4th of July

Chapter 89

I WAS ELATED WHEN Claire stepped down, but not for long.

I heard Mason Broyles call Dr. Robert Goldman, and when the brown-haired, mustachioed man in a light blue suit had been sworn in, he began to testify about the terrible injuries Sam had received at the ugly end of my gun.

Using a chart similar to the one Claire had used, Dr. Goldman pointed out that my first bullet had gone through Sam’s abdominal cavity, lodging in his thoracic vertebra number eight, where it still remained.

“That bullet paralyzed Sam from the waist down,” said the doctor, patting his mustache. “The second bullet entered at the base of his neck, passing through cervical vertebra number three, paralyzing everything below his neck.”

“Doctor,” Broyles asked. “Will Sam Cabot ever walk again?”

“No.”

“Will he ever be able to have sex?”

“No.”

“Will he ever be able to breathe on his own or have the full enjoyment of his life?”

“No.”

“He’s in a wheelchair for the rest of his life, correct?”

“That is correct.”

“Your witness,” Broyles said to Yuki as he returned to his chair.

“No questions of this witness,” said Yuki.

“Plaintiff calls Sam Cabot,” said Broyles.

I sent an anxious look to Yuki before we both turned to face the rear of the courtroom. Doors swung open, and a young female attendant entered pushing a wheelchair, a shiny chrome Jenkinson Supreme, the Cadillac of its class.

Sam Cabot looked frail and shrunken in his little-boy’s sport coat and tie, nothing like the vicious freak who’d murdered a couple of people for kicks before gunning Jacobi down. Except for the venomous look in his eyes, I wouldn’t have recognized him.

Sam turned those brown eyes on me now, and my heart raced as I felt horror, guilt, and even pity.

I dropped my gaze to the humming respiratory ventilator just below the seat of Sam’s chair. It was a heavy metal box with dials and gauges and a thin plastic air hose snaking up from the machine to where it was clipped right beside Sam’s left cheek.

A small electronically assisted voice box was positioned in front of his lips.

Sam locked his lips around his air tube. A ghastly sucking sound came from his ventilator as compressed air was pumped into his lungs. It was a sound that was repeated every three or four seconds, every time Sam Cabot needed to draw breath.

I watched as the attendant wheeled Sam up to the witness stand.

“Your Honor,” Mason Broyles said, “since we don’t know how long Sam will be asked to testify, we’d like to plug his ventilator into an electric socket to preserve the battery.”

“Of course,” said the judge.

The technician snaked a long orange cord into a wall socket and then sat down behind Andrew and Eva Cabot.

There was no place for me to look but at Sam.

His neck was stiff, and his head was braced to the back of his chair with a halo traction device strapped across his forehead. It looked like some kind of medieval torture, and I’m sure it felt that way to Sam.

The bailiff, a tall young man in a green uniform, approached Sam.

“Please raise your right hand.”

Sam Cabot cast his eyes wildly from side to side. He sucked in some air and spoke into the small green voice box. The voice that came out was an eerie and unnerving mechanical sound.

“I can’t,” Sam said.