Hornet's Nest (28 page)

At five, he gave up and went back to the track to run again. He clipped off eight more miles and could have gone farther, but he got bored and wanted to get downtown. It was strange. He’d gone from exhaustion to hyperactivity in a matter of days. Brazil could remember no other time in his life when his chemistry had swung him around like this. One minute he was dragging, the next he was high and excited with no explanation. He contemplated the possibility that his hormones were going through a phase, which he expected would be normal for one his age. It was true that if the male did not give in to his drives between the ages of sixteen and twenty, biology would punish him.

His primary care physician had told him exactly that. Dr. Rush, whose family practice was in Cornelius, had warned Brazil about this very phenomenon when Brazil had a team checkup his freshman year at Davidson. Dr. Rush, recognizing that Brazil had no father and needed guidance, said many young men made tragic mistakes because their bodies were in a procreation mode. This, said Dr. Rush, was nothing more than a throwback to colonial times when sixteen was more than half of the male’s life expectancy, assuming Indians or neighbors didn’t get him first. When viewed in this fashion, sexual urges, albeit primitive, made perfect sense, and Brazil was to do his best not to act on them.

Brazil would be twenty-three next May, and the urges had not lessened with time. He had been faithful to Dr. Rush, who, according to local gossip, was not faithful to his wife and never had been. Brazil thought about sexuality as he ran a few sprints before trotting home. It seemed to him that love and sex were connected but maybe shouldn’t be. Love made him sweet and thoughtful. Love prompted him to notice flowers and want to pick them. Love crafted his finest poetry, while sex throbbed in powerful, earthy pentameters he would never show to anyone or submit for publication.

He hurried home and took a longer than usual shower. At
five past eight, he was moving through the cafeteria line in the Knight-Ridder building. He was in jeans, pager on his belt, people staring curiously at the boy wonder reporter who played police and always seemed alone. Brazil selected Raisin Bran and blueberries as the intercom piped in WBT’s wildly popular and irreverent
Don’t Go Into Morning
show with Dave and Dave.

“In a fast-breaking story last night,” Dave was saying in his deep radio voice, “it was revealed that even our city’s mayor won’t go downtown at night right now.”

“Question is, why would he anyway?” quipped Dave.

“Same thing Senator Butler should have asked.”

“Just checking on his constituents, Dave. Trying to be of service.”

“And the eensy weensy spider crawled up his water spout . . .”

“Whoa, Dave. This is getting out of control.”

“Hey, we’re supposed to be able to say anything on this show. That’s in the contract.” Dave was his usual witty self, better than Howard Stern, really.

“Seriously. Mayor Search is asking everybody to help catch the Black Widow killer,” Dave said. “And next up is Madonna, Amy Grant, and Rod Stewart . . .”

Brazil had stopped in the middle of the line, frozen as the radio played on and people made their way around him. Packer was walking in, heading straight toward him. Brazil’s world was Humpty Dumpty off the wall, cracks happening everywhere at once. He paid for his breakfast and turned around to face his ruination.

“What’s going on?” he said before his grim editor could tell him.

“Upstairs now,” Packer said. “We got a problem.”

Brazil did not run up the escalator. He did not speak to Packer, who had nothing more to say. Packer wanted no part of this. He wasn’t going to insert his foot in his mouth. The great Richard Panesa could fix this one. That’s why Knight-Ridder paid him those big bucks. Brazil had been marched to the principal’s office only twice during his early school years. In neither case had he really done anything wrong.
The first time he had poked his finger into the hamster cage and had gotten bitten. The second time of trouble occurred when he inserted his finger into the hole at the top of his clipboard and had gotten stuck.

Mr. Kenny used wire cutters to free young Brazil, who had been humiliated and heartbroken. The blue Formica clipboard with its map of the United States was destroyed. Mr. Kenny threw it into the trash while Brazil stood bravely by, refusing to cry and knowing his mother could not afford to buy him another one. Brazil had meekly asked if he could stay after school for a week, dusting erasers on back steps to earn enough to buy something new to hold notebook paper and write on. That had been okay with all.

Brazil wondered what he could offer to Panesa to make up for whatever he had done to cause such a problem. When he walked into the publisher’s intimidating glass office, Panesa was sitting behind his mahogany desk, in his fine Italian suit and leather chair. Panesa didn’t get up or acknowledge Brazil directly but continued reading a printout of the editorial for the Sunday paper, which slammed Mayor Search for his glib, albeit true, comment about his reluctance to travel downtown these nights.

“You might want to shut the door,” Panesa quietly said to his young reporter.

Brazil did and took a seat across from his boss.

“Andy,” he said, “do you watch television?”

His confusion grew. “I rarely have time . . .”

“Then you may not know that you are being scooped right and left.”

The dragon inside Brazil woke up. “Meaning?”

Panesa saw fire in his eyes. Good. The only way this sensitive, brilliant young talent was going to last in this criminal world was if he were a fighter, like Panesa was. Panesa wasn’t going to give him a breath of comfort. Andy Brazil, welcome to Hell School, the publisher thought as he picked up a remote control from his mighty desk.

“Meaning”—Panesa hit a button and a screen unrolled from the ceiling—“that the last four or five major stories you’ve done have been aired on television the night before
they ran in the paper, usually on the eleven o’clock news.” He pressed another button, and the overhead projector turned on. “Then the radio stations pick them up first thing in the morning. Before most people get a chance to read what we’ve plastered on the front page of our paper.”

Brazil shot up from his chair, horrified and homicidal.

“That can’t be! No one’s even around when I’m out there!” he exclaimed, fists balled by his sides.

Panesa pointed the remote control, pressed another button, and instantly Webb’s face was huge in the room.

“. . . in a Channel Three exclusive interview said she returns to the scene of the crash late at night and sits in her car and weeps. Johnson, who turned in her badge this morning, said she wishes she had been killed, too . . .”

Panesa looked at Brazil. Brazil was speechless, his fury toward Webb coalescing into hatred for all. Moments passed before the young police reporter could gather his wits.

“Was this after my story?” Brazil asked, though he knew better.

“Before,” Panesa replied, watching him carefully, and assessing. “The night before it ran. Like every other one that’s followed. Then this bit with the mayor. Well, that clinched it. We know that was a slip on Search’s part and not something Webb could know unless he’s got the mayor’s office bugged.”

“This can’t be!” Brazil boiled over. “It’s not my fault!”

“This is not about fault.” Panesa was stern with him. “Get to the bottom of it. Now. We’re really being hurt.”

Panesa watched Brazil storm out. The publisher had a meeting, but sat at his desk, going through memos dictating to his secretary while he observed Brazil through glass. Brazil was angrily opening desk drawers, digging in the box under it, throwing notepads and other personal effects into his briefcase. He ran out of the newsroom as if he did not plan on coming back. Panesa picked up the phone.

“Get Virginia West on the line,” the publisher said.

• • •

Tommy Axel was staring after Brazil’s wake, wondering what the hell was going on and at the same time suspicious. He knew about Webb and had heard about the leaks and didn’t blame Brazil for being out of his mind. Axel couldn’t imagine the same thing happening to him, someone stealing brilliant thoughts and analyses from his music columns. God. Poor guy.

Brenda Bond also was alert to the uproar as she worked on a computer that had gone down three days in a row because the idiot garden columnist had a knack for striking combinations of keys that somehow locked him out or translated his files into pi signs. Bond had a strange sensation as she went into System Manager. She found it hard to concentrate.

West was standing behind her desk, struggling to pack up her briefcase and snap the lid back on her coffee and wrap up the biscuit she didn’t have time to eat. She looked worried and frantic as Panesa talked to her on the phone.

“You have any idea where he went?” West inquired.

“Home, maybe?” Panesa said over the line. “He lives with his mother.”

West looked hopelessly at the clock. She was supposed to be in Hammer’s office in ninety seconds, and there was no such thing as putting the chief on hold or being late or not showing up or forgetting. West shut her briefcase and slid her radio into the case on her belt. She was at a loss.

“I’ll do what I can,” she promised Panesa. “Unfortunately, I’ve got court this morning. My guess is he’s just blowing off steam. As soon as he cools down, he’ll be back. Andy’s not a quitter.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“If he hasn’t shown up by the time I get back, I’ll start looking,” West said.

“Good idea.”

West hoped that Johnny Martino would plead guilty. Hammer didn’t. She was in a mood to cause trouble. Dr.
Cabel had done her a favor, really. He had ignited a few sparks of anger, and the brighter they got, the more the mist of depression and malaise burned off. She was walking the fastest West had ever seen her, a zip-up briefcase under an arm, sunglasses on. Hammer and West made their way through the sweltering piedmont morning to the Criminal Court Building, constructed of granite in 1987 and therefore older than most buildings in Charlotte. Hammer and West waited in line with everyone else at the X-ray machine.

“Quit worrying.” West tried to reassure her boss as they inched foward behind some of the city’s finer citizens. “He’ll plead.” She glanced at her watch.

“I’m not worried,” said Hammer.

West was. There were a hundred cases on the docket today. In truth, this was a bigger problem than whether Martino pled guilty versus taking his chances before a jury of his peers. Deputy Octavius Able eyed the two women getting closer in line and was suddenly alert and interested in his job. West had not passed through his X-ray machine since it resided in the old courthouse. Never had Able so much as laid eyes on Hammer in person. He had never had complete control over her. West was in uniform and walked around the door frame that was beeping every other second as pagers, change, keys, good luck charms, and pocketknives went into a cup. Hammer walked around, too, assuming the privilege of her position.

“Excuse me, ma’am!” Deputy Able said for all to hear. “Ma’am! Please step through.”

“She’s the chief of police,” West quietly told him, and she knew damn well it went without saying.

“Need some identification,” the powerful deputy said to Hammer.

A long line of restless feet stopped, all eyes on the well-dressed lady with the familiar face. Who was that? They’d seen her somewhere. Maybe she was on TV, the news, a talk show? Oh heck. Then Tinsley Owens, six deep in line, here for reckless driving, got it. This lady in pearls was the wife of someone famous, maybe Billy Graham. Hammer was nonplussed as she dug through her pocketbook, and this made
Deputy Able’s assertion of self not quite as rewarding. She smiled at him, holding up her badge.

“Thanks for checking.” She could have knocked him over when she said that. “In case anybody had any doubts about the security of our courthouse.” She leaned close to read his nameplate. “O.T. Able,” she repeated, committing it to memory.

Now the deputy was dead. She was going to complain.

“Just doing my job,” he weakly said as the line got longer, winding around the world, the entire human race witnessing his destruction.

“You most certainly were,” Hammer agreed. “And I’m going to make sure the sheriff knows how much he should appreciate you.”

The deputy realized the chief meant every word of it, and Able was suddenly taller and slimmer. His khaki uniform fit perfectly. He was handsome and not nearly as old as he had been when he was at the BP pumping gas this morning and a carload of juveniles yelled, calling him
Deputy Dawg, Hawaii Five-O, Tuna Breath,
and other, racial slurs. Deputy Octavius Able was ashamed of himself for throwing his weight around with this woman chief. He never used to be that way and did not know what had happened to him over the years.

H
ammer and West signed in at the Court Liaison Office and punched time cards. On the second floor, they followed a long corridor crowded with people looking for a pay phone or the bathroom. Some were sleeping on maple benches, or reading the
Observer
to see if their cases might be mentioned. When West opened the door to 2107, her anxiety increased. The courtroom was packed with defendants waiting for punishment, and with cops whose fault it was. Hammer led the way to the very front, sitting on the side for lawyers and police. Assistant District Attorney Melvin Pond spotted the two powerful women instantly and got excited. He had been waiting for them. This was his chance.

Fourth Circuit Judge Tyler Bovine of the Twenty-fifth Prosecutorial District had been waiting, too, as had the media from far and near.
Batman and Robin
, she, Judge Bovine, thought with intense pleasure as she departed from her chambers. She’d see about that when she reigned on high in the long black robe that covered her massive body of law. West felt increasingly troubled for a number of reasons. She was worried about Brazil and afraid she’d never get out of here to check on him. Tyler Bovine, as was true of the rest of the judicial herd, was a traveling judge. She resided on the other side of the Catawba River and despised Charlotte and all that
was good about it, including its citizens. The judge was confident that it was only a matter of time before Charlotte annexed her hometown of Gastonia, and all else Cornwallis had failed to seize.

“All rise for the judge.”

All got around to it, and Judge Bovine smiled to herself as she entered the courtroom and spotted Hammer and West. The judge knew that the press had been tipped not to waste their time hanging around here this day. Batman and Robin would be back on Monday. Oh yes they would. The judge sat and put on her glasses, looking important and godlike. A.D.A. Pond stared at the docket as if he had never seen one before this morning. He knew he had a battle on his hands but was determined he would prevail.

“The court calls the case of the State of North Carolina versus Johnny Martino,” he said with confidence he did not feel.

“I’m not ready to hear that now.” Judge Bovine sounded bored.

West nudged Hammer, who was thinking about Seth and not sure what she would do if he died. It did not matter how much they fought or drove each other crazy or proved irrefutably that men and women could not be soulmates or friends. Hammer had a tragic look on her face, and A.D.A. Pond took it as a slight to his knighthood and professional future. He had failed this wonderful, heroic woman whose husband was shot and in the hospital. Chief Hammer did not need to be sitting here with all these cretins. Judge Bovine saw the look on Hammer’s face, too, and also misinterpreted, and was further aroused. Hammer had not supported Bovine in the last election. Bovine would see how big and important Hammer was now.

“When I call out your name, please stand. Maury Anthony,” announced A.D.A. Pond.

Pond scanned despondent faces. He searched people slumped back, pissed off, and sleeping. Maury Anthony and his public defender rose near the rear. They came forward and stood before the A.D.A.’s table.

“Mr. Anthony, how do you plead to possession with the intent to sell cocaine?” the A.D.A. asked.

“Guilty,” Mr. Anthony spoke.

Judge Bovine stared out at the defendant who was no different than all others. “Mr. Anthony. You realize that by pleading guilty you have no right to appeal,” she stated rather than asked.

Mr. Anthony looked at his public defender, who nodded. Mr. Anthony returned his attention to the judge. “Yes, sir,” he said.

Laughter was scattered among those awake and alert. Mr. Anthony realized his egregious error and grinned sheepishly. “I’m sorry, ma’am. My eyes ain’t what they once was.”

More laughter.

Judge Bovine’s big flat face turned to concrete. “What says the state,” she ordered as she sipped from a two-liter bottle of Evian.

A.D.A. Pond looked over his notes. He glanced at Hammer and West, hoping they were attentive and impressed. This was his opportunity to be eloquent, no matter what a dog of a case it was.

“Your Honor,” the A.D.A. began as he always did, “on the night of July twenty-second, at approximately eleven-thirty, Mr. Anthony was drinking and socializing in an establishment on Fourth Street near Graham . . .”

“The court requires the exact address,” Judge Bovine interrupted.

“Well, Your Honor, the problem is, there’s not one.”

“There has to be one,” said the judge.

“This is an area where a building was razed in nineteen-ninety-five, Your Honor. The defendant and his associates were back in weeds . . .”

“What was the address of the building that was razed?”

“I don’t know,” said the A.D.A., after a pause.

Mr. Anthony smiled. His public defender looked smug. West was getting a headache. Hammer had drifted further off. The judge drank from her bottle of water.

“You will provide that for the court,” the judge said, screwing on the cap.

“Yes, Your Honor. Only, where this transaction occurred isn’t precisely at the old address, but rather farther back, approximately eighty feet, and then another fifty feet, I’d say, at a sixty-degree angle, northeast, from the Independence Welfare building that was there, that was razed, in a thicket where Mr. Anthony had set up a hobo camp of sorts for the purposes of buying and selling and smoking crack cocaine and eating crabs with associates on that night. Of July twenty-second.”

A.D.A. Pond had the attention, however briefly, of Hammer, and West, plus Johnny Martino’s mother and the conscious courtroom, in addition to two bailiffs and a probation officer. All stared at him with a mixture of curiosity and lack of comprehension.

“The court requires an address,” the judge repeated.

She took another gulp of water and felt contempt for her psychiatrist and for manic-depressive people everywhere. Not only did lithium necessitate drinking a tub of water daily but it caused frequent urination, which by Judge Bovine’s definition was double jeopardy. Her bladder and kidneys were a drip coffee maker that she could feel and measure as she drove back and forth from Gaston County and sat on the bench and went to the movies and flew on crowded airplanes or walked on the track and found the fieldhouse locked.

Because she was a superior court judge, she could adjourn every fifteen, twenty, or thirty minutes, or until after lunch if her need was great and she so chose. She could wheel in a damn Porta-John, do whatever she liked,
ipso facto
. But what she would never do, not once during this life and on this planet, was to interrupt a case after it was started, because above all else, the judge was a well-bred lady who had grown up in an antebellum house and gone to Queens College. Judge Bovine was tough but never rude. She did not tolerate fools or classless people, and no one could accuse her of anything less than impeccable manners. There was nothing more important than manners, really.

A.D.A. Pond hesitated. Hammer had faded away again. West could not get comfortable. The bench seat was wood, and it pressed her police belt and the small of her back. She
was perspiring and waiting for her pager to vibrate. Brazil was decompensating. It was something West sensed, yet she wasn’t certain why or what to do about it.

“Mr. Pond,” the judge said, “please continue.”

“Thank you, Your Honor. On this particular night of July twenty-second, Mr. Anthony did sell crack cocaine to an undercover Charlotte police officer.”

“Is this officer in the courtroom?” The judge squinted at the sea of wretches below her.

Mungo stood. West turned around, dismayed when she saw who had caused such creaking and shuffling and whispering.
Oh God, not again.
West’s sense of foreboding darkened. Hammer remembered Seth bringing her breakfast in bed and dropping keys on the tray. The new Triumph Spitfire was green with burl wood, and she had been a sergeant with free time, and he was the rich son of a rich land developer. Back then, they went on long drives and had picnics. She would come home from work, and music filled the house. When did Seth stop listening to Beethoven, Mozart, Mahler, and Bach, and start turning on the TV? When did Seth decide he wanted to die?

“The subject, Mr. Anthony,” Mungo was saying, “was sitting on a blanket in the thicket Mr. Pond has just described. He was with two other subjects, drinking Magnum Forty-four and Colt Forty-five. Between them they had a dozen steamed crabs in a brown paper bag.”

“A dozen?” Judge Bovine queried. “You counted them, Detective Mungo?”

“Most were gone, Your Honor. I was told there had been a dozen originally. When I looked there were three left, I believe.”

“Go on, go on.” What patience the judge had for this drivel from the dregs of humanity was inversely proportional to her filling bladder as she took another slug of water and thought of what she would eat for lunch.

“The subject, Mr. Anthony, offered to sell me a rock of cocaine in a vial, for fifteen dollars,” Mungo continued.

“Bullshit,” was Mr. Anthony’s comment. “I offered you a fucking crab, man.”

“Mr. Anthony, if you aren’t quiet, I will hold you in contempt of court,” Judge Bovine warned.

“It was a crab. Only time I used the word
crack
was when I told him to
crack
it himself.”

Mungo said, “Your Honor, I asked the subject what was in the bag, and he distinctly replied, ‘crack.’”

“Did not.” Mr. Anthony was about to approach the bench, his public defender restraining him by a sleeve that still had the label sewed on it.

“Did too,” Mungo said.

“Did not!”

“Too.”

“Uh uh.”

“Order!” the judge declared. “Mr. Anthony, one more outburst and . . .”

“Let me tell my side for once!” Mr. Anthony went on.

“That is what you have a lawyer for,” the judge said severely, and she was beginning to feel the pressure of water and a loss of composure.

“Oh yeah? This piece of shit?” Mr. Anthony glowered at his free-lunch defense.

The courtroom was awake and interested, more so than A.D.A. Pond had ever witnessed before this morning. Something was going to happen and no one was about to miss it, people nudging each other and making silent bets. Jake on the third row, defendant’s side, was putting his money on Mr. Anthony ending up with his butt in jail. Shontay two rows over was betting on the undercover detective who reminded her of a haystack wearing a wrinkled pin-striped suit. Cops always won, no matter how wrong they might be, it was her belief, based on hearsay. Quik, way in the back, didn’t give a fuck as he practiced flicking his thumb out like a switchblade. As soon as he could, the asshole responsible for Quik’s
show cause warrant
was gonna pay. Ratting on him like that. Man.

“Detective Mungo.” Judge Bovine had had enough. “What probable cause did you have to search Mr. Anthony’s brown paper bag?”

“Your Honor, it’s like I said.” Mungo was unmoved. “I
asked him what was in the bag. He told me.”

“He told you crabs and suggested you crack these crabs yourself,” said the judge, who really had to go now.

“Gee. I don’t know. I thought he said crack.” Mungo tried to be fair.

This sort of thing happened to Mungo more times than not. He’d always found it easier to hear whatever he wanted, and when one was as big as him, one could. The case was dismissed, and before the judge could adjourn to her chambers, the agitated A.D.A. called the next, and the next, and the next, and the judge did not interrupt, because it was one thing she would not do. Citizens arrested for burglaries, car thefts, rape, murder, and more drug dealers and those who patronized them stood with their public defenders. A.D.A. Pond was mindful of the judge’s constricted body language and miserable demeanor. Pond was accustomed to the judge’s frequent visits to her chambers and knew that capitalizing on her disability was his only hope.

Each time Her Honor started to rise from her bench, A.D.A. Pond was off and running on the next case. As fast as he could, he announced Johnny Martino once again, in hopes Pond would break the judge, wear her down, and subject her to the water treatment until she could take no more. Her Honor would hear the state of North Carolina versus Johnny Martino so Hammer and West could return to life’s highways and the hospital. A.D.A. Pond prayed Hammer would think kindly of him when he ran for D.A. in three years.

“Johnny Martino,” A.D.A. Pond said as fast as he could, again, moments later.

“I’m not ready to hear that case yet.” The judge could barely talk.

“Alex Brown,” the A.D.A. blurted out.

“Yeah.” Mr. Brown stood, as did his counsel.

“How do you plead to malicious wounding?”

“He started it,” Mr. Brown stated for the record. “What I’m supposed to do, huh? In Church’s getting a quart of chicken livers and he decides he wants the same thing, only he’s going to get mine and not pay.”

Hammer had tuned back in long enough to make an assessment of her surroundings and those in it. This was much more disheartening than she had imagined. No wonder her beat officers and investigators got so discouraged, so jaded and cynical. There had been a time when she’d had no sympathy or use for people like this. They were lazy, no-account, self-destructive, self-absorbed wastrels who added nothing to society and took from everyone around them. She thought of Seth, of his money, privilege, and opportunity. She thought of the love she and others had given him. Chief Hammer thought of many people she knew who were no better than anybody in this courtroom, really.