Nathan sneaks a peek at the legal pad in her hands. On it is written nothing at all. Nathan manages a rueful smile. Touché. "Where's Milton?"
Ruth squeezes his elbow.
"Counsel, do you waive the reading of the rights and charges?"
"So waived.”
"Where is he?"
Ruth subsides into a berated doctor's stony silence.
The judge, leaning forward, glowers. "Step up, counsel."
Ruth and the A.D.A. approach the bench.
"What the hell is Mr. Stein doing before me?" the judge asks.
"Mr. Stein was taken into custody this morning at his office," the A.D.A. states. "Judge Acevedo so ordered because Mr. Stein has failed to produce tax returns she requested."
Ruth turns aside so that Nathan can hear: "Mr. Stein is a respected attorney."
"I know what Mr. Stein is," grumbles the judge. "I understand there is also a disciplinary action filed against him. What is the nature of the proceeding?"
The A.D.A. breaks in. "A pattern of various client abuses, your honor. Theft of bond. Larceny by false promise. Theft by deceit."
Ruth does not flinch. "Mr. Stein is an upstanding member of the community. He's stood before this bench on a number of occasions. His community ties are manifest. He is not a flight risk. I urge you to release my client on his own recognizance while he works this out with Judge Acevedo."
"Step back, counselors. For the record. People?"
Back at the lectern, the A.D.A. duplicates his performance in a slurred monotone: "Charges of contempt against Mr. Stein derive from his failure to produce tax returns requested by Judge Acevedo.
"Mr. Stein is a respected attorney, your honor."
The judge has hunched over, going at her paperwork with a bureaucrat's joyless determination. Scratching out a note, she does not raise her head. "Nature of proceeding?"
"A pattern of client abuse, your honor," the A.D.A. says, the efficiency of his performance bordering on neglect. "Theft of bond. Larceny by false promise. Theft by deceit."
Ruth clasps her hands behind her back, rises up on her toes and down. "Mr. Stein is an upstanding member of the community. He's stood before this bench countless times. His ties to the community and its ties to him are manifest. All his family and friends are here in this city. He will not flee. He doesn't even like to travel. Your honor, you should release Mr. Stein on his own recognizance."
The court clerk is whispering in the judge's ear, handing her a sheet of paper. The judge looks it over, initials it, returns it with a smile.
Ruth sighs. "Mr. Stein is an upstanding-"
"I heard you the first time, counselor. People?" With her eyes the Judge cues the A.D.A.
"Your honor, the people request Mr. Stein serve the maximum thirty days unless he produces his tax returns."
Ruth knows, apparently, as Nathan himself knows, that to fight is pointless. Still, there is the show. Nathan nudges her onward.
"Your honor, Mr. Stein will not flee," she says quickly. "He has"-she hesitates, continues-"nowhere to go."
Nathan bobs his head in full agreement.
But the judge has turned to her clerk before Ruth is done. "Mr. Stein shall remain incarcerated while in contempt up to but not beyond the maximum thirty-day period. We'll have a recess here."
"I'll need a couple hours," Ruth tells him.
"I have some money at the property desk. It's fifty thousand, no forty, maybe thirty. It should be enough."
"It's not enough. It's not going to get you out of this."
Thunder shakes the panes of the courtroom. The lights dim, flicker, then surge as before.
“What will?"
Ignoring him, Ruth gives the ceiling a dirty look. "Maria's wake is at three o'clock."
"Today?"
"They want to get her in the ground. New Life Missionary Baptist Church in Bushwick."
"Well, they wouldn't want me there."
Ruth's black eyes darken deeper with a disapproval Nathan knows well. "Benny will be there. And what about her will, Nathan?
"Will?"
"They want to know where it is."
"She didn't have anything worth leaving, Ruth."
"They want to know what it says."
"Where is Milton?" he asks.
She looks at him. "I'll need a couple of hours to arrange everything. Sit tight. Don't get hurt in there."
"Don't worry. I've made friends."
"What about the will, Nathan? You didn't answer my question."
"You didn't answer mine. Where's my father?"
Ruth sighs, squeezes his elbow, hushing him. "It'll be over soon. "
"Nathan."
It is Claire, he sees, standing at the gate. In a boyish reflex of embarrassment he blushes and stands to his full height, trying for any advantage. Are her eyes really sweeping over him sympathetically? Then the light goes out and they harden, and as quickly as she opened to him she has sealed shut again.
"I told you I'd make it to Regina Nunez's hearing," he says.
"Look at you, Nathan. Finally in handcuffs."
"Contempt of court has a nice ring to it," Nathan says.
"Tax evasion doesn't. And whatever else. Even when you think you're coming through on your white horse to save Regina Nunez you are incapable of not screwing it up. Eventually you get in the way of everything good you try."
He bends forward, near her ear. "Come with me," he says, believing, for once, at his own risk, his own certainty. Then he sees her expression, and reality, the day, comes crashing down around him. She has begun to walk away. "Claire," he says quickly. "Then do me one favor. Maria's memorial service is at three. Obviously, I can't make it."
"You have got to be kidding."
"She respected you."
"That's not fair."
"It's true. She deserves attendance-" he begins to say, then stops himself. But it is true. She deserves. "Somebody's got to be there.
He cranes his neck, catching the double doors at the back of the courtroom beating like wings then punching closed. In the little square window Claire's hair recedes, flecks of light in the murky hallway, the catch of his life, slipping away.
12 Noon
He runs toward the sound of her retreat, her clippety-clop across the mosaic floor of the courthouse atrium. "Claire!"
She turns. Her wild red hair, her eyes red-rimmed and damp. "Errol? What are you doing here?"
"Where is he?"
"You mean Nathan." Claire sighs. "News certainly does travel fast. So the celebration has extended to Brooklyn. But isn't there some place you should be? Your family-"
"What about the bail?"
"You think that judge would deprive herself of the pleasure of saying to Nathan, 'Bail denied'? Now that he's in the system she'll put it to him every chance she gets."
Santos peers at her. "I don't understand. This isn't funny."
"You don't think Nathan arrested for contempt of court is funny? "
"Contempt of-?"
“-court. Not that there isn't a soul on earth Nathan isn't contemptuous of." She lifts a hand and presses the back of it cold and clammy to his cheek. "You have bigger fish to fry right now. You didn't sleep at all. I felt you tossing and turning all night. Nathan can take care of himself. It'll be good for him."
Santos's face goes blank. He touches her elbow. "Look, where are you going now?"
"Back inside. I have to clean up that little mess of Nathan's. Poor pregnant kid he's left rotting-what's wrong? Please, Errol, go home. You look terrible." He doesn't seem to be responding. She sighs, looks at her watch. "I have ten minutes."
They stop at the door, beyond the metal detectors, to gaze outside. Sculpted regiments of black cloud march across the sky beneath the overcast. The McDonald's across the street lists like a plastic Ark, its playground drowned. A trail of penny candy stores, five-and-tens, discounters, makes it way upstream against a current of water and its attendant trash.
"My god, if this isn't Hell," Claire says.
He takes her briefcase and puts it on the floor then takes both her hands in his. "I have to ask you something."
She looks at him first in one eye then the other and back, to confirm. "I don't like what I see."