The Sabbathday River

by Jean Hanff Korelitz

  “I don’t know,” Naomi said lamely. That was all she could come up with.

  “You thought I had arrested the wrong person for this crime, didn’t you?”

  “Yes,” she said, trying to summon her outrage. “I still—”

  “You thought this good girl, this good employee and good mother and good friend, who would surely tell you, her only friend, if she got herself pregnant again, could never slaughter her children and get rid of their bodies, so that no one would ever know they existed. You thought that, didn’t you? But your track record’s not too strong, is it now, Ms. Roth? Not when it comes to what actually happened. You don’t really know a thing about Heather Pratt, do you?”

  And she wanted to answer, but Judith was screaming, at least in Naomi’s head. In the courtroom Judith’s voice was hard but not loud, and it was the judge shouting at Naomi not to answer, and Charter speaking softly, but somehow audibly over the other sounds, saying that he had nothing more to ask.

  Chapter 31

  Friends like These

  “WHO THE FUCK IS CHRISTOPHER FLYNN?” JUDITH said later, when they stopped for lunch. “Heather says she never heard of him.”

  And you believe her? Naomi almost said. She felt dreadful. She sat with Judith in the diner across from the courthouse, letting her hamburger sag into its greasy bun and taking scalding sips of her tea. “I’ve never heard of him either,” she said instead. He’s nobody I’ve ever met, but I know more women than men in the town. Could be one of the local Lotharios who can’t stand to be left out of the fun,” she said bitterly.”That’s all I can think of, anyway.

  “Do you think it’s possible there was somebody else?” Judith said, her voice so low Naomi had to watch her lips. “You know, somebody else besides Ashley? Maybe just because she felt especially lonely around the time he left her?”

  “I don’t think so,” Naomi said lamely, but she wanted to add that she was evidently the last person to consult on the subject. “Heather says no?”

  “‘Only Ashley, only Ashley,’” Judith intoned, with melodic sarcasm.

  “So what is this, then?”

  Judith took a bite of her sandwich, made a face, and put it down. “I have no idea. Some kind of smoke, obviously. But the kind with fire or without?” She shook her head. “I can’t tell yet.” She sighed. “Anyway, Charter was pretty good.”

  Naomi groaned.

  “No, you did the best you could. And who knew he had it in him?”

  She herself, she told Naomi, had assumed he’d want to get rid of his reluctant witness as quickly as possible; she’d never dreamed he would get as much out of Naomi as he had. That stuff about stealing from the sports center? Heather had said, grudgingly, that she might have taken a towel once or twice. For the car. But the rest … her taking Polly along for her trysts with Ashley and breaking into the mill—that bastard Ashley, Naomi thought; he hadn’t said a thing, just gone ahead and repaired the damage—Naomi didn’t want to know anything more.

  She mustn’t beat herself up, Judith said kindly. Clearly Charter meant to assassinate Heather’s character first and worry about the actual charges later, and after all, they’d been able to salvage something when Judith had her turn. With Judith’s guidance, Naomi had talked again about Heather’s fortitude, her love for Polly, her utter lack of other friends and the constant assault of bad opinion from all sides. She talked about how horrified Heather had been when Naomi visited her house and described the baby in the river—not guilt, not evasion, but horror that someone could do that to a child. Naomi told how she had seen Heather walk out behind her house in the darkness that night, and then what she herself had found behind the house, in the pond, precisely where Heather would later tell her to look: Heather’s own child, her baby, born dead. She told of her interview with Heather after her arrest, and how vehemently the girl had rejected any responsibility for the baby Naomi had found in the Sabbathday River, and how Heather had told her where to find her own baby, the one born dead in the field behind her house, and how Naomi had found it just there.

  And had Naomi herself formed an opinion on Heather’s connection to the baby found in the river? She had, Naomi told the jury. There wasn’t one.

  And the baby in the pond behind Heather’s house? A stillbirth, Naomi said. And judging from Heather’s tears, a mourned one.

  Even so, Naomi felt terrible about the morning. She pulled the pins from her hair and massaged her scalp: bruised. “You have the best hair,” Judith said, watching her. “My sister has hair like yours.”

  “Ashkenazi deluxe,” Naomi said. “One of my housemates in college called it that. Something in the density, not to speak of the waviness factor.”

  “Well,” Judith said, “it was cold out there in Eastern Europe. We had to keep warm somehow.”

  “Evolutionary adaptation?” She smiled, feeling, for the first time, a little lighter.

  “It’s what my mom said about hairy legs. My sister and I were cornering the local Nair market, right? And my mom used to say, ‘In the camps it kept us warm, girls!’”

  Naomi laughed. She stirred her tea. From their booth, she could see Ashley climb the courthouse steps. “Oh no,” she groaned.

  “It’s all right,” Judith told her. “I’m ready for him. By the time I’m finished with darling Ashley, they’ll imagine he slept with everything in town.”

  Naomi pursed her lips. “That’s pretty close to the truth, actually. He had that way.”

  She was looking at her tea. Never in the history of tea had tea been so mesmerizing.

  “Naomi,” Judith said.

  “A beautiful man,” Naomi considered. “Who loves women and doesn’t get insane about them. Isn’t that what every girl needs? A beautiful man who doesn’t get on your case about anything? He arrives. He courts. He compliments. Hey, maybe he fixes the sink. He seduces. He satisfies. And how. Because he really adores this, you understand? It isn’t about getting laid, it’s about pleasure, the more the merrier. And then he leaves. Whew! Out the door before he can say anything awful to make you feel like shit. Now, that’s what I call the perfect man.”

  “Jesus, Naomi.” She was shaking her head. “You might have told me.”

  “Why? What’s the difference? He was promiscuous, not Heather.”

  Judith was looking out the window. Her crooked nose made a Picasso shadow across her cheek.

  “He was always available, you understand. Always. It’s like he wore a sign: ANYTIME YOU WANT, YOU JUST LET ME KNOW. But I was with Daniel, which was fine. Then Ashley came around a lot after Daniel left. I’d hired him for stuff, like the bathroom. And my addition. But sometimes he came on his own. You know: ‘I thought I’d have a look at the roof again. It seemed a little spongy last time.’ Or he’d bring something he’d salvaged from another job, like a window, because he thought the ones Daniel put in were shit, and if I wanted he could just do a quick swap. What can I say?” Naomi sighed, meeting Judith’s eyes now. “There are some times in a woman’s life when she can really use a cad.”

  “Use being the operative word in that sentence,” Judith said dryly.

  “He didn’t suffer.” Naomi picked up and sipped her tea. “Anyway, it was only a few times. And then he stopped.” She pushed her teacup away. “Which was also fine. I was actually interested in somebody. I guess he knew that.”

  “I see.” Judith picked up the check and went to pay it. Naomi pulled on her jacket. Then she wound up her hair and pinned it again. “Are you sorry I told you?” she asked when Judith came back.

  Judith looked surprised. “No. Not at all. I just don’t want to be late back.”

  So they returned to the courthouse, Naomi conscious now of gazes fixed on her and how people stopped saying what they were saying to turn and note her passing. She saw Ann Chase and her husband and withstood their glares, then Stephen Trask, who looked resolutely past her, which was somehow worse. Judith went ahead to see Heather, but Naomi went up to Stephen, right up to him, and
made him look at her.

  “Thanks a lot,” she said.

  “You’re welcome,” said Stephen, falsely bright. “What for?”

  “Oh, take your pick. Telling me all about Heather, for one thing. I looked like an ass up there. You bring her to me with a great big bruise on her face, you don’t even bother to tell me she’s just been in a cat fight with her boyfriend’s wife.”

  “I didn’t think I had to pass on every sordid detail, Naomi. Heather and Sue Deacon … you know, it just didn’t seem like my place.”

  “Fine,” she said. “But that’s between you and me. What about what’s between you and Heather?”

  He started. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, why haven’t you been to see her? Why haven’t you shown her any support? When she saw your name on the prosecution’s witness list, she asked Judith if you hated her now.”

  He was red, his jaw set. “I don’t hate her. I just can’t see her.”

  “Why can’t you?” Naomi said harshly. “Why am I out here alone? You believed in Heather enough to give her a job. You brought her to me and praised her to the skies. You had her over to dinner at your house. Now nothing. And now’s when she needs her friends.”

  Stephen was shaking his head. “I wish I could help her, but I can’t help her now.”

  She put her hands on her hips. “And what’s that supposed to mean. This is all ludicrous, Stephen, and you know it. Twins by two lovers!” Naomi snorted. “Ridiculous. It would be ridiculous even if she’d had two lovers, but you know perfectly well she was madly in love with Ashley. Robert Redford couldn’t have gotten her in bed.”

  Still, he wouldn’t look at her.

  “Look,” she tried one final time. “I don’t know what Charter’s said, and I’m not going to try to find out what your testimony is going to be. But please, Stephen. Just go and see Heather. Just show her you’re still her friend.”

  He looked at her, and for a moment Naomi thought he was about to say something, but then he turned his mouth away, still pursed. “I’m just not able to do that, Naomi.” He nodded, as if reinforcing himself. “That’s it. And I’m sorry.”

  He put out his arm, as if she had stepped in front of him and he had to deflect her. Then he walked past her and past the open door of the courtroom into the hallway beyond. Naomi stared after him, swaying in disbelief.

  Dimly, she saw that they were all passing by, though not without slowing to look. Rubbernecking, Naomi thought vaguely, like what people did on the roadway when there was an accident, except that she was the accident here, or Heather was, really, but Naomi had somehow become the unlucky passenger along for the ride, and no one seemed willing to stop and help them. Charter, sweeping by and through into the courtroom, nodded to her, evenly and without rancor.

  For a moment she could not remember which side she was on.

  Naomi roused herself and went into the courtroom, taking her seat behind Judith.

  Judith was talking with Heather, their shoulders near but not touching.

  “No,” Heather said, too loud. “I said no, I have no idea. It’s all …” Bereft, she shook her head.

  “Fine,” said Judith, her voice chilly.

  The jury was called. Judge Hayes came in and took his seat.

  From where she sat, the witness chair bore scant resemblance to the hot seat of Naomi’s experience earlier that day. Now, watching Stephen Trask smoothly recite his oath, lift his hand from the leatherette Bible, and sit down in the same cracked plastic bucket of the chair, the whole episode of her testimony felt surreal, as if it belonged to some childhood embarrassment she had never successfully eradicated from her self image. Stephen sat calmly enough, his hands flat on the thighs of his crossed legs. He told Charter how he had first met Heather, and how he had employed her, and what kind of employee she had been.

  “Well,” he said carefully, “Heather isn’t really a very outgoing person. I’ve always thought she was shy. And I think working at the reception desk in particular was good for bringing her out of herself a little bit.”

  “So you were concerned for her,” Charter prompted.

  “Well yes, I was. I was hoping she might work for a short time and then find her way back to college. You see”—he turned, perhaps instinctively, to the jury—“she had had a chance to go to a very good college. She’s really a good student. But I think it didn’t work out because she just wasn’t ready for the … the interpersonal challenge of it. Her social skills.” He finished.

  “Her social skills?”

  “Sure. As I said. They were … she wasn’t easy with people.” He looked at Charter, waiting for a nod which didn’t come. “I think she’d been alone a lot. She wasn’t used to dealing with people.”

  “But wouldn’t you say that dealing with people was the primary requirement of the job you hired her for?”

  Stephen agreed that it was.

  “And yet you hired her despite her deficiency in this area.”

  “Yes. Because I thought it would be good for her.”

  “Ah.” Charter nodded. “You were thinking of her even more than you were thinking of the job.”

  “I suppose.” Stephen shrugged. He seemed uncomfortable with the praise.

  “And was your faith in Heather rewarded?”

  “Rewarded?” He considered the word. “Well …”

  “Was she, for example, an honest employee?”

  Stephen, after a moment, shook his head. “No. I’m sorry, but no.”

  “Could you perhaps elaborate on Heather’s dishonesty?”

  “It’s only a small thing, but a few items went missing that I believe she took. Towels,” he said, looking uncomfortable.

  “And Heather would have had access to these towels?”

  “Sure. Yes.” He uncrossed his legs, but didn’t like sitting that way either, and crossed them again.

  “Was there something else?” Charter nudged.

  Stephen straightened. “I considered it dishonest that Heather pursued an extramarital affair with a fellow employee. I considered it dishonest that they used the sports center to meet and plan their trysts. I also considered it dishonest that they should continue their affair even after it became evident that the affair was disruptive to a harmonious work environment at the center.” Having huffed through this speech, he promptly looked uncomfortable again.

  “Disharmonious,” Charter considered, as if for the first time. “In what way did this disharmony show itself.”

  “There were complaints. Other employees came to me. Well, one did. It was uncomfortable.” He stopped. “I was uncomfortable.”

  “Who, in your opinion, Mr. Trask, was Heather’s counterpart in this affair?” He was standing at his chair now, straight but at ease, one hand resting on the seat back.

  “Ashley Deacon. My handyman.”

  “And Ashley was married at the time?”

  “To Susan Deacon, yes.”

  “Did Heather know Ashley was married?”

  Stephen nodded. “Yes. We had a conversation about it. Heather said she didn’t care.”

  A movement made Naomi glance at the jury. One woman was shaking her head.

  “She didn’t care that he was married?”

  “Well,” he amended, “she thought it was really no concern of mine, or anybody else’s either. And I told her I didn’t see it that way. See, I was trying to help.”

  “You were advising her that, in your opinion, she was making a mistake.”

  Stephen sighed audibly. “It was a big mistake for her. I said he was never going to leave his wife, but she didn’t seem to care about that, either. And then she got pregnant. This was back in the fall of ’83. She still kept on with him.”

  “And what was your reaction to the pregnancy, Mr. Trask?” Charter said.

  “Just”—he shook his head—“disappointed. I knew she wouldn’t get back to college if she had a baby. She’d never get anywhere. And Ashley wouldn’t do a thing for her. He was hav
ing a baby with his wife at the same time. Which Heather knew,” he finished bitterly. “It was just a mess.

  Charter let this word linger, and busied himself turning the pages of his legal pad. When he found what he wanted, he walked around the table and across to Stephen.

  “I’d like to talk about something that happened in the Goddard Sports Center, on Friday the fourteenth of June, of that year. This was about six months into Heather’s pregnancy with her daughter Polly. Do you remember a significant event on that date?”

  Stephen nodded grimly. “I do. There was a confrontation between Heather and Sue Deacon. At the reception desk.”

  “A confrontation,” the D.A. said eagerly. “Can you be more specific?”

  “They were going at each other. I went running when I heard the screaming. They were grappling with each other. There was a lot of noise. And blood.”

  “Blood!” Charter sounded shocked. “Your employee was having a physical fight at the reception desk?”

  “Yes,” Stephen said. “People were standing and watching. Nobody seemed to know what to do. And then Ashley got between them and pulled them apart.”

  “So Ashley Deacon himself separated these two women?”

  “That’s right,” he said. “And after that, I really felt Heather should not continue to work at the sports center. I took her to meet Naomi Roth, because I knew Heather was very talented at embroidery. I thought they might be able to work together.”

  Charter nodded, as if in praise of Stephen’s perception. Then he cocked his head. “Mr. Trask, it seems to me that you made every effort to be of help to Heather. But even so, she was not very open with you, was she?”

  “I’d say she wasn’t,” Stephen agreed.

  “Did she, for example, inform you when her relationship with Ashley did finally come to an end in January of the following year, 1985?”

  He shook his head sadly. “No. I found that out from other people. It was pretty common knowledge around town.”

  “Did she tell you that she had again become pregnant at around this same time?”