Sycamore Row (68 page)

“Well, it looks like it’s time to fold up your chair and go home, Jake. This little party’s over. Get somethin’ for Lettie and get the hell out. She don’t need much. Settle this damned thing before it goes to the jury.”

“We’re trying, Ozzie, okay? Harry Rex approached Lanier’s guys twice this afternoon. They laughed at him. You can’t settle a case when the other side is laughing at you. I’d take a million bucks right now.”

“A million! How many black folk around here got a million bucks, Jake? You’re thinkin’ too much like a white man. Get half a million, get a quarter, hell, get somethin’.”

“We’ll try again tomorrow. I’ll see how the morning goes, then approach Wade Lanier during lunch. He knows the score and he obviously knows how to play the game. He’s been in my shoes before. I think I can talk to him.”

“Talk fast, Jake, and get out of this damned trial. You want no part of this jury. This ain’t nothin’ like Hailey.”

“No, it’s not.”

Jake thanked him and went inside. Carla was already in bed, reading and worrying about her husband. “What was that all about?” she asked as he undressed.

“Just Ozzie. He’s concerned about the trial.”

“Why is Ozzie out roaming around at this hour?”

“You know Ozzie. He never sleeps.” Jake fell across the end of the bed and rubbed her legs under the sheets.

“Neither do you. Can I ask you something? Here you are in the middle of another big trial. You haven’t slept four hours in the past week, and when you are asleep you fidget and have nightmares. You’re not eating well. You’re losing weight. You’re preoccupied, off in la-la land half the time. You’re stressed-out, jumpy, testy, sometimes even nauseous. You’ll wake up in the morning with a knot in your stomach.”

“The question?”

“Why in the world do you want to be a trial lawyer?”

“This might not be the best time to ask that question.”

“No, it’s the perfect time. How many jury trials have you had in the last ten years?”

“Thirty-one.”

“And you’ve lost sleep and weight during each one, right?”

“I don’t think so. Most are not quite this significant, Carla. This is exceptional.”

“My point is that trial work is so stressful. Why do you want to do it?”

“Because I love it. It’s what being a lawyer is all about. Being in the courtroom, in front of a jury, is like being in the arena, or on the field. The competition is fierce. The stakes are high. The gamesmanship is intense. There will be a winner and a loser. There is a rush of adrenaline each time the jury is led in and seated.”

“A lot of ego.”

“A ton. You’ll never meet a successful trial lawyer without an ego. It’s a requirement. You gotta have the ego to want the work.”

“You should do well, then.”

“Okay, I admit I have the ego, but it might get crushed this week. It might need soothing.”

“Now or later?”

“Now. It’s been eight days.”

“Lock the door.”

Lucien blacked out somewhere over Mississippi at thirty-five thousand feet. When the plane landed in Atlanta, the flight attendants helped him off. Two guards put him in a wheelchair and rolled him to the gate for the flight to Memphis. They passed several airport lounges, all of
which he noticed. When the guards parked him he thanked them, then got up and staggered to the nearest bar and ordered a beer. He was cutting back, being responsible. He slept from Atlanta to Memphis, landing there at 7:10 a.m. They dragged him off the plane, called security, and security called the police.

Portia took the call at the office. Jake was upstairs frantically reviewing witness statements when she buzzed through with “Jake, it’s a collect call from Lucien.”

“Where is he?”

“Don’t know but he sounds awful.”

“Take the call and put him through.”

Seconds later, Jake picked up the receiver and said, “Lucien, where are you?”

With great effort, he was able to convey the message that he was in the Memphis City Jail and needed Jake to come get him. He was thick-tongued, erratic, obviously bombed. Sadly, Jake had heard it all before. He was suddenly angry and unsympathetic.

“They won’t let me talk,” Lucien mumbled, barely intelligible. Then he seemed to be growling at someone in the background. Jake could visualize it perfectly. He said, “Lucien, we’re leaving in five minutes for the courtroom. I’m sorry.” But he wasn’t sorry at all. Let him rot in jail.

“I gotta get there, Jake, it’s important,” he said, his words slurred so badly that he repeated himself three times.

“What’s important?”

“I got deposition. Ancil’s. Ancil Hubbard. Deposition. It’s important Jake.”

Jake and Portia hurried across the street and entered the courthouse through the rear doors. Ozzie was in the hallway on the first floor talking to a janitor. “Got a minute?” Jake asked with a look that was dead serious. Ten minutes later, Ozzie and Marshall Prather left town in a sprint to Memphis.

“Missed you yesterday,” Judge Atlee said when Jake entered his chambers. The lawyers were gathering for the morning’s pregame briefing.

“Sorry Judge, but I got tied up with trial details,” Jake replied.

“I’m sure you did. Gentlemen, any preliminary matters this morning?”

The lawyers for the contestants smiled grimly and shook their heads. No. Jake said, “Well, yes, Your Honor, there is one matter. We have located Ancil Hubbard in Juneau, Alaska. He is alive and well and unable to rush down here for the trial. He is an interested party to these proceedings and should be included. Therefore, I move for a mistrial and suggest we start over when Ancil can be here.”

“Motion denied,” Judge Atlee said without hesitation. “He would be of no assistance in determining the validity of this will. How did you find him?”

“It’s quite a long story, Your Honor.”

“Save it for later. Anything else?”

“Not from me.”

“Are your next witnesses ready, Mr. Lanier?”

“They are.”

“Then let’s proceed.”

With the jurors so deeply in his pocket, the last thing Wade Lanier wanted to do was to bore them. He had made the decision to streamline his case and get to the jury as soon as possible. He and Lester Chilcott had mapped out the rest of the trial. They would spend Thursday calling their remaining witnesses. If Jake had anything left, he would then be permitted to call rebuttal witnesses. Both lawyers would deliver their closing arguments mid-morning on Friday, and the jurors would get the case just after lunch. With the weekend looming, and with their minds already made up, they should finish and deliver a verdict long before the courthouse closed at five. Wade and Lester would be in Jackson in time for a late dinner with their wives.

As seasoned lawyers, they should have known better than to plan the rest of the trial.

Their first witness Thursday morning was a retired oncologist from Jackson, a Dr. Swaney. For decades he had worked as a practicing physician while teaching at the medical school. His résumé was impeccable, as were his manners, and he spoke with a deep backcountry drawl that carried no pretensions. He was thoroughly credible and believable. Using as few medical terms as possible, Dr. Swaney explained to the jury the type of cancer that was killing Seth Hubbard, with emphasis on the tumors that metastasized to his spinal cord and ribs. He described the intense pain involved with such tumors. He had treated hundreds of patients with a similar condition, and it created some of the
worst pain imaginable. Demerol was certainly one of the most effective drugs available. An oral dosage of a hundred milligrams every three to four hours was not uncommon and would alleviate some of the pain. It usually rendered the patient drowsy, sluggish, dizzy, often nauseous, and unable to carry out many routine functions. Driving was certainly out of the question. And, obviously, important decisions should never be made while under the influence of that much Demerol.

As a younger lawyer, Jake had learned the futility of arguing with a true expert. A bogus expert often provided the opportunity for some real carnage before the jury, but not so with witnesses like Dr. Swaney. On cross, Jake made it clear that Seth Hubbard’s own treating physician, Dr. Talbert, was not certain how much Demerol Seth was taking in the days before his death. The witness agreed it was all speculation, but politely reminded Jake that patients rarely buy more of an expensive drug if they’re not using it.

The next expert was another medical doctor, a Dr. Niehoff, from the medical school at UCLA. Small-town juries are easily impressed with experts who travel great distances to spend time with them, and no one knew this better than Wade Lanier. An expert from Tupelo would have their attention, while one from Memphis would be even more believable. But bring in the same guy from California and the jury would hang on every word.

For $10,000 of Wade Lanier’s money, plus expenses, Dr. Niehoff explained to the jury that he had spent the last twenty-five years researching and treating pain in cancer victims. He was well acquainted with the tumors under discussion and did a thorough job of describing their effects on the body. He had seen patients cry and scream for prolonged periods of time, turn deathly pale, vomit uncontrollably, beg for medications, pass out, and even beg for death. Thoughts of suicide were quite common. Actual suicide was not rare. Demerol was one of the more popular and effective treatments. Here, Dr. Niehoff ventured off script when he lapsed into a bit of technical jargon, as happened so often when experts couldn’t resist the temptation to impress their listeners. He referred to the drug as meperidine hydrochloride, said it was a narcotic analgesic, an opiate pain reliever.

Lanier stopped him and brought his vocabulary back in line. Dr. Niehoff told the jury that Demerol was a powerful pain reliever and highly addictive. He had worked with the drug for his entire career and had written numerous articles about it. Doctors prefer to dispense it in the hospital or in their clinics; however, in a case like Seth Hubbard’s,
it was not unusual to allow the patient to take it orally at home. The drug was easy to abuse, especially for a person in severe pain like Seth.

Jake rose and said, “Objection, Your Honor. There is not a shred of evidence that Seth Hubbard abused this drug.”

“Sustained. Stick with the facts, Doctor.”

Jake sat down, relieved to have finally received a favorable ruling on something.

Dr. Niehoff was an excellent witness. His descriptions of the tumors, the pain, and the Demerol were detailed, and after forty-five minutes on the stand it was easy to believe Seth was suffering greatly and his pain was relieved only by massive doses of Demerol, a drug that practically knocked him out. In his expert opinion, Seth Hubbard’s judgment was so adversely affected by the daily dosages and cumulative effects of the drug that he could not have been thinking clearly in his final days.

On cross, Jake lost even more ground. When he tried to make the point that Dr. Niehoff had no idea how much of the drug Seth was taking, the expert “guaranteed” Jake that anyone suffering like Seth would be desperate for Demerol.

“If he had access to a prescription, then he was taking the pills, Mr. Brigance.”