Maybe, as well, it influenced her choice of genre for her novel, though deeper factors were at play: her father was a mortician, and both he and her mother drowned in a float-plane accident when I was seven. (Birth of a neurosis. You were expecting something more tangled and obscure?)
Victoria greeted me with a hug. At fifty-two, she seems even more striking than in her youth: tall, slender, black hair streaked with white falling to her waist. Expressive eyes that don’t always let strangers know she’s teasing. She still smokes, against my advice.
She printed out her latest obit and asked me to critique it. Until his brief ailment brought his heart to its final pause, Pops, as he was fondly called by relatives and friends, remained an avid gardener, whose roses were the envy of his neighbourhood. I told her I was reminded of Emily Dickinson.
Sitting beside her printer was a pile of manuscript. Victoria is hoping this new novel will sell more than the thousand hard-covers of her first effort. When Comes the Darkness didn’t make it into paperback.
Over corn soup and garlic prawns we talked about Sally, whom Victoria has known for nearly three decades, having replaced, in part, the mother Sally lost in childhood. They remain pals and share secrets. Sally had come by the day before, Victoria said, but they didn’t talk much about our separation.
“I didn’t press her, we hardly raised it. My attitude was: If she wants to vent, I’m all ears and sympathy. But we talked about Europe and about my inexpressibly revolting trial.”
“Yes, and did she mention any male friends she might be seeing?”
“I don’t think she’s ready for that.”
“It might take a little time – is that what you’re saying?”
“Honey, this is just a hiccup. She needs a break from you – she’s an artist, it’s hard to be creative when someone is pinging off the walls. You’re too wrapped up in the drama of all your incessant emotional crises. It would help if you somehow restructured your life a bit, got your act together.” Victoria is an expressive talker, her hands active, emphasizing points with chopsticks.
“I am getting my act together. I’m seeing a shrink. Allison Epstein, who wants to dig into my childhood. That involves you.”
“It’s always the mother, isn’t it? There’s a whole industry out there blaming mothers. I’ve no doubt she’s a part of it.”
I was perplexed that she was so defensive. Was she afraid of stirring up the working-mother guilt that has always oppressed her? I was a latch-key kid, and somehow she blames herself for all the time we couldn’t spend together.
Victoria abruptly changed the subject: she had her own crisis, her libel trial. She was set upon my coming to court, to meet with her lawyer, to help him get a handle on Mr. Huff.
The lawyer, John Brovak, is from the bull-in-a-china-shop school of litigation. Notorious for his lack of subtlety, he’s reputed to have once mooned a judge in open court. I’d recommended against hiring him, insisting she didn’t need a lawyer – her publishers are represented by a respected Queen’s Counsel. Her response: “I want a good old-fashioned brawler in my corner. I want someone with oversized testicles to take on the evil dwarf.”
She was needled at the Q.C. for having proposed a nuisance settlement of thirty thousand dollars – ten times the advance she got for the book. She wants vindication. It is only a coincidence that the fictitious Clint Huff has a living counterpart who also happens to be mayor of a small town. She’d picked the name at whim – it had a rural, good-old-boy flavour.
In the novel, Mayor Huff commits ritualized, sadistic murders, and the real Huff has been on television, taking such vigorous umbrage that one might conclude he’s revelling over his time in the spotlight. He is quite eccentric, though not without intelligence – apparently he is a capable English teacher. Adding to the weight of his claim is that he physically resembles the short, stocky, bespectacled killer in the book.
The non-jury trial, at the New Westminster courthouse, has been assigned to Judge Betty Lafferty, who, when in practice, had a history of defending the downtrodden. It is feared that she might favour the mayor of Jackson Cove over the well-heeled defendant publisher. Clinton Huff has no Q.C. in his corner; he is, in fact, representing himself, and not well. His try for an injunction against distribution of When Comes the Darkness has been thrown out; the book is still in the stores.
When I arrived by taxi, early, I found John Brovak outside the courts by the stern-faced sculpture of Sir Matthew Baillie Begbie, an infamous nineteenth-century hanging judge. (He is recorded as once having told a jury they should be hanged for bringing in a wrong verdict.) Begbie was clutching a pipe, Brovak a cigar. He is in his late forties, tall and burly, with a nose that has seen repair work, unkempt even in his black barrister’s robe, looking as if he’d hurriedly dressed for Halloween.
“Huff’s a fruitcake, Tim, active in the Libertarian Party, which attracts oddballs like flies to shit. His hobby is suing the government.” He showed me a file. “Look at this, the guy refused to fill in a census form, and he took it to the appeal court.”
There were other legal challenges in the file: to the firearm registry law, to various acts and bylaws. Judges had rejected his suits in peremptory fashion, often with one-paragraph decisions. There seemed sufficient evidence for a preliminary diagnosis of compulsive litigious disorder.
“You’ll thank me for bringing you here, pal, you’ll have a couch doctor’s field day. He’s got his own Web site. You want more information about how to challenge the government, log on to FreedomFirstForever.net.”
“I don’t want him to know I’m on a watching brief. Don’t announce me.”
Brovak told me that Huff was in the second-floor corridor, could be easily identified by the leather elbow patches. “He looks friendless – I don’t think there was a big turnout from Jackson Cove. Can you imagine those fucking suits – offering him thirty grand.”
I left Brovak to his cigar and made my way upstairs. Milling about near the courtroom were a small assemblage of the curious and a few reporters. The man I took to be Clinton Huff was wearing a checked sports jacket of a cut popular in the 1970s and was gazing solemnly at a larger-than-life print of a bejewelled Queen Elizabeth II and her consort. Huff is about fifty, balding, no moustache to compensate – instead, a flared structure of trimmed beard on chin and jowls. It makes him look leprechaunish.
As I walked past him, he turned my way and for some reason began to gape at me with a puzzled intensity, as if I were the last person on earth he expected to see on the second floor of the New Westminster Courthouse. I’ve had no previous connection with this man, so assumed he’d mistaken me for someone else. I was dressed too casually for him to think I was but an interested spectator.
Finally, he approached. “Excuse me, would you happen to be consanguine with anyone in Jackson Cove? “ A precise, formal manner of speaking.
“Consanguine?” His use of the word startled me.
“It means related to.”
“I don’t believe so.”
“Forgive my presumption.”
I would have pursued the matter but court was assembling, and this odd conversation was aborted.
In the spacious oak-panelled room, I found a seat on the front row with a view in profile, at the far side of the counsel table, of Sanford Whitaker, Q.C., grey-templed and lean, an affected expression of boredom – letting us know this case is almost beneath his dignity. Victoria was behind him, as were two representatives of her publishing house, New Millennium Press.
Clinton Huff sat not far from me, at the near end of the counsel table, a determined set to his face as he neatly arranged a formidable array of legal texts.
Judge Betty Lafferty, a pleasant, unaffected woman in her mid-forties, caught my eye as she surveyed the room and smiled. That caused Huff to turn in my direction, with a look of curiosity if not suspicion.
Brovak was the last major actor to arrive, striding down the aisle with his briefcase, swinging it up on the
table directly beside the mayor, crowding him. This brought about the first tussle of the day, as Huff asked, “Is this not the plaintiff’s side of the table?” Brovak merely responded with a grunt as he sat and brought out his files. The strategy was to be close and intimidating.
Huff rose to complain that this invasion of his territory was unfair. Lafferty listened politely, then just as politely urged Brovak to offer Huff more elbow room. “I think you should extend the courtesy, Mr. Brovak. It’s a small request, and he’s not represented.”
Brovak moved his kit a few feet, positioning himself almost in front of me. “Okay, but fair warning – just because he hasn’t got a lawyer, I’m not going to treat him with kid gloves.”
“I would never expect that of you, Mr. Brovak. However, I intend this to be a fair hearing.”
“Well, that’s good, if I take it you’re inferring that the court won’t be bending over backwards for any individual here.”
Huff wasn’t cowed. “I think implying is the verb the learned counsel was seeking. My Lady, I’m well able to represent myself. I not only teach English, I can read English – as well as any lawyer, and perhaps better than many. The sum and substance of this trial is what is in a book.”
“Let us hope it will be as simple as that,” said Judge Lafferty. “Do you have an opening statement?”
“Yes, it is my position that the defendants were at worst malignantly purposeful and at best criminally negligent in incorporating me into a horror novel. I have several authorities here that speak of a duty of care in defamation cases.”
Lafferty’s eyes widened, perhaps in alarm, as he opened one of his texts. “This isn’t the time to make argument, Mr. Huff. We have to hear the evidence first.”
Brovak twisted toward me and said in a stage whisper, “This is right out of Alice in Wonderland.” Huff turned and caught Brovak, still facing me, point a finger to his head and twirl it.
“My Lady, before I continue, as a point of procedure, can I have the man identified with whom my learned friend was sharing a jest?”
Lafferty puzzled over the request for a moment. “That gentleman is Dr. Timothy Dare.”
“And what, pray, does he do?”
“He is a psychiatrist. I believe he’s also the son of the defendant, Victoria Dare.”
I presume Huff’s researches had told him something about me, though obviously he hadn’t seen my photograph. He seemed startled.
“A psychiatrist … yes. I note he isn’t sitting with his mother, and I would appreciate knowing if he’s here for any other purpose.”
“Mr. Huff, I think you should get on with your case.”
“The Rules of the Supreme Court state that I’ve a right to know who the opposite party’s witnesses are.” Clearly, he had primed himself in the law.
Lafferty’s politeness toward the plaintiff may have provoked this bluntness from Brovak: “Well, if you want to know, Mr. Huff, he’s here to analyze you from a mental point of view.”
Sanford Whitaker, Q.C., grimaced. Clinton Huff seemed indignant.
“I haven’t decided yet whether to call him as a witness,” Brovak said. “Right now, he’s just here to watch you.”
Victoria smiled at me and gave a triumphant nod.
Again, Huff was prompted to call his evidence. He glanced at me, then passed to the clerk a hardbound copy of When Comes the Darkness. “This is Exhibit One, and an audited statement from New Millennium for their last financial year will be Exhibit Two.” The combination of Brovak’s effrontery and my mere presence was having an effect: Huff’s voice was strained, his facial musculature tight. “I call as my first witness: me, Clinton W. Huff.”
He was facing me as he took the oath but avoided my eyes. “May I commence by pointing out I’ve been a secondary-school teacher for twenty years and have been twice elected mayor of Jackson Cove. In both capacities, and particularly among a number of students, I have been the subject of ridicule since this book was published. I will now read some of the iniquitous passages. May I see Exhibit One?”
He turned to a bookmarked page and cleared his throat. “‘Clint liked what he saw beaming back at him from the mirror. Yes, he was a jolly, suspender-slapping, beer-swigging, clap-on-the-shoulder kind of guy, well liked by the folks of Bogg Inlet’ – note the use of the proper noun, as in Jackson Cove, as well as the maritime connotation – ‘five years an alderman’ – in my case it was also five – ‘and now, after four failed elections, mayor.’ I won on my third try and have been re-elected.”
He saw me jotting notes on the back of an envelope and went into a throat-clearing stall. “Fourth try, if one were to count the federal election in which I ran. Excuse me, my Lady, but must Dr. Dare stare at me so rudely?”
“Try to ignore him, Mr. Huff.”
“Yes. Page twenty-seven. ‘Clint had a special date tonight’ – and by the way I, too, am a bachelor – ‘so he figured he’d put on one of his good suits, the one with the bold check’ – I happen to own such a suit. And farther down, ‘He always liked to smell good on his dates, so he slavered his face’ – I suspect slather is the correct word, even for this colloquial manner of composition – ‘with his favourite cologne, Chanel pour l’Homme, before going downstairs. When he put his ear to the trapdoor he could hear the woman wailing. “Don’t worry, my dear,” he called. “I’m coming.” ‘ I have a trapdoor in my house that leads to a root cellar.”
Huff carried on gamely, with frequent stops for water, reading these passages to a courtroom silent but for the soft thump of keys on the court reporter’s steno machine. From time to time, he’d flick a look my way. At one point, Brovak, sensing the curious energy flow between me and the plaintiff, pretended to confer with me, causing Huff to lose his place in the text. When he ran out of coincidences, he recited a bloodcurdling scene, a rape victim choked to death with a wire cord. He finally stalled when a spectator made a noisy exit from the gallery.
“You don’t need to read the whole book, Mr. Huff,” said Lafferty.
“This material goes to the issue of punitive damages. The Clint Huff pictured here isn’t merely a disreputable character, he is a sadistic monster. He obtains sexual release through murdering innocent women. Even the school principal asked me – thinking it was quite a joke – if I would be playing the part in the movie.”
“Well, that’s just it,” said Brovak, rising. “People who know you think it’s all a joke. No one takes it as intentional. No one sees you as a sadistic monster.”
“I was subjected to malicious gossip and humiliation. For Christmas my class gave me a bottle of Chanel pour l’Homme.”
Brovak boldly carried on, though he hadn’t been called upon to do so. “Where is Jackson Cove, Mr. Huff?”
“Do you want to answer counsel’s questions now?” the judge asked.
“Yes. I’ve nothing to hide. Jackson Cove is in the West Kootenays, on the shore of Arrow Lake.”
“How many people live there? “ Brovak asked.
“Three thousand, four hundred and fifteen.”
“And do any of these good folk think you’re a serial killer?”
“I would submit that the test is whether one is held out to opprobrium and ridicule.”
“Yeah, there was so much ridicule you were re-elected mayor two Novembers ago – after the book came out.”
“Yes, but in the meantime, someone went around stencilling Wanted on my posters. It was ignominious.”
“I’ll give you another big word, Mr. Huff.” Brovak emphasized each syllable: “Coincidence.”
“Of course the defendants will fall back on that, but they were, at the very least, grossly negligent in not doing a name search.”
“They’re supposed to call every town in North America to see if there’s a Clinton Huff in it?”
“I am not unknown. I ran as an independent in a federal election. My name was in the newspapers, on television – not often, but a few times during the campaign. My photograph was shown on
the CTV network, and the Nelson News did a feature article on me.”
Here was a man who’d never achieved the level of importance he felt was his due. But I felt something deeper was at work – his anxiety about psychiatrists argued that he kept secrets he didn’t want revealed. I noted how orderly were his files and binders and papers, two pens and three sharpened pencils lined in a perfect row. The language of tongue and body, as well, was marked by the rigidity of the obsessive-compulsive personality. I wrote on my envelope: Neurotic camouflage? Fetish? Hiding shameful ritual? I wasn’t expecting the effect this had on Huff.
“My Lady, may I be permitted to see what Dr. Dare is writing?”
“No, Mr. Huff.” Lafferty’s patience was finally waning.
“The Supreme Court Rules state that I have a right of discovery of all written material.”
By this time I was feeling sorry for Huff, but paramount was my concern for my mother. If there was merit in the negligence argument, was she at risk? As a layperson, I wasn’t sure. So while the judge was explaining the law of discovery to Huff, I conferred with Brovak, suggesting a line of attack.
Thus armed, he began softly. “Mr. Huff, have you ever met Victoria Dare?”
“No.”
“Are you aware of any reason – like maybe she never studied every loser’s name in the election results – that she might know your name?”
“I’m not privy to what she knows.”
“Well, Mr. Huff, Victoria Dare never heard of you. And you know what, I never heard of you. Nobody in this courtroom ever heard of you. In fact, I don’t think anyone outside Jackson Cove has heard of you.”
Huff’s voice broke. “Who do you think you are, impugning my name? I am a respectable person. I demand a little consideration!”
He might have been admonishing some miscreant in class. He was close to unravelling, and Lafferty must have seen this too, for she ordered the mid-morning break. Huff almost stumbled from the witness box.
The gallery slowly cleared, and Victoria signalled me to join her outside, pantomiming puffing a cigarette. I was about to join her but had a premonition Huff was standing nearby – perhaps it was his body heat, the smell of anxiety. I turned to find him staring at the note I had jotted: Neurotic camouflage? Fetish? Hiding shameful ritual?
Mind Games Page 5