“I tried to stop him.” Buck shifts in his chair so he can face the jurors. “I shot him.”

“Were you able to stop him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

He closes his eyes, still facing the panel. “I tried. But I failed. I was too late.”

I move to the easel and set the photo-Billy beaming with his striped bass-to one side. Next to it I position the other one.

Buck keeps his face averted, toward the jury box, his eyes still closed. The jurors, though, look first at me, then at the easel. One by one, their gazes settle on the photo. The awful one.

It’s a close-up of Billy, from the chest up, on the autopsy table. His arms are bent at the elbows, hands open, palms up, on either side of his head. His eyes are closed and his freckled face looks as if he might be sleeping. But on his wrists the ligature marks are plain.

Finally, Buck follows the jurors’ gazes and stares at the autopsy shot. “You see?” he asks them through clenched teeth. “I couldn’t stop him. I was too late.”

Chapter 42

“Too late?” Stanley scrutinizes Buck Hammond as if he’s a still life about to be auctioned.

Buck’s expression is blank. Seated in the witness box, he’s the same height as Stanley on his feet.

“That was your testimony, was it not, sir? That you were too late?”

Buck leans forward in his chair and nods. “Yes.”

“You were too late long before you fired the shot that killed Hector Monteros, weren’t you, Mr. Hammond?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” Buck shakes his head, but his expression doesn’t change.

“Your boy was already dead, was he not, sir, when you pulled the trigger?”

Buck nods, agreeing. “He was.”

“And you knew that to be the case, didn’t you?”

“I know it now.”

“And you knew it then!”

I’m tempted to get up, but I don’t. Stanley shouldn’t testify, shouldn’t act like a witness. But I shouldn’t act like Stanley, either. Besides, we’ve got a long way to go. Stanley’s just getting started.

He waits for a response, but he won’t get one. Buck and I went over this a thousand times in the past few weeks. If there’s no question pending, Buck’s not to say a word. And he’s good at not saying a word.

A moment of silence. And then Stanley gets it. “You knew your son was dead, didn’t you, Mr. Hammond, when you fired that fatal shot?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Not sure?”

Stanley moves the easel to the wall, tosses the photos of Billy on our table. He walks toward the jury, hands clasped behind his back, a slight smile on his lips. For a moment, his footsteps are the only sounds in the room. A well-planned dramatic pause.

“You were in the courtroom, were you not, sir, when Chief Thomas Fitzpatrick testified?”

“Yes.”

“And you listened to his testimony, I presume?”

“I did. Yes.”

“You heard him tell us, then, that you identified your son’s body at the morgue?”

“Yes.”

“Do you remember doing that, sir?”

“Do I remember…?”

“Identifying the body.”

Buck looks as if he thinks Stanley might be temporarily insane.

“Of course I do.”

“No memory problems, then?”

Buck shakes his head. “No.”

“And you did that, Mr. Hammond-identified your son’s body-more than two hours before the chopper transporting Monteros reached Chatham. Isn’t that correct?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did you hear Chief Fitzpatrick tell us exactly that?”

“I did.”

“Is it your testimony, then, that Chief Fitzpatrick was lying?”

The question is improper, but it’s not worth an objection. Cheap shots say more about the questioner than anyone else. And we anticipated a few from Stanley. Buck is as well prepared to deflect them as any witness can be.

“No,” Buck says evenly, “that’s not my testimony.”

“You agree, then, that you identified the body more than two hours before killing Monteros?”

Buck takes a deep breath and answers the panel. “The Chief said more than two hours, so it must have been.”

“But you don’t have personal knowledge of that fact, is that your testimony, Mr. Hammond?”

Buck faces Stanley again. “Yes.”

“You don’t remember?”

“That’s right.”

Stanley lets out a short, sarcastic hiccup, not quite a laugh. He strides to the side wall, flips off the overhead lights, then makes a beeline for his star witness.

He holds the videotape in front of Buck for a moment-yet another dramatic pause-before popping it into the VCR. “Let’s find out, Mr. Hammond, what you do remember.”

Harry and I exchange surprised glances. We were certain Stanley would save his second run of the video for closing, certain he’d want the bloody runway to be the final scene emblazoned on the jurors’ minds.

The glow from the TV screen illuminates Stanley’s silhouette and Buck’s profile. The rest of us sit in inky blackness. This is the advantage to a windowless courtroom: easy video viewing. It’s the only plus, as far as I can tell.

Stanley retrieves a long wooden stick from his table. It has a white rubber tip, like the ones pointed at blackboards by teachers in elementary school. He waits patiently while the military chopper comes into view on-screen. He watches silently as the chopper descends to the runway. Then he presses a controller, freezes the frame.

I leave my chair and walk quietly across the room to lean against the wall beside the jury box. I want to keep an eye on Stanley’s pointer.

“You’ve seen this helicopter before, have you not, Mr. Hammond?”

Buck nods. “Yes. I’ve seen this tape.”

“I’m not asking about the tape. I’m asking about the military helicopter, the real one. U.S. ARMY printed on its sides. You saw it on June twenty-first, did you not?”

There it is. A question I didn’t ask. It never fails. There’s always a question I didn’t ask. More than one, in most cases.

Buck tilts his head toward one shoulder, considering the prosecutor’s query. “I’m not sure.”

Stanley jumps back, as if surprised by the answer. He plasters an incredulous look on his dimly lit face, then turns it toward the jurors. “You’re not sure?”

“I know I must have,” Buck says. “But I don’t remember actually looking at it then.” He shrugs, shakes his head. “I don’t know if I saw the words. I don’t think I realized it was an army aircraft.”

Stanley shakes his head too, and presses the controller again. “You don’t remember,” he mutters.

On-screen, a uniformed marshal emerges from the chopper, his sidearm drawn. One step behind him is Monteros, handcuffed and shackled loosely, so he can negotiate the stairs. A second guard follows a few steps behind, his weapon pointed upward, as if he might fire into the air at any moment.

Stanley freezes the frame again. “Do you remember these men?” He moves his pointer from the first guard to the second, skipping over Monteros.

That’s question number two I didn’t ask.

“The guards?”

Stanley nods. “And I’m not asking you about the videotape. I’m asking about the morning of June twenty-first.”

Buck frowns, as if even he doesn’t like the answer he’s about to give. “No,” he says, “I don’t.”

Stanley smirks, presses his controller, and the action on-screen resumes. He stops it again as soon as Monteros’s feet reach the runway.

“And I don’t suppose you have any memory of this gentleman, either, Mr. Hammond.” Stanley’s pointer rests on Monteros. “Is that your testimony?”

This question I didn’t overlook. I shift my position against the wall, so I can watch the jury as well as Buck.

He sits perfectly still in the witness box, his eyes on the white tip of Stanley’s pointer. “No,” he says. “That’s not my testimony.”

Stanley turns from the TV screen to the jurors, mock surprise on his face. “Do tell us,” he says. “What do you remember about Mr. Monteros?”