Scott Turow - The Laws of our Fathers

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 where 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.

Seth