T. Bunn - The Great Divide

“The lawyers for the plaintiff have filled the air with some pretty outlandish contentions, suggesting that somehow my clients are at fault. Mind you, their accusations against my clients are preposterous. Their lawyers, ladies and gentlemen, are claiming that my clients have formed some amorphous ties to a mystery factory sitting on the other side of the world. And somehow this factory has secreted away a woman named Gloria Hall. It is vital that you remember this one fact, ladies and gentlemen, because there has been a lot of smoke blown in this trial. The one issue we are here to determine is: What, if any, responsibility do my clients have in the disappearance of this woman.

“One thing is certain. Up to now we have been watching a trial by ambush. The plaintiff’s lawyers have repeatedly bent the rules of procedure by introducing new witnesses, new evidence, even new defendants. We have been so caught up in this widening series of attacks that we may have lost sight of what we are here for. But all that is over and done with. The plaintiff has rested-it’s no surprise he’s tired after all the stunts he’s pulled. Now it’s our turn.

“You hold me to my promise now,” Logan said, winding down. “We are going to uphold the American system of justice. We’re going to roll up our sleeves and look hard for the facts. And when you go home at night-and remember the judge’s injunction not to discuss this case with anyone-as you sit there and you relax, you can rest assured that my team and I are going to continue our hunt for the truth.”

Logan turned and walked back to the table, inspected his notes for a long moment of punctuation, then said, “The defense calls Ms. Stella Gladding.”

The woman’s skin was close to the same shade as the Chinese general’s. But in her case the sallowness came from a very rough life. The suggestion of hard living was heightened by the voice that gave her name and took the oath. Stella Gladding sounded as though she had gargled that morning with bourbon and ashes.

“Ms. Gladding, you knew Gloria Hall well, is that not so?”

“Very. We roomed together our first two years at Georgetown.”

“Would you please tell the court what she was like?”

“Wild.”

“Gloria Hall was wild.” Logan maintained his position at the podium, swiveling it so that it angled halfway between the witness stand and the jury, slid over just slightly enough that Marcus could not object that Logan was intentionally blocking his view of the witness. “Just how wild, Ms. Gladding?”

“Not only would she try anything,” she replied, “she would do it twice.”

“Objection,” Charlie said, his voice bored, his slouched appearance suggesting that this woman was not worth getting riled over.

“Sustained.” If anything, Judge Nicols responded in a tone flatter than Charlie’s.

Alma shifted in her seat next to Marcus. He glanced over, knowing no warning was possible, no words sufficient. Even so, she nodded without looking his way. She would hold on. To her other side, Austin Hall might as well have been carved from some dark and sorrowful stone.

“Ms. Gladding, did Gloria Hall have any boyfriends?”

“A lot.” She had been prepped well and dressed more carefully still. But no amount of professional makeup or dark-suited grooming could disguise that this was a woman who had seen much and done even more. “They changed from week to week.” A quick little smirk. “Sometimes from hour to hour. Gloria was a real friendly girl.”

Logan asked quietly, “Did Gloria use any drugs?”

“Absolutely.”

“Alcohol?”

“All the time.”

The questioning continued until Gloria Hall had been painted as a full-on party animal, studying little, hanging on to her place at Georgetown through luck and a strong memory. Charlie Hayes seemed to be asleep; Marcus watched because he felt at least one of them should show they cared. Logan’s problem was that the longer the witness remained on the stand, the stronger grew the woman’s bored carelessness. Her voice grew harsher, the answers tighter, as though she needed a drink or a smoke or something stronger. Badly.

Logan realized this, and as he walked back to his table he said, “Defense requests a brief recess.”

Judge Nicols was having none of it. She shook her head, her eyes glued to the witness. “We’ll finish with this witness first.”

Logan had no choice but to say, “Your witness.”

Charlie rose from his slouched position, his voice emerging before his legs were fully under him. “Ms. Gladding, you say you knew Gloria through your first two years at Georgetown, is that right?”

“That’s what I said.”

“And just how long ago was that?”

“Four years.”

He smiled, as though the answer amused him. “You’re sure it was four, now?”

“I just said …” The eyes searched. “No. Five.”

“If my math is correct, Ms. Gladding, it was more like six. Isn’t that right.”

“Five, six, fifteen, it doesn’t matter. I remember Gloria. Real well.”

“Fine. That’s just fine. It’s just that, well, a lot can change in five or six years, wouldn’t you say?”

“Maybe. But not Gloria.”

“No?” Charlie limped his way over to lean upon the corner of the jury box. “Ms. Gladding, could you enlighten me as to why you and Gloria Hall stopped rooming together?”

“I moved out.”

“Is that a fact. My understanding was that Miss Hall was the one who did the moving.”

The hand that rose to flick at her hair shook slightly. “Gloria started getting seriously weird. I couldn’t take it.”

“Weird.” Charlie cast a glance at the jury, then limped over to the plaintiff’s table and accepted the sheet of paper Marcus held. It contained a photocopied statement of court proceedings. But the witness did not know this. “Ms. Gladding, a careful inspection of Gloria Hall’s university transcript shows that she underwent a marked transformation at the start of her junior year.”

“I’ll say.”

“In fact, from that semester on, Gloria Hall’s record shows that she earned almost straight A’s for the remainder of her undergraduate career.”

“She got into this crazy religious phase. It was worse than the guys. Always talking about God and stuff. Wanting me to come with her to church, treating it like an AA meeting. Had to go every night, like she was afraid of falling off the wagon otherwise.”

Charlie kept up his slow nod long after Stella Gladding had stopped talking. “Are you aware that Gloria Hall went on to graduate from Georgetown with honors, and earned herself a full scholarship for her graduate studies?”

“At that price,” the woman sneered. “Who cares?”

“And what, may I ask, was your standing at graduation?”

“Objection,” Logan declared. “Irrelevant.”

“Overruled. The witness is instructed to answer the question.”

Stella Gladding flicked her head in careless irritation. “I flunked out my senior year.”

Charlie made his way back to the table. “No further questions.”

Most of the day was made up of such small combats. The defense attacked with one foray after another. Charlie countered with a few quick questions, gentle in tone, decisive in result. Yet Marcus watched as his case gradually unraveled before his eyes, knowing there was nothing he could do about it, knowing the worst was still to come. He did not need to look at the defense table to know Suzie Rikkers’ eyes were upon him.

Logan’s parade continued with a Washington, D.C. street cop who handled the beat around the Chinese embassy. He was followed by a security guard from the embassy’s permanent detail, then a court-appointed D.C. lawyer, and finally a prison guard for the city’s female lockup. All attested to the trouble they had experienced with Gloria Hall. In a space of fourteen months she had been arrested nine different times, on charges ranging from obstructing traffic to unlawful assembly to rioting to resisting arrest to causing mayhem while incarcerated. Charlie’s cross-examination was focused solely upon showing that all charges had related to activities taking place around the Chinese embassy, or in conjunction with visiting Chinese dignitaries. The defense countered by showing that the charges had arisen from a variety of Chinese-related issues, everything from imprisoned dissidents and freeing Tibet to missing missionaries and trade. A picture slowly developed of an angry young woman determined to make as much trouble for China as possible. Any pretext would do, so long as China was the target.