Rough Justice (8 page)

What to do? Last try. She typed in
EBENEZER
and punched
GO
!

Your search has found 3 articles.

Yes! Mary punched up the first article. It was the police blotter from February 7, 1965. Her heart leapt with hope until she read:

A brown 1964 Oldsmobile was reported to be stolen from a parking lot on Joshua Road in Plymouth Meeting. Ebenezer Sherry of the Plymouth Meeting Police reported that this was the twelfth automobile stolen from township residents this year and feared that auto theft was on the rise, even in the suburbs of Philadelphia.

News flash. Crime spreads to suburbs. Mary sighed and hit a key for the second article. Maybe this was a bonehead idea after all.

Ebenezer Yoachim, 68, died today at Sinai Gardens Convalescent Home. Mr. Yoachim owned the Yoyo Dry Cleaners on Cottman Avenue and until his illness was a baritone in the barbershop quartet called the Troubadours. Mr. Yoachim is survived by his wife, Rachel Newman Yoachim, and his son, Samuel.

Mary felt let down. An obit. Couldn’t be Darnton. One story left. She hit the key without enthusiasm. It was from April 12, 1965, and appeared in the business section.

Ebenezer Darning, of Greene Street in Center City, was promoted to teller at the main branch of Girard Bank.

Mary blinked, surprised at the similarity of the names. Darning/Darnton. She sat up straighter and scrolled down the page. Underneath the blurb was a thumbnail photo of a young man with a confident smile and a smooth chin.
EBENEZER DARNING
, said the caption. The man in the news photo was black, like Darnton. It was surprising. A black man promoted in that era? That was around the time of the Civil Rights Act. Racial discrimination was rampant then. Darning must have had brains and guts.

Mary leaned closer to the computer screen to see the bank teller’s face. She couldn’t tell what he looked like from the tiny photo, so she moved the computer mouse and clicked the cyber-magnifying glass over the man’s face. The photo blossomed into pixelated squares but was still too small. The man’s eyes looked closed, as if the shutter had been snapped at just the wrong moment. Mary clicked the mouse button again.

My God. She stared at the enlarged photo on the screen. The sight pressed her back into her desk chair. It was a photo of a young Eb Darning, but she could have been looking at an autopsy photo of Heb Darnton, his eyes sealed in death. Without the beard, there was a clear resemblance around the eyes, a protruding of the brow and a largish nose. It looked like the same man, over thirty years younger. Was Eb Darning the same man as Heb Darnton?

To be sure Mary needed to compare the computer image to the photos of autopsy photos in the file. Had she discovered something significant? Was this related to the evidence the D.A. had uncovered? Could everybody in the world type better than she did? Mary leapt from her desk chair and ran down the hall to the glass conference room.

T
he blizzard intensified as night fell outside the jury room in the Criminal Justice Center, but Ralph Merry was pleased. The jurors were going the right way, which was finding Steere innocent. Ralph believed 100 percent in the Fourth Amendment and argued that Steere was justified in defending himself when he got carjacked. Plus it would made a more upbeat ending for Ralph’s book.

The jurors weren’t allowed to sign any deals yet, but Ralph’s wife, Hilda, had gotten calls from two literary agents in New York, who said several publishing houses were interested in the inside story of the Steere case. That’s what publishing companies called themselves —
houses
— and Ralph thought they could call themselves whatever they wanted if they came through with six figures. Still, he wasn’t going to make any deals with any
houses
until he made sure they would put his picture on the cover like they did with General Schwarzkopf’s book. Ralph’s book deal was this close, except that Kenny Manning was putting up quite a fight to convict.

“The man’s guilty!” Kenny was saying. He had lifted himself from his seat and leaned halfway over the table on his strong arms, almost in Christopher Graham’s startled face. “The brother walks up to the car, all the man had to do was drive away. That’s it. He didn’t have to
do
him!”

“Damn right,” added Lucky Seven.

Christopher regained his composure and squared his broad shoulders as he stood behind his chair. He hadn’t had much contact with black people, but he wasn’t about to be intimidated by anything weighing less than a ton. “You can’t look at it that way, Kenny. You have to put yourself in Steere’s shoes.”

“Fuck that, man. Steere had a SL600. Twelve cylinders! Car like that’ll climb trees.”

“Thas’ right.” Lucky Seven nodded, though Kenny ignored him.

“If I had a car like that and some crazy old dude come up to me, I’d take off and leave him spinnin’.”

“If
I
had a car like that,” Lucky Seven added, “I wouldn’t be
here
.”

Megan would have laughed if she weren’t so anxious. She’d voted to acquit Steere, but didn’t want to say so with this going on. The fighting was getting worse. She really wanted this trial over with. Her e-mail had already been deleted by AOL. Megan wondered if that guy she met in the chat room had written back. He even had his own webpage. Megan liked that in a man.

Christopher remained focused on Kenny. “But Steere was scared. He panicked.”

“Ain’t no call to panic!” Kenny shouted. “Dude was just drunk, is all. He wasn’t gonna hurt nobody! He was jus’ an old man talkin’ out his mouth!”

Megan flinched at the decibel level, and Nick grew even more nervous. He couldn’t believe this was happening. The voting, the hollering. He never decided anything without Antoinetta. His stomach was killing him.

“Gentlemen,” said Mrs. Wahlbaum, who stood up at the middle of the table, a matronly fulcrum between Christopher and Kenny. Her form was stocky in a knit dress that flattened her generous bosom, and she raised her arms as if to separate the men. “Gentlemen, please. There are two sides to every story. We have to discuss this like civilized people, sitting down at the table, not shouting across it. You’re calmer if you’re sitting, you just are. It’s your body language. I think it’s a shame that that homeless man was killed, but I can’t blame—”

“I wasn’t talkin’ to you, teacher,” Kenny said, his smooth head snapping toward Mrs. Wahlbaum. “Backoff.”

“Just one minute, Kenny,” Ralph said.

“I’m fine, Ralph.” Mrs. Wahlbaum silenced him with a wrinkled hand. She knew the way to deal with bullies was to stand them down. “Why don’t you both sit down, Christopher? Kenny? Just sit right down, both of you.” She waved her arms at them, so hard she could feel the fat wiggle underneath.
Hadassah arms
, her sister-in-law called them, but that Yetta could go straight to hell.

Nick was getting more worried by the minute. He ate some Tums but his stomach was still on fire. He didn’t like being here without his wife. Forty-two years he’d been married, and Antoinetta had made all the decisions. Paid the bills, cooked the meals, raised the girls. Nick wished he had something to relax him. He wished he had some milk. Milk was supposed to be good for ulcers. Or maybe some nice, cold anisette in a little glass.

Christopher folded his large frame into the hard chair, but Kenny didn’t budge. “What?” Kenny said, with an incredulous laugh in Mrs. Wahlbaum’s direction. “Teacher, you gonna tell Kenny Manning what to do, you got a lesson to learn.”

“Kenny, I have forty years on you. You’d better show me some respect.”

“Respect?” Kenny said, menacing her with a smile. “Show
you
respect?”

“The expert again,” muttered Mr. Fogel. “The expert in sitting. She knows all about sitting. Ask her anything.” He leaned over to Wanthida. “It’s Iraq and Iran in here, and she thinks if they sit down, they’ll make nice. Like it’s automatic.”

“I’m ignoring you, Mr. Fogel,” Mrs. Wahlbaum snapped. Troublemakers hated being ignored. “Now, Kenny, you sit down. Sit, sit,
sit
!”

“Lady, you out your fuckin’ mind?” Kenny spat out, his smile vanishing. “Who you think you are, be orderin’
me
?”

Ralph figured if he didn’t step in Mrs. Wahlbaum would be dead. “Kenny,” he said, “tell us why you think Steere is guilty. You can stand or sit, whatever you like. Make the case, like the lawyers. We’ll listen. This is supposed to be a legal-type discussion.”

“Hey, Ralph Mouth, back off my man,” Lucky Seven said, and laughed nervously.

Isaiah Fellers sat off to the side, silent. He had voted not guilty the first time even though Kenny would be pissed off. The way Isaiah saw it, Steere was just protecting himself and his property. Didn’t matter who was black and who was white. Steere had a right as a man.

“It wasn’t an order, Kenny, it was a request,” Mrs. Wahlbaum soothed. “Please. We have to reason together, all of us. Discuss it. Sitting down.” Her knees were shaking slightly and she figured it was a good time to sit down. “See?”

Kenny stood alone, still braced on his arms at the other end of the table. Damned if he would sit down just because some Jew teacher told him to. She was dissing him but his arms were getting tired. The room fell quiet, waiting. Watching.

Nick wished he could cover his eyes. When the fighting stopped they’d have to vote again and he’d have to decide all alone. On his last visit with Antoinetta, she told him he should vote to convict. She said Mr. Steere was a crook and the Trolios had sold him their house for a song. But if Nick voted guilty he’d have to go up against all the other white people. He didn’t know how to vote. When the paper came to him, could he write
I STILL DON
’
T KNOW
?

In the meantime Kenny had made a decision and was pointing at Mrs. Wahlbaum. “Don’t be tellin’ me what to do, teacher. You understand what I’m sayin’?” His bicep knotted and nobody, including Nick, missed the small tattoo on his arm. It was a Chinese symbol that Nick couldn’t read, which only scared him more.

“She understands,” Ralph said, quickly.

Mr. Fogel shrugged his skinny shoulders. “Of course she understands. She understands everything. I bet she can predict the future.”

“Fine, Kenny,” Mrs. Wahlbaum said, knowing Kenny had to save face. “I understand.”

“Just so you understand,” Kenny said, a warning in his voice.

“I do. I understand.”

“Good.” Kenny slid into his chair almost as an afterthought. Lucky Seven didn’t meet his eye.

Megan Gerrity glanced at her Swatch watch. Babies’ heads tumbled around the circle. The watch was barely readable, but it was so cute. “It’s almost seven o’clock. How late can we deliberate tonight? Does anybody know? Maybe we can fit in a final vote.”

Kenny folded his arms like a musclebound child, but Christopher nodded, pleased. “We can deliberate as late as we want,” he said. “We’re supposed to call the judge and let the bailiff know when we want dinner.”

They all wanted to vote again, except for Nick, who thought he was going to catch on fire. He sipped his water but it didn’t put out the burning in his stomach. There was like a fireball racing up his throat. Nick couldn’t keep it down. He blurted out, “I think I’m gonna be sick.”

“What?” Christopher said, and around the table, eleven mouths dropped open.

M
arta didn’t reach Steere’s Society Hill neighborhood until the Taurus’s clock ticked to 7:01, but she was lucky to get there at all. The traffic jam on Locust had lasted forever, and she’d finally escaped it by driving up on the pavement for half a block and slipping down a side street. A frigid night had fallen and the snow blew harder. The windshield wipers pumped and the defroster had finally succeeded.

Marta looked for a parking space on the street near Steere’s house. The cars parked at the curb were expensive lumps of snow. Society Hill was the most fashionable residential district in the city but apparently tough to park in. Marta drove around the block looking for a space. Her eyes kept straying to the clock’s glowing digits. 7:04, 7:05, 7:06.

Fuck. It was getting late. She didn’t have time to screw around with the goddamn car. The space didn’t have to be legal, it just had to be open. There. Marta plowed through the snow and pulled up in front of the bus stop. She twisted off the ignition and climbed out of the car.

A cold blast hit her like a shock. Wind tore through her suit and raincoat. Snow chilled her shins and soaked her best pumps. Marta would have worn boots but she hadn’t owned any since she was a kid. She spent her adult life going from airport limo to hotel, from cab to courthouse. She hurried down the street in a rut from a car tire.

The street was narrow, lined with costly colonial brick rowhouses, their restored shutters piled high with picturesque snow. Each house bore a historic cast-iron fire sign, but Marta cared little for history. Her own history would have damned her. One therapist had called her “self-realized” and she’d fired him for it.

Hey, mister!
It’s snowing hard again.
Please, mister, stop!
A blue station wagon stops. It looks big as a house. The front door opens wide and the man at the wheel wears black glasses and a tie. Marta doesn’t want to get in, even though it’s warm in the station wagon. She has a bad feeling about the driver. Something in his smile. Her mother is too drunk to notice.
Praise the Lord,
her mother says, and it begins again.

Marta pushed those memories away. Why were they surfacing now? Was it the snow? Didn’t matter, she had no time for it. When she reached the corner, she squeezed between the parked cars, dumping snow on her legs, and climbed onto the sidewalk. The streets were deserted but lights were ablaze in the rowhouses along the street. Everybody was inside, hunkered down and riding out the storm.

Marta hurried down the sidewalk, passing first-floor windows. Warm yellow lights glowed through the slats of the wooden shutters. One living room had a fire in the fireplace and its flames flickered on the high ceiling. Marta imagined the families, snug and self-satisfied in their homes; prosperous families, with cabinets full of food. Books lining every room and stacked on every coffee table. Mozart playing softly on the CD player. It was sheer fantasy, and it wasn’t hers. Not anymore.