
oyote the Trickster yawned in perfect boredom, and out of his gaping mouth
tumbled the blue Earth wrapped in an old black Blanket. When Coyote saw what he
had done, he said aloud, "Good joke," then laughed uproariously at his own
cleverness.
Coyote's words resounded like thunder beneath the Blanket and his
laughter fell as rain upon the Earth, making slimy green puddles from which
Everything-that-is grew.
Even the First People came from the puddles.
They crawled out of them on their bellies, then stood up beneath the
old black Blanket and feared.
When he saw the People's dark confusion, Coyote chuckled for a moment,
then snapped his white-tipped tail like a whip across the sky, leaving behind a
Story that looked just like the Sun.
"Ahh!" the First People exclaimed, for now they could see their own
shadows, which they studied in fascination.
Soon they forgot the Story that lit up the Earth and ended their
confusion.
Coyote howled in dismay because the People were so foolish. His howl
echoed in the Canyons many times over until the People thought the echoes were
the First Story.
Coyote tried to laugh at their new foolishness, but nothing came out of
him but dismay, which the People called Death.
Then Coyote couldn't stop laughing.
He grabbed his sides and rolled across the world in a fit of glee.
Finally he reached the hills where Dog was curled up in a ball.
"You wouldn't believe what I just did," he bragged, then told her in
great detail of his exploits. She listened attentively and nodded at all the
right moments, for she knew it would be her turn when Coyote was done.
"You wouldn't believe what I just did," Dog announced, then held up
each pup she had given birth to while Coyote was off playing.
Coyote gasped in amazement, then noticed that one of them had a white-
tipped tail exactly like his own.
"You shall fly between worlds," he told that pup. "The world of the
foolish People with little memory shall be your home, while the world of the
Story shall be your salvation."
I was that pup.
This is that Story.
PART ONE: WAITING
“[A]ll the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come.”
Job 14:14
1. The Dog
he first time I saw the Dog he was trussed in chains and locked behind
two sets of steel bars. He stood rigidly in the holding cell, his
pale hands crossed at the wrists, staring at something only he could see.
I couldn’t tell if he were a simpleton or a farm boy who’d had too much
to drink and forgotten his own name. Then he stared straight at me
through the bars, gave me a doleful look, threw back his head and howled,
baying like a coon dog running in the night.
I cringed, not knowing
whether to laugh or cry.
It was after six p.m.
and I should have been sucking down my first Catamount Amber Ale instead
of watching a human dog perform behind steel bars; but at exactly 5:57,
just as I had been leaving the office, the phone had rung. I don’t
know what it is about ringing phones, but I can’t let sleeping dogs lie
or ringing phones go unanswered.
“Public Defender Office,”
I had answered automatically, my mind already out the door and in the pub
across the street.
“Jimmy?”
It was Diane, the public
defender and my boss. I could tell by her voice that something big
was going down. I could feel the tension that ran through the telephone
lines directly from her to me. Was it then the warning bells first
sounded in the back of my mind? Get ready, Jimmy, your life’s about
to change. . .
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m at the courthouse.
Judge Stone just appointed us to the Dog Case.”
The Dog Case is what
the press had tagged a gruesome homicide of a six-month-old baby whose
mother had left her asleep in a car seat while she ran inside the Mobil
mini-mart to pay for her gas.
Why Dog?
Because when they finally
found the baby’s body in the hills five miles away, it had been shaken
apart from the limbs the way some canines worry their prey.
My stomach turned over
just thinking about it.
“Does that mean they’ve
got the Dog?”
“The suspect is at
the jail right now. I want you to go over there and stay with him
until the sheriffs transport him to the courthouse. It shouldn’t
be long.”
“What’s his name?”
“John Doe for now.
Apparently he won’t talk to the cops.”
“Won’t or can’t?”
“That’s what I want
you to find out.”
“No problem.”
I was about to hang up when I heard her say something I didn’t catch.
I yanked the receiver back to my ear. “What was that?”
“If he talks to you,
make sure no one overhears the conversation.”
“Give me a break, Diane.”
My voice was brittle with scorn. I bristle whenever she plays lawyer
with me. Every so often I’ve got to remind her that it was me who
trained her, not the other way around.
A year ago when she
had walked through the doors of this office for the first time, Diane was
six months out of Vermont Law School. She had just passed the Bar
exam and finished her clerkship at a small private firm that made its money
on real estate. One Friday she’s doing title searches in Stowe, the
next Monday she’s handling arraignments in St. Johnsbury.
The morning of those
first arraignments I could hear her losing her breakfast behind the glass-paneled
door of the Ladies Room. I didn’t mention it, but stayed close to
her throughout the morning. I sat directly behind the defense table
in the Caledonia County District Court and watched her knees shake uncontrollably
every time she stood up to address the court. But her voice never
even quavered, and that made me think she might actually make a decent
public defender.
“And Jimmy . . .”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.
There’s something very weird about this case.”
“There usually is,”
I said in exaggeration, which broke the tension and made her laugh.
Diane has this bubbly laugh that tickles me every time I hear it.
“See you shortly,” I added, then gently put the receiver back into its
blue plastic cradle.
I heard the church
bells on Main Street strike six times. I could be at the jail in
five minutes if I hurried.
The Dog was waiting.
2. Lucky
he Dog’s name at birth was Donald Allen Hall, but he called himself
Lucky. One side of his face was covered with a strawberry — a red
wine-colored stain of skin that ran from above his left temple, across
his forehead to the bridge of his nose, then nearly straight down the middle
of his face into his shirt collar. When you glanced at him, it’s
all that you saw. Not the color of his eyes or the jut of his chin,
just the strawberry that transformed his face into a harlequin’s mask.
At the time of his arrest he was twenty-two years old and homeless.
He had no family in Vermont, no friends, no job. In short, if bail
were set in this capital case, the Dog would languish in jail for lack
of it. Part of my job as a criminal defense investigator is making
our clients look good to the court. I can’t accomplish that if they’re
sitting behind bars. With Donald “Lucky” Hall, I’d need more than
a little luck to make him look like anything other than a prime suspect
of an act so heinous it shocked the conscience.
I didn’t know any of this about the Dog when I first heard him
howl. He was inside a large holding tank directly across from the
tiny room where lawyers meet with their incarcerated clients. The
Dog’s howl resounded in the concrete vault of the empty cell, sending chills
up and down my spine. I’d been working in the public defender system
for ten years and had witnessed some strange behavior, but this was downright
eerie.
“Did I make him do that?” I asked Rod, the shift supervisor who
had escorted me through the jail to the attorney’s room. I saw Rod
nearly every day, and we had this unspoken agreement. If Rod knew
something I needed to know, he let it slip. I returned the favor
by keeping him posted on the anguish level of my clients. The last
thing Rod wanted on his shift was a suicide.
“Naw, he’s been howlin’ like that since they brought him in an
hour ago. Reminds me of my first coon dog. One night he’s so
worked up he follows a smart old coon into an apple tree, just scrabbles
right up after it. Soon as the dog’s into the crotch of that tree,
the coon jumps off a high branch into the night, leavin’ the dog stuck
behind, howlin’ in fear and frustration to be tricked that way — treed
by a coon!”
I started to laugh out loud but was pulled up short when the
Dog howled again, this time with such force that I flinched.
“Yeah, that dog was a lot like this fellow here,” Rod said, cutting
me a look out of the corner of one eye.
I wondered if he were trying to tell me something he couldn’t
come right out and say. I was about to ask when the Dog howled again.
Normally, Rod’s presence is enough to stifle anyone’s baser instincts.
Though he stoops over as if gravity is dragging down his meaty shoulders,
Rod standing tall is six feet six inches and 270 pounds. When Rod
had come back from Vietnam, a personnel officer at the Vermont Department
of Corrections had taken one look at him and hired him on the spot, assigning
him to the Goon Squad at the old Windsor State Prison. Whenever a
prisoner had started acting up, the Goon Squad had been sent in to “quiet
things down.”
That was a long time ago, but Rod continued to have a chilling
effect on most people.
Rod unlocked the two sets of steel bars to the holding cell,
then motioned for the Dog to follow him. The Dog was cuffed both
at his wrists and ankles, and the cuffs were attached by heavy chains to
a thick leather belt that was strapped around his waist.
He took one look at Big Rod and backed away.
“Gonna play that way, are we?” A grim smile spread across
Rod’s face as he lumbered into the cell, wrapped a giant hand around the
Dog’s skinny arm, then half led, half dragged him across the hall to the
attorney’s room.
We were deep in the heart of the jail beyond the reach of any
natural light. There was just one bulb recessed in the steel-plated
ceiling. It cast a pale orange glow on the sweating concrete walls,
making everything indistinct and almost smoky, reminding me of the hellish
scenes painted by Hieronymus Bosch.
The Dog howled in misery the whole way across the hall, his harlequin’s
mask a study in torture. Since I could see that Rod wasn’t physically
hurting him, I wondered what was behind the anguish so evident on the Dog’s
face.
As they passed by I reached out a reassuring hand, but the Dog
pulled back in fear and snarled at me, his chains rattling like Jacob Marley’s
in A Christmas Carol.
Rod chuckled and, as he shoved the Dog into the attorney’s room,
said, “I’ll leave you two lovebirds alone so you can get better acquainted.”
Even through the thick smudged lenses of his glasses, I could see Rod’s
eyes twinkling at the prospect of my being stuck alone with the Dog.
While we had a solid trust relationship, it clearly was within the confines
of our adversarial roles, which meant we both took pleasure in the other’s
professional tribulations.
“Before you disappear, I’d appreciate it if you’d remove all
the hardware from my client.”
“You just might regret that, good buddy. Trooper Smalley
is at the emergency room right now gettin’ stitched up from bites your
client inflicted before they could get him lashed down.”
“If that cretin Smalley ever tried to bust me, I’d bite him,
too.”
“I guess I can’t argue that one.” Rod laughed and unlocked
the cuffs. “But remember, this is your idea and I’m not responsible
for any harm you may incur in the performance of your dubious duties.”
“Big Man Rod, you’re simply the most eloquent screw I’ve ever
known.”
Rod bellowed at my sarcastic use of the old epithet for a jailer,
then added as he left the room, “From the looks of it, I’m ‘bout the best
screw you’re gonna see tonight.”
I grimaced in distaste at the sexual entendre. Though I’d
unwittingly opened the door to it, I don’t play the sex-talk game, which
I consider crude and counterproductive.
If the Dog had any clue about what we’d been saying, he didn’t let on.
He simply stared warily at me from the corner where he’d retreated when
freed from his chains. When I didn’t react, he crouched down and
drew into himself, panting slightly.
Sitting in one of the folding chairs at a gray metal table that
filled most of the small room, I studied the Dog. What I saw at first
glance was a young man who, except for the remarkable wine-colored blotch
covering the left side of his face, looked like any number of other street
people in the Northeast Kingdom — a region comprised of Vermont’s three
northeastern counties.
He was nearly six feet and very bony, his pale skin stretched
tightly across sharp features — a pointy chin, high cheekbones, a prominent
forehead. He had a shadow of a mustache and goatee, and his hollow
cheeks were pitted with a purplish hue from an old case of acne.
It was mid-October, and he wore a ragged wool coat. On his sockless
feet was a worn pair of blue Nikes, one without any laces. His black
jeans were faded gray and torn at both knees, his red flannel shirt frayed
at the cuffs where his wrist bones stuck out. The Dog’s shoulder-length
brown hair, very thin and lank, was cut in bangs over golden eyes that
darted around the room as I stared at him.
In the mounting silence I could hear the clanging of cell doors,
the groans and shouts of inmates and guards echoing down the concrete hallway
outside the attorney’s room. Then I could hear one thing more:
the Dog was snuffling. His head was cocked to one side, his nostrils
flaring open and closed, and I suddenly realized he was sniffing me.
His eyes were downcast, and I wondered how long the Dog would wait until
he finally looked directly at me.
No sooner had I thought this than his hooded eyes flashed open
and locked in on mine.
I was startled by his golden stare, which somehow was both intense
and vacuous. The look confused me, for I couldn’t tell what was behind
his eyes, which were large and set far apart, giving his face an open and
innocent look. I’d seen that look before, though it took me a moment
to remember who it was that shared this same wary, wide-eyed innocence.
Odysea. She had that open-eyed look that had made me trust her from
the start.
“My name’s Jimmy St. John,” I said, my voice sounding brittle
and false as it broke the silence. Even to me my name sounded like
a lie, which it was, but there was no way that the Dog could have known
that. No one in Vermont knew, not even Odysea. Yet his blank
stare seemed to say that he did know, that he was challenging me to stop
the lies and utter one true word for the first time in my life.
I ignored the challenge and continued. “I work for the
public defender who’s been assigned to represent you. Her name is
Diane Ashley-Warner, and she asked me to stay with you until the sheriffs
transport you to the courthouse where you’ll be arraigned.”
The Dog’s head quivered slightly as if he suffered a minor tremor.
I couldn’t tell whether anything I’d said had penetrated the
thick wall of his golden stare.
“Do you know why you’re here?”
The Dog just stared.
“You’re accused of kidnapping and killing a six-month-old baby.”
The Dog’s eyes blinked once, hard. It was as if I had struck
him in the face.
“What’s your name?” I asked in a softer tone.
Silence.
“Do you know where you are?”
No reply.
Sometimes I wonder why I do this work, but I never wonder at
moments like this. It’s the challenge that keeps me totally focused,
the challenge of getting through to someone who’s so completely lost they
don’t even know their own name.
One moment they’re standing on the earth like you and me — maybe
just brushing their teeth and wondering about an elusive dream — the next
moment they’re looking back at us from the wrong side of the River Styx.
They don’t remember dying, but they’re in Hell, literally, and I’m a guide
from the cool green world of the living, waving at them from across the
River, holding out a promise that maybe, just maybe, they can cross back
over.
As I looked at the Dog looking at me, I wondered if he’d ever
cross over.
Then I thought about him biting Trooper Smalley.
A wicked smile creased the corners of my mind and I had to admit
I garnered more than a little satisfaction from Smalley’s discomfort.
Maybe it was for all the wrong reasons, but suddenly I liked
this strange and timid young man who looked like a harlequin and bayed
like a hound and bit the bad guys. That’s the sum total of everything
I knew about him at that point, and suddenly it was enough. I dropped
my eyes and stopped staring at him.
“It’s okay, my friend, you don’t have to tell me your name.
If it was me, I wouldn’t feel like talking either. Besides, I know
that if Trooper Smalley was involved in your arrest, he didn’t make it
easy for you. He’s a mean-spirited asshole who gets his kicks by
pounding on people who can’t or won’t complain. So it’s my guess
that he provoked you, that biting him was an act of self-defense.
And it’s also my guess that right now you don’t trust anybody. I
don’t blame you.
“So you don’t have to tell me your name and you don’t have to
trust me. I’m not expecting you to, not yet. But I want you
to know that I’m on your side. It may be hard for you to believe
that anybody’s on your side right now, but that’s what your lawyer Diane
and I get paid to do — be on your side when no one else will. We
won’t judge you, we don’t even have to believe you are innocent, but at
some point we do have to know that you understand the criminal charges
you’re facing and that you can help us defend you against those charges.”
It was a long speech, but by the end I thought I saw a flicker
of comprehension flash across the Dog’s face.
Then I heard Rod pounding on the steel door.
“Time to go, Jimmy. The sheriffs are waiting.”
3. The Lawyer
ven after nine hours in court, Diane Ashley-Warner, Esq., looked exquisite
to me. It wasn’t just her physical appearance, which I found alluring
enough, but something deeper, a kind of sensual energy that pulled me towards
her unrelentingly. Of course Diane was unaware of this. Long
ago I had learned the trick of masking sexual interest with smug indifference.
When you look the way I do, dissembling is a survival skill. Yet
at certain rare moments I let slip the iron mask to study her unawares.
This was one of those moments.
As I had entered the first set of double doors on the Eastern
Avenue side of the brick courthouse, I had spied Diane at the other end
of the long hallway. She was talking animatedly to someone inside the district
court clerk’s office. I’d stopped before knocking on the second set
of glass doors and lingered a moment, feasting on the sight of this woman
who wielded more raw power over me than she’ll ever know.
I love to watch her body speak its subtle tongues. The
quick sweep of her elegant fingers as they punctuate a point. The
way her hips swivel as she laughs. The slight tilt of her head when
perplexed. All of it titillates and amuses me, making me feel more
alive than I manage on my own.
She was dressed in a pale yellow cotton shift that hung to her
knees, a purposely loose fit to hide her body from invasive eyes like mine.
Diane has a runner’s body, thin yet lithe, her legs long and finely muscled,
her shoulders broad, her breasts small. She has a pointy nose on
a face that’s too often too solemn, but when she smiles she holds nothing
back.
Except for the black blazer whose padded shoulders gave her the
more formal look required for court, she could have been headed for a boat
party on Lake Champlain. Her silver-blonde hair, which must have
been white as a child, was held back by a barrette at the nape of her neck.
She had black slipper-like shoes on her feet, the right one softly stroking
the back of her left calf. As she did so, a black leather shoulder
bag swung slightly at her side. The only jewelry she wore was a pair
of tiny gold ear studs and a very large and ostentatious diamond ring.
I once had chided her about the ring, which I’d implied was out
of character, and she had defended it as Bob’s choice. “It was his
mother’s wedding ring,” she had replied curtly, obviously aware of the
lavish statement the ring achieved.
At that moment I’d looked into her green eyes and seen that I
had hit a sore spot, so I mumbled something about the value of tradition
and changed the subject.
Now as I studied her I could see my own reflection in the glass
panel of the door before me. What I saw was a tired-looking man of
forty-eight with dark bulging eyes and thinning gray hair pulled tightly
back into a long pony tail. A thick salt-n-pepper beard dominated
my face but couldn’t hide the flat, wide nose, the swarthy complexion.
Thick-bodied and short, I was dressed in my usual uniform: dark jeans,
a blue work shirt unbuttoned at the collar, a knit tie loosely knotted,
a tan corduroy sport coat I’d found at a church rummage sale. I saw
my rumpled reflection, then through it to Diane, and realized not for the
first time the absurdity of my infatuation.
An ugly man should know his limits, resist and dissemble.
I resumed my iron mask of indifference and pounded on the locked
inner door to the courthouse. The glass rattled loudly, making Diane
turn towards me. I saw her eyes light up in recognition, then she
said something to the person inside the office, whose braying laughter
spilled into the hallway, so I knew it was Lucy Miller, the district court
clerk. Miller must have pressed the buzzer that unlocked the door,
for I heard the lock click open. Even in pastoral Vermont, court
security was getting tighter every year.
Diane turned away and headed down the hallway in my direction.
Her black slippers made soft sliding sounds on the tiled floor. Her
eyes bore into mine, making me flush with anticipation.
We met outside the jury room where we usually interview clients
before arraignments. She stood very close to me, our shoulders nearly
touching, and then she placed a hand on my arm, pulling me even closer.
Our faces were so near I could feel her breath on my neck, and for a moment
I thought her lips were parting in invitation.
My fantasy splintered as her lips broke into lawyer’s words.
“Lucy just told me that Judge Stone is biting at the bit to get
this over with so we can all go home, but I convinced Lucy we need a few
minutes to go over the case with our client before the arraignment.
What did you find out at the jail?”
I flinched inside, then tried to form a response but couldn’t.
What I had interpreted as intimacy was merely Diane being professionally
discreet. I turned away from her and opened the door to the jury
room.
When she followed me inside, I said with my back to her, “Not
much, he wouldn’t talk to me either. I wouldn’t even know his name
now except I got lucky as I left the jail.”
“Lucky?”
“You got it — Lucky — that’s what he calls himself.”
“What’s his legal name?”
“Donald Allen Hall. I know this only because I ran into
Sue Lecroix. Do you know her?”
“Isn’t she a new correctional officer?”
“That’s right. Turns out she also volunteers at the community
meals held at Grace Church. He apparently has been coming there to
eat for the past few months. Sue recognized him. He used to
live on a farm near her parents’ hunting camp in North Danville.
She told me he was a foster kid there. Apparently the farm family
had a contract with the state to provide emergency shelter for kids who’re
especially troubled.”
“And our client was one of them?”
“Definitely. Sue told me he rarely talks, and then only
in response to direct questions. She also told me he has no family
here. No one knows much about him, just his name and age. He
simply appeared one evening at the rest area on Interstate 91 in Lyndonville.
The attendant said he saw a battered old Chevy with Connecticut plates.
Someone shoved a teenaged kid out the door, then took off fast. He
called the cops, and Lucky ended up living with Sue’s neighbors until he
turned eighteen.”
“I thought social services keeps working with kids like him even
after eighteen.”
“They probably did, but that was four years ago and they must
have given up at some point because Sue says he’s been living in a tent
down by the river underneath the Portland Street Bridge.”
Diane considered this for a moment, then went back to an earlier
point she wanted clarified. “If the farm family provided temporary
shelter, why did he continue to live there?”
“I don’t know. Maybe social services couldn’t find anywhere
else to place him. I guess he was too weird for their long term foster
homes.”
“You mean because he doesn’t talk?”
“Not exactly.”
Just then we heard the courthouse doors open and the sound of
a dog whimpering. I looked at Diane and inclined my head in the direction
of the whimper.
“Tell me that’s not who I think it is,” Diane said, her eyes
widening in disbelief.
“You ain’t heard nothin’ yet,” I said as a baying howl erupted
in the high-ceilinged hallway.
A gruff voice hissed “Shut-up!” Then there was a sharp
rap on the frosted glass of the jury room door. When Diane opened
it, two grim-looking sheriff’s deputies stood on either side of Lucky.
I’d seen both of them before but didn’t know them by name.
“Here’s your client,” the taller one said, layering more contempt
on the word “client” than I thought possible.
“We’ll be sitting right there,” the second deputy said, pointing
with his trigger finger at a bench directly across the hall. Then
he shoved Lucky inside the room and quickly closed the door before Diane
could object to the shove.
As soon as Lucky spotted me, he shuffled over to my side of two
large conference tables placed end-to-end in the narrow room. His
chains rattled as he sidled up to me. He whimpered a few moments
then stopped, clearly calmed by my presence, which surprised me.
Diane took it all in without comment, then walked to the other
side of the tables and sat down in one of the Windsor chairs. She
removed a file from her black leather shoulder bag and opened it.
Inside was the Information, a pink sheet of paper that contained the formal
criminal charges brought by the State’s Attorney. Attached to it
were affidavits by the investigating officers, including Trooper Smalley.
She read them over carefully, then turned to Lucky and said, “My name is
Diane. I’m the public defender for Caledonia County. Judge
Stone, who’ll be presiding at your arraignment in a few minutes, has appointed
me to represent you, at least for the arraignment.”
Lucky stared at her blankly.
“Would you like to sit down?” Diane asked, motioning towards
a chair in front of him and directly across the wide table from her.
When he didn’t respond, she tried again. “What’s your name?”
He just moved closer to me, clearly disturbed by her persistence.
Then Diane abruptly pushed back the Windsor chair and stood up.
The steel-capped chair legs scraped loudly on the floor, which made Lucky
wince. Diane started walking along the other side of the table towards
the windows at the end of the room, dodging chairs in her way. It
was stuffy and dark in the room, so I assumed she was going to open a window
or raise the dark green shades. Instead of stopping at the windows
she kept coming around the second conference table until she was on our
side of the room. She walked right up to Lucky, looked directly into
his eyes, and smiled at him warmly.
“Let me start again,” she said. “My name is Diane.”
She held out her hand, and when Lucky didn’t take it, she continued reaching
towards him until she gently touched his forearm. Lucky looked down
at the floor, avoiding her gaze, but he didn’t pull away.
Then she said softly, “It’s okay, Lucky.”
When he heard her say his name, he snuck a glance before quickly
lowering his eyes again.
Diane patted his arm and pulled two chairs out from the table
so that they faced one another. She sat down in one and motioned
to the other. Lucky glanced at her again, hesitated, then sat in
the chair, his shoulders hunched over and his head hanging.
Diane reached out and took both his hands in hers. As she
did so, the chain that was strapped to the belt on his waist rattled slightly.
“Do you have any idea why you are here, Lucky?” she asked in
a voice uncharacteristically gentle.
Lucky looked up at her with his doleful eyes, then shook his
head, almost imperceptibly. If I hadn’t been watching intently, I
would have missed it.
“I didn’t think so,” Diane said. She studied him a moment
more, glanced at me, then continued. “The police say you took a six-month-old
baby out of her mother’s car and then killed her by shaking her body until
it broke apart.”
Lucky responded, as he had in the jail, as if he’d been punched
in the face.
“I’m sorry, Lucky. I don’t want to upset you, but we have
to go over this before the arraignment. As part of the arraignment,
the judge first must decide if there’s been a crime committed, which obviously
there has, and then whether it’s likely that you are the person who committed
it. That’s called determining probable cause. The state police
who arrested you claim that you were seen by the store manager at the mini-mart
at the time of the kidnapping.” She dropped Lucky’s hands and reached
across the gleaming maple table to grab the paperwork. After glancing
at the Information she said, “This was almost three weeks ago on a Friday
afternoon, September 25. Do you remember anything about that day?”
This time Lucky didn’t respond at all as far as I could tell.
“Lucky, you have to think about this. It’s important that
you remember where you were on that day, who you were with, what happened.
You have to be able to help us. If you weren’t there at the mini-mart,
if you can prove you were somewhere else entirely, we can claim you have
an alibi, but we have to make the claim soon or lose the legal right to
that defense.”
It was as if she hadn’t spoken, and I could see that Diane was
losing her patience. Her voice took on a more aggressive tone.
“Lucky, this is important. You must talk with me. You’re being
charged with murder and kidnapping! You could end up spending the
rest of your life behind bars, whether you did it or not. Please
talk to me!”
She might as well have been speaking to the wall. Lucky
had gone somewhere else. He was an empty container. No one
home.
As soon as she realized this, Diane turned to me and casually
announced, “I’m going to ask Judge Stone to order a competency evaluation.”
“Don’t do it, Diane.”
Her face flushed with anger. “Why the hell not? My
client won’t even talk to me!”
“Because they’ll never find him competent, and you know it.
It’s a cheap shot: Send your difficult client off to the shrinks
and never see him again. No trial, no conviction, no work, just Waterbury
State Hospital for Lucky until he dies or they kill him with their so-called
‘treatments.’ Is that what you want?”
She glared at me, then said, nearly shouting, “This is my call,
not yours! If he can’t communicate, he can’t assist in his defense,
which means he’s legally incompetent to stand trial. I don’t know
what your problem is, but take it somewhere else!”
I couldn’t believe she was saying this. “I thought we were
a team, Diane.”
“Not when you’re attacking my professional judgment.”
“Fuck your professional judgment! We’re talking about a
human life here.”
“What about the victim? Was hers not ‘a human life’?”
I shook my head in disbelief. “I don’t know where you’re
coming from on this. Just because he won’t talk to you doesn’t mean
he’s guilty. We have no idea what happened that day, whether he was
even there.”
“And how do you propose to find out?”
“I don’t know, but we’ll never get the chance if you go ahead
with your competency request.”
“I don’t see any alternative. At least he won’t be in jail.”
“There are worse places than jail, Diane.” As soon as it
was out, I wished I hadn’t said it. She’d hear the pain in my voice,
and it pricked her curiosity. She looked at me a long moment, then
asked quietly, “Why do you say that?”
I stared back at her, resisting her green-eyed gaze until the
silence that rose up between us solidified like a granite wall, each of
us on either side of it.
There was a knock on the door, which opened just enough for Lucy
Miller to stick her head in.
4. The Defendant
ccusing a public defender of selling out her client does not exactly
enhance career longevity, but at the time I didn’t care. Lucky deserved
better than Diane was giving him, and I was the only one around to remind
her of that. If doing so meant I had to put my job on the line, then
I would. I’m not a hero, but I’m no wage-slave, either. Besides,
street lawyers are supposed to be above the hierarchal mindset of their
more conventional colleagues, or so I always believed.
As we entered the small courtroom across the hall, I hoped Diane
was reconsidering her position on Lucky, but no sooner had they sat down
at counsel table than he let out one of his ear-splitting howls.
When Judge Stone grimaced in distaste, Diane turned to me with a superior
look that confirmed her earlier intention. From the set of Judge
Stone’s face, it was obvious Diane would have no problem getting him to
agree.
Not that she would under normal circumstance. Any of the
actors — the judge, the attorney for either side, a guardian, even some
“other person acting on behalf of the defendant” — can raise the issue
of competency, though in practice it’s left up to defense counsel to question
whether their client can meet the two-pronged test. Simply put, criminal
defendants must be able to understand the charges they face and be able
to assist their lawyers in their defense. Although the threshold
to be found competent is low, I doubted Lucky would ever pass the test.
Which meant that unless a miracle happened, the whole question
of his guilt or innocence would never be addressed.
Judge Stone began reading aloud from the Information, but quickly
stopped when he saw the John Doe. “Mr. Brown,” he said to the State’s
Attorney, “do we have an ID for the defendant yet?”
“I may be able to help, your Honor,” Diane said before Brown
could reply. “My client’s name is Donald Allen Hall.”
“What’s your date of birth, Mr. Hall?”
When the judge looked directly at him, Lucky started whimpering
and glancing back to where I sat in the first row behind the defendant’s
table.
“I don’t have an exact date of birth,” Diane said, “but I believe
he’s twenty-two years old.”
Lucky’s whimpers grew louder and more insistent, the judge’s
irritation more pronounced. Stone wasn’t known for his patience,
though in other ways he was a fair and competent judge.
“Isn’t there something you can do to calm your client?” he asked
Diane.
“I’m not sure, your Honor, but I think if my investigator was
sitting next to him, it might help.” As a non-lawyer I wasn’t permitted
on the other side of the bar that defined the legal arena.
Judge Stone looked at me and nodded his head in consent.
I quickly took the seat next to Lucky, which appeared to help.
Though his breathing, a kind of staccato panting, was loud enough to fill
the courtroom, he immediately stopped whimpering and sat quite still.
In the quiet that followed, Judge Stone quickly found probable
cause, then informed the defendant of his legal rights, including the right
to return the following day for the official arraignment. As usual,
Diane agreed to waive the 24-hour rule and proceed directly to the formal
arraignment. Stone then accepted the not guilty plea Diane tendered
on behalf of Lucky, and at the State’s request denied bail to the defendant,
“given the capital nature of the offense.”
When Diane stood up and requested an evaluation for competency,
Stone glanced down at the form he was filling in and asked, “And insanity
at the time of the offense, as well?”
She hesitated, and I didn’t know why since it was standard practice
to address both issues if there were any chance that the defendant’s mental
state might be raised, either during trial or at sentencing. When
she started shuffling papers on the table in front of her, an obvious ploy
for time, I suspected she was having second thoughts, that what I’d said
was starting to sink in. She glanced my way and saw me staring at
her. Then she stiffened and said emphatically, “Yes, your Honor.”
He checked off the additional box on the form and then ordered
Lucky sent directly to the Vermont State Hospital at Waterbury for up to
thirty days.
The State’s Attorney jumped to his feet and objected. “Your
Honor, the State requests that the evaluation be done at the correctional
center or at the offices of Northeast Kingdom Mental Health. We do
not believe that the defendant needs to be transferred to Vermont State
Hospital. We’re under the impression that sending him there could
result in unnecessary delay of the case.”
What he really meant was that he was grasping at straws to avoid
a finding of incompetency. The last thing Brown wanted was an incompetent
defendant, which would mean no clear conviction on a widely publicized
homicide that had horrified the public. State’s Attorneys were elected
officials in Vermont, and the next election was looming. This was
exactly the kind of case that incensed voters, exacerbating their worst
fears about public safety. Brown, who had been in office for the
past sixteen years, knew that he had to bring in a quick and clear conviction
with maximum punishment.
Diane rose and countered Brown’s argument. “The Division
of Mental Health is expediting all evaluations. They clearly want
to reduce their census in a continuing effort to downsize the state hospital.”
She put her hands inside the pockets of her black blazer, then continued.
“I also would point out that given my client’s — ” she grasped for the
right words — “current demeanor, he faces harassment and potential physical
violence from the other inmates at the correctional center. I suggest
the state hospital would be a safer, more appropriate setting for the evaluation
to occur.”
Judge Stone nodded his head in agreement and said simply, “My
order stands. The State’s objection is noted for the record.”
Then he stood up and started leaving the courtroom. A pale man of
fifty whose nervous eyes darted behind gold wire-rim glasses, Stone was
short with a growing paunch, neither of which was noticeable until he came
down from the elevated judge’s bench.
“Judge Stone,” the State’s Attorney called after him. Walter
Brown had a high, almost whiny voice that seemed at odds with his physical
stature, for he was a tall, trim man who always held himself erect as though
he were standing at attention.
Stone turned brusquely back, clearly annoyed. “Mr. Brown,
I am not eager to hear whatever it is you insist on saying. We have
been in this courtroom since eight o’clock this morning and it is now nearly
seven in the evening.”
“I’m well aware of that your Honor, but I want to point out that
13 V.S.A. 4815 requires that the defendant go through a screening process
before a formal evaluation occurs.”
Brown was a fighter who never gave up, even on the most picayune
points. He was relentless, some said ruthless, and it made him one
of the toughest prosecutors in the state.
Stone turned to Diane for help, and while she knew the prosecutor
was legally on solid ground, she said, “If the State is truly concerned
with timeliness, it ought to understand that the screening process itself
will result in additional delay. At this time of night, it’s unlikely
that the competency screener would be immediately available. The
statute allows the court to forego the screener’s recommendations if they
can’t be made within two hours of the defendant’s appearance at court.”
Judge Stone considered the options for a moment, then turned
to the State’s Attorney. “Thank you, Mr. Brown, for reminding us
of the wisdom of the legislature in circumscribing judicial discretion.”
His sarcasm cut through the courtroom.
“Your welcome, your Honor,” Brown said, ignoring the sarcasm
because he’d thought he’d won.
Judge Stone turned to Diane. “And thank you, Ms. Ashley-Warner,
for making it possible for us to go home tonight.” He quickly gathered
together the various documents before him and handed them to Lucy Miller,
who had been monitoring the tape machine that was recording the proceedings.
Then Stone pronounced with finality, “The defendant will be transferred
to the state hospital for an immediate evaluation to determine competency
to stand trial and insanity at the time of the offense.”
He banged his gavel, something I’d never seen him do, and was
gone from the bench in a flurry of black judicial robes.
Diane smiled sweetly at Brown, who shrugged his shoulders in
feigned nonchalance. She could afford to be gracious, having gotten
exactly what she’d wanted.
I stood in the empty hallway and watched the sheriff’s deputies march
Lucky out the front door. At the last possible moment Lucky turned
his head and gave me one of his sad looks.
I said, “I’m sorry,” though I doubted he heard me.
As the heavy doors closed behind him, Diane came out of the courtroom,
very buoyant and expansive. She came right up to me and said, “Now
we have to decide what to do next.”
“I thought it was already decided. Lucky’s on his way to
being found incompetent.”
“I’m not talking about Lucky.” She looked at me then, very
intensely, and there was a tone in her voice I’d never heard before.
She was standing close to me again, her hand on my arm as it had been before
the arraignment. Once more I could feel her breath on my neck.
“Then who are you talking about?”
“You and me.”
“Look, Diane, I just can’t agree with your plan to get Lucky
found incompetent. It’s nothing personal. You know that.”
“You don’t understand, Jimmy.” She looked away a moment
as if embarrassed, then ran her tongue over her lips before saying very
distinctly, “I’m talking about what we’re going to do about the way you
keep looking at me.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, though of course I knew exactly
what she’d meant. I felt my heart speed up, my mind begin to race
as I wondered what I could say to stop this impossible moment of Beauty
confronting the Beast.
Just then we heard Judge Stone and Lucy approaching down the
hall. In a moment they’d be in sight.
“Let’s get out of here,” Diane said, then took my arm as we headed
towards the exit. Her car, a new silver Audi, was parked in the lot
next to the courthouse. My old Toyota pickup was down the street
in the public parking lot behind Anthony’s Diner.
“Let’s take my car,” she said.
“Where to?”
“How about dinner at my place?”
“What about Bob? Isn’t he waiting?”
“No,” she said, then grimaced and gave a low laugh, which had
more than a little bitterness in it. “Believe me, Bob is not waiting.”
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