Try Fear

by James Scott Bell

  I went back in, to the hall bathroom, and took care of my bloody cheek with a damp towel.

  I wouldn’t be winning any beauty contests with my backside. I’d have to get it looked at. And forever I’d be marked with a scar. I guess if you had to pick a spot for a scar.

  Knuckles kept screaming about me being a dead man. So I took another towel, ripped off a strip, and gagged him. Then I went outside again to wait.

  152

  A BLACK-AND-WHITE PULLED in about seven minutes later. Two officers, male, one old, one new.

  The old one said, “You the guy who called the Southwest detective?”

  “Stein,” I said.

  “He’s on his way. What’s going on?”

  “Two inside,” I said. “Attacked me with a knife. Weapons in plain view. I think we have an ex-felon in possession here.”

  The new one was looking through the front door. “He’s got ’em tied up.”

  “How’d you do that?” the old one said.

  “I’ll explain when Stein gets here,” I said. “You might want to order up an ambulance. The rooster is going to need medical attention.”

  “Rooster?”

  “Have a look. And don’t let them talk to each other.”

  Stein arrived about thirty minutes later. Still no ambulance, but Sonny was now on a sofa in the house, covered with a blanket. Knuckles was screaming from the kitchen, where the new cop was holding him.

  Stein had a partner named Santos. Santos started talking to the older patrol officer while I talked to Stein.

  “First thing,” I said, “make sure you question these two separately so they can’t cook up a story.”

  Stein said, “And what’s your story?”

  “You’ll find a rifle and some handguns in the bedroom,” I said. “The rifle will turn out to be the one that shot Sister Mary. The screamer, he’s got to be the ex-felon.”

  “You searched the house?”

  “I did.”

  “How?”

  I was still holding the towel on my wound. I showed Stein the blood. “The one on the sofa is a street guru—he knifed me. I came here to question the other one, who I followed here. The kid who got beat up, Daryl, he said—”

  “Where is he?”

  “Motel 6. He ID’d the smell of this guy’s hair. He thinks this guy is the one who bopped him. So I followed him here, and knocked on the door. He didn’t want to let me in at first, but I convinced him.”

  “How?”

  “Let him tell you.”

  Stein scowled.

  “And so,” I said, “if you know your Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, the amendment does not apply to private citizens, so long as they are not working in concert with law enforcement. That’s why I didn’t contact you first. I didn’t want some tricky lawyer, somebody like me, arguing for exclusion of the weapons because I was acting as your agent. So now I’m giving you the observation, and I suggest you get a warrant before going in. Then we’ve covered all the angles.”

  “You’ve done some thinking about this,” Stein said. “You realize, of course, you could be facing a big fat lawsuit from one or both of these guys.”

  “Be still my heart,” I said.

  Stein smiled.

  153

  I FAVORED MY good cheek as I drove to St. Monica’s. When I got there, I told Father Bob what happened and he laughed.

  “Very sympathetic,” I said.

  He put me facedown in his trailer and started dressing my wound. It was the most humiliating experience of my life.

  “Humility,” Father Bob said. “It’s a good thing.”

  “Can we talk about something else? Can we talk about Sister Mary?”

  “By all means. You want stitches?”

  “No,” I said. “Just tape me shut. Just don’t tape the wrong crack, okay?”

  “I think I’m capable,” he said. “Sister Mary is doing fine physically.”

  “Okay, what’s that mean?”

  “That’s as far as I can go.”

  “Come on, tell me what’s wrong with her.”

  “I was talking about your buttock. I’m through. That’s as far as I can go with it. You can get up now.”

  I did. “What’s wrong with Sister Mary?”

  Father Bob sighed and sat at his little table. He offered me a chair but, under the circumstances, I preferred to stand.

  “I suppose it would be easier if you heard it from me,” Father Bob said. “Sister Hildegarde is going to officially sanction Sister Mary, for being a recalcitrant. She is stating her opinion in a letter, which will go to the archdiocese, that she has strong doubts about Sister Mary’s fitness to continue as a nun.”

  My face got hot.

  Father Bob put his hand on my arm. “Let us handle it from here. I’ll be speaking for Sister Mary.”

  “I have a few words to say, too.”

  “Don’t. You’ll only make it worse.”

  “I don’t get you people.”

  “Most people don’t get us. Leave it there.”

  I started to say something but he gripped my arm harder. “Leave it there,” he said again. “Sister Mary and I believe that God works all things for the good of those who follow him.”

  “Which is another way of saying when people shaft you, it’s a good thing. No worries. God’s plan. And the Hildegardes of this world take over, a little at a time.”

  “Ty, you’re upset—”

  “A couple hours ago I had a knife in my cupcake. Yeah, I’m upset. And now your commandant is putting the screws to the best nun in the whole place. It makes me sick.”

  “May I suggest you cool off?”

  It took me the rest of the weekend to do that.

  154

  ON SUNDAY MORNING I called Daryl and made sure he was all right. He was. Basically watching TV and ducking out to McDonald’s, trying to stretch my twenty bucks. I told him I’d get him more.

  He said I was the man. So maybe I really was.

  I called Sister Mary and we talked for about twenty minutes or so. Neither one of us mentioned the Sister Hildegarde thing. But it seemed to be hanging between us just the same.

  155

  ON MONDAY MORNING I limped into court. The clerk and bailiff asked if I was all right, and I told them I’d had an unfortunate accident and wouldn’t be sitting down much.

  The bailiff said Preparation H was actually very good for this sort of thing. I think he was serious. I thanked him and said, “Let us never speak of this again.”

  I went back to chambers and met with Radavich and Hughes. “Tom’s not putting on rebuttal evidence,” Hughes said. “We’ll go right into closing arguments.”

  “Fine,” I said. “And can you explain to the jury that, due to a slight injury, I may have to stand for most of the proceedings?”

  “Injury?” Judge Hughes said.

  “I’d rather not go into it right at the moment, if you don’t mind.”

  He shook his head. “You have a very dangerous way of practicing law, it seems.”

  “My problems are all behind me now,” I said.

  I went back in to a packed courtroom. The deputies brought Eric in. He looked tired. Or in complete denial.

  Kate was in her usual spot. She was chewing on a scarf.

  Me, I was chewing on the insides of my cheeks. There’s nothing like the anticipation of a closing argument. If you’ve done your job, you’ll be okay once you start talking. It’s the lead anticipation that juices you. You try not to show it, but the other lawyer knows what you’re feeling, because he’s feeling it, too.

  Eric leaned over and whispered, “You nervous?”

  “Me? Why should I be nervous?”

  “Because they’re going to convict me. They hate me. There’s no way we can win this thing.”

  “You’ve calmed me down now just fine, Eric. Don’t say anything else.”

  156

  JUDGE HUGHES ENTERED and called for the jury. The courtroom got real quiet.
This is the high point, the closing arguments. Last chance at the sale. What lawyers call the law of recency, meaning jurors tend to remember most the last thing you say to them.

  You need a boffo exit.

  In a criminal case the prosecutor gets to argue first, since he has the burden of proof. Then comes the defense, and then the prosecutor gets one last bite at the apple, in a rebuttal argument.

  Radavich was great. Workmanlike, dispassionate. Laid out his case in logical order, covering all the evidence, and leaving Leilana Salgado until last. Then he got out the long knives.

  He said, “And then the defense comes up with its only possible card, an alibi witness, but a complete surprise. Conveniently waiting for maximum impact. You didn’t hear about this witness in Mr. Buchanan’s opening statement, did you? No, it was only at the last second, with all the evidence pointing at guilt, that this woman is produced.”

  Radavich paused. I couldn’t see his face because he was at the podium and his back was to me. But if you can read the back of a guy’s head, his spelled out total contempt.

  “What kind of a witness? A prostitute. A call girl. Yet one who desperately wanted you to think of her as something else. Some noble woman of great purpose. Yet she lives a life making up illusions for others, and she wants you to believe an illusion now.”

  The way he said it didn’t sound hateful. He wasn’t spitting the words. But the impression was unmistakable.

  When he sat down, the courtroom was dead silent.

  Except for the sound of Kate Richess issuing a single, pathetic sob.

  Judge Hughes said, “You may begin, Mr. Buchanan.”

  I stood up and buttoned my coat, and started the way I usually do, with “Ladies and gentlemen…”

  157

  … THANK YOU FOR your attention during the course of this trial. Sometimes trials are complicated. You have hours and days and weeks of expert testimony and exhibits and recollections from the witness stand. And you have to try to piece all that together as you go back to the jury room and deliberate. But this case is not complicated. The prosecution tried to make it seem that way, by introducing experts and going through all sorts of scientific rigmarole to try to make a case where there was no case. To try to prove that something happened that nobody witnessed. And on the flimsiest of evidence they try to convince you, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Eric Richess killed his own brother.

  The judge is going to give you the law to apply to the facts. He will instruct you on the rules. And he will tell you that the fact that a criminal charge has been filed against Eric Richess is not, I repeat, not evidence that the charge is true. And you must not be biased against the defendant just because he’s been arrested, charged, and brought into this courtroom for trial.

  Must not. That’s the law.

  A defendant in a criminal case is always presumed to be innocent. This means the prosecution must prove any defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. You’ve all heard that phrase. But what does it mean?

  The judge will tell you what it means, and what the judge says you have to abide by. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt means proof that leaves you with an abiding conviction that the charge is true.

  Not just a conviction, or certainty, that the charge is true. But an abiding conviction. I looked up abide in the dictionary, just to make sure. And that’s what it means. To make sure. Something that will endure.

  You can’t wake up a week after your verdict and think, You know, I still have this part of me that doesn’t believe he’s guilty. If you have part of you that thinks that, you don’t have an abiding conviction.

  The judge will tell you that unless the evidence proves Mr. Richess guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, he is entitled to an acquittal, and you must—must—find him not guilty.

  Do you remember that boulder I told you about? The one that sits on the prosecutor’s desk? The one called the burden of proof? The prosecutor has failed to remove that boulder. It’s not enough for him to chip away at it. He has to obliterate it, get the whole thing off. But he hasn’t, and there’s a simple reason why. You can take all of the evidence that was presented, all the speculation about the science, and you can put that aside and ask yourself only one question. Do I believe Leilana Salgado?

  That’s it.

  Remember all that DNA testimony? You can forget it. The prosecutor never established when Eric’s small blood trace actually got on the gun. We presented a witness, Christa Cody, who established that it could have been days before Carl’s death. In any event, we don’t have the burden of proving anything. Despite all the expert testimony, Mr. Radavich offered no proof that the blood got on the gun when the fatal shot was fired.

  But even though we don’t have to prove anything, we have. We have proved that Eric Richess could not have fired that shot, because he was in Long Beach at the time.

  You twelve jurors, the law says, are the sole judges of the facts in this case. And you are the sole judges of the credibility of witnesses. And, therefore, you all sat here and looked Leilana Salgado in the face as she testified, and in your hearts you know this woman was telling the truth. That’s all you have to decide, that if you believe in your heart she was telling the absolute truth, backed up by printed evidence, that this case is over. And it should be over.

  There is nothing worse in our system of justice than that an innocent man should be convicted of a crime he did not commit. That’s why the system is set up the way it is, that’s why the system gives the prosecution such a large burden of proof.

  And that’s why the system does not trust any one person to decide the facts. No, in its wisdom the system entrusts all twelve of you to get together and to agree.

  And the law makes each one of you a sovereign. That means that if you believe that Leilana Salgado was telling the truth, and eleven other jurors don’t believe, you are entitled to resist them, and to hold on to your belief as you see it in fact. If you don’t, then you are violating your oath as a juror.

  Ladies and gentlemen, I leave this decision to you, with full confidence in your ability to do what is right. Answer that one question, and your decision will be the right one.

  158

  KATE LOOKED SO weary I thought she might faint. Criminal trials are hard on everyone, especially family. And most especially mothers. Their maternal desire to protect and comfort is locked up in a cold room, guarded by bailiffs and court personnel. Each day they suffer a little, uncertainty weighing down their delicate balance.

  So I insisted on bringing over a Chinese dinner, back at her house. She’d dropped about thirty pounds, it looked like. And for most women that would be a godsend. But for a former Roller Derby queen, it looked unhealthy.

  I went from court to the hospital and gave Sister Mary the blow by blow. She was like a trucker with the sports page, wanting the whole story. Maybe I even did her some good. She was starting to look stronger, and said she’d be out in a couple of days.

  When she said out, it sounded almost like it had a double meaning. But I left it at that.

  159

  THAT NIGHT I went to Kate’s with a bag of take-out from Yang Chow. Incomparable slippery shrimp and hot-to-trot Hunan beef. Kate made tea, and we sat at the dining room table. I was able to sit as long as I did a little leaning.

  “I guess waiting is the hardest part, isn’t it?” Kate said.

  “It’s pretty grueling, for sure,” I said.

  “Could you tell anything? From their faces, I mean?”

  “You never really know,” I said. “You can feel one thing from the jurors, and get completely blown away when they come back in. Jurors you were sure were on your side are not, and those you thought hated your guts end up loving you. It’s one of the reasons trial lawyers like to have a good, strong belt at the end of the day.”

  She took a sip of tea. “And how was Sister Mary today?”

  “Wanting out of the hospital, that’s for sure.”

  “I’ll go see her tomorrow. Take her so
me flowers.”

  It was the way she said it that got to me. Without pretense. Just an expression of someone whose desire to help others is woven through them in rich threads of decency. And I felt then how much I wanted her to get her surviving son back. That this would be the decent thing I could do for her.

  And I felt something else. The fear that I might fail her in this. It was a large, black, gaping fear, too. Not the usual, garden-variety, waiting-forthe-jury kind of anxiety.

  “Tell me about your mother, Ty,” Kate said.

  I looked down from her eyes. When I did, I saw Kate’s hands around her tea cup. As if to warm them.

  Hands. My mother’s hands…

  “You would have liked her,” I said. “I think you would have been friends.”

  She smiled. “That’s nice. What was she like?”

  I swallowed hard. “She was there. That’s the thing I remember most. My dad was a cop and had to be out a lot. My mom was always around when I needed her. Like when I was thirteen and stole some M&M’s. Well, more than some. One of the big bags. Stuffed in my pants. I had the whole thing worked out. Crime of the century.”

  “Sounds like it.”

  “Mom found them in my room, asked me where I got them. I was going to say I got them from the store, with my own money, but my face wouldn’t cooperate. I couldn’t lie to her. My dad was dead and I knew what that had done to her, to both of us really. I just couldn’t lie. So I didn’t say anything, and she knew.”

  I had not told this story to anyone, ever. Now the memory came flooding back. “She made me go to the store manager. Tell him exactly what I’d done and tell him I was sorry and pay for the candy. She stood there and I did. I thought I was going to juvi. Mom let me think that. The manager said nothing like this had happened to him before, but that his mom would have made him do the same thing. And then he offered me a job.”