Mystery Writers of America Presents the Prosecution Rests (28 page)

She looked wonderingly around at the smoke. “Did Mama close the flue?”

“Come, sweetheart. Come along, before I go mad.”

He helped her to her feet, held her, and noticed she’d wet herself.

That night he picked up the small bottle, stared at it for a long, long time. He wanted to weep, but no tears came. He wanted
to sense pain, but he’d spent it all too recently. If he couldn’t feel, he thought, he could go on, and he started to put
the bottle back. But no, that was wrong: if he could feel, he could never do what he had to do.

He displayed the bottle prominently, near the coffeepot. Instead of going to bed, he put a worn disk on the record player
and sat in the unlit living room. Finally, the tears began and washed over him, bathing him, mingling with his agony.

He entered the darkened bedroom, its gloom the same texture as the night in his soul. He watched her sleeping, childlike.

She stirred and, sensing him, opened her eyes to his pain.

Oh, how could he think of leaving the bottle out? First thing in the morning, he must put it away. Surely he could take care
of her for the rest of his life. He could rise to the occasion; he
would
rise to it. Hadn’t she dedicated
her
life to
him?
He could do this, yes, he certainly could. He was strong enough to bear this cross; it was a weight of no consequence. What
had led him so close to despair? Vanity? Self-pity?

He lay down beside her, and she held him again, fragile as an autumn dandelion, held him softly until he passed into sleep.

On the kitchen counter, a small bottle, forgotten, stood sentinel beside the coffeepot.

____

T
HE NEXT MORNING
glowed golden and bright. She had been up, but came back to bed to snuggle against him. These intimate mornings had long
been his favorite, their raison d’être.

He rose, enjoying this time with her, and began shaving. Looking at himself in the mirror, he remembered. Oh Lord, he must
be losing his mind. The bottle was sitting out by the coffeepot.

Flying suspenders and shaving cream, he scuttled out to the kitchen.

She stood there gazing out the kitchen window, reading his mind. “It’s okay, love. It’s okay. It’s exactly what I wanted you
to do.”

“But I was wrong. We’re both wrong. It’s not the time. It never will be. We can’t do this.”

“But it is time, love. Oh, not today perhaps, or even tomorrow. But another day. Or night. A glorious day, and you’ll hold
me tight that night. I’ll know when.” She held out her arms to him, dispelling his mute plea.

The bottle disappeared, and he was relieved as, day by day, she became more cheerful. But every day he detected new signs
of her sliding away.

One night she made a pot of tea, lit a candle, and drew him into bed. She stripped back his pajamas, kissed his body where
the skin clung thinly to his ribs. She lay next to him, willing her flesh to be part of his. It wasn’t making love, not in
the sense of what it used to be; this transcended, it was better. And he knew through his tears that time was no longer with
them.

____

A
ND SO, LADIES
and gentlemen of the jury, this is the part of the hearing called the summation. You have heard a crime described. A crime
of passion, yes, and, as my esteemed colleague suggests, a crime of compassion as well, but still a crime.

Certainly the most heinous crime man can commit is the taking of a life, deliberate murder, the only crime for which you can
never compensate the victim.

Over the last few days, you’ve heard testimony about Alzheimer’s disease, about impaired mental capacity and diminished responsibility.
I’m sure pain and suffering ensued for both parties. The psychiatric expert introduced by the defense mentioned a kind of
temporary insanity. You’ve heard the defense suggest the defendant may be senile, a pitiful victim of aged dementia. You’ve
heard how it’s kind to be cruel, and how our nation has become so gentle in delivering death.

All of this means nothing. It doesn’t matter whether she cooperated with him or not. And it doesn’t matter that you and I
find great sympathy with the defendant, or have even grown to like her, as I know we all have.

What matters to society is that a premeditated homicide took place. You cannot simply poison your husband if he becomes inconvenient
to you. Your husband or your wife today, your parents tomorrow, and then who’s next? What if your children become inconvenient,
or hyperactive, or incontinent?

That’s why, ladies and gentlemen, that is exactly why you must find against the defendant, no matter how much you like her,
or how sorry you feel for her. That’s why, beyond any doubt whatsoever—you must reach into your own personal repository of
justice, and find this defendant… guilty.

BY MICHELE MARTINEZ

A
cross the length of the courtroom, Melanie Vargas met the young woman’s eyes.
This is the hard part,
Melanie tried to say with her gaze,
but I know you can handle it.

“What happened next?” she asked.

“I was reaching for my keys, but they were way down in my bag.”

“Where were the men?”

“Behind me still, but getting closer. It was late enough that there wasn’t no traffic on the street and it was real quiet.
So I could hear their footsteps coming toward me.” Her voice cracked. “They were running.”

“Did you see their faces?”

The head defense lawyer leaped to his feet. “Objection.”

Good sign
, Melanie thought.
There was nothing objectionable about that question. He’s trying to break my stride.

“Rephrase it,” the judge said, looking annoyed.

“What if anything did you see of the men’s faces while you were trying to get your keys from your bag?” Melanie asked.

“I didn’t see nothing. I was too scared to look up. I was just praying. Like, please, God, make them go away, and trying to
get my keys out as fast as I could. My legs was shaking, and I couldn’t hardly breathe.”

“Then what happened?” Melanie asked gently.

On the witness stand, Gabriela Torres went visibly paler under a cloud of curly black hair. She was a tiny thing, five-two
and slender, and looked about sixteen, although she was twenty-three. She was one of the best witnesses in an ugly case full
of brutal people, untainted except for being a kingpin’s moll, and the jury was eating her up. As Gabriela stared down at
her hands, clenched before her on the podium, every juror’s gaze was locked on her. She took a deep breath, and the entire
jury breathed in with her and held, waiting for the horror show.

“They caught up with me,” Gabriela said, shaking her head in misery.

“Did you see their faces then?” Melanie asked.

The defense lawyer moved to get up, but the judge, who was a fearsome old man and protective of this young woman, froze him
in place with a glare.

“Yeah, I saw them when they were coming at me,” Gabriela whispered. “I saw them good.”

“Are either of the men who approached you that night here in the courtroom today?”

“Yes, both of’em.”

“Can you identify them for the jury?”

Now Melanie was the one holding her breath. Gabriela knew the attackers. Would she have the guts to ID them in open court?
But she looked straight at the defense table and pointed, her hand steadier than Melanie’s felt right then.

“That’s them. Sitting there at that table. The two black guys. The big one who’s missing his ear and wearing a blue shirt.
And the other one with the fade haircut and the tattoo on his forehead. I won’t never forget that tattoo.
Everybody Dies,
it said.
Everybody Dies.”

“Let the record reflect that the witness has identified the defendant Edwin Smith, who is wearing a blue shirt and whose left
ear is missing, and the defendant Rashad Baxter, who has a tattoo on his forehead that reads,
Everybody Dies
,” Melanie said.

And she paused for a moment to turn the page of her trial notebook, letting the jury get a good long look at those two before
Gabriela resumed her tale.

“Had you ever seen either defendant before the night in question, the night of March seventeenth of last year?”

“Yes. The second I saw their faces, I recognized’em both. I knew them from the spot. They came in there a lot.”

“How many times had you seen them before that night?”

“At least eight, ten times, maybe more.”

“Together?”

“Yes, always together.”

“And when you say you saw them at the spot, what are you referring to?”

“The pool hall on Myrtle Avenue I told you about. The one Orlando sold drugs out of.”

“When you would see them at the pool hall, what would they be doing?”

“They’d come in to meet with Orlando. I’d be hanging with him, and when them two guys showed up, he’d say, ‘Sit tight, baby,
I got business,’ and he’d take them in the back room, where they kept the product.”

“So you believed the defendants to be narcotics customers of Mr. Jiménez?”

“Objection.”

“Sustained.”

“Directing your attention again to the night of March seventeenth, what happened as the defendants approached you?” Melanie
asked.

“They both pulled out guns. I mean, scary-ass guns too, not nothing little. The second I saw the guns, I started screaming
real loud, thinking maybe Orlando would hear me and come out, but he didn’t. Instead, the one with the tattoo, he hit me with
his gun, hard, right across the face.”

“Rashad Baxter hit you with his gun?”

“Yes.”

“How did the blow affect you?”

“Well, I never been hit so hard before. When they say you see stars, it’s true. It was like lights going off inside my head.
Everything went white, and the next thing I know, I’m sitting on my a—on my butt on the sidewalk, bleeding like a stuck pig
from this cut. I still got a little scar. But that’s when the lady walked by, the old lady. My angel I call her now, but I
didn’t know her at the time.”

“Did you subsequently learn her name?” Melanie asked.

The woman had just testified, right before Gabriela took the stand, and Melanie wanted the jury to make the connection.

“Yes. Her name is Carmen Marrero. She saw me there sitting on the ground, and I saw her, but
they
didn’t see her. They were too busy messing me up.”

“What did Mrs. Marrero do when she saw you sitting and bleeding on the ground?”

“Nothing. She was smart. She went right back in her house real quiet and they didn’t notice. I’m just glad I was in such a
daze. If I wasn’t messed up, I would’ve called out to her, and then they would’ve seen her.”

“What happened after Mrs. Marrero went back inside?”

“He, him—the one with the tattoo?”

“You’re referring to the defendant Rashad Baxter?”

“Yeah. He pulled me up real rough and stuck the gun right up in my face. He say to me, ‘Where Orlando at?’ and tell me all
sorts of things he was gonna do to me if I didn’t take him to the apartment. See, because they had followed me, but they didn’t
know exactly which apartment was us.”

“What threats did Rashad Baxter make to you?”

“The one I really remember is…” Gabriela paused. “Can I use bad language?” she asked, looking up at the judge.

“Tell the jury what Mr. Baxter said,” the judge commanded.

“He told me if I didn’t take them inside right away, he was gonna put the gun up my cunt and pull the trigger.”

Some of the jurors gasped.

“So what did you do?” Melanie asked.

“I didn’t do nothing. I started crying, and I almost fainted. They took my keys out of my bag and opened the outside door
and shoved me in the hallway. As soon as I’m inside, I hear the handcuffs. I been arrested before, that time you asked me
about when we started? So I know the sound of handcuffs. When I heard it, I thought, I’m dead meat for sure. The guy with
the tattoo cuffed me behind my back, and the other guy, the one with the ear, he hit me and told me to shut up because now
they in, they don’t need me. If I want to stay alive one more minute, I better help out. Like that.”

“What, if anything, did Mr. Smith ask you to do to help him?”

“He told me, say something while I’m unlocking the door, so Orlando wouldn’t get suspicious. To tell him like, I was back
or something.”

“To say something when you walked in the door of your apartment?”

Gabriela’s eyes filled with tears. “Yes.”

“And did you?” Melanie asked.

The tears spilled over. “Yes! We went up to the door. They unlocked it and opened it a crack, and I said, ‘Baby, I’m home.’
Then Orlando, he come out of the bedroom and he saw me all bloody like that, and saw the two guys. He freaked out.”

“Where were your children while this was happening?”

“Asleep.”

“Were they in the apartment?”

“My God, they were in the next room! I’m praying the whole time, Please, God,
Díos mio
, don’t let my babies wake up and walk into this shit. I’m thinking they were gonna kill my kids.”

Gabriela was sobbing, but trying to control it. Melanie reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a small package of Kleenex
she’d been saving for a moment like this.

“Your Honor, may I approach the witness?”

“You may.”

Melanie walked toward the witness stand as Gabriela cried. When she handed the girl the Kleenex, Gabriela looked at her with
imploring gratitude.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

The jury was riveted.

“Do you need a recess?” the judge asked, a touch of impatience in his voice.

Gabriela shook her head. “Sir, I’d rather just get it over with.”

“You said your children were present in the apartment at this time,” Melanie said, resuming her place at the lectern. “How
many children do you have?”

“Orlando Junior, he’s five. And Antonio is almost three now, but when this happened, he was just a little baby.”