The Guilty (36 page)

“I guess so.”

“Maybe fourteen?”

“Maybe. But I don’t think so.”

“I see. Marcus Paris says you raped her. Did you?”

Bratt was on his feet again, but managed to maintain his composure this time.

“I object. My colleague can’t ask the accused if he committed a crime that he was never even charged with.”

“My Lord,” Parent responded, “I thought it might be relevant for the jury to know exactly why he was nev
er charged with raping that fifteen year-old girl.”

“My client never raped anyone!” Bratt came close to yelling.

“Calm down, Mr. Bratt,” Green said. “You know you can’t answer on behalf of your client.” He turned to speak to the jurors, who seemed to be very interested in Small’s relationship with Karen Paris. “The jury will disregard the defense lawyer’s last comment. If I decide to allow the question it is up to the witness to deny the allegations…if he so wishes.” 

Bratt was stunned into silence. He had fallen into Parent’s trap. They both knew that Small had never raped Karen Paris but now, even if Green over-ruled the question, the jury would think that maybe he had and then somehow managed to get away with it. He sat down slowly, regretting the overconfidence that had prevented him from seeing this coming.

Kouri reached over and grabbed his arm.

“Hey, he can’t-”

“Yeah, well he just did. Forget about it. We gotta let him score some points.”

Parent, not surprisingly, had nothing to say in
defense of his question and Green promptly disallowed it, admonishing the jury to disregard any implications that Small may have raped Karen Paris, as there was no evidence of this crime, nor was it an issue before them.

And just because he’s a rapist, doesn’t mean he’s a not a nice guy,
Bratt thought sarcastically to himself.
I’m sure that’s just what they’re thinking
.

Parent, looking more self-satisfied than he had for days, continued his cross-examination.

“Mr. Small, do you think Marcus Paris hates you enough to falsely accuse you of this murder?”

“Sure looks that way.”

“You must have really done something bad to his sister for him to hate you.”

“I didn’t rape her, if that’s what you mean.”

“I know, I know. Please don’t think I’m implying that you did. She was perfectly willing, wasn’t she?”

“That’s how it was.”

“She was barely fifteen years old and she did whatever you wanted her to, is that right?”

Kouri leaned over to Bratt again.

“Why don’t you object? They can’t attack an accused’s character.”

“Calm down,” Bratt whispered, well aware of how the judge would respond. “I’m the one who raised this issue first, with Paris.”

“The girl knew what she wanted,” Small was saying to Parent, remaining calm in the face of the intrusive line of questioning.

“And you weren’t too much of a gentleman to say no, were you? Not to a pretty f
ifteen-year-old girl. I guess they’re hard to resist.”

Again Kouri grabbed Bratt’s arm.

“He’s making him look like a scumbag.”

He is a scumbag,
Bratt was tempted to reply. He patted Kouri’s hand in understanding before removing it from his arm.    

“Tell me, Mr. Small,” Parent was saying, “if you didn’t rape his sister is there any other reason that Marcus Paris might hate you so much that he’d falsely accuse you of murder?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“Did you ever steal from him?”

“No, never.”

“
Did you maybe lie to him, or betray his trust somehow?”

“No, I was always straight with him.”

“So, if you were always straight with him and you never raped his sister, why would your lawyer suggest that Marcus Paris was ready to lie to this court because of his deep hatred toward you?”

This time Bratt did stand up to object, but he knew that it was already too late.

“Objection. The accused can’t be asked to comment on his lawyer’s cross-examination of prosecution witnesses.”

“I agree totally,” Parent magnanimously conceded, having already gotten his point across to the jury. “I withdraw the question.”

Bratt sat down slowly, irritated that Parent was trying to put ideas into the jury’s head by tossing out inadmissible questions, with no expectation that they be answered. At the same time, Bratt had to admit a grudging admiration for the prosecutor’s strategy.

Have your fun for now, Francis,
Bratt wanted to tell him.
But you’re going to have to deal with his alibi sooner or later.

Parent, though, had obviously decided that his best chance to score points against Small was not in questioning him on the details of his alibi. Instead, in the Marlon-Marcus-Karen triangle, he found a subject that he was going to milk for all it was worth. All Bratt could do was make sure he kept his questions legal.

“Isn’t it true,” Parent went on, “that Karen Paris was jealous about your several other girlfriends and she complained to Marcus about it, and that caused the rift between you?”

Bratt was quickly back on his feet again.

“My Lord…”

“I know,” Green replied before he could finish his objection. “Multiple questions, Mr. Parent. You know better than that.”

Parent breathed in and tried again, as Bratt sat back down.

“Could that be the reason Marcus hated you?”

“Could what be the reason?” Bratt jumped up again.

“Mr. Parent,” Green spoke as if he were lecturing an undergrad, “if I have no idea what you’re asking I don’t expect the accused to be in any better a position. Make your questions clear.”

Parent said nothing in reply, but simply bowed slightly, before turning to face Small again.

“Was the conflict between you and Marcus due to the fact that you had several other girlfriends Karen’s age and she was very jealous?”

Bratt couldn’t believe that he had to object again already, and he was quickly back on his feet.

“That’s as bad as the other one.”

Green sighed deeply, trying not to lose his patience.

“Mr. Parent, I’m starting to get a sore throat. Will you just break it up into separate questions?”

“I’ll try to do better,” Parent said with a solicitous grin, although Bratt doubted that he intended to do any such thing.

Parent was trying to draw the ugliest possible picture of Small’s character for the jury, and he knew his questions didn’t have to be allowed by the judge to succeed. Bratt objected whenever it was necessary, but was
well aware of the impression being made on the jury. Green warned the jurors several times to ignore whatever he disallowed, but there was no way to be sure they did.

As the morning wore on, though, Bratt began to notice a change in the attitude of several jurors. They had stopped listening as intently to Parent’s lurid insinuations. Instead, they began looking bored. Most of them stopped taking notes. Their eyes wandered and several yawned openly.

Bratt realized that Parent’s strategy had hit a wall. There was a limit to how long he could hint that Small had a hidden dark side without actually offering any proof. The jurors were surely expecting him to confront Small on his alibi at some point, and since he seemed to be purposely avoiding the topic, he was losing their interest. As for Small himself, his responses had been calm and courteous in the face of what were often embarrassing questions, and Bratt thought the accused might have started to look good in the jury’s eyes. 

By the time
the morning drew to a close Parent’s expression showed that he knew he had gone as far as he could with his attempt to discredit Small, and had only had limited success. He was going to have to rethink his strategy, but Bratt wasn’t going to repeat the mistake of feeling too confident yet.

There’s always this afternoon,
he told himself.
We’ll see what Francis has up his sleeve then.

They were only ten or fifteen minutes into the afternoon session when Bratt realized that Parent didn’t have any hidden reserves at all. It was as if he had tried everything he could think of in the morning and had nothing new for the afternoon.

When h
e finally got around to questioning Small about his alibi his questions were simple and straightforward. Small was confident and well-prepared, and he had no difficulty answering everything that was asked of him. Parent’s approach was so indifferent that Bratt wondered if the prosecutor had any fight left in him at all.

Maybe you smell your own defeat, Francis,
Bratt reproached Parent in his mind.
You never could handle a little adversity.

Parent spent an inordinate amount of time flipping through his pages of notes after each of Small’s answers, perhaps hoping to uncover that one key question that would shatter the witness’s self-confidence. Even Green tapped his fingers impatiently on his desk at the stalling tactics.

“Isn’t it possible that you left the park before midnight?” Parent finally asked.

“No. Like I said before, nobody’s allowed in the park after twelve, and a couple of city security guys came and told us to leave.”

“And you’re certain that was the night of June 14?”

“Yes.”

“There’s no doubt in your mind about it?”

“No, there isn’t.”

Bratt grabbed at his notepad, but only because he wanted to pass a note to Kouri. He was shaking his head internally at Parent’s weak-willed performance and needed an outlet for his frustration.

“He’s totally disheartened,” he scribbled. “He knows there are no chinks in our armor.”

He slid the note over to Kouri and sat back.

Somehow Parent managed to fill the entire afternoon with questions that didn’t come close to shaking Small up, or poking any holes into his story. When the cross-examination was over, Small turned out to have been as good a witness as Bratt could have hoped for. With Sims and Jordan scheduled for the next day his earlier optimism about this trial now looked justified. 

The court adjourned for the day, and Bratt began packing his briefcase while watching Parent out of the corner of his eye. The prosecutor’s face was drained, and his movements were slow and uncertain.

Kouri slid over to Bratt’s side.

“He looks like shit.”

“He’s a coward,” Bratt snapped, surprised at his own vehemence. “He talks big when he thinks he’s got you on the ropes, but score a few points on him and he’s ready to throw in the towel, just like a schoolyard bully. That’s why I could never work for him.”

Bratt dragged his heavy briefcase off the desk, picked up his overcoat from where it lay on a chair in the corner of the room, and headed out with Kouri.

Once outside, he turned to see Nancy coming out of the courtroom. Parent was nowhere in sight.

“What happened to Francis?” he asked.

“
Honestly, I think he’s pretty tired of this case. Ever since he called Marcus Paris to the stand he’s been feeling almost revolted. That’s just how he is.”

“
Oh, I know how he is, and I don’t think it has a lot to do with Paris.”

“So what do you think it is?”

“Does the expression ‘airtight alibi’ mean anything to you? He sees the case slipping though his fingers and he just doesn’t have the heart to put up a fight.”

“
Don’t be so smug, Robbie. You should know better than anyone that a lawyer can’t always love the case he has, …or the client.”

She raised her eyebrows knowingly and turned to join Parent who had
finally appeared in the hallway. His shoulders slumped, he walked past them without a glance. Nancy looked at Bratt a last time, shaking her head, then caught up with Parent.

That hit close to home
,
Bratt thought, his heart still beating hard.
Not that I’m ready to feel any empathy for Parent.

He thought of Dorrell Phillips and how his visit the week before had affected him. He wondered how Phillips would feel seeing the man who was supposed to get him justice slinking away, almost ready to admit defeat before the trial even ended.

If that’s not as ironic as it gets,
he told himself.
Now I’m the one concerned about the victim’s feelings.

On Friday morning, Vernon Sims, the first alibi witness, was called to the stand to testify on Marlon Small’s behalf. This day was to be Kouri’s true coming-out party. He had spent hours preparing Sims and Jordan for their testimony on his own and he would undertake their examination
s in chief. Bratt wasn’t totally free to sit back and relax, though, even if this was supposed to be Kouri’s show. He was going to have to stay alert in case Kouri, who was displaying a strong case of nerves that morning, had any problems with either Parent or Judge Green.

Sims, as a witness, turned out to be everything that Bratt had expected. He spoke well, remained calm and polite at all times, and retained a good grasp of the facts he had to recount. At times, when Kouri’s inexperience got him off track, it was Sims who brought the testimony back into line. Bratt, sitting next to Kouri, tugged on his robe from time to time, just to slip a word of encouragement or advice into his assistant’s ear. But it was clear that it was Sims that Kouri relied on to give the right answers, even when his occasionally awkward questions were not clear.

At the end of the examination in chief, which had lasted well over an hour, Kouri sat down, his face red and sweaty. Bratt patted him on his back. It had all gone quite smoothly: nothing spectacular, no disastrous mistakes.

As for Parent, it seemed that he wasn’t in any more of a fighting mood with this witness than he had been with Small. Once again, he went through the alibi, detail by detail, but in an uninspired and desultory fashion. He made no attempts to attack Sims’s character or reputation. Kouri had prepared his witness for far worse and Sims was able to answer all the questions without hesitation.

There were the engineering courses he had switched, meeting Everton Jordan at the Metro station, the undercooked hamburgers his friend had eaten. All the stories were told and retold. Their arrival at the park, who they had played basketball with, Jordan’s taking ill and being taken home. Sims never came close to contradicting himself on any of the details. The time of their return to the park, Small’s presence throughout, and his eventual defiance of the midnight curfew. Parent questioned Sims on everything, but there were no obvious lapses.

By the time the lunch break came around, the prosecutor looked about ready to pack it in. Bratt began feeling the excitement as he saw the finish line getting closer and he could almost taste victory. In the jurors’ eyes he could read their confirmation of the probable outcome. They no longer scowled when Small’s name was mentioned and they stopped averting their gazes from him in the box. He was no longer the cold-hearted killer that they were sworn to condemn. They had been given Marcus Paris, after all, on whom they could focus their righteous anger.

Everybody in the courtroom is on the same page,
Bratt told himself.
Even Parent, although he’d never admit it. Maybe I should call up Madsen tonight and tell him to let his buddies in Ottawa know they’ve got their next Superior Court Judge lined up right here.

When the court had emptied, and only he and Kouri remained, he couldn’t restrain himself from giving the younger lawyer a big bear hug.

“Did a hell of a job, Pete. I’m not one to count my chickens before they’re hatched, but unless they blow up the courthouse over the weekend you’re about to have your first victory in a murder trial.”

They left their files behind them in the courtroom since there would be nothing for them to prepare or work on over lunch. Jordan would be the last witness heard in this trial. It would surely go as smoothly as Sims’s testimony had, and they would have more than enough time over the weekend to prepare their final arguments.

They walked down the courthouse corridor with huge smiles on their faces, Kouri humming “We Are the Champions” as if the verdict had already been rendered. Turning into the lobby, Bratt spotted Jennifer Campbell standing alone near the Notre Dame Street exit on their left. He saw her facing them and he slowed his pace just slightly, expecting her to avoid him as had been her habit throughout the trial.

But she did not turn away. She continued to look at him from across the open space, nervously shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

He signaled Kouri to take the door leading out onto St. Laurent Boulevard and go to the office ahead of him, then he walked toward her.

He was only a few feet away from her when she finally made a move as if to walk away.

“Mrs. Campbell, don’t go.”

She stopped in her tracks, but she didn’t look back at him.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Things have been going so well I don’t think our talking is going to jinx anything.”

Now she turned to face him, but she didn’t seem to have understood his meaning.

“Jinx what?”

“You know, the trial. Marlon said you were a bit superstitious, but I have to admit I’m pretty amazed you’ve been able to avoid me for so long.”

Her eyes widened at his words, and she sounded indignant when she spoke.

“I don’t have a superstitious bone in my body. The Good Lord doesn’t deal with luck or jinxes.”

“Then why the vanishing act these past two weeks?”

Her face took on a nervous expression and she took a step back, looking like she was thinking of running away again.

“I can’t say I’m enjoying my first experience in a courtroom,” she said, not looking at him.

“I know it can’t be easy listening to the things that were said about your son, but now it’s our turn and it’s going even better than I could have hoped for.”

“None of this is easy,” she said, her voice dropping almost to a whisper. “I pray every day…”

Her voice trailed off, leaving Bratt puzzled at her attitude. He might have expected her to be concerned about the possible verdict, but something else seemed to be on her mind.

“Mrs. Campbell, what are you worried about? Is there something I can help you with?”

“They’re all swearing on the Bible in there.”

“Well, yes, that’s how it’s usually done.”

“But they lie anyway.”

“You don’t have to worry about the lies. I think our
defense is going over very well.”

She sniffed impatiently and looked at Bratt with a shake of her head. When she spoke again she sounded as if she was speaking to a child who just wasn’t getting the point.

“Mr. Bratt, do you know the story of Saul of Tarsus?”

Oh brother
, not with the Bible again,
he thought. The one thing he hadn’t missed about talking to her was her religious zeal, and he couldn’t help but be flippant when he answered her.

“Wasn’t he the Christian-hating Jew who became a Jew-hating Christian?”

“Well, that’s not exactly how it’s written in the Bible,” she replied, looking offended by his disrespectful tone, “but we seem to be talking about the same man.”

“What about him?”

“He spent his life persecuting the followers of Jesus, as you seem to know. Then one day everything changed, and he realized that everything he had ever believed in or stood for was a lie. He suddenly hated the man he once was.”

Her words hit Bratt like a slap in the face. It was as if she had been reading his most secret thoughts over the previous month and had now drawn them out into the open. Surely the reference to a man who questioned his life’s work was nothing but a coincidence.

“What’s that got to do with me?” he asked, dreading her answer.

“Oh, it’s not just you. It’s me too. When the scales fell from my eyes I knew I was a coward and I ran away from the truth. But you don’t even run away, Mr. Bratt. You just keep holding on to those scales, preferring to be blind than to see what you should know.”

“Hold it, hold it,” Bratt said, unclear about what she was talking about and unable to disguise the irritation this was causing him. “You’ve really lost me with your religious mumbo jumbo. If you’re unhappy about some aspect of the defense I’ve presented for your son, why don’t you just come out and say it?”

She looked deeply into his eyes now, and he could see that she was feeling a great deal of sadness and confusion. When she spoke, though, her words were straightforward.

“For such a smart lawyer you play dumb very well. Maybe this helps you lie to your heart.”

Bratt said nothing, unsure if she was trying to provoke him into anger.

She bit her lip to keep herself from speaking further, and looked around them for several seconds, before finally saying, “I have to go eat something to keep my strength up. Have a good lunch.”

Bratt couldn’t believe she was going to just walk away after her cryptic pronouncements. On top of that he was bothered by her suggestion that he knew something when he had no idea what that something was.

She left the building and he trotted out the door after her. He caught up with her on the sidewalk, where the sting of the icy wind made continuing their conversation particularly unpleasant.

“Listen. I have no idea what you’re talking about, so I don’t even feel insulted about being called dumb. I just wish you could be a little clearer in whatever it is you’re trying to tell me.” 

“Ananias can remove the scales from your eyes, if you really want him to.”

“Anna who? For crying out loud, is that supposed to be clearer?”

“He was a disciple in Syria and God sent him to give Saul his sight back, so that he might believe and spread the word. Go speak to your own disciple if you truly want to see. Now, please leave me in peace.”

With that she walked off, quickly disappearing into a crowd of people that were braving the bitter cold on the way to their
favorite lunch spots. Passersby, trying to squeeze between Bratt and the snowdrifts, lightly jostled him as he stood in their path.

He was far from certain what she had meant, but he could tell that underneat
h her holier-than-thou attitude she was clearly distressed. She seemed to expect him to feel the same way. He told himself that he didn’t know what was bothering her, even if she seemed to think that he did and was just refusing to admit it.

The cold began digging into his bones and he started back toward the office at a fast pace. As he walked he thought of the conversation he had had with Marlon at R.D.P. several weeks earlier, when the line between what a lawyer really knew and what he didn’t know had gotten blurred. Wasn’t that what she was saying now? He would have to seek out his own “Syrian disciple” it seemed. That was about the only part of her obscure ranting that he had understood.

Back at his office Bratt had no appetite for lunch. He watched Kouri, eating, talking on the phone, trading stories with Kalouderis, and he wondered what it was that his assistant could reveal to him. Despite Jennifer Campbell’s exhortations, he couldn’t get himself to ask.

It had been several weeks since he had first begun putting his life and his career under the microscope. In the middle of his self-analysis he had decided to put his questioning aside because it was going to be a distraction from the murder trial he had taken on. Now the trial was almost over. Victory was a strong possibility and after it there would come the reward that could put an honorable end to his now-unhappy legal career.

He decided he would have to get through the trial first, before approaching Kouri in search of enlightenment. Only then would he have the nerve to find out what secrets his assistant held.

That afternoon in court Bratt’s mind was on autopilot as his body went through the motions with which it was so familiar. Parent wrapped up his cross-examination of Sims, getting no further with the witness than he had that morning. The frustration on his face was clear for everyone to see, but Bratt felt no particular satisfaction from it. Despite his earlier commitment to himself that he would see the trial through to a successful conclusion, his mind kept harking back to Jennifer Campbell’s cryptic words. 

He glanced in her direction at the back of the courtroom, but she didn’t seem to be looking at him. Her face maintained the passivity it had shown over the previous two weeks, as if their conversation just two hours earlier had never occurred.

She was probably wondering if he had spoken to Kouri as she had instructed him to, but her face held no
clues. He didn’t know how she managed to get into his head the way she did, but his lack of concentration over the trial was proof that she had. If it had been him, instead of Kouri, who was questioning the alibi witnesses, the afternoon would have been a total disaster.

As it was, he hardly listened while Kouri took their next witness, Everton Jordan, through the events that constituted Marlon Small’s alibi for June 14, 1999. There was the occasional glitch, a few leading questions that Parent objected to, but overall Kouri was proving himself to be an able attorney.

There’s an ironic twist,
Bratt thought.
He’s got the trial well under control, while I can’t even get a grip on my own thoughts.

Jordan’s examination in chief ended at nearly four-thirty and Green suggested Parent cross-examine the witness on Monday morning. The judge looked at the prosecutor like he thought the weekend’s rest would do him good. Then, with a curt, “Have a good weekend,” he stood and followed the jurors out of the court.