Kill All the Judges
Page 41
“Pomeroy scrambles across the lawn for a better view. It’s the gaseous, oleaginous smarmaholic himself, staring over the gutters. So what we have here are the perp and the peep. Two tragedians in grand Shakespearian style, equally inflamed by jealousy. Pomeroy’s alcohol-addled sensory system picks up that something dirty is going on, something evil. What has this monster done with Caroline? A yell: ‘That dirty fucker is spying!’ Sounds like Caroline, could be.
“Then bingo, the perp snaps, everything goes haywire, love, anger, jealousy, hatred, it all boils up until there’s no reason left, just mindlessness.” He was breathing hard, his eyes locked with Arthur’s, imploring him to return with a fair and favourable verdict.
“Was it just a reflex action, Brian? Or were you bolder now, less afraid of detection–after all, you’d got clean away with the first one, there hadn’t been a whisper of suspicion. Second time, easy, they say.”
Brian walked stiffly out to the balcony railing, stared down at the rock-strewn slope below. “I went mad, Arthur, I did go mad.” There was such an tremor of insistence to these words that Arthur, who had been playing with the buttons on the radio, felt uneasy. He joined Brian at the railing. Close enough to restrain any dangerous, despairing final gesture.
Who could deny him a true moment of madness? It wouldn’t be right to abandon him to hopelessness. “Undoubtedly temporary insanity is there. It could be strongly argued. Gib Davidson, I’d suggest, for that.”
Brian picked up a remote, turned the radio on, the volume up. Music. Commercials. The news on the half-hour. “Canada tonight chose its first Green Member of Parliament, but only by the slightest of margins. With all polls counted, Margaret Blake leads by twenty-seven votes…”
“Thank you, Brian, turn it off.”
He did so. “Give her my love.”
Several silent minutes. A plinking of rain. Arthur didn’t know where Brian’s thoughts were, but he was with Margaret, delighted for her, vastly relieved.
Brian cried out. “I didn’t plan for Whynet-Moir to die! Christ, I came armed with a camera!”
“Take any pictures that night?”
“No.”
“Well, take one tomorrow. Of Cud Brown, as he’s being shackled and led to the wagon. Give some thought, as you wave him a fond farewell, as to how you eagerly undertook his defence, then sabotaged it. That’s the real twist, Brian.”
“How do you plead?” Kroop asked Arthur, who was bound and gagged on the witness stand. “My client has the right to remain silent,” said Pomeroy, who was working rapidly at a keyboard. Despite his mightiest efforts, Arthur couldn’t shout, not a squeak. The scene morphed to a suite in the Confederation Club, a telephone ringing. “I can’t talk!” he yelled, finally coming awake.
It was Margaret, but she couldn’t talk either. Or barely. He heard, “Beat the plucker by a whisker.”
“I am bursting with pride.”
“Not counting my chickens. Recount ordered.”
“You’ll win. Ah, you’ll be the belle of the ball in Ottawa. I can hardly wait. The nation’s capital, its beating heart.”
“Bullshit artist.”
He would join her at Blunder Bay at trial’s end. Now comes the task of finding caretakers for the farm for the several months that Parliament sits. In the meantime, while he waits for the jury, he will do some library time, bone up on the recount process.
That’s where Wentworth found him a couple of hours later, reading precedents. A ballot must be rejected if it identifies the voter. An X consists of any two crossed lines, a swastika qualifies, not a circle.
“The sheriff says they’re talking a lot. No loud arguing. At the Gilbert Gilbert trial, we had this army drill major who tied the jury up for five days.”
“Has Pomeroy showed up?”
“Yes. He’s sitting down the hall. Isn’t saying much. Said you spoke with him last night.”
“We had a tête-à-tête.” Nothing else could be said. It was a monumental task, holding his terrible secrets. Already they had inspired a bad dream.
He’d left Hollyburn last night only after receiving Brian’s promise to attend court. There’d been a few final questions. Brian denied that Florenza ever told him she saw Cud do an act of murder. Instead, she teased him. “Darling, he kind of looked like you.”
Why had she lied so blatantly to the jury when she hadn’t needed to? Silent Shawn, of course–he’d not trusted her account of a stranger rushing at Raffy; it sounded incriminating, a scheme between her and Carlos, the hit-man scenario. Blame Cud Brown, he’d counselled, assuring her it was the safer course.
Not much more was said between confessor and priest last night. It was understood that Brian must make the right decision, the decent, moral one. Understood by Arthur, at least. Whatever remained of Brian’s humanity and nobility would be sorely tested if the jury convicted a man guilty of many things–including an unregulated sex drive and the writing of bad poetry–but not murder.
Wentworth was looking pensive, and Arthur was feeling sorry for having been curt. He must speak to the young man’s associates about granting him a partnership, long overdue. “You’ve done stellar work throughout, young man…Wentworth?” Far, far away this time.
He came to. “Sorry, what?”
“This case could not have been won without you at my side. If the jury remains out tonight, I intend to reserve the finest table…”
“I can’t, not tonight. I…I have a date.”
“April?”
“Yes, yes! How did you know?”
“The old man isn’t as tuned out as you think. Picked up the vibes.”
“God, I almost blew it with her. I hope I’m not in love.”
“Ah, well, given that wondrous possibility, it will be my pleasure to invite you both for dinner and quietly disappear.”
Here came the sheriff, huffing and puffing toward them, trying to keep his voice down in the silence of the library. “They’re ready, Mr. Beauchamp.”
Eleven-thirty, one would have thought they’d have waited until after Her Majesty bought lunch.
It didn’t take the courtroom long to fill, lawyers flooding in, the case’s faithful followers swarming in from God knows where, like bees to the hive. Cud’s groupie base had been decimated further, their hero an anxious, hunched-over, pale imitation of the cocky maverick of yore. He’d been placed in the prisoner’s dock for the verdict, Felicity behind him, tissue at her flooding eyes.
Pomeroy was in the back row, staring at his hands.
No surly faces as the jurors filed in, even Altieri seemed at ease with his conscience. Arthur made eye contact with Professor Glass. A barely perceptible smile. Arthur relaxed.
The clerk stood, slowly intoned the options: murder, manslaughter, innocence.
“Not guilty,” said the forewoman.
Kroop nodded, seeming not dissatisfied. “So say you all?”
All stood in confirmation.
“The accused is discharged.”
Cud couldn’t seem to move, then started to back up, stumbled, nearly fell. He was taking great gulps of air, the free air he’d thought he might never breathe again. He began to weep.
Felicity, as if turned off by this show of unmanliness, slipped his grasping, comfort-seeking arms, ran to Arthur, hugged him, and then, to his utter embarrassment, mounted him, her legs curled around his like pincers. “Thank you, thank you,” she repeated.
Looking over her shoulder, Arthur saw Brian numbly staring at this scene. He dared one look at Arthur, then joined the crush for the door.
A few minutes later, standing with Abigail at the terrace railing, Arthur watched as Brian, in raincoat now, slouched toward the exit, alone but for the spectre of the guilt that must stalk him for all his days. He turned again, looked up at the man who must forever hold his secret.
“What’s with him?” Abigail asked.
“I wish I could say.”
Brian whirled, and raced outside. He began to run, darting thr
ough traffic, his raincoat flapping in the wind. He ran and ran…
BOOKS BY WILLIAM DEVERELL
FICTION
Needles
High Crimes
Mecca
The Dance of Shiva
Platinum Blues
Mindfield
Kill All the Lawyers
Street Legal: The Betrayal
Trial of Passion
Slander
The Laughing Falcon
Mind Games
April Fool
Kill All the Judges
NON-FICTION
A Life on Trial
Copyright © 2008 by William Deverell
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher–or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency–is an infringement of the copyright law.
LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION
Deverell, William, 1937–
Kill all the judges / William Deverell.
eISBN: 978-1-55199-181-8
I. Title.
PS8557.E8775K48 2008 C813'.54 C2007-905764-0
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.
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