The Laws of Our Fathers Page 20

  She stands, her skirt another pleated brownish print that spreads about her amply, and tosses her empty soda can into the trash, then shoots me a hard look, reaffirming her message. Hobie did this because he thinks I'm more likely than a jury to acquit Nile. Who'd be more sympathetic to Nile, twelve coldhearted folks off the street or me, somebody who knew Nile as a boy and, better yet, who knows firsthand the gripes of a child who lived through the revolution at home? That's the bet Hobie took. I'm here because I'm Zora's daughter. Always. Inescapably. Just as Gwen said yesterday. Marietta goes off, unable to restrain a slight toss of her head in unending amazement at what I miss.

  *

  The trial resumes with bickering. Hobie wants to have lab work performed on the money the state introduced yesterday. He cites Montague's acknowledgment that the bills had not been tested for blood, for example, or gunpowder. Rudy objects for the state.

  'Yaw On-uh, such tests are to be puhfawmed befaw thee trial.'

  'I made some calls,' says Hobie. 'I can have the tests done in twenty-four hours. Montague admitted the state doesn't need the bills they didn't submit to the lab. What's the harm?'

  'What's the relevance?' asks Tommy. 'Even if there's gunpowder or blood on the money, so what?'

  'Well then,' says Hobie, 'the state will have to explain how it got there.'

  'Talk about a fishing expedition!'

  Tommy's right. But I allow the motion. It's harmless, and the accepted wisdom in this job is to let the defendant have his meaningless victories. It shows evenhandedness to the court of appeals.

  The state completes its examination of Lovinia uneventfully. With unsettling calm, Bug describes the shooting on September 7: the approach of June's car, her call to Gorgo, and then, when a woman, not a man, rolled down the window to the Nova, summoning Hardcore. The woman and she were alone for about five minutes.

  'Did you have a conversation with the woman?'

  'She askin, can she talk to Or-dell.' Messing with Hardcore's given name, Bug pauses to smile. Hardcore came up fast, she says, and the woman and he conversed momentarily. Then Gorgo swung out of the alley. ‘I got wounded,' she says, with the composure of a soldier.

  Having survived the last of this examination, Tommy retreats to the prosecution table with a glum look, awaiting whatever will happen next. Hobie rises for cross.

  'Bug,' he says. In his fine suit, a rich grey nailhead which I would bet is part cashmere, Hobie strolls around the courtroom, hands in his pockets. 'Bug,' he called her. No pretending they're unacquainted. 'Let me ask you a few questions about this shooting. You say you didn't hear what Hardcore told this lady?'

  'Nn-uh. Seem like they trippin with each other.'

  'Some kind of argument?'

  'Seem like.'

  'Did she leave the area?'

  'No how. She standin there, you know, out the car, gone on with Core.'

  'And then Gorgo came and fired. Now, when that happened, where was Hardcore?' 'Come by me.'

  'He'd come over by you, leaving Mrs Eddgar at her car. Right?' 'Yes, sir,' she says.

  At the easel, Hobie has raised the street schematic, People's 3, where Montague made his Xs and Ys to show the location of the bodies. Now he is indicating that Lovinia had stepped into the street about fifty feet from June Eddgar's vehicle and that Core was near Bug.

  'And what did he do?'

  'Seem like he tryin to get me down.'

  'Before Gorgo shot?'

  'Seem like. It was all, man, that scene go down like ninety, man. Fast.'

  'But it seemed as if Hardcore was trying to get you down, as if he knew Gorgo was going to be shooting?'

  'Cuz got his T-9 out there, gone look like blastin.' Everybody laughs.

  'But did you see Hardcore frying to stop Gorgo?' 'He behind me, man.'

  'Well, Bug, do you remember hearing or seeing Hardcore do anything to stop Gorgo?'

  She eyes Hobie narrowly. Whatever her disaffection with the prosecution, her loyalty to Hardcore remains supreme.

  'Can't be tellin you that,' she says.

  'But you were trying to stop Gorgo, weren't you?'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'And he shot anyway?' 'Shot me.'

  'You've said. Now did Hardcore get shot?' 'Nn-uh.'

  'He ducked in time?' 'Got down by them cars.'

  'Okay.' Hobie lifts his face to consider her, the equivalent of a musical caesura. It' s not completely clear if he' s really suggesting something or simply wandering, the way he does. The mystery of this unannounced defense briefly lingers, like smoke, in the courtroom air. Then Hobie glances at his notes, shifting subjects.

  'Now, Bug, Mr Molto, Tommy over here, talked to you about some of the things that Hardcore said to you. Let me ask you this first: Whatever Hardcore says, does he always tell you the word?'

  'No, sir.'

  'He's not always truthful with you?'

  'Not hardly. Like be what kind of mood he in. Sometime, man, he get off, he just woofin.' Her emphatic delivery sets off a volley of hearty laughter.

  'And Mr Molto said that yesterday you told him and the police officers and Mr Singh that Core said on September 6 that this killing was being done on account of Nile. Remember Molto saying that?'

  'They all was gettin heavy on me.'

  'Were they angry?'

  'Hoo-ee,' answers Bug and inspires more chuckling. She's beginning to like it, to play a little to her audience. 'They was deep,' she says.

  'But let's make one thing clear, Bug. When you say Hardcore was doing something "on account of" someone else, does that mean he was doing it for that person?'

  The question, unfortunately for Hobie, confuses her. She looks all around the courtroom, searching for clues. Then she subsides to being what she is, a kid.

  'Maybe, kinda like that. Folks be saying lot of stuff, you know.'

  Stung, caught for the first time, Hobie tries again. 'But it could mean something different?'

  'Objection,' says Tommy. 'Asked and answered.'

  'Here, let's make this very clear,' says Hobie. He has perched on the defense table and leans there, like a teacher against a blackboard. He raises both hands. 'Very clear, Bug. Hardcore never told you he was doing this "on account of Nile," did he?'

  'No, sir. I ain never be sayin nothin gainst Nile.'

  'But you did talk with the po-lice?'

  'Too much,' she says sadly.

  'Too much,' he repeats. 'You don't really remember what you told the police one time or the next? That how it is?'

  Her narrow shoulders turn.

  'You have to answer yes or no,' he tells her.

  'Seem like I kinda be sayin what they say.'

  'Is that what happened yesterday? These men were angry and telling you what you'd said before and saying you were going to go to the penitentiary if you didn't say it again?'

  'Uh-huh,' she says. 'Molto and them, he sayin, Tell the truth.' 'Troof,' she says, 'then he start in readin from them reports, sayin I don't say it here, I a lie, I gone have do time on the hot one.' Murder one.

  Everybody in the well of this courtroom has witnessed similar scenes. What's interesting, though, is that Hobie's backtracking. Despite Tommy's accusations, Bug went further on direct than Hobie wanted. He knows I'm not likely to accept Bug's testimony that she never said what's in the signed statement she gave Lubitsch at the hospital.

  'So let's go back to how this started,' says Hobie. 'Now, Mr Molto asked you about this deal that your lawyer in the guardian's office made for you with the state? You remember that? That was a good deal for you, wasn't it?'

  ' Whole lot better than M-1.' More light laughter ripples through the room.

  ‘I just wanna be sure Judge Klonsky understands how you felt about the deal you made.' He looks up to be sure he has my attention, seldom a problem for Hobie in any courtroom, I'd bet.

  'Now, you told Mr Molto where you were living when you were arrested. Sometime with your momma, is that what you said?'

  'I s
tay by my momma some. Sometime by my auntie, too, or some my homegirls.'

  'And has your momma been to see you while you've been inside?'

  'Nn-uh,' says Lovinia. 'We ain been talkin none. Might be she don' even know where I is, seem like. Might be she done booked.' Lovinia shrugs, with an effort at sullen indifference that still somewhat betrays her. I've learned this much: these children know. From the comparisons to the TV, to the billboards, from the expression on our faces. They know they are the measure by which even the desperate give thanks they don't have less.

  'You and she don't get on?'

  'She just some smokehead bitch, you know. All she be.' Bug's eyes slide sideways. The softness in Bug is gone now. Although spoken quietly, this last declaration escapes her with venom. Hobie, wisely, lets the moment linger, so that I am accosted yet again with a clear vision of the life of the poor. This is the sanest, noblest legacy of being Zora Klonsky's daughter and I freely indulge it, pondering what it really means not to have. It's not the lack of luxury, the stuff we all know we can comfortably endure - driving a rusted beater, or having to eat p.b. & j. on your sandwich instead of smoked turkey and Boursin. And it's not just the lack of esteem, the sense of having finished second, which sometimes briefly grips me when I bump into friends from law school who chose the plummy, thin-air life of corporate firms and allow themselves crowing references to trips to Tuscany and Aruba, to 'second places' up in Skageon, to the kinds of delicious excess Nikki and I will never see. 'Poor' means what it probably has meant to Lovinia's mother - competing with the children for the little that is left, these drippy-nosed kids begging dollars for stupid trifles, a bag of chips, a Coke, when you need that six bucks in your pocketbook so bad, for just a little fun on Friday night. And they just keep up with it, Can-I? Can-I? Can-I, so that you want to bust them for asking, again and again, what you hear as only one terrible question: Who do you really love, yourself or me?

  'You've done a piece of time in juvie before, haven't you?' Hobie asks. 'A couple of weeks for selling dope last year?' 'Uh-huh.'

  'And when you went on selling dope, you knew there was a good chance you'd be goin back, right?'

  Her slim shoulders move loosely again. 'Seem like nobody has a forever run.'

  'So your deal with Mr Molto sounded all right to you?'

  'Yeah,' she says, 'all right.' Hobie nods. He's moving again, more slowly. This is the most artful he's been. A roof, three meals, a place where she belongs - Lovinia has plenty of reason to like juvie.

  'And when was the first time somebody from the state talked to you about a deal? Was it when Detective Lubitsch came to see you on September 12?' Hobie motions irritably at Nile for copies of the police reports. Still somewhat hypnotic, Nile wakes himself and fumbles awkwardly in the large carton of materials.

  'Oh yeah. He was rappin to me. Gone make me a good deal.'

  'Had you been knowin Lubitsch for a while?'

  'He in Tic-Tac. He done gaffled me twice.'

  'Arrested you?'

  'Uh-huh.'

  'And had he done right by you, Bug?'

  She gives him a complex expression suggesting the amount that can't be freely communicated in these circumstances. 'He ain beat on me or nothin,' she says, inspiring more laughter.

  'He's better than some, right?'

  'Word,' she answers.

  'And you were in the hospital, on September 12? That's where Lubitsch came to see you, right?'

  'Uh-huh,' says Bug, 'on accounta I been shot.'

  'On Account Of you'd been shot,' says Hobie slowly, throwing his watery, dark eyes my way again. 'And did you have a fever?'

  'Fever? Uh-huh.'

  'You getting pain medication?'

  'Seem like they givin me all kindsa stuff.'

  'And the po-lice questioned you anyway?'

  'Uh-huh.'

  'Did you have a lawyer?' 'No, sir.'

  'Was your momma round?' asks Hobie. 'No how.'

  'They bring a youth officer?'

  'I don't know who-all they was there. Ain no one said that.'

  'So Lubitsch came to see you. And he said they could make you a deal? Is that what he said?'

  'Yeah, if I spill. You know, all bout how this lady got faded and shit.' Lovinia's eyes dart toward me and she murmurs,' Sorry.'

  'And did you tell him at first, when he asked, what had happened?'

  'Nn-uhh. Say I don't know nothin. Just some Goobers comin through.'

  'But eventually you said something different, didn't you? Mr Molto's read some of the statements?' 'Seem like I have to,' she says.

  'Seems like you had to,' says Hobie. He knows just where we're going; he's fully the master of this child. I had this happen to me on one or two occasions when I was a prosecutor, and it was agony, sitting there as the defense lawyer waltzed my witness to any destination she or he chose. It brought to mind those mournful country/western tunes, where the singer wails about watching his date at the big dance go home with someone else.

  ‘I want to ask you about that, but first tell me this, Bug. Before you changed what you said, did Detective Lubitsch tell you that Core had been talking to the po-lice?'

  'Uh-huh. Told me he gone state and all how he been goin on.'

  'They told you he was a state witness now. And did they tell you everything he'd been saying about this crime?' 'Uh-huh. Seem like.'

  Again, Hobie looks my way. He's scoring quickly now, and wants to be certain it's all getting posted.

  'Now, Lovinia, let's talk about the gang, BSD. When did you get courted-in?' He's asking when she became a member, using the gang talk smartly, not just to make it easier for her, but to acknowledge again that he's spent time with Bug.

  'I be claimin mine a long time.'

  'Years?'

  'Five years at least.'

  'Okay. Where do you stand? You still a Tiny G or you a full homegirl now?'

  'Homegirl,' she says.

  'But Hardcore, he's Top Rank, isn't he?'

  She nods once, cautious again about the gang and its workings.

  'If he says go sell dope at Grace and Lawrence, you do that, right?'

  'Most times,' she says.

  'If he says somebody's got to be beat down, do you say no?' 'No, sir.'

  'Have you ever given some homegirl a beat down because Hardcore said so?'

  She freezes a bit here, looks away before answering. 'Once. Little girl name Tray Weevil. They was lotsa us. She been doin crazy stuff.'

  'Okay. Have you ever gotten busy with someone because Hardcore said so?'

  She does not like this subject, sex, at all. She looks straight at

  the lockup door from which she emerged. Hobie has finally gone too far with her.

  'Don' know bout that,' she answers finally, her eyes still nowhere in the room.

  'Okay, but you follow Hardcore's lead, don't you?'

  'He Top Rank,' she says.

  'And so when Lubitsch said that Hardcore was co-operating and told you what Hardcore said, you repeated exactly what they said Hardcore had, didn't you?'

  'Seem like.' Over at the prosecution table, Tommy has taken to flipping his pen in the air and catching it, a jury-trial trick meant to distract me. I'd call him on it, but after twenty years, it's principally second nature for Tommy and it's obvious he's too furious over what's going on between Bug and Hobie to be thinking clearly about much. It's all baloney as far as he's concerned, crap Hobie made up which she's parroting. But even Tommy recognizes the significance. Lovinia's statements to the police mean nothing if she was merely echoing what she knew Core had said.

  'They told you they'd make you a deal, they'd let you stay in juvie, if you said what Hardcore said?'

  'Pretty much.'

  'You had no choice, did you?' 'No, sir. Specially since I messed up on the lie box.' Hobie stands still, viewing her with half a face. 'Are you saying they gave you a lie detector?' 'Uh-huh.'

  'There in the hospital on September 12?'

  'Right w
here I was layin there in bed.'

  Hobie looks to me. 'Your Honor, I need a sidebar.'

  Tommy and Rudy drag themselves over. ‘I don't know anything about it,' Molto says. His eyes close briefly. He sighs, in pain.

  'Judge, if there's a polygraph, I'm entitled to the report. I'm entitled to explore this. Your Honor, this is a clear discovery violation.' I have my doubts about Hobie's claim of surprise. He's interviewed Bug too thoroughly to have missed this. I suspect his

  outrage is theatrical. But he has a point. 'Judge Klonsky, I might have grounds here to suppress her testimony.'

  'Yeah, right,' says Tommy. 'I'll join in that motion.' The four of us actually laugh. The moment of candor is becoming to Molto.

  'What do you want?' I ask Hobie.

  'The report.'

  'There is no report,' Molto repeats.

  'Then I want the examiner,' says Hobie. 'We can't complete her testimony without knowing what this is about.'

  I take two steps up so I can see Bug on the witness stand and ask her who gave her the polygraph.

  'Lubish,' she says to my astonishment. Molto's skimpy eyebrows have also jumped up his face.

  'Fred Lubitsch can't do a box,' says Molto. Rudy cuts in and draws Tommy away. They whisper heatedly, leaving Hobie and me looking at each other in order to give the prosecutors some privacy. As the silence lingers, I finally ask Hobie if he's married.

  'Not now, Judge. Three-time loser,' he says. 'I'm in solitary.' He emits a brave laugh, then regains a sober expression. Somehow, in this scrap of conversation, I see a clear resemblance to Seth, not simply in the news of foundering marriages, but in the attitude: the gloomy eyes, the dark fog of things that did not go well. Having had such high hopes for the world, are we the unhappiest adult generation yet? Hobie tells me he has two daughters, the older one a junior at Yale. Singh and Molto return then.

  'We'll have Lubitsch here in the morning,' Molto announces.

  'We'll recess now?'

  The lawyers agree. From the witness stand, the transport deputies remove Lovinia, who, despite his fixed gaze, his silly smile, still will not look at Nile.

  WINTER, 1970

  Seth

  The early months of 1970 were terrible. We were in California's first season, whatever it's called. The acacias had bloomed; the purple ice plants flowered beside the freeways. But everyone I knew was miserable.