Rose Connors - Temporary Sanity

“We haven’t been able to start, Judge. Not in any meaningful way. And now we opt to defer.”

The judge nods again. “All right,” he says.

Stanley runs up to the bench. He’s so close to it the judge has to lean forward to see him.

“You can’t be serious.” Stanley points at me again. “You’re not going to let her get away with this.”

“Nobody’s getting away with anything, Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third. The defendant has the right to defer. It’s in the Rules of Criminal Procedure.”

“Not now he doesn’t. Not after his lawyer has already addressed the jury.”

“I’ve ruled, Mr. Ed-gar-ton.”

“But Your Honor, don’t you see?” Stanley is on tiptoes, his eyes barely clearing the judge’s bench. “She wants an extra bite of the apple.”

Judge Long leans forward even farther and stares down at him. “Apple?”

Stanley grabs the edge of the bench with both hands and his knuckles turn white. “She wants to have her cake and eat it too.”

Judge Long’s eyes meet mine, then move quickly back to Stanley. The judge looks as if he’s about to laugh. “Cake?”

I shrug and take my seat. “I’m no match for this legal argument, Judge.”

A few of the jurors snicker and Harry laughs out loud. Judge Long fires a cautionary stare in our direction.

“I don’t even cook.”

“Enough, Ms. Nickerson.”

Judge Leon Long doesn’t fool me. He’s on the verge of laughing too.

“Mr. Ed-gar-ton,” he says, so softly it’s almost a whisper. “Sit down, sir.”

Stanley returns to his table and rights his chair. He shakes his head and mutters a barely audible “you people” before he sits.

Silence. For a moment, it seems no one knows what to do next. Even the cameras are still. Finally Judge Long breaks the quiet. “Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third,” he says, “call your first witness.”

“Our first witness is Chief Fitzpatrick, Your Honor, of the Chatham Police Department.” Stanley looks uneasy. He glances quickly around the room, then stares at the floor as if he just dropped something precious.

“Bring him in, then.”

“I can’t, Your Honor.”

“You can’t?”

“He’s not here.”

“He’s not here?” The judge glares at Stanley. “He’s not in the building?”

“He’s not in the building.”

Harry leans in front of Buck. “Is there an echo in this room?”

“Your lead-off witness in this first-degree murder trial is not here, Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third?” Judge Long looks as if he thinks Stanley might be joking. One look at Stanley tells me he’s not.

“I didn’t think we’d need him today, Your Honor. I never dreamed we’d finish both jury selection and opening statements before the end of the first day.”

“You never dreamed?” The judge’s eyes are protruding. “You never dreamed?”

Stanley isn’t dreaming now, either; he’s having a nightmare.

Once again, I cover my mouth and swallow a laugh. Once again, Buck Hammond looks confused. I don’t dare look at Harry.

Stanley’s assumption wasn’t unreasonable. We didn’t begin the afternoon session until after two, and Judge Long always adjourns promptly at four, reserving the last hour of his courtroom day for pending cases. Of course Stanley didn’t think he’d need a witness today.

He did his part. He talked at the jurors for a full hour, and apparently assumed I’d do likewise. But my aborted opening took just twenty minutes, even with Stanley’s tiresome objections. We have forty minutes of trial time left, and Judge Leon Long doesn’t waste trial time. “It’s the taxpayers’ nickel,” he always says. “It’s not ours to squander.”

Stanley’s expression brightens, and he raises an index finger in the air. “Perhaps the defense could call one of its witnesses, Your Honor. Several of the defense witnesses are here in the courtroom. We can take one out of order.” Stanley looks from the judge to me, pleased with his proposal, happy to have solved the problem.

Harry jumps up like a man who’s just heard gunfire. “No way, Judge.”

Judge Long laughs and removes his half glasses, leaning forward on the bench. “Mr. Madigan, how well do you know Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third?”

Harry doesn’t miss a beat. “We’re pretty close, Judge. He’s Mr. Third to me.”

The jurors chuckle yet again, and Stanley reddens. The judge continues to address Harry. “Then you must know he’s joking. He can’t possibly mean what he just said.”

Harry sits, but he’s perched on the edge of the chair, neck muscles taut and fists on the table. He’s ready to shoot up again in an instant. The seasoned defense lawyer’s instincts, I realize, are fueled by adrenaline. I don’t know that I’ll ever acquire them.

Judge Leon Long turns back to Stanley. “Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third,” he says, chin down, half glasses back on the edge of his nose, “surely you don’t mean to suggest that Mr. Hammond should begin defending himself before the Commonwealth has offered a shred of evidence against him.”

“Well, Your Honor…” Stanley gestures toward the TV as if it’s his star witness, and it’s already testified.

Harry stands again, but says nothing.

The judge’s composure is slipping. He takes a red bandanna from the pocket of his robe and mops his brow. “Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third, opening statement is not evidence. Were you not listening when I instructed the jurors?”

The blue vein erupts across Stanley’s forehead. He lifts his hands in the air, palms up, helpless. He’s out of ideas. The crowd in the gallery grows noisy. The judge is about to lose it.

“Chief Thomas Fitzpatrick is here, Your Honor. He’s ready to be sworn in.”

Judge Long bolts upright. Everyone else in the courtroom wheels around. It’s Geraldine, with the Chief in full uniform at her side, hurrying up the center aisle.

J. Stanley Edgarton the Third looks like a man newly delivered from the fires of hell.

Harry leans down toward Buck and me. “She saved his sorry ass.”

“What’s that, Mr. Madigan?” the judge asks.

“He got here awfully fast, Your Honor, awfully fast.” Harry gives the judge a meaningful nod, as if he’s genuinely impressed with the Chief’s velocity.

Geraldine whispers to Stanley, then takes a seat beside him as Tommy Fitzpatrick strides to the front of the room. An ordinary witness might be rattled by this abrupt call to the stand, but not Tommy. He has participated in more trials than most lawyers. He’s composed and confident. And he’s the consummate straight shooter.

Wanda Morgan, the courtroom clerk, approaches the witness box and holds a Bible in front of the Chief. He smiles at her, sets his hat on the box’s railing, then stands at attention. He puts his left hand on the Good Book, raises his right in the air.

“Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give in this court will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

“I do.”

“You may be seated,” Judge Long tells him.

The Chief settles into the witness box, hat on his lap, and faces the jurors.

Stanley is up. “Would you state your full name for the record, please.”

“Thomas Francis Fitzpatrick.”

“And your occupation?”

“Chief of Police, Chatham, Massachusetts.”

“Were you on duty in that capacity during the early-morning hours of September twenty-first?”

Stanley isn’t wasting time with preliminaries. There’s little more than half an hour left in the trial day. He wants to end day one with Tommy Fitzpatrick’s most damning testimony. Let those words echo in the jurors’ minds throughout the night.