Keller moves in closer, the predator creeping toward his prey. “About twenty years?” He nods, as if calculating, counting on invisible fingers. He turns and looks at Jeremy. “How old is your son, Ms. Long?”
Jeremy doesn’t flinch.
Keller wheels back around to Rita. “Ms. Long, how old is your son?”
Rita stares at the ceiling, then spits it out: “Almost nineteen.”
Keller’s lip curls up—a grin? a snarl? “Were you pregnant when you left Grain and dropped out of school?”
Rita turns to the judge. “He can’t ask me that, can he?”
The judge looks like she feels sorry for Rita.
Raymond’s slow on the draw, but he jumps up. “Objection!”
Keller smiles at the judge. “Goes to motive, Your Honor.”
Does it? Does it go to motive?
I lean way forward so I can see Jeremy’s face more clearly. He’s staring at Rita. His eyes are still and deep. He knows. I can see that. Jeremy knows exactly what’s coming.
“Overruled,” says the judge. “Please answer the question.”
“I was pregnant,” Rita says softly, not looking at Keller.
“Was the child Jay Jay’s?” Keller asks. “Is Jeremy the son of John Johnson?”
The courtroom goes crazy. Everybody’s talking at once. The judge bangs her gavel and threatens to clear the courtroom if we don’t shut up.
“Do you need me to repeat the question?” Keller shouts. “You’re under oath, ma’am.”
“I know that!” Rita snaps. “And I don’t see what any of this has to do with anything. Yes! Jay Jay was Jeremy’s father. Okay? Is that what you wanted? But Jeremy didn’t know it.”
I haven’t taken my eyes off my brother. Rita is wrong. He did know. I can read my brother better than anyone on earth. Jeremy knew that John Johnson was his father. I don’t know how or when he discovered it, but I can see the truth in his eyes. There’s not a hint of surprise on his face.
Why didn’t he tell me, write me a long note in his delicate calligraphy? I thought Jeremy told me everything. How could he have kept this enormous secret from me? I will myself to quit staring at my brother. When I look back to Rita, she’s wringing her hands in a way I’ve never seen her do before. I hate her for keeping this secret, but I almost feel sorry for her too.
Keller isn’t finished. “Are you positive John Johnson was Jeremy’s father?”
Rita acts insulted. “I told you! I didn’t sleep around in high school. I think I ought to know who the father of my baby was.”
How many times have I asked her about Jer’s father? I try to picture the two of them together, Rita and Jay Jay. But I can’t. He was quiet, patient, good-natured. I don’t think I ever saw him say more than a couple of words to Rita. She never talked about him. On the other hand, I have a dozen memories of Jeremy and Coach together. Jeremy and his father: in the barn, at the ballpark, with the horses.
I try to listen to what else Keller will make Rita say.
KELLER: Did you and Jay Jay pick up where you left off when you returned to Grain?
RITA: No!
KELLER: But he gave Jeremy a job, didn’t he? And he took the boy under his wing, let him help out at ball games. Weren’t the two of you having an affair?
RITA: We were not having an affair!
KELLER: But Mr. Johnson gave you money. Isn’t that right?
RITA: So what? He should have been giving me child support all those years. It was the least he could do to try to make up for that.
KELLER: How much was he paying you?
RITA: Oh, he was real generous at first. Helped us with the security deposit on that little house we rent. And he helped with rent.
KELLER: At first? You said he was generous at first? When was that?
RITA: When I first told him Jeremy was his son.
KELLER: And when was that?
RITA: Right after we moved here. So about three years ago.
KELLER: Not before then?
RITA: That’s what I said. I’d started a new life for myself, and it didn’t include a husband and father. I didn’t need him trailing after me. No way I was going to get stuck in this town my whole life.
KELLER: But things changed when you moved back and told him Jeremy was his son? He paid you money, helped with the bills … at first?
RITA: Yeah. Then he stopped, refused to pay me a penny.
KELLER: When did he stop giving you money?
RITA: Last spring.
KELLER: Why did he quit paying?
RITA: He said he didn’t have it. He said he had hospital bills and responsibilities. What did he think we were? We were his responsibilities too.
KELLER: Is that what Jeremy thought?
RITA: Jeremy? He never knew about Jay Jay or the money.
KELLER: I find that hard to believe. Didn’t Jay Jay want to tell Jeremy he was his father?
RITA: Huh-uh. He was the one who didn’t want Jeremy to know. I didn’t care either way.
KELLER: Why? Why would John, Jay Jay, want to keep Jeremy a secret?
RITA: Because of his wife having the cancer and all. She couldn’t have children, he said. He didn’t want her to know that he already had one.
KELLER: But you told Jeremy anyway, didn’t you?
RITA: No! I didn’t tell him nothing. Jeremy didn’t know.
KELLER: Ms. Long, when was the last time you saw John Johnson alive?
It seems like a full minute of silence passes. I think the courtroom is holding its breath.
KELLER: Your Honor, will you please instruct the witness to answer the question?
JUDGE: Mrs. Long, please answer the question.
RITA: I don’t remember.
KELLER: I’ll ask you again. If you lie, you’ll be subject to a charge of perjury. Do you understand? One more time. When was the last time you saw the deceased?
RITA: That morning. The morning of the murder. I stopped by the stable.
I cannot breathe. Rita didn’t say anything to me about seeing Coach then or any other time. “What time was this?” Keller presses.
“Just after seven,” Rita mumbles.
“Please speak up,” Keller asks, but there’s no politeness in his voice. “What time was it, and how do you remember the time?”
Rita squeezes her lips together so hard it looks like she doesn’t have teeth. “It was seven-oh-seven, and I know because they said so on the radio right before I shut off the engine, okay? Station seventy-point-seven at seven-oh-seven. AM radio in the AM.”
“Where exactly did you find Mr. Johnson that morning?” Keller asks. I get the feeling that he knows the answer to every question before Rita opens her mouth.
“I told you. In … the barn.” Rita cocks her head at him, then looks down.
“Was Jeremy with you?” Keller asks.
“No!” Rita snaps. “I was going home from Bob’s, but I decided to stop by the barn and talk to Jay Jay face to face about the money he owed me.”
“So you argued?” Keller asks.
Rita squirms in her seat. “He owed me child support. I had that coming. I just wanted what was rightly mine. He had no right to stop paying. Jeremy was his son, his flesh and blood! And we needed the money. I could have asked twice what I did. But I didn’t.”
“I understand,” Keller says, like he’s suddenly on Rita’s side. “You and Jeremy deserved that money, and he was cutting you off.”
“Exactly!” Rita sits up straighter.
“When you told Jay Jay that you and Jeremy deserved that money, were you loud?” Keller asks.
“Yeah. You ever argue without being loud?” Rita challenges.
“Precisely where did this argument take place?” Keller asks.
“Near one of the back stalls. I had heels on, and I remember that I had to watch where I was stepping and walk way to the back because Jay Jay wouldn’t come up front and talk.”
“So if someone had been in the stable, for example, the
y would have heard you?” Keller asks.
“They’d have heard us. But nobody was there,” Rita says.
“You’re wrong about that.” Keller turns and points at Jeremy. “Your son was there.”
Rita gasps. She shakes her head. “No. That can’t be. He never … He didn’t …”
Raymond jumps to his feet and objects all over the place. He yells phrases like “facts out of evidence” and “move for a mistrial” and other things I can’t hear because everybody is shouting. I don’t have any idea how Keller knows what he does about Jeremy finding out Coach was his dad that morning, but I recognize truth when I hear it. And that’s truth. Jeremy knew. He didn’t know before that morning, so he must have heard Rita screaming it. That’s why he doesn’t want to see me, why he won’t write to me. He couldn’t keep that secret if he did.
The judge is angrier than I’ve ever seen her. She pounds her gavel and orders the courtroom cleared.
I watch Rita staring at Jeremy. Tears stream down her face. Mascara streaks her cheeks like tribal paint. Over and over again, she mutters, “I’m sorry, Jeremy. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I just didn’t know.”
Chase and I are ushered out of the courtroom like everybody else. The second we’re outside, I dash around the corner and hurl. I vomit again and again until nothing else is in me.
Rita, how could you?
I don’t know what will happen in the courtroom, or what it will mean. But I do know this for sure. My mother has just given the jury the one thing they didn’t have—motive.
34
Chase drives me around and tries to talk me down, but I’m too angry. It’s all so unbelievable, even for Rita. “All that time,” I say, to myself as much as to Chase, “she knew who Jeremy’s father was, and she didn’t tell him? I don’t care if Coach wanted Jeremy to know or not. Jeremy wanted to know! Didn’t that count for anything?”
“You really didn’t have any idea, did you?” Chase says. Mostly, he’s let me rant and has just been circling Grain while I blow off steam.
I glare at him. “Are you kidding? There’s no way I would have kept it secret if I’d known.”
“Maybe your mother was trying to do what she thought was best for Jeremy.”
“Rita?” I let out a one-note laugh that has no laughter in it. “She did what she thought was best for Rita. It’s what she always does.” I think about those pictures of Jeremy in Coach’s desk, Jer’s special color wheels pinned up on the wall in his office. “They might have had a relationship, Chase. A shot at a father-and-son relationship, if Rita had told Jeremy the truth.”
Chase sighs. “I don’t know. Father-son relationships are overrated, if you ask me.”
“You don’t mean that. I’ve missed my father my whole life, and I never got to know him in the first place.”
He reaches across the seat and puts his hand on the back of my neck. “Ready to go home?”
Rita is waiting for me when I walk in. “Don’t start, Hope,” she warns the minute I close the door.
I stare at her. Her hair is a mess. She’s in that same white slip. And she’s drinking, not bothering with a glass. She tilts her head back and gulps. I watch the whiskey travel down her throat, making waves in her neck.
“How could you do that to Jeremy?” My voice is quiet, but I’m screaming inside.
She shakes her head, coughs, then chokes out her answer. “I didn’t do nothing to that boy.”
“True enough,” I admit. “You didn’t tell him he had a great father, who really cared about him.”
“Jay Jay didn’t want the kid to know!” Rita screams.
“Since when do you care what anyone else wants?” The anger is bubbling up now. “You didn’t tell Jeremy because you were afraid Coach would stop giving you money. Was he paying to keep you quiet? That’s blackmail, Rita.”
“That’s not the way it was.” She sprawls on the couch, the bottle cradled between her knees. “He didn’t want his wife to find out.”
“So you took advantage of that. You made him pay you to keep your mouth shut.” I can see on her face that I’m right.
“You don’t understand,” she moans.
“And when Jay Jay stopped paying, why didn’t you tell Jer then? He would have been so happy, Rita. Now he won’t ever have that, the feeling that he has a father who loves him. You should have told him.”
“Jeremy was all right. He was already spending lots of time with Jay Jay. I thought I could change Jay Jay’s mind. I thought I could get him to start paying up again.” She shoves her hair out of her face and takes another drink.
“That’s what you were doing the day he was murdered? Trying to get more money out of him? What happened, Rita? What really happened that morning?”
“Get away from me.” She says this because I’ve slipped in front of her, eased onto the coffee table so we’re face to face.
“Tell me the truth. Did you lose your temper?” I’ve seen Rita lose her temper. I’ve felt her temper. “You did, didn’t you?” I can see it in my mind—Rita exploding in front of Coach, grabbing the bat, swinging it. “You killed him. And you’re letting Jeremy take the blame.” Pieces fall together when I say this. “Is that why you didn’t tell anybody, even Raymond, that you went to the stable that morning? That you talked to Coach? That you—?”
“Shut up! I didn’t—!”
But it’s making sense now. “Jeremy saw you. He saw you kill Coach. And he’s trying to protect you! He’s covering up for you! That’s why he wouldn’t see me. He knows I’d get the truth out of him.”
“You’re as crazy as he is.” Rita shoves me, but I won’t give an inch. “Why would I kill Jay Jay?”
“How should I know why you do anything? Maybe you couldn’t stand Jeremy having another parent, a good parent, in his life. Maybe you killed him for that.”
“Don’t be a fool.” She takes another swig, a big one this time.
“You couldn’t stand for Jeremy to have a real parent, someone who was kind to him. Was it like that with my father, Rita? Were you glad when my father got killed too?” Those dreamlike images of my father shoot through my brain, too fast for me to tell whether they’re real or imagined. “Two fathers, two sudden deaths. Quite a coincidence … Or was it? Was it, Rita?”
She shrugs. “You’re talking crazy.”
“Rita, did you kill my father too?”
Rita raises her arm and aims the back of her hand toward me. I brace myself for a slap, but I don’t budge. She lowers her arm. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I remember.”
“You were three years old. You don’t remember nothing.”
“He was wearing a baseball cap. A red cap. And it was sunny.”
That makes her look up at me. “How did you …?”
“Tell me what really happened.”
“He was run over by a truck. How many times do I have to tell you?”
This is what she’s told me every time I’ve asked. But it’s not good enough now. I’m standing up to her. I want answers, real answers. “Why? How did it happen? Why would he be in the street? Did he run out in front of the truck?” I pause because the image is there. My father. Me. And Rita. Rita, her arms outstretched. Then I say it, what I think I’ve wanted to ask her my whole life. “Did you push him?”
Again, I think she’s going to hit me, but I don’t care. I don’t flinch, or duck, or scoot back to break the impact. “Did you kill him? Did you push my father in front of that truck because you were tired of him? Because he wouldn’t pay you anymore? Rita! Did you kill him too?”
“You crazy little—!” Her teeth are clenched. Her eyes are watering. She stands up, weaving from side to side. Then she leans forward and gets in my face. I smell her stale breath, the liquor like vomit in her mouth. “If anybody killed your father, it was you.”
I start to yell back at her, but I stop. I remember something—an image in black and white. They’re never in black and white. It
’s blurry too. I think it must be cloudy, but then the day clears, and it’s sunny. I can see a tall, thin man in a baseball cap. The red cap is the only color in the scene. I’m looking up at him, and he seems like the tallest person in the world—in my world, at least. I walk away, laughing. The ground is dry and lumpy, and it’s hard to walk without tripping. The picture is joined by other images, one after the other, fast, like animation, a jagged film. A shaggy puppy dances around my feet, then dashes ahead of me. I laugh and run after it. There’s a curb, and I spread my arms to step down from the grass to the pavement. Cars are parked there, but I follow the puppy and go between them. Someone’s yelling at me from behind. It’s a game, so I keep going, chasing Puppy. I hear footsteps behind me and more shouts from Daddy, who lets me call him Daddy and wants Jeremy to do the same. I hear thunder from the street and screeching that makes me stop so I can cover my ears. The next thing I know, I am lifted off the ground, as if an angel has flown by and picked me up. Only instead of carrying me, the angel tosses me like a football. I land hard, and it hurts. I cry and scream because I’m scared now. People run at me, past me, into the street. The truck driver stumbles out of his cab. I see his face, looking like he’s just seen that angel and doesn’t know what to make of it. “I tried to stop! I tried to stop!” He says this over and over. And Rita is screaming, and I want her to quit, but she won’t. She keeps screaming and screaming and never stops.
I gasp for air. I’m sitting in the living room, staring at the empty couch. I am light-headed, and I think I’m going to be sick again.
Rita is right. I caused my father’s death.
What’s wrong with us? Are we all killers? Murderers? Is Rita? Is Jeremy?
Am I?
35
After the weekend, the prosecution takes two days to sum up its case and for Keller to give his closing argument. Chase and I sit through all the explanations. Keller brings in his whole team and puts on a grand finale. A short, chubby lab guy uses four-color art to reexplain diagrams of the blood evidence found at the scene and on the bat, in spite of whatever Jer did to wash it off. A gorgeous assistant prosecutor, with long black hair and a body that three of the jurors can’t stop staring at, sets up a miniature stable, complete with horses and a baseball bat, just to show the jury who stood where and what the prosecution has been claiming all along took place, that Jeremy Long willfully bludgeoned to death his father, John Johnson.
The Silence of Murder Page 22
