Silent Witness

by Richard North Patterson

  Stella turned to Sam, her voice almost casual. “That first time, when you say Marcie Calder gave you oral sex in your office at Lake City High School, did you reach climax?”

  Glancing at Tony, Sam folded his hands. “Yes.”

  “In Marcie Calder’s mouth?”

  Sam shut his eyes again. “Yes.”

  “Do you happen to know why this inexperienced girl found you so irresistible?”

  “No.” Eyes still shut, Sam shook his head. “No…”

  “Did she have emotional problems, do you think?”

  “No.”

  “No psychiatric treatment that you know of?”

  “No.”

  “Her grades were good?”

  “Yes.”

  “Her reputation at the school was good?”

  “Yes.”

  “No rumors of promiscuity?”

  “No.”

  Stella looked at him in open disbelief. “And yet this sixteen-year-old girl, without any prior warning, was suddenly so overcome by your appeal that she wanted to give you oral sex in the vice principal’s office.”

  “That’s what happened.” Sam’s face was suffused with new resentment. “Maybe you can’t understand it, but that’s what happened.…”

  “No,” Tony murmured under his breath. In the jury box, the nutritionist—the woman with two teenage daughters—looked startled and then stared at Sam with the same distaste and belief, Tony was certain, that he himself felt.

  In a level voice, Stella said, “Explain it to me, Mr. Robb. Please, make me understand.”

  Sam’s cheeks turned red. “I can’t,” he said. “She just wanted that with me.…”

  “Uh-huh. Just like she wanted you to be the first to insert your penis in her anus…”

  “Look,” Sam started, then caught himself. “I was the responsible adult here, not Marcie. I knew we shouldn’t have done those things, and still I took advantage, all right? I said that.”

  “So about anal sex, at first you were reluctant?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’d never, ever, done that, Mr. Robb? Not even once?”

  “Objection.” Tony tried to make his voice sound weary. “It’s obvious what Ms. Marz wishes to do—to make everyone here squirm with such discomfort that it rubs off on Mr. Robb. But if she wants to humiliate him, she should at least choose questions that have some theoretical relationship, however tenuous, to Marcie Calder. This question has none at all, and to me and I’m sure to others, it’s deeply offensive.”

  “If it is,” Stella retorted, “then I regret offending Mr. Lord. But the purpose of my question, Your Honor, is to test the credibility of this witness. When Mr. Robb claims that this sixteen-year-old girl initiated a sexual act as to which she had no prior experience, his own experience is relevant to whether this story deserves credence. Particularly when Ms. Calder cannot be here to answer for herself—”

  “Relevant evidence goes to death,” Tony snapped. “Not to her sexual reputation. Or experience.”

  “Your Honor…,” Stella began.

  “Never mind, Ms. Marz. I’m overruling Mr. Lord. You can have your answer.”

  Promptly, Stella turned to Sam. “Had you, before that night, ever experienced anal intercourse with anyone? Man or woman?”

  Face red with anger, Sam stared back at Stella. “No.”

  “No? So how did this eleventh grader get you to go along, Mr. Robb?”

  Sam folded his arms. “I don’t know.…”

  “I mean, there you were in a car, just sitting in the lot at Taylor Park, and a sixteen-year-old girl from your high school is trying to get you to sodomize her? Didn’t you stop to wonder if that was such a good idea?”

  “I wasn’t thinking.…”

  “So how many times did Marcie have to ask you?”

  “I don’t know.…”

  “Did you make her beg? Or were you more gracious than that?”

  Sam sat straighter. “It just happened,” he said between his teeth. “I lost my head.…”

  “You? Hard to believe.” When Sam stiffened, insulted, Stella underscored this with an ironic smile. “So once you lost your head, how did you do it? You know, the act.”

  “Jesus,” Saul murmured. But Tony did not move.

  “Sam’s on his own,” he whispered. “If I break in every time he looks angry, the jury will hate us both.”

  Brusquely, Sam said to Stella, “What kind of question is that?”

  “Okay, I’ll break it down for you. Did Marcie bend over?”

  Sam’s voice filled with resentment. “Yes.”

  “And then you put on a condom?”

  “Yes.”

  “It was in a foil packet, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And then you had to take off your pants?”

  Sam folded his arms again, staring at Stella with open dislike. “Yes. I did.”

  “How long did all that take?”

  Sam’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe five minutes.”

  “And all this time, you were struggling with your conscience.”

  “I don’t know.…”

  “Did Marcie do anything to encourage you? Or was she just lying there, bottom in the air, obediently waiting?”

  Sam took another deep breath. “She said that she wanted me.”

  “And you always did what this sixteen-year-old vamp wanted you to?”

  “We both wanted to, Ms. Marz.” Suddenly Sam’s voice was rueful, as if Stella had held the mirror to his shame. “And that makes it my fault.…”

  “How long did it take between the time she asked you and the time you decided to give anal sex a whirl?”

  “I don’t know. Five minutes.”

  “And another five or so minutes to put on the condom.”

  “Yes.”

  “So after you had the condom on, you put your erect penis between Marcie Calder’s buttocks, right?”

  Sam could no longer look at her—whether out of shame, or fear of his own anger, Tony could not tell. “Yes,” he said. “I did that.…”

  “Did she tell you if that hurt?”

  Sam swallowed. “I tried to take it slow.”

  Stella cocked her head. “How long, would you say, did it take to achieve full penetration? A couple of minutes, at least?”

  “I don’t know, Ms. Marz. I guess so.”

  “And after that, did you achieve climax?”

  “Yes.”

  Stella paused, her expression curious. “How long after?”

  Next to Tony, Saul smiled faintly at the table. “Clever,” he murmured, and Tony knew that Saul, like him, could see where Stella was headed.

  Sam looked down. “Four or five minutes.”

  “And then, afterward, Marcie asked you how it was.”

  Now the anger in Sam’s eyes seemed close to hatred. “Yes.”

  “And you were nice enough to thank her.”

  “Yes.”

  “Were you still inside her?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long did you stay inside her?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe another five minutes.”

  Stella gave him a cold smile: “So there you were, naked, lying on top of a sixteen-year-old with your penis inside her bottom. I hope at least it was dark out.”

  Sam took his water glass, sipping as he watched her with veiled eyes. “It was dark,” he said.

  “In fact, it must have been. Because, according to your testimony, you were startled by headlights.”

  “That’s right.”

  Stella paused a moment. “I guess it was dark when you started lovemaking too. I mean, otherwise you’d have worried about someone recognizing you. Or Marcie.”

  “Yes.”

  “It was also dark when you met her, right? At the gas station.”

  Sam hesitated, and Tony saw comprehension cross his face. “I wouldn’t say dark, Ms. Marz. I’d say dusk.”

  “How long did it take you to drive to Taylor Park?
Five minutes?”

  “Roughly.”

  “And was it dark then?”

  Sam sat back. “Mostly.”

  “How long after that did Marcie Calder whisper in your ear that she wanted you to penetrate her anus?”

  Sam scowled. “It was right away, almost.”

  “One minute, two minutes?”

  “Soon.” Sam’s answer was grudging; to Tony, the distraught man the jury had seen on direct examination was gone. “Say two minutes.”

  Stella paused, eyes narrowing, as if there were something she wished to visualize. “So,” she said, “it took at least five minutes to get to the park, one or two minutes for Marcie to proposition you, five minutes to wrestle with your conscience, at least five more to pull down your pants and get the condom on, a couple of minutes to achieve penetration, four or five minutes to orgasm, and, after that, roughly five minutes to thank Marcie politely before the headlights show up.” She gazed at the ceiling. “That comes to a half hour, give or take a minute or two. Sound right to you, Mr. Robb?”

  Sam folded his hands. “I don’t know,” he said coolly. “Maybe it didn’t take that long, Ms. Marz. I never checked my watch.”

  It was too obvious, Tony thought, that Sam understood the question. From the nutritionist’s skeptical expression, she thought this as well.

  Stella returned to the prosecution table, picking up a document. “Your Honor,” she said, “this is a certified copy of a report rendered by the National Meteorological Center in Steelton for Thursday, May twenty-third, the night Marcie Calder died. According to the survey, dusk occurred at approximately eight fifty-six. I ask the court to receive it into evidence.”

  Karoly looked at Tony. But before this jury, to challenge the meteorologic service was a losing proposition. Calmly, Tony said, “The defense has no objection.”

  In moments, the jurors were passing the report. Sam folded his arms again, defensive. “Would you agree, then,” Stella said to him, “that at the time you saw the headlights, it was roughly a half hour—if not more—past the time you met Marcie Calder at dusk?”

  Sam glanced at Tony. “Roughly.”

  “That would take us to nine twenty-five, at least. Do you have any reason to quarrel with that?”

  Sam spread his hands. “I don’t have any reason to say it’s true, either. I just don’t know, Ms. Marz, and neither do you.”

  Sam was tired, Tony saw: it was becoming difficult for him to maintain deference for more than a few questions. But what was more troubling was the difference in manner, caused by his antagonism to Stella: Sam no longer seemed contrite. Glancing at the clock, Tony made up his mind.

  “Your Honor,” he said to Karoly, “it’s close to noon. If, as it seems, Ms. Marz has reached a convenient place to break, perhaps we should take the noon recess.”

  Stella was prepared for this. With a brief look of disdain at Sam for hiding behind his lawyer, she said calmly, “If Mr. Robb is tired, I’m willing to give him some time off.…”

  “I’m fine,” Sam shot back.

  Tony gave Karoly his most pleasant smile. “I’m sure Mr. Robb is fine,” he said. “But I’m hungry. So perhaps we should ask Ms. Marz how much longer she plans to take.”

  Stella paused. “At least two hours.”

  Turning to Karoly, Tony shrugged. “The rest of the day, effectively.”

  Karoly looked from Sam to Stella. “Let’s take our break,” he said. “We’ll reconvene at one-thirty.”

  As Sam left the witness stand, clearly annoyed, Tony fooled with some papers, pretending not to look at him. Only when Sam was close enough did Tony say under his breath, without looking up, “Don’t ever fucking do that to me again. For the next hour and a half, pal, you can damned well shut up and listen.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  Fleeing reporters, Tony and Saul hurried to the witness room, Tony carrying a bag of roast beef sandwiches from the courthouse cafeteria. “God,” Saul murmured. “I think I’m in love. Do you suppose Stella would go out with an old fat Jewish defense lawyer?”

  Despite himself, Tony gave a thin smile. “Good, wasn’t she.”

  “Too good,” Saul answered, emitting a mock groan. “ ‘Explain it to me, Mr. Robb. Please, make me understand.’ Only a woman could get away with this.” He stopped at the door of the witness room, pensive. “Maybe if I promise her I’ll give up drinking…”

  Tony did not smile now. “I hope the jury’s not having the fun that you are.”

  “Don’t bet the ranch, Tony. She’s killing him.”

  Tony gave Saul his sandwich. “I’d better do this alone,” he said, and entered the witness room.

  Sam was waiting there, hands folded on the table in front of him. He looked wan, resentful, drained by Stella’s attack, and his gaze at Tony was opaque. “You wanted to talk,” Sam said.

  “I wanted you out of there before you started calling Stella a ‘cunt.’ ” Tony leaned forward, speaking more softly. “The woman’s a professional, Sam, and she’s doing her job.…”

  “Professional. She fucking hates me—”

  “Why wouldn’t she?” Tony snapped. “Don’t make that your problem, or it’ll be the jury’s.” He paused for emphasis, looking into Sam’s clear blue eyes. “The issue isn’t Stella Marz; it’s Marcie Calder. You’re not nearly sorry enough about what happened to her, Sam, and you can take that any way you want. Because you’re so busy resenting Stella that it even makes me wonder.”

  Sam sat back. “She’s humiliating me.”

  “Humiliation is the price of admission here. Your job is to see that it’s the only price.” Pausing, Tony took the seat across from Sam, putting the bag of sandwiches between them. “Let me explain the game, pal. Stella’s not just screwing up your time line. You’re letting the jury watch you get pissed off at a woman, which is exactly what she wants. Every time you show a flash of temper, someone in the jury is imagining you crushing Marcie’s skull with a bloody rock.” Tony made his voice soft again. “Maybe she offended you by getting pregnant, they’re thinking. Maybe she said she’d tell someone.…”

  Sam sat back, eyes wider. With equal quiet, he said, “What are you saying, Tony?”

  Tony drew a breath. “What I want you to do, every time you’re getting mad at Stella, is to think of Marcie Calder and how very sorry you are.”

  Sam stared at him. “I didn’t kill her, Tony.”

  For a moment, Tony was quiet. “I didn’t kill Alison,” he answered. “And there’s not been a day in the last twenty-eight years I haven’t felt sorry that she’s dead. If you can’t get back in touch with that same feeling, and within the next hour or so, your next twenty-eight years will be spent in prison.”

  Sam’s mouth opened, soundless; suddenly he looked winded, dispirited, and his nod, when it came, was a delayed reaction. All that was left on his face was fear.

  They still had an hour, Tony thought. “All right,” he said. “Let’s get a little food in us. Then we can talk about where Stella’s going.”

  * * *

  Taking the witness stand, Sam Robb was calm, composed.

  “After you got dressed,” Stella asked Sam, “what happened next?”

  Sam gave her a reflective look, as though trying to remember. “The very next thing,” he said at last, “was when Marcie said she wanted to get married.”

  “She just came out with it?”

  Sam nodded. “I think the headlights spooked her too. And it must have been on her mind.”

  “How did you react?”

  Sam shook his head in wonder. “I was flabbergasted—shocked. I remember that especially, but I know I felt guilty too.”

  “So you told Marcie you couldn’t see her anymore.”

  Sam tilted his head. “Like I told Mr. Lord, it was a little more than that—things about Sue, about being wrong for Marcie. It sounded empty, and I guess it really was.”

  “How did Marcie react?”

  “Upset,” Sam said. “Outraged. I�
�d never seen Marcie like that. I’m sure it was that she knew about the baby.”

  “How long did this conversation take?”

  “Not long. I’d say a couple of minutes.”

  “A couple of minutes?” Pausing, Stella looked incredulous. “Two minutes for Marcie to ask you to marry her, and for you to talk about your wife, your life, your twenty-four-year marriage, and all the reasons Marcie couldn’t throw away her life for you?”

  Sam placed a finger to his lips. “Maybe it was a little longer,” he said at last. “Maybe it was four minutes, or five. But we were both upset, for different reasons. I mean, when people fight, they start blurting things out at warp speed. You never stop to think.”

  Next to Tony, Saul watched Sam with keen attention. “What did you do?” Saul murmured. “Sedate him?” As if to underscore Sam’s change in manner, Stella gave him a considering look, ending in a smile so faint and so skeptical it was barely a smile at all. But Sam was behaving as Tony had ordered, and Tony’s most fervent hope was that Sam not go too far.

  “So here you are,” Stella was saying, “scared to death, the vice principal of Lake City High School in a car with a sixteen-year-old girl who could cost you your job, your career, your marriage, and your family, and now she’s terribly upset and angry with you, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And you couldn’t spare a few more minutes to try and calm her down?”

  Sam gave a helpless shrug. “She was out of the car so quick—”

  “Didn’t you follow her, Mr. Robb? To make sure she didn’t do anything rash?”

  Sam looked down. “I was worried about being seen.”

  “Weren’t you even more worried that she’d tell someone?”

  “I don’t know.…”

  “You don’t know? By your own admission you were one step from disaster, which is why you say you lied to everyone, and yet it never occurred to you that by rejecting Marcie Calder—as you say happened—you’d bring that same disaster right down on your head?”

  For a moment, Sam was silent. Tense, Tony watched the jury study Sam expectantly. “I thought she wouldn’t do that to me,” he said in an embarrassed mumble. “Really…”

  “Wait a minute, Mr. Robb. The Marcie Calder you describe was impulsive enough to give you oral sex in your office, aggressive enough to ask that you penetrate her anally, and it never occurred to you that this impulsive, aggressive, angry girl might tell someone you’d had sex with her?”