The judge stops there and points.
“Oh, man,” the kid says, but it’s fairly fainthearted. After Cobberly’s stunt, the other cops are careful not even to glance in George’s direction, but he knows from a pulse in the room that he selected the right boy.
Next, Grissom leads George and the legal retinue behind him to the desk of one of the detectives. Six handguns are laid out, two of them undoubtedly recovered from the boys under arrest. George knew nothing about firearms when he started as a State Defender, but he learned more than he might have liked on the job, and he has remained somewhat up-to-date because he often reads trial transcripts of the testimony of ballistics experts. He thought the silver gun with black handles that the older boy held on him was a Kahr MK40, which he recognized only because it’s the current king of concealed weapons. It was probably ‘rented’ from a senior gang member in exchange for a share of the proceeds. The second kid had a black. 32 or. 38, also an automatic. George picks out the first gun without hesitating. The courtroom axiom is true. It’s the only thing you really see. He takes a guess at the second.
“So much for the unreliability of eyewitness testimony,” Gina murmurs. With the IDs made, George and Abel and Gina await the cops who have remained behind in the detectives’ area with the Deputy P.A. from Felony Review, caucusing to be certain that they need nothing more to make their case.
“Neither gun was loaded by the way,” Gina says to George, as they’re waiting. “Just for the record.”
“Pros, huh?” Abel asks.
“Not first-timers. But it counts, right? Not to take a chance on killing somebody?”
“Except by heart attack,” the judge says.
The cops and P.A. s are bound to be satisfied, but from George’s perspective, picking out the right kids is only a start. The real issue is whether Corazon sent them. Gina will never let the boys talk to the cops, especially if Cobberly or anybody like him is involved. George keeps turning the problem over.
“How would you react if I said I wanted to interview your client?” the judge asks her. “The taller one?”
“What’s he get?” Gina responds instantly.
“I’m not in charge.”
She smiles. “Something tells me everybody will listen pretty hard to the recommendations of an appellate court judge.”
“So then, let’s see if he spills. It’s the one way he can lighten the load on this thing.”
When the cops emerge, Grissom likes the idea. “You’ll get more from this kid than we will, Judge,” he says.
Gina goes off to inform her client.
The boy is placed in a beaten-up interrogation room with an old wooden desk and three chairs and a number of heel scuffs and gouges running up the walls. From the corridor, he can be viewed through a one-way mirror. Nonetheless Grissom, Gina, and the P.A. escort George into the room and remain standing behind him while the judge takes a chair opposite the kid. There’s an iron hook in the floor used to chain the prisoners who are shackled, but as a juvenile, the boy is merely cuffed. By the terms Gina established, her client will not get renewed Miranda warnings, meaning his statements can’t be used against him in court, on the odd chance he ends up going to trial.
“Man, you got me down bad, man,” he tells George. He’s talking about the lineup.
“How’s that?”
“Man, I ain’ never seen you before. Never, man.”
“It didn’t look to me like your eyes were closed last night, so I don’t think I believe that.”
“Nuh-uh, man. You got me down bad.” The kid has a round face, a hawk’s nose, and large, dark eyes, quick with concern. The half-head of raven hair shines on the back of his scalp. Even lying, he looks a good deal more appealing than he did when he was holding a gun.
Gina speaks up behind George.
“Hector,” she says, “didn’t you listen? I told you, you have two choices. Either shut up or tell the judge you’re sorry and answer his questions straight down. Nobody wants to hear that you weren’t there last night.”
“ Es verdad, man,” Hector says.
“Cut it out,” Gina says. “Listen to what the judge wants to know, and do yourself some good.”
Hector responds to the word judge this time.
“You a judge?” When George nods, the brief lick of a smile crosses Hector’s lips. He jacked a judge. There will be some street cred for that. But the smile slips away as the young man reflects further. In his face, you can see the digits falling and his mounting concern. “So how’s this go, man? You ain’t gonna be the judge on me, man, right?”
“Nope.”
“Just gonna be one of your people, right?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Yeah,” Hector says. He doesn’t believe it for a second. His tongue slides around in his mouth as he assesses his predicament. Then his black eyes kick up to George with an aspect of surprising openness.
“So how’s that anyway, man?” he asks.
“What?”
“You know, man, sittin’ up there, goin’ like, ‘You guilty, man. You ain’ guilty. Dude, you get twenty-five. But you, hombre, you get paper.” ’ Hector’s cuffed hands circle the air as he passes out these imaginary sentences. “That cool or what?”
“That’s not actually my job anymore,” George says. “But when I did it, I never especially enjoyed that part.” George has never met a judge who didn’t say that sentencing is the hardest thing he or she has to do.
“ Ese,” the kid answers, “is pretty cool.” When George was a State Defender and had conversations like this, he used to give his young clients the same timeworn speech. Forget thug life, stay in school, you can be a lawyer too. It was 1973, and George believed that. He hears occasionally from a couple of the young men he represented who turned their lives around, but nobody’s a lawyer or a judge. These days kids like Hector sneer. At the age of sixteen, he already knows how much of the world is closed to him.
“Hector, I want to know why you and your brother decided to rob me.”
“Man, I don’t know nothin’ ’bout who jacked you, man. But gotta be to see the presidents, no?” Money, he means.
“Maybe we should ask Guillermo,” Grissom says from behind, referring to the little brother.
“Oh, he’s soft, man. You can’t go with nothin’ he gonna tell you. He’s just off the hook, man.”
Nonetheless, Grissom’s made his point. Hector seems to sober.
“That arm broke, man?” He nods at George’s sling.
“Hairline fracture. Hurts.”
“ Y que,” says Hector again. “Gotta do your work, right?”
“If that’s what you call it.” George gives the boy a cold look. “I want to know why you jacked me, Hector. I want the whole story. It’s the only way Guillermo and you catch a break.”
Hector ponders while George keeps a hard eye on him.
“ Y que,” the kid says wearily again and takes a deep breath in defeat. “We got this carnal, man. Fortuna? Had his first appearance and all last week. And that judge, man, he did him real greasy. Twenty bills, man. The bond? And he’s just hemmed in on some little dope thing, man. Twenty bills? What’s up with that, man? So like, Billy and me, man-you know, we was gonna back him up.”
“Help him make bond?”
Hector nods. “We seen you, man? Just sittin’ there? Couple times we seen you. So, you know, we get us the cuetes. But Billy, man, we come up on you, and he’s like, ‘No, vato, no way we can do this hombre, man, he’s like prayin’.’ Were you prayin’ in that car?”
George can’t help smiling briefly.
“But why me, Hector, and not somebody else?”
The boy draws back with a quick, disdaining look.
“Man, that’s a nice g-ride, man, ain’t that? Mucho ferria. ” A lot of change.
George would have been skeptical that a 1994 Lexus, a virtual antique, commands much on the street, but Cobberly said the Mexican gangs prefer to detail and retrofit older cars, regarded as classics. A style born of need is now fashion.
“Nobody pointed me out? Described the car?”