At that point, Harry broke in, his voice belligerent. “So you never had any way of stopping the story?”
“No,” Jude admitted.
“That was a dirty trick.”
“Yes,” Jude said. “I learned it from you.”
“I wouldn’t be so pleased with myself if I were you,” Harry said. “You seem to have forgotten about one little detail. You forgot that you happened to confess to your father’s murder. I’ll make sure everyone knows it. There’s no statute of limitations on murder.” Harry smiled with satisfaction. “It seems we’ll all be going down together.”
45
JUDE SPENT MUCH of that night lying awake thinking. The next morning the first thing he did was buy a bus ticket to Danbury. In less than two hours he had arrived at the gates of the federal penitentiary, and he was filling out the forms to see Joseph Palazzo—the man who had killed his father but left him alive.
Twenty minutes later Jude was waiting in one of the visiting rooms when Joseph Palazzo entered, flanked by a guard. Jude opened his mouth to explain who he was, but he didn’t have a chance. Palazzo took one look at him and exclaimed, “Jude!” He advanced with his hand out-stretched, captured Jude’s, and shook it warmly.
“How—”
“I’d know you if you were fifty,” Palazzo said, anticipating Jude’s question. “I’m so glad you came.” He paused and looked at Jude more closely. “I’m so sorry about what happened with your father. I’ve always hoped that you forgave me that.”
“I do. I mean, I did a long time ago. I always knew you didn’t have a choice about my father. But with me … you let me go, when anyone else would have taken me out.”
Palazzo beamed at him. “And I never regretted it for a minute. It was the stupidest thing I’d ever done … well, it was until I trusted my son to help me run the business. Unfortunately, that didn’t turn out quite as well. It’s how I ended up in here. He fucked up and got nailed by the feds. The thing is, the feds didn’t really want him, they wanted me. So he cut a deal and agreed to wear a wire. No one else could have gotten me. I always checked for wires, but I didn’t think that my own son …” He trailed off. Then a moment later he revived, shaking it off. “But you—you I never regretted for a minute. If I’d had a son like you …” He sighed. “But you didn’t come here to listen to an old man’s regrets. I imagine you had a reason for coming?”
“I came here to ask for your help,” Jude said. “But first I should probably explain.”
Jude launched into the whole story, starting from his first meeting with his mother and his false confession to Harry. He explained about the gang at school and the visits to the old neighborhood. Then he described the trial and jail and everything that had happened since he’d been released.
The whole time Jude was speaking, Palazzo sat silent and attentive. He didn’t display any sort of emotion except that at one point his hands curled into fists. But when Jude finished, there was a pause, and that’s when Palazzo erupted.
“I wish I could kill that son of a bitch with my own hands.” He raised his clenched fists in the air. “If you can get him here, I will. Or I could put out a contract. I still have connections on the outside—he could be dead by Monday.”
Jude was startled by the ferocity of Palazzo’s response. There was no question as to whether he was kidding. Jude said, “What he did was bad, but—”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Palazzo interrupted.
“There’s something I don’t know? What else could there be?”
“Where do I start? Okay, you know how he said he felt … what did he say, he felt justified”—Palazzo sneered as he said the word—“for leaving you in prison because you admitted you killed your father? Total bullshit.” Palazzo threw his hands up in disgust. “He knew you didn’t have anything to do with your father’s death.”
“He knew? Are you sure?”
“Sure I’m sure.”
“But how do you know?”
“Because I told him,” Palazzo said.
“You what?”
“Sure. In fact, I told him I was going to kill your father before I even did it.”
“But why?”
“Because I knew he would help cover for me.” Palazzo held up a hand, forestalling Jude’s question. “And I knew he’d cover for me because I had something on him. I had leverage.
“See, your father came and looked me up when he moved back to Hartford. He needed a way to make some money. He was starting to think about your future. And he had something to offer me as well—he had this information on Harry Wichowski. You see, they’d had a falling out when your father announced he was moving back to Hartford. So he came to me for help, and he told me his story. Told me what you just found out—about how Harry helped your father all the way through. Then he went back to Harry, and I think he rubbed it in Harry’s face a little—that he was staying in Hartford and he was making his money dealing drugs, and even though Harry was deputy police commissioner, he couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Your father instructed me to spill the beans if anything were to happen to him. And your father put Harry in the position of having to protect me, because Harry knew if I went down, I’d take him down with me. That must have really stuck in his craw.
“Anyway, that’s why he was so unhappy when I let you go. It was like a row of dominoes. You could bring me down, and then I’d bring down Harry. He was terrified that you’d break and spill your guts to the police. He tried to convince me to finish the job. I told him to forget about that and stop worrying. There was no way you were gonna break.”
“How could you know that?” Jude asked, thinking that he himself hadn’t known.
“Are you kidding? You were the toughest little kid I’d ever seen. I still remember that night. We’d just killed your father, and there was a shotgun pointed right at your head, and you didn’t turn a hair.”
“But I was scared to death,” Jude said.
“Of course you were. Anyone would have been. The thing was, you didn’t show it. And when you gave me your word, I knew it meant something. Like in the old days, when guys would die to keep their promises. Now you can drop a nickel in front of someone and they’ll roll over. But you—well, listening to your story, I see you haven’t changed. But Harry couldn’t understand that kind of honor. People expect everyone to act the same way they would in a situation. Can you see Harry taking the kind of knocks you did, just to keep his word?”
Jude smiled.
“Right. So he figured he needed a little insurance to keep you quiet. And he thought of a way to take the pressure off without you—or anyone—getting too curious as to why. Knowing Harry, I wouldn’t be surprised if he intended for you to confess so he’d have a little something in his back pocket in case he ever needed it.”
Jude sat thinking about the enormity of the damage this one person had done to his life. The extent of it was only just beginning to sink in. “So he set me up to take the drug rap and the criminal negligence charges, knowing I was innocent. He knew I was going to jail, and he didn’t care how much time I got?”
“No, it’s worse than that,” Palazzo said.
“Worse?” Jude had to laugh at the absurdity of it, though there wasn’t much mirth in it. “How could it possibly be worse?”
“He did care about how much time you got. He tried to get you sent away for as long as possible.”
“But how—”
“How do I know that?” Palazzo finished for him. “Well, did you ever wonder where Harry got that heroin?”
Jude frowned. “I figured he took it from police evidence. From another drug seizure.”
“It’s not so easy to steal that much. Not when you’re the deputy police commissioner. Too visible. And he couldn’t have asked another officer. Think of the hold that officer would have over him. So of course he came to me. We were already at a stalemate. He had me on the murder, I had him on the kidnapping. He must have thought, what was a little heroin on top o
f that? He asked me for it, promising it was a onetime deal. I figured he wanted to make a little extra money. That or impress a girlfriend junkie. When your trial came up, I thought maybe you’d been in on it, and knowing what I did about you, I figured you took the fall for him. I didn’t know till just now … and I put it together … Jude, when Harry came to me for the heroin, he asked for a very specific amount—four ounces.” Palazzo waited for a moment, but when Jude didn’t respond, he said, “I see you don’t know the significance of that. Four ounces is the amount that put you into the next bracket of mandatory minimums. Above four ounces carries a sentence of fifteen years to life. It’s a good thing I shortchanged him, wouldn’t you say?”
The malice of it took Jude’s breath away. It was so evil Jude’s own hate seemed paltry in comparison. And when his anger should have exploded, instead he felt it fade away.
“And,” Palazzo continued. “And he specified that it should be pure. As pure as I could deliver it.”
“So I’d get the criminal negligence charge,” Jude said.
“He was probably hoping for murder. It was a goddamned miracle you just got five years.”
When Jude didn’t say anything immediately, Palazzo said, “You see now that you have to nail him to the wall. Nothing’s too good for this asshole. I hope you know that I’ll do anything I can to help. There’s that contract guy I know….”
Jude shook his head. “No. No thanks.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“Okay, if you don’t want to go that route, I’ll give you whatever else you need.”
“There is something,” Jude ventured.
“Anything,” Palazzo said.
“Would you tell other people what you’ve just told me?”
“I’d swear up, down, and sideways if you wanted.”
“But you’d be implicating yourself.”
“Son, I’m in here for twenty-five to life. All you need to do is look at me to know I’m not getting out. I could confess to anything, I could get ten life sentences, and it wouldn’t make a difference.”
“Why didn’t you say something before?” Jude asked.
Palazzo shrugged. “Because I had no reason to. As far as I knew, Harry had done right by me. I got busted on a federal charge, so there was nothing he could have done for me. But once I got sentenced, he knew there was nothing keeping me from talking. So he said he was going to put in a good word for me here with the prison officials. Who knows, maybe he did. They treat me all right.” He glanced up with a smile. “But now I have a reason. A very good reason. And I bet when your mother finds out the whole story, she’s gonna get down on her knees and beg your forgiveness.”
Six Months Later
46
“JUDE! JUDE, COME quick,” Lizzie called, slamming the front door behind her, dropping her bag and dripping umbrella, and shedding her raincoat. “Jude?”
“Just a second,” Jude called. A moment later he emerged from the back room.
“Look what came in the mail,” she said, waving an envelope. “What do you want to bet we’ll be moving to New Haven?” She held it out to him.
“No, you open it for me,” he said, retreating to a perch on the arm of the sofa.
She ripped open the end and pulled out the sheet of paper, her eyes scanning the page. She looked up at him. “I knew it.” She whooped and threw the envelope and paper up in the air. “I knew it.” Then she tackled him and they both fell back onto the cushions of the couch. She pretended to pin him down. “Did I tell you, or did I tell you?”
“You’re a genius,” he agreed.
“Damn straight. Every other law school you’ve applied to has accepted you. Why not Yale?”
“They just accepted me because of the story,” he pointed out. “Who would have thought that going to prison would get me into Yale?”
“Going to prison didn’t get you in. The reason you went to prison got you in. And the hard work you did there getting your degrees got you in. You got you in. Oh.” She sat up. “We’ve got to call Maria and tell her. You would never have applied if she hadn’t made you. You wouldn’t listen to me.”
The day the story broke in the paper Maria, his old lawyer, had tracked him down. After a slight hesitation he agreed to meet for coffee at a Starbucks near the courthouse. When he arrived, she was already there, waiting in a booth near the back. He almost didn’t recognize her. She wasn’t thin, but she wasn’t the unhealthy size she had been. She saw his surprise, smiled that ironic little smile he remembered, and said, “It’s sad, isn’t it? Now there’s only half as much of me to love.”
They had fallen easily into conversation. Instead of immediately bringing up his trial, she told him a little of what she had been doing over the last few years. She now specialized in youth cases, and she explained to him the progress she thought had been made in fighting for leniency for minors. And it looked like the state might be considering a revision of the mandatory minimum drug sentencing laws. It was only after they’d finished their coffee that she admitted that she’d never quite gotten over his case. “I always had a feeling about it,” she explained. “Like something wasn’t exactly right. It’s not as if I haven’t had other cases before and since that had some strange elements, but …” She cocked her head to one side and squinted, as if staring into the past. “I remember what it was that bothered me the most. It was a really little thing. It happened during the meeting we had at your mother’s office. When you officially turned down the plea bargain. I remember glancing over at Harry Wichowski, and he had this little satisfied smirk on his face. I’d had several conversations with him, and he was supposedly trying to help us in negotiating a plea for you. He claimed to be very concerned, but there he was, smiling as it all caved in. It was almost creepy, and it bothered me. Like this nagging itch. I should have pressed you more. I should have made you tell me the truth.”
Jude tried to convince her that there wasn’t anything she could have done, and when that failed, he tried to explain why his time in prison hadn’t been a complete waste—how it had turned him around and gotten him interested in school. That led him to confess his interest in law, and she enthusiastically took up his cause.
After that first meeting not only had they kept in touch, but Lizzie and Maria had become fast friends, and between the two of them they had convinced Jude that after all the media attention his case had gotten, law schools might view his application differently. So he started to apply, and more quickly than he could have imagined, the acceptances started to roll in. Maria had already taught him an incredible amount by recruiting him to help on her pro bono work, assist on research, and often talk to the kids who were on trial themselves. Jude explained to them what had happened when he wasn’t completely honest with his lawyer. They opened up to him, and as a result Maria was able to present a better case.
“Maria is going to have a fit,” Lizzie said, heading for the phone.
“No she’s not,” Jude replied. “She’s going to say exactly what you said. She’s going to say, ‘I told you so.’”
“Well, we did,” Lizzie retorted. She reached the phone and picked up the receiver. Then she noticed the blinking light. “Did you know there’s a message on the machine?”
“Oh, I meant to erase that,” Jude said.
Lizzie picked up the unspoken meaning in Jude’s tone. “Your mother again?”
Jude nodded.
He hadn’t spoken to Anna since that day at her house. That seemed like years ago instead of just a few months—so much had happened since. Davis had broken the story in a series of front-page articles in the Courant, and those articles had changed all their lives. The story had done as much for Davis’s career as he had hoped. He was promoted to the news desk, and his articles now regularly appeared on the front page. He was even nominated for a Pulitzer for investigative reporting, though in the end he was beaten out by a reporter covering the dangers to workers who dismantle ships.
However, Davis had not calculated the personal cost. Lizzie had been appalled at his betrayal, and when she wasn’t able to talk Davis out of publishing the story, she stopped speaking to him altogether. Just in the last month they had talked on the phone a couple of times—short, stilted conversations—but that was only because Jude had insisted. Somehow Jude found it easier to forgive Davis than Lizzie did. He wondered if that was because a part of him had always known—or at least suspected—that Davis wouldn’t honor the deal. Maybe, Jude thought, he had wanted Davis to publish, without having to take responsibility for the results.
And the results were dramatic—especially for Harry. Jude had underestimated the effect because he had underestimated the indignation of the public’s response. Davis’s articles were perfectly calculated to inflame public opinion. Harry was charged with falsifying evidence for Jude’s trial, and he would have been charged in the kidnapping as well, but the statute of limitations had run out. However, the jury must have kept that in mind, because Harry was given the maximum sentence.
Harry’s conviction had happened only a month ago. Jude heard that, because of his former position as deputy police commissioner, Harry had been assigned to a solitary cell to protect him from the other prisoners. Despite those precautions, during the first week of his sentence Harry was stabbed in the throat with a toothbrush that had been sharpened to a lethal point. But the inmate had missed the jugular, and Harry had already been released from the infirmary and was back in his cell.
Jude suspected Palazzo was behind the attack. It would be a miracle if Harry made it through his sentence, though in a way, Harry might consider death an escape. Jude knew better than anyone what Harry’s life was like. In solitary you didn’t have a moment’s privacy. There was always someone watching—even when you went to the toilet. Humiliation was part of the daily routine. It was hard to get used to. It had been hard even for Jude, who had been accustomed to feeling powerless and vaguely ashamed. Harry was used to power. He was used to being able to intimidate and bully others. Jude knew that prison was probably Harry’s idea of a personal hell. Strangely, the thought of it didn’t give Jude pleasure. What he felt was mostly relief. Relief that he didn’t have to care about Harry anymore—that Harry didn’t take up even the smallest corner of his mind. Jude had lived so long fighting hate. Now that it was gone, it felt like the moment he had walked through the gates of the prison. It was a new kind of freedom.
Jude Page 27
