The Accused, Harold R. Daniels [read out loud books txt] 📗

notified. Why startled, if Louise’s fall were an accident? And so I say…

*

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts vs. Alvin Morlock. From the summation of Prosecution Attorney Alfred Gurney.

After delivering his charge to the jury, Superior Court Justice Dunstan Cameron watched the jurors file from the room in solemn procession. He felt troubled. Before he rose from the bench to recess the court, he called to the bailiff. “Ask Mr. Liebman and Mr. Gurney to come to my chambers,” he said.

When Liebman and Gurney arrived Judge Cameron was staring out the high window of his chambers. He turned at their entrance. “Gentlemen,” he invited them, “find chairs. I won’t take much of your time.” He turned to Liebman. “Sam, I don’t want you to misunderstand me. I am not criticizing your conduct of the defense, but I don’t believe Morlock could have made a worse impression if he had tried. Wouldn’t he consent to take the stand?”

Liebman shook his head. “I did my very damnedest to persuade him,” he said. “I practically told him it was his neck if he didn’t get up there. I guess you noticed his expression—the jury did.”

Judge Cameron nodded. “Lack of expression would be a better description. I don’t believe he showed the slightest sign of emotion throughout the entire trial.”

Liebman shrugged. “I told him, for God’s sake to look as if he were sorry about something—anything. Judge, I was appointed to defend Morlock. He’s indigent and couldn’t afford counsel after the way his wife stripped him. In spite of that, I give you my word that I did everything that I could. I worked harder to try and make a case for him than I have since I was admitted—and you know how long that’s been. It’s almost impossible to defend a man who won’t defend himself.”

“I’m sure of that, Sam. You did your best. Still, I’m worried about a reversal if the jury comes in with the verdict I think they’ll reach. He made a poor impression.”

Liebman shook his head. “Morlock has already told me that he doesn’t want to appeal the verdict, whatever it is. I’d like to tell you something else he said. This was after I’d told him that he was just asking for the chair if he didn’t listen to my advice. He said, ‘If I’m to be executed, I hope the judge will make it as soon as possible.’ I’ve heard that sort of talk before but I always could see the martyr complex behind it. I think Morlock actually means it.”

Gurney said, “If they bring in a guilty verdict, appeal is automatic.”

Judge Cameron nodded. “That’s true,” he said, “but the Supreme Court would be prejudiced against him if he didn’t actively seek the appeal. Couldn’t you have produced a few more witnesses?”

Liebman shook his head. “I wanted to put her brother on the stand,” he said. “Morlock wouldn’t have it. Actually, he was probably right. If I had used her own brother to attack her character—particularly after the showing the old man made—it would have had a bad effect on the jury. In any case, the prosecution admitted to her poor character. The only defense was to establish Morlock’s good character, and he is such a neutral sort of man that even that is difficult. And you, Gurney, made his trip to Providence with Dodson look like the orgy of the century.”

Judge Cameron nodded. “I suppose you’re right,” he said slowly. “Under the circumstances it was almost imperative that Morlock take the stand himself—unless he actually wanted to be found guilty. He was aware of that?”

Liebman nodded. “As I said, I told him that it was his neck if he didn’t.”

Judge Cameron stood up. “Well, gentlemen, I guess that’s all. Thank you for coming.”

In the corridor Gurney said to Liebman, “What about lunch?”

“I guess so. Let’s go to the Hof-Brau. I could use a drink before I eat. I’ll tell the bailiff where we’ll be.”

When their drinks came Liebman lifted his in a mock salute to Gurney. “You murdered us,” he said.

“I don’t know,” Gurney answered. “If I did, it wasn’t your fault. How long do you think, Sam?”

Liebman glanced at his watch. “Two hours,” he said. “If it goes three they’ll bring in first-degree.”

Their food was brought, but neither man ate with any interest. Liebman said, after a lengthy silence, “Your summation was solid, Alfred. What little popguns I had, you spiked.”

Gurney shrugged. “Tell me about Morlock,” he said. “What was his story about what happened up on that rock?”

Liebman put down his fork and lit a cigarette. “I went to see him the second day after he was arrested,” he said. “I told him that I’d been appointed to the case and that I’d looked into it and that the first thing I’d do was ask for bail to be set pending a hearing by the Grand Jury.”

Gurney looked interested. “Well?” he asked.

Liebman smiled ruefully. “He told me that he didn’t want bail. Then I told him that he should have no secrets from his attorney and asked him what happened up on the rock. He said, ‘She fell.’”

“That’s all?” Gurney asked.

“That’s all. I told him that if he had killed her, his best course was to plead guilty and that, under the circumstances, we might get the charge reduced to manslaughter. His answer?”

Gurney said, “She fell?”

“Correct. And that’s all he would say. I pleaded with him to tell me what had happened. I threatened him with a first-degree murder verdict. I even drew him a picture of the chair. He actually took a small, academic interest in that. I tell you, Gurney, I’ve had clients who were scared numb so that they could only repeat over and over whatever lie they had committed themselves to. And I’ve had some who couldn’t help me because they were in a state of shock. Morlock was neither scared nor in a state of shock. I got the impression sometimes that he was actually sorry for the trouble he was causing me.” Liebman pushed his chair back and stood up. “I feel badly about this,” he said. “Can you think of anything I didn’t do that I could have done?”

Gurney signaled for the check. “I don’t think so, Sam.”

The courtroom was nearly empty when they returned to it. Only a handful of spectators, grimly determined to be present when the jury came in, clung to their seats. A few court attaches sat listlessly at the front of the room. Liebman thanked Gurney for the lunch and made his way back through the maze of corridors to the detention cells, where Morlock was being held during trial hours. He nodded to the custodian and said softly, “Alvin?”

Morlock sat up. “Hello, Sam,” he said.

Liebman said, “I don’t want you to worry any more than you can help. Let’s face it. They’ve been out almost two hours already. If they were going to find you not guilty they’d have done it by now. I want you to ask for the appeal if things turn out badly.” Liebman argued in vain. After a few minutes he returned to the courtroom. When Gurney saw him, he raised an eyebrow. Liebman returned the gesture with raised shoulders and out-turned palms.

*

When Liebman had first visited Morlock in his cell two days after his arrest and two months before his trial, Morlock had already decided on the course he would take. He would die—he smiled wryly at the thought that it was quite possible that he_ would_ die before he would reveal the nature of that last quarrel. On the night of the day that Louise fell to her death, he had known animal panic and great fear that he might be found out. Later the fear became revulsion, shame that he might stand publicly accused of killing her, that before the world he would appear to have risked his life in such a sorry cause. He had killed her because she had trespassed on the most secret recesses of his being, trampling and scuffling with dirty feet, but he could not say this. It would be assumed that he had killed her, if they refused to believe his story of an accident, because she had spent his money, had gambled, had whored. Stewart, the police chief, had indicated when he arrested Morlock that these were the stuff of suspicion. Well, let them. He would not, could not, ask for the pity and the mercy of a jury by telling them what Louise had been any more than he could tell them of her obscene remark about Marianna Cruz. The jury would never be able to understand how he felt about Marianna. He Was left no choice but to say that Louise fell, this and nothing more. He said it with the monotonous beat of a metronome and to the great exasperation of Sam Liebman.

In the first days of his confinement, he slept little. He had only to close his eyes, it seemed, and the vision of Marianna Cruz’s body hurtling into the green depths of the forest would recur. He had not been there when she actually had fallen and he had never before pictured what it must have been like. The picture had been forced upon him when he saw Louise make the same terrible journey through space; and it returned and returned. He had much time for his regressions and this time he did not have to apologize to himself for making them. In a cell there was little else to do. But there was another difference. He had lost the power to select, to pick and choose from a hundred memories, and the memory that kept returning was one he had avoided for nineteen years. It concerned his betrayal of Marianna.

He had been sixteen, nearly two years older than she, when it happened. She had been his constant companion for four years. If her English had improved, she had changed little otherwise. She remained a shy child with great eyes and an elfin quality that he could recognize even then. If her breasts were beginning to bud, she was unconscious of it. Through long association they could very nearly understand each other without the use of speech. Each school day he waited for her to pass his house. He would walk with her then and so much a habit was this that the schoolboys no longer jeered or made comments when they approached the schoolyard.

It happened that a cycle of teen-age faddism made scholastic ability fashionable. Morlock, who was an excellent student, won several prizes in quick succession and whereas this would have ordinarily gone unnoticed by the student body, the fashion dictated that he be given the same recognition as an outstanding athlete. Morlock, who had never been noticed by ninety per cent of his classmates, who had been invited to not more than two parties in his life, who did not resent being called a stickin-the-mud, suddenly found himself being lionized. Football and basketball players sought him out, calling him admiringly, “The Professor.” He reacted to it in the manner of a ham actor finding himself in a hit show. There was a girl, an early blooming Circe of a girl, in Morlock’s class. So pretty a girl that most of Morlock’s classmates were in love with her, dreamed pillow-hugging dreams of rescuing her from all manner of terrible situations. Morlock had been content to admire her from a great distance, knowing that she was from another sphere and not reaching to it. When he suddenly became socially acceptable, she sought him out in the corridor.

“Alvin,” she said, “we’re all going over to Franklin’s for hamburgers after school. Why don’t you ever come with us?”

She