The Good Wife (10 page)

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Authors: Stewart O'Nan

BOOK: The Good Wife
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THE TRIAL’S SCHEDULED FOR EARLY MAY. WHEN SHE MEETS WITH the lawyer, he says there’s no way a jury will go murder two on both of them, as if the manslaughter charge would be a victory. Each time she speaks to him she comes away even more discouraged. She replays those first few days after the arrest and thinks she should have done things differently, starting with hiring their own lawyer. She doesn’t see how she could have pulled it off, but is hounded now by the idea that she didn’t even try.
Since their motion for severance failed, their lawyer has to craft an overall strategy with Gary’s. Neither of them will take the stand. Both lawyers will hammer the fact that Mrs. Wagner’s death was an accident, the result of a fall. They’ve lined up an expert witness to question the coroner’s report. That way it still comes down to reasonable doubt.
As the date grows closer, Tommy swears to her that he didn’t do it. He says it in the visiting room where the guards can hear and over the phone they know is being taped, as if he’s trying to find a blameless way to inform on Gary. Patty doesn’t tell him to cool it.
She doesn’t tell him he can still make a statement either. He knows how she feels about that.
Instead, they concentrate on getting him a suit to wear. The lawyer has a tailor he recommends, but Patty has to pay for it. To her surprise, her mother comes through without any hesitation, and Patty’s grateful, moved by her honest generosity. The suit is beautiful, charcoal gray with thin lapels. The tailor has to visit Tommy to make alterations. He’s a little round Greek man who talks to himself while he measures and marks with his chalk. Twice he’s supposed to have the suit ready for them and then postpones at the last minute, saying he’s got a wedding. There’s less than a week. The lawyer tells her not to worry, he always cuts it close.
When she gets a call at nine in the morning three days before the trial, she thinks it’s him, that the suit’s finally done.
It’s the lawyer. “I’m glad I got you,” he says. “I just got some news. You better sit down for this.”
“What?” Patty says, thinking he’s being dramatic.
“He’s pleading out,” the lawyer says. “Your husband’s buddy.”
“He confessed?” Because this is what she’s been waiting for, for Gary to step up and tell the truth.
“Just the opposite,” the lawyer says. “He’s gone state. He’s giving the DA a statement right now.”
WHEN SHE CALLS DONNA, DONNA SWEARS SHE DOESN’T KNOW WHAT’S going on. She says she’s sorry.
“Why is he doing this?” Patty asks, because she needs an answer, while another, uglier part of her wants to trap Donna, to make her say something incriminating, since the phone’s probably tapped.
“I don’t know,” Donna says. “But I know he wouldn’t lie.”
“Not even to save his own ass.”
“I know him. He wouldn’t.”
“I don’t care,” Patty says. And she doesn’t. “He should have kept his fucking mouth shut. And you can tell him that from me.”
NOW THAT THEY’VE GOT GARY, THEY WANT TOMMY TO PLEAD TOO. It’s neat and clean that way; the DA gets both convictions and the court avoids having to try the case. The lawyer’s not sure what
they’ll offer, but with Gary’s testimony, it won’t be less than the murder two as charged, which is fifteen to life.
Patty rejects it out of hand. Gary’s lying.
It’s possible, the lawyer says, but the way he says it makes her understand that at this point it doesn’t matter.
He asks her to go over the statement to see if she can disprove the smallest part. As Patty reads about their earlier burglaries, she recognizes things Tommy brought home—the chainsaw, the ten-speed—all the evidence numbered and catalogued right in front of her. The feeling sinks in as she reads on, the heat of shame gathering in her cheeks. Maybe it’s the strangeness of seeing her fears laid out on paper, but she’s even more certain now that he didn’t kill Mrs. Wagner, as if there has to be a limit to her cluelessness.
She can’t picture him hitting her, or spinning her, or flinging her against the dresser, though she can see him laying her gently on the bed.
Patty gives him back the statement.
“Nothing?” he asks, and she wishes she could lie and make it stick the way Gary has.
“So,” the lawyer says, “what we need to do is figure out which way we want to go here. We turn down the plea, odds are the DA’s going to recommend the maximum, which is twenty-five to life. So you’re looking at a ten-year difference there.”
Patty’s thinking of the fifteen years, not the ten. To life. And Gary’s lying. This whole thing was his idea, Tommy just went along with it. She knows Tommy.
“There’s still room for interpretation, I think,” the lawyer says, “between murder and manslaughter. Depending on how much leeway they give us on the old lady’s frailty. And they may give us none—that may actually work against us. The arson will, regardless
of the fact that it didn’t really do anything. So there’s a number of unforeseeables.”
He talks like a doctor laying out the dangers of surgery, letting her know everything that can go wrong, so that, whatever happens, his ass will be covered. In the end, he wants her to know, it’s her decision.
THE TRIAL GOES AHEAD AS SCHEDULED, EXCEPT NOW TOMMY AND the lawyer have the table all to themselves. The new plan is to discredit Gary’s statement, then attack Gary himself, which is fine with Patty. The lawyer’s turned up some previous B&E convictions—not the felony count they wanted, but enough to make him look shady, while Tommy’s record is clean. The cops also took a bundle of money when they raided his and Donna’s place. The lawyer’s trying to find a way to make everything admissible. If they can convince the jury that Gary was the brains behind the operation, they’re halfway there.
Tommy still can’t believe Gary would do him like this. On the phone he sounds down, like he doesn’t care what happens. In the courtroom, he slouches in his suit, and the lawyer has to nudge him to sit up straight. Like a bad actor, he doesn’t know what to do with his hands, and keeps rubbing his nose.
Donna doesn’t come anymore, doesn’t call. And Patty used to feel sorry for her, that’s how big of a fool she was.
At home, her mother and Eileen pretend they still have a chance. Cy avoids the subject, tries not to get caught alone in the same room with her.
The trial’s like going to a job she despises. Every morning she gets Casey ready, stuffing his diaper bag full of cloths and bottles and wet wipes, then hands him off to her mother so she can get dressed. She doesn’t fit into her old clothes yet. Her mother’s taken her on an emergency shopping spree at Penney’s, but still, people who watch the news must be sick of Shannon’s pantsuit. Patty’s learned to bring extra pads after soaking through one of her new shirts.
Every recess she expects her mother to go over and introduce herself to Elsie Wagner and her husband, but she stays with her, taking Casey when Patty needs her hands free.
And Casey’s good, Casey’s easy. When he fidgets, she walks him on her shoulder in the women’s room, cooing to him and pacing in the mirror. The reporters leave her alone there, as if they’ve agreed it’s safe, home base.
Most of the time she sits still on the hard bench behind Tommy, trying not to show her emotions. It’s surprisingly easy. The trial is mesmerizingly dull, an endless church service. She’s heard so much of the evidence already that she’s not shocked. The neighbor, Mr. Ayres, returns to tell his version of events, and takes all morning, placing the truck in the turnaround, verifying that Mrs. Wagner was legally blind. It seems to Patty that every sheriffs deputy testifies. The DA’s just being thorough, her lawyer says; it’s a big case for him.
Does he even listen to himself? It’s a big case for her and Tommy, not the fucking DA.
The worst part is listening to the coroner describe what might
have happened to Mrs. Wagner. Patty can handle the diagram of the room with the body on the bed, the location of the broken glass and the capsized night table; it’s only when he starts making guesses that she has to grip her own leg to keep from flinching. Elsie Wagner raises her tissue to her face like a white flag.
The injuries sustained by the deceased are consistent with a blow to the head with a heavy object such as a lamp or telephone receiver.
“Isn’t it also possible,” their lawyer cross-examines him, “that she could have received these injuries by falling and striking her head on a hard surface like that of a dresser or a doorframe, maybe even a plaster wall?”
“It’s possible,” the coroner concedes, and for the first time since Tommy was arrested, Patty thinks they’ve scored a victory.
Afterward, in the lawyer’s office, she asks him what kind of time Gary’s going to see. He says he doesn’t know what the agreement is. But something; he’s definitely not getting away with probation in this type of case. For an instant she savors a vision of poetic justice: Tommy walking and Gary going to prison for turning on him.
When they leave his office, the TV vans are gone, the sidewalks empty, the courthouse doors locked. It’s only when they’re driving home that the rest of the world returns—the steamy heat of spring with its sun and thunderstorms, bright backlit clouds riding the green hills. On Hunt Creek Road the tidy houses all fly flags. Her mother gazes directly ahead, her face slack under her makeup. The car makes Casey sleep. In these empty moments Patty’s mind wanders to harmless places, memories of a better future, Casey growing up, Tommy playing catch with him in the backyard of their new house while she makes dinner, as if all this—the last six months, today—is in the past and can no longer touch them.
After dinner she waits for Tommy’s call. They go over the day’s testimony and preview what’s coming up tomorrow. He asks about
the bumps on Casey’s arm—gone, thanks to the cream the doctor prescribed. They’ve gotten better at not wasting their expensive minutes, hopping from topic to topic like talk show hosts.
Happy Days
is on at eight, then
Welcome Back, Kotter
; they’ll watch it as if the TV can magically connect them, a place where they meet in secret. It gives them something to share next time.
When their shows are over, she gets Casey down and says good night herself. She has to get up to feed him and then again at six to be at the courthouse, but of course she can’t sleep, and wakes up with a headache.
She’s busy; there’s not a lot of time to sit around and feel sorry for herself. Plus—she never forgets—she’s not the one in jail.
The trial grinds on, the firemen taking the stand. The DA props blown-up photos of the house on an easel. Patty has to be careful not to stare at the jurors. She sneaks peeks to see what interests them, the way they lean forward to absorb a witness’s testimony. She can’t help but see them as the enemy, the same as the judge and the DA and the reporters. She’s even come to resent Elsie Wagner for being there.
The only person on her side is her mother, and she says almost nothing about the case, as if she’d rather not get involved. She critiques the trial like a movie with a faulty plot, but gently, as if she’s afraid of upsetting her. “I’m surprised he didn’t question that second guy more,” she’ll say in the car, and that will be it.
The DA’s saving Gary for last, hoping he’ll clinch the deal. The rest is buildup, putting things in place. The forensics expert from the state police barracks testifies that both Tommy’s and Gary’s fingerprints match those taken from the gas can and that traces of accelerant were found on the bed. The jury’s interested in his diagram showing the trail of gas winding through the furniture; though Patty can see it from halfway across the room, the DA has them pass it along both rows for a closer look.
“1 was afraid of that,” the lawyer says in his office.
Then why didn’t you do something about it, Patty wants to ask, because now it just sounds like an excuse.
Gary can’t surprise them. By the terms of the plea agreement, he has to stick to his sworn statement. What they have to do is hammer his record and then trip him up on cross.
But first the DA wastes a day nailing down the burglary charge, introducing Gary’s hockey bag and the guns into evidence, then going over the long list of property confiscated from their garage, bringing in a sheriff’s deputy to recap their other robberies to show they’re professionals. Their lawyer scores a point, asking the court to acknowledge the exact sum of the wad taken from Gary and Donna’s apartment. Patty’s strangely embarrassed, and angry at the way they used Tommy: they kept the money while he got stuck holding a bunch of junk.
What bothers her is how methodical and bloodless the process is, the steady accumulation of tape from the court reporter’s machine, the folders full of typed pages the lawyers take out of their briefcases every morning. The whole thing is just words, so why is it so expensive? And anyway, the most important ones are lies. From the beginning, no one’s been interested in the truth.
She knows what Gary’s going to say, so that when he finally gets up on the stand in his fake suit and tie, his answers seem rehearsed, which of course they are. His story’s familiar to anyone who’s been following the news. He and Tommy go into the house, thinking it’s empty. Tommy struggles with the woman and knocks her down; after that, she doesn’t move. Tommy decides they have to set the fire and gets the can from the garage.
Gary recites his lines so matter-of-factly—dipping to the microphone so he has to look up at the DA—that Patty can’t believe the
jury will buy it, and yet they’re paying attention to every word he says. Question after question, the DA keys on the violence of the struggle, the size of Tommy, “a hockey player,” against a bony old lady. One woman in the front row raises her hands in self-defense as Gary describes how Tommy poured the gas on Mrs. Wagner. Patty contains herself, jaw clenched, staring directly at Gary, daring him to look her in the eye.
On cross, their lawyer nails him on his previous convictions and the bundle of money. He asks whose idea it was to target Mrs. Wagner’s in the first place, then quotes from a list of property reported stolen from their earlier jobs, including a dozen rifles that are still missing. He tries to tie the guns to the money, but the DA objects, and the judge sustains it.
Patty wishes they could call Donna to the stand and make her tell the truth. That would prove that all of this was Gary’s doing. But they can’t, by law, as if that makes any sense.
And the lawyer can’t make Gary take back his statement. It’s admitted as evidence, testimony given under oath, meaning now the jury will have to find out that he’s lying by themselves, and she’s not sure they’re that smart.
The judge dismisses Gary, who’s escorted out the side door by the bailiff like a special guest. It’s past four, and Patty thinks they’ll just adjourn for the day, but the DA steps forward and asks to introduce one last piece of evidence.
He brings it out on an easel, hidden behind a black shroud. It’s probably another diagram of some kind—or a photo of Mrs. Wagner, burnt.
He circles it, recounting Gary’s testimony of the struggle between the defendant and the victim. “She realizes she’s fighting for her life,” he says, “but her opponent is too young, too strong. And yet she doesn’t give up. She
can’t
give up. In her final minutes, Audrey
Wagner does everything she can to stay alive. It’s the most basic human instinct, self-preservation.” With that, he lifts back the veil.
It’s a blowup of Tommy’s mug shot, his hair wild, the bloody slice across one eye.
“Ob-
jec
-tion!” their lawyer yells, and the judge orders the DA to cover it up and calls a conference.
The picture isn’t admitted, but it doesn’t matter, the damage is done.
“He told me he ran into a tree,” Patty says.
“I
think the cops beat on him.”
“I don’t think we want to argue either of those. It was a cheap shot, we just have to move on.”
What he’s really saying is that they have to play by the state’s made-up rules, but the DA can do whatever he likes.
That night, Eileen informs her that she and Cy are coming tomorrow. Patty wonders what their mother told her. She half expects Shannon to call and try to cheer her up.
The next morning the court is packed to hear the lawyer and the DA make their closing arguments, but for Patty the trial’s over. If that’s all the evidence the state has, she isn’t convinced, not beyond a reasonable doubt. In the end it comes down to Gary’s word, and it’s obvious he testified to save his ass. As she listens to the judge give the jury their instructions, she thinks they have to see that.
She tries not to imagine what the jury’s saying as they deliberate—the way she willfully ignores a Bills game on TV in the other room, afraid to hear something bad happening, wanting only the relief of the final score. She plays with Casey in the lawyer’s office, pressing his nose like a button. There’s not enough room for all of them. She’s told Eileen and Cy they can go home, but they won’t, filling the chairs, staring out the window at the street below, the reporters smoking in the gazebo. The lawyer says they want the
jury to stay out as long as possible, which makes the afternoon drag. Every time the phone rings, Patty holds Casey still, as if the slightest movement could jinx them.
At five, there’s still no word.
“That’s a good sign, right?” Patty asks.
“Usually,” the lawyer says.
He checks with the court clerk, and it’s official, the jury’s sequestered for the night. She might as well go home.
In the car, she thinks the phone will be ringing when they pull in.
It isn’t, of course, and it doesn’t ring—as she fears—just as she’s walking past it, a land mine set just for her.
Eileen and her mother try to distract her with dinner and TV. Casey picks up on her nerves and cries, and she can’t calm him. That’s never happened before, and after a while she has to hand him to Eileen and close the bathroom door to compose herself. It’s been eight hours, and they couldn’t have spent much time on the burglary and arson charges. Or have they already quit for the night?
She splashes water on her face, comes back out and takes her place on the couch. She can feel herself vibrating inside, a tremor in her skin that makes her want to swallow. If she could just stop thinking, but it’s impossible, and the TV’s no help, flashing pictures of airports and convertibles at her, a dog running across a yard in slow motion. It’s almost like being stoned, the way her mind flies around, bouncing off things, never landing.

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