Scott Turow - The Burden of Proof

"Of course," said Stern. No more. It made for an uneasy moment, but he felt obliged not to join any conspffacies against Fiona. They had their own compact now, and Stern sensed from what Nate had said that Fiona and he might have matters to sort out. If so, he had only himself to blame.

Stern saw Nate to the door. When he began to castigate himself again, Stern held up a hand.

"I know what it means to maintain a confidence, Nate. Clara had her secret and you were obliged to keep it."

Nate waited. His mind seemed to be working ahead. Stern wondered if there was more that Nate had determined not to tell him out of some vestigial duty to Clara. Nate seemed to read that thought.

"I don't know who it was, Sandy, if that's what you're wondering."

The sound of it was so gross that Stern's impulse was to deny that he had any curiosity. But of course that was not "She told me years ago that the person, whoever, was aware of the problem. That was the only thing I had the right to be concerned about.

The relationship was already over when she came to me." Nate looked at him helplessly. "I assume it was a man. These'days-" He lifted a hand.

"Yes, ofcoume," said Stern. Of course. This possibility, briefly contemplated, Stern rejected.

They shook hands. When Nate was gone, Stern returned to the solarium and the rOW of family photos lined up in their frames on the game table.

A picture of Clara as a very young woman was at the end. She was dressed in a white blouse and pleated skirt, posing in her page boy with a hand on the newel of the central staircase of the Mittlet family home.

Hdr smile looked coaxed at best, a wrinkle of hope managed against deep currents of resistance. The world was at war then, and even at the age of thirteen or fourteen, Clara Mittler seemed to have her doubts about the future.

IF one thought about it carefully, as Stern had for three days now, this was not a theft. Not legally. The property in question, the safe, was lawfully in his custody, not Dixon s. And the risks of prosecution, in any event, were nil; neither Dixon nor Silvia would ever prefer charges.

This action was simply an expediency. He had taken advantage of Silvia by asking about the safe. Involving her in its return, in light of Dixon's iron,headed determination not to yield to the government, would compromise her unforgivably with her husband. This solution was dramatic, effective, and, given Dixon's conduct, richly deserved. But in the car with Remo, driving from the highway through the wooded h'dls with their subdevelopments and residuum of baronial estates, Stern was beset with considerable anxiety-he had not made a court appearance in twenty years that had frightened him the same way. His bowels and his bladder both seemed on the verge of becoming unpredictable, and throughout his entire upper body there was a palpable tremor. Suppose the brnwny German driver came in and resorted to violence? What if the police were somehow advised and entered with guns drawn? Stern, on a dozen occasions, had imagined Remo and him bloodied or massacred.

Remo, driving his old Mercury, was cheerful. He loved his work. He had urged Stern to allow him to do this alone, but that was unthinkable. If someone intruded, Stern, whatever the embarrassment, could explain, but Remo alone might come to real grief. As it was, the risks-at least as they could be calculated-were minimal. The Hartnells would be at the club, Dixon shooting a late round of golf, Silvia sunning herself by the P91, ind on a Sunday afternoon no one else would be home. The cook and the house-man were both dismissed at 2 p.m. The driver stayed with the car, cooling his heels behind the clubhouse. As long as the weather was good-and the sky was crystalline as they drove-the plan was fiawles.

Behind the wheel, Remo smoked his cigarette and chatted companionably.

"I din' done houses much," said Remo. "Not since I'm young.

There ain't no good guys to work with. Them burglars, they're all crazy. I'll never forget, I'm eighteen, nineteen, a guy got me on a job, one of them places down near the river. You know, real fancy apartment. Knocked the door right off the hinges. Jesus, the stuff these people had, real nice stuff, beautiful." Remo lifted two fingertips to his lips and made a kiss. "We got what we got, and I come in the living room and this son of a buck, Sangretti his. name is, he's got hispants down and he's taking a shit, right there on the rug. I says, What the fuck is this? You know, and.since, I heard all the time about burglars do stuff like that. In somebody's house, for Chrissake?"

Stern, too nervous to respond directly, nodded and for whatever reason felt obliged to explain again that this was not a burglary. The house was his sister's; it was a practical joke of sorts within the family. An ironic glimmer came into Remo's eyes. He needed no excuses; he knew how it was. Everybody wanted things and did what they had to.

Remo was one of those crooks who believe that they are. no worse than anyone else.

Sensing this judgment, Stern nearly spoke up in his own defense. He was not one of those lawyers, the state court shatpies with the razor cuts who worked only for the Boys, and who took payment in cocaine, or hot artwork, or, in one instance Stern had heard of years before, a hit on his wife. As a young lawyer, he had done things for money on occasion, some of them nasty enough that he no 1onge cared to rec and the house-man were both dismissed at 2 p.m. The driver stayed with the car, cooling his heels behind the clubhouse. As long as the weather was good-and the sky was crystalline as they drove-the plan was fiawles.

Behind the wheel, Remo smoked his cigarette and chatted companionably.

"I din' done houses much," said Remo. "Not since I'm young.

There ain't no good guys to work with. Them burglars, they're all crazy. I'll never forget, I'm eighteen, nineteen, a guy got me on a job, one of them places down near the river. You know, real fancy apartment. Knocked the door right off the hinges. Jesus, the stuff these people had, real nice stuff, beautiful." Remo lifted two fingertips to his lips and made a kiss. "We got what we got, and I come in the living room and this son of a buck, Sangretti his. name is, he's got hispants down and he's taking a shit, right there on the rug. I says, What the fuck is this? You know, and.since, I heard all the time about burglars do stuff like that. In somebody's house, for Chrissake?"

Stern, too nervous to respond directly, nodded and for whatever reason felt obliged to explain again that this was not a burglary. The house was his sister's; it was a practical joke of sorts within the family. An ironic glimmer came into Remo's eyes. He needed no excuses; he knew how it was. Everybody wanted things and did what they had to.

Remo was one of those crooks who believe that they are. no worse than anyone else.

Sensing this judgment, Stern nearly spoke up in his own defense. He was not one of those lawyers, the state court shatpies with the razor cuts who worked only for the Boys, and who took payment in cocaine, or hot artwork, or, in one instance Stern had heard of years before, a hit on his wife. As a young lawyer, he had done things for money on occasion, some of them nasty enough that he no 1onge cared to recall them. But one of the clearest grams in his character as a lawyer was the desire to let his clients know that he did not wade in the same polluted waters they did. The utter meanness of this convict'Ion-and its dubious basis-came home to him with sudden disturbing clarity'. a visit to yet one more unattractive aspect of his soul. These months of gazing inward had been a little like a trip to a freak show, with the sheer ugliness Of what he found never quite overcoming his compulsion to look.

Following Stern's d'ections, Remo proceeded down the narrow wooded road fronting Dixon and Silvia's home. The house itself, erected more than a century ago of stone and heavy joints of mortar, was below them, behind a quarter mile of lawn, which itself was interrupted by a lighted tennis court. Behind the house, Lake Fowler twinkled, dotted with speedboats and small craft under sail "Nice," Remo said. He turned the car around and parked so that it was partially obscured by the untamed shrubbery that grew up with summer lushness along the roadside. They would walk in, Remo said, down the long gravel drive. After they had the safe, one of them could bring the car down.