Winding Stair (9781101559239) (34 page)

“That's all I have.”

“Mrs. Thrasher, you're excused,” Judge Parker said. “Mr. Evans?”

“Your Honor, the government rests.”

T
he jury was a grim-faced crew after Mrs. Thrasher's testimony. Among the spectators, even the horse racers and chicken fighters were taking no bets on acquittal, at any odds. But McRoy still seemed confident when he called his first witness, a man named Philas Schafer, who identified himself as the Boinses' family doctor. He was a smallish man with a well-trimmed beard and perhaps the most expensive waistcoat in the room.

“Dr. Schafer, what has been your relationship to Johnny Boins and his family?” McRoy started.

“I have been their physician. I have been the personal confidant of the family for years, and a personal friend of John Boins, Sr.”

“And what has been the relationship between Johnny and his parents?”

“On the parents' part, a bit of overindulgence and a tendency to overlook what in normal children and young men is generally considered to be antisocial activity. On the boy's part, a sometimes violently manifested urge to break family ties, although this has been thwarted by the parents' overweening attention to him and his own reluctance to leave their protection.”

“Your Honor, I don't see that this has any relevancy to the case,” Evans remarked almost casually.

“It may well have, Mr. Evans,” Judge Parker said. “I'm going to allow it for a while yet. Proceed, Mr. McRoy.”

“Doctor, as a medical expert, how would you describe Johnny Boins as a boy and as a young man?”

“At a very early age, it was apparent he was different. Unlike other boys. He was wild and undisciplined, often violent to his playmates and to adults, to the extent sometimes of inflicting physical injury. This was a condition that persisted throughout his life. The most disturbing part of it was that he never showed contrition for his acts. I have never known him to display the slightest repugnance over anything he did.”

Johnny Boins looked back through the crowd, arrogantly, as though proud of what this medical man was saying.

“As an expert witness, Doctor, would you say that the defendant often acted without any clear understanding of what was right and wrong?”

“I would say so, many times. Although he was brought up in a Christian home of outstanding quality, given love and affection, he seemed to rebel against all proper deportment from an early age.”

“In your opinion as a medical expert, Doctor, would you say this condition has improved over the years?” McRoy said. It began to be amusing, this constant reference to Schafer as a “medical expert,” a term designed to impress the jury, but from their expressions having little effect.

“It has not improved. It has gotten worse.”

“Would you say at this moment, Doctor, that Johnny Boins is capable of determining what is morally right and wrong?”

“No, I doubt he can make that distinction.”

McRoy was trying to avoid the rope by sending his client to the asylum, and Johnny Boins seemed unaware of what was happening. Or, I thought, perhaps he knew exactly and was playing his part well. He still smirked, his eyes going boldly about the room.

“Do you think he can make such a determination before the law?”

“If he cannot determine right from wrong morally, it is hardly likely he can do so under the law. The restraints of Christian morality are more wide-ranging, it seems to me, than are those of the law.”

There was an interesting point of procedure here. McRoy was having his cake and eating it, too, pleading his client not guilty yet arguing now for consideration of a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity. Normally, he would have to plead to that effect, which is actually an admission of guilt though not culpable due to mental derangement. But he hadn't done that. It was as if he were giving the jury a choice: Johnny was either not at the Thrasher farm at all, or else if he was, he was insane. I assumed Judge Parker was allowing it due to the pressure of Supreme Court review and to ensure that no one could say the defendants had not obtained their full day in court. Evans remained silent for his own reasons.

“Does drinking strong spirits have any influence on this behavior?” McRoy asked.

“It makes it worse. The restraints of morality are lessened by hard drink, even in a normal person, and in Johnny Boins there has never been much moral restraint to begin with.”

“As an expert witness, Doctor, do you think Johnny Boins has been incapable of making a determination of right from wrong over, say, the last year?”

“It is my opinion he has not had that capability.”

“Your witness,” McRoy said, wheeling toward the defense table with that now-familiar flourish, his head up, smiling, looking pleased and sure of himself.

I suspected Evans was in unknown territory, but I was soon to learn that such an experienced prosecutor did not stand in awe of any expert witness.

“Dr. Schafer,” Evans said, “what is the nature of your practice?”

“I am a general practitioner.”

“In that role, how much time do you spend reading the most recent literature on the practice of medicine as it applies to mental disorders and insanity?”

“I have read some of it, certainly,” Schafer said, becoming a little indignant. Evans was unperturbed, moving calmly, the best I had seen him at any time in this court.

“Are you familiar with any of the periodicals inspired by studies on mental disorders done in such places as Vienna?”

“I read German very badly,” Schafer said, and laughed.

“In your practice, I would suppose that you need to keep abreast of developments in such diverse fields as surgery, obstetrics, infectious disease, respiratory ailments, constipation, falling hair, blemished skin, and other such things. Is that true, Doctor?”

The doctor flushed as the laughter spread through the crowd. Judge Parker sat with his head down, one hand over his face, and I could see the smile behind it.

“Yes, my practice is diverse,” Schafer said.

“Then how do you find time, Doctor, to read so widely in the field of insanity?”

“I try to keep up with all manner of medicine.”

“Doctor, have you ever studied at an institution the symptoms or the treatment for insanity?”

“Well, no—”

“But, Doctor,” Evans cut in sharply, “you have been presented here as an expert on the subject.”

“Well, I am not what you'd call an expert on insanity.”

“I could have sworn I heard the defense counsel refer to you as a ‘medical expert.' ” And the people laughed again, and a few of the jurors as well. “But never mind. You used the word
normal.
What is a normal person?”

“It would be difficult to provide a definition on the spur of the moment.”

“You have indicated that Johnny Boins was not normal, and it seemed that was on the spur of the moment.”

“I've watched him over a good many years.”

“Did you watch him, or treat him, or even see him throughout the month of June last?”

“No, I don't believe I saw him during that time.”

“Yet you would come here and state that at the time of the Winding Stair crimes, which occurred in June, that he was not able to distinguish between right and wrong?”

“That is my opinion,” Schafer said.

Evans startled the courtroom with a short, harsh laugh, a burst of mirthless sound, and abruptly he sat down.

When McRoy called his next witness, the crowd moved expectantly, and Judge Parker subdued them with his usual slap on the bench. Johnny Boins walked to the stand and lifted his hand to be sworn, his lips twisted into a crooked smile as though he had some dark secret about to be shared.

“Johnny, do you have headaches?” McRoy asked.

“All the time,” he said, but there was no show of pain on his face nor even the flicker of its memory.

“Are you sometimes forgetful?”

“Your Honor, he's leading his witness,” Evans said without rising.

“Rephrase it, Mr. McRoy.”

“What is the state of your health, Johnny?”

“Not good. There are times I get these bad headaches and there are times I can't remember anything.”

“How do you relieve this pain?”

“I take these powders the druggist gives me, but they don't do much good. Usually, I drink.”

“And what happens when you drink?”

“I don't have headaches anymore,” he said, and laughed. “And I don't usually remember anything.”

“Now, Johnny, you've heard in testimony here of a letter written to you by someone who drew a deer's-head signature. Do you recall getting that letter?”

“Sure. I met Rufus Deer in the Creek Nation a long time ago, and we sometimes went to horse races together, and sometimes chicken fights. Last May we were at Saddler's Ford on the North Canadian where they were having some races. Rufus saw this black stallion he wanted to buy, but before be could make any offer, the man who owned the horse left.”

“It was at this time you met a girl named Jennie Thrasher?”

“Sure. At Wetumka, I think it was, a few days before, then at Saddler's Ford. Her daddy owned the horse Rufus wanted to buy. I got to know Jennie pretty well.” And he laughed again. Joe Mountain, still beside me, placed a hand on my leg and patted me as though soothing a skittery horse, as though he were afraid I'd leap over the railing and assault the witness. “I told her I'd marry her and she asked me to come to her daddy's farm because she was willing. But her daddy found us together and threatened to kill me if I ever came around again, so I decided it was useless and forgot it.”

“Then you received the letter?”

“Sure. Rufus knew about the girl and that I was taken with her, and of course I knew about that horse he wanted to buy. I'd gone on home to Eureka Springs and then I got the letter. He'd sent somebody to find that horse, and the girl was there, too. So I decided I'd go with him and maybe I could talk her daddy into letting us get married.”

“What happened then, Johnny?”

“I met Rufus here in Fort Smith. We went across the river that night and got good and drunk. I guess we stayed drunk for two weeks. I don't remember anything until I was back home.”

“Do you recall going to the Winding Stair Mountains?”

“Rufus may have. I don't know. I don't ever remember being down in that part of The Nations. A little far south of my normal range.”

“Have you ever seen any of these defendants before, the ones at that table where you've been sitting?”

“I never have. Not until they brought 'em into this jail, where they had me locked up.”

“Now, Johnny, this loss of memory when you're drinking. Does it happen often?”

“All the time. The pain in my head gets so bad and I start drinking and then I can't remember. I was up in Missouri once for over two months, and didn't remember a thing.”

“You might say your mind leaves your body.”

“You might say that.”

“No more questions,” McRoy said. Evans sat for a long time, staring at the witness, then shook his head.

Nason Grube took the stand, his eyes still bloodshot. He sat on the edge of the chair, his hands clasped between his knees.

“Nason, have you ever been in the Choctaw Nation?”

“No, sir, I ain't.”

“Nason, how do you make a living?”

“I work on Mr. Cornkiller's farm,” Grube said. “I work there all the time.”

“Were you there during the month of June?”

“Yes, sir. I ain't been off the farm since last Christmas when me and Mr. Cornkiller went into Muskogee to get drunk.”

“Was Mr. Cornkiller there, too?”

“Most of the time. He went to Okmulgee once and then to Muskogee to trade horses. He goes around Creek Nation and horse trades some.”

McRoy had been holding a slip of yellow tablet paper behind his back throughout this, and now he presented it to the witness.

“Do you recognize this document, Nason?”

“Yes, sir. It's a bill of sale.”

“Your Honor, I ask this be entered in evidence,” McRoy said. “It indicates that on June tenth, 1890, a bay gelding and a blue roan mare were sold to one Skitty Cornkiller in Creek Nation the Indian Territory, for the sum of seventy-five dollars each.”

“Objection,” Evans shouted. “I request His Honor instruct the jury.”

“Sustained,” Parker said. “The jury will disregard the defense counsel's statements going to the content of this paper. Let me see that thing.”

He carefully placed his glasses on the end of his nose and studied the yellow paper intently, then shook his head.

“Mr. McRoy, you're going to have to show proper foundation for this. More than the testimony of the witness. It is self-serving.”

“Your Honor, may I call another witness at this time?”

“Prosecution hasn't had the opportunity to cross,” Parker said.

“I will recall Mr. Grube, Your Honor.”

“This is all playacting,” Evans said, obviously upset. “A sudden so-called bill of sale, and now this sandwiching of witnesses.”

“I am going to allow it, Mr. Evans,” Parker said, a dangerous edge on his voice. “But I must tell you, Mr. McRoy, your sequence of witnesses leaves a great deal to be desired.”

I wondered if Judge Parker would have so ruled before his decisions became subject to review by the Supreme Court. Nason Grube clanked back to his place and McRoy called James Fentress, a man who identified himself as an operative of the Acme Detective Agency in Little Rock. He was a seedy-looking man with a face like a squirrel, running mostly to nose.