BLIND TRIAL

by Brian Deer

  “Thank you, please. I appreciate your advice. I know what I am doing, thank you, please.”

  She arched her back and heaved against the weight.

  She pushed and pushed. One last push. But no. Her bowels released.

  “Do it now, for chrissake.”

  If she could just get air…

  A hand gripped her leg, then freed it.

  “It must be the arm. Please hold her. Hold her… Good… Good. That’s excellent… Now then.”

  She felt a sting: a stab in her shoulder.

  What was that? What was that? He’d injected her. Injected her.

  She screamed, unheard, into the pillow.

  “That’s it. Don’t worry, don’t worry, Doctor Mayr. I feel certain before long you’ll be grateful.”

  Now the pressure was lightening. The vice was opening. But her arms stayed pinned. And still the pillow.

  “There, there… There, there… Sleep well, Dr. Mayr… Sleep well, dear Trudy… That’s excellent.”

  Her heart thumped. No struggle. The worst was past. Better. The mattress rose like a tide. Then the pillow returned—so soft—beneath her head. She was turning… turning sideways… to the right.

  Her body was turning… That was better, it was passing… She must be having a nightmare, that’s all. She felt cooler, calmer, sleepy, relaxed. A cool cloth dabbing her face.

  “There, there, Trudy, that’s good… That’s good… Aren’t you feeling much better now? Aren’t you?”

  “Look, we gotta move this thing. You sure you got it nailed here?” The other voice, low, far away.

  “Why not count for me, yes? One… two… three… You’re going somewhere better, believe me.”

  She felt light, so light. And relieved. At last. She felt blown, like high-flying cirrus. A wonderful summer’s day, with air so thick, and the swing on the porch a delight.

  “Four… Five… Six… That’s excellent.”

  Mom smiling from the swing, but Trudy had her tree house, high in the arms of a live oak. Tomorrow she’d go scouting, down to Buxton Wood: loblollies, maples, and ironwoods.

  “Nine… Ten… Eleven… Most commendable.”

  Carol could come. They’d drive and drive… Carol’s hair blowing… And laughing.

  People were clapping and murmuring, “Dr. Mayr.” People were calling her doctor. Her mother would be home, and she was feeling so light. A big book opened. Her name was in it.

  Wind rustled yaupon, skittered sand in wax myrtle. Terns and gulls hopped in spent waves.

  She was casting off the ferry, the engine growling, turning across the calm of the inlet.

  Ghost crabs, scuttling… It was dark… It was night… The wind… And again, it was day.

  She was sailing, gliding across Pamlico Sound, sparkling in brilliant sun.

  And now it was fading. The light was retreating. Without sunset. Without orange. To a point.

  She was floating through a tunnel: a barge beneath a bridge.

  Now the light was far away.

  And was gone.

  SUNDAY JULY 27

  Fifty-five

  DAWN. But the chorus was already faltering under a sky turned mockingbird gray. Blue jays perched silent in oak holes and cedar eaves. Titmouses didn’t whistle from dogwoods. Only the common grackles—iridescent, oil-slick black—were unfazed by the prospect of rain.

  On Piedmont Avenue, a dozen-strong flock squabbled on the park’s border lawns. They stabbed damp grass for worms and bugs and peered with snake-yellow eyes. Tschaak-tschaak, they clucked like demons cursing. Tschaak-tschaak… Tschaak-tschaak-tschaak.

  The grackles fluttered, leapfrogging one another, as Ben Louviere stumbled past on the sidewalk. Tschaak-tschaak… What’s this? Tschaak-tschaak… And there was more: a battered gray automobile followed him. It cruised in the wake of the unwary pedestrian, as soft as a stalking cat. It rumbled down the hill from where the big buildings towered. Many grackles had died this way.

  The car slowed, and slowed again, to the pace at which he walked. A window scraped down with a grind. Inside: two females, tired-eyed and nervous. The passenger—a blond girl—waved.

  He pressed his palms together and touched them to his cheek in a movement from prayer to pillow. The females frowned… the window scraped shut… and the car gathered speed to Monroe Drive.

  ALL KINDS of cat crept Ericson Vale. Behind yellow brick walls, red doors, and green awnings lurked Tabbies, Burmese, even a Munchkin. They were all that stirred after sunrise Sunday, save the occasional returning clubber like himself. Below the concrete walkway outside his apartment, the pool lay calm, a can floating on the water. A towel draped forgotten on the fence.

  He paused in the lot and checked his BMW before climbing eighteen steps to the walkway. He passed curtained windows, slipped a key into the deadbolt, and paused to think.

  That’s weird.

  The levers didn’t move: the deadbolt wasn’t locked. Could he have forgotten when he left last night? Was dementia setting in, or had drugs fried his brain? Either way, he was getting pretty slack.

  He pressed a second key into the cylinder lock and pushed. The apartment smelled mountain fresh.

  He kicked shut the door, stumbled to the kitchen, and gulped a tumbler of water. Then he leaned against the stove and gazed at the appliances. Who said he’d never keep this place clean? He untwisted green glow sticks, hooped around his neck, and threw them on the counter.

  Clatter-rapp.

  He pulled open the dishwasher, yanked out a wire tray, and unloaded it of mugs and plates. He stacked them in a cabinet with saucers and egg cups, pushed its door shut.

  And froze.

  Lying on the counter, not a foot from his hand, was a pale blue cardboard package. It was stamped with pictures of brown Swiss rolls and the grinning cartoon face of Little Debbie.

  12 Cake Rolls—Twin Wrapped—Net Wt 13 Oz

  The pack was open and empty.

  Shit. What the fuck? That wasn’t here. Little Debbie products made him puke. Someone had been here. This wasn’t like the deadbolt. He couldn’t have made this mistake.

  And now he rethought. He didn’t make a mistake. He did double lock the front door.

  Somebody had gotten in during his hours at Bluestreak.

  What’s more, they mightn’t have left.

  Something like this happened at Cleveland Avenue. He snagged a burglar: caught him in the act. He came home one afternoon after a canceled lecture and found a guy going through their stuff. The intruder took off, and Ben let him go, but afterward wished he hadn’t. When Luke got back, they did a check on what was missing: eighty-five bucks and a watch.

  He studied the kitchen: nothing else looked suspicious. But kitchens aren’t rooms to burglarize. He felt his blood pounding… Maybe they weren’t thieves… Maybe they’d another agenda. Or maybe they were thieves and dangerous if cornered. This wasn’t a good time to lose your phone.

  Silently, he opened a drawer under the counter and lifted out a nine-inch knife. Then he edged toward the dining area and listened… and listened… but heard only birds on the roof. He crept through the living room and paused beside his bookshelves. He spotted nothing missing or disturbed.

  The curtains were shut against the morning light. But there—something else—on the floor. Right by the window—beside his stone Buddha—he saw a milk carton and cellophane wrappers.

  No question: he was freaked. This was serious shit. A burglar would hardly take time to snack.

  Gently, he retreated, swung open the front door, and propped it back with a stool. If someone was here, they’d be in the bedroom or bathroom. There was no other place to hide.

  He’d brandish the knife, back off slowly, and shout all the way to his car.

  He thumbed the blade’s edge. He’d use it… Do it. Don’t even think… Just do it.

  Then he edged toward the bedroom, right arm forward. He could feel hi
s heart pumping in his fingers.

  At the doorframe, he saw the Gibson… Thank Christ for that… On the floor: red Joe Boxer shorts. He’d bought them months back in a store on North Halsted—but hadn’t worn them lately or left them there.

  He turned sideways to the door and peered past the hinges.

  Nobody stood behind.

  He breathed.

  The bedroom was brighter than the rest of the apartment, with one curtain half open to the walkway. He stepped through the door and—there—by the window, he saw the intruder on the bed.

  He was naked, gym-toned, with cropped brown hair, and lay like a runner mid-sprint. If he wasn’t a couple of years shy of thirty years old, you’d think he was sucking his thumb.

  Around his feet: a tangled sheet. By the bed: a pair of boots—black, Cuban-heeled. Ben had worn them. Beside the boots: a leather bag and a canvass backpack. On the backpack, a shirt: cream, button-down. On the shirt: a fleur-de-lis pattern tie.

  Ben withdrew the knife and laid it on the backpack. The fuck you doing here bro?

  They’d practically had a fist fight Memorial Day weekend about keeping spare keys to the apartment. Luke had refused them, storming out to his Spider. “Seven hundred miles each way?”

  But Ben prevailed. The meaning was the main thing. He wanted Luke to have his keys.

  Fifty-six

  LUKE FELT a bounce, a sheet breeze across him, and a shoulder press against his back. At least Ben wasn’t dead, behind bars in California, or trying to squeeze some lady in between them. Luke exhaled, “What’s up,” heard a mumbled, “Uh-huh,” took several long breaths, and fell asleep.

  When next he woke, it was nearly noon Central, and Ben had wrapped an arm round his waist. Luke rolled over and looked at his friend, who appeared to have been punched in the face. His left eye was stained mauve, yellow, and red. He’d taken one hell of a whack.

  Luke extended a finger and touched Ben’s nose. It felt swollen, maybe a ridge, possibly broken.

  Eyelashes flickered. The window reflected. That familiar blue glistened.

  “I know.”

  Luke rolled away. “So, what’s up buddy?”

  “Not a lot. Welcome to my world.”

  Luke threw back the sheet, vaulted across the room, took a piss in the bathroom, and headed to the kitchen for coffee. He returned with two mugs and set them on the floor, then showered and climbed back into bed.

  “So… What’s going on?”

  “You know you’re still wet?”

  “And there was me thinking I was wet.”

  AT PARKER’S Bagels on Monroe Drive, yellow umbrellas shaded the brunch crowd, where the Chicago pair sipped Americanos. Between them, a table was spread with half-eaten sandwiches, a pair of Maui Jims, and Luke’s Motorola One cellphone.

  “You were saying?” Luke spoke through roast beef and cheddar cheese. “Sorry to miss your call Friday.”

  With mention of the message from the Ukiah gas station, Luke had switched over to quiz mode. Now he’d attempt a cross-examination. He was a motel roach on deception. He often claimed to detect a “change in the light,” or a “smell” he picked up off a lie. And, once he got that, his antennae would twitch, he’d say “So…” and go beetling in.

  “So… The foxy lady. The doc in San Francisco. She slap you when you opened the drapes?”

  “Nah. Klingon thing. Gets me off. And don’t talk with your mouth full. It sucks.”

  Years had passed since he’d tried to snow job Luke. It was better to have him inside the tent. He never got mad except once, way back, when a plate went missing from St. Savior’s. If Luke heard gunfire, caught Ben with a dead woman, a smoking .45, and blood on his face, he’d click with his tongue, step over the corpse, shower, and go to the gym.

  “So… You remember to block your SIM card? Yeah? Or there’s guys getting free calls on your Samsung.”

  Undistracted, Luke would gnaw, triangulate facts, and eventually spit back a narrative. He’d repeat the best parts like a bedroom confidence, or a courtroom summation to the bench. “And so, your honor, my client’s associates killed Ms. Glinski with a lethal injection because, at the time, it appeared to them to be a commercially prudent course of action.”

  But Luke could keep his nose out. He needn’t know the story. This wasn’t cheating at cards.

  Ben gazed at the sky. “Looks like rain coming.”

  “So… You were saying. Henry’s pal.”

  “Fuck you talking about now?”

  “You know what I’m talking about now.”

  Ben watched the traffic on Monroe Drive: turning into the mall or heading south. The afternoon was as gray as the sweatpants on his legs. Luke’s phone said it was raining already. “Wish I knew, to tell you the truth. If there’s a thing called ‘the truth.’ Beginning to wonder about that.”

  “Wonder about what?” Luke wasn’t paying attention. For a moment, he’d flipped to cruise mode. He could do that too: give the impression of showing interest, while his brain had moved on to higher things. Right now, it had moved on to a dark, hairy guy: moody, mid-twenties, facial stubble.

  “So… Everything’s good then with your BerneWerner buddies?”

  “Who knows what’s good? How d’you know what’s good? How d’you know how shit turns out?”

  Ben rose from the table, stepped inside the restaurant, and grabbed a fist of napkins from a box. The hairy guy watched him—sneaky eyes—across the terrace. Luke buried his teeth in beef and cheese.

  Ben returned and snatched the shades. “I mean, how d’you know what’s good and what’s bad, if you don’t know how it all turns out?”

  “I’m wearing those.”

  “I mean, you take Tricky Dicky Nixon. Nineteen sixty. Like, he whacks his knee on a car door when he’s running for president, right? Been in the hospital, debates JFK, looks crap, sweating and everything on TV, and so he loses. How the fuck you work out how the world would be today if he’d gotten out the other side of the car?”

  “Was a crook, whatever side.”

  “Yeah, well what’s a crook?”

  “Perpetrator of crime.”

  “Yeah, well what about the cause of crime?”

  Luke took back the sunglasses and hooked them on his vest. “What about it?”

  “The cause of crime is injustice.”

  “Hold on. I’ll write that down. The cause of crime is injustice. Might try it in a reckless homicide.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe you should. All I’m saying’s, if you don’t know where shit’s heading, and you don’t know where it’s come from, how the fuck you know the right thing from the wrong thing?”

  Luke watched the hairy guy stroll to his car. “No, look, you got it the wrong way round. You start out knowing the right thing from the wrong thing. Like walking fifty miles in some desert. You gotta get it right on the first steps, or you’re gonna find yourself going so way off behind the sand dunes you’ll end up blowing camels.”

  “Pertinent image.”

  “All I’m saying’s, is something funny going down here? Something to do with that Hoffman guy and Henry Louviere? Just tell me. Get it the fuck over with. Please don’t go to jail. You owe me money.”

  BACK AT THE apartment, Ben tuned the Gibson while Luke switched outfits to the DePaul & Furbeck T-shirt with blue surf shorts before heading downstairs to the pool.

  At the sound of the first splash, Ben quit guitar and dug into a pile of cartons in the bedroom. They were stacked in a corner with bags he hadn’t opened since he brought them down Memorial Day. He rooted among stuff he’d known he’d never need: an old catcher’s mitt, a bag of glass marbles, a set of Cartoon Network wobbleheads.

  Then—there—he found it: a Mead composition book, wrapped in crumpled clear plastic. It bulged with clippings—Xeroxes and printouts—held together in a cross of rubber bands.

  He’d found the originals twelve years back, hidden among his
mother’s personal stuff. At the time, she worked nights on an acute ward at Memorial, leaving him home, alone, and on a mission. Like previous expeditions, he turned the house over: closets, drawers, cookie cans, and shoe boxes. He snooped in spare purses and postmarked envelopes.

  Then he found a cereal carton full of papers.

  Their letters, he didn’t touch, except to see they were love letters. Today, he’d probably read every one. But what he did read—and much later copy—were a bunch of raw clippings from his father’s first trial: the full folded pages and headlines. That was the big one—in the United States court—producing twenty-five Trib and Sun-Times stories.

  Now he removed the rubber bands, took out the papers, and unfolded them flat on his knees: front pages, double-pages, columnists, readers’ letters. Exactly as sold on the streets.

  Here was the event before the later state conviction that WGN cranked up like Watergate. He remembered their special feature, with its slo-mo perp walk. But this first trial, in federal court, had so freaked him out that, on the night he found the clippings, he cried and cried, before running to the Ronsons to sleep over.

  The first was from the opening, across five deep columns, heralding a major occasion.

  FBI TAPES WILL STAR IN FORBES, LOUVIERE TRIAL

  He looked at the lead again.

  The trial of Circuit Judge Frank L. Forbes and downtown attorney Henry Louviere is due to open Monday after a seven-woman, five-man jury was selected Friday in federal court. Forbes and Louviere are accused of taking and giving bribes to fix hearings in Cook County Chancery Court.

  There was a picture of his father like an Atlantic City pimp. The text was ingrained in Ben’s head. Henry was accused of paying the judge two thirty-five-hundred-dollar bribes for restraint orders in commercial disputes. But what neither man knew was that both petitioners and defendants were government agents running a sting.

  LOUVIERE ON FORBES: “BEST JUDGE MONEY CAN BUY”

  Assistant US Atty Sandra Rawlings, prosecuting the case with First Assistant US Atty Brendan FitzGerald, said the case against Forbes and Louviere would take jurors into “a seedy world of corruption where a judge dispensed decisions not by who persuaded him, but who paid him.”