From the small
entrance hall, stairs led up to the guest rooms on the second floor. The
kitchen was off to the right. To the left there was an immense boxy room that
terminated in a glass wall overlooking a garden composed of three descending
terraces and the reservoir at the bottom of the hill. The room was furnished
with austere New England antiques but its austerity was lightened by elegant
pieces of Chinese pottery, Oriental carpets, and wall-hangings like the parlor
of a nineteenth- century Boston sea captain made prosperous by the China trade.
It was a room designed for entertaining but its stillness indicated that it had
not been used for that purpose for a long time, since Ned’s suicide.
After Ned’s death,
Larry had built another wing onto the house, where he now lived. It consisted
of a loft bedroom that looked out over his study and the garden.
I went upstairs
where I would be staying while I was in town. In a study on the second floor I
read rapidly through the files that Sharon Hart had given me. I noted the name
of her investigator, Freeman Vidor. I also found the name of the psychiatrist,
Sidney Townsend, who had examined Jim. There was no report from the
psychiatrist. I called him, reaching him just as he was about to begin a
session. He told me to come by in an hour. Freeman Vidor was out, but I left a
message on his machine. Finally, I called Catherine McKinley, who had spent the
morning in court attempting to continue my cases and then in my office fending
off clients.
“What happened in
court?” I asked her.
“I got three
continuances and disposed of two other cases.
That frees you up
for at least a couple of weeks. How are you?”
“Trial’s set in six
weeks. My client wants a straight not guilty defense.”
“On the facts you
told me?”
“That’s right.”
“The kid has a
death wish.”
“Then he may get
it,” I replied. “The D.A. wants to amend and add special circumstances.”
“That just occurred
to him?” she asked, incredulously.
“He’s playing to
the press,” I replied. “I don’t know how serious he actually is about amending.”
“Any chance the kid’s
not guilty?”
“I asked the very
same question of the P.D. who was handling the case. She rolled her eyes.”
“That must mean no,”
Catherine said. “What are you going to do, Henry?”
“Larry Ross sees
Jim as a victim of bigotry against gays,” I said. “That’s what he wants to put
on trial.”
“I don’t see how
that changes the evidence.”
“Agreed. But it might
change the way the jury looks at the evidence.”
“I don’t know,
Henry,” she said. “I think people are tired of being told they have to take the
rap when someone else breaks the law.”
“Larry’s point is
that in this society it’s easier to kill than to come out. That’s not so
far-fetched.”
“Not if you’re gay,”
she replied. “Most people aren’t.”
“Would you buy it,
Catherine?”
“Yes,” she said
after a moment’s pause. “And I’d still vote to convict.”
“You’re a
hard-hearted woman,” I joked.
“That’s right,” she
said seriously. “And I’m not even a bigot.”
We said our
goodbyes and I sat at the desk in the study looking out the window to the lake
below.
Sidney Townsend
looked exactly like what I imagined someone named Sidney Townsend would look
like. He concealed the shapelessness of his body in an expensive suit but his
face was big, florid, and jowly. His hair was swept back against his head and
held fixedly in place by hairspray. Small, incurious eyes assessed me as he
smiled and shook my hand.
He led me into his
office, a tastefully furnished room that was nearly as dark as a confessional.
Perhaps he specialized in lapsed Catholics, I thought, or maybe the dimness was
evocative of a bedroom in keeping with psychiatry’s obsession with sex. I sat
down on a leather sofa while he got Jim’s file. He joined me, sitting a little
too close and facing toward me, his jacket unbuttoned and his arm draped across
the back of the sofa, leaning toward me. The perfect picture of candor. I drew
back into my corner.
“So,” he said, “you’re
taking Jim’s case to trial.”
“So it appears. Do
you get many appointments from the court?”
“It’s probably a
quarter of my practice,” he said. “Does that bother you?”
“I just like to
know,” I said. “I wouldn’t want the D.A. to be able to call you a professional
witness.”
“I have a whole
response worked out for that,” he said with a confident smile.
I
bet you do,
I thought. Aloud I said, “I’d like to know something about Jim Pears.”
“Oh,” Townsend
said, offhandedly, “a typical self-hating homosexual.”
“Typical?”
He shrugged. “I
know that the A.P.A. doesn’t consider homosexuality to be a mental disease,” he
said, “but let’s face it, Mr. Rios, many if not most homosexuals have terrible
problems of self-esteem. I see a lot of instability among them.”
“You think being
gay is a mental disorder per se?” I asked, keeping my voice neutral.
“That’s not what I
said,” he replied tightly, then added, “You’re gay yourself, aren’t you?”
“Is that relevant?”
He smiled and
shrugged. “To whether you retain me, probably.” He studied me. “I’m not the
enemy, Mr. Rios.”
I looked back at
him warily. “Okay, you’re not the enemy. Why don’t we talk about Jim.”
He picked up a
folder and opened it. “Jim says he’s known about his homosexuality from the
time he reached puberty,” Townsend said. “He’s had sexual relations with men
for the last couple of years. Typical bathroom pickups, parks, that sort of
thing. The incident in the restaurant was consistent with his pattern of sexual
behavior.”
“Which incident?”
“The man he was discovered
with,” Townsend said, “was a customer in the restaurant who picked him up and
took him out to his car for sex. That’s where this other boy — Fox? — found
them.”
“These sexual
encounters sound risky,” I said.
“They are.
Maximally so, but then, Jim wanted to get caught.”
“Is that what he
says?”
“No, but it’s
obvious, isn’t it?”
“What seems obvious
to me,” I said, “is that the reason a gay teenage boy has sex in public places
is because he has nowhere else to go.”
Townsend looked as
if the thought had not occurred to him. “Possibly,” he said.
“I was told that
Jim doesn’t remember anything about the actual killing,” I said.
“That’s right,”
Townsend replied. “It’s a kind of amnesia induced by the trauma of the
incident. It’s fairly common among people who were in serious accidents.”
“Not physiological
at all?”
“He was given a
medical examination,” Townsend said. “Nothing wrong there. It’s psychological.”
“Aren’t there ways
to unlock his memory?” I asked.
“As a matter of
fact,” Townsend said, “I tried hypnosis.”
“Did it work?”
“No. People have
different susceptibilities,” he explained. He thought a bit. “There are drugs,
of course. Truth serums. I doubt they would work, though. He’s really built a
wall up there.”
“Are you treating
him at all?”
“That’s not really
my function, is it? My examination was entirely for forensic purposes.”
“What about his
parents? Have you talked to them?”
“They wouldn’t talk
to me. They’re strict Catholics who don’t trust psychiatry.”
“They’d rather
believe their son is possessed by the devil,” I observed, bitterly.
“Which is simply an
unschooled way of describing schizoid behavior,” Townsend explained.
“Who’s schizoid?”
“Jim, of course. He’s
completely disassociated himself from his homosexuality.”
“Can you blame him?”
“I’ve given you my
views on homosexuality,” Townsend replied tartly.
“No doubt you
shared them with Jim as well.”
His small eyes
narrowed. “I said I wasn’t the enemy.” “Because you’re not actually malicious?”
“Do you want me to
testify or not?” he snapped.
“No, I don’t think
so.”
He looked at me,
then shrugged. “I still have to bill you for this time.”
“Sure.” I got up to
leave.
“Mr. Rios,” he
said, as I reached the door. “You’re making a mistake, you know. I’m the best
there is.”
“So,” I said, “am
I.”
His fingernails
were bitten down to ragged stubs. His face was white to the point of
transparency and a blue vein pounded at his temple as if trying to tear through
the skin. Splotches of yellow stubble spotted his chin and cheek. His hair,
unwashed and bad-smelling, was matted to his head. The whites of his eyes were
streaked with red but the irises were vivid blue — the only part of his face
that showed life.
His eyes were
judging me. It was as if I was the last of a long line of grown-ups who would
fail him. It annoyed me. His glance slipped away.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t
able to talk to you this morning,” I said. “Do you understand what happened in
court?’’
In a soft voice he
answered, “You’re my lawyer now.”
“That’s right. We
have to be ready to go to trial in six weeks.”
He shrugged and
stared at the partition between us. After a moment his silence became hostile.
“Is anything wrong,
Jim?”
“I don’t like
lawyers,” he announced.
“You’ve got lots of
company.’’
His face remained
expressionless. “She didn’t believe me,” he said. “Do you?”
“That you didn’t
kill Brian Fox?”
He nodded.
I make it a point
not to lie to my clients, but this can involve something short of the truth. I
said, “I’m willing to start from that assumption.”
His face was
suspicious. “What do you mean?”
“What matters is
convincing a jury that you’re innocent,” I explained.
Now he understood. “You
don’t believe me, either.”
“I have an open
mind,” I replied.
He withdrew again
into a sulky silence. I decided to wait him out and we sat there as the minutes
passed.
“I can’t sleep at
night,” he said abruptly.
“Why?” I wondered
if he was going to confess.
“They leave the
lights on. It hurts my eyes.”
“It’s just so the
guards can keep an eye on things.” “Nothing happens in there.” He looked at me.
“I’m with the queens. That’s what they call them.”
“You’re safer there
than in the general population.” “They’re like women,” he continued, ignoring
me. “They say things that make me sick.” He shuddered. “I’m not like that.” “Not
like what, Jim?”
“Gay.” He spat out
the word. Once again, his eyes drifted away. He seemed unable to look directly
at anything for longer than a few seconds.
“Whether you’re gay
doesn’t make any difference in jail,” I said. “There are guys here who would
claw through the walls to get at you.”
His face shut down.
“You’re gay,” he said.
“That’s right.”
“Gay lawyer,” he
said, mockingly. “Do you wear a dress to court?”
The taunt was so
crude that at first I thought I’d misheard him. It was something that a
six-year-old might say.
“I don’t give a
damn whether you think you’re gay or not, Jim. That’s the least of your
worries.”
“I’m sorry,” he
mumbled. “You made me mad,” he added. “I didn’t kill Brian.”
“Then who did?” I
demanded.
His shoulders
stiffened. “Someone else.”
“Someone else is
not going to be on trial. You are. And you are also the only witness to what
happened in the cellar. So unless you cooperate with me, I’d say your chances
of getting out of here are pretty damn slim.”
“I don’t remember,”
he whined.
“Then you might as
well fire me and plead guilty,” I replied.
His face began to
disintegrate into a series of jerks and twitches. At that moment, his father’s
theory of demonic possession seemed almost plausible.