by Brad Smith
“Your son bought a nine-millimeter Glock at a sporting goods store in Syracuse a month before the murder. He bought a silencer from a disreputable citizen named Ducky Sands here in Kingston four days later. His computer shows that he used MapQuest to find the victim’s address, and his cell phone records indicate that he called the victim’s place of employment several times to determine his schedule. Your son shot the man in the parking lot of his apartment building when he got home from work. When the police arrived, your son admitted to the act. And he said he was glad he did it.” Mickey closed the file. “I’m really struggling to find a spot where we might make the word ‘involuntary’ apply here.”
Sally shifted her eyes past Mickey, to the windows, and the leafy maples outside. “My son is not a criminal.”
Mickey nodded after a moment, as if agreeing to the stupid statement, and then looked at Chuck. “I’m sorry, Chuck. Second is the best we can do here. Unless you want to go to trial. And then he’s looking at life.”
“Not if you get an acquittal,” Chuck said. “I mean, that’s what you do. That’s what you’re known for. You find a technicality, or improper police work. We’re willing to pay you whatever it costs.”
Mickey picked up the case file and dropped it on the desk before the Fairchilds. “I’ve been looking for eighteen months. It’s not there.”
Chuck looked at his hands again. “We just came from the jail,” he said. “Byron’s not interested in a plea bargain. Not for second degree, anyway. He wants a trial.”
Mickey winced theatrically, as if despairing of the very notion of a trial. This was nothing but fucking nonsense, utter and complete denial. He wanted to be on the golf course, a cold Coors in his hand as he drove the cart. He wanted to be away from these disillusioned people. After a moment he nodded. “Then that’s what he’ll get,” he said. “He is the defendant here. It’s your dime, but he is the defendant.” He opened up a thick leather binder in front of him. “We won’t be able to delay this any longer. Unfortunately . . .” Mickey took a moment for a well-rehearsed perusal of his schedule. “Unfortunately, I’m not going to be available for the actual trial. My colleague Dan Wilson can fit it in, though. I’ve spoken to him, contingent on your decision.”
A heavy silence fell over the room. Mickey, pretending to glance again at the ledger, took the opportunity to check his watch.
“You sonofabitch,” Sally said softly. Then, upon further reflection, “You fucking asshole!”
“I beg your pardon.” Mickey closed the schedule.
“We were told you would do this,” she said. “You don’t want to go to trial because you’re afraid you’ll lose. You’re trying to protect your record. You don’t care about my son.”
“I care enough that I’m advising him not to do this,” Mickey said. “But either way, my slate is full. We’ve dragged this out for more than a year at his insistence.”
Chuck stood up. By his expression it was quite evident that he shared his wife’s opinion. But he was not about to verbalize it. He was a professional athlete who had been forced to retire because of gimpy knees, and a TV talking head who had lost his job due to his increasing years and inherent blandness. Mickey suspected that he fully understood the concept of inevitability. His wife, however, had not arrived at that place yet.
“You’re a self-serving little cocksucker,” she told Mickey before they walked out.
By the time Mickey arrived at Burr Oak, it was nearly eight o’clock. The final few groups were just finishing the stag, which was the front nine this week. Mickey teed it up alone and set out in a cart, thinking he could just get the round in if he hurried.
Driving down the first fairway, he thought about the meeting with the Fairchilds. He was a little offended by Sally’s accusation, even though it was fundamentally true. Man is prideful by nature, and, as such, Mickey was proud of his unblemished record in capital cases. But it was also true that this reputation delivered to him the highest-profile clients. These cases had netted him over two million dollars the previous year, money that he required to keep two ex-wives happy, and to maintain his home and hobbies and lifestyle. Relinquishing his perfect score would undoubtedly hurt his future business.
But there was more to it than that, in this particular instance anyway. Mickey had no desire to represent Byron Fairchild in court. The kid was a nasty little prick, a sociopath with dead eyes and a detached manner bordering at times on narcolepsy.
Mickey had no doubt he would re-offend. He had grown up alone and coddled in a rambling house in the country, where, Mickey had learned, he had begun shooting squirrels and rabbits and the neighbors’ cats with his father’s .22 at the age of five or six.
Mickey Dupree was not about to risk his own reputation on a punk like that. In truth, he was hardly dismayed at the prospect of the kid going upriver for life.
Mindful of the approaching dusk, he played quickly and evidently the pace was good for his game. He was even par after six holes. If he could get past the treacherous seventh, he just might post a good score and help out his team. Maybe even birdie the par five ninth and come in under par. Seven was playing short, with the pin in the right front. Mickey hit a seven iron that headed straight for the flag, landed short, bounced once toward the green, then hit something and kicked right. And into the bunker.
“Gimme a fucking break,” Mickey said as he jammed the club back into the bag.
When he arrived at the green he found that the ball was on a downslope in the sand, with the pin a mere twenty feet away. It was a tough shot. Mickey got out of the cart and walked to the deep bunker, carrying his sand wedge. Other than the downslope, the ball was lying decently, sitting up in the sand. Before stepping into the bunker, Mickey thought he heard something and paused for a look around. He was the only one on the course and it was a beautiful summer evening. The setting sun threw fingers of light through the sugar maples to the west, illuminating the shallow water of Gibson’s Creek where it crossed the eighth fairway. Mickey could hear the faint gurgle of the stream. To the south there was a copse of pine trees and then the iron fence, which marked the course boundary. Beyond the fence was a deep ravine. Mickey could hear the squawks of blue jays and the machine-gun rat-a-tat-tat of woodpeckers, the soft rustle of leaves in the wind. Perhaps it had been the birds he had heard. He felt a strange and uncharacteristic wave of contentment pass over him.
The news reached the maintenance barn first, and then went to the pro shop before finally whipping through the clubhouse like a prairie fire. Just before dusk, one of the grounds crew had driven a Gator out to turn on the sprinklers surrounding the seventh and eighth greens and spotted the abandoned cart. Mickey Dupree was still in the bunker. His ball, however, was on the green, roughly three feet from the pin, suggesting that Mickey had finally made a good sand shot on the hole. The par putt, however, would remain unstruck. Mickey was on his knees, bent back awkwardly, the sand wedge in his hand, a sizable welt on his cheekbone, and a look of surprise on his face.
The broken shaft of a five iron had been driven through his heart.
TWO
The rain stopped during the night and the morning dawned clear, with a drying wind rising from the southwest. After lunch, Virgil Cain walked out into the alfalfa field along the side road and decided it would be dry enough to cut by mid-afternoon. While he waited, he changed the oil in the Massey and then hooked the tractor to the mower and pulled it out of the machine shed. He greased the fittings on the mower and the Massey’s front end, out of routine more than anything else; he’d serviced the mower before putting it away last summer and hadn’t used it since. He climbed onto the tractor and was about to hit the starter when he heard the harsh blat of a blown muffler and looked up to see a rusty Sunfire roll to a stop in front of the house, where Kirstie’s green Jeep sat on the lawn, a for sale sign on the windshield.
Virgil waited until the two young guys got out of the car and started toward the Jeep before he climbed down from the tractor
and headed over to meet them. He watched them circling the Jeep as he walked. They were skinny rednecks, both wearing frayed ball caps, one advertising Coors Light, the other some NASCAR star. The taller of the two wore a sleeveless T-shirt and had a thick leather wallet fastened to his belt with a chain. Each of them had the standard tattoos and piercings, proclaiming them to be the individuals they weren’t. The Sunfire, parked on the shoulder of the road, was a rattletrap that might fetch a couple hundred dollars at a wrecking yard.
“Hey,” the taller one said as Virgil approached.
“Hello,” Virgil said.
“Year is this?”
“Oh-seven.”
The other one opened the driver’s door and got in behind the wheel. He glanced at the odometer; then his eyes went to the sound system. When Kirstie had bought the Jeep, she had immediately replaced the factory stereo with a fancy German setup. Virgil couldn’t remember all the specs of the system— this many amps, such-and-such speakers, any and all bells and whistles available—but he did know that the package ran her around two grand. Two grand that she typically did not have but that her credit card would cover. At least temporarily.
“What’re ya asking?” the taller one said.
“Twelve thousand.” If these two jokers had access to twelve thousand dollars, Virgil would eat his hat.
The other one was still paying a lot of attention to the sound system.
The taller one nodded thoughtfully at the price, as if considering his current financial situation. The other one turned in the seat. “We take it for a drive?”
Virgil glanced back to the tractor and mower. He had a lot of hay to cut. But, as unlikely as these two were as buyers, he really could use the money for the Jeep. Taxes on the place were due and Kirstie had left a lot of debt behind. Kirstie had left a lot of everything behind, none of it good.
“Yeah, we can take it around the block,” he said.
“You don’t gotta come,” the other one said. “You can get to your farmin’.”
“My farming can wait. I’ll go with you.”
“What, you don’t trust us?” the taller one said. He was close to being offended.
“No,” Virgil said. “Why would I?”
“Dude’s got a problem,” the other one said.
“Actually, I don’t,” Virgil said. “But I don’t know you.”
The other one got out of the car. Apparently the notion of going for a drive had lost its appeal when Virgil became part of the bargain. The two circled the Jeep, stopping short of kicking the tires, but just. The taller one had an inspiration.
“Interested in a trade?” he asked, indicating the Sunfire.
“You a comedian?” Virgil asked.
“I can’t believe this fuckin’ guy,” the other one said.
“I’m not interested in a trade,” Virgil said.
“So you’re asking twelve,” the taller one said. “What’ll you take?”
“Gotta get twelve.”
The taller one gave the Jeep one last critical look. “I’m gonna think about it. See what I can swing.”
“It’ll be here,” Virgil said.
He watched as they got into the Sunfire and drove off. He hoped he’d seen the last of them but he wasn’t sure about that. He wasn’t sure about much nowadays.
As Virgil walked back along the lane toward the tractor, the thoroughbred gelding came across the pasture field and followed him along the fence, looking for a treat. Or just company. The other eight horses were gathered beneath the hickory tree at the far end of the field, where they stood out of the sun, hip to shoulder, tails flicking flies off one another. The gelding was a sociable animal, especially for a thoroughbred, which he was finally beginning to resemble. He’d put on weight, thanks to Virgil, and seemed to have recovered from his tendon problem, courtesy of Mary Nelson. Virgil would love to sell him, but there wasn’t much of a market out there for broken-down racehorses.
The gelding trailed Virgil as far as he could, stopped at the end of the field where the pasture met the barn. With his head over the fence, the horse watched as Virgil climbed back into the tractor seat, fired the engine, and drove into the front field where he began to cut hay.
Once she decided, there was nothing to do but get on with it. At times like this it was harder not to do it than to do it. The bay gelding was lying on the ground in the shade of the pole barn, and they had been unable to get him to eat or even to drink anything all morning. His organs were done, she knew. The other horses, save the half-feral mare, were all gone now, the last one loaded up twenty minutes earlier, headed for a rescue farm outside of Binghamton.
Mary walked to the F-250 and opened the back door. Pulling on a pair of surgical gloves, she loaded the syringe, guessing the emaciated horse’s weight to be no more than four hundred pounds. Donald Lee held the bay as she injected him. Mary kept her hand on the animal’s neck as his breath grew shallow and then shallower and then stopped altogether. The horse’s bladder released and a thin stream of urine stained the dirt of the corral.
Mary got to her feet and looked at Donald, the anger rising within her.
“What did they charge him with?”
“Improper care of animals. Misdemeanor.”
“And what’s that going to be, a two-dollar fine?”
“First offense, it won’t be much,” Donald admitted.
Mary removed the gloves. “And then he’ll be back here.”
“Well, it’s his farm.”
“I’ll be watching him,” Mary said.
She walked to the truck and placed the syringe and gloves in a disposal bag. She heard Donald approaching behind her.
“What are we going to do about her?” Meaning the mare.
“I was hoping you might know the answer to that,” Mary said without turning.
“I don’t. The SPCA doesn’t have any place that will take her. I think the horse is crazy.”
Mary turned and walked toward the corral. The mare stood watching her, lifting her head up and down in a rhythmic tic, as if agreeing with something over and over again. Her ribs were showing and her mane and tail were matted and tangled. She was filthy from fetlock to withers and her hooves were a mess, overgrown and splayed.
“She’s no crazier than you or I would be under the same conditions,” Mary said.
“I suppose,” Donald said. “But I don’t know what we can do for her. If there’s no place for her to go, I think we have to put her down.”
Mary nodded slowly, still watching the mare, who stared back. Then Mary glanced at the dead bay gelding in the dirt, the animal’s tongue extended, sour urine beneath the skinny body. She thought about the owner, a man named Hopman, whom the police had led away a couple of hours earlier. His snarl and his unrepentant eyes. Mary thought about loading a syringe for him, and the thought suddenly jolted her. She was seventy-one years old and had never, even for a fleeting moment, considered killing anyone before. Of course, she wouldn’t do it. She couldn’t do it. But apparently she had changed enough that she actually entertained the notion, even for only a moment.
She heard a noise from the mare then, a soft nicker from somewhere within, rolling up from her chest. Mary looked over. The mare was still watching her.
“Well,” Donald Lee said. “If we’re going to do it—”
“We’re not,” Mary told him.
It was late afternoon when Virgil finished cutting the ten acres. After completing the final swath at the back of the field he drove out of the side-road gate and headed back to the farm, thinking about a cold beer. From a quarter mile away, he saw Mary Nelson’s F-250 parked by the barn, with the double horse trailer behind. As he drew closer he saw that Mary was leaning against the front fender, watching him come down the road. Her long gray hair was tied back and tucked beneath a straw hat, and she was wearing brown pants and a man’s button-down shirt. He guessed the shirt had belonged to her husband, who had passed away a few years back, before Virgil had arrived in the are
a.
Virgil thought it comical that Mary had decided to buy the big F-250. She was maybe five foot three, with short legs and a bit of a belly. She practically needed a ladder to climb into the truck. He wasn’t sure of her age, but she was well past retirement, he suspected, although she wasn’t allowing a little thing like that to slow her down. He also knew that she had a heart about as big as the truck she was leaning against.
She removed the hat to smooth her hair back as he drove up, and he realized he was not unhappy to see her. Virgil didn’t have a lot of visitors and more often than not was content with that. But now he was thinking it would be nice to have a beer with Mary. He was finished for the day, and he was thirsty. Maybe she was too.
He stopped the tractor beside her, indicating the trailer.
“Don’t tell me you’re finally going to pick up some of your horses,” he said.
“They’re not my horses.”
“They’re not mine either,” he told her.
He drove the tractor and the mower into the machine shed.
It wasn’t until he walked back out that he saw the mare’s rump over the trailer gate. He stopped.
“Chrissake, Mary. The answer is no.”
“I didn’t ask anything,” she said.
“No,” he said.
“Virgil—”
“Don’t Virgil me, and don’t snow me, and don’t nothing me,” he said. “I told you the last time.”
She threw her hands dramatically in the air, announcing that she was giving up. “Forget about it.”
“I already did. You want a beer?”
“No, I don’t have time for a beer. I have to find a home for a quarter horse.”
“Good luck with that.”
“You don’t have to be a jerk about it.”
“I’m not being a jerk. Have a beer.”
She stood looking at him, her lips pursed like a petulant teenager. It was a pose uncharacteristic of her, and, as if realizing this, she quickly dropped it. “All right. Give me a goddamn beer.”
Virgil kept beer in a forty-year-old fridge in the old milk house built onto the end of the barn. He went inside and retrieved two bottles of Bud. Along with the beer, he brought out a couple of mismatched wooden chairs, and he and Mary sat in the shade of the barn and drank. Virgil lit a cigarette with his antique Zippo and inhaled deeply.
