Nigel fixed the jury with a holy stare.
“I ask you to focus your powers of compassion and ask yourself: what if that piece of metal had been shot into your head? What if your good thoughts were suddenly hijacked? Would we be right to strip you from your family and send you to jail for the rest of your life?”
Nigel leaned back on his table again, looking exhausted. He smiled sadly, cautiously.
“Well, now you have the power. And I beg you-I beg all of us-to use it with mercy and wisdom.”
And he sat down and wiped his brow with a handkerchief.
• • •
The law was clear. If you know right from wrong, if you are awake and you intend your actions, then you are responsible for them. It doesn’t matter if you were born angry or mean or impulsive. So why should it matter if you were born kind and gentle and then changed by a bomb?
As with any good mock trial, we were on the verge of blowing our fragile categories wide open. Do we have minds, capable of choice and free will? Or do we have brains, made of cells and electricity, firing like pinball machines with only the illusion of free will?
In one fell swoop, Nigel had swept aside hundreds of years of criminal law and asked, how can we punish this man? And he spoke like a Shakespearean actor. His client wasn’t even real, and when I saw one of the jurors dab at her eyes, I knew I was in trouble.
11
If Daphne were just gorgeous, or just smart, she would be amazing. But the combination of both seemed unfair, statistically boggling, almost mystical; she took the air out of the courtroom. And yet in front of the jury, she seemed softer than I’d ever seen her-except maybe for that brief, sleepy moment at the end of Nigel’s dinner party, her hair down, her contacts out-then and now, she was warm and likable, someone you could curl up with by the fire in pajamas and read a book.
“Mrs. Reid, you told us your husband was a kind and gentle man, is that right?”
“Yes,” said the actress playing the defendant’s wife.
Daphne was near the witness stand, close to her-just two ladies talking.
“He wasn’t violent at all before the accident, right? Night and day? That’s what you said?”
“Night and day.”
“And that’s important, right? It’s important because you believe it was the accident that made your husband commit this crime?”
For a second, the witness tried to look at Nigel and John, but Daphne stepped casually into her view.
“Right?”
“Yes.”
“Kind and gentle. Those are the same words the attorney used to describe your husband, aren’t they?”
“If you say so.”
“Are they your words or the attorney’s?”
“Excuse me?”
“What I’m wondering is, who decided to call your husband ‘kind and gentle’? Was that your phrase? Or did the attorneys tell you to call him that?”
“Objection,” John said, standing. “Counsel is asking about privileged attorney-client communications.”
“Mrs. Reid isn’t the client,” Daphne answered calmly. “Her husband is. And she volunteered to testify as a character witness.”
“Overruled,” the justice replied.
“Thank you, Your Honor.” Daphne turned back to Mrs. Reid. “I can repeat the question,” she said gently. “Did the attorneys come up with the phrase kind and gentle, or did you?”
Mrs. Reid mumbled something.
“Could you repeat that, Mrs. Reid?”
“The attorneys,” she answered, glaring at Daphne.
“I see. So you’ve told us what the attorneys think of Mr. Reid.”
“Objection,” Nigel and John said at the same time.
“Withdrawn,” Daphne said. “Mrs. Reid, would it be fair to say that your husband never raised his voice at you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“So he was a kind and gentle man who yelled at you?”
“We had fights like everybody else.”
“Big fights or little fights?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Mrs. Reid, please, my question isn’t difficult. Did you and your husband have big fights or little fights?”
“Little, I guess.”
“So he yelled at you during little fights?”
“Well, I mean… he only yelled during big fights.”
“So you had big fights too?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I’m going to trust that you are answering my question accurately this time. Is that fair?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. Reid was starting to get steamed, and Daphne hadn’t raised her voice once.
“Mrs. Reid, can a husband be kind and gentle if he hits his wife?”
“Objection,” Nigel blurted, standing up. “The question is vague, more prejudicial than probative, assumes facts not in evidence…” He was talking as fast as he could think.
“Your Honor,” Daphne said pleasantly, “the defense is putting a lot of weight on this phrase kind and gentle. I think the jury deserves to know exactly what it means.”
“Go on,” the U.S. Attorney said.
“Mrs. Reid, can a husband be kind and gentle if he hits his wife?”
“Of course not.”
“And Mr. Reid never hit you?”
“Never. Not once.”
“Can a husband be kind and gentle if he pushes his wife?”
“No.”
“And Mr. Reid never pushed you?”
“No.”
“Can a husband be kind and gentle if he grabs his wife and shakes her?”
“Nuh-”
Halfway through the word no, Mrs. Reid came to a halt.
“Mrs. Reid? It’s a simple question. Can a husband be kind and gentle if he grabs his wife and shakes her?”
“I don’t know…”
“Yes or no, Mrs. Reid.”
Silence.
“Your Honor, please instruct the witness to answer my question.”
“Mrs. Reid?” Bernini looked at her curiously.
“Yes,” she whispered.
Daphne cocked her head, confused.
“Mrs. Reid, for the record, are you saying that a husband can be kind and gentle if he grabs his wife and shakes her?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
“Please, answer my question. Yes or no?”
“No,” she said softly.
“Good. We can’t call a husband kind and gentle if he grabs his wife and shakes her. Mrs. Reid, I’m sorry, but I have to ask, has Mr. Reid ever grabbed and shaken you?”
Mrs. Reid shook her head, not yes or no, but as if she were warding the question away. Nigel and John stared straight ahead, betraying nothing.
“Yes,” she said finally.
“Thank you for your honesty,” Daphne said kindly. “It was on the night of your husband’s company dinner, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“You thought you two were alone in the coatroom, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” she said, starting to weep softly.
“Would it surprise you to know that a man named Arthur Willey, the man working in the coatroom that night, saw you two fighting?”
“I didn’t see anyone else.”
“Your husband was yelling, wasn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“He grabbed you by the arms, didn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“He shook you and shouted at you, didn’t he?”
“Yes,” she said, and tears started to run down her face.
Daphne leaned in, like a priest or a cellmate.
“What were you fighting about that night?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Was someone cheating?”
“No.”
“Were you in financial trouble?”
“No.”
“It must have been something big. Surely you remember?”
Mrs. Reid was shaking her head, wishing the questions away.
Then she said, “No.”
“Are you saying your husband grabbed you and shook you over something you can’t even remember?”
“Asked and answered,” Nigel called out.
“Sustained.”
Daphne spoke softly to Mrs. Reid, ignoring Nigel and the judge. “Just one more question, and then we’re done.”
Daphne made a sad face, as if it hurt her to even ask it.
“Was this fight before or after Mr. Reid’s accident, when the piece of metal went into his head?”
There was a painful pause.
“Before,” Mrs. Reid said, so softly you almost couldn’t hear it at all.
John faced Mrs. Reid and smiled kindly at her. He looked at the jury, with his understanding eyes and his broad hand on the back of his neck, as if to say: this woman deserves better than what she just got.