Eyes of a Child (40 page)

‘Could I see number three again?' a new voice asked.

A woman's voice, low and a little hoarse. Paget could not recognize it.

Ray stepped forward. He turned to the right again, then left, and then faced forward for what seemed quite long.

‘Step back,' the cop called out.

There was silence. And then, more softly, the woman said, ‘I want to see number five.'

Paget stepped forward, facing the darkness again. No one asked him to turn.

‘That's him.' The woman's voice was shaking now. ‘I'm sure of it.'

The Jury

Chapter
1

Christopher Paget watched the jury pool – eighty or so strangers with no connection to his past – wondering which twelve of them would now decide his future.

Judge Jared Lerner's spacious courtroom was a curious amalgam of sterility, majesty, and urban dinge. The walls were a cheap blond-wood panelling; the fluorescent squares overhead cast a pitiless light; and the worn theater seats behind the low wooden divider, packed with potential jurors, gave it the institutional look of an overcrowded classroom in an underfunded school. But the presence of a black-robed judge lent gravity, and the room had the taut hermetic feel unique to a high-profile murder case about to begin. Reporters lined the walls; the lawyers fidgeted or stared into space; Lerner himself – a sharp-featured man with a dark beard like the prow of a ship – looked edgy and alert.

Paget, sitting next to Caroline, could not enjoy an unconsidered moment: minute to minute, he was aware of each potential juror watching him. He sat very still, hands folded in front of him, trying to look serious yet composed, as ordinary as Caroline's artifice could make him.

The Italianate ties were gone, along with the double-breasted suits and the breast-pocket handkerchief. It was unsettling to realize how much of one's sense of self was superficial: the protective blandness he had assumed at Caroline's instance added to the diminishing effect of being brought before a court on a charge of murder – dependent on Caroline and a random group of strangers whose quirks he could not know and whose response to Paget's every look or gesture must be his constant concern. Part of him could still not believe that Ricardo Arias had brought him to this.

Of course, it was some comfort, he thought with irony, to have the best defense that money could buy: Caroline Masters and, seated discreetly behind them, the detective Johnny Moore. But neither Carlo nor Terri was here: as potential witnesses, they had been barred from court by Judge Lerner, on the motion of Victor Salinas.

Salinas had swiveled on his chair, hands in pockets, eyeing the jury pool with ostentatious casualness. The ease, Paget knew, was feigned: Salinas was gauging the ethnic composition of the panel, honing his strategy for selecting the jury that, on the basis of prejudice or predilection, was most likely to convict Paget of first-degree murder. They were about to begin the chess game where cases are won or lost – the strange mixture of intuition, sociology, pop psychology, and racism through which Caroline and Salinas would winnow eighty people down to twelve.

On the surface, Judge Lerner's rules were simple enough: the bailiff would call out twelve names at a time, and the candidates would shuffle forward to the jury box to be queried by Judge Lerner for competence or bias. If some disqualification was obvious, Lerner might dismiss a juror on his own accord, or Salinas or Caroline could ask him to do so for cause. But the real art lay in the lawyers' use of peremptory challenges: the precious occasions, twenty in number, on which each side could demand dismissal of a juror it did not want – either immediately or at any time before a jury was impaneled. Peremptories must be husbanded: Paget had seen defense layers, their peremptories exhausted, forced to accept a nightmare juror who then led his fellows to a verdict of guilty. And it was not hard to see trouble ahead for Caroline: the first prospects sitting in the jury box did not fit the profile she had hoped for, and there was an ominously high percentage of young Hispanic males.

‘All right,' Lerner said. He had a thin, reedy voice, but these first words brought down a curtain of silence. He turned to the first twelve panelists. ‘As you know,' he continued, ‘this is the case of
People versus Christopher Paget
. The defendant, Christopher Paget, stands accused of murdering Ricardo Arias. My role, and that of counsel, is not to embarrass or discomfit you but simply to determine whether you can judge the facts fairly and impartially.'

Caroline touched Paget's arm, as if to reassure him. But Paget knew that Caroline Masters must do more than pick jurors who claimed to be unbiased: somewhere in the panel, she must find twelve people who would acquit a man who would not testify in his own defense.

‘First,' Paget had said to Caroline, ‘Salinas has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Richie didn't kill
himself
. If he can't do that, I go free.'

They had sat in the quiet elegance of Masa's restaurant, cool and dark and modern, the night after Paget's arrest. Paget had spent the preceding night on a cot in a solitary cell, listening to the low voices coming from the dark cages around him, the odd cry of protest or insanity, the footsteps of guards as they paced the corridor. After an angry session between Caroline and McKinley Brooks, they had agreed to the amount of bail. But arranging a half-million dollars had taken until early afternoon; after that, Paget had needed to wash away the smell of jail and the feel of prison clothes, then to reassure Carlo and Terri as best he could. Both conversations had been painful: it became clear that the best thing Paget could do for them, and for himself, was to start building a defense as quickly as he could. It was Caroline's grace note to take him to Masa's, a slice of Paget's normal life as far removed from prison as she could manage.

She sipped her Manhattan. ‘Suicide's a possible defense,' she answered. ‘But based on the crime scene and the condition of the body, the medical examiner seems convinced that Richie was murdered. We not only have to shake her but have to give the jury some reason to believe that Richie wanted to kill himself.' She frowned. ‘Other than good taste, that is.'

The mordant comment was meant not as a joke, Paget knew, but as a spur: she did not yet know enough about Ricardo Arias to build an alternative to murder. ‘The script for suicide isn't hard to see,' Paget answered. ‘He'd lost his wife, he had no job, and he was involved in a custody fight.'

Caroline looked unimpressed. ‘Maybe. But it's not enough. I want a detective, Chris – I'd prefer your friend Johnny Moore, if that's all right. Among other things, I want to know every slimy little thing Ricardo ever did – I don't care if it was in grade school. I'll bet money that he didn't start with you and Terri.'

‘Maybe not. But the fact that Richie was a maggot isn't relevant to murder. At least in and of itself.'

Caroline touched one finger to her lips; the brightness of her eyes, a half smile, lent the thoughtful gesture a faintly sensual quality. ‘I want the jury to despise him. All I need is an excuse, and then I'm going to trash him.'

‘All you need,' Paget answered, ‘is a judge who'll let you get away with it. I can only think of one or two.'

Caroline looked away; her eyes narrowed a little, but the smile remained. ‘Leave that to me.'

The comment, quiet and ambiguous, lingered there a moment. ‘Maybe,' Paget finally remarked, ‘you can say you're proving a lifetime of emotional instability. Or that, starting in kindergarten, eleven other people had good reason to kill him. Perhaps his sixth grade teacher.'

Without responding, Caroline looked around her. Their table was in a quiet corner; three waiters, attentive but deferential, glided among the well-dressed diners – couples and business people on expense accounts – there to enjoy an elegant three-hour presentation of dishes. Quietly, Caroline said, ‘As of now, you know the only other decent suspect as well as I do. Better, in fact.'

Paget felt himself stiffen. ‘Is that a serious observation?'

Caroline looked at him steadily. ‘She's not my client, Chris. I have to put this on the table. In some respects, Terri's a far more likely murderer than you.'

Paget put down his drink. ‘There's no way.'

Caroline watched his face. ‘As a matter of strategy? Or as a matter of fact?'

‘Both.'

Caroline gave the half smile again. ‘So I suppose I needn't mention Carlo. Who also has no alibi.'

In his surprise, Paget almost laughed. ‘No,' he answered. ‘I'm sentimental that way.'

Caroline angled her head. ‘Then we have a lot of work to do, don't we. Just for the record, I assume you want to waive your right to trial in sixty days.'

Paget sipped his martini, cold and bracing and medicinal. ‘No,' he answered. ‘I don't.'

Caroline's gaze became a stare, and she sat straighter; everything about her was intended to convey her restraint in not calling him a fool. ‘The prosecution is way ahead of us. We –
I
– need more time to assemble a defense.'

Paget stared into the bottom of his drink. ‘But then,' he said softly, ‘we'd be giving Salinas and Monk more time, wouldn't we?'

Caroline leaned back in her chair. The distance between them was more than physical; she studied him with a new air of reserve. ‘That assumes, Christopher, that there's something else for them to find.'

The question, tacit yet pointed, left Paget with a sense of vulnerability: except for Caroline, he was alone in this. ‘I don't want to live with this hanging over me, Caroline. Every day will be tainted, borrowed.'

She shook her head almost angrily. ‘Then imagine the days you'll spent in
prison
if we don't give them our best. For God's sake, at least you're
free
now. Once the trial's over, the
best
thing that will have happened to you is that you're where you are right this minute – not in prison.' She touched his arm for emphasis. ‘There's another practical thought to consider. This witness they've found is
not
a young woman. Given enough time, memories fade and witnesses even die. Without her, I think we win.'

Paget met her eyes. ‘Before yesterday, Caroline, I'd have given the same advice. But I've had twenty-four hours of living with a charge of murder, and already everything has changed – my relationship to Carlo and Terri, the way I think about time. I doubt I'll even taste this dinner.'

‘Then think about Carlo – just that.' Caroline leaned forward. ‘Suppose you're found guilty. If we stretch this out and then take an appeal, you'll have seen Carlo well into college before you go to prison. He's what now – a junior? Each month could be precious.'

The combination of pragmatism and sentiment jarred Paget as much as having his own lawyer imagine the consequences of a guilty verdict. It was odd that Caroline, who had no children of her own, had put her finger so acutely on his fears. ‘I can't tell you,' Paget said quietly, ‘how much – for Carlo's sake as well as mine – I don't want to go to jail.'

Caroline's face went blank. ‘Then you might try thinking of Carlo, Chris. Rather than just using him as an excuse.'

Paget gave her a level glance. ‘You play rough sometimes. Don't you, Caroline?'

The comment seemed to startle her, and then her face softened a little. ‘Only when I should.'

He exhaled; the effect was somewhere between the release of tension and a plea for understanding. ‘I've tried to weigh everything, more carefully than you know. Including the effect of a delay on my chances of acquittal.'

Caroline gave him a long, quiet look, as if to decipher his last comment. ‘Have you also considered,' she asked for the first time, ‘whether you're going to testify?'

The seeming change of subject, Paget saw, was not a change at all. He tried to sound dispassionate, as if he were discussing theory with a colleague. ‘The conventional wisdom is that I don't. The jury might not like me, or Salinas might make me look bad.'

Caroline propped her chin on folded hands, studying him keenly. ‘That's always possible. But you're an appealing man, and you have a fine record. Most important, you're a good father – one who would never risk leaving Carlo in the lurch, correct? And you just may be the only witness we have.' Caroline narrowed her eyes, as if considering whether to say something more, and then continued in a quiet voice. ‘Juries can forgive someone they like, Chris, for lying to the police. Deep down, most jurors can imagine circumstances where
they
would lie to Charles Monk. They just won't forgive you for lying to
them
.'

Behind Caroline's impassive gaze Paget sensed some obscure embarrassment. It took him a moment to understand: contrary to all her training, and against her better judgment, Caroline wished him to be innocent. ‘As of now,' he answered calmly, ‘assume that I won't testify. I can always change my mind.'

Caroline's eyes were very still for a moment, and then she shrugged, glancing down at the menu. ‘Have you had the salmon mousse here?' she said. ‘It's quite wonderful.'

Sitting next to Caroline, Paget watched Jared Lerner, the defense bar's favorite judge, question the first potential juror.

According to Johnny Moore's inquiries, the middle-aged redhead, Alice Mahan, was an Irish Catholic mother of four, a telephone operator for twenty years, the wife of a parochial school teacher, and the sister of a security guard. Paget, Caroline, and Johnny Moore had rated Alice four on a scale of one through five, placing her toward the bottom of the list, on the theory that Alice might be rules-oriented and inclined to trust authority. Which could be nonsense, Paget knew. But they had to start somewhere, and if Alice got past Lerner, Caroline must decide whether to use a peremptory challenge to strike her from the jury.