by D. W. Buffa
“The more he looked at me, the more sympathetic the deputy became. He offered to help. ‘I’ve got some things in the back. A razor, an extra toothbrush.’
” ‘Thanks,’ I said, as I turned to go, ‘but I think I owe it to the judge to let him see me the way I am.’ “
Three
_______
Adrink in his hand, Harper Bryce let his eye wander across the bar and grill. A few more people had come in while we talked, a blast of late winter wind announcing each new arrival, and it was now almost half full. It was one of those places that stay in business for years, seldom empty but never crowded. The dishes had been cleared from the table, and the coffee had gone cold, but no one felt any pressure to leave. We could sit there all day if we wanted, talking among ourselves, and no one would think twice about it.
Pushing up the sleeve of his shirt just far enough to steal a glance at his watch, Jonah Micronitis started to say something, another reminder that it was getting late and there were things they had to do. Time was money, and money, for Jonah Micronitis, had always been everything. Asa Bartram ignored him. With a slight movement of his head, and an even less discernible movement of his hand, he stopped him from making a sound.
“Did you really go to court, Calvin’s court, like that?” Asa asked, encouraging me to go on. His arms, folded together, rested on the table. A faint smile flickered at the corners of his broad mouth. There was a look of nostalgia in his aging eyes, as if he had been reminded of some indiscretion of his own, some act of defiance which he had grown too prudent to commit, but on which he still looked back with pride.
“I did not even stop at the men’s room to comb my hair and wash my face. I was furious. I don’t think I had ever felt quite so righteous in my life.”
Asa knew exactly what I meant. “Having nothing left to lose is a kind of liberation, isn’t it?”
“You would have thought I was leading a slave rebellion. Three days in that place, and in some ways I had become more demented than any of the poor souls I found there. I could have killed Jeffries and gone to my execution convinced that I was entirely justified for what I had done. I didn’t kill him, of course, but when he took his place on the bench I tried to murder him with a stare. I need not have bothered; he damn near died when he saw what I looked like.
“I was sitting at the counsel table, pretending there was nothing out of the ordinary, one leg crossed over the other, my left arm trailing over the back of my chair. With my thumb and forefinger, I stroked my chin like some elegantly dressed fop, bored to tears with everyone around him. Mrs. Larkin, sitting in the chair next to me, did not know what to make of it. The deputy district attorney, who had been reading his file, lifted his head, like an animal which has just caught a scent. Jurors shifted uneasily in their chairs, nudging each other to make certain they were all seeing the same thing.
” ‘Mr. Antonelli!’ Jeffries shouted, his face red with rage.
“I had already turned to the same juror I had been talking to on Friday. ‘Thank you, your honor,’ I said without looking back.
‘Now tell me,’ I went on as if time had stood still, ‘even if you’re convinced the defendant is probably guilty, will you still vote to return a verdict of not guilty if the state fails to prove that guilt beyond a reasonable doubt?’
“I’ll never forget the look on that juror’s face. The poor woman did not know what to do. She was willing to answer my question, but afraid to open her mouth.
” ‘Mr. Antonelli!’ Jeffries was screaming from the bench.
“With a speed that surprised even myself, I shot to my feet.
‘Will you stop interrupting me!’ I shouted back at him. ‘I’ve earned the right to ask that question!’
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen anyone that angry. ‘Do you know who you’re talking to, counselor?’ he asked, clenching his teeth so hard his whole face seemed to tremble.
“I had always had a fondness for the kind of English barrister we used to read about in the old novels, the ones who could stand there, hand on hip, and with only a slight change of in-flection destroy an opponent with a single well-turned phrase. I don’t know where I got it—it must have been something I had read. I certainly did not make it up myself, but all of a sudden I remembered, and before I knew what I was doing, the words just came out.
” ‘Your honor, I’m not sure. Because, you see, I’m like a Bud-dhist in front of his idol: I know you are ugly, but I feel you are great.’
“The jury, the bailiff, the clerk—everyone in the courtroom—
froze, and every eye turned to see what Jeffries would do.
“I had called him ugly and I had called him great. He could not contest the one without contesting the other. He stared hard at me, but behind those piercing eyes he was gaining control of himself, quickly calculating what he could safely do. Folding his hands together, he lowered his head and pursed his lips. When he looked up again, he nodded slowly, a thoughtful expression on his face.
” ‘That was very good, Mr. Antonelli,’ he said in a quiet, reassuring voice. There was an almost audible sigh of relief from around the courtroom. ‘Very good, indeed,’ he added before he turned to the jury. ‘Mr. Antonelli,’ he informed them with a solemn smile, ‘has obviously been under a great deal of stress. I’m sure that with a good night’s sleep he’ll be back to his normal self. In the interest of everyone concerned, I think it would be better if we recessed now and started again tomorrow morning.’
“I went straight home, threw my clothes into a pile on the bathroom floor, and took a long hot shower. When I was finished, I crawled into bed, languishing in the pure luxury of clean sheets.
I slept all day and got up only long enough to have something for dinner before I went back to bed. The next morning, wearing a fresh shirt and a new suit, I sat at the counsel table and as if I had never laid eyes on her before began questioning that same juror.
” ‘At the end of this trial, after you have heard all the evidence, if you believe that the defendant is probably guilty, but you also believe that the state has not proven it beyond a reasonable doubt, will you return a verdict of not guilty?’
“Instinctively, her eyes flew toward the bench. Jeffries was hunched over, reading something. ‘Yes,’ she replied, her eyes coming back to me.
“We moved rapidly through voir dire, and by the end of the morning had a jury. That afternoon we made our opening statements and the next day the prosecution called its first witness, Edward Larkin.
“He could have been anyone, the father of the kid down the block, the husband of a woman you work with, a pleasant-looking, well-dressed man, someone you would chat comfortably with while you stood together waiting for a bus. He spoke about the sexual relationship with his daughter as if he were a psychologist describing something that one of his patients had done. That was what you had to understand about him: He had learned to ana-lyze his past behavior with almost clinical detachment. Yes, he had for years been having sexual intercourse with his own daughter. Yes, he understood this was something he should not have done. But now he was in counseling, where he was learning how to deal with his problem. Remarkable how a few words can change the way we think. His problem! Suddenly, it becomes something private, his own possession, something that ultimately does not concern anyone else, except insofar as the people affected by his behavior can help him with his problem. He is no longer the subject who has inflicted an unforgivable wrong that must be punished as an example to others, but an object for the professional attention of those trained to deal with his particular disease. He testified at the trial of his wife as if he had been called as an expert witness on a case that had nothing whatever to do with him.
“He admitted everything; he gave no indication that he was embarrassed, much less ashamed, of anything. In response to the questions put to him, he described the way he had several times each week left the room he shared with his wife and gone down the hall to his daughter’s room. Though he
said he always waited until his wife was asleep, he said it in a way that suggested he could not always have been sure.
“The prosecution tried to make certain no one missed the point.
‘Then, it’s quite possible, isn’t it,’ Spencer Goldman asked, ‘that during the years this was going on, your wife became aware of what you were doing with your daughter?’
“It was a call for speculation if there ever was one, and I was on my feet shouting my objection before he was finished with the question. But if I had thought that Jeffries was through with me, I quickly learned just how wrong I could be.
” ‘Overruled!’ he barked, motioning for me to sit down.
” ‘Your honor,’ I insisted, still on my feet, ‘he’s—’
” ‘He’s eliciting testimony that the mother must have known what the father was doing,’ Jeffries interjected. He gave me a sharp look. ‘And he’s doing that to demonstrate that the mother herself must have had something to hide. Isn’t that correct, Mr.
Goldman?’
“I stood there, speechless. There was no precedent for this. The judge had become the prosecutor, and I was the one he was after.
” ‘Isn’t that correct, Mr. Goldman,’ he asked again, his eyes still locked on mine.
“Astonished at what Jeffries had done, Goldman had difficulty getting the words out. ‘Yes, your honor,’ he said finally.
” ‘Objection, your honor,’ I said, forcing myself into an even-tempered voice.
“He thought I was repeating the same one. ‘I’ve already ruled,’
he said, turning away.
” ‘I’m objecting to the comment of the court. It was gratuitous, and irrelevant, and completely prejudicial. I ask that the court withdraw it and instruct the jury to ignore it.’
” ‘You what!’ he blustered. Then, aware that a packed courtroom was watching, he stopped himself before he said or did something he might later regret. ‘You made an objection, Mr. Antonelli.
I ruled on it. You made it again. I gave you the reasons for my ruling.’
” ‘The reasons for your ruling, your honor?’ I shot back. ‘Or the reasons why you think the jury should convict?’
“He was livid. It was written all over him. But we were now on a public stage.
” ‘I hope you’re not questioning the integrity of this court, Mr.
Antonelli,’ he said, with an ominous glance.
” ‘Far be it from me, your honor,’ I replied with a quick, ag-gravating smile, ‘to deprive anyone of the right to hope.’
“If he had had a gun, I think he would have killed me. Instead, all he could do was try to ignore it. He shook his head as if I wasn’t worth his trouble and invited Goldman to continue his examination of the witness.
“When it was my turn, I attacked. ‘You never saw your wife do anything with your son, did you?’ I asked before I was halfway out of my chair.
“He was unflappable. ‘No,’ he said without expression.
” ‘Your wife never admitted to you that she had ever done anything improper with your son, did she?’
” ‘No.’
” ‘You never saw or heard anything from anyone that led you to believe that anything improper was going on, did you?’
” ‘No.’
“I stood in front of the counsel table and let my gaze wander from the witness to the bench. ‘And despite what was suggested earlier, your wife, Janet Larkin, never said or did anything that made you think she had any suspicions at all about what you were doing with your daughter, did she?’
“His head down, Jeffries pretended to be busy, though he knew full well that my eye was on him and not the witness.
” ‘So any suggestions about what your wife must have known, about what your wife must have been hiding, are nothing more than speculation. Isn’t that right?’
“Jeffries snapped his head up, an angry expression on his face.
Before he could say anything, I took a step toward the witness and asked, ‘Isn’t it true, Mr. Larkin, that your son never said anything about any of this until he came to live with you?’
“He started to answer, but I talked right over him as I moved another step closer. ‘And isn’t it true, Mr. Larkin, that your daughter isn’t the only child of yours with whom you wanted to have a sexual relationship?’
“Jeffries raised his gavel; Goldman shot out of his chair; the noise from the crowd was deafening. I never heard what Goldman said or the sound the gavel must have made. The jurors, who by hearing it so often had almost forgotten what Larkin had done with his daughter, were stunned by the enormity of what they had now been told he had wanted to do with his son. The only one who seemed unaffected by what I had charged was Edward Larkin himself. He sat on the witness chair, hands folded together, waiting impassively, as if all this commotion had nothing to do with him.
“Jeffries did not know any better than I did the objection Goldman had made. It did not matter. Over the dying tumult, he struck his gavel and shouted, ‘Sustained.’
” ‘Do you deny that you told your daughter that you had fantasies about your son?’ I asked so rapidly one word ran into the other.
” ‘Objection.’ Goldman was on his feet again, waving his arms like someone trying to stop a train.
” ‘Sustained,’ Jeffries ruled, beside himself.
” ‘Do you deny having fantasies—sexual fantasies—about your son?’
“Jeffries sustained the objection before Goldman could finish making it. I spun away from the witness. ‘Grounds?’ I demanded to know as if it was my right. For an instant, Jeffries was at a loss for words. He was not used to anyone, much less a young lawyer, talking back.
” ‘Relevance, your honor,’ Goldman managed to interject.
” ‘But it is relevant, your honor. It goes to the credibility of the witness.’
“Glowering, Jeffries told me to move on to something else.
‘The objection has been sustained.’
” ‘Tell me, Mr. Larkin,’ I said, turning back to the witness, ‘when you testified that your son told you that his mother had forced him to have sexual intercourse with her, did he explain why he had never said a word of this until he started living with you?’
“Larkin shook his head. ‘It only came out after he started therapy.’
” ‘Then tell us this, Mr. Larkin. Until your son told this story, you never once suspected anything like this was going on, did you?’
” ‘No, I didn’t.’
” ‘And wouldn’t you of all people have been alert to any sign that something like this was going on?’
“Goldman objected, and Goldman’s objections now practically sustained themselves. Without so much as a glance in Jeffries’s direction, I waved my hand, as if to signal how boring they had both become, and asked the next question.
“If I could pick a moment when my life changed, this was it.
I don’t mean the next question I asked. I’m not sure I even remember what it was. I mean this time, this point in the trial, when without quite realizing it I had taken that one decisive step that decides forever who you are. Everything up until then had been training, instinct, the combination of things that lets you react, lets you adjust to everything that is going on around you.
I had been practicing for about three years, and I was good at it—at least I had thought I was. I hardly ever lost, and that was the way everyone else seemed to measure things—did you win or did you lose. But now, really for the first time, I knew what I was doing. I was conscious of myself, of the effect I had, of the way everyone else involved in that trial was reacting to me. It was not ego, though I’m sure there was plenty of that; it was something more. I could not have explained it then, and I probably can’t explain it now, but I understood what everyone was doing and why. I understood the reason for things. I learned to trust myself in that trial and not care what anyone else might think.
It was either that, or let Jeffries help the prosecution convi
ct a woman who had never done anything wrong of the worst crime with which any mother could ever be charged.
“Finally finished with Edward Larkin, the prosecution called the boy’s psychologist, who had believed and reported what he had been told. Then they called the police officer who had reported, and claimed to believe, what the boy had said.
” ‘How old are you?’ I asked the officer on cross.
” ‘Thirty-eight,’ he answered.
” ‘And are you married?’
“When he said he was, I asked if he had children. He had three and was obviously quite proud of it. I picked up my copy of his report off the table and turned to the page I wanted. ‘You wrote this?’ I held it up at arm’s length, a bewildered smile on my face.
“He was not sure where I was going. ‘Yes,’ he answered.
“I looked at him a moment longer, as if I was not sure whether I should believe him. ‘I see,’ I said, as I brought the document close enough to be read. After a few moments, I looked up. ‘You wrote this part? “According to the boy, the sexual intercourse with his mother usually lasted one and a half to two hours.” ‘ I lifted my hands, and shrugged. ‘Between one and a half and two hours?’ I asked skeptically.
“He seemed not to understand the question. ‘Didn’t it strike you as—what shall we say?—unusual?’
” ‘That’s what the boy said,’ the officer replied as if that had been my question.
“I looked at the jury and let my gaze settle for a moment on each of the men. ‘Between one and a half and two hours.’ I repeated the phrase like an awestruck spectator.
” ‘Do you have a question, Mr. Antonelli?’ Jeffries snarled.
” ‘Oh, I think I do, your honor,’ I said cheerfully as I walked back to the counsel table. ‘But not of this witness.’
“It was an amazing thing, the way everyone had been drawn into that boy’s story. All of us understand how something like a rape can take place. We can understand how someone, driven by the same impulses and desires that drive us all, can become so twisted, so violent, that he attacks a woman. It is much more difficult to understand how anyone can attack a child, and next to impossible to imagine how a mother could do anything like this to her own son. And that, I’m convinced, is what gave his story a strange kind of credibility. It was so utterly bizarre, so far beyond the range of anyone’s experience, everyone was afraid to express any doubt about what the boy had said. The only way they could distance themselves from an act so completely obscene was to denounce it, and the only way they could do that was to believe that it had really happened.