Rough Justice (12 page)

“Well, yeah. But my stomach has a hole in it, I can tell. And I heaved, which is like, proof. Your Honor. Sir.”

“Do you need to see a doctor now?” the judge asked, as his stenographer tapped away. He was asking only for the record. A doctor wouldn’t work on a night like this, doctors made too much money. Only judges had to work on a night like this. Trial judges.

“No, I don’t need no doctor. I ate six Turns. Tropical flavor.”

“Fine. You don’t need a doctor.”

“But my stomach hurts. From my nerves.”

“You have an upset stomach, is that what your problem is?”

“Yeah.”

Judge Rudolph leaned back in his chair and snapped off his glasses. He examined their tiny hinges while he thought about his record. He had handled this issue. Kept it from the press and anyone outside his chambers. Blocked the lawyers out of the action with the promise of a next-day transcript. Downgraded an ulcer to an upset tummy. Time to get the tailor back to the jury room. “Perhaps if you had something to drink, you’d feel better.”

Nick’s throat caught with hope. “You got anisette?”

“For an upset stomach?” Judge Rudolph pursed his lips. All my trials, Lord. No pun intended.

“It relaxes me. My stomach.”

“Forget it,” the judge said flatly. “You’re in deliberations. You can have any nonalcoholic beverage you want. Soda or hot tea, a beverage like that.”

“Maybe a nice glass of milk?”

Judge Rudolph waved at his law clerk. “Joey, go get Mr. Tullio some milk.”

“Milk?” repeated the clerk. “We don’t have any milk.” He was a short kid who didn’t look Italian to Nick, even though his name was Joey.

The judge frowned. “What do you mean, we don’t have any milk?”

“There’s no milk in chambers, Your Honor.”

“Not even in the fridge?”

“No, Your Honor.”

“You put milk in my tea, don’t you?”

“No. I put cream.”

“Christ, Joey. Get the cream then.”

Nick raised his hand weakly. “Uh, I can’t drink cream. It’s too heavy.”

“This is
light
cream,” the clerk countered.

“It has to be milk,” Nick said, but the judge and the clerk stared at him together. Nick wondered if they could sue him. Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything. So what if he heaved? He wouldn’t die. Nick felt himself slipping deeper into the big chair. He felt like he was drowning, like the only thing keeping him above water was the armrests. “Listen, I don’t need no milk. You can forget I said anything about milk, Your Honor. Joey, forget it.”

“Not at all, Mr. Tullio,” said Judge Rudolph. He was protecting a record, not a stomach lining. “If you need milk, we’ll get you milk.”

“That’s okay. That’s all right.” Nick shook his head nervously. “I don’t even like milk. I hate milk. Never liked it from when I was a little kid. I only drink it ’cause Antoinetta says to. If I never saw no more milk, I’d die happy. You can’t die from heaving, can you? It was like, dry heaving.”

Judge Rudolph slapped his glasses back on. “Mr. Tullio, if we had milk, would you drink it?”

Nick blinked. He wasn’t sure if you could lie to a judge and if you did, would you go to jail. Maybe it was like being under oath when you came into a judge’s room. Maybe it was like you swore on a Bible. Nick was sorry he said anything about his stomach. He shoulda just voted innocent like the other white people. He wished Antoinetta was here.

“Get Mr. Tullio his milk, Joey,” ordered Judge Rudolph.

The clerk blanched. “Your Honor, I don’t know how I’d get milk in a snowstorm. I’m sure all the stores are—”

“I don’t care which tit you have to squeeze, Joey. Just get him the goddamn milk.”

“Yes, sir,” the clerk said and took off.

Judge Rudolph’s gaze stayed pinned to the tailor. This conversation should have been over ten minutes ago. The juror should be deliberating, not sitting in chambers complaining about his tummy. For God’s sake. Judge Rudolph hated the trial level. He belonged in the appellate tier, where the talk was about the law, not elcers.

“I hope Joey’s okay out there,” Nick said, just to make conversation because the judge looked so mad at him.

“I’m sure he’s fine.”

“Prolly.”

“Probably,” the judge corrected him.

“Okay. Good. He prolly is,” Nick said, just to agree, but Judge Rudolph only looked madder.

“I’m not worried about my clerk, Mr. Tullio, I’m worried about you,” Judge Rudolph said, though he didn’t mean a word of it. He was worried about how that “tit” would play in the newspapers if it came out. Would women’s groups oppose his nomination? “Remember, Carol,” he said to the stenographer, “this transcript is sealed until I say further.”

Carol nodded, understanding. She’d worked for Judge Rudolph since her divorce. If he went up to the Court, he’d take care of her. She’d skip a couple grade levels and the benefits were out of this world. “Yes, Your Honor.”

“Thank you.” The judge turned to the tailor and tried to look sympathetic. “Mr. Tullio if you have no other problems and you’re not in need of medical care, you can return to the jury and resume your deliberations.”

“Uh, what? You mean, uh, go back?”

“Yes, of course. I’ll send the milk in as soon as it arrives. The jury has a job to do right now, a very important job. Dinner tonight is scheduled for seven-thirty, under extended hours. You can get some substantive deliberation in before then, I’m sure.”

“I don’t know. My nerves. The stress.”

Judge Rudolph leaned farther over his desk, almost in the tailor’s face. He’d be damned if he’d let this pipsqueak screw him over. “You’re not telling me you’re too sick to deliberate, are you?”

“Well, no. I mean, yeah. Yes. In a way. Your Honor.”

“But you don’t need a doctor.”

“No, Your Honor.”

“All you need is milk.”

“Yes, Your Honor. Sir.”

“So why can’t you go back and discuss the case?”

Carol cleared her throat noisily, warning the judge off. Judge Rudolph knew he was treading on dangerous ground, especially since he hadn’t called the lawyers in. How close was he to reversible error? Where was that goddamn law clerk? Damn!

“I can’t go back because my nerves…” Panic seized Nick and strangled the life from his sentence. He felt too scared to talk and too scared not to. He couldn’t go back to the jury and he couldn’t stay here with the judge. It was like he was caught in the middle and something was squeezing him in a fist. “I just wish Antoinetta was here,” Nick croaked, near tears.

Judge Rudolph scrutinized the tailor, scanning his working-class features and searching his wet and rheumy eyes. Suddenly, the judge felt as if he could see into the man’s shopworn little soul. He understood what was happening, comprehended it with a crystalline clarity he hadn’t experienced since his law review comment. “I know just what you need, Mr. Tullio,” the judge said.

“You do?” Nick asked.

“Yes.” Judge Rudolph breathed in deeply and his chest inflated. When he ascended to the bench of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, he would do great things for the citizens of the Commonwealth. But right now he wanted them out of his chambers.

“I
’m comin’ into the conference room with you,” Bogosian said as he faced Marta in the hallway at Rosato & Associates.

“No.” As threatened as she felt inside, Marta had to stand her ground.

“I gotta hear what you’re sayin’.”

“You can’t.” Marta watched him eye the two young associates through the glass wall of the conference room. They were cleaning up the file, and Marta didn’t want Bogosian anywhere near them. She felt bad enough leading him to them. She wouldn’t jeopardize them further. “You can’t come in. It’s a privileged conversation.”

“Big fuckin’ deal,” Bogosian said, though he had only the vaguest idea what she meant. So many fuckin’ words. He hated lawyers. He never had an honest one in his life, and they couldn’t keep him out of jail.

“How am I going to explain who you are?”

“I don’t give a fuck. You’re not leaving my sight.”

Marta pointed a short distance down the hallway. “Look, there’s another conference room directly across from the one I’ll be working in. It has glass walls like the one I’ll be in. You can see everything I’m doing. I won’t make any phone calls, and if one comes in, you can listen in on your phone.”

“You think I’m stupid? You could tell the other two lawyers.”

“And put them in danger? Never.”

“Fuck that. I’m comin’ in with you,” Bogosian said, and stepped so close Marta almost freaked. The last time he had been this close he’d beaten her unconscious. She suppressed the fear rising in her throat and walked neatly around him to the elevator bank, punching the
DOWN
button with authority.

“Then I’m not working on the motion,” Marta said, struggling to keep her voice strong. “Take me back to the hotel right now. You can call Steere and tell him his fingerprints are coming into evidence.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fine. I’ll call him as soon as we get back.”

“You’re bluffin’.”

“Am I?” Marta turned and forced a smile. The beauty shot. “Want to find out?”

Bogosian thought a minute. What a bitch. Steere would go ballistic if Bobby called him on the cell phone again. And Steere did say he wanted the motion done. Bogosian figured it would be okay if he could watch her. Besides, what could she do? She was just a broad.

“What have you got for me, ladies?” Marta barked at the associates. She closed the conference room door behind her and pulled out the seat at the head of the table. She was trying to hide her anxiety, but she wasn’t fooling Judy, who appraised her with a critical eye. Her blouse was wrinkled, a first for Erect, and her eyes drooped as if she were in pain. Something odd was definitely going on. Judy would have asked Marta if she were okay, but Erect didn’t invite that sort of inquiry. And Mary had an agenda.

“Marta, I have something to tell you,” Mary said. She stood up nervously, her neck blotchy under her blouse. Mary had decided to show some balls for a change. Be a FEMINAZI. “Something important.”

“Make it fast.”

“I didn’t finish the motion
in limine
. You can tell Bennie if you want to. You can fire me if you want to. The motion’s not done.”

“I don’t care about the motion,” Marta shot back. “Did you figure out what the D.A. has on Steere?”

Mary’s eyes widened in surprise, and Judy found herself thinking: schizophrenic, even for Napoleon.

Marta rose to her feet as the associates told her about Steere’s color blindness and the traffic light. Her instinct told her they were onto something. Steere had lied to her again, even when he supposedly confessed. Why hadn’t she seen it? Steere had admitted he was a liar, yet Marta had swallowed his shit about killing a homeless man. What, did she need a fucking sign? She’d nail him to the wall.

“The only problem is motive,” Mary said. “Maybe you know something that can fill in the blank.”

Marta’s thoughts raced ahead. First she’d have to shake Bogosian, who was waiting in the conference room across the hall. She could see him through the glass, a slick leather mountain, sitting at an identical conference table. He was reading his dog magazine and glancing over at them from time to time. Marta had told the associates he was her driver, but hadn’t introduced him.

“This is the picture from Darnton’s autopsy.” Mary handed an 8 × 10 photo across the table to Marta. “We both think his real name is Eb Darning.”

Marta picked up the photo. A corpse on a slab. A face in a morgue. She flashed on the Magnum that had bored into her ribs and realized something she should have realized before. If Marta uncovered the truth about this murder, it would cost her her life. Steere would send Bogosian after her and he wouldn’t stop pounding until she was the corpse on the slab. The face in the autopsy picture. Marta had to put Steere behind bars for the rest of his life or she’d be dead. Her head thundered. Her wounds throbbed. Blood pulsed in her ears. The conference room seemed suddenly distant. The photo slipped from her fingers.

“Marta, are you okay? Marta?” It was Mary. Her expression was anxious, but Marta couldn’t hear her clearly. It sounded like she was underwater.

Marta felt suddenly warm. Perspiration appeared under her blouse and on her palms. The conference room whirled around her. Papers and briefs and files circled like a tornado. She’d had spells like this as a kid, after the station wagon. She couldn’t give in to it now or it would bring Bogosian down on them all. Marta forced a smile that even to her felt like a horrid grimace.

“Marta?” Judy asked, rising to her feet. Marta looked so pale Judy thought it was a heart attack.

“I’m fine,” Marta said quickly. “Fine. Don’t worry about it.” She wiped back her hair with a shaking hand. The room came back into focus and the associates’ voices came up. Whatever the spell was, it was ebbing away. She could see Bogosian out of the corner of her eye, his head cocked. He was standing up beside his chair, watching her. She gave him a dismissive wave and held the back of a chair for support.

“Are you having chest pain?” Judy was asking.

“Take a deep breath,” Mary said.

“I’m fine.” Marta braced herself against a chair as the merry-go-round of a room slowed to a complete stop. Across the hall, Bogosian eased back into his seat with the magazine. Marta breathed freer and she looked at DiNunzio and Carrier hovering around her. She realized they were concerned about her, which was confusing. She had toyed with the notion of slipping them a message about Bogosian, but now she knew she couldn’t do that. It had to end here, at least for them. She’d work them like dogs, but she wouldn’t get them killed. “Listen, you two, go home. Go home now.”

Judy and Mary exchanged looks. “What are you talking about?” Judy asked.

“Go home. Now. That’s an order. This case is over. Steere doesn’t matter, forget about Steere. Go home.”

“I don’t understand,” Carrier said. “What about the D.A.?”

“Forget about the D.A. We’ll deal with him later.”

“But Mary could be right. If we knew more about Darning—”