"They came sometime after that?"
"Yes. Immediately after I got back to my dorm."
He had finally worn me down. It made awful sense that no matter how hard I tried, he would be left standing at the end.
"Now, you said, you testified that he kissed you; is that right?"
"Yes."
"Once or twice or a lot of times?"
I could see Paquette. Madison sat behind him, interested. I felt the two of them were coming in after me.
"Once or twice when we were standing and then, after he had laid me down on the ground, a few times. He kissed me." The tears were just rolling down my cheeks now and my lips trembling. I didn't bother to wipe them. I had sweat through the Kleenex that I held.
Paquette knew he had broken me. That was enough. He didn't want this.
"May I have a moment, Your Honor?"
"Yes," Gorman said.
Paquette went to the defense table and conferred with Madison, then checked his yellow legal pad and files.
He looked up. "Nothing further," he said.
The relief in my body was immediate. But then Mastine stood.
"A couple of questions, if it please the court."
I was tired but knew now that Mastine would handle me gently if he could. His tone was firm but I trusted him.
Mastine was concerned with working Paquette's former territory, going back to strengthen weak lines. He made a quick five points. First he established how late it was and how tired I was when I gave my statement on the night of the rape. He had me detail all the things I had been through and on no sleep. Then he moved on to my statement on October 5, the one Paquette had gleefully put forth to me-the feeling versus sure. Mastine was able to establish that, as I had said, it was an affidavit in which I retold the encounter with Madison chronologically. I first saw him from the back and had a feeling. I then saw him face-on and was sure.
Then he asked me if anyone was with me. He wanted to point out that because my father was present, I had elected to decline the presence of a rape crisis representative.
"My father is waiting outside," I said. This fact didn't seem real to me. Far away, in the hall outside, he was reading. Latin. I hadn't thought of him since entering the courtroom. I couldn't.
Mastine asked me how long I had been under Madison in the tunnel and how far away from his face I was.
"One centimeter," I said.
Then he asked me a question I felt uncomfortable with, one I had known he might ask if Paquette's approach warranted it.
"Could you give the judge an idea of how many young black men you would see on a daily average in your travels, or class or dormitory or at all?"
Paquette objected. I knew why. It went straight to his case.
"Overruled," said Gorman.
I said, "A lot," and Mastine had me quantify. "More than fifty or less?" I said that it was more. The whole thing made me uncomfortable, separating the students I knew by their race, pooling them into columns, and tabulating their number. But this wouldn't be the first time, or the last, that I wished my rapist had been white.
Mastine had no further questions.
Paquette got up only to have me repeat one thing. He wanted me to repeat the distance of Madison's face from mine during the rape itself. I did: one centimeter. Later he would try and use my certainty against me. Quoting this distance in his final statement as to why I couldn't be trusted as a credible witness.
"No redirect," Mastine said.
"You are excused," Judge Gorman said, and I stood.
My legs were shaky underneath me and I had sweat through my skirt and stockings and slip. The male bailiff who had led me in came toward the center of the room and waited for me.
He took me out.
Down the hall, Murphy spotted me and helped my father gather his books. The bailiff looked at me.
"I've been in this business for thirty years," he said. "You are the best rape witness I've ever seen on the stand."
I would hold on to that moment for years.
The bailiff walked back toward court.
Murphy hustled me off. "We want to get away from the door," he said. "They'll be breaking for lunch."
"Are you okay?" my dad asked.
"I'm fine," I said. I did not recognize him as my father. He was just a person standing there, like all the rest. I was shaking and needed to sit down. The three of us, Murphy, my father, and I, returned to their bench.
They spoke to me. I don't remember what they said. It was over.
Gail breezed out of the courtroom and over to us. She looked at my father. "Your daughter's an excellent witness, Bud," she said.
"Thank you," my father said.
"Was I okay, Gail?" I asked. "I was worried. He was really mean."
"That's his job," she said. "But you held up under him. I was watching the judge."
"What did he look like?" I asked.
"The judge? He looked exhausted," she said, smiling. "Billy is really tired. I wanted to get up there so bad. We have a break until two and then it's the doctor. Another pregnant lady!"
It was like a relay race, I realized. The leg I'd run had been arduous and long, but there were still others-more questions and answers-more key witnesses, many more hours to Gail's day.
"If I learn anything I'll contact the detective," she said, turning to me. She extended her hand to my father. "Nice to meet you, Bud. You can be proud."
"I hope the next time we meet it's under more pleasant circumstances," he said. It had just hit him. We were leaving.
Gail hugged me. I had never hugged a pregnant woman before, found it awkward, almost genteel, the way both she and I had to lean only the upper halves of our bodies in. "You're incredible, kiddo," she said quietly to me.
Murphy drove us back to Hotel Syracuse, where we packed. I may have slept. My father called my mother. I don't remember those hours. My attention had been so focused that now I let go. I was aware that my case was still continuing as we folded clothes and waited for Murphy to pick us up later that afternoon. My father and I sat on the edges of the twin beds. Putting distance between us and the city of Syracuse was our unspoken goal. We knew the plane would do it. We waited.
Murphy came early to meet us. He brought news.
"Gail wanted to be the one to tell you," he said, "but she couldn't get away."
My father and I were in the carpeted lobby, our red American Tourister luggage waiting nearby.
"They got him," he said joyfully. "Guilty on six counts. He was remanded to jail!"
I went blank. My legs felt weak beneath me.
"Thank God," my father said. He said this quietly, acknowledging an answered prayer.
We were in the car. Murphy was chattering. He was high off it. I sat in the back of the car while my father and Murphy sat in the front. My hands were cold and limp. I remember feeling them distinctly resting on either side of me, useless.
At the airport, while my father and Murphy sat off at a distance in an airport lounge, I called my mother from a pay phone. Murphy offered to buy my father a drink.
I pushed in my home phone number and waited.
"Hello," my mother said.
"Mom, it's Alice. I have news."
I faced the wall and cupped the mouthpiece in both hands. "We did it, Mom," I said. "All six counts except the weapons one. He was remanded to jail."
I didn't know what remanded meant yet but I used the word.
My mother was ecstatic. She shouted up and down the house in Paoli, "She did it! She did it! She did it!" over and over again. She could not contain her joy.
I had done it.
Murphy and my father exited the bar. Our flight was boarding soon. I found out what remanded meant. It meant Madison would not be released between conviction and sentencing. They had handcuffed him inside the courtroom as the charges were read. This made Murphy gleeful.
"I wish I could have been there to see his face."
It had been a long, good day for John Murphy, and, as my father confided on the airplane, Murphy could really pack the drinks away. But who could blame him? He was heady, celebratory, off to see his Alice.