"No! We in a hurry."
She got up and peed in the toilet; they watched dispassionately, familiar with the sight of women relieving themselves. She dressed in front of them, pulling on a T-shirt and a pair of jeans. Her nipples were hard in the cool air, and it bothered her that the matrons saw this. They shackled her hands behind her, then pushed her out of the cell. Some of the other women stood clutching their bars, curious about any activity along the hallway. Yo, they taking you to the electric chair, white bitch? Maybe the Dep was moving her to another prison, but that would not explain why she'd been told to dress in free-world clothes. It was hours before any courthouse would be open; perhaps she was being transferred upstate to another prison.
"Where am I going?" she asked again.
"You'll know soon."
They took her directly to a blue-and-white Department of Corrections van parked outside; before she got in, her feet were cuffed, and then she was helped up on the bench seat, where they ran a loose chain through her leg cuffs. She was the only prisoner being transported, which was strange, given that the prison system, so overcrowded and pressed for funding, usually crammed prisoners together.
"Where am I going?" she screamed at the window. No answer came back. The van pulled through the heavily fenced entrance, where a guard closed a gate behind the vehicle before opening the gate in front of it. Through the tiny caged window she could see the looming rise of Manhattan, a bright veil of glass and steel and stone. How forbidden and marvelous it looked! Maybe the D.A.'s Office really was releasing her. Either they had been fooled or possessed some reason to reverse her verdict-discovered some advantage in it. But she didn't like either scenario. It put her inside other people's plans, it was an if-then formula, and all branches of supposition arrived at people whom she didn't like having some reason to see her out of prison, especially Tony Verducci.
Thirty minutes later the van bounced up in front of the massive Criminal Courts Building at 10 °Centre Street, and the matrons took her into the north tower, the Tombs. On the twelfth floor prisoners were segregated into a series of holding pens; most had been arrested recently and were awaiting their arraignments. The bridge connecting the twelfth floor to the rest of the court building was known as the Bridge of Sighs, and she was taken across it with a couple of prostitutes, who clattered awkwardly in their high heels and handcuffs, to a small holding cell next to a courtroom on the thirteenth floor. Two new matrons flanked her, one of them clutching her plastic bag. A wall phone rang and the matron picked it up.
"Let's go," she told Christina.
It was the same courtroom in which she'd been convicted four years earlier-same high ceilings and deep bank of benches, same green walls. And the same assistant district attorney who had prosecuted her sat at a table. The judge, a middle-aged man with half-glasses, appeared through an open door, dropped into his chair, and picked up a telephone. He noticed Christina.
"You may sit."
A few minutes passed. Another man came in and whispered to the assistant district attorney. The detective, she thought, the guy who testified at my trial.
"Your Honor," said the young prosecutor, "Detective Peck has been told that Miss Welles's lawyer is somewhere else in the building."
The judge did not look up from his paperwork. "Fifteen minutes, or I'm adjourning."
Detective Peck disappeared from the room.
"Miss Welles," said the judge, "we're trying to find your attorney."
"Oh," she said. "Why?"
"This is a formal proceeding, and you need representation."
"Okay."
"Your attorney is not an 18-B lawyer?"
"What's that?"
"The state pays their fees."
"No. I don't think so."
"It's Mrs. Bertoli?"
"It was."
"Did Mrs. Bertoli contact you?"
"No."
"Well, perhaps the district attorney's notice was mislaid amongst Mrs. Bertoli's voluminous paperwork," the judge concluded wearily. "Perhaps that is plausible. Then again"-he raised his eyebrows, his hairline lifting upward-"she may have seen said notice and not perceived its import." The judge looked at Christina. "Its importance to you, I mean."
"Yes," agreed Christina uncertainly.
"Mrs. Bertoli is well known to this court," the judge continued. "Her professional demeanor is well known and her habits are well known. That she has not contacted you is inexcusable. Yet she has been and no doubt will continue to be excused. She is a pack mule of excuses working in a pit mine of societal disinterest. We release unaccountability and irresponsibility from its natural ore, and we carry it to the surface and smelt it into the coin of chaos." The judge sighed. "I will stop there. The court officers have all heard my speeches. I will let that be my day's protestation. The court should not characterize the quality of defense counsel, it is true, but-"
"But we're among friends," piped in the assistant district attorney.
The door opened and Mrs. Bertoli entered, followed by the detective. She flicked a cell phone shut and dropped it into her briefcase and walked officiously up to the front of the courtroom. "Is this really a 440.10?"
"Yes, Mrs. Bertoli," answered the judge. "Let's go now." He picked up his phone and muttered a word or two, and a court reporter entered and sat down at her steno machine. "All right, then, Mr. Glass, I've read your statement. Your detective, Mr. Peck, is sure that he made a mistake with the identification?"
"Yes, Your Honor," said the prosecutor.
"After more than four years he mystically realizes he made a mistake?"
"He was involved in ongoing police work," answered Glass, "and realized that there were several lost subjects in the undercover case involving Miss Welles. By that I mean unnamed targets of surveillance, and he realized that it was one of them in the truck on the day in question, and not Miss Welles."
Christina cut her eyes at Peck. This was bullshit. Of course she'd been in the truck-that's where she'd been arrested. Peck blinked but did not change his expression.
"Miss Welles never confessed?" the judge asked, flipping over a sheet of paper.
"That is correct," said Glass.
"There was no plea bargain, in fact?"
"That is also correct."
"Has the lost subject from the original case been arrested?"
"Detective Peck informs me that an arrest is expected shortly."
"What was Miss Welles's role, then?"
Glass looked directly at the judge. "She was the girlfriend of one of the principals. That's all."
"Your summary referred to some confusion over the method of communication used by the gang."
"We thought she had something to do with it."
The judge paused, then winced at some private thought. "There was no confession, no familiarity with the line of questioning?"
"This was more than four years ago, Your Honor, but the answer is no. She never confessed to anything the whole time."
"There was no prior record?"
"No."
"No arrests at all?"
"Nothing."
"Prison record was what?"
"Exemplary."
"Is Detective Peck ready to answer a few questions?"
"Yes."
The detective was sworn in. He had spent some time with his hair and necktie that morning.
"All right, explain this to me," barked the judge. "I'm surprised the newspapers aren't here. It's a good story."
"That's because they never sent me any notice," protested Mrs. Bertoli hoarsely. "If they did, then I would have raised holy hell."
The judge ignored her. "Go ahead, Detective."
"It's simple, Your Honor. We made a mistake in the identification. There was another woman involved in the smuggling-same weight, same coloring, height a little shorter. We didn't get much of a close look at her. We never heard her name. When we arrested Miss Welles, we thought that was the same woman. Miss Welles admitted she was the girlfriend of Rick Bocca, whom we suspected of masterminding the whole operation, but that was it."