Time's Witness (57 page)

“The state of North Carolina should want justice, not a victory! If you wanted the whole truth, you’d listen. I’ve tried to tell you that George Hall was repeatedly threatened by Russell, that if he didn’t keep his mouth shut, his family would be hurt. He does keep his mouth shut. And Russell still shoots his brother. And we still don’t know why.”

Mitch shook his head fast. “I don’t believe a word of George Hall's story. It's just something he came up with after the fact. Trying to make himself look heroic. Nobody goes to the gas chamber if he thinks he can get out of it, not just because of some vague threat against his brother. George Hall knew he
couldn’t
get out of it. And he's not going to get out of it either. I’m going to nail him in this stupid retrial. You can tell your friend Rosethorn that Hall's going right back to death row where he belongs. That's something Rosethorn can set his clock by!” It was interesting that Bazemore accepted the idea that a man like Otis Newsome could get so upset by a brother's “shame” that he’d kill himself, but wouldn’t accept the idea that a man like George Hall could let himself be killed in order to save a brother's life.

He flung open the glass door with DISTRICT ATTORNEY, HAVER
COUNTY painted across it. Caught reading a soap opera magazine, his secretary leapt to her feet, then snatched up a stack of message slips, which she offered him as a quick distraction. He didn’t, however, even see her, much less her offering, but marched around her desk and slammed the door to his inner office. Immediately it was yanked back open and out came Bazemore's nasal command that I phone him tonight “
re
what to have Savile say to Newsome in the A.M.,” adding that he had to discuss things with the A.G. first. I suggested that if Purley was dumb enough to believe in deals made with murder suspects by lieutenants over the telephone, we should go ahead and promise him whatever it took to get him into custody.

“I don’t make promises I don’t intend to keep,” snapped Mitch, with his pious prosecutor expression.

“So, what’d you promise Moonfoot Butler that you intend to give
him?
” I snapped back. The D.A. said what he’d give me was five seconds to get out of his office.

I made it easy and drove to Carippini's Restaurant.

That night Nora Howard's brother had closed Carippini's to the public. Gold and silver balloons bounced against the ceiling, twisted mylar streamers shimmered around the columns and swagged from the archways. Across the windows, above the bar, and along the back wall stretched some long multicolored strings of big letters. They spelled out CONGRATULATIONS, NORA. A huge white pastry concoction in the shape of a Greek temple (it turned out to be the Supreme Court Building) also said CONGRATULATIONS, NORA. Tables had been pushed together into two long Ls, and at them sat twenty noisy, cheerful people drinking wine and eating a meal cooked by Nora's brother, veal marsala with risotto and Roman artichokes. Her brother had invited everyone to his restaurant to celebrate the fact that on Friday, Nora Angelica Carippini Howard had learned that she’d passed the North Carolina law bar exams.

It was a good dinner party, with lots of songs and lots of wine, lots of children, and “Golden Oldies” dancing; there were zippy accordion tunes by (I think) Nora's aunt's second husband, and tributes to the guest of honor: the presentation of a new briefcase by her
kids, Laura and Brian, a comic skit by three friends from the Law Library, the recitation by Isaac Rosethorn in Italian of Dante's meeting Beatrice in the
Divine Comedy
(in honor, he said, of his meeting “the more beautiful half of Rosethorn and Howard”). Later, there was a prize of little champagne bottles won by Nora and, in fact, me, for our energetic jitterbug to Jerry Lee Lewis's “Breathless”—which was exactly how three minutes of that youthful pastime left me.

Among the people at the party was Jordan West, who sat with the young black psychiatrist from the Department of Human Services. He couldn’t take his eyes off her; a feeling most people had about Jordan to some degree or other. Watching them together, a comment of Jack Molina's popped in my head, about how if I didn’t believe him when he said Cooper had no interest in “the personal,” I should just ask Jordan West. Well, this new man looked as interested in the personal as it was possible to be; every time she spoke to him it was like she’d tapped a tuning fork. They danced a slow dance in a way that made me think John Emory might as well quit struggling to overcome his shyness in order to ask her out. I sat with them awhile and we talked about the trial, about Moonfoot Butler's testimony (she assumed it was all a fabrication—including George's involvement in the smuggling), about Nomi Hall's faith that Isaac would win an acquittal for her son.

I said, “I hope so too.”

Jordan looked at me. “Nomi doesn’t hope so; she believes so. To her, Cooper died for George. Saving George helps to redeem his death. Me, I don’t think Coop…” Her voice faltered, and the young doctor put his hand quietly over hers. “I don’t think of it that way. Cooper lived for George and all the others, people he never saw. But he died for no reason, just…hate.” None of us spoke for a while. Finally, she slid her hand out from under her escort's. She stood up, which I took to be a signal for me to leave, so I stood up too, and she shook my hand quickly, then said, “I hadn’t known until your testimony that you had written to the parole board for George. Isaac always told Coop that he was wrong about you. And I think if Coop had heard your testimony today, he would have decided that Isaac was right.”

“Well, Coop wasn’t wrong about some things. I wasn’t good enough or fast enough to protect him.”

She didn’t argue with me. I shook Dr. Arnold's hand too. He turned back toward her and I left them alone.

Three more dances with Nora and I pleaded exhaustion. While I sat off at a far corner table recovering, replaced as her partner by (I think) her brother's wife's cousin, Isaac pulled up a chair beside me. “So, Slim,” he said, licking white icing from his fingers. “Nice people.” I agreed. We watched the party awhile, then he gave me one of his tragic looks. “Cuddy, tell me, do you think Billy's dead? Now we know how close Purley Newsome was to home, and maybe Russell, too, I’m sick with the thought that they grabbed Billy.”

I said I hoped not, but it was possible. “’Course, Paul Madison's convinced that Gilchrist held out more than he said on those contributions to the collection plate we heard so much about, and that he's off on another toot to Vegas or Miami.”

“Well, Paul's a man of faith. He's naturally optimistic.” Isaac's rounded shoulders shrugged up around his neck. “Me, I imagine chain saws and pools of blood.”

“How badly do you need Gilchrist's testimony?”

Isaac's eyes turned even more mournful. “Ah, Slim, Slim, are you really so pragmatic as that? I
liked
Billy.” We were both quiet awhile, then he said, “I’ve got the girl who was up in the Montgomery Hotel room with Russell.” Another silence. Then, “You want to know the word you used on the stand that hurt most? ‘Pursued.’ ‘George got hold of the gun and
pursued
Pym.’”

“‘Pursued’ was the truth.”

“‘Pursued’ was hearsay. You weren’t there, and I doubt whichever patron of Smoke's described the scene to you said, ‘And then he pursued him out the door.’ Interesting, how Judge Hilliardson will allow a bit of hearsay, a bit of conclusion. He gave us quite a speech in chambers before we opened. You know how he bites off his words like little pieces of rock candy?” Rosethorn was an excellent mimic (most good trial lawyers are good actors), and it was remarkable how he transformed his large bulk, Semitic features, and rolling baritone into the clipped nasal tenor, and the thin Wasp semblance of Shirley Hilliardson, as he gulped down a sip of watery
whiskey and said, “‘Gentlemen, in my courtroom, the game of law must and will be subordinated to the quest for truth. In that—and I am unabashed in calling it, holy—quest, jurisprudence is the servant of justice, never the master. We are all three here to seek truth. Not a conviction, not an acquittal, but truth. Counselors, are we in accord?’ Well, naturally Bazemore and I bobbed our heads like fuzzy dogs on a dashboard, then ran out into the court shooting, dodging, blocking, and behaving like any sane lawyer would. Still, it was a lovely speech.”

I said, “I’m with Hilliardson.”

“I’m with George Hall.” He smiled. “But in general, your testimony was helpful.” A pat on the knee. “The jury seemed to find you morally appealing.”

I wiped my forehead and neck with my handkerchief. “Maybe because they figured I was telling the truth. Which I suspect is more than we can say for Moonfoot Butler.”

Isaac went on an unsuccessful pocket search for his cigarettes. “Ah, Mr. Moonfoot. What he said isn’t as interesting as why he said anything at all. And even that's not nearly as interesting
really
, as I’m going to make it sound tomorrow morning. Poor Moonfoot Butler. It's never safe to sell your soul. The buyers can rarely be trusted to pay off. So, Bazemore scared you on redirect, didn’t he?”

“You noticed? Thanks for shutting him up before that catechism on the death penalty got going. I would have had to answer—”

“Why?” He had taken off his jacket, and unbuttoned his shirt cuffs, which flapped loose around his wide stubby hands as he nibbled at pieces of Nora's cake. “Your beliefs aren’t on trial; George Hall's actions are on trial. And I’d advise if you’re ever in similar circumstances—deprive yourself of the self-satisfying pleasure of beating the breast of truth,
or
baring your social philosophy.” His finger ticked back and forth near my nose.

“I think Mitch Bazemore and the A.G. and the commissioner already have a pretty good idea of my social philosophy.”

He smiled. “Well, pretty good ideas are very different from forced acknowledgment. Which is why I never allow my clients to tell me things I shouldn’t know.”

“Things like the fact that they’re guilty?”

“Oh, no. That they do need to tell me; it helps me plan their defense better. I meant things like—they cajoled a friend into supporting a false alibi, or they’ve decided to bribe a juror, or skip bail.”

I grinned. “My reservations about capital punishment are in the same category as skipping bail? Why, you have even stronger reservations than—”

“No, sir! I have none.” His deep black eyes blazed out at me. “My position on that subject is utterly
without
reservation: simply put, I deny the difference between a hanging and a lynching. Profoundly deny it.” He rubbed the napkin roughly across his face. “
And
, I might add, the statistics agree. The states that have
had
the most lynchings, also have had the most executions.”

“That doesn’t make them the same, for Christ's sake.”

“Oh yes it does. The props and the sets are immaterial.” He reached out and grabbed a floating balloon whose string Brian Howard was leaping for, and handed it to the child. “Who said this? ‘Murder and capital punishment are not opposites, but similars that breed their kind’?”

Neither Brian nor I knew the answer, and the lawyer told us it was George Bernard Shaw. “What do you think of that, Brian?” he asked the five-year-old. “‘Murder and capital punishment are not opposites, but similars that breed their kind’?” Not surprisingly, Brian said he had no ideas on the subject. “Well,” said Isaac, “Say I kill somebody—”

“Who?”

“Somebody you don’t know. A man. Say I get mad and shoot him. Let's say you’re the police. What do
you
think my punishment should be?” He leaned down to Brian, awaiting his answer with real interest. “Would you kill me back?”

Brian bounced his head against his balloon a few times. “I’d make you go sit all by yourself ’til you said ‘I’m sorry.’ I’d put you on a boat and send you to the middle of the ocean all by yourself.”

Serious consideration from Isaac. “All right. That's a good plan.”

“And then…” Another bounce. “And then when you came back, you’d have to be nice to the man's family because they’d be sad.”

Tapping his own forehead, Isaac nodded thoughtfully. “Brian, you have a very smart noggin. But suppose I didn’t want to be nice? Suppose I kept being mean?”

Racing around in a circle, Brian squealed, “Then you have to go back in the boat, and then you have to clean up the whole ocean by yourself, and then
you’ll
be sad!” Suddenly, he scooted under the table, having spotted his mother's approach.

Nora was not at all out of breath, despite her nonstop exertions on the dance floor (she attributed her stamina to aerobics). Lifting the table cloth, she gave Brian a “ten-minute warning” before time to leave. Then, leaning over Isaac's chair, Nora hugged the old man from behind. She looked happy. He patted her crossed arms, and told her she had a wonderful family.

She said, “Aren’t they? Look, I just thought of another discrepancy. In fact, in at
least
five places, Butler's testimony today contradicts
both
the deposition he gave you back in December,
and
his pretrial statement from Bazemore!”

I said, “Good Lord, you mean you can do the Mashed Potatoes and think at the same time?”

She straightened, held up the black curls off the nape of her neck. “Captain, I can think, do the Mashed Potatoes, chew gum, keep an eye on the kids, and smell if the coffee's done at the same time. Multiple-focus skills, you get them when you’ve trained to outwit nuns at a convent school.”

“I’ve never seen you chewing gum.” “I said, I
could
do it, not I did.”

Isaac laughed. “Never argue with a lawyer.”

I told Nora, “Seems to me you’re wasting your talents on the courts, the way you can
dance.
Any old clodhopper like Isaac here can sway juries and confound judges. But how many folks still living can double-time Walk the Dog?”

She grinned. “Well, you, for one.”

The deejay (I think, Nora's oldest nephew) had put on Glenn Miller's “Moonlight Serenade.” I said, “I always loved it when June Allyson got this thoughtful look and tugged at her earlobe every time Jimmy Stewart started working on ‘Moonlight Serenade.’ Remember that movie? And she hides all his pocket
change ’til she's got enough to buy the band a car? What a woman. Care to dance again?”