Degree of Guilt

by Unknown

  Terri turned to her, startled. Rappaport looked quite composed, except that she did not notice Terri at all; quite suddenly, Melissa Rappaport seemed to be in a room by herself.

  ‘Whatever Laura Chase did,’ she murmured, ‘he wanted me to do. I was never real to him. And neither, in the deepest sense, was Laura herself. Dead or living, we were both about his needs and fears. We couldn’t be ourselves.’

  Slowly, Caroline Masters nodded. But Rappaport did not seem to see her, and no one wished to speak.

  Quietly, Terri said, ‘I think you can see the relevance, Your Honor. Except for the issue of consent, the use of the Laura Chase film in a fantasy rape bears striking similarity to the role of Laura’s tape in Ransom’s attempted rape of Ms Carelli.’

  Caroline turned to her, as if grateful to be refocused on the law. ‘I understand the parallel, Teresa. As we agreed, I’m reserving judgment until you’ve called your other witness.’

  ‘Then I’ll reserve my argument,’ Sharpe said. ‘But with the court’s permission, I’d like to ask Ms Rappaport one or two questions.’

  Masters looked at Rappaport; she sat with her hands folded, unusually still. Masters turned to Sharpe again. ‘All right.’

  Nodding, Sharpe faced Rappaport. ‘When you were discussing bondage, you mentioned that your husband “lost interest.” Could you explain what you meant by that?’

  Rappaport watched her. ‘What I meant by that,’ she said, ‘was that it – I – no longer excited him.’

  ‘By excited . . .’

  Rappaport lit a cigarette. ‘By excited,’ she said coolly, ‘I mean to convey the opposite of flaccid.’

  Sharpe gazed at her. ‘In other words, he no longer achieved erections.’

  Surprised, Terri remembered with embarrassment that Paget had raised the question after Terri first saw Rappaport, and that she still did not know the answer.

  ‘Yes,’ Rappaport said finally. ‘Once or twice.’

  ‘And it was after these failures that Mr Ransom contrived the pretended rape.’

  Where, Terri wondered, was Marnie going with this.

  ‘Yes,’ Rappaport answered. ‘It was.’

  ‘You also mentioned that after bondage, he could hardly look at you. Did you associate this with guilt?’

  ‘I don’t know. Perhaps it was just embarrassment at what he seemed to need.’ Rappaport looked away. ‘Or at what I was willing to do.’

  Caroline, Terri saw, was looking at Rappaport with an air of concern. But in comparison to the woman Terri had met in New York, Rappaport seemed less highly charged, as if by acknowledging what had happened, she had started drawing out the poison.

  ‘After he simulated rape,’ Sharpe was asking, ‘did Mr Ransom also have trouble looking at you?’

  ‘Sometimes. Yes.’

  Sharpe paused reflectively. ‘You already indicated that the “rape motif had played itself out.” Did that involve a similar loss of interest?’

  Facing her, Rappaport seemed stronger. ‘It involved a decline in frequency, if that’s what you mean.’

  ‘It’s partly what I mean. But did it also involve impotence?’

  It startled Terri. ‘Did Ms Rappaport mention impotence? I certainly don’t recall that.’

  ‘Mark wasn’t impotent,’ Rappaport interjected. ‘The time before the Laura Chase incident, he couldn’t achieve erection.’ Her voice became bitter. ‘But that was obviously due to the limits of my appeal. With Laura Chase to help us, Mark was every inch the man he wished to be.’

  Sharpe shrugged, as if wishing to spare Rappaport further embarrassment. ‘Thank you, Ms Rappaport.’

  Terri turned on the night-light, kissed the top of Elena’s head. ‘Good night, sweetheart. I love you.’

  ‘Forever?’

  ‘Forever,’ Terri answered firmly. It was a formula they had started; newly frightened by the concept of time, Elena had extracted a promise from Terri never to get old or die. It would not do to tell Elena that, tonight, Terri felt as old as her own mother.

  She walked into the living room. ‘Long day,’ she said to Richie. ‘And another one tomorrow.’

  He sat at the coffee table, with index cards spread in front of him, coding them in red pen for input into his computer. Terri did not ask what plans this might involve; she had an almost superstitious fear of knowing, and Lindsay Caldwell was too much on her mind.

  ‘Did you have time to put through that loan?’ he asked.

  Terri considered lying, to give herself the peace she needed. But she could not bring herself to do it. ‘I haven’t signed the note yet.’

  His head snapped up. ‘Why not?’

  ‘I still don’t feel quite right about it.’

  ‘Damn it, I need that money for Lawsearch. You know that.’

  Terri felt the familiar weariness that seized her every time Richie wanted something. ‘And borrowing will gut my pension plan and tighten our cash flow. We’re already mazed out on our credit cards and paying consumer interest without any end in sight.’

  He stood. ‘Look, Ter, this deal will pull us out.’

  ‘Then you should be able to find one more investor. Besides me.’

  His long appraising look ended in a distrustful half smile. ‘You envy me, don’t you? You have to work for someone, and I have my own life.’

  Terri wondered yet again at how Richie could always change the subject, find some hidden and petty motive for her objections to his plans. ‘I don’t work for someone, Richie. I work for you.’

  Richie shook his head. ‘We work for each other. Right now we can get by on what you make, and invest in the future.’ He paused, adding pointedly, ‘Besides, having me home is good for Elena. Don’t leave her out of the family equation.’

  ‘I never do. But during your “workday,” Elena’s in day care. Which is another cost in our financial equation.’

  ‘Not during the summer. I figured out the other day that between June and September I saved us nearly two thousand dollars by working at home. Besides, she goes to public school this fall.’

  Terri moved to the couch and sat. ‘I’d like to look for another place,’ she said. ‘Somewhere near where we can afford to buy someday, and which has a public school we like. That way, Elena won’t have to change schools.’

  Richie stared down at her. ‘We’ve got better ways to spend our money than moving, and the schools here are fine.’ His voice became accusatory. ‘I’m not going to do something with my daughter just because Chris Paget found some special school for his son and then fills your head with how great it all is while the waiter pours expensive wine. I’ll be damned glad when this trial is over and we can have a family life without his fingerprints all over it.’

  Terri did not trust herself to speak. Finally, she said, ‘Why do you believe that I need help to worry about Elena? And why do you think I disagree with you just to cut you down? Because it isn’t true, and it hurts to have you think that.’

  The half smile returned. ‘You always think I’m trying to manipulate you, don’t you? Wear you down. There’s a name for that, Ter. Paranoia.’

  Terri rose from the sofa and went to Richie. She put both hands on his shoulders, gazing up at him. ‘Am I real to you?’ she asked.

  He gave her a defensive look. ‘Real? You’re my wife, Terri. You’re a big part of my life.’

  She shook her head. ‘But am I real to you? Do I exist outside you? Does Elena?’

  ‘Why are you attacking me, Ter?’ Quick as a stage actor, his shoulders slumped in her hands, voice conveying a mystified hurt. ‘We’re a couple. We dream together, make love together, raise Elena together. We’ve made a family. Don’t you see that every time you attack me it threatens that?’

  Terri felt the numb helpless feeling creep over her again. She could think of nothing to say.

  Gently, Richie kissed her forehead. ‘Let’s not quarrel like this, okay? It’s no good for Elena.’

  It was a familiar moment, Terri knew; the point w
here she could not go on, where Richie promised her peace in return for giving in. Suddenly the words rushed out. ‘Don’t you see what we do? We both use “family” – you to get me to do what you want, me to hide what I’m doing from myself.’ Her voice became pleading. ‘I’m dead inside, Richie. I don’t feel anything.’

  He stared at her. ‘You’re tired. It’s no good for you to talk when you’re tired – you lose perspective. Get some sleep.’ He paused. ‘Even better, wait till this trial is over and things are where they used to be.’

  Terri found she could not go on. She turned and walked out the door.

  What, Terri wondered, am I doing? She was halfway down the hall before she knew that she was headed for the fire escape, to get some air. Richie did not follow; he knew that he did not need to.

  The night air was cold. Slowly, Terri climbed the catwalk to the fourth floor. She stopped there, looking across the street at the student housing where they once had lived. And then she felt the tears on her face.

  Why, she wondered, do men never seem to cry? Even the best ones, and even at the worst of moments.

  She stayed there long after her tears had stopped, listening to the crickets in the cool night air, remembering the five years that had brought them to where they were. Tried to imagine the next five years, and then Elena’s life to come.

  She knew why she was afraid to do this. It was easier to keep busy day to day, the future no farther than next Saturday’s matinee with Richie and Elena, or a picnic to which they took Elena and a friend from day care. Snapshots of a family, with both parents’ arms around Elena. Pictures that hid, rather than revealed, the truth about her marriage.

  At what age, Terri wondered, would Elena start absorbing the subliminal message of things unsaid and unfelt? At what point in childhood would she start to become like Terri, without ever choosing for herself? For what, when she was older, would she hold Terri to account – the marriage that Terri had stayed in, or the marriage that she had left? And with what damage would Terri send her to a marriage of her own?

  She could find no answers. Standing there, Terri realized that she was tired and cold.

  She had a trial to worry about, she told herself, Lindsay Caldwell to shepherd. The process did not stop because some defense lawyer had started to face her life.

  She went back inside. Richie was still in the living room; the stacks of cards seemed only to have changed their sizes, some smaller and some larger.

  ‘I agree with you,’ she said slowly. ‘We shouldn’t talk until the hearing’s over. And then we should talk seriously.’

  He looked up, eyes newly alert. ‘About what?’

  She gave an apologetic shrug. ‘Maybe we both should take a little time off. To think.’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘Time off from work?’

  ‘Time off from us.’

  He stood, his tone suddenly aggressive. ‘That we should separate, you mean. Why don’t you just say that?’

  Terri felt suddenly confused. ‘Live apart,’ she temporized. ‘Just for a while.’

  ‘“For a while.”’ His voice rose. ‘You’d do this to Elena, without even listening to me or going to see a counselor. Just walk out.’

  Already Terri felt guilty. ‘This is about Elena. Even if we’re apart, we can always see a counselor.’

  Richie watched her with an odd, superior smile. ‘You’re not being practical, Ter. We can’t afford to separate.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m not leaving this apartment. Not while I’ve got a business to get up and running.’ His voice became cool. ‘If you pull the rug out from under me, I figure a court awards me around two thousand a month in interim support.’ He paused. ‘More, if they give me Elena.’

  It startled her; the conversation had spun out of control, with Richie pushing it into realms she had not contemplated.

  ‘They’d never do that,’ she managed.

  ‘Because you’re a woman? Before you go running off, Ter, wake up and smell the coffee.’ His tone turned harsh. ‘The women’s movement has arrived. Courts look at who the real parent is, not just gender. In this family, your role has been to provide, and mine to care for Elena.’

  Terri could not shake the sense of unreality; she seemed to have entered a world she did not believe in, armed only with a lawyer’s rote responses. ‘I never asked you not to work.’

  The smile reappeared. ‘But you agreed to it, and I relied on that. And that’s all I’ll need to tell the judge.’

  Terri felt herself trembling at Richie’s rising air of confidence. With a sudden terrible clarity, she knew that he had been planning for this moment, perhaps for a long time.

  ‘I’m very slow,’ she said softly. ‘But once I learn something, I remember it.’

  He nodded. ‘This is ugly, Ter. I don’t like even imagining it. But if you’re going to bring it up, we should talk about reality.’

  Terri looked at him: the slender frame, the curly hair, the face in which she once had seen such life and imagination. The face of her husband, her adversary.

  ‘I’ve got another witness in the morning,’ she finally said. ‘I’d better get some sleep.’

  ‘Sure.’ His voice was gentle now. ‘When I come to bed, I’ll try not to wake you.’

  Terri felt something shiver inside her. ‘Please,’ she said.

  That night, with Richie asleep beside her, she wept again.

  In the morning, Terri found him in the kitchen. The coffee was already made.

  He handed her a cup. ‘French toast coming up,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Your favorite.’

  She took the coffee, sat at the kitchen table. ‘Want some milk for that?’ he asked. ‘Or half-and-half?’

  For a long time, Terri merely looked at him. With sudden pitiless comprehension, she saw the moment for what it was: the sweetness after the storm, calculated to help her pretend that nothing had happened. ‘I may not be real to you,’ she said quietly, ‘but what you understand about me, you understand very well.’

  He turned to her, expression hovering between relief and apprehension.

  Terri stood. ‘I’d tell you not to threaten me with Elena, Richie. But it might be far too late.’

  ‘I didn’t threaten you. It was you who wants to separate.’

  ‘Don’t twist things.’ She shook her head. ‘You told me to face reality. The sad reality of our marriage is that you’re always three moves ahead of me, and I still can’t bring myself to believe that there are even more moves to make.’

  He stared at her. ‘What exactly are you saying?’

  ‘That you don’t love me. And that I haven’t loved you for a long time, and hid that from us both.’ Terri paused. ‘If you want to blame me for something, blame me for that.’

  He flushed with anger. ‘Don’t bullshit me, Ter. It isn’t our marriage. You had this alleged breakthrough when you started spending time with Christopher Paget.’

  Terri walked silently to the sink, tossed the coffee down the drain, turned to face him again. ‘Chris and you don’t belong in the same conversation. First, you’re nothing alike. Second, this has nothing to do with him. It’s all about you.’

  ‘I can’t believe that.’

  ‘Believe it. It’s you, Richie. You, and the fact that you can never accept that it’s you. And never will.’

  He was silent; for the first time, Terri saw the panic in his mental calculation. ‘It’s about Elena, Terri. Our daughter, remember?’

  She felt a surge of anger. ‘Didn’t you hear me? Don’t use Elena to cover for yourself or to blackmail me.’ She paused, lowering her voice. ‘I’ve got a case to try, and I’m going to do it right. For as long as I’m doing that, you’ve got me to support you. As long, that is, as you don’t touch me.’

  Terri turned and went to wake Elena.

  Watching Caroline Masters greet Lindsay Caldwell, Terri thought that they seemed like members of the same species, who recognized each other without ever having met. Ca
roline’s manner bespoke a respectful sense of how difficult Caldwell must find this; Caldwell’s quiet command seemed tempered by the knowledge that she could not control what Caroline did. Both spoke softly; neither smiled.

  ‘Did they get you past the press?’ Caroline asked.

  Caldwell nodded. ‘They took me through the underground garage and then up a private elevator. I felt like plutonium.’

  ‘Which you are, in a way.’ Caroline Masters paused. ‘Unless I decide they have to, I don’t want the press to ever know that you were here.’

  Caldwell glanced at Sharpe. ‘I appreciate that,’ she said, and the four women sat, Caroline behind her desk, Terri next to Caldwell, Sharpe a few feet back.

  They were a strange assortment, Terri thought. Sharpe’s alertness suggested some deeper tension, whereas the case appeared to have drawn from Caroline an unforeseen reserve of empathy. As for Terri, she still felt her inexperience. But at least all three were lawyers; here in chambers, Caldwell, with her tawny hair and chiseled profile, familiar only as an image on film, seemed startling.

  Caroline faced her. ‘Tell me about Mark Ransom,’ she asked.

  Caldwell nodded briskly, as if she appreciated the judge’s directness and would be equally direct. In the corner, the stenographer sat poised over her machine. ‘It’s quite simple,’ Caldwell began, ‘and quite painful. Twenty years ago, shortly before she died, I had an affair with Laura Chase. Mark Ransom found out.’

  Caroline’s face was expressionless. ‘Did he make clear how he intended to use what he knew?’

  ‘It was clear to me,’ Caldwell answered coolly. ‘And he made it very clear that he was in control.’

  Caroline seemed to appraise her. ‘When you say that what Ransom knew was “painful,”’ she finally asked, ‘do you mean something about the affair itself. Or do you mean the fact of it?’

  For a moment, the two women looked at each other; to Terri, their silence had a sudden unspoken intimacy. ‘Not the fact of it,’ Caldwell answered. ‘It was confusing to me then, but I’ve come to terms with that part. People’s sexuality can cover a wide range, and my range, it seems, made being with Laura a possibility – at least for that time. No, what was painful was that the circumstances were so tied to Laura’s death.’ Caldwell paused, as if still processing the memory, and then went on. ‘The affair began two weeks before Laura shot herself, with Laura looking out for me at a time I badly needed someone. One week later, I abandoned her, out of fear of Laura’s needs and my own sexuality. Her suicide completed the chain of cause and effect. That’s the pain Mark Ransom touched.’