Salem Falls

by Jodie Picoult

  “If you take muffins from a witness, you’re more likely to believe him.”

  Roy blinked, confounded.

  “Let’s just say I’m on a gluten-free diet,” Matt said with a sigh. “Do you mind if I ask you a few things now?”

  “Go on ahead. I took the whole afternoon off for you.”

  Matt rolled his eyes. “Mr. Peabody, were you inside when you saw Gillian leave?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “And Gillian went around the back of the diner?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was your window open?”

  “No, Addie says it’s a waste of the air-conditioning.”

  “So you didn’t hear who called whom over, then?”

  “No. But I sure noticed she was pissed off when she left.”

  Matt looked at the judge. “I’d like to move to strike that statement.”

  “I wouldn’t,” Judge Justice said. “Mr. Peabody, what led you to believe she was angry?”

  “Her nose was so high in the air I thought she’d trip on the sidewalk. She was walking a mile a minute. Huffing, like she was fit to tie Jack.”

  Jordan grinned from ear to ear. If he won this trial, he’d eat lunch at the Do-Or-Diner every day of his life from now on. And he’d tip Roy, as well as his waitress.

  “Do you know, Mr. Peabody, why she was angry?”

  “Can’t say.”

  “Well, for example, what if he’d made an improper advance toward her? Wouldn’t that have upset her?”

  Roy slanted a look at Jack. “I suppose.”

  “Or if he touched her inappropriately? Might that account for a rapid retreat?”

  The old man hesitated, then said, “Maybe.”

  Matt walked back to the county attorney’s table and picked up his sandwich. He took a huge bite, chewed and swallowed. “Thank you, Mr. Peabody,” he said, smiling. “It’s not every day a defense witness caters to the prosecution, too.”

  Meg knew better than to cast a spell that tried to control another person. If a spell was going to work, it meant that energy and power poured through you into someone else-so a connection had been made between the two of you. Which meant if you sent harm out, eventually you’d be the recipient of it, too.

  Hexing, though, wasn’t the same as using magick to destroy. After all, when they’d cast a spell for old Stuart Hollings, they were trying to get rid of his tumor. A growing cancer had to be dissipated. And a person who repeatedly threatened the safety of others had to be stopped. That was why Meg had to do a binding spell.

  It was the first time she’d ever cast a circle by herself. Meg knelt between the shrubs in her backyard, praying her mother wouldn’t come home early from work. A black candle burned in front of her, and an ashtray she’d dug up from the attic held a stick of incense.

  She was supposed to have a poppet, a wax or cloth doll made to represent the person she wanted to stop from doing harm. But Meg had never been crafty and so had no idea how to go about making a representation of someone. In the end, she’d rummaged through her closet, into the bin of old Barbie and Ken dolls she’d had as a kid. Naked, the doll was obscene, the hair matted. Meg sprinkled it with salt water and whispered the words she’d copied from a grimoire at the Wiccan Read. “Blessed be, you creature made . . . uh, in China . . . and changed by life. You are not plastic, but flesh and blood. You are between the worlds, in all the worlds, so mote it be.”

  She held the doll in her hands and imagined a silver net falling out of the sky. Then she took a length of red ribbon from the pocket of her shorts and wrapped it tight around the doll’s hands, mouth, and groin. Finally, Meg took all the energy that trembled through her nerves, feeding her fear, and she directed it into the doll, until the thin figure jumped out of her palms and fell onto the ground before her. “By Air and Earth, by Water and Fire, so be you bound, as I desire.”

  Meg would not be hurt again. She would not let anyone else be hurt again, either. Lies were only as strong as the suckers who believed them; and figuring that out late, Meg knew, was better than never figuring it out at all. Opening the circle, she took a spade from her mother’s gardening set and buried the doll beneath the roots of a hydrangea bush. On top of this, she set the heaviest rock she had been able to drag over. And when the poppet meant to represent Gillian Duncan was safely underground, Meg patted the mound with satisfaction.

  In the middle of Matt’s cross of Roy Peabody, the bailiff walked up to Jordan and handed him a note. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he muttered, balling it up in his hand. He waited until the prosecutor had finished and then asked to approach the bench.

  “Your Honor, could we take a ten-minute recess?” he asked.

  “You’ve had plenty of time to confer with your client,” Matt began.

  “I’m not going to talk to my client. If it makes you happy, you sit here and baby-sit him.” Jordan turned to the judge. “This is a personal matter, ma’am.”

  She nodded and granted Jordan the time. He hurried back to the defense table, motioned to Selena, and strode out of the courtroom.

  Thomas was waiting for him there. “This’d better be good,” Jordan said.

  “I think it is.” He held out his hand, presenting a notebook. “This came in the mail for you.”

  Jordan stared daggers at his son. “And you felt the profound need to bring it to me in the middle of a trial?”

  “Book of Shadows,” Selena read, taking it from Thomas. “I saw these at the Wiccan Read, when I was there.”

  “If Starshine felt the need to send a gift, I could have used a goodluck charm.”

  “I don’t think Starshine sent it, Jordan,” Selena said quietly, pulling the silver ribbon that Thomas had used as a bookmark out in a long spool.

  Jordan fingered the ribbon. Then he took the book from Thomas’s hand and flipped through it, skimming. The last page with writing on it held his attention for a long time.

  It was little-known fact, but witnesses were allowed to use anything-anything at all-to refresh their recollection.

  Engrossed, Jordan did not take his eyes from the final entry. He touched the page with reverence. “Where did it come from?”

  Thomas thought for a moment before he answered. “A good witch,” he said.

  Sitting on the witness stand, Jack looked warily at the enemy.

  His lawyer.

  At first, Jordan had not wanted Jack to testify, believing that he usually did a better job of speaking for his clients. But his defense so far consisted of a witch, a pair of toxicologists, a shrink, and Roy-it sounded more like the punch line to a joke than a legal rebuttal. Jack was well spoken, clean-cut, educated-even if he had nothing to counter Gillian Duncan’s story, he would look good sitting on the stand.

  It was no small measure of irony that the last person in the world Jack would ever trust was the only one who could help him now. As he sat on the stand and watched Jordan’s antics-his hand motions, his calculated frowns at the jury-Jack thought, They are all alike. Liars, the lot of them. And just as he’d been screwed once before by a lawyer, Jack believed he’d be screwed again.

  Don’t act defensive or angry or they’ll think you capable of violence, Jordan had said moments ago. Just follow my lead. This is what I do for a living. But that was impossible for Jack to do. It was as if Jordan stood at the bottom of a cliff urging Jack to jump, trusting the promise he’d catch him . . . yet Jack was still beaten and bruised from his last fall.

  Jordan leaned close, so that only Jack could see his anger. “Pay attention, dammit,” he hissed. “I can’t do this without you.” Then a pleasant expression whitewashed his features, and he said, “What happened next?”

  He was back there for a moment, their laughter sparkling over his head like stars, close enough to catch. “I was on the edge of a clearing in the woods,” Jack said slowly, “and when I looked up, there were a group of girls standing there. Naked.”

  That single word stilled the court. “Wait a
second.” Jordan shook his head. “You’re telling us you stumbled upon a bunch of naked girls?”

  “I know. That’s exactly what I thought, too. That I’d had so much to drink I was hallucinating.”

  “I can imagine. What else do you remember?”

  Jack shook his head. “It looked . . . well, like nothing I’d ever seen. There were candles. And ribbons, hanging from the trees.”

  Jordan crossed to the evidence table and lifted one. “Ribbons like these?”

  “Yes. But longer.”

  “Can you recall anything else?”

  Jack closed his eyes, struggling. “Only bits and pieces. Like I’ll close my eyes and see the bonfire. Or I’ll wake up in the morning and there’s a sweetness on my tongue, a taste I can place from that night.” He shook his head, frustrated. “But there’s so much of it that’s just empty space, and the things that do come to me make no sense.”

  Jordan began to walk toward his client. “Do you remember any particular items laying around that night?”

  “Objection,” Matt called lazily. “If the witness is drawing a blank, Mr. McAfee isn’t allowed to fill in the picture with his own crayon.”

  “Sustained.”

  Undeterred, Jordan caught Jack’s eye. “Is it annoying to be unable to remember what happened that night?”

  “You have no idea.” Jack reached deep for the words. “I know I didn’t do what they say. I just know it. But I can’t see it clearly.”

  “What do you think it would take to jog your memory?”

  “I don’t know,” Jack admitted. “God knows I’ve tried everything.”

  “Me, I have to hold some souvenir in my hands, and boom, I’m back there.” Jordan grinned. “I have a foul ball I caught during game seven of the 1986 American League championships, the one when Henderson hit a three-run blast off Donnie Moore of the California Angels. Every time I pick it up, I think of the Sox pulling ahead from behind and making it into the World Series.”

  “Once again, Your Honor, objection. As much as I love getting Mr. McAfee’s life history, it’s beside the point.”

  “But Judge, it’s not. I’d like to enter into evidence this notebook and let the witness use it to refresh his recollection.” Reaching behind the defense table, Jordan took the black-and-white composition book from Selena, then brought it toward the evidence table.

  “Approach!” Matt yelled, coming to his feet.

  “All right, Mr. McAfee, what’s up your sleeve now?” Judge Justice asked.

  “Your Honor, the rules of evidence say I can refresh my witness’s memory with any document at my disposal. This is a book of shadows-a witches’ log, if you will, that documents the Pagan ritual that took place the night of the alleged crime.”

  Judge Justice turned it over in her hands, flipping through it, then handed it to Matt to examine. “This is inappropriate, Your Honor,” Matt insisted. “The witness didn’t write a single page of this book . . . he has no original knowledge of what’s in it. His memory isn’t going to be refreshed by reading it-it’s going to be created new.” He narrowed his eyes at Jordan. “Mr. McAfee is finding a way to put words into his client’s mouth.”

  “Even if the witness was not a party to its creation, Mr. Houlihan, the defense is welcome to use this item to spark a memory.” The judge turned to Jordan. “I myself saved a souvenir cup from the 1975 World Series, game six, when Carlton Fisk’s fly stayed inside the foul line by inches, and as long as I have that godawful plastic mug, I’ll never forget the magic of that moment. Objection overruled.”

  As soon as Jordan handed the composition notebook to his client, Jack’s hand began to shake. “That night,” he murmured. “She was writing in this, under the dogwood tree.”

  “And then?”

  “She stood up,” Jack said slowly. “She stood up, and she said my name.”

  A more sober man would have turned and walked away, but Jack could not hold that thought in his mind. It was too full with other things-ribbons hanging where they did not belong; a knife set perpendicular to a white candle; the scent of cinnamon; the simple fact that she was asking for him. “You’re just in time,” Gillian said. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

  Clearly, he was asleep and this was a dream. A bad dream. The car follow ing him, his run-in with Wes, and now, these half-dressed girls. Yes, it all made sense now. This was a trick of the mind. He felt safer now, knowing it was not real.

  When Gillian took Jack’s hand, his entire body jerked. “Oh,” she said sooth ingly, running her fingers through his hair. “Poor Jack.” She touched the cuts on his brow and cheek, then lifted her discarded shirt and dabbed at the blood.

  Her beautiful breasts were an inch from his mouth, and they looked as real as anything he’d ever seen. From the far corners of his mind, Jack began to struggle. “I can’t . . . I need to . . .”

  “Stay here.”

  Gillian finished for him. She smiled at her friends. “What’s the one thing we haven’t done tonight?”

  The short, plump girl’s mouth rounded. “You wouldn’t, Gilly.”

  Jack could suddenly see the scene as if from a great height. This girl, his hand in hers, the ribbons fluttering behind them. You cannot be here, he warned himself, because . . . but he could not finish the sentence. He willed his feet to move, but he was too drunk. Get away, he thought, and did not realize he’d spoken aloud until Gillian turned to him. “Don’t you like us?”

  “I have to go,” he said, his voice breaking.

  “But you’ll help me first, won’t you? I need a man for this.”

  Jack made himself a deal: He would reach something up high or open a pickle jar and then he’d be on his way. But to his surprise, Gillian laced his fingers with hers and tugged him toward the fire. She began to run, until he had no choice but to do what she did, to leap it.

  They fell to the ground. Gillian’s face was flushed. “Now you’re tied to me, for a year.”

  Jack didn’t understand, but then he didn’t understand much of anything. The forest was spinning around him. He watched the girls pour drinks from a thermos, pass out biscuits. “For you,” Gillian said, and maybe he would have even drunk it if one of the other girls hadn’t lost her balance and fallen on top of him.

  “Steady.” He looked at her-Meg, that was her name, and she was related to a detective in town-but in that moment, she might well have been Catherine Marsh. That was how pure the need was in her eyes. Jack’s heart began to pound, and he turned to the other girl, the taller one, and to Gillian-and they all looked that way. They all wore that expression. That want, that incredible one- sided want that had nearly ruined him before.

  Jack staggered upright and crashed through the woods, finding the path he had come in on. He stumbled forward for nearly a minute, and then Gillian came running up from behind. She was near tears, her hair wild around her face. “The fire-we can’t get it out. We’re going to burn the whole forest down. Please,” she begged. “You have to come.”

  He followed her to the clearing, where there was no fire . . . and no one else. Before he could ask her what was going on, she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her mouth to his. He choked on the whole of her; he backed up along the edge of the glowing fire, unsure which was the greater danger. Gillian writhed against him, aiming to slip under his skin. And then she took his hand and brought it up to her breast, holding his gaze the whole time, so that he knew this was an offering.

  “No,” Jack whispered. “No.” He put his hands on Gillian’s forearms and set her away, fireflies sparking around their bodies. “I said no,” he answered more firmly. No. The pine needles quivered, the stars slipped from their perches, history looped back on itself. This was not Gillian Duncan; this was Catherine Marsh. And Jack was being given the chance to defend himself, in a way h never had last year. “You get away from me,” he said, his chest heaving, “and you stay away.”

  But Gillian Duncan, who had always gotten what she wanted and then
some, grabbed at him. “I cast a spell,” she insisted. “You came to me.”

  “You came to me,” Jack corrected. “And I’m leaving.” With a shove, he sent Gillian sprawling, and he ran down the path so far and so fast that for the first time in months, he managed to outstrip his past.

  “Jack,” Jordan asked. “Did you rape Gillian Duncan on the night of April thirtieth?”

  “No.”

  “How did your skin get under her fingernails?”

  “She was trying to keep me there, when I kept trying to get away. Her hands kept grabbing at me. And when she . . . kissed me, she had her fingers raking into my scalp.”

  “How did you get the scratch on your face?”

  “From a branch, when I was running. I had it before I ever saw her that night.”

  “How did your blood get on her clothes?”

  “She used her shirt to dab at my cheek.”

  Jordan crossed his arms. “Do you have any idea how difficult it’s going to be for these twelve people to believe your story?”

  “Yes.” His eyes swept the jury members, compelling them to listen. “I could lie to you and tell you a version of that night that’s easier to digest . . . like that we were getting intimate and then she changed her mind at the last minute . . . but that isn’t what happened. The truth is just like I told it. The truth is I didn’t rape her.”

  “Then why would Gillian make up a story like this?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t really know her at all, in spite of what she’s said. But if I were seventeen and I was discovered in the woods doing something I didn’t want my father to know about . . . I guess I’d spin a different story, too. And if I were really smart, I’d dream up a tale that would ruin the credibility of the person who’d intruded . . . so that no one would believe him, even if he told the truth.”

  Jack met his attorney’s eyes. That, Jordan communicated silently, is the best we can do. “Your witness,” he said, and offered Jack up for sacrifice.

  * * *

  It was all Matt could do to not laugh out loud. That had to have been the absolute worst defense he’d ever heard in his life, and he truly believed he could get up and speak Swahili and still manage to win this case. “Ribbons, candles, naked girls . . . are you sure, Mr. St. Bride, that you didn’t leave out any pink elephants?”