He looked at the wall, the ceiling, then took a sip of water. Slowly, he said, "I think it would depend on the reasons behind her decision."
"I don't follow you, Nicholas." He was such a sweet boy, and so sharp. Her youngest son wanted to be a lawyer, and she'd caught herself hoping he'd turn out as smart as Nicholas.
"For the sake of simplicity, let's skip the hypotheticals," he said. "Let's say this juror is actually you, okay?"
"Okay."
"So something has happened since the trial started to affect your ability to be fair and impartial?"
Slowly, she said, "Yes."
He pondered this for a moment, then said, "I think it would depend on whether it was something you heard in court, or something that has happened out of court. As jurors, we're expected to become biased and partial as the trial progresses. That's how we reach our verdict. There's nothing wrong with that. It's part of the decision-making process."
She rubbed her left eye, and slowly asked, "What if it's not that? What if it's something out of court?"
He seemed shocked by this. "Wow. That's a lot more serious."
"How serious?"
For dramatic effect, Nicholas stood and walked a few steps to a chair, which he pulled close to Millie, their feet almost touching.
"What's the matter, Millie?" he asked softly.
"I need help, and there's no one to turn to. I'm locked up here in this awful place, away from my family and friends, and there's just nowhere to turn. Can you help me, Nicholas?"
"I'll try."
Her eyes watered for the umpteenth time that night. "You're such a nice young man. You know the law and this is a legal matter, and there's just no one else I can talk to." She was crying now, and he handed her a cocktail napkin from the table.
She told him everything.
LOU DELL AWOKE for no reason at 2 A.M., and took a quick patrol of the hallway in her cotton nightgown. In the Party Room, she found Nicholas and Millie with the TV off, deep in conversation, with a large bowl of popcorn between them. Nicholas was actually polite to her as he explained they couldn't sleep, were just talking about families, everything was fine. She left, shaking her head.
Nicholas suspected a scam, but he did not indicate that to Millie. Once her tears stopped, he grilled her on the details and took a few notes. She promised to do nothing until they could talk again. They said good night.
He went to his room, dialed Marlee's number, and hung up when she answered the phone with a rather sleepy hello. He waited two minutes, then dialed the same number. It rang six times, unanswered, then he hung up. After another two minutes, he dialed the number of her hidden cellphone. She answered it in the closet.
He gave her the full Hoppy story. Her night's rest was over. There was much work to be done, and quickly.
They agreed to start with the names of Napier, Nitchman, and Cristano.
Chapter Thirty-Four
The courtroom didn't change on Saturday. The same clerks wore the same clothes and busied themselves with the same paperwork. Judge Harkin's robe was just as black. The lawyers' faces all blurred, same as Monday through Friday. The deputies were just as bored, maybe more so. Minutes after the jury was seated and Harkin finished his questions, the monotony settled in, same as Monday through Friday.
After Gunther's tedious performance on Friday, Cable and crew thought it best to start the day with a bit of action. Cable called forward and got qualified as an expert a Dr. Olney, a researcher no less, who'd done some amazing things with laboratory mice. He had a video of his cute little subjects, all of them alive and seemingly filled with energy, certainly not diseased and dying. They were in several groups, boxed in glass cages, and it was Olney's task to apply various quantities of cigarette smoke each day to each cage. This he did over a period of years.
Massive doses of cigarette smoke. The prolonged exposure failed to produce a single case of lung cancer. He'd tried everything short of suffocation to force death upon his little creatures, but it just wouldn't work. He had the stats and details. And he had lots of opinions about how cigarettes do not cause lung cancer, either in mice or in humans.
Hoppy was listening, from what was now his usual seat in the courtroom. He had promised to stop by, to wink at her, to give moral support, to once again let her know how awfully sorry he was. It was the least he could do. And after all it was Saturday, a busy day for realtors, but Dupree Realty seldom got cranked up until late in the morning. Since the disaster of Stillwater Bay, Hoppy had lost his drive. The thought of several years in prison sapped his will to hustle.
Taunton was back, on the front row now behind Cable, still wearing an immaculate dark suit, taking important notes and glancing at Lonnie, who did not need the reminder.
Derrick sat near the rear, watching it all and scheming. Rikki's husband Rhea sat on the rear seat with both kids. They tried to wave at their mother when the jury was seated. Mr. Nelson Card sat next to Mrs. Herman Grimes. Loreen's two teenaged daughters were present.
The families were there to be supportive, and to satisfy their curiosities. They'd heard enough to form their own opinions about the issues, the lawyers, the parties, the experts, and the Judge. They wanted to listen, so that perhaps they could later share an insight into what ought to be done.
BEVERLY MONK slipped out of her coma mid-morning, the remnants of gin and crack and what else she couldn't remember still lingering hard and blinding her as she covered her face and realized she was lying on a wooden floor. She wrapped herself in a dirty blanket, stepped over a snoring male she didn't recognize, and found her sunglasses on a wooden crate she used as a dresser. With the glasses on, she could see. The open loft was a mess-bodies sprawled on beds and floors, empty liquor bottles perched on every stick of cheap furniture. Who were these people? She shuffled toward a small loft window, stepping over a roommate here and a stranger there. What had she done last night?
The window was frosted; an early light snow was falling on the streets, where the flakes melted as they landed. She pulled the blanket around her emaciated body and sat on a beanbag near the window, watching the snow and wondering how much of the thousand bucks was left.
She inhaled the chilly air close to a windowpane, and her eyes began to clear. The throbbing in her temples ached but the dizziness was fading. Before she'd met Claire years ago, she'd chummed with a KU student named Phoebe, a flaky girl with a substance problem who'd spent time in recovery but was always on the brink of succumbing. Phoebe had worked briefly at Mulligan's with Claire and Beverly, then left the place under a cloud. Phoebe was from Wichita. She had once told Beverly that she knew something about Claire's past, something she'd learned from a boy who'd dated Claire. It wasn't Jeff Kerr, but some other guy, and if her head wasn't pounding she maybe could remember more of the details.
It was a long time ago.
Someone grunted under a mattress. Then there was silence again. Beverly had spent a weekend with Phoebe and her large, Catholic family in Wichita. Her father was a physician there. Should be easy to find. If that nice thug Mr. Swanson would fork over a thousand bucks for a few harmless answers, how much would he pay for some real background on Claire Clement?
She'd find Phoebe. Last she heard, she was in L.A. playing the same game Beverly was playing in New York. She'd shake down Swanson for all she could, then maybe find another place to live, a larger flat with nicer friends who'd keep the riffraff out.
Where was Swanson's card?
FITCH SKIPPED the morning's testimony to engage in a rare briefing, an event he despised. His guest was important, though. The man's name was James Local, head of the private investigation company to which Fitch was paying a fortune. Hidden in Bethesda, Local's firm hired lots of former government intelligence agents, and in the normal course of things an excursion into the heartland to locate a lone American female with no criminal record would be a nuisance. Their specialty was monitoring illegal arms shipments, tracking terrorists, and the like.