Now and Forever (23 page)

"Ojection!"

It took two more hours to finish Martin's questioning, and Jessica felt as though she were going to melt into a small invisible blur by the time it was over. She couldn't even begin to imagine what Margaret Burton felt like as she was led, crying, from the stand. She was assisted by Inspector Houghton while Matilda Howard-Spencer rearranged her papers. Jessica had the impression that the austere prosecutor was interested in the case, not the victim.

The judge called a recess and dismissed them until Monday. For a moment they all stood numbly in the courtroom; it was only lunchtime, but Jessie wanted to climb into bed and sleep for a year. She had never been so tired in her life. Spent. And Ian looked five years older than he had that morning.

When they emerged from the courtroom with Martin behind them, Margaret Burton was nowhere to be seen. She had been escorted out through the judge's chambers, and Martin guessed that she would be taken out some more discreet exit, to avoid another encounter like the one that morning. He had a feeling that Houghton didn't quite trust the woman either, and didn't want any more trouble than he already had.

As they walked out into the sunshine, Jessie felt as though she hadn't seen it for years. Friday. It was Friday. The end of an interminable week, and now two whole days to themselves. Two and a half days. And all she wanted was to go home and forget this rococo hellhole where their lives seemed to be coming to an end at the hands of a madwoman. It was like a Greek play, really ... the jury could play the chorus.

"What are you thinking?" Ian was still worried about her after the morning's outburst. Now more than ever. The testimony had been grim.

"I don't know. I'm not sure I can think anymore. I was just drifting."

"Well, let's drift on home. Shall we?" He guided her quietly toward the car, and opened the door for her, and she felt two hundred years old as she slid onto the seat of the Volvo. But it was familiar, it was home. She needed that right now more than anything. She wanted to scrub the whole morning out of her soul.

"What do you think, love?" She looked at him through a haze of cigarette smoke as he drove slowly home.

"What do you mean?" He tried to evade her question.

"I mean, how do you think it's going? Did Martin say anything?"

"Not much. He plays it pretty close to the vest."

She nodded again. He hadn't said much as they'd left except that he wanted to see them in his office on Saturday. "But I guess everything's going okay." Sure it was. It had to be.

"It looks okay to me too." Okay? Christ, it looked horrible. But it was supposed to. Wasn't it?

"I like Martin's style."

"So do I."

They both still thought they would win, but now they were beginning to realize the price they'd have to pay. Not in money, not in cars, but in flesh, guts, and souls.

On Saturday morning, Ian went down to Martin's office to discuss his testimony on the stand the following week. Jessica stayed home with a migraine. As a favor, Martin came to see her at the house that evening, to discuss her own testimony.

And on Sunday afternoon, Astrid called, as the pair sat zombielike in chairs, watching old movies on television.

"Hello, children. How about a spaghetti dinner at my place tonight?" For once Jessie was short with her friend.

"I'm sorry, Astrid, we just can't."

"Oh, you two. Busy, busy, busy. I've tried to reach you all week, and you haven't been in the shop." Shit.

"I know. I had some work to do here, and I'm helping Ian ... edit his book."

"That sounds like fun."

"Yeah. Sort of." But her voice didn't carry the lie well. "I'll give you a call sometime next week. But thanks for the invitation." They blew kisses and hung up, and Jessica marveled at the fact that no one knew what was happening. It seemed remarkable that the newspapers hadn't picked it up, but she had finally realized that what was happening to them was in no way extraordinary. There were a dozen cases like it every day. It was new to them, but not to the news business. And there were far juicier cases than theirs to pick from--except, of course, for the Pacific Heights angle, and Jessie's exclusive boutique. It would destroy her business if it came out. But there didn't seem to be any danger of that. No members of the press had appeared thus far, and there had been no interest shown at all. It was something to be grateful for. And she was. And Martin had promised that if some stray reporter did happen through, he'd call the paper and ask for their discretion. He felt sure that they'd co-operate with him. They had before.

Jessie felt bad about having cut Astrid short. They hadn't seen her in a while, and they hadn't seen their other friends in two months now. It would have been hard to face anyone. It was getting harder even to face Astrid. And it would have been impossible to confront the girls in the shop this week. Jessie had no intention of going near the place. She was afraid they'd read too much in her face. For the same reasons, Ian had been staying away from everyone he knew since the arrest. And he was content to lose himself in his book. The characters he'd invented kept him company.

And meanwhile, the bills continued to mount. Zina dropped off Jessie's mail every day during the trial, and most of it was bills, including Harvey Green's second bill, for another nine hundred dollars. And once again for nothing. It had been "in case" money--in case Margaret Burton had done something she shouldn't have, in case something had turned up, in case but nothing had. He had managed to come up with absolutely nothing. Until Sunday night, right after Jessie talked to Astrid.

The phone rang, and it was Martin. He and Green wanted to come right over. She woke Ian, and they were waiting, tensely, when the two men arrived. They were dying to know what Green had found out.

What he had was a photograph. Of Margaret Burton's husband from the rapidly annulled marriage of almost twenty years before. The photograph could have been of Ian. The man in the picture was tall, blond, blue-eyed, with laughter in his face. He was standing next to an MG; it was of a much earlier vintage than the Morgan, but there was still a great deal of resemblance between the cars as well as the men. If you squinted, even a little, it looked like Ian and the Morgan. The man's hair was shorter than Ian's, his face was a little longer, the car was black instead of red ... the details were off, but not by much. It was a shock just looking at the photograph. It told the entire story. Now they knew the why. And Martin's first suspicion had been right. It must have been revenge.

The four of them sat in the living room in total silence. Green had gotten the photograph from a cousin of Miss Burton's, a last-minute lead he'd decided to follow, just on a hunch. A damn good hunch, as it had turned out.

Schwartz heaved a sigh of what sounded like relief and leaned back in his chair. "Well, now we know. The cousin will testify?" But Green shook his head.

"Says she'll take the Fifth, or lie. She doesn't want to get involved. She said that Burton would kill her. You know, this woman, the cousin I mean, almost sounds as though she's afraid of the Burton woman. Said she's the most vindictive person she's ever known. You gonna subpoena her?"

"Not if she's going to take the Fifth on us. Did she tell you why the Burton woman annulled the marriage?" Martin was pensively chewing on a pencil as he asked the questions, while Ian and Jessica listened silently. Ian still held the photograph in his hand, and it made him exceedingly nervous. The likeness was startling.

"Peggy Burton didn't annul the marriage. The husband did."

Martin raised his eyebrows quickly. "Oh?"

"The cousin thinks Margaret was pregnant--just a guess," Green went on. "She had just graduated from high school and was working in this guy's father's office, a law firm. Hillman and Knowles, no less." Ian looked up and Martin whistled. "She married Knowles's son. A kid named Jed Knowles. He was only in law school at the time, and was spending the summer working in his father's office. He's the kid in the picture." Green waved vaguely at the snapshot still resting in Ian's hand.

"Anyway, they got married in a big hurry, but very quietly, at the end of the summer. And the father made a real stink that nothing be made public, no announcement of the marriage, no nothing. The Burton girl's parents were both living in the Midwest, so she didn't have any family out here except the cousin, who isn't even sure if they ever lived together. They just got married, and the next thing she remembers is that Margaret was in the hospital for a couple of weeks. She thinks she might have had a complicated abortion, miscarriage, something. Knowles had the marriage annulled right after that, and Margaret was out of a husband, out of a job, and maybe out of a baby. She had kind of a nervous breakdown, it sounds like, and spent three months in a Catholic retreat house. I went back to check out the retreat house, but it was torn down twelve years ago, and the sisters of that order are now located in Kansas, Montreal, Boston, and Dublin. Not very likely we'd find any records on it, and if we did they'd be privileged anyway."

"What about the Knowles boy? Did you check him out?"

"Yeah." Green didn't look pleased. "He married some debutante, with a big splash and a lot of noise, at Thanksgiving of that year. Parties, showers, announcements in all the papers. The clippings at the Chronicle said that they'd been engaged for over a year, which was obviously why Papa Knowles didn't want any publicity when sonny boy married the Burton girl."

"Did you talk to Knowles?"

Green nodded unhappily. "He and his bride crashed in a two-engine plane seventeen months later. The father died of a heart attack this summer, and his mother is traveling in Europe, no one seems to know where."

"Terrific." Martin scowled and started to gnaw on his pencil again. "Any brothers and sisters? Friends who might know what happened? Anyone?"

"It's a dead end, Martin. No brothers and sisters. And who'd remember now, among his friends? Jed Knowles has been dead for eighteen years. That's a hell of a long time."

"Yeah. A long time to carry a grudge. Shit. We have it all wrapped up, and we don't have a fucking goddam thing. Nothing."

"What do you mean, nothing?" It was the first time Ian had spoken since seeing the photograph. He had been listening closely to the other men's exchange. "It sounds like we've got everything."

"Yes." Martin rubbed his eyes slowly with one hand and men opened them again, "And nothing we can use in court It's all guesswork. That's all it is. What we have here is undoubtedly the truth, and the full psychological explanation of why Margaret Burton has accused you of rape. You look just like some rich man's son who got her pregnant, married her, probably made her have an abortion, and then ditched her and married his high society girlfriend a few weeks later. Miss Burton met the handsome prince and then he shat on her. Back to Cinderella again. And she's been out to get him for twenty years. Which is probably why she hasn't tried to hit you two for money. She doesn't want money. She wants revenge. She probably got a little money out of it the first time. Money is too easy for some people." Jessica rolled her eyes at the remark and Ian gestured to her to keep still.

"The point is, she'd rather see you go to prison than hit you for bucks. In her mind, you're just another Jed Knowles, and you're going to take it for him. You look like him to a frightening degree, your car looks like his, you probably even sound like him, for all we know. And she probably spotted you at Enrico's months ago. You're a regular. She may well have set you up from beginning to end. But the problem is, that we can't prove that in court." He turned back to Green. "You're sure the cousin won't testify willingly?"

"Positive." Green was curt and emphatic. Martin shook his head.

"Wonderful. And that, Ian, is why we can't prove a goddam thing in court. Because a hostile witness who takes the Fifth Amendment would ruin you faster than never having her on the stand at all. And besides, even if she took the stand, we couldn't prove any of this. All we could prove is that Burton married Knowles, and shortly thereafter Knowles had the marriage annulled. The rest is pure conjecture, hearsay, guesswork. That doesn't hold up in court, Ian, not without solid proof. The prosecution would have the whole theory thrown out of court in ten minutes. You and I now know what probably happened, but we could never prove that to the jury, not without someone to testify that she was pregnant when Knowles married her, that she did have an abortion, that she did have a nervous breakdown, that someone heard her swear to take revenge. And how're you going to prove all that, even if the cousin did take the stand? What we have here, I'm afraid, is the truth, and no way to prove it."

Jessica felt tears burning her eyes as she listened, and Ian was paler than she'd ever seen him. He looked almost gray.

"So what do we do now?"

"We give it a try, and we pray. I'll call Burton for redirect and see how much she'll admit to. And how much they'll let us get away with. But it won't be much, Ian. Don't count on anything."

Green left a few moments later with a quiet handshake in the hall for Martin, and a shake of the head: "I'm sorry." Martin nodded, and left a few moments later.

The trial continued on Monday, and Martin recalled Margaret Burton to the stand. Had she been married to Jed Knowles? Yes. For how long? Two and a half months. Ten weeks? Yes. Ten weeks. Was it true that she had to marry him because she was pregnant? Absolutely not. Did she have a nervous breakdown ... objection! ... overruled! ... did she have a nervous breakdown after the marriage was annulled? No. Never. Didn't the defendant bear a striking resemblance to Mr. Knowles? No. Not that she had noticed. Had Mr. Knowles remarried almost immediately after ... objection! Sustained, with an admonition to the jury to disregard the previous line of questioning. The judge warned Martin about asking irrelevant questions and badgering the witness, and Jessica noticed that Margaret Burton was silent and pale but totally poised. Almost too much so. She found herself praying that the woman would lose control, would disintegrate on the stand and scream and shriek and destroy herself by admitting that she had wanted to destroy Ian because he looked like Jed Knowles. But Margaret Burton did none of those things. She was excused from the stand. And Jessica never saw her again.