Gideon - 02 - Probable Cause

by Grif Stockley

  “Not that normal,” Morris replies, shrugging, each digit of his hands now a blunt poker testing the strength of the wooden arms of the chair.

  “Any dude dumb enough to get involved with a white bitch in your circumstances needs a lot of work.”

  His crudeness crashes over his brother’s face like a tidal wave. I lean back in my chair, content for now to watch the family dynamic work itself out. Andy cocks his head at his brother as if he is amazed that Morris can use such terms, and especially in front of me. Yet his tone, when he finally speaks, is mild.

  “White bitch?” he says, laying equal emphasis on both words.

  “Mo, you haven’t even laid eyes on her.”

  “Damn straight,” Morris says dispassionately as he looks squarely but blandly at me as if I were a poorly painted bowl of fruit in a frame on the wall.

  “She’s played you for the starry-eyed, guess-who’scoming-to-dinner nigger aristocrat you’ve always wanted to be. If you had to have some respect able pussy, what’s wrong with Yettie? She’s always gone into heat every time your name comes up. You’ve dragged Yettie down to work with those shit-for-brains fuck-ups and now you won’t even look at her ‘cause you’re too busy sniffing white pussy. Damn, Andy, the only way they’ll let more than one nigger at a time in that bunny hutch where you live is in a maid’s uniform.”

  As awful as Morris sounds, I have to resist the urge to hug him. I have thought everything he is saying. But white people can’t talk to blacks that way. Afraid I will end what is be coming an embarrassing but revealing harangue, I stare into the space between the two brothers, wondering how much more of this Andy will take. Yet surely Morris is no surprise to him. Everything comes with a price, and perhaps Morris is merely presenting his bill. After a few polite minutes of chitchat to show him I was real, I had intended to ask Morris to wait outside, but now I wanted him to stay. Despite his crudeness, he is delivering some badly needed reality therapy to his brother, who, amazingly, doesn’t seem angered by it.

  As if he were a child learning to pray, Andy brings his hands together and touches them to his lips.

  “My brother’s living proof,” he tells me, “of my theory that the most rabid racists and chauvinists are black men.”

  Peeling somehow that Morris, Leon Robinson, and I are not all that different, I shake my head.

  “I doubt that.”

  Brother Morris, clean-shaven and almost burr-headed, so closely clipped is his bristled head, clearly couldn’t care less about our sociological speculations and now gives me a hard stare.

  “I should of figured Andy’d get a white lawyer but I hear you don’t mind leaning on people. Can’t he agree to spill some shit on this Olivia Le Master and still cut a deal?”

  Perhaps I should feel insulted, but I can live with the word “lean.” Morris understands the game, but surely he doesn’t know how prescient his remark is, and I doubt he knows how deeply involved Andy and Olivia are. Quickly, before Andy can interrupt, I reply, “Sure he could, but he says she hasn’t done anything wrong except trust his judgment.”

  “Bullshit!” Morris explodes, slapping the arms of the chair.

  “According to you,” he says, turning to his brother, “she was gonna pocket a couple million off her own kid’s death.”

  Implicit in Morris’s question to me is the suggestion that Andy conspired with Olivia. More probably, Morris, cynical beyond words, thinks as I do that Andy may have been duped.

  Andy returns his brother’s stare. He is younger, but he isn’t about to be bullied by him.

  “Olivia’s only mistake in this nightmare,” he says stubbornly, “was to let me shock her daughter.”

  I watch Andy’s lips curl into a rare but now familiar pout, signaling he won’t even begin to be budged. If this were still a charge of manslaughter, I’d have another guilty plea on my hands. It is as if it has taken his brother’s presence for him to admit he has some responsibility for Pam’s death, something that can’t be easy to accept when all his energy has been directed toward fighting for his freedom. How ironic that his streetwise, misanthropic brother has had the effect of stimulating his conscience.

  “And your mistake,” Morris replies to Andy but nicking a glance at me, “was to pull your pants down when she started wagging her white ass at you.”

  Maybe Morris knows more than I think. Andy, who rarely uses profanity in my presence and never refers to women in sexist terms, merely winces as he says to me, “Morris is a real liberal, isn’t he?”

  Never having had a brother, and not being particularly close to my only sister (we blow hot and cold), I don’t get it.

  What binds these two except blood?

  “I think that species,” I reply, “has gone out of business.” “I hope to hell you’re right,” Morris says benignly.”

  “They were about to kill us black folks.”

  Despite my vow to keep out of this, I laugh out loud.

  Morris probably thinks Franklin Roosevelt was part of a Communist plot to overthrow this country, while his brother may well pray to him every night. Still, they must touch something in each other. Maybe it’s just as simple as sleeping in a room together for a number of years and calling the same man and woman your parents. “The composition of the jury could be crucial for us,” I say, having called attention to myself and feeling forced to speak. I would like to be able to discuss my plan to force Leon Robinson to admit his membership in the Trackers, but I am afraid of the reaction I’ll get from Andy. Despite a concerted effort in the last few days on my part to get some information on Leon, I still have no evidence that he deliberately let go of Pam. Yet, surely it was as obvious to Leon as it was to Yettie that Andy and Olivia were romantically involved; and, given his feeling about blacks, Leon wouldn’t miss an opportunity to act upon his pent-up hatred. Too bad I can’t prove it.

  “Damn straight,” Morris says emphatically, giving the chair a rest and slapping his knee with the palm of his hand. With his height and aggressiveness, Morris could have been a point guard in basketball had he gone to col lege. Owner of several businesses and some real estate in downtown Atlanta, according to his brother, Morris had better things to do than dribble a basketball and waste his time fantasizing about the pros.

  “It only takes one to hang up a jury,” Morris says, looking at me for confirmation.

  When I nod, he says, “On the other hand, no nigger I know, man or bitch, is gonna like it when it comes out Andy was messin’ with white pussy.”

  I’ve almost gotten used to Morris, but when he says the “N” word, I flinch. For the last two days I’ve worried that there will be no blacks on the jury. Since Blackwell County is about twenty percent black (though its percentage of registered voters from whom the jury panel is selected could be lower), there should be at least a couple. But this is the kind of no-win case that makes prospective jurors, especially blacks, suddenly remember they are about to miss their mother’s funeral in Cleveland.

  As if we have touched on something sacred, Andy pointedly changes the subject.

  “Tell Morris about our expert,” he says to me.

  Morris, like a dog with his favorite bone, shakes his head.

  “You’re not gonna pull this shit about race not being an issue,” he says to his brother.

  Again, I feel relief that Morris is here.

  “It’s the most important thing in this case,” I tell Morris, convinced that only he can bring Andy around on this subject.

  “As a psychologist Andy has got to appreciate more than either of us that the jury is going to be influenced by their own racial biases.

  We just can’t sit there while the prosecutor takes advantage of that and we don’t,” I plead, hoping Morris will work on him.

  For the first time today, Andy’s magnificent eyes begin to smolder behind the gold frames of his glasses.

  “You know exactly how I feel about this,” he warns me, his voice a low rumble, “and you gave me your word. You are n
ot going to pander to the racist instincts in the courtroom, and that is final.”

  “Using peremptory strikes to keep whites who won’t admit their racism off” the jury,” I say, somewhat disingenuously, “is hardly pandering.” Andy and I have previously discussed that in a capital case the defense gets to eliminate up to twelve potential jurors without having to disclose a reason, and the prosecution gets to eliminate ten. This tradition, not required by the United States Constitution and purely a creature of state law around the country, has as its purpose the selection of an impartial jury.

  Like a law professor lecturing the statistically inevitable bad apple in his ethics class, Andy adjusts his glasses as if he would prefer not to see me and thunders, “You just want to use the system to get a black racist on the jury.”

  Instinctively, I shake my head. Hell, I want both. I want to win his damn case for him. His long arm striking like a snake, Morris bridges the space between their chairs and clutches his brother’s arm.

  “Jesus Christ!” he yells.

  “Every person on this earth is racist. I don’t give a damn who you are. You think you aren’t one the way you run after whites? You hate us niggers so bad it makes you sick to look at us!”

  Andy recoils as if Morris were trying to spit on him.

  “I

  don’t live where I do,” Andy says icily, “because I hate African-Americans.”

  Morris laughs, sending an ugly barking sound through my small office as he holds the arm of Andy’s chair so he can’t pull back further.

  “You’re scared shitless by us. You always have been. Even when you were a kid, you wouldn’t go play basketball if it was just a bunch of niggers.”

  “I wasn’t any good and didn’t enjoy playing,” Andy observes coolly.

  “And I live where I do because of the crime downtown.”

  Disgusted, Morris gives Andy’s chair a shove.

  “Bullshit!”

  he snorts.

  “Every other black person you see looks like a mugger to you.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Andy scoffs, meeting his brother’s now malevolent gaze. Watching this, I wonder how close to the truth Morris is. Their shared history has to count for something. Though I doubt if I would call for Morris to come hold my hand while I struggled through a life-threatening illness, I’m glad to have him now because I don’t have the guts to challenge Andy this way. And I can’t imagine he is making any of this up for my benefit. By the expression on his face he is as frustrated by his brother as I am.

  “If you get convicted,” Morris says, his voice dropping,

  “we’ll get a chance to see how scared you are, ‘cause the penitentiary is full of us!”

  Maintaining his composure, Andy looks at Morris and me as if we are necessary but inescapably inferior beings. Maybe we are, but when this case is over, it seems highly likely that Morris and I will be going home, while he goes to jail.

  it is late afternoon when Olivia arrives with the attorney for her company for a meeting that has been postponed twice.

  Karen Ott is no more a criminal defense attorney than I am a real estate lawyer. If Olivia is eventually charged, undoubtedly Karen will bow out before the ink is dry on the warrant for Olivia’s arrest; but for now, she is here and plainly un comfortable with her role. Andy has seized on Olivia’s failure to go out and hire the best criminal lawyer money can buy as proof of her innocence. I’m not so sure she hasn’t already done so and is only appearing to be represented by Karen. Olivia may be as pure as new-fallen snow, but I no longer trust a word out of her mouth.

  “It’s just going to be you, your client, me, and Olivia,” Karen says nervously after I tell her that Andy wants Morris to sit in with us. She is wearing a silk designer blouse that has never seen the inside of a courtroom, and has admitted in a previous conversation that it is difficult for her to refuse Olivia, especially since she does all her title business. I have kept to myself Olivia’s attempt to employ me.

  “If you’re going to insist on it,” I say, pretending reluctance I do not feel, “I’ll tell him.” Morris, though he has promised to be merely an observer, is too much of a loose cannon for this meeting, which may soon take on the over tones of something other than a final get-our-stories-straight session. At some point I will take this opportunity to remind Olivia of her past.

  I have reserved the conference room for this meeting. Pour people make my office seem a little close, especially under the circumstances. Andy and I take the east side of the table.

  His former lover and her lawyer sit directly opposite from us. I do not offer coffee and Cokes. If they want something, they can ask for it. Andy is wearing a light gray suit with one of those wild, flowered ties in fashion that I can’t bring my self to buy. Even Morris, no clotheshorse either, is wearing one. Andy looks everywhere in the room except at the face of the woman he told me he loved. Maybe he, too, is finally having second thoughts about Olivia’s innocence.

  Though I have requested this meeting, Karen begins it by asking me if I think Olivia should consider taking the Fifth Amendment and not testifying, which is another way of asking me if I have any knowledge that her client bears some criminal responsibility for what happened. Though she doesn’t practice criminal law, nobody has ever said Karen was dumb. She is not bad-looking for a real estate lawyer.

  In addition to being as tall as her client, she looks around the mouth and eyes like that goofy movie star Geena Davis. She has the advantage of being able to claim relative ignorance.

  Even if my client can’t bear to take a good look at his former lover, I can and do. She looks damn nice. Her hair, longer than the last time I saw her, is tightly permed. Her long legs, shaped by black tights under a short teal-green skirt, make her look sexier than I remembered. I guess if I were a woman and knew I was going to be on the front page of every news paper in the state the day after tomorrow, I’d go shopping and to the beauty parlor, too. Now that I’ve been handed this opportunity, I say, “I’m beginning to wonder, Karen. This morning I was told that your client” I watch Olivia’s face “years ago gave up another child she had abused.”

  “That’s not true!” Olivia says, jerking her head sharply in my direction. But there is no mistaking she has been caught off guard. I turn and look at Andy who has become rigid in his chair. Behind his lenses, his eyes, more cinnamon than brown today, are wide and staring like a startled child’s, reflecting a mixture of anxiety, surprise, and fear. For once I have shocked him.

  “Who told you that?” Olivia demands, her voice shrill with anger.

  “I’m not at liberty to say,” I say, only half lying.

  “I don’t think Andy or I knew you had another child, Olivia.”

  “I knew about her son,” Andy says weakly. It is clear from his tone, though, that he hasn’t been told everything.

  “It wasn’t child abuse; it was an accident,” Olivia says, her voice urgent and loud.

  “He pulled a pan of water off the stove. I was going through a bad time then and was drinking a lot. In fact, by then I had become a full-fledged alcoholic.”

  This admission does not come easy, and Olivia looks at me with undisguised resentment.

  I do not quite shrug in disbelief, but I do not want Andy to think Olivia should be allowed to worm out of this one so easily.”

  “Is that all?” I ask, indicating by my tone that I know more.

  “Val had had a couple of accidents before this, and in my condition I couldn’t handle going through some kind of child-abuse proceeding, so I let my mother in Ohio take him, and that’s where he is today.”

  What a great mother you’ve been, I think.

  “How come you’ve never tried to get him back?” I ask, drawing the battle lines between us.

  “Children and Family Services would have worked with you. Both state and federal law requires them to work to rehabilitate the family.”

  “Val is happy where he is,” she says, her voice without a trace
of warmth. I have found her guilty of abuse even if there is no court order.

  “I see him whenever I can.”

  I am the enemy now, and that is okay with me. I don’t like her much either. I say to Karen, “I don’t know if Jill Marymount knows this yet or not.”

  Karen’s slightly round face appears deflated by this turn of events. This is more than she bargained for.

  “Is this admissible?”

  she asks me.

  “It might well be,” I say, sensing Andy’s discomfort. He has begun to squirm in his seat like a small child who needs to use the toilet. Perhaps this revelation will be like replacing a distorted pane of glass in his bathroom mirror, and when Andy takes a hard look at himself tomorrow morning he might see a different man.

  “I want to testify,” Olivia says, her jaw set, but her words sound brittle as if she has begun to doubt that she is still in control of her own fate.

  Karen says in a low voice intended to soothe her client.

  “We can talk about it later.” Olivia barely nods, and Karen, her gray-green eyes narrowing with obvious distaste at the question she is about to ask, says to me,”

  “What are you going to say in your opening statement? Will you admit their affair?”

  I look over at Andy who is studying a blank spiral note book he has brought in with him.

  “I don’t see how it can be avoided,” I say, beginning to warm to the role of themes senger of bad news. If Olivia doesn’t testify, by the time we get to closing argument I can consider pointing a finger at her, possibly without running too great a risk that the jury will find the remaining fingers are pointed at my client. I justify this decision by saying, “If Andy is going to stay out of prison or worse, the jury will have to trust him. If he tries to hide anything, it will be extremely difficult for them to accept him, given that most or all of them will be white and will suspect a relationship anyway. His credibility is every thing in this case.” Without having said so, I have implied her client has none.

  Olivia’s long, sensuous face dips slightly, as if she knew this part of the story wouldn’t be left on the cutting-room floor. Remembering her coldness at the probable cause hearing I ask her, “If you do testify tomorrow, how reluctant a witness are you going to be?”