The Burden of Proof kc-2

by Scott Turow

"That's a planet."

  "Ah," said Stern.

  The boy accepted this failure without complaint. Stern had forgotten that-that it was not rivalry or a showdown that Sam was after, just information. ff it was unavailable here, there would be better sources soon enough.

  "I'm cold."

  "Would you like your jacket?"

  "Can I sit in your lap?"

  "Of course." Stern boosted the boy beneath his arms, and he settled in at once, lolling back against his chest and belly. Dear God, the sensation. He had forgotten. To be able to fold yourself about this life in the making. The small limbs; the waxy odor of;his hair after time in the woods. Stern put both arms about the boy and let Sam nestle against him.

  "Is the sun a star?" asked Sam. "So they say."

  "Are the stars hot?"

  "They must be."

  "Could you drive a jet plane through a star if you went real fast?"

  "I suspect not, Sam. The stars are hot enough to bum up most anything."

  "Anything? Like the whole earth?" Sam now had a troubled look. Stern wondered if he was telling him inore than he should. "What if you poured like jillions and jillions of gallons of water on it?"

  "That undoubtedly would work," said Stern.

  The boy was still watching him. "Are you joking me?"

  "Joking? NO. Is that a joke.9"

  "You're joking me," the boy insisted. He pressed his finger in Stern's belly, as often seemingly had been done to him.

  "Well, perhaps a little."

  Sam turned around and rested again against his chest.

  Was it possible? Stern thought in a swift rush of emotion.

  Was it truly possible? Could he start again and do it better on this go-through? Oh, but this was mad. With the small boy somehow coursing against him, Stern closed his eyes in the great country darkness and wrestled despair.

  How, truly, could this be occurring? He saw more and more clearly how fixed his feelings were, how set he was on a path of absolute lunacy. He could not prevent a brief sound from escaping.

  In a moment, Sam turned back.

  "Can I go in the hot tub? Please," he said. "Please please please."

  "Sam, I know nothing about hot tubs."

  "I do. I'll show you. It's easy." He slithered away and ran down the veranda. "It's full and everything."

  Stern drifted over. The tub protruded about a foot above the level of the porch. Sam had already eased off the canvas cover. The water temperature was moderate, apparently for Sam's benefit. What, after all, was the harm?

  Sam hugged him the instant he agreed and immediately shed his clothes. Fully naked, he dipped in a toe. "Come on," he said.

  "Pardon me?"

  "Come on. Get your clothes off."

  "Thank you, Sam. I do not care to get into the hot tub."

  The boy gaped. "You have to. Sonny says I can't go in without a grownup. I'm only five years old, you know."

  "Yes," said Stern. He stood a moment and stared at the moon, just rising and visible through the fingerlet branches of the trees of the ravine. He had lost control over most everything sometime ago. In the dark, he kicked off his shoes and loosened his belt.

  As life had repeatedly shown him, there was usually something to other people's pleasures. However suspect it seemed, the hot tub was enchanting. Little foggy wisps rose in the moonlight and the ihin evening air was genre as a breath. His large body felt lighter, submerged in the dark.

  Stern sat on a bench inside the tub and Sam crouched beside him to keep his chin above the water's level.

  "When is Sonny gonna get up?"

  "Soon, Sam. She must have been very tired."

  "She's going to have a baby," said Sam. It was the first mention he had made of the subject. "So I understand," said Stern. "Is she sick?"

  "No," said Stern.

  "You said she was sick."

  "No, I said I Wanted to be-sure she was not sick." What would he tell his father of what he observed? Or Sonny, for that matter? For the moment, that concern, like many others, seemed capable' of passing. "Do you go to Sonny's,work?"

  "In a fashion."

  "Sometimes, if someone does something bad, the good people have to tell them they did something bad."

  Stern thought of adding a defense perspective but answered finally,

  "Yes."

  Sam suddenly stood straight up, shining like a fish in the moon's light. He hung his head over the edge of the tub.

  "Uh-oh," Sam said.

  "What?", Stern feared that the tub might be leaking. "No towels."

  Together they groaned in the dark.

  It was Stern who, after a brief disagreement was appointed to return to the cabin. Wearing only his boxer shorts, he saw in the mirror on the back of the bathroom door that his seat was sopping. He could hear Sonny a few feet away, grumbling a bit in her sleep.

  Sam was wrapped and dried and placed in his pajamas. Before going to sleep, he demanded a story. In his backpack was a comic book depicting a protracted battle between two television characters, a blond hulk and a hooded creature who resembled a skeleton. They were dressed in medieval costumes but were located in outer space in the distant future and traded threats. The blond triumphed; that much had not changed.

  The boy lay down, then drew himself up again, full of the familiar curiosity of bedtime.

  "Sandy," he said, "does good always win?"

  "Excuse me."

  "Does good always win?" the boy repeated.

  Stern was not certain if this was apropos of the story or their conversation before. He nearly asked what Sam was referring to but restrained himself with the thought that it was unseemly to be evasive with a five-year-old. Marta used to venture questions like this. Peter did as well, probably, but in his case they were put.solely to his mother. "No," Stern said finally. "Not always."

  "It does on TV," the boy said. This was offered in part as refutation.

  "Well, it should win," said Stern. "That is what the television is showing you."

  "Why doesn't it win?"

  "It does not always lose. It wins often. But it does not win evehe good people have to tell them they did something bad."

  Stern thought of adding a defense perspective but answered finally,

  "Yes."

  Sam suddenly stood straight up, shining like a fish in the moon's light. He hung his head over the edge of the tub.

  "Uh-oh," Sam said.

  "What?", Stern feared that the tub might be leaking. "No towels."

  Together they groaned in the dark.

  It was Stern who, after a brief disagreement was appointed to return to the cabin. Wearing only his boxer shorts, he saw in the mirror on the back of the bathroom door that his seat was sopping. He could hear Sonny a few feet away, grumbling a bit in her sleep.

  Sam was wrapped and dried and placed in his pajamas. Before going to sleep, he demanded a story. In his backpack was a comic book depicting a protracted battle between two television characters, a blond hulk and a hooded creature who resembled a skeleton. They were dressed in medieval costumes but were located in outer space in the distant future and traded threats. The blond triumphed; that much had not changed.

  The boy lay down, then drew himself up again, full of the familiar curiosity of bedtime.

  "Sandy," he said, "does good always win?"

  "Excuse me."

  "Does good always win?" the boy repeated.

  Stern was not certain if this was apropos of the story or their conversation before. He nearly asked what Sam was referring to but restrained himself with the thought that it was unseemly to be evasive with a five-year-old. Marta used to venture questions like this. Peter did as well, probably, but in his case they were put.solely to his mother. "No," Stern said finally. "Not always."

  "It does on TV," the boy said. This was offered in part as refutation.

  "Well, it should win," said Stern. "That is what the television is showing you."

  "Why doesn't it win?"


  "It does not always lose. It wins often. But it does not win every time."

  "Why not?"

  "Sometimes the other side is stronger. Sometimes both sides are good in part." Sometimes neither, Stern thought. In the midst of this, he could not keep himself from thinking of Dixon. He looked at the boy. "Sam, who talks to you about this, about good winning?"

  "It's on TV," said Sam innocently. He had no notion that he had engaged in an abstraction. "How much does good win?" he asked. "A lot?"

  "A lot," said Stern. He had meant to answer, As often as it loses. But he felt this was inappropriate and perhaps not even correct. There was no place for brutal honesty with a child. Everyone felt that. It was taken in the Western countries as a rule of nature. So we raise our children with love and comfort for a future they can only find disappointing. He told Sam it was time to sleep.

  "Thank you for keeping me company, Sam."

  "Sure." He lay down and popped up again. "Wait a second."

  He clambered from the bed, searched his bag, and came back with a small stuffed bear and a yellow piece of blanket.

  Passing by, he kissed Stern as naturally as if he had been doing it forever, and then right before Stern's eyes laid himself down and was instantly asleep.

  A child asleep, a woman asleep, and Mr. Alejandro Stern in sole waking possession of a still home. It had been many years since he had felt this particular'pleasure. He sat at the cable-spool table and ate a bowl of strawberries, listening to Sam's husky breath and, now and then as a distant counterpoint, a sighing sob from SonnY. Oh, he was pretending. He knew that. Nothing was truly hidden from himself. But he was enjoying it far to much to depart. He again wandered outside to the veranda. His wet underwear had begun to chafe, and after some reflection, he retrieved his towel inside, undressed once more, and hung his shorts on the branch of a tree, hoping the breeze would dry them before the long ride home. Then he resumed his place in the hot tub.

  The moon had risen fully and loomed over the ravine, full of tricks and magic. All his troubles waited for him in the city, in the daylight.

  For just this instant, watching the wisps wraith off the water, he was free.

  It was only a few minutes before he heard the screen door bang.

  "There you are." Her voice in the dark came from somewhere behind him.

  He turned in one direction, then the other, and still did not see her.

  "I thought you'd left until

  I saw the car. How long was I asleep?"

  About five hours, he told her.

  "Oh God." Sonny was at the corner of the porch, keeping her distance in an effort to be discreet. "I'm so sorry. What did you do with Sam all that time? Did you feed him?"

  Stern described their activities. "He is a splendid young fellow.

  Bright as a firecracker."

  "His father's son."

  "No doubt."

  "I don't think much of'Rebecca, his mother. But she's done great things with Sam. I don't quite understand it. It seems like you can't predict who the good parents will be: It frightens me."

  "You will fare well, Sonny. I am sure of it." Gradually, she had approached. She was now a few feet from the tub and took the last few steps at once. She stooped a bit and her hand lingered in the dark water.

  "God, it's nice. Sam helped you figure it out?"

  "He was quite insistent on getting in here,"

  "We do everything to encourage him. He doesn't seem to recognize yet that it's the same water that's in the bathtub."

  "It was only after I had finally agreed to let him do this that he informed me that I was required to join him. But I must say, it is most pleasant. After he was in bed, I could not let the opportunity pass.

  Here I am on a Saturday night in the woods. The sky is clear, the moon is full. The solitude is magnificent."

  She inclined her head to look, as Stern'had, at the stars.

  She was quiet a second.

  "Will you die if I come in there?"

  The shock of cold emotion, terror really, went through him like a bolt of iron. He shook his head before he spoke.

  "No, no," he said.

  "Because, look. I mean, people have different attitudes.

  You can just say it's too embarrassing."

  "No, no," Stern said again. He was not sure he was capable of more.

  When she began to slide off her shirt, Stern looked away, studying the tremorous movement of certain dark branches in the wind. But even this effort at discretion was not a full success. In the extended half of the cabin's casement window, he noticed a clear reflection and, turning back, caught, even against his will, just the slightest glimpse of her form, licked in the moon's bluish cast. It was no more than her upper torso as she eased into the bath, the smooth swell of the other life, and the lopsided proportions of her chest, where the fine blue light clung to the smoothness of her scarred left side, the visible ribs looking a bit like piano keys; like all things human, the sight was far more' bearable than he had imagined. She settled in the bath and shook her hair free.

  "Ah, this is great."

  "I feared you had heat stroke."

  "Just tired."

  She reached over and laid her hand very briefly on his forearm. "It was nice out there."

  "Yes."

  "I'm glad we've become friends."

  "As well."

  These things came out of Sonny trippingly; she spoke from the heart as a regular matter. For him, it was all a muddle. He felt, as so often in his life, the importam moment, the one of high emotion, deep feeling, sliding beyond him, not merely beyond control but wholly out of reach.

  He would never stop being himself.

  "Can I tell you a story that will embarrass you?" she asked.

  "If you believe I can stand it."

  "I think you can." She looked off in the darkness. "When I was in law school, I went down to watch you in court. When you were defending Judge sabich. I was there every day. It was like close-up magic. You know-how it doesn't really matter whether the balls are disappearing, because it truly is magic that human skill can make it look that way?

  That's how I felt. I didn't care whether he was guilty or innocent. I just wanted to be able to do what you did. What do you think of that?"

  "I think you are most kind to tell me." She peered over; he could see she did not understand, and he inched somewhat lower in the tub. "I find it difficult, of late, to think of my professional life as an example to anyone. Given its costs. ' ' "Are you talking about your wife?"

  He made a sound.

  "Huh," Sonny said. She was quiet. "Is there something you could have done?"

  "Paid greater attention."

  She did not seem inclined to respond, and he was quickly seized by a fear that she found this morose or, worse, self-pitying. For a second she disappeared, plunging beneath the surface of the water and came up glistening, shedding water and light, bubbling her lips and smoothing her hair. "You know what I think?" she asked.. "What is that?"

  "I think you can only be yourself." She wrong out her hair.

  Was this the thought for the night? Stern wondered. "I tell myself that a thousand times a day. Everybody's screwed up.

  And things happen that screw you up worse. You get cancer.

  Or somebody dies. But you do your best. I would give anything to be a lawyer as good as you are, to think I did something important that well.

  I mean, look at what you've done."

  "I look," he said, "and feel that I could have done better."

  "Then do better next time."

  "With the next life?"

  "With the next part of this one."

  That was, he realized, the only answer, the sole sane response. This, too, seemed to be a repetitive theme.

  "And remember," she said, "that you're an example to people like me."

  "You flatter me."

  "I mean it."

  He looked over to Sonny. She had laid her arm on the back of the tub and he touched
her most briefly, as she had touched him. Then he went on.

  "Apparently, I was not example enough, in as much as you chose the wrong side."

  She drew back, as he expected. "Is this humor?"

  "Of course."

  "Oh." She smiled, shirking off the sense of injury. "I always thought I'd become a defense lawyer. But prosecutors have so much power. To do good things, you know-not just bad"

  "Of course," he said again. "I admire the rectitude for which prosecutors stand."

  "But you wouldn't think-of doing it?"

  "I have thoughts. But my view-purely an idiosyncratic one, I stress-is that I would only be doing further damage to what is already smashed and broken. Understand, I truly believe yours is a job that must be done-but better not by me."

  "Is the story true, then?"

  "What story is that?"

  "That you turned down the offer to be U.S. Attorney before they gave the job to Stan?"

  He waited, reflecting. "Is that worn-oUt rumor circulating again?"

  She knew she was being put off.

  "I'm not asking so I can tell someone else." With all her terrible pride, she was, he saw, somewhat offended. "I have a reason for wanting to know."

  He described his meeting with the senator's aide in a few sentences. "I was never told that I was the first choice. I have no idea who would have been selected, even had I been disposed."

  "You know it would have been you," she said, "and so does Stun.! think that bothers him. A lot," she added.

  Stern privately had long harbored the same view. She was pensive, and then dipped again beneath the water.

  "I'm getting out," she said when she emerged. "The o.b. doesn't like me in here for more than ten minutes."

  Stern turned away to stare at the moon and the darkness.

  "When you're ready," she said behind him, "we can have that talk." He heard her pad off and, after telling himself not to, turned to watch her go, with her bundled clothes clutched to her chest, her hair dripping, the broadened lower proportions of her form still a becoming sight, wet and shining, as she retreated.

  In a minute, he rose. He was on the edge of the tub, in his full naked glory, when Sonny leaned out the window with another towel. "You should see the look on your face," she said, and hung the towel on the window frame. He could hear her laughing inside as she walked away.