Presumed Innocent (26 page)

"What is it with him?"

"He is a very angry man." Stern walks determinedly through the marble lobby.

"I see that. Has Nico convinced him that I'm guilty?"

"Probably. Certainly he thinks you could have been a good deal more cautious, particularly on his behalf."

"I wasn't a faithful servant?"

Sandy makes another of his Latin movements: hands, eyes, brow. He has other matters on his mind. As he walks, he cocks a grave eye in my direction.

"I had no idea that Horgan had an affair with Carolyn. Or that you had conversed with him on that subject."

"I didn't remember the conversation."

"No doubt," says Stern in a tone which implies that he doubts me a good deal. "Well, I think Della Guardia will be able to use that to his advantage. When was it that this relationship took place between Raymond and Carolyn?"

"Right after she stopped seeing me."

Sandy stops. He makes no effort to mask his pain. He talks to himself an instant in his native tongue.

"Well, Nico is certainly coming closer to a motive."

"But he's still some distance," I say hopefully. He still cannot prove the principal relationship between Carolyn and me.

"Some," Sandy tells me. There is a deliberate flatness in his expression. He is clearly quite put out with me, both for my performance upstairs and for keeping so significant a detail from him. We will have to speak at length, he says. Right now he has a court call. He puts his homburg on and ventures into the blazing heat without glancing back at me.

In the lobby I feel instantly bereft. So many emotions are surging that there is a kind of dizziness. Most of all, there is caustic shame for my own stupidity. After all these years, I still failed to recognize how these events would impact on Raymond Horgan, although now the trajectory of his emotions seems as predictable as a hyperbolic curve. Raymond Horgan is a public man. He has lived to make a reputation. He said he was not a pol, but he has a pol's affliction: he thrives on acclamation, he yearns for the good opinion of everyone. He does not care about my guilt or innocence. He is devastated by his own disgrace. His own chief deputy indicted for murder. The investigation, which he let me run, sabotaged right before his face. And he will have to sit upon the witness stand and broadcast his own indiscretions. There will be tavern jokes for years about being a deputy P.A.
under
Raymond Horgan. Between his conduct and mine, the office will sound more active than a Roman bath. Worst of all is the fact that the murder took Raymond from the life he really loved; it changed the course of the election; it sent him here to his glass-and-steel cage. What infuriates Raymond, inspires his rage, is not really that I committed this crime. It is that he believes he was intended to be another victim. He said as much when he finally let things loose. I screwed him. I killed Carolyn to bring him down. And I succeeded. Horgan thinks he has the whole thing figured out. And he has clearly planned his vengeance.

I finally leave the building. The heat is intense; the sun is blinding. I feel instantly unsteady on my feet. Compulsively, I try to calculate the one thousand subtle impacts on the trial of Raymond's testimony and his evident hostility to me, but that soon gives way. Ideas come and go erratically. I see my father's face. I cannot make things connect. After all these weeks, after all of this, I feel that I am finally going to go to pieces, and I find, stunningly, that as I turn about in the street, I am praying, a habit of my childhood, when I would try to cover my bets with a God in whom I knew I did not much believe.

And now, dear God, I think, dear God in whom I do not believe, I pray to you to stop this, for I am deathly frightened. Dear God, I smell my fear, with an odor as distinct as ozone on the air after a lightning flash. I feel fear so palpably it has a color, an oozing fiery red, and I feel it pitifully in my bones, which ache. My pain is so extreme that I can barely move down this hot avenue, and for a moment cannot, as my backbone bows with fear, as if a smelted rod, red-hot and livid, had been laid there. Dear God, dear God, I am in agony and fear, and whatever I may have done to make you bring this down upon me, release me, please, I pray, release me. Release me. Dear God in whom I do not believe, dear God, let me go free.

In the United States, the prosecution in a criminal case may not appeal the outcome. This is a constitutional principle, declared by the U.S. Supreme Court. An American prosecutor, alone among all the advocates who stand before the bench — among the sophisticates and hacks, the collection lawyers in their rayon suits, the bankruptcy moguls, the divorce-court screamers, the gold-chained dope lawyers or the smooth likes of Sandy Stern, the big-firm "litigators" who perform even routine courtroom tasks in pairs — the prosecutor alone is without right to seek review of a judge's trial rulings. Whatever the majesty of his office, the power of the policemen he commands, the bias in his favor jurors always bring to court, a prosecutor is often under a continuing duty to endure in silence various forms of judicial abuse.

Nowhere, while I was a P.A., was that obligation more regularly or onerously borne than in the courtroom of Judge Larren Lyttle. He is sly and learned and indisposed by the experience of a lifetime to the state's point of view. The habits of twenty years as a defense lawyer, in which he regularly manhandled and belittled prosecutors and police, have never left him on the bench. And beyond that, he has a black man's authentic education in the countless ways that prosecutorial discretion can be used to arrogantly excuse unreasoning caprice. The random and complete injustices which he witnessed on the streets have become a kind of emotional encyclopedia for him, informing each decision that is made almost reflexively against the state. After two or three years, Raymond gave up coming to court to argue. The two of them would bellow at each other as they must have done in their old law office. Then Larren would bang his gavel, more adamant than ever, and declare a recess so that he and Raymond could make up back in chambers and plan to have a drink.

Judge Lyttle is on the bench, receiving status reports on other cases, when Stern and I arrive. It is always as if there is a spotlight. He is the only person you see — handsome, mercurial, extraordinarily prepossessing. Judge Lyttle is a big human being, six foot four or five and broad across. His first fame came as a football and basketball hero at the U., where he went on scholarship. He has a full head of medium-length African hair, most of it gone gray, a big face, enormous hands, a princely style of oratory, with a large voice, full across all the male ranges. His intelligence, which is mighty, is also somehow transmitted by his presence. Some say Larren sees his future on the federal bench; others guess that his real goal is to succeed Albright Williamson as the congressman from the district north of the river, whenever it is that Williamson ceases defying age and his cardiologist's predictions. Whatever his inclinations, Larren is someone whose prospects and personal powers make him in these parts a man of capital importance.

We were summoned here yesterday morning by a phone call from the judge's docket clerk. With the filing of the defendant's pre-trial motions two days ago, His Honor desires to hold a status hearing on my case. I suspect that he is going to rule on some of our requests, and perhaps discuss a trial date.

Sandy and I wait in silence. Kemp has stayed behind. The three of us spent yesterday together and I told them everything I knew about each witness Nico has listed for the case. Stern's questions remained precise and limited. He still did not ask me if I screwed Carolyn that night, or was there for any other reason, or whether, notwithstanding my prior proclamations, I own any instrument that might conform to the crack atop her head.

I spend these moments, familiar downtime in a courtroom lawyer's life, looking about. The reporters are all here again, although the sketchers have stayed home. Judge Lyttle, politic in the ways a judge can be, treats reporters well. There is a table set aside for them against the western wall and he always gives the press room a call before issuing any decision of import. The courtroom where the course of the rest of my life will be determined is a jewel. The jury box is set off by a walnut rail and descending baubles, round spheres of beautifully grained wood. The witness stand is similarly constructed and abuts the judge's bench, which is well elevated and covered by a walnut canopy supported by two red marble pillars. The docket clerk, the bailiff, and the court reporter (whose job is to write down every word spoken in open court) are in a well before the bench. A few feet in front of them, two tables have been placed, finely hewn, again in darker walnut, with carefully turned legs. These tables for the lawyers on trial sit perpendicular to the bench. The prosecution, by tradition, will sit nearer the jury.

When all the other business is finished, our case is called. Some of the reporters creep up to the defense table to better hear the proceedings, and the assembly of lawyers — and me — convene before the bench. Stern, Molto, and Nico state their names. Sandy notes my presence. Tommy shoots me a little grin. I bet he's heard about our meeting with Raymond last week.

"Gentlemen," Judge Lyttle begins, "I asked you here because I thought we could do a little work to move this case along. I have some motions from the defendant and I'm prepared to rule on them, unless the prosecutors are particularly anxious to make a response."

Tommy speaks in Nico's ear.

"Only to the motion to disqualify Mr. Molto," Nico says.

Naturally, I think. An entire office working for him, and he's still gun-shy about putting things on paper.

Larren says that he will leave the motion to disqualify to the end, although he has some thoughts about it.

"Now the first motion," Larren says, with the stack of paper right before him, "is a motion to set an immediate trial date. And I've thought about this, and as the prosecutors know, the
Rodriguez
case pled earlier this morning, so I will be free for twelve trial days beginning three weeks from today." Larren looks to his calendar. "August 18. Mr. Stern, can you be here?"

This is an extraordinary development. We had expected nothing sooner than the fall. Sandy will have to set everything else aside — but he barely hesitates.

"With pleasure, Your Honor."

"And the prosecution?"

Nico at once begins to back and fill. He has a vacation planned. So does Mr. Molto. There is still evidence to be developed. With that, Vesuvius erupts.

"No, no," says Judge Lyttle, "I will hear none of that. No, sir, Mr. Delay Guardia." He pronounces Nico's name that way, as if he is trying to incorporate the nickname. With Larren, you can never tell. "These charges here — These charges are the most serious crime — What else could you do to Mr. Sabich? A prosecutor his entire professional life, and you bring charges like this. We all know why Mr. Stern wants a quick trial. There're no secrets here. We've all been tryin cases for a good part of our lives. Mr. Stern has looked at the evidence you have provided by way of discovery, Mr. Delay Guardia, and he doesn't think you have much of a case. He may not be right. I wouldn't know about that. But if you come into this courtroom chargin a man with a crime, you better be ready to prove it. Right now. Don't be tellin me about what's going to develop. You can't leave this hangin over Mr. Sabich like that old sword of Damocles. No, sir," Larren says again. "We're gonna have a trial three weeks from today."

My blood is ice. Without excusing myself, I take a seat at the head of the defense table. Stern glances back momentarily and seems to smile.

"Now, what else have we got?" says Larren. Just for an instant, as he looks about, there is a private smile. He can never quite hide his satisfaction with himself for trashing a prosecutor. He passes quickly on our motions for production. Every one is granted, as they should be. Tommy complains a little bit about the motion to produce the glass. He reminds the court that the prosecution has the burden of proving a chain of custody — that is, that the glass was never out of the state's hands — an impossibility if the glass is turned over to the defense.

"Well, what is it that the defense wants to do with this glass?"

I stand immediately. "I want to take a look at it, Your Honor."

Sandy gives me a corrosive glance. With his hand on my forearm, he puts me back down in my seat. I will have to learn: it is not my place to speak.

"Fine," says Larren, "Mr. Sabich wants to look at the glass. That's all. He's got that right. The prosecution has got to show him the evidence. You know, I've looked over the discovery and I understand why Mr. Sabich might want to look very carefully at that glass. So that motion will be allowed." Larren points at me. It is the first real notice he has taken of my presence. "And by the way now, Mr. Sabich, you of course will be heard through counsel, but if it's your desire to speak yourself, you have that right. At any time. When we have our conferences in chambers or during the proceedings, you have every right to attend. I want you to know that. We all know Mr. Sabich is a fine trial lawyer, one of the finest trial lawyers we have in these parts, and I'm sure he'll be curious about what we're doin from time to time."

I look at Sandy, who nods, before I answer. I thank the court. I tell him I will listen. My lawyer will speak.

"Very well," the judge says. But his eyes hold the light of a warmth that I have never seen from him in court. I am a defendant now, in his special custody. Like a chieftain or a Mafia don, he owes me some protection while I am in his domain. "Next we have this motion to get into the apartment."

Molto and Nico confer.

"No objection," Nico says, "so long as a police officer is present."

To that, Sandy instantly objects. A few moments of typical courtroom skirmishing follow. Everybody knows what's going on. The prosecutors want to figure out what we are looking for. On the other hand, they have a valid point. Any disturbance of the contents of Carolyn's apartment will hinder their ability to make further use of the scene for evidentiary purposes.