Superior Court Justice Dennis Mallon is one pissed-off judge.
He has the dark suspicion that someone is jerking his leash here and he thinks that person might be Deputy Wade. So he gets Jack in front of him, reminds him that he's still under oath and asks in no friendly tone of voice, "Deputy, did you coerce this statement from this witness?"
Jack's problem – well, one of Jack's many problems – is that he doesn't have time to think this through. If Jack were more experienced he would have taken the Fifth, which would have tubed the prosecution but probably saved his own ass. Jack's not thinking that way, though. What he's thinking is that he has to protect his witness. He's also thinking that it's Career Felon and All-World Scumbucket Teddy Kuhl's word against his and Bentley's – like, they're up against a guy who's got a teddy bear with a hard-on on his arm – so Jack decides to gut it out.
"No, Your Honor."
"Is there any truth to what this man Kuhl is saying?"
"None, Your Honor."
Me and him, we're lying motherfuckers, Your Honor.
Judge Mallon scowls and then the defense attorney asks permission to approach the bench. He and the DA and the judge all whisper and hiss stuff that Jack can't hear and when the huddle breaks, it's the defense attorney asking Jack the questions.
"Deputy Wade, how did you come to suspect my client of this arson?"
"His modus operandi matched that of the fire."
"That's not true, is it?"
"Yes, it is."
"You said you had a gas can with my client's prints on it, is that your testimony?"
"Yes."
"And did you?"
"Yes."
Which strictly speaking is true, because he and Bentley went out and got a gas can, jammed Teddy's hand onto it, placed it on the site and "found" it.
" You planted that evidence, didn't you?"
"No, sir."
"Did you beat up my client?"
"No."
"You beat this so-called confession out of him, didn't you?"
"No."
Jack hangs tough.
Billy Hayes is watching this and thinking that Deputy Wade is a genuine tough guy.
Judge Mallon lets Jack off the stand but instructs him not to leave the courtroom. Jack sits in the gallery sweating bricks while there's another endless huddle at the bench, the clerk makes a phone call, and twenty minutes later Brian Bentley walks in.
Walks right past Jack without looking at him, and the back of his jacket is soaked.
He takes the oath, and the stand, and the judge asks him how the statement was obtained and Bentley tells him that Jack Wade beat the confession out of Theodore Kuhl.
Bentley is sweating like a sauna as he turns into a Chatty Cathy doll on the stand. Tells about how Jack told him to leave the room and when he came back in Wade was stomping on Theodore Kuhl and threatening to really hurt him. How he had pulled Wade off the suspect, explained to the suspect that they had an eyewitness No, no, no, Jack's mind is screeching.
– who could place him at the scene, so he might as well try to help himself, and how based on that, Kuhl had written his statement. How Jack had forced Kuhl to put his prints on the gasoline can and then planted that evidence, and it was all so unnecessary because they did have an eyewitness "I want that witness produced," Judge Mallon tells the DA.
No, no, no, no.
"Yes, Your Honor."
"What's the witness's name, Deputy Bentley?"
"Mr. Porfirio-"
Jack stands up and yells, " No!"
"-Guzman."
Jack, he wants to race out of the courtroom and get to Guzman first, except he's in handcuffs because the judge orders him arrested for perjury. Teddy's sitting there grinning at him. Azmekian is smiling at Billy Hayes, who's calculating how many millions it will take to settle his lawsuit. Bentley's on the stand wiping his brow with a handkerchief as he reaches for his spiral notepad to give up Guzman's address.
Which he does, in front of God, the judge, and the defense attorney, and when the sheriffs go to pick up Mr. Guzman – surprise, he's disappeared.
Dropped off the face of the earth.
Jack always hopes that he's in Mexico somewhere, in some village by the sea, drinking cold beer to some sweet canciones. He knows it's far more likely that Teddy's crew took him out.
And it's my fault, Jack thinks.
I didn't do the job.
I didn't do it well.
And I got that good gentleman killed.
As Teddy Kuhl walks, as Kazzy Azmekian gets two million bucks from California Fire and Life, as Jack pleads out to perjury in exchange for unsupervised probation and his uncontested dismissal from the department.
All through this Jack doesn't say shit. Doesn't rat out Brian Bentley, doesn't say a word in his own defense, doesn't offer any explanations. Just takes the ass kicking and goes.
Worst thing is, he can't get a job.
28
Any job.
He's a lying felon. A corrupt, brutal cop. And with that kind of reference he can't get a gig asking, Would you like fries with that, sir? And his dad's retired, so that's out, and then a few months later his dad dies while on a sport boat fishing off Catalina, and Jack disappears inside himself into his trailer across the PCH from Capo Beach and drinks beer for breakfast and surfs but after a couple of months he stops surfing.
Letty wants to stick it out with him. Letty is there, man, she ain't going anywhere. She is one hundred percent solid gold, she walks the talk. She'll even walk down the aisle with him, have kids, do a life. She tells him that and he looks at her like she's some freaked-out skell and says, "Married? What are you, drunk?"
She starts to answer, No, asshole, you are, but she swallows her temper and says, "I thought you wanted to get married."
He laughs. "I don't even have a job!"
She says, "I have a job."
"What, you'll support us?"
"Sure," Letty says. "Until you find something."
"There's nothing to find."
"It's not like you're busting your ass looking."
Unless they got jobs at the bottom of Budweiser cans.
"What do you want from me?" Jack asks.
"I want us to get married," Letty says. "I want us to have a life. I want kids."
Jack says, "I won't bring kids into this shitty world."
"Jack, you got beat," Letty says. "You lost a case-"
"I lost everything."
"Not everything."
"I got a man killed!"
"Not everything, Jack!" Letty yells.
"Yeah," Jack says. "What are you doing here, anyway?"
"What am I doing here?"
"Go away, Letty."
"I don't want to."
"I want you to."
"No, you don't," Letty says. "Don't throw me away, Jack. I'm too good to throw away."
"You're too good to hold on to, Letty."
"Don't give me that self-pitying shit. If I didn't want to be here, I'd-"
"What are you, fucking deaf? I'm telling you to get out! Leave! Go! Split! Pintale!"
"I'm gone."
First word in Spanish he ever says to her and it's Go away.
"I'm gone," she repeats.
"Good."
"Yeah, good."
She slams the door shut behind her.
Two months later Jack's unemployment has about run out when Billy Hayes trots his cowboy boots up Jack's steps and into the trailer where Jack's slumped on the sofa, drinking a beer and watching the Dodgers on TV Jack recognizes him as the insurance guy he jammed up, so Jack asks, "What, are you here to give me shit?"
Billy says, "No, I'm here to give you a goddamn job."
Jack stares at him for a long time, then says, "Mr. Hayes, I did everything they said I did."
"You have some construction background," Goddamn Billy says. "And you already been to fire school, so you save me some money right there. I figure you can make a pretty decent adjuster. Basically, it's putting people's houses back together. You want the job or not?"