Mercy (49 page)

Bud flushed, which made his nose stand out in relief. "Well, we got the bolts of fabric in the living room, with the dry goods. And we stock a fair select ion of children's hockey skates; we'll even do trade-ins on used ones, so we get a lot of parents coming in. We got penny candy for the little ones, and s ome best-seller paperbacks, and a few board games. I guess we got a little of everything and a lot of nothing."

"How do you know Jamie, Mr. Spitlick?"

Bud glanced at Jamie and gave him a big, honest smile. Graham hoped everyon e on the jury had seen that. It was the first time Bud had seen Jamie since Maggie's death, and he wasn't going to be allowed to talk to him until aft er his testimony, so this was the only way to make a connection. "Jamie bou ght the house next to mine twelve or so years back."

"And you knew his wife Maggie, too?"

"Sure. Cutest little thing. He married her about ten years ago. My wife and I went to the wedding."

Graham leaned against the witness stand. "Can you tell us about Jamie and Maggie?"

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Bud whistled through his teeth. "If a neighbor don't know you, you tell me who does. Jamie and Maggie, as I recall, went off on a honeymoon after th ey were married and just never stopped. They weren't the kind who'd be thr owing pots and pans and yelling at each other about the checkbook every ni ght. More often we'd hear 'em chasing each other around the house and laug hing."

Graham looked at Jamie. For the first time during the trial, he was smiling.

"Crazy in love," Bud Spitlick said. "I cared for them like my own son and da ughter." Then he cleared his throat. " 'Course, when Maggie got sick, it was just awful. I think it was easier for Maggie to handle than Jamie, since he was watching her hurt and knew he couldn't do anything about it."

"Can you give us an example?"

"Well, last spring--real early, I'd say March--something happened to Maggie in the middle of the night. She was on some new kind of medicine; she was always trying some new kind of medicine; and I guess her lungs stopped work ing. The siren from the ambulance woke me up. It woke up near everyone on t he street, I figure, and most of us were outside in our bathrobes watching the paramedics run up the front stairs and bring Maggie back down on a stre tcher. And there comes Jamie, naked as a jaybird, huddled over the stretche r, his mouth over Maggie's doing that artificial restoration. The paramedic s pulled him away, told him to put on some clothes, but he just stood there like he was in shock. I don't think I'll ever forget the way Jamie looked, with those flashy red lights all over his skin, watching the ambulance tak e Maggie away."

Graham nodded, giving the jury a minute to let down their sympathy. "Can yo u tell us a little bit more about Maggie?"

"Objection," Audra said. "The deceased is not on trial."

"I'd like a little leeway, Your Honor," Graham countered. Roarke nodded. He looked moved by the ambulance story too. "I'll advise co unsel not to go too far with this." He turned to Bud Spitlick. "You may pr oceed."

Bud shook his head. He was becoming visibly choked up, so Graham handed hi m a box of Kleenex from the railing of the witness stand. "Well," Bud said

, pausing to blow his nose. "Maggie was real sick. She wasn't getting any better, and we all knew it."

Graham waited for Bud to continue, then realized he was lost Jodi Picoult

in his own memories. "Did Maggie ever speak to you about the right to die?

"

"Objection!" Audra yelled. "This is absolutely irrelevant."

"This is completely relevant," Graham said, moving closer to Judge Roarke in tandem with Audra. "It goes to Jamie's state of mind, and the nature and qu ality of his act."

Roarke glanced from Audra to Graham and back again, as if he was trying to make a decision about which fool lawyer to throw out on his ass first. "Obj ection sustained," he said. "Watch yourself, Counselor." Graham turned away, smiling inside. He hadn't expected Audra to be overrul ed, but now he'd managed to plant the idea of euthanasia in the jury's col lective mind. Without mentioning the word mercy.

"Mr. Spitlick, what were your conversations with Maggie regarding her heal th?"

Bud was beginning to sweat; big patches stood out against the armpits of hi s white shirt. He tugged at his tie. "She was very concerned," he said. "Sh e was nervous in general around people who were sick."

"And how do you know this?"

"Some time ago, I guess about five years back, my own sister had a stroke. Maggie was an angel; she ran the store while we were at the hospital and she brought us dinner at home or up at County General. My sister was prono unced brain-dead, you see, but she was living on those fancy machines, and this went on for a while. From time to time Maggie would come to the hosp ital to pick my wife up and give her a ride home, or to leave us sandwiche s. Still, Maggie wouldn't much come past the doorway. She said people who were that sick scared her to death.

"One night, she came all the way into the room and looked down at my sister. She said that wasn't a way to live."

"What did you say?"

Bud had started to cry. "I told her," he said, his voice thick with emotion

, "that God would take Frances when he was ready. And Maggie said that if i t was her, she'd want someone to tap God on the shoulder and wake Him up." He wiped his nose with a ball of Kleenex. "I'm sorry. I'm real sorry about this."

"That's all right, Mr. Spitlick." Graham looked at Jamie, who was staring a t his neighbor with obvious pain in his eyes. "Take your time." He waited u ntil Bud glanced up at Jamie and received

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a short nod and a genuine smile. Then he turned to Audra. "Your witness." Audra knew better than to antagonize a witness the jury not only liked but f elt sorry for. Bud Spitlick was the real thing; he was too rough around the edges to have put on so fine a performance. She smiled at him and walked clo se to the witness stand. "Mr. Spitlick, I've got a hypothetical question for you. Thirty years ago, would you have guessed you'd be running a general st ore right out of your living room?"

Bud grinned. "No, ma'am, I would not. We were the toast of the town, back then. It was before Wal-Mart and Woolworth got to Cummington, so everyon e came to us first."

"So you'd agree that what you say in answer to a hypothetical question isn't always the way things work out when you're faced with the actual situation?

"

She could see the wheels turning as he sorted out the words. God preserve he r from stupid people. "Yes," Bud said, "I guess that's true."

"Then what the deceased said in the context of your sister's unfortunate sit uation might not have been what she wished for when she actually found herse lf in similar straits?"

Bud's face went dull red. "I can't say," he mumbled. "I can't be sure."

"Mr. Spitlick, when your sister was terminally ill and comatose, were you und er a lot of stress?" She started pacing, her back to the witness.

"Oh, yes," Bud said, relieved to be talking about a topic he could firmly gras p.

Audra turned to face him and pinned her cold blue gaze to his. "Why didn't y ou kill her?"

Graham jumped up. "Objection."

"Sustained."

Audra smiled at the defendant. "Withdrawn."

A Hie could hear the water running, so she knew Cam was taking a shower. He had come home from work in the middle of the day because he had been on th e midnight shift, and this was his usual procedure: he'd eat everything in the refrigerator that did not require heavy cooking, he'd shower, and then he'd crawl into bed and sleep like a log for six hours.

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He had left the door ajar. Allie watched the steam slip out of the bathroom in a long, thick curl and come to lie on the Oriental runner in the hall. He was singing, and he must have been washing his hair, because every few w ords came out gurgled. His eyes were probably screwed shut. She cracked the door a smidgen more and put her face up to the opening. She told herself that she was still angry at him; that she didn't want to be l ooking, so it didn't matter if it was her business or not. Through the smoky g lass stall she saw the length of his legs, his arms raised overhead to soap hi s back, the muted outline of his buttocks.

It wasn't until she had run back down to the kitchen and waited for the fire to leave her cheeks and the shaking to stop that she realized her agitation h ad nothing to do with voyeurism. It had to do with the fact that in spite of her best intentions, she could not help wanting something she knew she should not have.

Dascomb Wharton almost did not fit into the witness box. Graham saw several jurors hiding smiles behind their hands as the bailiff helped the doctor s ettle himself across the seat of the witness chair and a second one that wa s placed inside for his comfort. Great, Graham thought. Our one expert witn ess is a laughingstock.

But Wharton's answers were clear and clipped, very professional. When he listed his credentials, which included Harvard Medical School and a resid ency at Massachusetts General Hospital, even Judge Roarke looked impresse d.

"How long have you practiced in Cummington, Doctor?" Graham asked.

"Twenty-one years," Wharton said.

"And what kinds of cases do you see?"

"I'm a general practitioner. I deliver babies, I take care of those babies when they have whooping cough, I get them through the chicken pox and give them school physicals and physicals for the Army, I help some of them give birth to their own children. I also see a wide range of emergent cases: app endectomies, gallstones, cancers of various kinds."

"When did you first see Maggie?"

Wharton shifted; the floor of the witness stand creaked. "Maggie started coming to my office when she moved to Cummington, which was in 1984. I wa s quite familiar with her medical history."

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Graham nodded. "Can you tell us how you diagnosed her cancer?" He did not listen to Wharton's story of how Maggie had come to him with a b roken ankle, a skating accident, and how X-rays had revealed not only the b est way to set the bone, but lesions which indicated a tumor had insinuated its way into her body. Instead, Graham watched the jury. For the first tim e during the trial, some of them were taking notes. Most of them perched on the edge of their seats.

Wharton explained in layman's terms the type of breast cancer Maggie had; t he decision to do a radical mastectomy that would also remove the lymph nod es; the meaning of finding the secondary site--the bone lesions--before the primary one. He chronicled her forays into chemotherapy and radiation, as well as the side effects she experienced.

Jamie did not look at the doctor. He stared into his lap.

"Can you tell us, given the various cancers Maggie had, what the prognosis was?"

Wharton sighed. "She was going to die. It wasn't a matter of if, but of when.

"

"In your experience, was there any hope for improvement in her condition?"

"I haven't seen it, no."

Graham stood beside Jamie. "Did you tell Jamie and Maggie this?"

"Yes, of course."

"And what were their reactions?"

"Maggie was very stoic about it. I believe that she had known what I was goi ng to say. Jamie didn't take it quite as well. He held her hand the entire t ime I was speaking, but when I was finished, he told me I was out of my mind

. He suggested that I had mixed up her results, and that they would get a se cond opinion."

"Did they, to your knowledge?"

"Yes," Wharton said. "The doctor's findings confirmed mine. He sent along a diagnosis to stick in her file."

"Did you ever meet with Jamie alone?"

The doctor nodded. "He came to see me several times with new cures he'd hea rd about. Once it was something to do with Chinese ginseng, I believe, and another time it was some sort of chiropractic nonsense that supposedly brok e up the cancer. He said that he liked to meet with me alone because he did n't want to give his wife false

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hope, but he would then explain the latest theory that he'd found. It was e vident he did a great deal of research on ductal melanomas and the differen t therapies that they'd responded to in other cases. However, even the more reasonable treatments he brought to my attention would not have made a dif ference for Maggie."

"Would you say he was a devoted husband?"

For the first time since he had taken the stand, Wharton looked at Jamie. "I'v e rarely seen the like."

Graham sat down again. "Dr. Wharton, when did you last see Maggie?"

"She came to my office for a 4:45 appointment on September fifteenth. Friday

, I believe it was."

"What did you tell her on that date?"

"She was complaining of flashing in her eyes and temporary blindness, which I explained was a result of the tumor pressing down on her optic nerve. At t hat point, the cancer was spreading through the brain. I told her that I was not sure what part of her would be affected next. Depending on the directio n the tumor took in its growth, it could have depressed her respirations. It could have led to seizures, or a stroke. It could have resulted in permanen t blindness. I told her I just did not know."

"Can you tell the court what Maggie's state of mind was like when she left y our office?"

"Objection," Audra said. "Witness cannot know what was going on in the d eceaseds mind."

"I'll rephrase. Can you tell me how she was acting before she left?" Wharton shook his head. "She was very subdued. She thanked me and she shoo k my hand." He paused, as if remembering something. "She forgot her coat; my secretary had to call after her as she walked down the hall." He pursed his lips. "She already knew she was going to die; she was told that day t hat her body systems would be shutting down in a Russian roulette order; I don't imagine she was feeling very spirited."

Graham thanked the doctor. "Nothing further."

Audra stood up before Graham had even made it back to his chair. "One ques tion, Dr. Wharton. In your expert opinion, can you tell the court what the chances would have been of the victim dying of natural causes by the morn ing of September 19, 1995?"