Court of Lies

by Gerry Spence

  Suddenly, Tina turned and threw her arms around her grandfather. “Why can’t Mama find a man like you” she cried, “instead of that stupid beast?” She held on to her grandfather as if he were the last man on earth—and the Indians were attacking.

  * * *

  For two years, Tina had been under the care of the renowned New York child psychiatrist Dr. Josephine Brady. The doctor was an avid mountain climber and rented a cabin every year in Jackson Hole. Lillian held nothing back. She told Horace about Tina shortly after they’d discovered they were getting serious, but his response was always the same: “I’ll take you, and everything and everybody you love, as part of me, including Tina.”

  Why was she attracted to this man? He wasn’t handsome like the pretty male faces in the magazine ads. He wasn’t an accomplished conversationalist. Often he was silent when she expected a response. And as often his naïveté was on the other side of her expectations. His money was an issue that she’d shelved to worry about later. She thought she had enough of her own money. She felt love for the man, but she thought his money might get in the way.

  One night at bedtime, Tina was breathing heavily and her eyes were iridescent and wide. Lillian thought she was approaching hysteria. “Mother, I know you wouldn’t have married him if he hadn’t possessed you like a witch. A witch, Mother!”

  Dr. Brady’s advice had been, “Do not engage the girl when she’s entered that strange land of hers.”

  “Was it his money, Mother? If it was his money, that was an awful thing to do. He must have possessed you for you to marry him for money. And he’s such a weird old man. Can’t you see the wrinkles on his face? Are you that blind?”

  “He’s not an old man. And you don’t judge people’s age by the number of wrinkles on their faces. You judge them by who they are, and the life they bring into your life.”

  “Well, he’s so old, he gets lost. I went with him to town like you asked, and he got lost—kept driving around, not knowing how to get back home.”

  “He’s always been that way, Tina. You inherited my good sense of direction, but this little town is new to him.”

  “A three-year-old couldn’t get lost here, Mother. Something’s wrong with him.”

  How could Lillian explain her relationship with Horace to Tina? Tina had experienced no close affiliation with anyone but her. True, Horace was strange during those “excursions.” Yes, he was older, but his age was a relief and served to protect her from the mob of horny Don Juans out there begging to be serviced. His wisdom provided what had been lacking in her father, and thrown in as a bonus were his romantic ways, as when he’d come home and drown her with pure love in his eyes and with a fistful of flowers.

  Later on, she and Sylvia Huntley were talking about “the man-woman thing,” as they called it. “At a certain age, we all secretly wanted babies,” Lillian said. “We didn’t understand it, but that’s what our hormones were hollering for. We bred like dogs. We called it love.”

  “I never wanted babies—not me, kiddo.” Sylvia said. She was a woman Lillian’s age—lean and athletic, not the delicate artist type. The roots of her short blond hair were dark. Her large canvases of tough men on hard-ridden horses struggling against weather, wilderness, and wild-eyed beasts hung in the galleries in Taos and Santa Fe. “Do you want babies with him?” Sylvia asked.

  “No. For God’s sake. I don’t want any more babies.”

  “Well then?”

  “But I like being loved. And I like not being alone.”

  “And the sex thing?” Sylvia asked, as if working down a checklist.

  “I don’t know how to talk about that. He’s older, and he’s not a sexual athlete. But men—they’re all different. And sometimes they bring something out in you that you didn’t know was there, and maybe you like it. You can’t just try on sex like a pair of shoes in the shoe store. Besides, shoes are just part of the outfit.”

  “I never wanted to be barefoot very long,” Sylvia said. She’d been married three times. “I see men like I see a painting. I finish one, take a break, and then start on the next. I’d hate to do just one painting in a lifetime. And I wouldn’t want it hanging on my living room wall forever.”

  “Two different kinds of art there. One with a brush and one with a bush,” Lillian said.

  “I used a brush on my first husband once,” Sylvia said.

  “What color did you paint it?”

  “Made a barber pole out of it.”

  They were drinking in the Bull Moose Bar. They turned down a couple of invitations to dance before they left. “You’re not as much fun to go out with anymore,” Sylvia said. “I think you got a serious case of ‘settlin’ down.’”

  * * *

  Tina was a list of contradictions. Her high school teachers, in their frequent conferences with Lillian, described Tina as “brilliant but…” It was the but that was the problem. The school counselor tried to downplay Tina’s unpredictable outbursts, her days of pouting, her lack of interaction with other students, her combativeness, but, at last, he was unable to avoid calling her “deeply disturbed.”

  Horace’s contacts with Tina had been sparing. When he and Lillian were together, Tina wouldn’t come out of her room. When Horace phoned Lillian, and if Tina answered, she’d often hang up. Once, after much cajoling, Lillian got Tina to join them for dinner. Tina glared at her plate, never looked up, never spoke a word, and ate nothing. But they’d been patient. They believed Tina was simply jealous of Lillian’s affection for Horace and that she’d get over it in time.

  “Mother, he is a warlock, you know. I’ve seen him doing those things?”

  “What things, honey?”

  “He walks up and down in front of the books in the library and never takes a book out. He just keeps walking back and forth, and sometimes he’s mumbling to himself. He’s like that polar bear in the zoo. It walks back and forth and back and forth all day, every day, in its cage. They say that no one goes into the bear’s cage because it would kill anyone who did.”

  “He’s just looking for a book, honey. You know we moved his whole library here.”

  Before Horace and Lillian were married, Dr. Brady had diagnosed Tina as borderline schizophrenic. The doctor explained that the disease is often progressive, and that the girl’s symptoms had finally manifested themselves to the point where the doctor could make the diagnosis. She assured Lillian that Tina’s condition was probably controllable with continued psychiatric supervision and medication.

  “My God! What have I done?” Lillian asked Dr. Brady.

  “It’s not your fault,” the doctor assured her. “Some believe the tendency for the disease is inherited, but others think it may be the result of subtle injuries in pregnancy or at birth. No one really knows.”

  Lillian folded her arms across her chest, as if to protect herself from further assaults of the shocking truth.

  “Teenagers with schizophrenia may suffer hallucinations and become delusional. They may withdraw even from those closest to them, and, from time to time, lose all contact with reality.”

  “She’s so afraid I’ll leave her. I always let her know exactly where I’ll be at any given time.”

  “As indeed you should,” Dr. Brady said.

  “And sometimes she acts as if I’m not there at all. I can’t get her to look at me or speak to me or acknowledge that I’m even alive.”

  “Yes,” the doctor said knowingly.

  “Should I take her out of school? She’s having all kinds of trouble there. She gets in fistfights with some of the boys. As you know, she’s large, and she’s strong. Her father, my second husband, was six and a half feet tall, and I’m no shrimp.”

  “As long as she stays on her medication, she’ll be better off in the small classes where she is, and where she can get individual attention.”

  “I can hire tutors.”

  “She needs social contacts,” the doctor advised.

  The intensity of Tina’s refusal to accept
Horace as her stepfather, or even as a member of their household, continued to grow. She blamed him for the destruction of “our happy home.” Once, she claimed Horace had tried to poison her. She wouldn’t eat if he went near the kitchen.

  “I try to keep her busy with her schoolwork,” Lillian told Dr. Brady. “At times she can do a week’s work overnight. She’s so quick. And other times I can’t get her to open a book, to watch TV, or even to come out of her room.”

  “A girl her age can’t understand the nature of her condition, so it can be a confusing, terrifying experience for her,” Dr. Brady said. “Then add all the normal stresses of teenage life and you understand the real meaning of teenage schizophrenia. It’s a world of terror, confusion, and loneliness.”

  One night after Lillian and Horace had been out to dinner, Tina came charging into Lillian’s bathroom. Lillian was getting ready for bed.

  “He’s dangerous, Mother. You don’t understand. He is very dangerous. I couldn’t sleep, worrying about you. I have to go to school in the morning, you know.”

  “Yes, and I have to go to work, too. So go to bed.”

  “I can’t go to bed until you kiss me good night.”

  With that, Lillian held Tina close to her, kissed her, turned her around and pointed her toward the bedroom door, gave her a small pat on the bottom, followed her into her room, kissed her again on the cheek, tucked her in, and handed her daughter her doggy doll. “I love you most of all,” Lillian said. “I will always be your mother until the day I die. That’s what’s important between us. That’s the way it will always be.” She turned out the light and shut the door before the girl could say more.

  Then she heard Tina crying. “Mother, the voices are arguing.”

  Lillian went back into the bedroom. “What’s the argument about?” she asked.

  “Some say I should kill him now. But others say I should wait.”

  “Tina, don’t frighten me like that. You are not going to kill anyone, ever. If you do, they’ll take you away from me, and we will never be able to be with each other again.”

  * * *

  That night after Tina had finally quieted down, Lillian called Sylvia. They met for coffee at the drugstore, as usual. The place was abandoned except for the pharmacist, who was sleeping, and the clerk up front, who was closing down the cash register. Still they whispered over their cups, the steam from their coffee rising between them.

  Lillian looked both ways before she said, “I had to talk to someone. Tina’s finally gone over the edge.”

  “What do you mean?” Sylvia asked.

  “She locks herself in her room and won’t come out. She screams in there night after night, and I go in, make sure she’s taken her meds, and sleep with her and calm her down.”

  “My God, girl, what are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know what to do. She’s getting worse. I keep calling Dr. Brady, and she says we have to be patient. Dr. Brady has been increasing her meds, but it isn’t helping. I’m scared to death. I took her out of school. I’m afraid she’s going to kill Horace.”

  “You have to call the police.”

  “They’ll just lock her up. I can’t do that. I’m the only one she trusts. Dr. Brady says I’m the only place she can escape from her nightmares. If I call the police, she’ll think I’ve betrayed her, and she’ll never trust me again, and never recover. You don’t call the police on your own sick child.”

  “What about Horace?”

  “These days, Horace is out of it most of the time. He wants to help, but he doesn’t seem to understand, and if he understood, what would he do? Then he falls off into that strange world of his, and sometimes he’s in it for days. He doesn’t even know me. Once, when he was clear he understood what was happening to him, he made me promise to keep his condition secret. I promised. I had to share it with someone.”

  “Of course, honey,” Sylvia said, “When my grandfather got old, he didn’t know where he was or who he was. He nearly destroyed the family. You have to get Horace to a safe home. You need to be safe yourself.”

  “I know,” she said. “I can’t handle two people in the same crazy house who are irrational, lost, and afraid of each other.”

  That night, Lillian returned home to find Tina screaming hysterically over the body of Horace, a pistol in her hand. “He killed himself,” Tina screamed. She screamed it over and over. “The witch killed himself.”

  CHAPTER 23

  SEWELL CALLED SYLVIA Huntley as his next witness. With an air of resolve, she walked to the witness box with strong steps. She was dressed in a navy blue business suit absent jewelry. She was handsome in a way that favored neither sex. After she settled into the witness chair, Sewell charged to the point. “You’re the best friend of the defendant, Lillian Adams?”

  Sylvia nodded and glared at Sewell like one recoiling from something vile on a dinner plate.

  “And you’re here under subpoena?”

  “Yes.” She reached into her purse, removed the folded paper, and held it up.

  “Prior to the murder of Mr. Adams, you had a conversation with Lillian Adams?”

  “Again?” Coker proclaimed. “Again? Again I move for a mistrial.”

  The judge slammed his gavel on the bench. “Mr. Sewell, the jury will decide if this was a murder, not you. You know that,” the judge said. “Mr. Adams’s demise will be referred to as ‘a death.’”

  “You had a conversation with the defendant, Mrs. Adams, the very night her husband died?” Sewell asked.

  “I wouldn’t answer any questions about that in your office, and I refuse to now.”

  Sewell turned to the judge. “I represent to the court that this is a hostile witness and that under the rules I’m entitled to cross-examine her.”

  The judge excused the jury. Behind closed doors in his chambers, he turned to Sewell. “So you think Ms. Huntley is hostile merely because she doesn’t want to talk to you?”

  “She’s doing more than refusing,” Sewell said. “She’s made a lot of accusations against me personally. She said I knew Lillian Adams was innocent and that I was prosecuting her in order to make a name for myself, which, of course, is preposterous.”

  Coker rose slowly, unable to conceal his weariness. He pointed at Sewell. “Mr. Dirty Tricks is at it again. This is one of the oldest scams of all. He wants to ask Ms. Huntley a set of poisoned leading questions, like ‘Didn’t Mrs. Adams tell you that she wanted to go home and kill the old bastard?’ The jurors will naturally think that the prosecutor’s questions state the truth, and the reason Ms. Huntley won’t answer is because she knows his questions state the truth—that Lillian Adams did indeed go home that same night and kill her husband.”

  The judge turned to Sewell. “Do you have any bona fide basis for asking leading questions that suggest an answer, such as Mr. Coker fears?” the judge asked.

  “Yes, I do, Your Honor. But I’m not at liberty to identify the name of the witness who provided this information to me,” Sewell said. “As an officer of this court, my representation to you that I possess a bona fide basis for my question ought to be sufficient under the law.”

  “Lay a foundation for Ms. Huntley’s hostility and I will reconsider your right to cross-examine your own witness,” the judge ruled.

  Back in the courtroom, Sewell took a step toward Sylvia Huntley and carefully aimed his words at her: “On the night of Mr. Adams’s death, did you have a conversation with Lillian Adams at the drugstore concerning her husband?”

  “I think I’ve answered enough questions for you, Mr. Sewell. I will not answer your question. I think you are a miserable son of a bitch.”

  The judge struck his gavel. “You can’t use that language in this courtroom, madam! Mr. Sewell, you’ve satisfied me that this is a hostile witness. So ask your question again.”

  Impatiently, Sewell asked, “On the night of the death of Horace Adams the Third, did you have a conversation with Lillian Adams at the drugstore concerning her husb
and?”

  “Answer the question,” the judge ordered, and when Sylvia Huntley remained silent, he leaned over the bench. “I said, ‘Answer the question,’ Ms. Huntley.”

  “I refuse.” She crossed her arms.

  “I move for contempt against this witness,” Sewell said.

  The judge turned to Sylvia Huntley. “You understand you’ve been asked a relevant question by the prosecutor. There are privileges for some relationships, such as priest and parishioner, doctor and patient, lawyer and client, husband and wife. But there is no such privilege for friends. Do you understand?”

  Sylvia Huntley said, “I will not be made a victim by the law. I am an ethical woman. You force me to choose between my loyalty to my friend and what you claim is my obligation under the law. The choice is not hard for me to make.”

  “So do you refuse to answer Mr. Sewell’s question?” the judge asked.

  “Yes, I do.”

  Again the judge excused the jury and met the parties in his chambers.

  “Mr. Sewell, make your offer of proof,” the judge said.

  “I offer to prove that on the night Mr. Adams died, Mrs. Adams told Sylvia Huntley, ‘I ought to kill the son of a bitch.’”

  “What is the good-faith basis of your offer?” the judge asked.

  “As I’ve said before, I am not at liberty to disclose my witness.”

  The judge raised his right eyebrow to a threatening arch. “On one hand, you want me to put Ms. Huntley in jail for refusing to answer your question, and on the other, you refuse to answer mine?”

  Coker interrupted them. “He wants the jury to believe Lillian Adams said something incriminating, when she probably was complaining about the kind of sex they were having, or something else that would be confidential between women. We should show a simple respect here both for the dead and the living. Fair’s fair. The prosecutor won’t tell and Ms. Huntley won’t tell.”