Rituals of the Season

CHAPTER 13

We must work for our heavenly peace on earth. The mental discipline, to prosper, must be aided by divine grace, but it must spring from our own hearts.

Florence Hartley, The Ladies’ Book of Etiquette, 1873

Here in eastern North Carolina weather forecasters get downright giddy at the faintest possibility of snow; and the closer we get to Christmas, the more they massage their satellite photos to show how a system that could maybe—maybe—bring possible flurries might actually hang around long enough to blanket us by the twenty-fifth. Despite the hopeful chatter on television last night, we almost never get snow in December, but freezing rains were a distinct possibility. In the belief that the tires of rush-hour traffic would help keep the main roads from turning into sheets of greased glass, Dwight made me promise before I left home Monday morning that I’d head on back as soon as I adjourned court.

On the drive down to Makely, my mood was almost as bleak as the cold gray clouds that filled the sky. It wasn’t just gloomy thoughts about Tracy, Mei, and the unborn baby either.

I was due to testify in superior court sometime today in the trial of a former colleague. I usually have reliable instincts about people, but Russell Moore had foxed a lot of people besides me. He was a big, good-natured country boy who’d pulled himself up by his own bootstraps, worked his way through college, went to law school at night, then, spurred on by the grinding poverty of his childhood, opened a one-man practice in Makely, determined to succeed. He played hard, but he worked hard, too, and was particularly good with juries, who tended to trust him implicitly. Hell, we all did. And why not? He was just like an overgrown Saint Bernard puppy, still something of a farmboy, awed by how far he’d come from the tobacco fields. But then he did an out-of-court settlement with an insurance company on behalf of a client.

A hundred-thousand-dollar settlement.

Only he didn’t tell his client.

By the time he was indicted, he’d made at least three more similar settlements. That wasn’t how he got caught, though. He got caught because he forged my name on a DWI judgment that allowed his middle-class client to get a restricted license. Said client was so happy that he could continue driving himself back and forth to work that he bragged about it in the wrong place, and when another attorney asked for something similar for one of his clients, I pulled the record to refresh my memory and immediately realized that it wasn’t my signature on the form. My courtroom clerk said that wasn’t her signature either.

Once Russell had drawn attention to himself like that, it took only a cursory examination of his records to discover the embezzlements.

Disbarred and disgraced, he was now on trial and I was a witness for the State. And yeah, I know that there are very few attorneys up for sainthood—there’s a reason for all those crooked-lawyer jokes—and yes, they’re expected to argue a client’s innocence when, in their heart of hearts, they suspect he’s guilty as hell. They may not be held to the spirit of the law, but they’re damned well supposed to uphold the letter of it.

There had been little mention of Russell Moore at Saturday night’s dinner. His acts shamed us all, but he’d been arrested back in June, so the nine-days-wonder element had long since dissipated.

When I got to my own courtroom, I was dismayed to find another white officer of the court and his wife standing before me, red-faced and repentant. Marvin Pittman was a town of Makely policeman, but the SBI had accidently discovered that he was fighting cocks out on his farm. An undercover agent on the trail of some illegal Mexicans suspected of running drugs through the area had gotten himself accepted enough to go along for a drug buy out in the country.

In addition to rounding up six men dealing the drugs, they had stumbled across the social aspects of the buy—one of the largest cockfighting arenas they’d ever seen. Inside Pittman’s barn were four pens, bleachers, and an announcer’s booth. Pittman’s wife and fourteen-year-old son were even running a snack bar on the side, selling hot burritos and cold beers. Some forty people were arrested there that night and issued criminal summonses.

In addition to dozens of razor-sharp spurs, leather thongs, and other cockfighting accessories, the SBI had confiscated a half-kilo of coke, eighty-nine hundred dollars in betting money, solid gold prize jewelry worth another couple of thousand, and twenty-six gamecocks.

The gamecocks were currently residing at the county animal shelter.

The SBI conceded that the Pittmans had nothing to do with drugs and were technically unaware of the side action. All the same, cockfighting is illegal and they were charged with animal cruelty, selling beer and food without a license, and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

Unfortunately, cruelty to chickens is only a Class 2 misdemeanor in North Carolina. Dogfighting is a felony, but not cockfighting. And just for the record, a second offense of animal cruelty other than chickens is a felony, but a second offense of chicken cruelty is still a misdemeanor. Where are North Carolina’s chicken lovers on this? Why aren’t they up in arms?

Even after all the charges were combined, a thousand-dollar fine and a suspended sentence were about the most I could give him since he didn’t have any prior convictions.

The wife had a prior DWI, but feeling sorry for their teenage son I suspended any jail time for her on condition that she contribute one hundred hours of work at the county animal shelter and take her son with her for at least fifty of those hours.

After that, it was almost a relief to be presented with Bullard Morris, a fifty-year-old black man who had appeared before me more than once since I came to the bench. Bull Morris might have been shiftless, but he was usually amiable and philosophical when arrested for shoplifting or public drunkenness. This time, though, he’d been charged with disorderly conduct, and the police officer who testified against him said he’d been loud and profane and belligerently ready to fight when the officer was arresting Morris’s roommate for possession of stolen property.

After he’d pleaded guilty as charged, I said, “That’s not like you, Mr. Morris. What happened?”

“I’m sorry, Your Honor. Usually I wake up sober. I reckon I’m not real good at waking up drunk.”

I gave him court costs and a suspended sentence on condition that he go for yet another alcohol assessment at Mental Health. “You don’t get your drinking under control, you’re liable to wake up shot some morning,” I lectured him.

He earnestly agreed, but we both knew we’d be meeting like this again.

A bailiff approached the bench and told me that they were ready for my testimony in superior court, so I recessed for an hour, left my robe hanging in chambers and slipped into a deep green cropped jacket, and hurried down to the larger courtroom, adjusting the collar of my white shirt as I went.

Zack Young, the best criminal defense attorney in our district and certainly the one I’d retain if I were ever in serious trouble, had agreed to defend Russell Moore. According to courthouse gossip, Zack planned to argue mitigating circumstances—that the embezzlement began as an oversight error in bookkeeping and then escalated when Russell’s widowed mother developed a leaky heart valve and had no insurance for the needed operation. As for the forgery, well, that was just Russell’s well-known empathy for people in embarrassing situations, an empathy developed when he was a gawky hayseed who was jeered at because he drove back and forth to his night classes at law school in an old rattletrap that was held together with duct tape and baling wire.

According to Zack, he couldn’t bear to see his client humiliated and reduced to commuting to his white-collar job by motorbike.

As I entered the courtroom by the side door, I took the nearest seat on a bench directly behind the defense table. I couldn’t see Russell’s face as Zack Young finished up with the witness ahead of me, but he seemed to be staring straight ahead. Zack is good, but I had a feeling that Russell knew he was staring at a few years of hard time. Juries aren’t particularly sympathetic to attorneys who bilk their clients.

My testimony seemed to be part of the prosecution’s clearing out of the underbrush before they got into the embezzlement part. Brandon Frazier was ADA and his questions were straightforward when I took the stand.

“Did you remember this case, Judge Knott?”

“Not specifically.”

“When did it come to your attention?”

“When the attorney of another DWI with a similar suspended sentence petitioned for the same judgment as I’d supposedly given Mr. Moore’s client.”

“What did you do then?”

“I had a clerk pull the record.”

“Why was that?”

“When someone to whom I’ve given a suspended sentence comes up again on the same charge, the original sentence is automatically activated. It would have been improper for me to give him limited privileges. I couldn’t and I wouldn’t. That’s why I had the record pulled to see what was going on.”

“And yet your signature was on the form?”

“It had been signed with my name, but that wasn’t my signature.”

“No further questions,” said Frazier.

“Mr. Young?” said Judge O’Donnell, who was presiding that day.

Zack Young looked over the top of his glasses and thanked me for coming, as if I were doing his client a favor rather than helping to build the case of dishonesty against him. “Judge Knott, you said that was not your signature on the order. Do you know for a fact who signed your name?”

“No, sir.”

“Could it have been a clerk or a—”

“Objection. Supposition,” said Frazier.

“Sustained,” said O’Donnell.

“In fact,” said Zack, “you do not know that my client signed it, do you?”

“No, sir.” Mine not to add that it really didn’t matter who did the actual forgery. It was last in Russell’s hands before it was filed with the clerk of court’s office.

“Now, when you said you normally activate the original sentence, what does that mean?”

“It means that the more severe punishments that the original offense carried would now be put into effect.”

“And in the case of Mr. Moore’s client?”

“It would have meant that all of his driving privileges would have been revoked.”

“So that he couldn’t operate a motor vehicle under any circumstances?”

“That’s correct.”

“How was he supposed to get to work?”

“I’m afraid that’s not the State’s problem, Mr. Young.”

“It didn’t bother you that he might lose his job if he couldn’t drive to work?”

“It did bother me. That’s why I didn’t take away his license the first time he appeared before me. But I explained very thoroughly that he would lose it if he were charged with a second DWI.”

“I’m sorry,” Zack said with an air of innocent bewilderment. “I thought you didn’t remember this case. How can you know you explained it so thoroughly?”

“You’re quite right,” I conceded. “Spelling out the consequences of a second DWI is what I normally do, but I can’t say with certainty that I did so in this particular case.”

“No further questions,” said Zack.

I’m sure he hoped that some members of the jury would be so befuddled by my less than absolute memory about something irrelevant to begin with that they might think I’d somehow been lacking in my rulings that day.

“You may step down,” said Judge O’Donnell.

As I walked back to my own courtroom, I was dispirited to think of how hard Russell had worked, only to throw it away for that quick dollar.

If his secretary had been the one to open that unexpected insurance check, if his client hadn’t assumed his claim had been denied, would Russell be sitting there as a defendant now?

Because even though he hadn’t confessed, I was sure that his downfall must have began with that first sudden temptation, coupled with the knowledge that he could probably get away with it.

“What if you were tempted like that?” whispered the preacher.

“By money?” the pragmatist jeered. “Give me a break.”

“It’s a dark night. You’re driving too fast. You’re not drunk, but you have had a glass or two of wine. You feel a sickening thump off your bumper and realize that you’ve hit something. Maybe it’s a deer. Maybe it’s a person. Do you stop or do you keep driving?”

The pragmatist hesitated, weighing his options.

“I thought so,” said the preacher.

It’s my worst nightmare: that I will be faced with a choice like that and will come up wanting in that split-second decision that separates principle from self-interest.

Some judges, those who know they’ve driven with a blood alcohol level over .08, are apt to give middle-aged DWIs the benefit of any doubt. Judges with teenage kids tend to go a little easier on the teenagers who show up in their courts. Me? I can’t help empathizing with defendants who are there because they yielded to that first self-serving impulse, especially if they make me believe that they’re totally appalled by that yielding.

Grown men and women have stood before me with tears running down their faces, practically begging me to give them the maximum, anything to help ease the load of guilt they carry for doing something they’d always thought themselves incapable of doing.

O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

In chambers, I hung my jacket on a peg and put back on my heavy black robe.

“All rise,” said the bailiff as I took my seat at the bar of justice.

We moved methodically through the calendared cases. Plaintiffs and defendants had their minutes before me, then left, as did their supporters and accusers. By midafternoon the whole courtroom had turned over at least three times except for a wiry young black man. Eventually I realized that he had been there since shortly after I convened court this morning. I hadn’t seen him confer with any of the attorneys and he didn’t seem to be connected with any of the cases. He was neatly dressed in faded straight-legged jeans, a cranberry turtleneck, and a heavy black wool jacket that he’d removed and laid in his lap to act as a desktop for a spiral-bound notebook.

A new reporter for the local paper?

He was back after lunch and was still there when the last case of the day was disposed of.

As I stood to leave, he closed his notebook, hooked his jacket over his shoulder, and came forward.

“Judge Knott? May I speak to you?”

The white bailiff started to put himself between the young man and the bench, but I waved him back.

“Can I help you?”

“I hope so. I’m Nolan Capps.”

He paused as if that would mean something to me.

“Yes?”

“Mr. Stephenson didn’t call you about me?”

Call? Oh, Lord! I fumbled in the pocket of my robe. My phone. Still switched off.

“Sorry,” I said. “My phone’s been off all day. What can I do for you?”

“I was wondering if I could talk to you about Martha Hurst?”

“Martha Hurst?”

“Yes, ma’am. Mr. Stephenson thought you could help me.”

I didn’t see how, but I invited young Mr. Capps back to chambers so I could pick up my briefcase and coat. Mindful of my promise to Dwight, I warned him that I could give him only a few minutes.

“That’s okay,” he said, looking around with interest at the behind-the-scenes hallways where so many plea bargains are worked out between DAs and attorneys. The halls were pretty much deserted now, although I was waylaid by a white police officer who wanted me to sign a search warrant for him. I skimmed through it and noticed that he’d neglected to fill in the house number on the street address.

“If you aren’t specific, a good attorney will probably get the results thrown out if you do find the drugs and it comes to trial,” I told him. “And in that neighborhood, you can bet it won’t be a court-appointed one either.”

“Oh, shit!” he said without thinking, and immediately apologized. “Sorry, ma’am. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be right back.”

“So how can I help you?” I asked Nolan Capps as I unzipped my robe and hung it behind the door.

“It’s sort of complicated,” he said. “I believe you know Bessie Stewart?”

Now there was a question straight out of left field.

Bessie Stewart was to Dwight’s nosy, gregarious mother what Maidie Holt had been to mine—technically a domestic employee: cleaning woman, cook, babysitter, yet at the same time a friend as well, a friendship rooted in mutual need and mutual dependence. Like Maidie’s husband on our farm, Willy Stewart was a tenant on the Bryant farm. When Miss Emily married Calvin Bryant and went to live there, she discovered that a childhood friend was there before her, eight years’ married and already the mother of four children. I’ve heard Miss Emily speak more than once about how Bessie was the one who taught her the practical side of running a farmhouse and how to grass tobacco and cotton without chopping up all the money plants. She actually helped deliver Dwight when he arrived in the middle of a hurricane that blocked the roads with downed power lines and fallen trees. And when Calvin Bryant was killed in a farm accident three more children later, it was Bessie Stewart who pushed her to upgrade her certificate and go back to teaching, “’cause you never gonna be no farmer, I don’t care how long you live on one.”

Miss Emily is principal at Zachary Taylor High School these days and Bessie Stewart is still running the domestic side of the farm for her, so yes indeed, I certainly do know her. In fact, she intimidates me a little because I’m not quite sure that she approves of me as a proper wife for Dwight.

“How do you know her?” I asked.

“Her granddaughter’s in one of my law classes.”

“You’re a law student at Eastern?”

“Third-year.”

He was aiming for nonchalance, but I heard the pride in his voice, a well-deserved pride because Eastern’s law school is making a name for itself in the ranks of smaller universities. Located over in Widdington, it was one of the first Negro colleges in the state after the Civil War; and while it opened its doors to all after segregation ended, the student body is still mainly black. At least it is in the science and liberal arts programs. For some reason, though, Eastern’s law school attracted some top names in the field from the moment it opened and there has always been a good racial balance in its classrooms.

“You won’t remember me,” he said, “but we’ve met before. You did a symposium at Eastern last year. ‘The View from the Bench’?”

“You came to that?” Luther Parker and I were there to represent North Carolina’s district courts. Ned O’Donnell represented superior courts, and Frances Tripp, who administered my oath of office when I came to the bench, spoke about her work on the Court of Appeals.

“Yes, ma’am. It was great. Made me want to run for judge someday.”

“Hold that thought,” I said as my phone rang. One of Dwight’s numbers appeared on the little screen.

“You on the road yet?” he asked.

“Just leaving,” I assured him. “But I don’t have a window here. What’s the weather like?”

“Rough and getting rougher. It’s raining and the temperature’s dropping fast, so be careful, okay?”

“I will. See you in about an hour.”

“We don’t have anything on for tonight, do we?”

“Nothing on my calendar that I know of.”

“I’ll bring pizza.”

“A man after my own heart.”

“That’s what I’m aiming for.”

“Sorry,” I said to Nolan Capps as I rang off.

“That’s okay. I know you need to go, so I’ll be quick. See, our criminal law clinic is connected with the Actual Innocence project. We’ve already taken on our limit for the year, and besides, we don’t do death penalty cases because they have access to a lot of legal reviews. But when I was telling my mother about it, she got all excited and wanted us to stop Martha Hurst’s execution. You know about Martha Hurst?”

“A little,” I said cautiously.

“Then you know that she’s never confessed to killing her stepson. That’s one of the criteria for taking on a case. Usually a prisoner can get a lesser sentence if they confess. Of course in Hurst’s case, she wasn’t offered a deal, so she had no incentive to confess. But she’s still maintaining her innocence after all this time even though most killers eventually admit that, yeah, they did it.”

As he spoke, the police officer returned with all the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed on his search warrant. I signed it and picked up my heavy coat.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Capps. I have to leave now, but walk out with me and tell me why your mother’s interested in Martha Hurst.”

He slid on his own jacket, tucked the notebook into an inner pocket, and held the door for me.

“They used to be on a team together when I was a kid and we lived in Cotton Grove. Fastpitch softball. Mom played third and Martha Hurst played short. I think I saw her hit two home runs in the same game once. Then we moved to Widdington and Mom started playing with a team there. They kept in sort of loose touch since sometimes their teams would be in the same tournament, and when the murder happened, Mom heard all the talk about it. Nobody on her team thought Ms. Hurst had done it, and Mom went to see her in prison a couple of times. She swears she would have known if Ms. Hurst was lying.”

We walked down a double flight of marble stairs that led to the main rotunda of the old courthouse. It was a few minutes past five and most of the offices were dark. Our footsteps echoed off the marble-clad walls as we passed through the rotunda and continued down a long gloomy hall to the side entrance nearest the parking lot.

“So where do I come in?” I asked.

“First I tried the DA’s office. Mr. Woodall said that as far as he was concerned, the case was over and done with. That she’d had all the benefits of the law, that she was guilty and now the law could take its course. But Ms. Johnson was prosecuting over in Widdington week before last. I got her to talk to me and she finally said she’d take a look at the records. I think she found something because she said she was going to ask to see the first defense lawyer’s case file. That would be Mr. Stephenson’s father, right?”

“Right.”

“And now she’s been shot?”

“You think there’s a causal link?”

“Not necessarily. But it sure does complicate things.”

I pushed open the door. A cold wet wind smacked us in the face, but the portico above sheltered us from the rain itself. The steps already looked slick, though.

“Anyhow, Kayra—Kayra Stewart—she said her grandmother knew just about everybody in this end of the county and that she worked for the mother of the chief deputy and she’d put in a word with him. And Kayra said she’d help while we’re on Christmas break. Then, when I called Mr. Stephenson this morning to tell him we had Martha’s permission to see all her records, he said he wouldn’t mind if I looked at his, but he’d given them to the deputy. He said he had a feeling that you’d probably read them and that he’d call you and—”

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I really do need to go. Maybe we could talk tomorrow?”

“Martha Hurst only has a month to live,” he said, giving me a soulful look.

It was too cold to argue. I opened my umbrella and started down the steps. He offered me his arm so I wouldn’t slip.

Young, idealistic, and polite, too? He reminded me of my nephew Stevie. I sighed.

“You like pizza?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then follow me,” I told him. “It’s about a forty-minute drive, so keep up.”

“Yes, ma’am!”