“Captain, this is not the time to play coy. I need your help and I want to help you.” Grace’s face almost matched her flaming mop of hair, blown wildly about from the ride in the crazy cab whose windows wouldn’t stay closed. Her green eyes flashed in defiance of his authority.
“So you learned some big words in college, did ya? I don’t understand ‘coy,’ Grace, speak to me in English, not in uppity University of Penn lingo,” he mocked.
“You understand the name Carmen Lopez, don’t you? The little girl you’re holding back there.”
“Is that the little foul-mouthed brat’s name?”
“Sounds like you’re torturing her.” Grace lifted an eyebrow. “You know there’s laws against abusing kids.”
“Abusing
her
?” The captain almost choked. “She can take care of herself, that one. Do you know what she did to the guy in the bathroom?”
“Yes, I heard. But don’t you mean the killer? The assassin, the fucker who deserved to die at least a dozen times. The one who almost killed her and her sister?” She took a deep breath. Her chest was about to explode. “Look, Captain, I know these girls. I worked with their mother, Celia Lopez.”
“Lopez…” He looked quizzically up at the ceiling, as if trying to recall the familiar name, even though it was a common Hispanic surname.
“Come on, Cap, the woman who was murdered last month on Butler Street.”
“Look, Grace, there’s a lot of murders in this city. I can’t remember them all.”
“Maybe you should consider a long vacation.” She stopped, instantly feeling ashamed of her harsh treatment of the good captain
who had been like an uncle to her. “You should remember this one. Ralph Kirby was assigned to the case. Gates pressured someone to close it and then just recently reopened the investigation. It was in the papers.”
“Look, Grace. If you want my help, my cooperation, this is not the way to get it.” The captain turned to walk away.
“Don’t—I’m sorry.” Her eyes filled up. She followed close behind him, hoping he would turn around. She touched his arm.
He did.
“Is the plaintiff ready to proceed?” Judge Barnes said, looking down his patrician nose at his notes. The last words scribbled on the yellow legal pad were:
Doletov, eyewitness, credible.
Nick rose from his chair and looked behind for support. There was none. Grace was noticeably missing, as were Silvio and Levin— even his own bodyguards. Where were they? An uneasy feeling crept into the pit of his stomach, but he had learned to control it. He had honed the act of control to a fine edge at the firm under Joe Maglio. No matter what he felt inside, the master had taught him how not to show it. Spontaneity was a liability in the law business. Particularly in the courtroom.
Nick put two and two together and came to the conclusion that something had happened, something noteworthy. He remembered how the bailiff had practically broken down the closed chambers door to whisper something in Barnes’s ear. But Barnes, like Nick was schooled to reveal nothing. For all that Nick knew, the secret could have been that Barnes’s Great Dane had just taken a crap on the antique Aubusson carpet in the judge’s library. Barnes had simply waved the little gnome away and off he had gone, limping and huffing out the door of the chambers. Neither Nick nor John Asher had heard a word, and Barnes was not about to reveal anything that might provide someone with an excuse to postpone this trial.
“No, Judge. I’m not recalling Nurse Doletov at this time. I’m calling Doctor Manin as of cross.”
A look of surprise sprang up on Barnes’s face as fast as a trout snapping a fly. It was gone just as quickly. He had been expecting the normal course of events where the plaintiff’s attorney called his own witnesses in his case and not the defendant’s. It was obvious that Nick wanted to control Manin’s testimony, not simply punch
holes in it on cross-examination. By calling Manin as of cross, no holds were barred. Nick could ask him questions on just about anything relevant to the case. Nick could even ask him leading questions and maintain control of the witness.
Nick understood that Barnes would be displeased. The deal they had made in chambers was
no shenanigans
on Nick’s part in return for Barnes not stripping him of what little money he had left and then throwing him in jail for contempt. Nick would try his case, represent his client to the best of his ability, and let the jury decide the fate of Doctor Manin.
But Nick had decided to chance infuriating His Majesty. His position was that calling Doctor Manin in the plaintiff’s case was not a shenanigan. It was a legitimate trial tactic, and recognized under the Rules of Civil Procedure in Pennsylvania. Barnes couldn’t stop him. The game was being played within the Rules. If the judge tried to stop him, it would be
his
neck on the block, not Nick’s. At any rate, he thought, that it was a plausible theory.
“Very well, proceed, Mr. Ceratto.” The judge lowered his head toward the yellow notepad and rested his forehead on his hand in order to conceal his anger. He was now determined to look for any opportunity he could find to strip this little wop of his livelihood. If not that, to teach him a lesson not to fuck with Judge Joseph Barnes, and not to try to take control of
his
courtroom.
Manin hesitantly rose from his seat next to Asher, hoping his attorney would protect him with some sort of objection. He glanced momentarily at Asher as he rose, but Asher was expressionless. There was no signal to sit back down, nothing to indicate that his attorney was going to protect his ass. He slowly walked toward the witness stand, feeling as if he were walking to the guillotine. Manin avoided the eyes of the jury although he could feel their multiple stares like a cold wind at his back. He had been told by Asher to make eye contact with them at every natural opportunity, and this might have been one of those opportunities, but he just couldn’t. He was afraid that he might recognize his executioner among them, and he did not wish to see which one it would be.
He stood stiffly as the bible was almost irreverently shoved under his left hand. He was left-handed. It was his strongest hand. But he couldn’t stop its shaking, and he wondered whether it was obvious—whether the jury would be convinced that he was indeed an incompetent surgeon because of his tremors, among other things about himself which were of concern to him.
Brown hollows surrounded his eyes, which were now slits from lack of sleep and stress. Nick approached the witness stand slowly and with purpose. Their eyes met, and now both men focused intently on each other. It was clear that the doctor had not slept the night before. He blinked with each footstep taken by his enemy. It was also evident to Nick as he got closer that the good doctor hadn’t shaved that morning. Gray and brown stubble speckled his cheeks and chin. He was wrinkled and unkempt, one step away from looking as if he belonged in a box on the streets or in one of the recesses of Suburban Station. Manin looked worse at trial than he had at his deposition. This was a one-eighty for him. Nick recalled seeing his photos in the Philadelphia Inquirer on the society page—always dressed to the nines in a tailored tuxedo with a rose in his lapel—and in the
Philadelphia Magazine
’s “Top Docs” issue in a crisp white lab coat. From riches to rags, from prince to pauper.
Oh, what the law can do to you
, Nick thought, wondering about his own fate—teetering on the edge, as it was.
The last thing on Manin’s mind was his clothes. As a matter of fact, he didn’t care about anything except getting out of there— off the witness stand, out of the courtroom, and on with his life— whatever was left of it. He was beyond caring about his career. It was ruined anyway. His estranged wife had taken everything that wasn’t already repossessed. He had nothing left but his honor—his belief in the truth, that he was a good doctor who cared about his patients and who cared about Sean Riley.
Nick could read all this in Manin’s face. There was a certain resignation stamped on his tired features. Nick stopped just in front of the witness stand.
“Doctor Manin, my name is Nicholas Ceratto. I represent the Estate of Sean Riley and the interests of his widow, Mrs. Riley, and his family present here in the courtroom.”
Victor Manin smiled and nodded. “I know,” he said softly, shifting on the cold, hard chair.
Nick went through his notes, methodically asking questions about the doctor’s education, his training as a resident, whom he trained under, his hospital affiliations, his degrees, his publications, his lecture circuit, his distinctions—all easy for the doctor to answer— in fact, enjoyable. He hadn’t thought about his accomplishments in such a long time. He had almost forgotten that he was Phi Beta Kappa at Harvard, had gone on to Harvard Medical School, done a residency in vascular surgery at Massachusetts General, was triple board certified. He had moved to Philadelphia when he was offered the chairmanship of the vascular surgery department at Metropolitan-Mercy Hospital where he had a research lab of his own, which was funded by the Federal Government and private companies with money to burn. Being reminded of all he had done gave him enough confidence to finally look at the jury, even at Alonzo Hodge, who remained unimpressed. As far as Alonzo was concerned , this was just professional bragging, flaunting titles for the poor folks.
Manin recognized the humanity in most of the jurors. The two older men in the rear looked at him with a certain intelligence. They appeared to be interested in what he had to say. They weren’t the demons John Asher had painted them to be—the vultures who would finish off a dying man, and then pick out his brains. His spine relaxed as the young woman, juror number three, gave him a faint smile from the jury box, an admiring one at that.
“Doctor Manin, thank you for giving us your impressive credentials. Now, sir, we must move on to the night Captain Riley arrived at Metropolitan-Mercy for emergency treatment of a severed femoral artery. That date was…”
“June nineteenth, nineteen ninety-five.” Manin grabbed the date out of Nick’s mouth, halting him in mid-sentence.
“I’m sorry for interrupting,” he said softly, apologizing. “It’s just that I remember the date so well.”
“Good, then your memory of the events should be just as precise,” Nick responded, sharply. He hated it when someone stole his thunder.
“I hope so.” Manin nodded sincerely. All eyes were on him now. He was about to tell his story—to the twelve gods who would determine his fate. It made him feel queasy, but at the same time, relieved. If he could just make them believe him—at any rate, no matter what, it would all be over soon. This was his only consolation—and he might just be able to rest, to sleep peacefully.
“Can you begin, Doctor, with your first encounter with the decedent…with Captain Sean Riley?” Nick looked back briefly, to check his audience. He saw no one, only the widow clutching a used tissue so tightly the veins in her hands bulged from the pressure. And the Riley boys, both leaning forward at the edge of their seats, ready to react to each and every anticipated lie.
Manin felt the Rileys’ stare. He knew they wouldn’t believe a word he said. But he also knew that it didn’t matter. It was the Alonzo Hodges of the world that mattered. He knew that he had to get past him to get to the others in the jury box. He sat back and took a breath.
Here it goes
, he thought as he heard his heart pounding against his chest wall.
“I was changing out of scrubs to go out to meet my wife at a black tie affair, a charity function for the homeless.” He quickly glanced at Alonzo Hodge, who managed a blink at the word
homeless
. “I heard myself being paged to come to the ER. I went immediately, examined Mr. Riley, and ordered him to be taken to the OR where he was given an emergency Betadine splash prep so I could immediately start to repair the femoral artery. I quickly scrubbed while Officer Riley was being anesthetized. Then I began the repair. It was not a complex procedure. I debrided the wound and irrigated it. And then I repaired the severed artery. After the procedure, we removed the clamps and checked that there were no leaks, that the artery was firmly sutured, his blood pressure was
normal, his vitals were fine. Then the external wound was irrigated again and closed. I stayed throughout the procedure to make sure the patient was stable. I left and went back to change. I had asked a nurse to phone my wife and tell her that I would be late before I started working on Captain Riley—I forgot to mention that.”
“You were concerned about being late, about disappointing your wife?” Nick asked in a sarcastic tone.
“No, she’s used to it.” Sarcasm returned, which caused a knowing smile to break across the faces of two of the men in the rear of the jury box. How well they could relate.
“I see. Does this, your always being late, bother your wife—even though she’s
used to it
?”
“I should put that in the past tense. It
did
. You see, Carla’s not with me anymore.”
The smiles faded from the men’s faces, and the curly blond shook her head in sympathy.
“And on those occasions when it did—did bother Carla—what did she do?”
“Well,
I
wound up on the couch.”
Alonzo broke his icy stare, and a smile appeared on his face. No one on the jury could resist a chuckle, not even Alonzo.
Nick continued, “And this was a consistent pattern in your private life? Is that right?”