“Not yet,” she says. “But I want to ask him a few questions as soon as he is. Find out if he saw anything, heard anything.”
“The nurses might not let you in, though.”
Geraldine gives me her “Get a brain, Martha” look again. “The nurses and what army?”
She’s right, of course.
Luke and Maggie head out as soon as Geraldine leaves. Patty does too. She’ll follow them to Chatham, she says, in case Luke has trouble driving on the snowy highway. Or in case she does, she adds.
It will be at least a few hours before I can join Luke and Maggie at home. I plan to pay Sonia Baker another visit, see if we can’t have a calmer discussion about Prudence Nelson. After that I’ll meet with Harry and Buck to prepare for tomorrow’s testimony. It feels as if this day will never end.
Snow falls steadily as Harry and I trudge through drifts in the parking lot, then climb the snow-clogged concrete steps to the Barnstable County House of Correction. Harry’s arm around my shoulders is the best thing I’ve felt all day. When I lean into him, he rests his chin on the top of my head. If only I could spend this evening with Harry-alone.
But it’s not in the cards. We part company at the top of the hill. Harry heads to the men’s ward and I turn toward the women’s.
Harry will start the process with Buck while I spend some time with Sonia. I’ll join them when I can.
Buck is my witness. I’ll handle the direct as well as the objections during cross. Harry is with me tonight, preparing Buck, only because I insisted. I’m a good enough defense lawyer to know Buck Hammond deserves a better defense lawyer than I am.
Chapter 33
The decision to take the witness stand-or not-belongs solely to the accused. A good defense lawyer advises the client of the ramifications of each option: the damning admission of prior convictions if he takes the stand, the unavoidable suspicions of the jurors if he does not. A good defense lawyer also voices an opinion, usually a strong one, about which decision the client should make. But the final call rests squarely on the shoulders of the defendant. And rightly so.
Defense lawyers admit this truth only when the client testifies. “Mr. Smith has no obligation to take the stand,” the lawyer will announce. “But he wants to. He insists. He plans to tell you people what really happened that night.”
If Mr. Smith decides to keep quiet, though, his attorney will lay claim to the decision. “The Commonwealth hasn’t proved its case,” the lawyer might say. “No client of mine will take the stand when the Commonwealth hasn’t met its burden. I won’t allow it. And the judge will instruct you that you’re to draw no inference from Mr. Smith’s silence. He’s under no obligation to testify. He certainly has nothing to hide.”
The truth, though, is that most criminal defendants, even those not guilty of the crimes charged, have something to hide. The neighborhood gang member accused of knocking over the local liquor store didn’t necessarily do it. But if his alibi is that he was closing a crack deal at the time of the robbery, he probably shouldn’t take the stand to say so.
Even a defendant with no priors runs a risk when he testifies. The stakes are highest when the crime charged is a violent one. If the accused is angry-and almost all of them are-then the prosecutor need only get under his skin, provoke an outburst. One flicker of rage from the defendant during trial and the Commonwealth is one giant step closer to a conviction.
In Buck Hammond’s case, this is my greatest fear.
It’s not that Buck is an angry man. He’s not. His manner is calm, resigned. He rarely speaks unless asked a question. Even then, he pauses and thinks-often for an unnaturally long time-before he answers. When he does, his voice is always the same, low and steady.
I’ve spent dozens of difficult, tedious hours with Buck during the past six weeks. I’ve asked him questions he couldn’t answer, a few that made his eyes fill. But I’ve never seen a trace of anger in him. Not even when he talks about Billy. And that, more than anything, is what worries me.
I’m afraid Buck has buried his rage, pushed it so deep into himself that no one-not even he-can see it. I’m worried that the stress of testifying, speaking publicly about all that happened to Billy, will be more than Buck can bear. I’m afraid that his fury has been pent up too long, that once it’s tapped it will boil over into the courtroom.
I’m scared as hell that Buck Hammond will erupt in the witness box.
Harry’s not worried about buried rage, though. He’s worried about Stanley.
“You can’t let him get to you,” Harry says as I join them. He and Buck are seated at an old, stained card table in the middle of a small meeting room. They both look comfortable, relaxed.
“Who? The little guy?” Buck arches his eyebrows. He’s surprised to learn he should worry about the little guy.
Harry laughs. “Yeah. The little guy-the one with the big head and the mouth to match.”
Buck looks up to see if I share Harry’s concern. I nod silently as I hang my parka next to Harry’s on the coatrack.
“Okay.” Buck shrugs. “So I won’t let him get to me.”
Harry shakes his head. “It’s not that simple. Stanley gets to everybody. Even people who aren’t on the hot seat.” Now it’s Harry’s turn to look my way. He wants backup.
I cross the small space between us and nod again.
Four metal folding chairs surround their rickety table. I wipe a layer of dust from one of the remaining two, then settle on it. “Harry’s right, Buck. Stanley would like nothing better than for you to explode in front of the jury. He’ll do everything he can to make that happen.”
“Explode?” Buck’s expression suggests he can’t fathom such an event.
“Yes-explode.”
I lean back in my chair and stare at Buck. He needs to take this to heart. “If you get mad, even for an instant, then Stanley has everything he needs for closing argument. You killed Monteros, Stanley will tell the jury, because you’re out of control.”
Buck shakes his head, but I keep talking. “You could kill again, Stanley will argue. You could take the law into your own hands yet again. You could become a vigilante. The jurors will worry about that.”
Buck’s eyes move from me to Harry, then down at his hands on the table. He’s silent.
“Look,” Harry says, “the bottom line is this: Stick to the script.”
Buck looks up again. “The script?”
I’m glad he asked-so I don’t have to.
“That’s right, the cross-examination script.”
Buck turns to me and I turn to Harry. I didn’t know we had a cross-examination script. I wonder who wrote it.
Harry stays focused on Buck. “If Stanley’s question calls for a yes or no answer, give him one. And give it loud and clear. If we don’t like the way it sounds-the way Stanley phrased the particular question-we’ll clean it up on redirect.”
Harry points his pen at me when he says this, as if it’s certain that I’ll clean up whatever mess Stanley makes.
“But if Stanley gives you room to talk”-the pen moves from me to Buck-“you only know three topics.”
“Three?” Buck looks as if this news makes him smarter than he thought he was.
“That’s right,” Harry says. “You know all about Billy before June nineteenth: the funny kid he was; how he was growing like a weed; the names of his best friends; how he loved fishing and the Red Sox.”
Buck closes his eyes, sways from side to side on his folding chair.
“You know what happened to Billy on June nineteenth.”
Buck stops swaying, but his eyes stay closed.
“And you know you had to stop Monteros-for Billy.”
Buck opens his eyes and nods, but says nothing.
“If Stanley tries to get you to talk about anything else-I don’t care what the hell it is-you steer the discussion right back to the script. Three topics. That’s it. You know nothing about anything else.”