by D. W. Buffa
“Don’t,” I said reflexively, but I knew there was nothing I could do, nothing that was going to make him change his mind. It was too late. It had always been too late.
He pointed the gun right at me. “It’s time for you both to go,”
he said, glancing up at the judge and then across to the prosecutor.
Loescher turned to go, but Bingham refused to leave. “It’s my courtroom,” he insisted.
Elliott seemed surprised. “Jeffries would already be out the door,”
he remarked. He looked at me to see if I agreed and then looked back at Bingham. Stretching his arm straight, until the gun was as close to my head as it would go, he asked him again to leave.
“I would be very grateful if you would go.” He said it with a kind of respect, the way he must once have thought every judge was supposed to be addressed.
Bingham, still reluctant, looked at me.
“It’s all right,” I assured him. “I’ll be fine. You better go.”
We were alone, and Elliott took a position in front of the bench, just below where Bingham had been sitting. Gesturing with the gun, he had me move to the far end of the counsel table, closest to the empty jury box and farthest from the double doors at the back. We stood like that, facing each other, and for what seemed like forever did not say anything at all. Everything in that quietest courtroom was now so quiet I could have sworn I could hear the thoughts that were passing through Elliott Winston’s mind.
“There’s no reason to do this, Elliott.”
He looked up at the clock. “Four forty-four. We’ll wait one more minute: four forty-five.”
I stood there, helpless, staring at the barrel of the revolver, and from somewhere deep in my subconscious recalled the story Anatoly Chicherin had told me about Dostoyevsky waiting in front of a firing squad, waiting for the order to fire, knowing with absolute certainty it would be the last word he would ever hear.
“Don’t do it,” I begged. “What happened twelve years ago was an accident. It wasn’t a crime.”
For an instant he looked like the Elliott Winston I had known at the beginning, the bright, eager young man with the wife he loved and the children he adored, his whole life in front of him, certain that nothing bad would ever happen.
He shook his head. “It wasn’t a crime?” He smiled. “It wasn’t what I intended.”
I heard the clock strike four forty-five. “Don’t,” I begged again.
The gunshot exploded in my ear, and then there was nothing but silence, silence everywhere. Then I heard it: the sound of feet running, rushing, and the sound of voices, a huge, animal roar, and then the sound of the door at the back of the courtroom behind me crashing open.
I looked up just in time to see Elliott, tranquil and unafraid, smile at me as he lowered the gun which he had just fired into the air.
“Don’t,” I begged again, turning toward the door as the police began their assault. No one heard me, but it would have done no good if they had. The sound of that single gunshot had been the signal for Elliott’s own execution. He lay there, at the base of the bench, his eyes open, blood trickling past that strange smile that was still on his mouth.
Two police officers tried to help me out of the courtroom.
“Elliott Winston didn’t come to my office to kill me,” I told them. “He came to kill himself. This time he let someone else do it for him.”
The two officers exchanged a glance. Neither one of them had any idea what I was talking about.
Thirty-one
_______
Though I had told her all about it before, I told her again, trying to remember everything just the way it had happened.
“Bingham meant it when he said it was his courtroom,” I said as the Porsche moved easily through a wide sweeping turn. Jennifer’s eyes were fastened on the road. Her hair flew back behind her as we picked up speed.
“He had everyone back in court the next morning. ‘Mr. Antonelli,’ he said, ‘do you have any other witnesses you wish to call?’
” ‘No, your honor,’ I replied. ‘The defense rests.’
“Then he looked at Cassandra Loescher. ‘Does the prosecution have any rebuttal witnesses it wishes to call?’
“She shook her head. ‘No, your honor.’
“He turned back to me. ‘Does the defense have any motions it wishes to make at this time?’
” ‘Yes, your honor. The defense moves for a directed verdict of acquittal.’
“Bingham looked at Loescher the way he does when it’s your turn to say something.
” ‘The prosecution does not object,’ she said with a slight nod.
“That was it, all of it. Five minutes and it was over. Bingham thanked the jury and told them that while he did not think any of them would ever forget what had happened, he hoped they would also remember that justice had been done and an innocent man had been set free.”
We raced down a straight stretch of road, the engine screaming, and Jennifer lifted her head and smiled as the wind rushed past us.
I kept on talking. “Sometimes I think about Elliott and the things that happened to him and the things he did.”
Sinking low behind us, the October sun turned the fields and the vineyards and the orchards brown and orange, dark green and black, the last colors of autumn before the winter rains turned everything a damp, dismal gray.
“Sometimes I think about those people out there, the ones who live under the bridges, the ones who don’t have anywhere to call home. Sometimes I wonder if they’re everywhere, all the time, but we only take notice of them at night, because that’s when we’re most vulnerable and most afraid. Sometimes I wonder if there are any more of them out there, ones that Elliott knew in the hospital.”
After a while I stopped talking, and just watched the road in front of us, glancing across every so often at the face that had haunted me all my life, glad we were once again together.
“There was one good thing that came out of this. Danny won’t be homeless anymore. You were right about Howard Flynn, when you said he thought of Danny as his son. Howard took him in, gave him a home.”
It was getting dark, and we had been gone all afternoon. Jennifer was tired. I helped her out of the car and held her by the arm as we walked to the door. The light was on inside.
“Good evening, Mr. Antonelli. Did Jennifer enjoy the drive?”
the nurse asked as I let go of her arm. “See you next week?” she asked with a kindhearted smile.
“Of course,” I replied. I watched them walk down the corridor together, hoping until they disappeared around the corner that Jennifer would look back, remember finally who I was, and call my name.
Outside, in the cool night air, I opened the door to the Porsche and then, before I got in, glanced down the street toward the opposite end of the three-story brick building and remembered the first time I had come here, to the state hospital, to see Elliott Winston.
I drove through the darkness on my way back to Portland. To keep my mind off Jennifer, I turned on the radio and a few minutes later, after the music stopped, I heard the news. Asa Bartram had been killed, stabbed to death outside his office, in the street next to his car.
Document Outline
Cover
Acknowledgments
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-one
Twenty-two
Twenty-three
Twenty-four
Twenty-five
Twenty-six
Twenty-seven
Twenty-eight
Twenty-nine
Thirty-one
Table of Contents
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