That insult awakened the half-empty courtroom and the audience shouted at William. Prosecutor Visser, bewildered, looked at the judge. It was almost becoming a popular uprising when Roberti beat both fists on the bench to calm the crowd, and he did it with such violence that he almost broke the capillaries of his hands.
«Deveux», the judge thundered, «you fired the first and only bullet that this highly respected Court allowed you to bring into the courtroom! From this very moment, and until the end of the trial, I no longer want to hear your voice except to answer a direct question! Did I make myself clear? If you have any comments to make, you will report them to the delegate and to no one else.»
«But the prosecutor...», William tried to defend himself.
«Silence! I order you to shut up! Prosecutor Visser humbly asked this Court to be able to express a personal opinion and I believe it was also explained to you that such an opinion would not be recorded. You had no right of reply!»
Judge Roberti paused and tried to wipe the sweat off with a handkerchief. He waved the same handkerchief to cool off a little and then closed his eyes and breathed in. He turned to the prosecutor right after and apologized for the defendant's outburst and assured him that no other such incident would occur. Visser bowed his head in gratitude. The judge eventually imposed the second break of the day, with a little change compared to the first: he demanded that William Deveux be taken to a detention cell, to punish him for his insolence. He would wait there, alone, until Michael Roberti thought it appropriate to resume the session. William Deveux sought comfort in his defender again, but Alfred DiFraia did not even look at him and remained in his place to re-read the defensive arguments he had laboriously prepared. William Deveux had just brought everything down and ruined all the work he had done.
In the unhealthy and smelly cold of the detention cell, William was able to reflect on the idiocy he had just committed. He wondered about his inability to control his temper under stress and, with a good dose of self-criticism, he asked himself how much guilt could be attributed to Lore-Burr syndrome and how much depended on his reluctance to correct himself, to admit he had flaws but, above all, to concretely try to work on them. Even Lucinda had pointed it out to him in the past, during one of their many arguments.
He looked at the hovel in which they locked him up: about ten feet long and less than seven wide; there would not be enough room for two people. It was better to start liking it, William thought, there was a strong risk it would be his new home in a short time.
It had been half an hour, at most forty-five minutes, when a militiaman came to pick him up and bring him back to the courtroom. The judge had cooled down, it was clear, and he wanted to finish in order to go to lunch or go home. He was not the only one, William said to himself. The militiaman led him to his place and almost threw him down. He dared to offend an exponent of Scarlet Militia: it was like offending them all. Sure thing. If nothing else, Alfred DiFraia was talking to him again. The delegate scolded him for his rashness, he explained that things were going well at first, but, after that insult, all hope of getting away with it was gone. They would not let that episode go unpunished, Militia never let anyone make fun of them like that. They would find ways to produce or invent evidence against him, make admissible even mere suspicions or unreliable witnesses. «You really did a good work, Deveux», the delegate concluded sarcastically, pointing his thumb upwards.
So, Judge Roberti resumed talking, reiterating the apology to the prosecutor and inviting him to continue. He had to clear his throat two or three times, the previous screams almost damaged his vocal cords. Prosecutor Visser thanked the Court again and reassured it that he would no longer put it in such awkward position with personal remarks. Judge Roberti nodded, then - before the prosecutor started again to recite the atrocities committed by the defendant - told him that he had carefully analyzed the charges and, with particular reference to counts five and six, namely serious misconduct and gross negligence, had already decided to validate those charges. So William Deveux would certainly be condemned for those two crimes, while the previous four charges remained yet to be assessed. The judge availed himself of the right not to provide clarifications regarding his decision, the losing party would get information once the sentence was published.
Alfred DiFraia shook his head, angry. He leaned down and whispered into his client's ear, and told him that the judge just threw him a first uppercut. Minimum two years' imprisonment. And it was not over yet. It could be worse. If only he remained calm and quiet... William hid his face in his hands. Two years' imprisonment. Being aware of the risk of going to jail was a matter, having the certainty that at best he would be locked up for twenty-four months... it had a completely different taste. The taste of gall. Stay calm? Easier said that done. What would he do two years in jail? And his life? And his job? Alfred DiFraia gently took his arm and waved it: if ever there was a moment to give in to despair, it certainly was not that. It was necessary to keep a cool head to limit the damage. Yes, because, as he told him a few moments before, things could even get worse.
The discussion arrived to the fourth and last item on the agenda. Misappropriation of sensitive data. Prosecutor Visser, satisfied with the judge's position on two of the six crimes attributed, a prelude to an exemplary sentence, slowly savored the taste of his last speech, taking his time before formulating the final allegations of the entire proceedings against William Deveux. It was necessary to be pungent and incisive at the same time, not only to surprise the accused, but the judge himself, to the point of inducing him to a peremptory decision: to condemn the criminal right away to a long prison sentence. Twenty years, if possible, but even fifteen would be good enough. It was private matters between citizens, after all; the Most Excellent Institute of which he was honored to be a member had been already bothered too much. One year more or less would make no difference. However, after stumbling several times in the early stages of that second day of trial, he was keen to end on a high note.
After Michael Roberti's permission to proceed, Kasper Visser began to walk around the courtroom in measured steps, almost tracing an oval path. Hands crossed behind the back, head bowed and lips extended upwards. He looked like a genius at work to find a final solution to a dilemma. An unreal silence fell upon them all. All eyes followed the prosecutor wandering inside the room, everyone waiting to know what was in his head. Suddenly, without stopping or diverting the route, he asked a question to the accused with a heavy tone. An apparently easy and innocent question.
«Mr. Deveux... do you know a lady named Augusta Rottinger?»
As obvious as the answer seemed, William chose to take a few moments before opening his mouth. He had to try to guess why the prosecutor mentioned his dear neighbor, what was hidden behind such a trivial question. Delegate DiFraia, as puzzled as his client, turned to him with curiosity to see where that was going and who that Mrs. Rottinger was.
«I think you already know...» William bit his lip. He just would not stop falling into traps and arguing. «Yes... yes, I know her.»
«Well, and does the name William McGuire mean anything to you?», the prosecutor went on, keeping a calm yet cold tone of voice, as if he were ruminating.
«William... McGuire?», answered William Deveux.
«Do you need me to repeat the question, Mr. Deveux?»
William was silent. McGuire? The kid who sometimes visited him to ask for some favor? What the hell were they planning, William wondered.
«There's a kid who lives near my house... his name's actually William McGuire, but I don't know if it's the same person.»
The prosecutor, without ever looking him in the eye, gestured to invite him not to dwell. He did not care about personal comments, he just wanted a yes or a no.
«What about Beatriz Sanz? And Thomas Coons?»
Beatriz Sanz? Thomas Coons? William turned pale. It was all clear at last. They had uncovered his attempts to sneak into the Minneman archives and investigate the inh
abitants of Numbered District and their illnesses; and for some reason they had not intercepted him at the time. They probably thought it was better to use that information when it was needed. That was a real ace in the hole, the one he hadn't been able to find. He and Charlie shouldn't have stayed online all that time. Yes, it was pretty clear that they had kept the thing hidden to use it against him at the right time. And that was certainly the most opportune moment for them.
«So, Deveux?»
«I know them by sight... nothing more.»
«That's enough», said Kasper Visser, changing gear to get to his seat. He took his little computer again and projected new information on the screen.
«Your Honour, we have evidence that Mr. Deveux has stolen personal data from the individuals you see on that list. In particular, it is information of a medical nature... diseases, various pathologies... I will not go into details to protect the privacy of these respectable citizens.»
The judge gasped. Prosecutor Visser, instead, covered his mouth to not laugh.
«Your Honour, God only knows what the defendant intended to do with that data. Blackmail? Resell information? No one knows at this stage. We still have no such evidence. Yet what is certain...», said the prosecutor, raising the voice of several decibels, «is that Mr. Deveux had no authorization to collect them and keep them hidden in his computer. He hoped no one would come to know of it but, as often happens, criminals end up underestimating the powerful means of Our Most Excellent Institute!»
Alfred DiFraia tugged William by the arm. «Is it true what he says? Is that true?» The delegate was furious and demanded explanations. William Deveux stammered in giving an unconvincing answer, but he could not tell in detail what had happened without risking self-incrimination. “Forgive me, delegate, while I was trying to prove my innocence, I breached two or three servers and discovered a plot against the inhabitants of my neighborhood.” Alfred DiFraia would punch him before he finished his speech. So he merely asked him to trust him: the story was more complicated than it might appear and, if he had the chance, he would make everything clear. The delegate did not care about that justification: he got up very quickly, told the judge he considered his task fulfilled and asked to be exonerated.
«Granted!», Judge Roberti thundered again and, on every occasion that he repeated that term, the courtroom seemed to come down. The judge thanked the delegate for his service and reassured him, stating that what he had heard was more than enough. He declared that second session concluded and, full of hatred, he informed the accused that he would remain confined to his house until the day of the sentence. Under normal conditions he should have kept him locked up in a cell of Militia headquarters, but he did not want to risk seeing his ugly face around. With a hurried nod he also dismissed the prosecutor, then ordered a militiaman to escort the accused to the exit, paying attention not to accidentally bump him into some door. The militiaman understood the intentions of the judge right away and first he pushed William against a row of desks, causing him pain in his left femur, then threw him on the right edge of the entrance door, almost causing him a dislocated shoulder. «Oh, I'm so sorry! His Excellency even warned me to be careful!» William tried to stifle the moans, but he could not hold back the tears. The militiaman continued undaunted to push him here and there through the corridors, making him lose his balance several times. Getting to the exit and reaching the sunlight was kind of a catharsis for William. That pleasant sensation lasted a fraction of a second, just the time necessary for the escort militiaman to alert his fellows responsible for transporting the accused home. The militiaman made the gesture of crossing his wrists to indicate his colleagues that, once brought back home, the defendant must remain under arrest and especially under strict surveillance. Once the switch was made, it was the turn of the transport militiamen to shove William, to induce him to quickly enter a large car equipped for the transfer of prisoners. After so many stresses, the wetsuit got torn in several places and one of them revealed a small bleeding cut, which William tried to cover with his hand, having nothing else available. A militiaman saw the scene and took the chance to console him, explaining that the wetsuit was no longer needed and that as soon as possible they would provide him with a brand new and much more resistant outfit. It didn't take long to understand by his laugh that he was referring to the uniforms worn by prisoners.
And let's start again, for the umpteenth trip, racing wildly through the streets of the city to go back to the attic of Building 16. What once he considered a refuge, an escape from dissatisfaction, from selfishness and disappointment, it would then become a small temporary cage; just for a short time, until he would be transferred to a much larger cage, the Zoo of East Eden. That's how people called, in jargon, the notorious prison on North Hill, on the northern outskirts of the city. Obviously, the final sentence was still missing, but it was just a mere formality.
Chapter XX
Alfred DiFraia, all in one stroke, felt the weight of his age on his shoulders. He had reached fifty in a pretty good shape and the veil of gray that marked his silky hair more and more, he considered it the unmistakable sign of his increasing charm, never a testimony of aging and decay. Single, far from being a Don Juan, he had spent his whole life serving the Goddess who with one arm supported the scale and with the other hand wielded the sword. From time to time his faith faltered, but he was convinced that in the end everything would fit into the right place, that everyone's lives would follow a certain path that, for better or for worse, would lead them where they deserved to be. There was a reason if someone became a successful woman or man and some others ended up beaten by militiamen on the street. Married with children or singles, sad or happy, honest or thugs, everything was a direct consequence of what everyone had decided to be and do during life. And there was not necessarily anything right or wrong in the thing in itself, what that mattered was to accept the consequences with serenity because, at the end of it all, Justice would prevail and override every question, from the most futile to the most burdensome.
In recent years, however, that unyielding and pragmatic view of the world softened a bit. Grey areas began to appear, suddenly the events that he could not categorize as white or black were more and more frequent. He often wondered if he was doing the right thing, if the others, his colleagues, were making the right decisions. What were those right choices, by the way? In the beginning of his career his only wish was to direct the guilty to Justice. Because of his moral integrity, his rectitude and sense of duty he was chosen to represent those who had been accused of crimes. Directing and representing were the terms he preferred to describe his job. He did not bring people to Justice, others took care of that. He indicated the right choices to the culprits. He clarified the reasons why confessing a crime was the only desirable option. Without forcing decisions by resorting to vulgar retaliation, without distorting the reality of the situation. No, resorting to threats would have brought down the castle he so laboriously erected to approach the highest and noblest ideal of justice. The defendant had to be helped, led towards a conscious and convinced confession. Without grudge. Obviously, that was not always possible, not all the subjects had the open-mindedness and the balance necessary to make such choices. Nevertheless, that was the purpose to be pursued.
He represented, not defended, the persons suspected of a crime. Defending might imply some form of innocence or deniability and, in Alfred DiFraia's mind, there was no worse assumption than raising a barricade against an Institute that had taken charge of administering justice, of ensuring order and peace. Representing meant taking care of his clients' interests and the only way to do it properly was to ensure that the balance of things was restored, that a mediation could be achieved between those who had offended and those who had assumed the burden of remedying the offense.
Although he did not openly admit to himself that something had changed over time, each trial left inside of him a growing dissatisfaction, a clench in his gut, something that made him lose h
is appetite for several days. Discomfort he had learned to treat with a glass of cognac. The time between one glass and another was less and less, and he had even started to import it from the European continent, beyond the ocean; but the effect soon faded and he found himself back to zero. The moments of self-induced anger that he sometimes used with the defendants and even with his colleagues were futile. A vain attempt to shake himself up, to awake from torpor, to hide what his body had already understood for some time: he was no longer certain of doing the right thing. Even if with his clients he always proved unyielding and severe, something inside him had begun to spread inexorable, like a virus: the doubt that the punishments were excessive and even unjust; the doubt that someone - even if the term was almost disgusting to him - was actually innocent, that is, completely extraneous to the facts and to the charges. Unbeknownst to the defendants, when doubts about their guilt were stronger, he started working for them, trying to get them exonerated or lead them to a lenient sentence.
The trial of William Deveux was, in a way, the coup de grace on his mental balance already so weakened. Many things of that trial did not add up, starting from the tons of accusations put together just for the show, continuing with the evidence presented, weak and circumstantial even for a histrionic prosecutor such as Visser. He had the idea that the story had been inflated to set a sort of precedent, to get a conviction that could serve as a warning to those who wanted to undertake a profitable yet illegal career in buying and selling business secrets. He had certainly seen circumstantial evidence in the past and most of the time he had accepted it willingly because, in his vision, they were necessary pieces to fit in the great mosaic dedicated to the Goddess Justice. That time, however, they had definitely overplayed their hand. Prosecutor Visser had presented a multitude of very fragile clues, allusions referable at least to other twenty or thirty people who had worked at Minneman Company in the same period of the criminal events. The stammering in the courtroom, being caught unprepared – both prosecutor and judge – while facing the basic objections raised by the delegate, all that deepened the suspicion that the Institute had planned to get a quick and unreserved condemnation, trusting in the inaction of the delegate on duty. Alfred DiFraia had not even believed there really was a footage in which the defendant would have been seen fighting a probable fence. In fact, he had not yet submitted a request to examine the aforementioned video, believing that that story was unconvincing right from the start and it would be a waste of time. Learning of privacy violations, computer intrusions, misappropriation of personal data for unknown purpose, had been like being stabbed in the back. William Deveux disappointed him. A lot. He had begun to believe in him. Yes, that misunderstanding at the end of the first day of trial - when William had believed he had to remain in custody indefinitely - made him a little nervous, but all in all it wasn't that serious. And he liked him, by the way. He thought he was a good guy, after all; with his many flaws maybe, but not capable of creating a plot of such magnitude, involving a pharmaceutical giant and unsuspecting citizens. In other times he would have let things go, the case would have been closed and the defendant sentenced, without a shot being fired. But not anymore. He had made a habit of reviewing the file of each defendant before every verdict to see if the arguments were really consistent with the criminal profile. He had never found in re-examined cases elements such as to completely overturn a verdict, at least until then. Most of the time the decision to convict appeared to be correct, but perhaps the sentence was excessive. In some cases, it would have been preferable to even turn a blind eye and not prosecute, but the disrespectful reactions of those accused of crime had rightly required exemplary and inevitable responses.
The Ruling Impulses Page 30
