Fogbound
Page 25
It turned out to be an overstatement of sorts.
In the weeks and months that followed, a more apt metaphor suggested itself. It was as though, suggested one commentator, Jorgensen had simply tossed a pebble onto the surface of a pond, and the resulting ripples had gradually spread out in all directions, until they left no shore untouched.
Jessica Woodruff was summarily fired by Trial TV. Two months later, she was indicted by the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, on obstruction of justice charges. In order to avoid the possibility of a prison sentence, Jessica voluntarily surrendered her law license and cooperated against her superiors at Trial TV, including Brandon Davidson. Although Davidson himself was never formally charged (given Jessica’s own culpability and her relationship with Davidson, she was considered an unreliable witness who might not be believed by a jury), he was eventually forced to resign both his presidency of the network and his seat on its board of directors. Today, Jessica works as a paralegal in Cleveland, while Davidson is employed by a title insurance company in Sacramento. Their romance, once it had been exposed to the light of day, wilted and died.
Reynaldo Gilbert also lost his job and was permanently barred from practicing law in the state of Louisiana. Timothy Harkin fared somewhat better. Having received no response to the note he’d left on the door of Judge Jorgensen’s lighthouse, Harkin had soon after left the defense team. But for failing to blow the whistle on those who remained, he was suspended from practice for three years.
Michael Schneider, whose known aliases included “Mickey,” “Willie,” and “the Duke,” was indicted for the attempted murder of August Jorgensen, as well as the kidnapping of Kurt Meisner. Schneider’s insistence that he had no connection with the Lithuanian national who’d run down Jorgensen’s boat was seriously undercut by the discovery that the letters in the name “Ekud Redneisch,” when rearranged, spelled out “Duke Schneider.” Ultimately, Schneider pleaded guilty to attempted assault and is currently serving ten years in a maximum-security federal prison in scenic Otisville, New York.
Kurt Meisner surfaced when he was expelled from an old age home in Miami Beach - not because he was fourteen years shy of the minimum age for admission, or because his German ancestry was discovered by the Jewish director. While those minor flaws might have been overlooked, Meisner’s inability to continue paying for his stay (once Trial TV stopped footing the bill) could not be. He currently lives in a men’s shelter in downtown Miami.
Zachary Crawford returned to school from spring break. When his turn came to describe what he’d done over vacation, Zachary entertained his classmates with a story about how he flew to Washington, D.C., met all the justices of the United States Supreme Court, and played a movie for them. Zachary’s teacher, who for some time had been concerned about the boy’s propensity to confuse fact and fantasy, sent him straightaway to the principal. But the truth was eventually discovered, and the teacher was required to write, “I shall never again doubt Zachary’s word,” twenty times on the blackboard.
August Lars Jorgensen returned to his lighthouse, on his barrier island. He bought himself a new boat - if, that is, something thirty-two years old can be considered new. On breezy days, he can often be seen sailing in and around the coves; he no longer ventures out into the open ocean quite so far as once he did. And these days, Jake’s weight is no longer needed to trim the boat; in semiretirement, the old Lab is permitted to ride full-time as a spotter at the bow, his ears pinned back by the wind, his open mouth drinking in the salt spray. His former job as first mate has been handed down to another who, it turns out, loves the rhythmic rise and fall of the boat, the steady beating of wind against canvas, the constant thrumming of taut lines, and the comforting slap of water against wood as much as anyone. Not only that, but he speaks these days, albeit a little. He never did get around to saying “alive” out loud. Before he’d had the chance, he’d succeeded instead in uttering a different, albeit related, word.
Free.
Currently, they’re working on home.
Boyd has resumed his drawing, and Jorgensen recently introduced him to watercolors. Boyd took to them instantly. As of late, his work seems to be undergoing a transformation of sorts, from pure photographic re-creation to something more akin to realistic impressionism. The quality, though, remains every bit as high as before.
That said, the ripples ended at the shore, as ripples have a tendency to do. Capital punishment supporters did, indeed, seize upon Boyd Davies’s exoneration as proof that the system works to protect the innocent. The Commonwealth of Virginia continues to put people to death, as do most of its sister states.
August Jorgensen feels bad about that, and there are even times when he’s forced to acknowledge that Jessica Woodruff and her friends had a rather noble idea. But then he looks across the boat (or the room, or the front seat of the truck) and sees the human being they were ready to sacrifice, and he knows that the end could never have justified the means.
Late fall has come to the barrier island. Leaves are turning, and hordes of raucous migrating birds are stopping over on their long journey southward. On cool mornings, dry breezes drift over an ocean still warmed by the Gulf Stream, magically drawing water up into air and turning it to visible cloud. August Jorgensen is teaching Boyd Davies the word to say when that happens.
Interestingly enough, although no one seems to understand quite why, ample anecdotal evidence tells us that individuals who suffer from autism tend to draw great comfort from the sensation of having physical pressure exerted against their bodies. This phenomenon may explain why, when the offshore breezes die down and the ocean swells flatten out, the worry lines vanish from Boyd Davies’s face, and are replaced by an expression of quiet calm. Jorgensen says nothing then, but he senses it is at such times that the young man has somehow managed to escape the bonds of his affliction and found peace, nestled safely in the enveloping arms of the fog.
Jorgensen worries some about what will happen after he dies, but he also believes that, for the most part, things have a way of working out. Besides which, Edna Coombs has taken quite a liking to Boyd, and Edna’s only seventy-three. And if it should turn out that Edna’s not around, someone else will be. Barrier islands are strange places, their inhabitants few and far apart. But there must be something about being constantly battered and humbled by the sea that teaches folks to look after one another. Perhaps it’s simply a matter of knowing that if they don’t, there’s likely to be no one else around who’s going to.
So Boyd will be okay.
Or as August Lars Jorgensen might put it, “Not to worry.”
Published by New Word City LLC, 2016
www.NewWordCity.com
© Joseph T. Klempner
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher.
ISBN 978-1-61230-955-2