I felt a twinge in my heart. Dani would have to get used to it, too. That was even worse.
Two women came in. They looked like Mexicans and were jabbering excitedly in Spanish. They fell suddenly silent as they saw us, then went over to a bench and sat down. The younger one looked pregnant.
A moment later a colored woman came in, then a man and a woman. The woman’s face was puffed and bruised and she had a black eye. The man tried to take her arm to lead her to a seat, but she shook his arm off angrily and sat down along the other wall. She didn’t look at him.
The colored woman spoke to one of the Mexicans. “Think they goin’ to give you yo’ girl back, honey?”
The pregnant woman made the classic gesture of ignorance. “I don’ know,” she said, her accent faintly Spanish.
“It’s the relief what wants them kep’ here, honey. I’m sho’ of it. If she stays here it costs only forty a month for her keep. They let you take her home they got to give you seventy. It’s the money, honey.”
The pregnant girl shrugged her shoulders. She said something in Spanish to the other woman and she nodded her head in violent agreement. On the bench along the wall the woman with a black eye began to cry silently.
More people came down the stairs and soon all the benches were occupied. The overflow began to gather in the corridor outside the waiting ro
om. At five minutes to nine Harris Gordon appeared, followed by Nora and her mother. I got up and went out to meet them.
Harris Gordon looked through the glass. “Looks pretty crowded.”
“S.R.O.,” I said. “It looks like we’re not the only people with troubles.”
He gave me a peculiar look. “People in trouble seldom are alone. Wait here. I’ll go check the clerk and find out when the judge expects to get to us.”
He disappeared down the corridor. I turned to Nora. “How are you?” I asked politely.
She nodded, her eyes searching my face for any signs of sarcasm. “I’m all right. I went home and stayed in bed after I got through in court yesterday. I was completely exhausted.”
“I can understand that. What you did wasn’t easy.”
“Did I do all right? I didn’t want to say anymore than I had to. I could hardly bring myself to testify but I had no choice, did I?”
“That’s right. You had no choice.”
Gordon came back. “We won’t have long to wait,” he said. “We’re the third case on the docket. The first two shouldn’t take more than fifteen minutes, the clerk told me.”
I lit a cigarette and leaned back against the wall. The door to the courtroom opened and I heard a name called. I turned and saw the two Mexican women get up. The door closed behind them. It was exactly nine o’clock.
They couldn’t have been inside for more than ten minutes. The pregnant woman was crying as they walked past. The clerk called another name. It was the man who had come in just after me.
He came out in less than ten minutes, a look of smug satisfaction on his face. He stopped in front of me on his way to the stairs. “They’re going to keep her for good this time. I told ’em they can throw away the key for all I care!”
I didn’t say anything. He turned and stamped up the stairs. I heard the clerk’s voice behind us. “Carey.”
We went through the waiting room into the court. The clerk motioned us to seats at the table in front of the judge’s desk and surveyed us with a bored expression. “Is this the first time you’ve been here?”
We nodded.
“The judge stepped out for a moment. He’ll be right back.”
The words were no sooner out of his mouth than the door behind him opened. “All rise and face the court,” the clerk called. “Be it known that the Juvenile Court, State of California, County of San Francisco, the honorable Justice Samuel A. Murphy presiding, is now in session.”
The judge was a tall man in his early sixties. His hair was white and thin, and through his horn-rimmed glasses his eyes were blue and piercing. He wore a rumpled brown suit, white shirt and dark maroon tie. He sat down and picked up a paper from the desk in front of him. He nodded to the clerk.
The clerk got up and walked over to a door on the right side. He opened it. “Danielle Carey.”
Dani came through and looked around hesitantly. Then she saw us and ran toward us. Nora half rose in her seat and they were in each other’s arms.
Dani was crying. “Mother. Mother, are you all right?
I couldn’t understand what Nora was mumbling. I looked away for a moment. Even I felt it and I didn’t believe half the act Nora always put on. Another figure appeared in the doorway. It was Miss Spicer, the probation officer. She stood there watching Dani and Nora.
I looked up at the judge. He, too, was watching. I had the feeling that this was somehow important, that the judge had staged this very carefully.
Another door opened on the same side of the room, and a uniformed officer came in. He was brown-haired and of medium height. The blue-and-gold patch on his shoulder bore the insignia of the San Francisco County Sheriff’s office. He closed the door and leaned back against it.
Dani had left Nora and gone on to kiss her grandmother, then came over to me. Her eyes were shining. She kissed my cheek. “Mother did come, Daddy. Mother did come!”
I smiled at her. “I told you she would.”
Miss Spicer came into the courtroom and walked over to the edge of the table. “Sit down here near me, Dani.”
Dani left me and sat down. She looked t Harris Gordon. “Hello, Mr. Gordon.”
“Hello, Dani.”
The judge cleared his throat. “This is a very informal sort of hearing. Just so I will know who you are will you please introduce yourselves?”
“May I, Your Honor?”
The judge nodded. “Please do, Mr. Gordon.”
“On my left is Nora Hayden, the child’s mother. On my right, Mrs. Cecelia Hayden, the child’s maternal grandmother. Next to her, Colonel Luke Carey, the child’s father.”
“And you are acting as attorney for the child?”
“Yes, Your Honor,” Gordon said. “And also as legal adviser to the family.”
“I see. I assume you are all acquainted with Miss Marian Spicer, who is the probation officer assigned to this case?”
“We are, Your Honor.”
“Then I think we may begin.” He picked up the sheet of paper on his desk. “On Friday night last, the police department, operating under Section 602 of the California Juvenile Court Law, turned over custody of one Danielle Nora Carey, a minor, to the probation officer for detention. The grounds were that said minor had committed an act of homicide, a felony in the State of California. Since that time, with the exception of the first night when the minor was released in custody of Mr. Harris Gordon, an attorney, on the advice of a physician and to protect the health and well-being of said minor, the minor has been held in custody in the juvenile detention home in accordance with the law.
“We are here this morning to hear a petition submitted by the probation department to further detain this minor in custody until such time as the probation department can properly investigate all the factors pertaining to the minor’s being brought before this court.”
The judge put down the paper and looked at Dani. His voice was kind and gentle. “Despite the legal sound of all that, Danielle, this is not a trial, nor are you facing any criminal proceedings. You are here because you have committed a wrong act, a very wrong act, but we are not here to punish you. We want to help you, if we can, so that you will never again do any evil deeds. Do you understand that, Danielle?”
Dani’s eyes were large and apprehensive in her white face. “I think so,” she said hesitantly.
“I’m glad that you do, Danielle. It’s important for you to understand that although you will not be criminally punished for what you have done, you cannot escape certain consequences which result from your wrongdoing. I am bound by the law to inform you of these possible consequences and of your rights before this court. Are you following me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“This court has the power to take you from your home and place you in a state youth home or reformatory until you are of age. Or it can place you in a state hospital for observation. It can even place you in a foster home, if it feels it is not to your advantage to be returned to your immediate family or any other of your relatives. It can, at anytime while you are under the jurisdiction of this court, keep you on probation, so that no matter whom you live with, you will remain in contact with the probation officer assigned to you until you are released from so doing by the court or come of age. But I want you to bear this in mind. Whatever the court decides will not be punitive in nature but only what it thinks is in your best interest. Do you understand that, Danielle?”
Dani nodded. She looked down at the table in front of her. I could see her hands twisting nervously.
“During any of the proceedings before this court,” the judge continued, “you have, of course, the right to counsel. You have the right to summon witnesses on your own behalf, and the right to question any witness whom you may consider prejudicial to your best interest. Do you understand that, Danielle?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m bound further to inform your parents that they are entitled to the same rights to counsel, witness and cross-examination.
/> “We will now open the hearing on the petition. Miss Spicer, will you please state your reasons for requesting the court to detain this minor?”
The probation officer got to her feet. She spoke in a soft, clear voice. “There are two reasons for this request, Your Honor. One, the nature of the act committed by the child indicates an emotional disturbance far deeper than a preliminary psychological and psychiatric examination could reveal. For the welfare and well-being of the child, we request additional time to complete such examinations in depth. Secondly, we also need additional time to investigate further the child’s environment and family life in order to help us make a proper recommendation for the child’s future care and treatment.”
She sat down.
The judge turned to us. “Do you have any objection to the petition?”
Harris Gordon got to his feet. “No, Your Honor. We have the utmost faith in the experience and judgment of the probation department and in its ability to make a proper evaluation and determination of all the factors in this case.”
The judge’s voice was mildly amused. He knew that Gordon couldn’t say anything else, that he had no choice. Petitions for detention were always granted. “Thank you for your display of faith, Mr. Gordon. We trust that we may be truly worthy of it.”
He looked down for a moment, then went on. “It is the decision of this court that the petition by the probation department in re Danielle Nora Carey, a minor, be granted, and further that she be declared a temporary ward of this court until such time as a final determination shall be made. I will set the date for a complete court hearing on this matter for a week from today. At that time I shall expect all parties present to return, and all evidences and examinations pertinent to this matter to be placed before me. I shall also expect all plans for the future custody and welfare of this child to be presented to me, in writing, not less than twenty-four hours before the hearing.” He rapped his gavel smartly on the desk.
He looked down at Dani, his voice kind and gentle again, completely unlike its official tone. “This means that you will go back to the cottages again, Danielle, while your case is being investigated. Be a good girl and cooperate with Miss Spicer and the others and everything will be that much easier and better for all of us. Do you understand?”
Where Love Has Gone (1962) Page 19