by Gerry Spence
He didn’t answer. If it wasn’t Jenny Winkley, it would be some other member of the courthouse gang. All were his enemies. One way or another, they would get him.
When he finally struggled to his feet and opened the door, Jenny thrust the newspaper at him.
JUDGE MURRAY REMOVED FROM ADAMS CASE
Today the Wyoming Supreme Court removed Judge John Murray from the Lillian Adams murder trial. Judge Homer Little of Platte County has been appointed by the court to sit in his stead.
The story reviewed the history of the trial, repeating Sewell’s allegations that more than a passing relationship existed between the judge and Lillian Adams. The judge threw the paper down without finishing the story.
“You got good press,” Jenny Winkley said, still smiling. He’d never noticed before: She reminded him of a Rhode Island Red hen—her henna red hair, her skinny legs, the puffed-up middle, and the chicken’s beak. “You never finished reading it,” she clucked. She picked the paper up from the floor. “Look! Right here.” She jabbed at the last paragraph of a story that covered the entire front page of the paper. “It says that the state supreme court found you didn’t do anything wrong. That should help a lot.” Her smile creases were foreign to the scenery of her face. “I’m going to clip this out and put it in your scrapbook. This will stop all that courthouse gossip.”
“All they’ll remember is that this licentious old coot, me, had a relationship with a woman charged with murder in his court, that she is more than thirty years his junior, and that the old bastard, me, ought to be impeached. That’s what they’ll remember.”
“No. The clerk said he knew all along you weren’t a … you know what he called it.”
“A cockhound, I suppose.”
“Something like that,” she said. “And Martha Sternhouser over in the county clerk’s office said she knew you had a lot of chances at women, and you never fell. But then, none of them was as good-looking as Lillian Adams, I’ll say that.”
“So a man is only innocent of philandering in direct proportion to the beauty of the woman involved. I’d have to be a pedophile to get involved with Lillian.”
“She isn’t that young.”
Why shouldn’t she suspect me? he thought. And the more he protested, the more they’d believe he was a rotten old pussy chaser and had been from the beginning.
“Well, I know you’re innocent if the Wyoming Supreme Court found that you were. I had my suspicions for a while.” She seemed happy, even light-headed.
He felt a flood of self-hatred. He’d always been repulsed by those old toads who had no libido left except in their bony fingers and their coated old tongues. How could anyone love his old sack of hide and bones? Such is Betsy’s major fault, he thought.
He fought for his breath, thinking he must be on the brink of a heart attack. So this was the way he’d cross the river Styx and take that endless dive into eternity. He wasn’t afraid of death. It would be the wondrous, dreamless sleep that Plato predicted. If the heart attack was coming, let it come. Hurry and be done with it. But he wanted to die at home.
He got to his truck, reached up to adjust his rearview mirror, and felt something foreign. He pulled the mirror around, and staring him in the face was a tiny microphone neatly attached there with electrician’s tape.
A new wave of fear immersed him.
What had he said aloud in his truck? Had he been talking to himself, for Christ sake? How long had that microphone been there? Had it been there that night after court when Lillian Adams was waiting for him in the pickup, when she’d said those uninvited words: “I’m so sorry, Judge Murray, for all the trouble I’ve caused you. I killed Horace because—”
He felt raped. And he felt sudden anger. How dare they bug a judge! He would order a hearing immediately, and throw all the bastards in jail! Yes, he would call in the attorney general and have him appoint a prosecutor pro tem. In the morning, he would interrogate both of them in his chambers, Sewell and the sheriff, one at a time, the cowardly, sneaking sons of bitches.
When he arrived at the cabin, there stood the sheriff’s white Chevrolet parked in front of his door, a fog of exhaust rising from the engine. Undersheriff Jim Bromley, along with a deputy he didn’t recognize, got out the car. Bromley swaggered up to the judge’s truck and yanked open the door.
“Good evening, Judge,” he said in an injuriously hard voice. “You know Deputy Bill Hannery here? We’ve come out of duty, Judge. You wouldn’t want it any other way. We have a warrant for your arrest. Hand the judge the warrant, Bill,” he said to the deputy, who was wearing his new uniform.
The judge sat frozen in the seat of his pickup, both hands gripping the steering wheel.
“Get out of your truck, Judge,” Bromley ordered. The young deputy grabbed hold of the old man’s arm and pulled at him. He started to fall, but Bromley caught him, snapped the cuffs on the judge, and led him to the sheriff’s car. He protected the judge’s head with his hands to prevent him from smacking it against the car’s roof until the judge was safely seated inside. Then Bromley slammed the door and crawled into the passenger side, the young deputy in the driver’s seat.
It was then that Betsy came running out of the house, wielding the judge’s shotgun. Old Horatio ran ahead of her. She ran toward the sheriff’s car as it pulled out of the yard, the shotgun at her shoulder swaying back and forth with each step.
Old Horatio charged after the car, barking. As the patrol car slowed to make the turn onto the main road, Bromley rolled down the window, leaned out with this .357 Magnum pistol, and fired at Horatio. The old dog let out a surprised yelp when the bullet entered his chest. He fell. Then Bromley fired a second shot and the dog slumped into a pile on the snow, shaking from postmortem fibrillations, the snow strained crimson where he lay.
“What did ya do that for?” Hannery said to Bromley. “The dog wasn’t hurting nothing.”
“Self-defense,” Bromley said.
“You dirty, rotten son of a bitch,” the judge hollered. “I’m going to kill you if it’s the last thing I do.”
Betsy had stopped running. She raised the shotgun. It was too long and too heavy, and the shot went awry. Gasping for breath, Betsy ran to where the old dog lay lifeless. She stood for a long time staring down at the pile of bloody fur in the snow. Then she ran back to the cabin.
* * *
Wild with anger and screaming beyond the limit of his old lungs, Judge Murray continued to threaten the officers from the rear seat of the sheriff’s car. Bromley turned their radio up to high blast, so that the car was drowned in loud disharmony. Then he hollered at the judge, “Shut up, you old fart.”
“You rotten bastards,” the judge hollered back, “how could you shoot a harmless old dog?”
“If you hadn’t shot that crazy cur, he’d have tore us apart,” Bill said. “And that old lady of his had her shotgun on us. We had to get the hell out of there in a hurry, or she would have killed us both.” They both laughed.
“Women are goddamned nuisance and are good for only one thing, and you know what that is,” Bromley said. “I had three of them, and there wasn’t one of them worth a shit.”
“That’s because you don’t know how to pick them,” Hannery said. “Them’s who can cook usually can’t do nothing else, if ya get my meaning.”
“You’re a whole lot smarter than you look,” Bromley said.
At the courthouse, Bromley jerked the judge out of the car. The old man felt like a trapped rat. He found himself looking for avenues of escape. He’d been a respected member of society all his life, but now he’d been reduced to a felon, separated from the community by a piece of paper called an arrest warrant.
He tried to force the idea of escape from his mind. He was a judge, not a criminal. Besides, he couldn’t run. He clutched the warrant in his cuffed hands. The officers pushed him into an elevator, which landed him on a floor where Deputy Huffsmith met them at the door.
Huffsmith looked sad. “Sorry to mee
t you here under these circumstances,” Huffsmith said to the judge. “Now I got to search you.” He pushed the judge gently to the wall, spun him around, removed the handcuffs, and then began patting him down.
“Now would you empty your pockets?” He put a tray on the counter in front of the judge.
The judge took out his billfold and dropped it in the tray. It contained two one-dollar bills, his driver’s license, and a picture of Betsy.
“Now the watch and the ring, Judge.”
The watch was a cheap thing he’d bought at the drugstore, plastic band and big numbers so that he could read it without his glasses. The ring was his wedding ring, which Betsy had put on his finger at the altar, love in her eyes, her happy voice saying that they would remain one “until death do us part.” He gave Huffsmith his watch.
“The ring, Judge.”
“Can’t give you the ring,” the judge said. “Betsy put this on me when we were married, and we promised never to take our rings off. You’ll have to cut my finger off before I’ll take it off.”
The deputy called to the undersheriff. “The prisoner wants us to cut his finger off,” Huffsmith said.
Undersheriff Bromley stomped into the room, showed the judge his crooked brown teeth and red gums. “You know what can happen by accident to prisoners who want to give us a lot of trouble.”
“I’m still the judge in this county, and I order you to leave my ring on my finger. It is not dangerous to anyone, and it’s sacred to me. Do you understand, Undersheriff?”
“Yes, I understand, Judge. So are ya going to give us the damn ring, or do we have to take it off of you?”
When the judge didn’t answer, Bromley nodded to Huffsmith, who came up behind the judge and grabbed him under the arms. Then Bromley took hold of his feet and they laid the old man on the floor. His head jarred against the concrete.
“Bill,” Bromley hollered to Deputy Hannery, “get me that bar of soap in the can.” When the deputy came back with the soap, Bromley spit on the soap a couple of times, then coated the judge’s finger with the lather and pulled off the ring.
“Now that wasn’t too bad, was it, Judge?” Bromley said. His breath was full in the face of the judge, and foul. “Ya see, if ya cooperate with us, things go easier.”
The old man struggled to his hands and knees. He tried to stand up. Huffsmith reached down and, with his hands under the judge’s armpits, lifted him. “Now take your shoes and socks off.”
The judge felt embarrassed. His toenails were too long.
Huffsmith said, “Step over here now. Stand up against the wall.”
He took the judge’s picture.
Then the deputy took the judge’s fingerprints.
“I want to talk to a judge about bond.”
“This here is Friday, as you may remember,” Huffsmith said. “And it’s past five o’clock. You got to wait until Monday to get your bond set.”
“That’s unacceptable.”
“Well, everybody works five days a week now’days. And there ain’t no other judge around since you got crossways with the law. Besides, you think we’re supposed to make this jail run for the convenience of the criminals?”
“I told you, I am not a criminal.”
“Then what are you doing here if you ain’t?”
“I’m here because a bunch of other criminals conspired to put me here.”
“You want to make a call before I lock you up for the night?”
“My wife will hire a lawyer.”
The deputy handed the judge some canvas shoes with rubber soles, a toothbrush, a small tube of toothpaste, and a small black plastic comb. When he was finally dressed in his new jail clothes—a short-sleeved slip-over blue cotton top with a V-neck and a pair of blue cotton pants—Deputy Huffsmith led him like a well-disciplined child to his cell.
CHAPTER 34
EACH DAY AFTER court, often late into the night, Coker worked with Lillian, preparing her to testify. Coker and Lillian agreed: Tina’s involvement in Horace’s death, whatever it was, would not be part of their defense. Coker argued that the jurors would hate Lillian for blaming her child. Lillian would hate herself for the same reason. Besides, despite Tina’s insistence she had shot her stepfather, Lillian remained steadfast that Tina was innocent. Horace had intervened to end his own life. That, Lillian insisted, was the defense and the truth.
Still the question hung heavy over the case: Could Coker convince a jury that Horace had killed himself in face of that questionable suicide note? People on the ragged edge of psychosis sometimes suffered a change in their handwriting. Coker would argue that Widdoss’s testimony was provided to Sewell in exchange for the payment he received from the prosecution. Pure business.
Would Lillian fold as a witness under the fire of Sewell’s cross-examination? Ordinarily, she could hold her own in any argument. But Coker had his doubts. She could take shelter behind the Fifth Amendment and not testify. But Coker knew that most jurors would think, Don’t try to fool me with that Fifth Amendment bullshit. The Fifth is for crooks and killers. Yet the more Coker tried to prepare Lillian as a witness, the more his provisional decision began to solidify. He thought she would likely wilt or detonate on the stand. Either would do her in.
Each day, Tina was becoming more erratic. Believing that Mrs. Houseman and the nurse, Mrs. Clemmins, were conspiring with Sewell to kill her, Tina pulled a butcher knife on Mrs. Houseman and the nurse, and both ran out of the house. Mrs. Houseman called the sheriff’s office as well as Lillian, who’d been working with Coker after court. When Deputy Huffsmith responded to the call, he found Tina standing in the kitchen in her pajamas, the butcher knife still in her hand.
“Put that knife down,” Deputy Arthur Huffsmith ordered. “I’m here because your mother sent for me.” Lillian had arrived almost simultaneously and was standing next to the deputy.
Tina looked at her mother. “Yes, Tina, put the knife down. I’m here. Mrs. Houseman and Mrs. Clemmins are here. Deputy Huffsmith is here. We are all your friends.” Only then did the girl hesitantly lay the knife on the table.
“Now we’re going to have ourselves a little talk,” Huffsmith said to Tina. He motioned to a chair he’d pulled out from the kitchen table. “Sit down,” he said in a commanding voice. Her eyes darted in panic around the room, and at last, concluding there was no escape, she obeyed and eased slowly into a chair at the kitchen table, her hand close to the knife. Then Deputy Huffsmith, Lillian, and Mrs. Houseman also took chairs around the table. Mrs. Clemmins stood against the wall near the back-door entry hall. Tina stared at the deputy, a mask of fear fastened to her face.
“Now, Tina, I am your friend. I am a friend of your mom here.”
Lillian nodded.
“I am a friend of Mrs. Houseman. We are all your friends. Your enemies are not in this house,” Huffsmith said. “Everyone here is your friend, and everyone wants the best for you. Do you understand?”
Tina watched the deputy like a cornered animal.
“Now, you are in control of us. We are not in control of you. Do you understand?”
She remained silent, her eyes wide and unblinking.
“Yes, you’re in control,” he said again. “Because if you decide to be good and peaceful and cooperate, you can keep bad things from happening to you. You get in control by controlling yourself, do you understand?”
Her eyes were still wide with terror.
“But if you act crazy and pull knives, and make Mrs. Houseman call me, then you ain’t in control of yourself, and you can’t control nobody else. Do you understand?”
No response.
“So you want me to be in control of you, or do you want to be in control of yourself?”
Tina didn’t answer.
“Tell me if you’re hearing me.”
A slight nod.
“Is there something you ain’t saying that you want to tell me?” Huffsmith asked.
He waited.
Finally, in a high, childlike
voice, Tina said, “I’m in control.”
“Okay,” Huffsmith said. “If you’re in control, then hand the knife here to Mrs. Houseman and tell her how sorry you are for acting like you did. She cares about you, and you hurt her feelings. If this happens again, and I have to be in control, I will take you away from here, and you won’t be able to come back. You wouldn’t like that, would you?”
She shook her head no. Tina lifted the knife by the blade and offered it to Mrs. Houseman, who took it and returned it to the knife drawer.
“Now how did it make you feel, Mrs. Houseman, for Tina to pull that knife on you?” Huffsmith asked.
“It scared me. Tina and I get along very well, and we like each other.”
“What do you have to say to Mrs. Houseman, Tina?”
“I’m sorry,” Tina sobbed. Mrs. Houseman went to the girl and put her arms around her.
“You see there, you are in control,” Huffsmith said. “When you are in control, you treat people right, and they treat you right. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” Tina murmured.
Lillian walked with the deputy to the door. “How did you know what to do?”
“My brother has mental problems,” Huffsmith said. “I learned this the hard way. He got violent because he thought people was going to kill him. He read a lot of them murder-mystery books, and we had to keep ’em from him.”
“What happened to him?”
“He’s better now. He lives with us. Long as he’s on his meds, he’s pretty good. He’s a couple years older than me. He does yard work in the summer to help out. He’s a good man.” Huffsmith’s eyes got cloudy, and he turned away.
CHAPTER 35
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, the judge once again heard the flat, tuneless voice over the loudspeaker: “You have a visitor, Murray.”
Jenny Winkley greeted him with a reluctant smile in the jail’s visitor’s room.
“You look like something dead that the dog drug in.” She handed the judge a note from Betsy:
Honey, I buried Horatio in my tulip garden. Next spring he’ll come up as a bouquet of red tulips.
