Red Mass

by Rosemary Aubert

  “Each officer you’ve heard,” she continued, “has added some small detail to the overall picture of the hospital lobby, the corridors, the vault from which the drugs were stolen, the nursing station, the volunteer lounge and, of course, the unfortunate victim’s room.”

  I rose. McKenzie nodded for me to voice my objection. His immediate response meant that he knew what I was going to say. “Your Honor, no witness has given any indication of ever being in Mrs. Stoughton-Melville’s room.”

  “Ms. Portal?”

  “I apologize, Your Honor,” Ellen replied snappily. “Several officers,” she corrected, with what I thought was annoying care, “have told you what a typical room at Riverside would have been like at the time in question. They’ve also been able to say that most of the rooms were quite similar.” She paused as if she still had something to add, but she thought better of it. It was a weak note on which to end. I glanced at Nicky, almost expecting him to show pity for Ellen. Instead, he winked at me:

  Behind me in court at all times, I could feel the strange presence of my client, who said nothing, not to the guards who daily brought him back and forth to his cell, or to Nicky, or to me. I wondered sometimes whether he was asleep. But when I glanced at him in the glass-enclosed prisoner’s box, I saw that his eyes were on Ellen, alert, ablaze.

  On the second Friday of the trial, Justice McKenzie decided we all needed an afternoon off, which meant, of course, that he needed an afternoon off.

  I was grateful for the break because I had promised my grandson I would spend some time with him. When I got home, I found that Ellen’s nanny had dropped the boy at our building. Angelo was playing with his cousin Sal. Tootie was minding them, but she was distracted by a lively conversation with her Tamil neighbor, conducted in brutally fractured English and street slang. Angelo was in the process of taking his tiny cousin into custody.

  “These are handcuffs, see,” he told Sal. Both the children were still sporting brightly colored winter gear, and Angelo appeared to be fiddling with the sleeve of Sal’s jacket. As I moved closer, I saw he was tying something around the little girl’s wrist. He tried to make a knot, failed, then tossed something away behind him. “Forget it,” he said.

  I saw a small strip of red blaze against the ground. It was a length of tape, exactly the same red tape that had bound the boxes in my office.

  “Where did you find this, Angelo?” I asked.

  He looked up as though caught in an illegal act. He was only eight, but I saw adult defiance in the set of his jaw, the levelness of his gaze. “I have rights, Grandpa. I don’t have to tell you.”

  I didn’t want to get into a discussion with him about illegal search and seizure of evidence. I was half convinced the little genius could argue such a motion.

  “Angelo, please. It’s really important. Just tell Grandpa where you got this tape.”

  He shrugged. “It probably got stuck on somebody’s shoes or something. I found it on the floor in the apartment.”

  “My apartment?”

  “No, Grandpa. Not your apartment. Sal’s. What difference does it make, anyway?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said honestly. “It just seems funny to see it here.”

  “Yeah,” Angelo answered, no longer interested. “Can we do popcorn and homemade ice cream?”

  After spending time with this family, I felt compelled to visit my “other” family.

  Down in Tent City, I found an evacuation in full swing. Clearly the situation had worsened since the firebombing I had witnessed. Looking south from the bridge, I could see extensive damage. Shacks and tents were charred, and whole sections of the riverbank had been torched. Pathetic figures shifted through piles of scorched rubble trying to rescue personal belongings.

  A narrow file of displaced people wound along the path that led north, like foreign refugees displayed on the evening news. They carried bags and bundles and even some of the support posts from huts. It was a dispiriting sight in a wealthy city. I made my way down the embankment, careful not to push anyone aside in my eagerness to locate Queenie. I found her with a woman about her own age, whose shaky fingers prevented her from tying up a small box. When Queenie tried to help, the woman slapped her hand.

  “Let me help,” I said, stepping up to the two of them. Queenie looked tired, but a small smile flitted across her features at the sight of me.

  She handed me a ball of rough twine. Her hand brushed mine, and the warmth of her fingers filled me with a desire long quiescent.

  I knew at that precise moment that she deserved to be taken away from the dirt and grimness of her chosen work, and that I was the one to do the taking. I opened my mouth to utter something personal when someone called out her name in seeming anguish. As if my existence was the least of her concerns, Queenie turned and headed in the direction of that sound. One small glance of approval was all I received before she disappeared into the confused mass of the dispossessed.

  Chapter 13

  The next day, Saturday, I woke at dawn and headed back to the Tent City site.

  It was as though the settlement had never existed. The river lapped the shore’s beaten earth where the tents had once stood, but otherwise, there was no trace of any kind of human existence.

  It wasn’t until I read the Toronto Daily World back at the office that I learned the evacuees were thought to have scattered throughout the city, some moving farther north in the valley, others giving in to the prodding of city officials to enter shelters. Many had probably disappeared altogether.

  “I don’t know how Aliana does it,” Nicky said with evident admiration. “She tracked down the Tent City gang, wrote about them and about you, too. Women today are ballsy!”

  “Yeah, right,” I answered. No doubt he meant Ellen, too. I glanced over the piece about me and the judgeship. It seemed general and innocuous, which was a good thing. To be perceived as someone’s favorite might give the Attorney General the wrong impression.

  “You’re going to get this judgeship, Ellis,” Nicky said. “You’re the man.” He raised his Styrofoam cup of coffee in salute. “Thanks,” I said. His expression of loyalty was touching, even if it did remind me that the empty courier envelope still sat unexplained in my desk. Maybe the time would come when I could ask him, yet again, why the office never seemed to remain the way I left it, but not this morning. I had to break the news to him that I was going alone to Fernhope. During the week, Stow was kept at the Don Jail, the usual remand facility for unconvicted detainees. On the weekend, the cops took him back up north.

  “Stow wants to talk to me alone, Nicky.” I gestured around the room. Boxes were scattered here and there, covering two-thirds of my tiny office’s floor. “This mess could use some help,” I said tentatively.

  Nicky surveyed the boxes that had once sat in neat stacks against the wall. Some lids were askew and papers were spilled out onto the floor. “Yeah, a disaster waiting to happen,” he said. “Are you sure you haven’t been hosting an orgy?”

  “Nicky,” I asked carefully, “does it seem to you that somebody has been in here? Besides us and the orgy attendees, I mean.”

  I feared he’d get angry, as he’d done on the phone. Instead, he gave me the same look of worried exasperation as when he caught me daydreaming. “I’ll do what I can about this mess. I’ll even admit that I don’t always know exactly where every document in here is all the time.”

  “You’re a solid kid, Nicky,,” I said. I walked over to the nearest box and straightened a file that was teetering atop a pile. I recognized the file as one I, myself, had left there the day before. “Do what you can, but take some time off, too. All work, etc., you know. I’ll see you on Monday.”

  He nodded, but he didn’t look up because he was busy extricating his fingers from a piece of red tape. “Yeah, right, bye ...” he said absently.

  On the drive up to Fernhope, it was hard to keep up my spirits. I kept mentally going over the testimony of Ellen’s witnesses thus far. My cross-
examinations of all those cops had certainly alienated Ellen. She became frostier by the day. Worse, I might also be alienating the jury. As for whether I was pleasing my client, the question was moot—and mute! Stow had offered no help in his defense, and I was surely wasting my precious weekend in traveling up to prison again. It seemed he had no intention of offering any fact, any opinion, even any genuine interest in his case.

  My only comfort was glimpsing the woods of early spring, dappled sun on melting snow, sparkling blackness of clear forest streams no longer bound by ice. Contemplation of rebirth occupied me completely until I reached Fernhope.

  As I waited for Stow, I remembered how shocked I had been the previous autumn when I’d first seen him here. Now I could not imagine seeing him anywhere except in custody—in shackles, behind glass walls.

  But if I expected Stow to enter the visiting room subdued and meek, I was mistaken. Instead of his usual air of detached mental instability, when he entered the room I could see that he was deeply annoyed. Something or someone was bugging him.

  “You know, Portal,” he said without preamble, “it’s not every day that a man being considered for a judgeship receives a recommendation from a judge of the Supreme Court.” He scowled. “So you should be more careful. Pandering to the media does not advance your cause. Shake loose that reporter who’s always on your tail.”

  This was the Stow of old—arrogant, even imperious. So it was he who—I was forced to this conclusion—had not only put in the good word for me, but had chosen to leak the news to a reporter other than Aliana. Was he controlling the press now, as well as the real estate market—not to mention my career?

  “Stow,” I said, trying to keep all emotion out of my tone, “why don’t you just skip the favors? Because if you’re the one who influenced that justice, you’re more likely to lose me the judgeship than to win it.”

  I waited for lightning to strike. His silence was so deep and so long that I could hear crows cawing in the woods beyond the compound.

  “Get McPhail off the case” was his only reply. “He’s as green as an unripe mango, and he can’t keep his thoughts to himself. He’s favoring the Crown. Lose him.”

  “What?”

  “Do the cross yourself. I don’t like you sitting there doing nothing. I mean, half the time you look like you’re asleep. I want you up there alone. Starting Monday.”

  The man had to be mad. He veered day to day from dazed silence to ramblings to peremptory advice. “Stow, give me a break. Is this behavior of yours an elaborate act to drive me as crazy as you are? If you’ve suddenly become concerned about the most efficient cross, you’ve got to cooperate, help me out a little. I can’t make a sensible cross without your input.” I felt like shaking the man until his teeth rattled. “What really happened in Harpur’s room that night?” I practically yelled, but the guards barely looked up.

  “All I’ve heard is a number of police officers describing a hospital,” Stow responded. “If you think that’s all the Crown has, then you should go for a directed verdict.”

  I laughed. “I’m supposed to stand up and ask McKenzie to acquit on the basis of the weakness of the Crown case? I don’t think so. Besides, there’s more to come from Ellen.”

  Stow didn’t challenge my statement. “Her most damaging witness thus far is the one we’re going to face Monday morning,” I continued, “the expert from the pharmaceutical firm. He’s going to describe the trials he conducted, the study that alerted him to the irregularities in Harpur’s blood test results ...”

  “Portal, that evidence is useless. The Crown is relying on experimental results gathered more than five years ago.” He made that dismissive gesture with his long fingers. The movement infuriated me further.

  “Stow,” I said, “what are you hiding?” I remembered the document that was missing. “Has your silence got something to do with the fact that the Crown signed a statement regarding Harpur’s fortune? Come to think of it, why wasn’t that paper part of the original disclosure? I may need to petition Judge McKenzie to find out if anything else hasn’t been disclosed.”

  I thought I saw a change in his expression. Had I surprised him?

  “Ellis,” he said, after a moment’s reflection, “Harpur’s money has no part in this. I assure you the Crown has signed no such paper. I instruct you not to seek any further disclosure. Don’t forget that whatever else I am, I am still an officer of the court. I know that nothing is missing from this case. Just get that greenhorn off the matter and dump the reporter.” He glanced at the guards. “Or all the recommendations in the world will be powerless to save your career.”

  Before I could react, the guards sprang to life and spirited him away, just as though they were servants eager to do his bidding.

  I didn’t follow Stow’s instructions, not exactly. On Monday, I asked Nicky to sit in the body of the court, behind Stow, rather than at the counsel table at the front. I told him to take careful notes because I was going to be on my own when it came to the cross-examination of Ellen’s expert.

  “This drug Somatofloran,” Ellen said. “What does it do, exactly?”

  “Somatofloran is an oxygen-absorption inhibitor,” the witness answered. “It slows the absorption of oxygen into the blood.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “In certain patients, the blood absorbs oxygen too rapidly. This causes a sort of internal hyperventilation—just as if the patient were breathing too shallowly and too rapidly. Under such circumstances, the body receives the false signal that it is no longer necessary to breathe because no further oxygen is needed.”

  “The patient would stop breathing—that is, would suffocate—if there was an overdose of Somatofloran?”

  “No. Quite the opposite,” the witness said. “Somatofloran is used when the patient’s breathing is lazy. It causes the body to compensate for a lack of oxygen by increasing the rate of breathing. The very worst that could happen with an overdose of this drug is that the patient might actually hyperventilate, that is, breathe too rapidly. The patient might then briefly lose consciousness, but his or her body would soon compensate by beginning to seek oxygen again. I mean the resumption of normal breathing, albeit at the usual ‘lazy’ rate.”

  Ellen appeared to ponder this information. She was stalling on purpose so that the jury had more time to consider the witness’s remarks.

  “Let me be certain that I understand this, Doctor,” she said. “A person—say Mrs. Stoughton-Melville—is not breathing as efficiently as she should. So she’s chosen to take part in the Somatofloran trials. Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. She’s given the drug—in the proper dosage, of course—and her breathing becomes easier because the drug increases her rate of breathing. Correct?”

  “Correct so far. Yes.”

  “But somehow she is, let us say, accidentally given too much of the drug. The result then is hyperventilation. An undesirable but not fatally dangerous situation, am I right?”

  “You are right,” the doctor said. I could tell he was beginning to be impatient with the slowness of the questioning. Good. Maybe I could make him even more impatient, make him annoy the jury.

  “Bear with me for a moment, Dr. Swan,” Ellen said, sounding pleased with her own sensitivity to the needs of the witness as well as the jury. “We just want to make sure we are clear on this. So,” she rose slightly on her toes, “if this drug is in itself benign, easing the breathing of patients, and if the sole effect of an overdose is to cause momentary hyperventilation, which, though uncomfortable, is a fairly common and natural occurrence, then how could such a drug be suspected of being used to murder someone?”

  It is an old trick of the prosecution to pretend to be puzzled as to how a murder could possibly have taken place, and one that Ellen had mastered. Her witness was primed to tell the jury exactly how my client could have done away with his wife.

  “The fact is,” Dr. Swan said, “that if the patient had received
an excess of Somatofloran, she would have momentarily stopped breathing because her body would have registered a surfeit of oxygen. Under such circumstances, the slightest interference with her regaining control of her breathing would have resulted in the complete inability to resume the natural function.”

  The doctor didn’t look at the jury. Perhaps he could sense that he needed to be clearer. “What I mean is, the patient would have been in such a state that even holding a hand in front of her nose and mouth for a few seconds might have rendered her unable to catch her breath.”

  “So she would have suffocated without a fight?”

  “Yes,” the doctor said. “Normally a person puts up a powerful fight when anyone or anything interferes with breathing. An overdose of Somatofloran would have made that struggle impossible.”

  “I see,” Ellen commented, as if she’d finally understood a difficult point. “Thank you for that lucid explanation, Doctor.”

  I fought the urge to object. Unlike in trials on TV, objections are fairly rare in actual criminal trials, and are perceived as a rude interruption of the opposing counsel’s presentation. But it was improper for Ellen to praise her own witness while he was still on the stand.

  “There’s another area we need to cover, Doctor,” she said. “I would like the jury to know why incriminating irregularities were discovered after so long a time.”

  Now I did spring up. “Objection!” I declared a little too loudly. “Counsel cannot make findings as to the incriminating nature of evidence. Only the jury can do that.” I turned slightly so that I could glance at Nicky. He nodded. Stow frowned as if well aware we were not following his specifications. Tough!

  “Sustained.” McKenzie was not one for elaborating on his decisions.

  “I apologize, Your Honor,” Ellen said evenly. “Dr. Swan,” she continued, “why are we looking at this matter after so long a time has passed?”