The Dark Backward

by D. W. Buffa

“You wouldn’t want them to remain in ignorance, would you?”

  “And to cure that ignorance you were going to bring them – in fact you did bring them, as I recall – the wonders of modern medicine. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, absolutely – These people, living out there like that….That was the first thing we worried about, the kind of diseases they must be carrying. So, yes, of course we brought medicine, and a team of physicians.”

  “Are you trying to tell us that these people – two or three hundred of them – had no doctors, no medicine of any kind?”

  “They were isolated, cut off from civilization. They were -”

  “Cut off from civilization, you say. But that doesn’t mean they didn’t have a civilization of their own, an organized way of life. It doesn’t mean that they didn’t know how to deal with the sort of accidents and illness everyone has, does it?”

  “Yes, perhaps; but only in the most primitive sense. The Indians of the Orinoco know the use of herbs, for example, if that’s the sort of thing to which you’re referring.”

  Darnell nodded as if in agreement, but still seemed not to understand.

  “But no doctors, in the way we know them; and certainly nothing in the way of medical technology. Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Yes, exactly right; which is the reason –”

  “So none of these people would know whether when a woman was pregnant she was going to give birth to a healthy child? No way to know, Mr. Phipps, whether the child she was carrying might be born deformed or in some serious way impaired. Correct?”

  “Yes; I mean, no, there wouldn’t be a way to know that. I see where you’re going with this, but -”

  “I’m not going anywhere with it, Mr. Phipps. I’m only trying to establish the facts of what happened, the facts to which you were a witness.”

  Darnell paced rapidly in front of the jury box, three steps one way, three steps back, his gaze fixed on a point straight in front of him as if he were making an effort to concentrate his mind. He suddenly stopped moving, nodded quickly as if he had just come to some agreement with himself and stared hard at the witness.

  “You said you thought at first that you were watching a funeral, that the defendant appeared to pray to heaven. It was only after he told you that he had killed the child that you changed your mind, that you interpreted those same facts – what you actually saw – in a different way. But if it’s possible, as you’ve just admitted, that the child had been born with a condition that with us would have meant the end of the pregnancy, a condition that would have made it impossible for the child to live, you’re forced, are you not, to go back to your original interpretation and view this for what you thought it was: a grieving father doing what he had to do? What you yourself said was what he seemed to think ‘fitting.’?”

  Leland Phipps jumped forward to the edge of the chair and jabbed the air with his finger.

  “You forget! That wasn’t the reason he used that word. It was ‘fitting’ because the child he fathered was the child of his sister. What he clearly meant was that it was fitting that a child like that, a child born of incest, not be permitted to live.”

  Angrily, Darnell stepped closer.

  “He never said any such thing and you know it! That’s only how you chose to take it.”

  Phipps drew back. His hands rested in his lap. A look of satisfaction filled his eyes.

  “He said the mother of the child was his sister,” he said quite calmly. “That’s not something I made up.”

  Darnell shoved his hands deep into his pants pockets and for a few short seconds stared gloomily at the faded hardwood floor.

  “There were how many people living on this island?” he asked, barely lifting his eyes.

  “Nearly three hundred.”

  “Living there for how long?”

  “It’s hard to say, we really don’t know. We’ve only just begun to study them, but hundreds of years, I imagine; perhaps even longer.”

  “All alone, isolated, generation after generation?”

  “Yes, I don’t see any other possibility.”

  Darnell placed his hand on the back of his neck, a puzzled expression on his face.

  “Did you ever read Mutiny on the Bounty, Mr. Phipps?”

  “Yes, I’m sure I did, as a boy.” He seemed as much amused as surprised by the question.

  “It’s the first in what became a trilogy. Did you know that?”

  “I’m not sure I did.”

  “It’s very interesting, the way the story ends. After a very long time – seventy or eighty years – Pitcairn’s Island is discovered along with the descendants of Fletcher Christian and the other mutineers. What is particularly interesting, Mr. Phipps, is how many of the children had the same father but different mothers. Now what do you suppose would have happened, out there in that isolated place, if it hadn’t been discovered by the outside world? What do you think would have happened when, in just a few short years, those children, all of them at least half-brothers and half-sisters, had become of an age to have children of their own? Tell us, Mr. Phipps, would you have arrested all of them on charges of incest and brought them here for trial?”

  “Your Honor!” cried Hillary Clark as she sprang from her chair. “That’s an outrageous thing to ask!”

  “It’s what’s been done here that’s the outrage,” said Darnell before the judge could say a word. “The prosecution objects to a question about a work of fiction – why? Because the only permissible outrages are the ones she and the witness commit themselves?”

  Suddenly the courtroom was alive, everyone talking at once. William Darnell was a legend, known to push the limits as far and as often as he could, but no one had seen him go this far before. Evelyn Pierce hammered her gavel.

  “Silence or I’ll clear the courtroom!” She turned a withering glance on her old friend. “Mr. Darnell, you have exactly two seconds to apologize!”

  “But your Honor, I -”

  “Two seconds, Mr. Darnell!”

  “I apologize, your Honor, to the court and to Ms. Clark. I shouldn’t have said what I said.”

  Evelyn Pierce was barely satisfied.

  “This isn’t like you, Mr. Darnell. I think you know me well enough to know I won’t tolerate this kind of thing in my courtroom.”

  “Age, your Honor; I’m afraid it’s catching up with me,” he explained with a boyish, puckish grin.

  “It isn’t your age that the problem, Mr. Darnell; it’s the fact that your mind works so fast your mouth sometimes gets impatient.”

  This cut the tension. The courtroom crowd relaxed. The jurors who had been sitting on the edge of their seats sat back. Darnell shook his head in wonder at a public reprimand that seemed more a backhanded compliment.

  “Mr. Phipps!” he exclaimed with a burst of energy that riveted everyone’s attention. “Let’s leave aside Mutiny on the Bounty. Have you read the Bible?”

  Phipps nearly fell off the witness stand.

  “Have I read…? Yes, I’ve read the Bible, not as thoroughly as perhaps I should, but -”

  “Genesis. You’ve read that, it’s something you’re familiar with?”

  “Yes, reasonably so.”

  “The story of Adam and Eve?’

  Laughter rippled through the courtroom. Leland Phipps could only stare.

  “The story of Adam and Eve, Mr. Phipps. It’s a simple question.”

  “Yes, I know the story.”

  “Tell me if I have it right. God created Adam, and then, out of one of Adam’s ribs, God created woman. He created Eve. Is that correct.”

  “Yes, perfectly.”

  “Then Adam and Eve had two children, Cain and Abel, and we all know what happened to them. Cain slew Abel. My question, however, is simply this: If God created Adam and Eve, and if they had two sons….well, what then?”

  “What then? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “How did the children of Adam and Eve have childre
n? You see the difficulty, Mr. Phipps. In the beginning, whichever way you look at it, without some form of what you so quickly and easily denounce as morally and criminally wrong, without incest, Mr. Phipps, there would be no human race!”

  Hillary Clark immediately objected, but Judge Pierce overruled her.

  “Go ahead, Mr. Darnell.”

  “Only one more question, your Honor. Mr. Phipps, you testified that the defendant made these admissions to you; confessed, as you would have it, to having had relations with his sister and having been responsible for the death of their child. Is it still your testimony that he said these things to you?”

  “Yes, absolutely; there is no doubt at all. That is exactly what he said.”

  “And he did this freely, of his own free will? He wasn’t subjected to coercion or anything like that?”

  “No, I told you. He was there, by the fire, when he told me what he had done.”

  “In other words, Mr. Phipps, the defendant made no attempt to conceal anything that he had done. The fire, the statements he made to you – everything was done out in the open. Tell me, Mr. Phipps, does that sound like someone with a guilty conscience, someone who thinks he has something to hide?”

  Chapter Eight

  The next ferry did not leave until half past five. Darnell did not mind the wait. It would give him a chance to wander around, lost in the anonymity of the crowd; a chance to forget, or try to forget, the trial. He could not quite remember the last time he had come down here, to the Ferry Building, or the last time he had taken a ferry across the bay. For years the building had been an eyesore, an aging relic of the distant days when San Francisco had been a bustling commercial port. He remembered coming here as a boy, when the ships were unloaded by hand and sweating longshoremen shouted eager obscenities as another huge cargo net was lowered onto the dock. Born in the city, Darnell had grown up dreaming of ships and sailors, great adventures and exotic places, certain that all the excitement in the world was waiting for him out at the edge of the horizon, somewhere just beyond the Golden Gate.

  William Darnell leaned on the railing, gazing across the bay. It was Summer’s idea to meet for dinner in Sausalito, her idea that instead of driving over he take the ferry instead. He scuffed his shoe against the thick block of wood that kept paper and other debris from falling off into the water below. There were always people here now, crowds of them, come to shop for gourmet foods or to eat in one of the fashionable restaurants that had changed one of the city’s most famous landmarks from a shipping center into an upscale urban market. Darnell thought about going inside to look around at what the vendors had to offer, but the late day sun felt too good against his face.

  It was odd, the way those boyhood dreams had changed. He had not had to wait that long until he was sailing on a ship to adventures in exotic places, but the war had taught him all he wanted to learn about the sea. The last time he had passed beneath the Golden Gate was the day he had sailed home. The only sailing he had done since had been on small boats that belonged to his friends, and the trips he had taken had never gone beyond the bay. He wondered now if that had been a mistake, whether he should have seen more of the world, but for a long time after the war the last thing he had wanted to do was leave the city. And he never did. His life had been here, in the city, the only place he had ever wanted to live.

  A few feet from where he stood, an old woman wearing a large, bulky flannel shirt sat on a bench, tossing breadcrumbs to the seagulls wandering fearlessly about her feet.

  “I used to come here with my father,” she said, somehow aware that Darnell had turned to watch her. “I was just a little girl, but I remember what it was like here, before they built the bridges and the ferries ran back and forth all day between here and Oakland, bringing people to work. I remember when all the men dressed like you, in suits and ties.” She threw the last breadcrumb over the railing and laughed as the few seagulls still remaining flew off to get it. “I’m glad they brought the ferries back,” she said as she ambled to her feet and dusted off her hands. “It’s the best way there is to see the city, especially this time of day, with the sun going down over the bridge and the shadows start to move. It always reminds me what a mystery the city has always been.”

  Despite her rumpled clothing and unkempt gray hair, the woman spoke with a lucid precision that matched the bright clarity of her eyes.

  “But I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that, Mr. Darnell. You’ve lived here at least as long as I have.” With a hand gnarled with arthritis she touched him gently on the arm. “I’d wish you good luck with this case of yours, but all the years I’ve been reading the papers you always seem to win. Luck doesn’t seem to have much to do with it.” She smiled in the way of older people who, though they have never seen each other before, have much in common. “I’m glad I finally had a chance to meet you. You’re the last great one we have left.”

  The last great one: Words not just of praise, but of affection, and, as he well understood, words that carried with them their own finality. Darnell had his doubts whether he had ever been as good as she had said, but he liked that she had said it, liked the fact that in the city he loved, he had become, in the minds of at least some of those who lived here, a part of the fabric, a part of the legend, of the place. He tapped his knuckles three times on the metal railing and then walked across to the ticket window.

  He bought a ticket and then bought a newspaper and joined the line that had begun to form. The ferries did not bring cars across anymore, only passengers, and they did not look like the squat open-mouthed ferries he remembered as a boy, more like sleek white coast guard cutters. But this was California, and this ferry went to Sausalito in Marin, and a dozen different passengers had bicycles to bring. A few of those who boarded with him took a second look, but no one bothered him; no one came up to introduce themselves or offer an opinion about the case. The bicycles were neatly stacked on racks just inside, and the passengers quietly took their seats. Darnell sat on the open deck on top.

  As soon as the ferry started to move, Darnell admitted to himself that Summer Blains was right, and so was that old woman. “Old woman,” Darnell laughed to himself. “She’s probably younger than I am.” He shook his head at his own strange vanity. “A good deal younger, if you want to be honest about it.” But never mind, the point was not age, but the truth of what they had said, though the woman he had just talked to was the one who really had it right. This was the best way to see the city: on a ferry going away from it. You could see it the way you remembered it, the first time you saw it whole, glistening in the morning sun or, like now, in the faded light of early evening, with the sky a solid azure blue and the Golden Gate turning deeper shades of reddish orange. Even for someone who loved the city, it was easy, if you had lived here all your life, to forget the sense of wonder you got when you saw it like this, rising up from the water like an island in the bay. Even the great steel bridge that connected the city to the northern shore seemed to float like some disembodied dream designed to make the place seem more magical.

  A line Darnell had first read as a boy drifted chance-like through his mind: “That City of Gold to which adventurers congregated out of all the winds of heaven.” Robert Louis Stevenson had written that and, as far as Darnell was concerned, it was still the best description of the city and its character. More than that even, it was still the best description of the way he felt, the pride he took in being part of a place that had from its very beginnings laughed at convention and whenever possible ignored the law.

  The farther the ferry moved away from it, the closer the city seemed, as if the more of it you could see - the more of it you could take in – the more it became your own possession. There were times Darnell wished he had been a writer so he could put it all down in words, even though he knew somehow that words would always be inadequate. He remembered the day, years ago, when half the city had turned out to say good-bye to Herb Caen, the newspaper columnist who for half a century had
given everyone who read him the sense that the city was the only place to be. Dying of cancer, Caen said that he had had a dream in which he found himself wandering around heaven and that St. Peter had come up to him and asked him how he liked it. To which he replied, “It’s not bad, but it isn’t San Francisco!”

  But still, Darnell told himself, he should have seen other places, seen more of the world, traveled, spent summers in Italy or the south of France, and seen a bullfight in Spain. He was lying to himself, pretending a regret he did not feel, enjoying for a moment the luxury of a disappointment he had not had. He had been lucky beyond measure and he knew it. Travel, see other places – it was like being married to the most beautiful woman he had ever seen and wondering what he might have found had he stayed a bachelor. See other places – where would he have gone to see something like this, the Golden Gate glowing in the evening sun, and there, just on the other side of it, billowing hundreds of feet above, like the curtain in a theater, a thick, impenetrable fog, shielding behind it all the mysteries of the sea. The mysteries, Darnell reminded himself, of that island where Adam had been found.

  He tried not to think about the trial. He had read enough Hemingway to know that the best preparation was sometimes to let your mind do its work undisturbed by conscious thought. He watched the fog spiral higher and the sunlight shining on the bay and he watched the long white wake stretch out in the distance and listened to his own brief stories about the past, the voice inside his head that still remembered who he had been and who he was.

  Summer Blaine was waiting for him on the dock. He waved, but she did not see him. He smiled at the eager look in her eyes as she searched the crowd, and smiled even more when she finally found him and ran the last few steps and kissed him gently on the side of his face.

  “Shall we find a cheap motel, or would you rather have dinner first?” he asked with his best imitation of a scoundrel’s glance. Summer took his arm and walked beside him with an easy, swinging gait.

  “Why waste money on a motel when we can always use the backseat of my car?”