Bruce DeSilva - Providence Rag

Standing behind Chief Angelo Ricci, Mulligan did a rough count. About nine hundred, he figured, many of them waving protest signs and all of them looking angry. They spilled down the steps, onto the sidewalk, and out into Benefit Street, where they were obstructing traffic.

A half-dozen TV reporters, accompanied by cameramen, were working the crowd, shoving their microphones into the faces of protesters for quotes that would pad their evening reports. Mulligan looked around for Gloria. He knew she was out there somewhere, snapping pictures.

At the curb across the street, Iggy Rock was broadcasting live from the back of WTOP’s mobile van, his words lashing the crowd from a pair of loudspeakers.

“According to our source inside the courtroom, Judge Needham claims he needs, and I quote, some time, unquote, to make his ruling,” Iggy was saying. The source, Mulligan figured, was the woman he’d seen texting. “He needs time ?” Iggy snarled. “Really? What for? Time to get out of town before he sets a monster loose to prey on our wives, sisters, and daughters?”

The crowd hooted and shook their signs.

“Because that’s what he’s going to do,” Iggy shouted. “He telegraphed his decision by what he said at the conclusion of the hearing. He said, and again I quote, ‘What is not clear is the degree to which his release would pose an imminent danger, and that is the standard on which this case must be decided.’”

The crowd howled.

Not the most responsible thing for Iggy to be doing, Mulligan thought, but at least he hadn’t passed along the word that the principals in the case were leaving by the side door.

The first egg landed with a splat on Chief Ricci’s visor. Suddenly, the air was thick with them. Mulligan remained behind the chief, using him for cover.

Two of the uniforms raised their batons and stepped forward.

“Steady,” Ricci commanded, and the officers froze in place.

Ricci raised a megaphone to his lips. “Let’s keep it peaceful, people,” he shouted. “We don’t want anyone to get hurt today. The show’s over now. Time to go home.”

More hoots. More eggs.

Then someone threw a rock. It sailed over the chief’s head and cracked one of the courthouse’s glass doors.

The chief lowered the megaphone.

“Okay, then,” he said. “Let’s move them out.”

The cops raised their batons and waded into the crowd. Ricci watched them go and sadly shook his head.

And then he ducked.

Mulligan regained consciousness in the Rhode Island Hospital emergency room with a throbbing headache and a gauze bandage on his left temple. To his right, he heard a commotion. He turned his head on the pillow and saw stocking feet protruding from the cuffs of a Providence police uniform, the rest of the prone figure obscured by a partially closed curtain.

A TV mounted on the wall was tuned to the news. After a couple of minutes, Mulligan caught the gist. Three police officers, a dozen protesters, and a journalist had been taken to the hospital with an assortment of gashes, bruises, and broken bones.

“Mrs. Diggs?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Gloria.”

“I have nothing to say to you.” Her voice was so cold and bitter that it made Gloria shiver.

“Did you watch the confession?”

Esther Diggs was silent for a moment. Then she hung up.

WTOP’s mobile broadcasting van claimed a spot on Benefit Street across from the Superior Court building shortly before eight thirty A.M. Minutes later, police chased it off.

At nine, an hour before Judge Needham was expected to take the bench, protesters began to gather again on the courthouse steps. Outside his courtroom’s swinging double doors, sheriffs ordered spectators to drop their cell phones into a cardboard box. The authorities were not about to let Iggy Rock stir up trouble again today.

It was ten forty-five before Needham emerged from his chambers and climbed onto his booster seat behind the bench.

“I have made a decision in this case,” he said. “I shall not read it in full at this time; but immediately after we adjourn, the attorneys and representatives of the press may obtain copies in the clerk’s office. Afterwards, I suggest you all again exit the building by the side door.”

He paused and looked directly into the pool camera.

“The State has failed to offer convincing evidence that Kwame Diggs poses an immediate threat to himself and others,” he said. “Therefore, the petition that he be involuntarily committed to a psychiatric facility upon completion of his sentence is regrettably denied.”

Howls rose from the spectator benches.

From his seat in the jury box, Mulligan saw Attorney General Roberts slump at the prosecution table, his head in his hands. Needham climbed down from the bench, scurried out of the courtroom, and, Mulligan figured, headed right out of town.

The crowd outside the courthouse was the largest one yet, but today it was oddly subdued. Perhaps because the judge’s ruling had broken its spirit. Perhaps because the Providence police were out in force, at least forty officers bunched on the courthouse steps and a dozen mounted officers patrolling the perimeter.

Mulligan walked among the protesters, collecting a few bitter quotes for his story. As he was about to leave, someone shouted, “Impeach Needham!”

The crowed picked up the chant.

“You’ve been busy,” Mason said.

“I have.”

It was a balmy evening, so they’d taken a sidewalk table at Andino’s Italian Ristorante on Atwells Avenue, the main thoroughfare through the city’s Italian neighborhood of Federal Hill.

Felicia tossed Mason an inviting smile and offered him a bite of her lobster ravioli. He nibbled the creamy pasta from her fork, closed his eyes, and sighed. Then he dipped his fork into his plate of veal saltimbocca and raised it to her lips.

“I take it you were served,” she said. Mason didn’t want to talk about Diggs, but his specter was at the table with them.

“I was,” he said.

“And?”

“The paper’s attorney will fight the subpoena for my notes,” he said. “No way we’re ever going to give them up.”

“But will you testify?”

“Only to what’s in the story,” Mason said. “Nothing more.”

“What about the video?”

“Did you subpoena the Corrections Department for it?”

“I did, but I’m afraid they might claim it’s been discarded. The bastards could be erasing it as we speak.”

“If you can’t get the tape from another source,” Mason said, “we’ll surrender our copy.”

“With your testimony, that should be enough.”

“The hearing is still scheduled for Wednesday?”

“It is. Judge Needham will be presiding again.”

“Think he’ll rule in your favor?”

“It’s a slam dunk.”

“When will Diggs be released?”

“That depends on whether Roberts appeals the decision-and on how long the state Supreme Court drags its feet before admitting there are no grounds to overturn it.”

“So it’s almost over,” Mason said.

There was a life waiting on the other side of the ugliness they’d been surrounded by for so long. Looking at Felicia, her hair glistening in the candlelight, he decided it was time to cross the line.

“How’s October in Paris sound?” he asked, and then immediately regretted it. He hadn’t just crossed a line. He’d hurdled the Atlantic.

She laughed as if she thought he was kidding.

“Don’t be so fast to spoil me. I’m thinking October in Rhode Island. The crisp air will smell of dead leaves, decaying shellfish, and a hint of petroleum. And there’ll be carved pumpkins on every stoop. It’s a great time to cuddle up in front of a fire. Let’s see how that works out and then take it from there, okay?”