Роберт Паркер - Robert B. Parker’s Blackjack

Simmons did a masterly job of making the young fella describe in horrific detail how he literally stumbled across the maggot-infested, waterlogged, and badly beaten body of Ruth Ann Messenger. Juniper Jones objected for what seemed to be a solid hour until Callison told him to sit down and shut up.

The defense led by Juniper was thin, but he started by cross-examining the young man who found the body, only to give the jury some understanding that the boy was not an expert, and also not very bright, and before Juniper was done with the boy he was nearly in tears.

Next up were the owners of the inn where Boston Bill was staying the night Ruth Ann was murdered. They were an older married couple named Bloom and their testimony of hearing Bill Black and Ruth Ann arguing the night Ruth Ann went missing and then later finding blood on the back steps brought a gasp in the courtroom, followed by a hush.

Juniper weighed in with a volley of objections, exclaiming that none of what was being said was in any way substantial evidence. Juniper eventually got his opportunity to cross-examine the couple that owned the inn and did little to dissuade anyone from what seemed to be pointed, yet without question circumstantial, evidence.

Juniper spared calling Daphne but called Hollis Pritchard and Charles Lemley, Pritchard’s construction foreman, to the stand.

Each of them had nothing but good things to say about Boston Bill Black, but both men were attacked by Simmons, who was doing everything in his power to discredit their credibility. Simmons was ineffective, however, as Pritchard and Charles Lemley proved to be in every way unflappable.

Juniper also did a good job of keeping the focus off the victim and on the prosecution’s lack of evidence.

After an afternoon recess, Denver detective sergeant Sherman King entered the proceedings, stood in the center aisle, and asked Judge Callison if he could approach the bench.

After some pointed questioning, Callison granted him the request, and after King spoke with the judge, the judge called for both the prosecution and defense to approach. King, Dickie Simmons, and Juniper Jones all spoke quietly with the judge, and after a moment the judge shook his head a little.

We could not hear the conversation, but afterward Judge Callison slowly got to his feet, which prompted the bailiff to call out, “All rise.”

Everyone got to their feet.

“This court is adjourned,” Judge Callison said. “We will reconvene tomorrow at ten o’clock sharp... or thereabout.”

He banged his gavel, stepped down, and exited out the door behind him.

After the court adjourned, Chastain, Book, Virgil, and I stood with Bill Black and Juniper in the court’s holding room. Black began to pace when Juniper told him there was a new development in the case. A witness had come forward and the prosecution asked that they recess until the witness could be vetted, vexed, and delivered.

Book and Chastain were next to the wall behind Black and Virgil, and I stood behind Juniper, watching Black pace. He was furious, and it was obvious this news was deeply disturbing to him. Juniper just stood there looking up, watching intently as the monstrous Black, who was twice the size of Juniper, moved to the left, then to the right. After a few turns Black stopped and looked down at Juniper.

“This is bullshit,” Black said.

“Well, regardless,” Juniper said. “Whether it is bullshit or not—”

“It is,” Black said interrupting.

“Yes, well,” Juniper said. “Unfortunately, it’s bullshit in the form of a human being who is coming with damning evidence.”

“Who?” Black said.

Juniper shook his head.

“The pesky young Detective King didn’t, wouldn’t, say,” Juniper said. “And the judge did not press him on it.”

Black started to pace again, moving back and forth in the small room. He jerked off his jacket and threw it over the back of a chair.

“Obviously we will know who and what will be said by whom tomorrow,” Juniper said.

Black shook his head.

“So,” Juniper said, “I have to ask you. Do you wish to reconsider your position here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Just that.”

“You mean do I want to confess?”

Juniper did not answer. He just looked up at Black without blinking and without expression.

“I goddamn do not,” Black said.

“Okay,” Juniper said.

“I will not,” Black said. “I will hang first.”

“There is that,” Juniper said.

“I cannot believe this is happening to me,” Black said.

“It is,” Juniper said. “So tell me...”

Juniper was making his push to see just what Black was really about, what he was made of.

“If this is a matter of pride, you need to let that go,” Juniper said.

“Pride?” Black said. “What do you mean?”

“She was threatening you,” Juniper said. “Wasn’t she?”

“Goddamn right she was,” Black said.

“What was she threatening about, exactly?”

“I told you she wanted to be with me.”

“What else?”

Black shook his head.

“All kinds of nonsense.”

“Per se?”

“I told you she was crazy.”

“What else did she threaten you with?”

Black shook his head. Then he dropped onto a chair.

“I told you, at first when I met her I had no idea she was married.”

Juniper nodded.

Black looked at Virgil and me.

“Go on,” Juniper said.

“And we went about town doing this and doing that.”

“She encouraged it, getting out, not being discreet?”

Black nodded.

“Yes, she acted as though she did not have a care in the world. Then, when I was starting to not see her as much, she got desperate.”

“How so?”

Black got silent for a moment. “She wanted to cling on to me,” he said. “Like I told you before.”

“What did you do?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“I didn’t do anything... I just got tired of her.”

“You tell her that?”

“Not really, no, but my interest in her was less than it had been and she knew it.”

“She didn’t like that, I suspect.”

“No,” he said. “She did not.”

“What did you do, Mr. Black?” Juniper said.

“I told you, nothing.”

“What did she do?”

“That was when she told me she was married and not just a separated woman.”

Black looked at his hands and worked them together for a moment.

“She also told me that when her husband found out about us it was because she told him she was seeing me, wanting to be with me, and that he was a lawman.”

Black shook his head and stared at the floor.

“She also threatened to tell her father-in-law, the chief of the goddamn police, that I raped her, that I forced her.”

“And you were angry with her?”

Black laughed.

“Wouldn’t you be?”

“You were?”

“Hell yes,” Black said. “But...”

“What?” Juniper said.

Black looked at Juniper with a stern expression on his face.

“I did not kill her.”

“Then who did?”

“I told you I don’t know.”

Juniper did not say anything.

Black looked at Virgil. He did not look at anyone else but Virgil and pointed out to the streets.

“They, someone, is out to get me,” he said. “I don’t know who or why exactly, the old man or someone is covering up for her husband or somebody I don’t know. Maybe Ruth Ann was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but you have to believe me.”

“No,” Virgil said. “I don’t have to do anything. Nobody else here does, either, but there is a jury and a judge that will most certainly have to decide your fate.”