Degree of Guilt (35 page)

Moore looked curious. ‘Why is that?’

The wind shifted, rippling Terri’s hair. She leaned back, gazing at the sailboat that cut across her line of vision. ‘Because like any judge,’ she answered, ‘Caroline is a real person, with real opinions. Her personal life is an enigma, but her personal
beliefs
aren’t: if you’d taken off her robe and introduced her to Mark Ransom, she’d have told him to go fuck himself. And she used to be a defense lawyer. You can make yourself a judge – and Caroline’s a good one – but you can’t make yourself a whole different person.’

Moore nodded. ‘But you can,’ he ventured, ‘make yourself a
Superior
Court judge.’

‘Or, even better, an
appellate
judge.’ Terri paused. ‘Everyone at the P.D.’s office knew
that
was Caroline’s goal. At some point, the politics of letting Mary off are going to cross her mind. Depending, of course, on how Mary looks on the stand. And, Chris tells me, on the publicity Mary intends to generate.’

Moore frowned again. ‘Before we leave Judge Masters’s more human qualities, there’s something else about her.’ Moore glanced over at Terri. ‘Perhaps it’s just that she’s so determined to be in charge, and therefore a sexist reaction on my part, but I’ve the funny sense that Judge Masters may not like men much. Of which variety our friend Christopher is undubitably one.’

‘And so was Mark Ransom.’ Terri paused, intent on showing Johnny that at least they had thought this through. ‘Chris and I parsed this until, as he put it, we felt like a couple of soothsayers reading the entrails of a goat. Because she’s a woman who’s new on the bench, Caroline is very sensitive on the issue of bias, both other people’s and her own. She strives not only to
be
fair but to
look
fair. What I can’t tell you is how that cuts. Will she bend over backward not to show favoritism to the female defendant, or to the female prosecutor? It’s probably a wash.

‘Anyhow, I’m not sure that Chris and Caroline won’t have better chemistry than Caroline and Marnie Sharpe. Caroline likes to be on the cutting edge of the law, and she admires creativity almost as much as she does intellect.’ Terri smiled over at Paget. ‘For sheer creativity, what Chris did yesterday is hard to beat. In her own way, Caroline seemed almost grateful.’

Moore pondered that. ‘You seem to have put Judge Masters through everything but a Rorschach test.’

‘It’s the trial lawyer’s favorite game,’ Paget observed. ‘Psychoanalyzing the judge. I’ve been wrong so many times that I figured it was Terri’s turn.’

Moore studied him. ‘Now that you have Caroline Masters, you must also have a plan to impress her.’

Annoyance crossed Paget’s face; it was a sign, Terri knew, of how worried he was. ‘Eat your sandwich,’ Paget answered, ‘while I try to figure out some way to keep your excitement under control.’

For a while, they fell quiet. Terri sat between Paget and Johnny, eating her lunch, content. The water lapped at the boat. In the distance, the city looked like a dream.

‘It would be a lovely world,’ Moore observed at length, ‘if life were as gentle as this.’

Paget nodded, silent. For an instant, Terri imagined she read his thoughts: I hope Carlo’s will be. Idly, he tore the crust of his sandwich into bread crumbs, lobbed a couple to the sea gulls. Finally, he said, ‘At least let’s try to make the world safe for Mary Carelli, shall we?’

Moore turned to Paget, face troubled again. ‘Let’s hear it, then.’

‘To start, our defense is an evidentiary nightmare.’ Paget leaned back again. ‘We all know what rings true about Mary’s story – something between Mark Ransom and women was very badly wrong. That’s what this whole obsession with Laura Chase suggests and what, in their different ways, Melissa Rappaport and Lindsay Caldwell made clear to Terri. To me, they help make Mary’s version of Ransom credible. The problem is that – as the law now stands – Judge Masters isn’t likely to let them testify before the jury.’ Paget paused. ‘If that’s true, then what happened to Rappaport and Caldwell will be like the proverbial tree falling in the woods: in the jury room, Rappaport and Caldwell won’t exist.’

Moore thought for a moment. ‘But they’ll exist for Caroline Masters.’

‘One hopes.’ Paget tossed another bread crumb, watched a gull scoop down to skim it off the water. ‘If Terri can persuade them, we ask Rappaport and Caldwell to tell their stories. Sharpe will insist that the judge hear them first in chambers, so that she can argue that their testimony should be excluded. Should Judge Masters decide against us, neither woman will have to face the ordeal of public testimony. But while the judge may erase them from the hearing, there’s no way that she can erase them from her mind. And it’s Masters who decides whether this case goes to trial.’

Moore examined him. ‘You’re going to need more than that.’

‘I know, I know, but it’s at least a start.’ Paget paused again. ‘Even the smartest of judges likes to appear evenhanded. If Masters turns us down on Rappaport and Caldwell, we’ll ask her to split the baby. Specifically, to rule that Mary’s tape is inadmissible, and to order that any misuse of the information therein will result in the dismissal of the case. And if
that
doesn’t work, there’s the tape of Laura Chase. I don’t want to reveal it now, if for no other reason than because it would look so gratuitous. But in chambers I’ll insist that the Laura Chase tape is at least as relevant as Mary’s tape – given that it’s part of Mark Ransom’s sexual pathology – and ask that it be played in open court. The Colt family notwithstanding.’

Moore gave a low whistle. ‘All that,’ he said, ‘would make Sharpe
very
angry.’

‘Yes. I’m counting on her.’

A gull swooped, capturing a bread crumb without breaking the speed of its flight. Moore watched it rise again, as if toward the sun, and then turned to Terri. ‘I thought the idea was not to engage Sharpe’s pride.’

‘This is
my
call,’ Paget cut in. ‘Not Terri’s. For whatever reason, Marnie Sharpe disliked me on sight. Perhaps for my own sake, perhaps because she thinks I’m helping Mary rip off the rape issue for her own self-preservation. That means that charming her is hopeless, but it also means that she’s carrying around some psychic baggage. My guess is that if I’m careful about how I do it, I can goad her into a mistake.’ Paget turned to Moore. ‘The only advantage I have over Marnie is that, smart as she is, I’m some sort of symbol to her. Whereas to me, she’s simply a technical problem. Like quantum mechanics.’

Moore hesitated. ‘If goading Sharpe is a positive benefit,’ he said finally, ‘then you’re off to a flying start. Or so it appeared from the peanut gallery.’

Paget seemed to contemplate the whiteness of the city; in the distance, the afternoon sun made its buildings shimmer with light. ‘I understand that it’s risky,’ he answered. ‘But we don’t have many cards. At the least, we’ll find out before trial just how good Sharpe really is. And in a hearing like this, without a jury, my lack of recent practice in trying homicide cases should hurt a little less.’

Moore gazed out to the city. ‘What happens,’ he asked finally, ‘if Judge Masters goes along with you? Suppose she rules “no probable cause.” Can’t the D.A. just dig up more evidence, satisfy probable cause, and take Mary to trial then?’

‘It depends. If the prosecutor fails for lack of evidence, they can refile if they come up with new facts. The tape, for example.’ Paget sipped his mineral water. ‘But until and unless they do that, Mary walks. Forever.’

‘You’re taking a pretty serious chance, it seems.’ Moore looked from Paget to Terri and back again. ‘If this strategy is so inspired, why don’t real defense lawyers use it?’

Paget smiled faintly. ‘Because they know better.’

‘You make it
sound
good enough.’

Paget turned to him. ‘What it is, Johnny, is a terrible risk; Caroline Masters saw right away how desperate we are, no matter what face I put on it. Masters hit the nail – probable cause is far too easy to make out, and if I lose, we’ll have previewed our case so thoroughly that Sharpe will crucify us when it comes to jury time. And on the evidence that now exists, I lose.’

Moore seemed to squint. ‘Am I correct in assuming that the purpose of this little outing is to make me feel the heat?’

‘Of course.’

‘In other words,’ Moore said slowly, ‘you need a real live act of rape. Within the next two weeks, no facsimiles accepted.’

Paget nodded. ‘Sometime, somewhere, Ransom has to have crossed the line. The problem is that women don’t report these things.’

Moore turned to Terri. ‘Do you agree with that?’

Terri gazed at her feet. ‘Yes. I do.’

‘Then all I can do,’ Moore said, ‘is try.’

For another moment, they were silent. ‘I’m sorry to be so bald about it,’ Paget offered in half apology, ‘but I need to give Judge Masters something to hang her psychic hat on when she’s thinking about Rappaport and Caldwell, whose testimony she may never acknowledge and whom the press may never see. If I can, maybe we win. If not, Mary loses.’

And you, Terri thought. And, more important to you, Carlo. Once more, she admired Paget’s stoicism and felt his fear.

Moore was looking at her. After a time, he asked, ‘Would you consider going on television?’

Interrupted from thought, Terri felt confused. ‘To do what?’

‘To ask for witnesses.’ Moore hesitated. ‘Try as men may, I suppose something like this strikes a chord in women that we simply can’t replicate.
You
obviously feel it.’

‘I still don’t follow.’

Moore shrugged. ‘Perhaps it’s a bad idea. I just wondered if some appeal for information about Mark Ransom, perhaps on CNN, might scare up a witness. A request for help from women, by a woman lawyer, on behalf of a woman defendant.’ He glanced over at Paget. ‘Is that insane?’

Paget, Terri realized, had been looking at her for some moments. ‘I hadn’t thought of it,’ he said. ‘It’s hard enough to ask something so intimate of someone sitting right in front of you – which Terri’s done so well – let alone of an audience of women you can’t even see. We’d likely learn nothing, and look desperate in the bargain.’

For a moment, both men were silent. Neither looked at Terri.

‘If you want me to,’ Terri finally told them, ‘I’ll do it. God knows we need a break.’

‘That’s a tricky one,’ Elena Arias announced to Carlo Paget.

They sat hunched over a black onyx coffee table in Paget’s library, arranging small odd-shaped blocks in a precarious high-rise. The purpose of the game was alternately to place the blocks one upon the other, without causing the edifice to fall. Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, Carlo sprawled with his long legs stretched on the rug; Elena, pretty in a pink dress, with her hair freshly combed, was on her knees; the pile of blocks they had constructed – a rickety multicolored tower with angles jutting everywhere – violated every rule of aesthetics and, as far as Terri could see, of gravity. Elena, who had just placed a round peg on top of the block beneath it, was delighted with herself. Carlo looked bemused.

‘I never lose to five-year-olds,’ he said in mock frustration. Carlo glanced up at Terri, who sat on the couch sipping wine. ‘Do you see any way out for me?’

‘You’re on your own,’ Terri answered. ‘I thought you were the house champion.’

‘For eight years running.’ Carlo smiled. ‘But that’s against my father, who has the spatial-reasoning capacity of a primitive fern. He didn’t prepare me for Elena.’

But he had, of course, Terri knew; the pile of blocks was a tribute to Carlo’s deftness at selecting moves that would keep Elena in the game, as all the while he acted as if she had forced him to the wall. The tower Carlo and Elena were creating was like a minihistory of Paget’s relationship to Carlo; the younger player gaining confidence while the older, groaning and protesting, lost at great length and with great ingenuity. Elena, who played with more daring than sense, had stretched Carlo’s gifts to the limit.

‘Your mother won’t help me,’ he told Elena.

‘She can’t help
you
.’ Elena jabbed her chest. ‘’Cause
I’m
her kid.’

Carlo raised his hand for silence, signaling his awareness of all that was at risk. With utter gravity, he trained his eyes on the rickety tower. The windows of Paget’s library cut the late-afternoon sun into squares of light on the black onyx table and inside the marble fireplace; across one of the squares fell a shadow of a frond from Carlo’s palm tree. Carlo’s wrist caught the light as he suspended his block over the tower, moving downward with excruciating slowness, block pinched between his thumb and index finger. Terri held her breath.

Slowly, carefully, he placed the block on Elena’s peg. The peg leaned one way, the block beneath it another. The tower began to teeter.

With the terrible inevitability of a chain reaction, the blocks crashed in a heap.

Carlo stared at the rubble as if galvanized. ‘Total devastation,’ he said to Elena. ‘I can’t believe it.’

‘But you
tried
.’ With sudden concern, Elena touched his hand. ‘I bet you can still beat your daddy. That means you’re the
second
champion. Next to me.’

Carlo laughed out loud. ‘Five years old,’ he told Terri, ‘and she’s already learned condescension.’

Terri smiled. ‘It’s not condescension, it’s codependency. Elena’s taking care of you.’

Carlo gave her a look of exaggerated concern. ‘Are you codependent,’ he asked, ‘if you go to a movie that your girlfriend wants to see?’

‘Only if the movie’s terrible.’ Terri appraised him. ‘Does this mean you got Jennifer out of the house?’

‘Yeah.’ Carlo grinned. ‘Like you said – I went over there a couple of times and sat around and talked with them.’

‘Was that okay?’

‘It was fine.’ Carlo’s face clouded. ‘Except half the time they wanted to talk about my dad’s case. At least that’s what they called it – “your dad’s case.”’