Then the light blinked as the lights in a theater calling back the audience. She stood and took his hands in hers.
“Time to go,” she said with an ancient smile that came as no surprise.
She turned and walked down to the surf, this time without him. He stood up and waved but she didn’t turn around again. She walked directly into the surf, into the crash of the waves, and disappeared.
He waited and waited but she was gone and the light was trailing away as he swam to the surface of his—
“The Clerk called! Thaddeus, wake up.”
Sleep! He commanded himself. She might return. Don’t move!
“Thaddeus, are you going to wake up? Judge Hoover says the jury has a question.”
58
They had sent out a handwritten note. The judge read it to the lawyers and Dr. Sewell: “Can we find Attorney Wang and Jack Middleton CPA guilty of theft?”
Judge Hoover looked across his office desk at the lawyers. “Well?”
Thaddeus wasted no time. “I say give them a ‘yes.’”
“Funny man,” said Sanders. “The question requires a ‘no,’ of course, Your Honor.”
“Agree,” said Judge Hoover. “And there was a second question. More of a request, actually.”
He looked at his visitors. Then he shook his head. “They have asked for a copy of Dr. Sewell’s book, The Doctor Is In…Heaven.”
“I see no harm in them having the book,” Thaddeus immediately said. “Maybe they want to compare Dr. Sewell’s medical records in the back of his book with the medical records of Nadia Turkenov. No harm in that.”
Sanders violently shook his head. “No, no, no! The book isn’t in evidence. It would be gross error to provide it to them during deliberations.”
Thaddeus continued, “But you made such a big deal out of Dr. Sewell’s illness compared to Nadia’s illness. Now they want to follow up on your comparison. It might be error but it’s harmless error. And it’s helpful error.”
“Show my continuing objection,” Sanders said. “My strong objection.”
“I wasn’t going to provide it,” said the judge. “But I am required to provide any such communication from the jury, to you. It might indicate to you this would be a good time to enter into a plea agreement.”
“Voluntary manslaughter,” Sanders immediately said. “No less.”
“Complete dismissal of the charges and we’ll agree not to sue the D.A.’s office for malicious prosecution,” Thaddeus shot back.
The judge sighed. “So. We’re that far apart, are we? Then I’ll send a ‘No’ to the jury on both questions. That’s all for now, gentlemen. Thank you for coming in.”
The attorneys and Dr. Sewell trudged back into the courtroom and took the chairs along the rail, the padded ones. Thaddeus crossed his ankle over his knee and began keeping time to an interior melody with his foot. Shep sat beside him, poking his smartphone over and over. Dr. Sewell was on his other side, looking exhausted and shell-shocked and wondering when it would all be over with. His own cell phone erupted with the Grateful Dead’s “Touch of Grey,” and he answered it. “No, we’re still waiting. All right, honey. I will.”
At 4:45 the bailiff strode into the courtroom. “We have a verdict,” he announced.
Judge Hoover, again robed up, took his seat on the bench and nodded at the bailiff. The bailiff went down the hall and retrieved the jury. They followed him back into the courtroom and took their places in the jury box.
“Ladies and gentlemen, have you reached a verdict?”
The computer programmer spoke up, “Yes, we have, Your Honor.”
“Please pass the form of verdict to the bailiff.”
The paper changed hands and the bailiff held it up to the judge, who read it once through.
“Very well. Is this your verdict, ladies and gentlemen?”
They all answered affirmatively.
“Very well. The clerk will read the verdict.”
The clerk took the verdict in hand and read, “We, the jury duly impaneled in the case of State of Arizona vs. Emerick Sewell do find the defendant not guilty. Signed, Mona Harwick, Foreperson.”
The defense table immediately erupted in handshakes and whispered congratulations. Dr. Sewell threw his head back and silently mouthed words at the ceiling. Then he whipped out his cell phone and began punching numbers.
“We’re in recess,” said the judge, and he thanked and excused the jury.
* * *
Christine had flown in six days ago, and the next day the two adults and four children had taken Katy’s ashes to the mountain and the ceremony was held and words said and the ashes spread. Thaddeus remembered all of it as he drove home to the ranch that night. As his windshield wipers swatted at the falling snow, he remembered the dream. The little girl and the sand and the ocean. A chill ran down his spine, a good chill. “Thanks, Biscuit,” he said in the dark cab of the Ram.
* * *
Dr. Sewell went home to San Diego, “A free man for the second time in my life,” he told anyone who asked. He was writing a new book, one about his most cherished conversations in heaven. His publisher was frantic for the new volume, since the finding of not guilty had spurred a hundred thousand new orders for the original title. The Doctor Is In…Heaven was number one on the best-seller lists and looked to remain there for weeks if not months to come. His dream of touching others with his journey had come true.
Shep went back to his office and purchased 160 acres that joined his ranch on the north side. New cattle would soon take over the grassy slopes and the project would enlarge and become the dream he had always envisioned.
District Attorney Sanders, all but crippled from his rodeo days, walked clumsily around his office and stared out his window at the cloudy, snow-heavy skies. He was intent on prosecuting the three conservators and Milbanks Wang. Herbert Constance, the lead detective, was putting together the case, while each of the four defendants hurried up to say they would testify against the other three in return for grants of immunity. Sanders was angry but wasn’t carrying a grudge. He was too professional for grudges. But he fully intended to see all four of the Four Horsemen of the CD’s (his name for them) do some time in jail for their theft. “It’s a dream case,” he told everyone. “They might as well start packing.”
* * *
On Friday, Thaddeus finished up in the office just before noon. Christine drove in from the ranch, where she was staying, helping the smaller children adjust. Together they walked down to Kathy’s Kafe for lunch. As they strolled along on the snow, Christine passed her hand into Thaddeus’ hand and gave it a squeeze. Then she withdrew it.
“You’re all going to be fine,” she said.
It was snowing again, the sun was hidden, and the girl was a memory from a dream.
He shivered hard and hot tears burned his eyes. They stopped at the red light and he swiped a backhand across his face.
“What?”
“Beeswax,” he said.
She slipped her hand beneath his arm and kept it there.
Across the street they went and then up over the curb.
At the sidewalk sign with the damask rose, they stepped inside the cafe.
Christine smiled and Thaddeus looked at her.
She shook her head. “Nothing.”
They ordered and passed the bound menus back to the waitress.
Thaddeus ran his hands up and down his face. “Hey,” he said, “remember that meadow a week ago? Where we spread her ashes?”
“Sure.”
He blurted it out, unable to keep it inside any longer.
“Here’s the deal. She told me I should go there with you in six months and marry you. But she told me not to tell you.”
Christine leaned forward and took his hands in hers.
“You didn’t,” she said. “She told me the exact same thing.”
“Is the jury still out?”
“No, the jury’s back.”
“And you’r
e still here.”
“I’m still here.”
THE END
Also by John Ellsworth
THADDEUS MURFEE SERIES
The Defendants
Beyond a Reasonable Death
Attorney at Large
Chase, the Bad Baby
Defending Turquoise
The Mental Case
Unspeakable Prayers
The Girl Who Wrote The New York Times Bestseller
The Trial Lawyer (A Small Death)
SISTERS IN LAW SERIES
Frat Party: Sisters In Law (June 2015)
Hellfire: Sisters In Law (July 2015)
MICHAEL GRESHAM SERIES
Michael Gresham (Coming February 2016)
Afterword
My sources are Stuart Hameroff, M.D., of the University of Arizona School of Medicine, who posits the ORCH-OR theory of human consciousness, with the incredible collaboration of Roger Penrose of Oxford. That would be the Roger Penrose, the one who received the 1988 Wolf Prize for physics, which he shared with Stephen Hawking for their contribution to our understanding of the universe. If you have an interest in this stuff, suggest a jumping off place for you might be YouTube’s video interviews with Stuart Hameroff, a series of five or six thirty minute interviews that will bring you up to speed.
The scientific method and the legal method of our judicial system have much in common. No assumptions, testing of veracity, and eventual laws that will emerge because they overwhelm us with their truth.
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— John Ellsworth (Baja California 2015)
Copyright © 2015 by John Ellsworth
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—John Ellsworth
The Near Death Experience (Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thriller Series Book 10) Page 29