“Objection, Your Honor. His preference is not on trial. What he actually did is on trial.”
“I’ll let him put what he did in context. Overruled. You may answer.”
“Yes, absolutely. That is what I hoped for all the time.”
“Why did you finally decide that you had to take the law into your own hands?”
Cox nearly bolted out of his wheelchair. “Objection, objection! He didn’t ‘have to’ do anything. He decided to seek private revenge.”
“No, Your Honor,” Abe replied. “It’s our position that he had no choice—that he had to take revenge. Let him testify.”
“Please rephrase the question, Mr. Ringel.”
“Fine. Why did you finally decide to give up on the law, Professor Menuchen?”
“It was a gradual process. I finally gave up on the law when I learned that Prandus was dying of cancer and could not be deported. The time for justice had run out. Then I learned what Prandus did to my sister. That resolved any doubts in my mind.”
“What did you learn about your sister’s fate?”
“I learned that Marcelus Prandus had kidnapped my sixteen-year-old sister and raped her, then gave her as a present to a Nazi general who also abused her. When the general was finished with her, he sent her to Auschwitz.”
Max began to sob and shake as he completed his answer. From the spectator section, Paul stood up and screamed, “My father was not a rapist!” Judge Tree banged the gavel and told Paul to sit down and be quiet. Abe saw this as a perfect opportunity to turn his client over to the prosecutor for cross-examination, so he sat down, barely whispering, “No further questions.” The judge recessed the trial for the day.
Chapter 41
MARC AND EMMA
“Why did that man kill Grandpa Chelli, Daddy? And why did he try to run me over?” Marc Prandus was looking directly at Max Menuchen as he and his father, Paul, took their seats behind the prosecutor’s table in the courtroom.
Paul was expecting these questions from his son now that he had decided to bring him to the trial. In the beginning he’d thought he could protect his inquisitive child from the ugly truth surrounding his grandfather’s death, but the trial had become headline news, and the TV reporters were referring to the late Marcelus Prandus as a “Nazi mass murderer,” a “killer of children,” and a “rapist.” It was the talk of Marc’s classmates, and the principal had called to alert Marc’s parents to the problem. It was time to have a talk with Marc—to put his grandfather’s actions in some understandable context.
Marc had asked to come to court early in the trial. Paul had not wanted him to hear Max Menuchen’s gruesome testimony. He was certainly glad he had not brought him yesterday. Today, however, Menuchen was being cross-examined by Cox. It was the right day to bring Marc. Spending a day in court talking about Grandpa Chelli might provide a useful opportunity for a father-son discussion.
Paul decided to arrive at court a few minutes early so that he could explain what was happening and why Max Menuchen had done the terrible acts of which he stood accused. Paul knew it would not be an easy job to strike the appropriate balance: he could not defend what Marc’s grandfather had done, yet he could not permit his son to think of his late grandfather as a monster.
“Your grandfather was a good man. He loved you. He loved all of us. But he did some bad things, many, many years before you were born, even before I was born.” Paul had his arm around Marc and was whispering to him as the courtroom began to fill with journalists, lawyers, and assorted court watchers. Emma Ringel and Rendi took their seats in the front row behind the defense table, across the aisle from Marc and Paul Prandus.
“I loved Grandpa so much, Daddy. I don’t care what he did a million years ago. Why did that old man have to kill him?” Marc whispered back, tears in his eyes.
“He was wrong. It’s a complicated story. I’m not sure I can explain.”
“I understand more than you think. My friends in school talk about it.”
“What do they say?”
“Dennis told me that the old man was a Jew who needed to get revenge for something Grandpa did. He said Jews are taught not to forgive.”
“Well, that’s not the way I want to put it. Let me put it a little differently. Do you know what it means to be a patriot?”
“Sure. The flag and all that.”
“Grandpa was a Lithuanian patriot.”
“I know,” Marc said. “He always told me how beautiful Vilnius was. He even took me to the Lithuanian club once. He told me not to tell you.”
“Just imagine how terrible it must have been for him when Hitler conquered it.”
“Did Grandpa work for Hitler?”
“Everyone in Lithuania worked for Hitler.”
“What did Hitler make Grandpa do?”
“Some terrible things—like hurting Jews.”
“Did Grandpa want to hurt the Jews?”
“This is the part you may not understand.”
“Yes, I will.”
“What do your teachers tell you about Jews, Marc?”
“They tell us that Jesus was a Jew and that Judaism is the older brother of Christianity.”
“That’s not what Grandpa’s teachers told him. They told him that the Jews killed Jesus.”
“That’s not true. The Romans killed Jesus. The Jews were his disciples.”
“You’re right. That’s not what Grandpa’s teachers, priests, and even parents taught him, though. They taught him not to like Jews. And then something happened to Grandpa’s father that made it even worse.” Paul related to Marc the story of his great-grandfather’s death in the bar and how everyone had blamed it on the Jews.
“Grandpa thought that by hurting Jews, he was avenging his father’s death. That’s the way people thought in those days. When Hitler told him to arrest the Jews, Grandpa agreed with Hitler.”
“The kids in school said that Grandpa didn’t just arrest Jews, Daddy. He helped to kill some of them.”
“Grandpa believed he was doing the right thing.”
“Then it wasn’t right for that old man to kill Grandpa, was it?”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“And it certainly wasn’t right for him to try to run me over. What did he have against me? I wasn’t even born when Hitler was around.”
“He knew how much Grandpa loved you, and he figured that if he hurt you, it would hurt Grandpa.”
“That isn’t fair. He’s a terrible person, that old man.”
“Yes, he is, and I hope he goes to prison.”
“I hope he dies,” Marc said contemptuously. “Will the court make him die for killing Grandpa?”
“No. We don’t have the death penalty in Massachusetts. He’ll probably go to prison, but it’s possible he could go free.”
“He can’t go free. He killed Grandpa. He almost killed me. He can’t go free. That wouldn’t be fair,” Marc said, raising his voice.
Emma and Rendi could now hear what the child was saying as they pretended to continue their conversation about Cox’s upcoming cross-examination.
“That man is a lawyer, like me,” Paul said, pointing to Abe, who had just walked into the courtroom. “He’s trying to persuade the jury that the old man did nothing wrong.”
“That’s gross. The lawyer knows it was wrong for the old man to kill Grandpa.”
“He’s just doing his job.”
“You mean like Grandpa?”
“I guess,” Paul replied without thinking much about his answer.
Emma could not pretend she did not hear the last exchange. She bolted out of her seat and confronted Paul Prandus. “How dare you tell your son that what his grandfather did to Max’s family is anything like what my father is doing in this courtroom.”
“I intended no such comparison, young lady. And what I tell my son is our business. Now, please leave us alone.”
“It becomes my business when you mention your father and my father in the same breath.”
>
“Please let’s not have this discussion in front of my son.”
“Why, what are you afraid of—that he’ll learn the truth about his grandfather—that he was a murderer?” Emma said pointedly. As Rendi pulled her away, Emma turned to Marc Prandus and whispered, “Your grandfather wasn’t just doing his job. He was killing innocent people.”
“Quiet!” Paul shouted. “He’s only a child. I’m just trying to give him some frame of reference for what his grandfather did. He loved his grandfather.”
“Max loved his baby son, too. Did you tell your son what his grandfather did to Max’s baby son and his pregnant wife? Did you? I didn’t see him in the courtroom yesterday for that testimony.”
“Shut up!” Paul shouted, the veins becoming visible on his neck.
“Calm down,” Rendi said, forcing herself between Paul and Emma.
“Mind your own business,” Prandus snapped at Rendi, whispering, “Bitch,” under his breath.
“Nice word coming from the son of a man who raped young girls,” Emma hissed.
“Let’s get out of here,” Paul said as he pulled his frightened son out of his seat and hustled him out the door. As they were leaving, Marc turned to his father and asked, “What if they win?”
“There’s nothing we can do.”
“Yes, there is, Daddy.” Marc clung to his father with a determined look on his face. “We can kill him.”
Chapter 42
PAUL’S DECISION
Paul couldn’t sleep that night. What kind of a man am I? he thought to himself. He was furious at Abe Ringel for the way he had used him during the cross-examination. He was enraged at Emma and Rendi for humiliating him in front of his son. But most of all Paul was angry with himself for remaining so passive in the face of such a concerted attack on his family.
His rage bubbled up from within. He felt like screaming, like pounding someone. He longed for the days of his youth, when he could deal with frustration by acting out. He cursed his adulthood, his responsibility, his need to control himself. At a rational level, he knew that his childish ways were inappropriate. Still, he fantasized about hurting Max.
Paul thought about his dead father—a man’s man. He would have known what to do. He would have acted like the godfather of a wronged family, not some wimpy lawyer.
Suddenly it all became clear to Paul. He knew what he had to do. A plan began to form in his mind. A satisfied smile curved his lips as he finally drifted off to sleep.
The next morning at seven A.M., Paul and Freddy were in the ring of the local gym, boxing a few rounds. Paul loved boxing. It was such an unlawyerly sport. His sparring partners were cops, mechanics, and factory workers—men who worked with their hands and sweated, as his father had. Freddy used to be a good boxer before his injury. Now he just stood, flat-footed, as Paul danced around him, landing an occasional jab on his gloves. It was a good exercise, and it gave the two friends a chance to talk man to man.
“Marc says I should kill him if he gets off,” Paul said, landing a left hook on Freddy’s glove. “I’ve got to do something. My son thinks I’m a wimp.”
“Don’t even talk like that. It’s ridiculous. Did Marc actually say that?”
“Yeah, he did. He was angry at what happened in court yesterday.”
“It was just kid talk, Paul. Forget about it.”
“I can’t forget about it. Maybe Marc is right.”
“Cut that out. Do you want to spend the rest of your life in prison for proving you’re a tough guy?”
“What makes you think I’d be convicted? If he gets off for killing my father on the ground that my father killed his family, I’ll use his defense. If he can do it, why can’t I?”
“ ’Cause that’s not the way the world works, Paul. You know that. You’re not thinking like a lawyer, you’re thinking like a son. Just put it out of your head. He’s not gonna get off, and if he does, you’ll get on with the rest of your life. You’re young, you’ve got Marc, your wife, a future—everything Max Menuchen doesn’t have.”
“He killed my father.”
“Because your father killed his father. It has to end somewhere. You just can’t keep killing each other. Your families will become the Hatfields and McCoys.”
“It can’t end with him just walking away, Freddy. It just can’t end like that. If he gets off, I’ve got to do something. What would you do?”
“Well, I’d think of something that wouldn’t get me into trouble. I don’t want to spend my weekends visiting you in some godforsaken prison.”
The men finished their boxing, and Paul Prandus changed back into his “lawyer’s costume,” as he called it. But as Paul Prandus left the gym, Freddy sensed that he was still not thinking like a lawyer.
Chapter 43
CROSS-EXAMINING MAX
Erskine Cox maneuvered his wheelchair so that it was between the jury and the witness. He swiveled it toward the witness and asked him sharply, “Did you actually see Marcelus Prandus shoot anyone other than your wife and child?”
“No, of course not. He shot me right after that. I was unconscious.”
“How do you know whether he shot anyone else?”
“I saw the graves. I found my grandmother’s body.”
“How do you know that they were not shot by another person?”
“What is the difference who shot them? Prandus was in charge.”
“It’s for the jury to decide whether that makes a difference. Are you certain it was Prandus who shot you?”
“I will never forget his shooting my pregnant wife and baby. Then he shot me.”
“You say the bullet struck you in the head and rendered you unconscious.”
“It did.”
“Have you ever heard of retrograde amnesia?”
“Yes. It is when someone is traumatized and does not remember what happened immediately prior to the trauma.”
“Do you believe it sometimes occurs?”
“I have no reason to disbelieve what experienced doctors say.”
Cox then lifted himself out of his chair and asked, “Would you disbelieve me if I told you that I have no recollection of what happened in the hours before the diving accident, which knocked me unconscious and left me unable to walk?”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Abe interjected. “He’s testifying, not asking a question.”
“Sustained. Stick to what happened to Professor Menuchen.”
“Are you aware of the medical term confabulation?”
“Vaguely.”
“Do you know what it means?”
“I think it is when a person with memory loss fills in the blanks by making up events.”
“Is it not possible, then, that you believe that you actually remember seeing Marcelus Prandus shoot your wife and child, whereas the truth is that you are confabulating these events?”
“That is not possible. I do remember,” Max said, raising his voice.
“Maybe you are remembering your confabulation.”
“Objection. That is not a question.”
“Sustained. Put it as a question, Mr. Cox.”
“I think I’ve made my point. I’ll move on to something that the witness clearly does remember.
“You do remember kidnapping Marcelus Prandus, do you not?”
Max wiped his eyes and replied firmly, “I do.”
Cox continued in a staccato tempo. “You do remember transporting him to an isolated cabin, do you not?”
“I do.”
“You do remember tying him to a chair, do you not?”
“I do.”
“You do remember making him watch videos that appeared to show his family being killed, do you not?”
“I do.”
“You did intend for him to die without ever learning that his family was alive, did you not?”
“I did.”
“He did take his own life after being shown the videos and while he was under your control, did he not?”
“He did
.”
“No further questions.”
“Only a couple of questions on redirect, Your Honor,” said Abe, rising.
“Had Marcelus Prandus been punished by some government for what he did to your family, would you have kidnapped him?”
“Objection. Calls for speculation.”
“I’ll let him answer,” Judge Tree ruled.
“No, I would not have. I am not a violent person.”
“One more question,” Abe said, looking in the direction of Paul Prandus. “After you secured your revenge, how did it make you feel?”
“Objection. This is not The Oprah Winfrey Show. Who cares how he felt?”
“Overruled. Remorse is always relevant. You may answer, briefly.”
“I did not feel remorse for what I had done to Prandus, only to the other members of his family. Neither did I feel pleasure from Prandus’s suffering. It was not completely satisfying. It left a bitter taste.”
“I have no further questions of this witness,” Abe said, and Max stood up.
“Fine. We’ll take up motions and legal arguments the rest of today, and we’ll resume testimony tomorrow at nine A.M. sharp,” Judge Tree announced.
That night the pundits continued to pound Abe Ringel for raising the Abbie Hoffman defense. “It will never work in the 1990s,” legal commentator Joe Genevese predicted confidently.
Chapter 44
EMMA’S TRIP
“I told you it would backfire,” Emma said as she and Abe watched Larry King Live.
“The jury’s watching Friends. They don’t care what Genevese says,” Abe replied somewhat defensively.
“They may be thinking the same thing. And some of them may be wondering whether Max was—what was that word?”
“Confabulating.”
“Cox planted a seed there—that bastard. It wasn’t fair what he did, especially testifying about his own injury.”
“The judge stopped him,” said Abe.
“Not until after he made his point. Did you see the jury?” Emma asked rhetorically.
“Sure. They’re always interested in the human side.”
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