Scott Turow - Presumed innocent

As usual, it is Molto, heedless and overeager, who begins to drag me back from the abyss. When the last stipulation is read, he asks for a corridor conference.

"What is it?" asks Larren when we are all assembled.

"Judge," he says, "we are ready to proceed with the fingerprint expert. There is just one small difficulty."

Kemp eyes me with wicked glee. The difficulty, so called, is obvious to both of us: They have not found the glass. Jamie's smile is welcome. It is the first sign of any renewed warmth between us in better than a day, and it comes at the right moment, for the members of the defense have each been wordless and grim all afternoon. During the 3:30 recess, I encountered Stern in the john and we did not say a thing aloud. He gave me one of his Judeo-Latin shrugs. His eyes were listless. We knew this was coming, he seemed to say. Our time on the high wire has ended.

Now, in the small anteroom to his chambers, Judge Lyttle fulminates. Molto still cannot do anything right in Larren's eyes.

"Are you telling me that you have completed your search and this object absolutely cannot be found?"

"Judge-" he starts to say.

"Because that's one set of facts. And I'll have to rule on that basis. But if you're tellin me that you think the thing is gonna turn up but it's convenient right now for you to go ahead without it, then that's quite another. We aren't gonna be talkin about proceeding now and discovering the evidence later. Am I understood?"

Nico catches Tommy's arm. He tells the judge they would like to take one more night.

"That's fine, then," Larren says. "Do I take it that you're moving for an adjournment for the day?"

Nico crisply says, "Yes." It is clear that the day's success has fortified him. He can tolerate adversity without distress. His old confidence seems to possess him again.

"Your Honor," says Stern. "I hope the court has not decided to let the prosecution proceed with the fingerprint evidence in the absence of the glass. Certainly, if Your Honor please, we would ask to be heard on that question."

"I quite understand," says Larren. "You may want to do some research on this issue, Mr. Stern. And I'll be happy to hear you. And I can tell you right now, I'm not eager to let anybody get up on the witness stand in my courtroom and give his opinions about what he says was once observed on some physical object that nobody can even find anymore." He casts a rough-tempered glance toward Molto. "So you look in the books tonight and I'll listen to you. And, Mr. Della Guardia, if I were you, I'd roll up my shirt-sleeves and get over to that evidence room myself."

"Yes, Your Honor," says Nico dutifully.

Stern gives me a meaningful look from beneath his extended brow as we head into the courtroom. He seems to be inquiring. It is almost as if he thinks that I can account for the glass's absence. Perhaps it is merely a sense of promise that gives Sandy this expression. If Larren were to keep the prosecutors from presenting the fingerprint evidence, the case against me would certainly fail. Stern is not sure whether or not he should be hopeful. Nor am I.

"Would he really think about keeping out that proof?" I ask Stern as we stand behind counsel table. We are waiting for the jury to return to the courtroom, so that the judge can tell them they are being dismissed for the day.

"It strikes me as a serious question of evidence. Is it not? We must study tonight." More time for Kemp and me in the library. I nod, accepting Stern's unspoken instruction.

About 9:30 that night, Kemp comes back to Stern's small library to tell me that I have a call. He remains behind to inspect the series of cases I have copied from the reports of the state supreme and appellate courts, while I go to the receptionist's desk, where Jamie has picked up the phone. A line is blinking, on hold. I assume it is Barbara. She usually calls about now, hoping to review the day's evidence for a few moments; and every evening I go through an arabesque of diffidence and contained response.

The truth is that I have done my best to avoid Barbara since the days immediately before the trial. I have suggested she go to sleep each night before I return; I have eaten dinner with Stern and Kemp, enjoining her even from leaving me a meal. I cannot stand to have her abstracted curiosity turned on this evidence like some high-powered light. I do not want those late-night scenes where we chew over the events of my trial as we did those malefactors I accused. It would make me unbearably ill at ease to hear Barbara engage in close analysis of the tactical decisions undertaken in this trial for my life. Most of all, I do not wish to get drawn into discussions of my discomfort. With the evidence being trotted out each day before us, I know the conclusions she might reach, and in my present state I could not abide that confrontation-to allay suspicions or confirm them. But when I pick up the phone, it is not Barbara's voice I hear.

"How'd I do?" Lip says. "I thought they were goin to give you a medal or somethin with all these terrific things you and I done."

"You were great," I tell him. There is no point in the truth.

"Fuckin Delay, I'll tell you," he says. "Schmidt come to see me this mornin before I got on. He says a little birdie wanted to make sure that I got the message that if I fucked around on the stand, I'd be walkin beats in the North End by myself in the middle of the night. Nice subtle stuff with this guy."

I make a sound, general agreement. I have sent a few such messages myself from time to time-to coppers who have a peculiar friendship with defense counsel; who know the defendant from the 'hood. It's part of the job.

"I thought maybe we could get together tonight," Lip says. "Talk about that thing I said I'd help you with." He means finding Leon. "How about I drive you home? You be there a while?"

"Another two hours probably."

"That's good for me. They got me workin 4:00 to midnight. I'll take my coffee early. Corner Grand and Kindle at 11:30? I'll be drivin the unmarked Aries."

We work it like a spy movie. I am in the lobby until the car moves into sight and Lip is barely at the curb five seconds before he is moving. Now that he is off the witness stand, the pressure on him has lessened, but there are many people who would tell him that the better part of wisdom right now lies in staying away from me. He pulls around the corner so quickly that the rear end gives way a little bit on the pavement, which is slick from a light rain.

I compliment him again on his testimony. "It was good," I say, "because you played it straight."

"I'm tryin," he says, and reaches for his radio, which is putting out a tremendous ruckus. "This is great," says Lip, of the radio. "We're workin on a dope bust with the G-men to make up for that fiasco in April and these guys can't get on the air together often enough to make sure nobody gets turfed. They better hope their subject don't have a scanner, because he couldn't miss this posse comin."

I ask about what is going down.

"It's cute," says Lip. "They got a nice-lookin little female agent in a mink coat that got seized last time the Strike Force went in on Muds Corvino's bolita game. She's makin out to be some dope-crazed suburbanite and she's gonna buy ten keys of coke from somebody in Nearing."

"Probably one of my neighbors," I say. "There's a guy down the block named Cliff Nudelman whose nose is redder than Rudolph's."

We are quiet, listening to the radio traffic. Cops and robbers. I feel a vague melancholy when I admit to myself that I miss it. There is lots of static because of the rain. Thunder and lightning must not be far off. I am reluctant to mention Leon first, but I finally ask how Lip is doing.

"I haven't started," he says. "I will. First thing. Only I haven't got a fuckin idea where I oughta look. That's what I wanted to hear. You got some suggestions?"