Sleepers (44 page)

I still hadn’t recovered from seeing him take the stand and lie for us. He didn’t just testify for John and Tommy, he testified against Wilkinson and the evil that had lived there for too long. Still, I was sorry he had to do it, to tell the lie that I know must have cost him dearly, just to help us get our ounce of revenge.

I was sorry any of us had to go through this trial. I wondered about Carol, and how these days would affect her. She was smart and attractive, and should have been spending her time meeting men who did more than simply combat the ghosts of their pasts. I prayed that the trial would free Michael of his demons and allow him to go on with his life. As for John and Tommy, I hoped the best for them, but feared only the worst.

It just seemed that no matter how hard we tried, no matter how many of them we got, we could never rid ourselves of the Wilkinson Home for Boys. My friends and I
had
to live with it. Now Carol and Father Bobby had to live with it as well.

Carol turned toward me and, sensing my unease, leaned over and hugged me.

“That place is a part of me and a part of Father Bobby too,” Carol said. “In different ways, maybe. But it’s in our lives. And it’s going to stay in our lives. No matter what we do now.”

“None of it helps make it even,” I said. “We’ve got a long way to go till we get to even.”

“But you’ve got to admit,” Carol said, “you’re off to a helluva nice start.”

“I was real proud of him up there,” I said, wiping tears I couldn’t control.

“We were all proud of him,” Carol said. “And Father Bobby did it not because we asked him to. But because it was the
only
thing he
could
do. He had no choice either, Shakes.”

“He looked like Cagney up there,” I said. “Looked everybody square in the eye. Didn’t back off for a second.”

“More like Bogart, you mean,” Carol said, smiling, putting an arm around my waist.

“I’ll never understand how you could have grown up around here and still think Bogart’s better than Cagney,” I said.

“I suppose you think the Three Stooges are better than the Marx Brothers too.”

“Hands down, porcupine-head.”

“And you probably like John Wayne westerns too,” she said.

“There’s where you’re wrong,” I said. “I
love
John Wayne westerns.”

“You’re hopeless.” And then Carol Martinez laughed out loud. It was the first time I’d heard real laughter in a very long time.

“We’re all hopeless,” I said, walking with her alongside the dock, up toward Pier 82, her arm under my elbow. “That’s why we’re still together.”

“But I swear, if you tell me you still think Soupy Sales is funnier than Woody Allen, it’s gonna be all over,” Carol said. “I mean it.”

“Can Woody Allen do White Fang?” I asked her.

“Probably not,” she said.

“That’s right,” I said.
“Nobody
does what Soupy does, because
nobody
can.”

“No, Shakes,” Carol said. “It’s because nobody
wants
to.”

The sound of our laughter echoed off the empty steel piers and out into the rough waters of the Hudson.

20

A
T NINE-TEN A.M
., on a rainy Thursday morning in January 1980, Michael Sullivan stood in the well of a courtroom and addressed a jury for the last time in his career.

That morning, he had carefully chosen his dark gray suit, blue tie, and black loafers. Two thin specks of dried blood clung to his right cheek, thanks to a close shave with an old razor. He had a Superman wristwatch on his left hand, an egg-shaped college graduation ring on his right, and a cherry Life Saver in his mouth.

“Is counsel ready?” Judge Weisman asked.

“Yes, your honor,” Michael said. “I’m ready.”

“Please proceed,” Judge Weisman said.

Michael pushed his chair back and walked toward the jury box, twelve faces studying his every move. He put one hand in his pants pocket, caught the eye of the eldest member of the panel, and smiled.

“You have to admit, it’s been an interesting couple of weeks,” Michael began, his free hand rubbing the rail of the jury bench. “And it sure beats deciding a civil court case.”

He waited with his head down for the scattered laughter to fade.

“But now you have a decision to make. A very difficult decision. A decision whose weight will determine the fate of two young men.

“You’ve heard the arguments from both sides. My side tells you the defendants, John Reilly and Thomas
Marcano, shot and killed the victim, Sean Nokes. The other side tells you they didn’t. In fact, if you
really
want to know the truth, they weren’t even
there
to kill him.

“So, who to believe?
That’s
what you must now decide.”

Michael moved slowly down the jury box, taking care to look at every member of the panel, looking beyond their faces, beyond their eyes.

“So how do you reach a decision? You start by going over what you know based on the evidence that was presented. You
know
that Sean Nokes was murdered on November 6, 1979, at eight twenty-five in the evening. You
know
he was shot to death while sitting in the back booth of the Shamrock Pub. And you
know
he was gunned down by two men in black jackets. But which two men? That’s where things start getting a little fuzzy.”

Michael had both hands in his pockets now as he walked past the court stenographer, his head raised, his back to the jury. The spectators in the crowded courtroom were, with a handful of exceptions, all from Hell’s Kitchen.

“You heard testimony that painted the two defendants as less than ideal citizens.
Does that make them killers?
Then you heard testimony that described Sean Nokes as a man with an ugly past.
Does that make it less than a crime to kill him?
You heard from an eyewitness who saw the two defendants walk out of the Shamrock Pub moments after shooting Sean Nokes dead. Then you heard from a priest who said the two defendants were with
him
at a Knicks game, eating hot dogs and drinking beer at the same time Sean Nokes was sitting up dead in a back booth. So, who do you believe? Who’s lying? Who’s telling the truth?”

Michael ambled past the defense table, inches away from John and Tommy, hands still in his pockets, his eyes back on the jury.

“It’s not going to be easy for you to decide,” Michael said. “It’s not supposed to be. Decisions where people’s lives are at stake
should
be hard. They should take time. They should take a great deal of search and thought. You have to look at the facts, and then beyond them. You have to listen to the testimony, and then read through it. You have to weigh the witnesses and then go past their words and search out
their motives.
You have to go beyond the one victim and the two defendants. You must look to the lines that connect them.”

Michael stopped at his desk and sipped from a cup of cold coffee. He put the cup down, unbuttoned his jacket, and moved back toward the jury box.

“With this case, I’m asking you to do what few juries are asked to do,” Michael said. “I’m asking you to look at the facts and
then
look at the reasons for those facts. I’m asking you to find the truth in what you’ve heard, in what you’ve seen and in what you
believe.
It might be the only way for you to come up with a decision you can live with. A decision that will not cause you doubt. A decision that you will
know
is the right one.”

Michael had both hands spread across the jury rail, his body leaning against it, his eyes focused on the men and women before him.

“You have to make your decision based on the guilt of two men and the innocence of one, and you have to
believe
it. You have to go
beyond a
reasonable doubt; you have to go to where there is
no
doubt. You take everything you know to be true and then you take all the time you need to move past the truth and past the doubt and come out with a decision we can all live with. A decision that many may question, but
you
know to be the
right
one. Because now
you
are the only judges. In your hands will rest the evidence and the testimony. In your hands will rest the facts. In your hands will rest the fate of two men and the memory of a third. In your hands will rest the truth.

“I have confidence in those hands. I
believe
in those
hands. And I believe those hands will find a verdict that will be filled with truth. And filled with justice. An honest truth and an honorable justice.”

Michael Sullivan then thanked a jury for the last time, walked back to his seat, and put his legal pads into his black briefcase.

“Do you have anything to add, counselor?” Judge Weisman asked.

“No, your honor,” Michael Sullivan said. “There’s nothing else. I’ve said it all.”

21

“L
ET ME HAVE
a hot dog with mustard, sauerkraut, and onions,” Michael told a chubby vendor in a leather flap cap, standing on the sidewalk outside the courthouse. “And let me have a Coke too.”

“No ketchup?” I asked.

“I’m on a diet,” he said without turning around.

It was a snowy, windy Monday afternoon and the jury had been in deliberation since the previous Thursday night. The courthouse rumor mill was working on overdrive, with most of the gossip predicting a verdict of guilty.

“You got a place to eat that?” I asked Michael, pointing to his hot dog.

“Behind you,” Michael said, lifting the bun toward a park bench over my shoulder.

“Okay if I join you?”

“What can they do?” Michael asked. “Arrest us?”

“You did good in there, counselor,” I said to Michael, sitting on the bench, taking a bite out of a pretzel.

“How I did won’t matter until they come back in and hand me a win,” Michael said.

“Will you settle for a loss?” I asked, smiling over at him.

“I can live with it,” Michael said, finishing his hot dog and snapping open his soda can.

“What happens to you now?” I asked. “After this ends?”

“I walk away,” Michael said. “Wait a few weeks and then hand in my notice. After the way I handled this case, there won’t be a rush to keep me from the door.”

“You can switch to the other side,” I said. “Work as a defense lawyer. More money in it, probably, and you’ll never be short on clients. There are always going to be more bad guys than good. The work from John and Tommy’s crew alone will get you a house with a pool.”

“Not for me,” Michael said. “I’ve seen all the law I want to see. It’s time for something else.”

“Like what?”

“I’ll let you know when I know,” Michael said.

“You’re too old to play for the Yankees,” I said. “And you’re too young to take up golf.”

“You’re shooting holes all through my plans,” Michael said, smiling. “I’m starting to panic.”

“You’ll work things out,” I said, finishing the last of my soda. “You always have.”

“It’s time for quiet, Shakes,” Michael said, staring down at the ground. “That I do know. Give things a rest. Find a spot where I can shut my eyes and not have to see the places I’ve been. Maybe I’ll even get lucky and forget I was ever there.”

“It took pieces out of us, where we were,” I said. “What we had to do to get out. Big pieces we didn’t
even know we had. Pieces we gotta learn to do without or find again. All that takes time. Lots of time.”

“I can wait,” Michael said.

“You always seemed to know how,” I said. “The rest of us didn’t have the patience.”

“I’ve got to get back in there,” Michael said, standing up and moving toward the courthouse. “The jury may be coming in.”

“Don’t disappear on me, counselor,” I said, my eyes meeting his. “I may need a good lawyer someday.”

“You can’t afford a good lawyer,” Michael said. “Not on your salary.”

“I may need a good friend,” I said.

“I’ll find you when you do,” Michael said. “Count on it.”

“I always have,” I said, watching Michael walk through the revolving doors of the courthouse to the elevators and up nine floors to face a jury’s verdict.

22

T
HE AREA OUTSIDE
Part 47 was crowded with the familiar faces of Hell’s Kitchen. They stood against stained walls, smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee, or sat on long wooden benches, reading the
Daily News
and
Post.
Others jammed the phone banks, calling in their bets and checking in on either an angry parole officer or an impatient loan shark.

They were waiting for the verdict.

Walking past them, I shook a few hands and nodded
to a few faces before finding an empty spot in a corner near the black double doors.

After fifteen minutes the doors swung open. A court officer, tall and muscular, his gun buckle hanging at an angle, held the knob in one hand, his body halfway in the hall.

“They’re coming in,” he said in a listless voice. “In about five minutes. You wanna hear, better come in now.”

I stood to the side and watched as the crowd slowly trooped in. Then I moved away, and walked over to a bench and sat down. I leaned over, my head in my hands, eyes closed, sweating, shaking, praying that we could finish this the way we planned. I went over everything we did and tried to think of things we should have done. The plan had only one flaw. Its success or failure hinged on the whims of twelve strangers.

“You’re not going in?” Carol asked, standing above me.

“I don’t want to go in alone,” I said, taking my hands from my face.

“You’re not alone,” she said.

“I don’t want to lose either,” I said.

“You’re not going to lose.”

“It sounds like you’ve got all the answers,” I said, standing up and taking her by the arm.

“Maybe I do,” Carol said. “Maybe I do.”