Her voice was low, difficult to hear, but no one in the courtroom missed a word. She wept into her handkerchief almost continuously during her testimony; many of the spectators—even the white wealthy women whose sympathy was with the defendants—wept along with her.
“Yes, that was his shirt,” she said, as Kelley somberly showed her the bloody clothing. “And those, his socks. And his dungarees…yes. Yes. I just washed them, and sewed the buttons on.”
“Was Joe in good health that morning when he left you?”
“Yes.”
“When did you see him again?”
“Saturday. At…at the undertaker’s.”
“That was the body of your son Joseph?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Kahahawai. No further questions.”
Darrow’s voice was barely audible: “No questions, Your Honor.”
Sobs echoed in the courtroom as Kelley, in an almost courtly fashion, led her down from the stand.
Darrow leaned over to me, his stringy locks tumbling carelessly, and whispered: “I guess we had that coming. The sympathy can’t be all on one side.”
He looked very old to me at that moment; tired and old.
Kelley looked fresh as a daisy. He was prancing toward the prosecution table, talking as he went: “The prosecution rests, Your Honor.”
The court recessed for lunch, and as usual, Darrow, Leisure, his clients, and I went over to the Alexander Young. C.D., accompanied by Ruby, passed up luncheon for a nap in his room, while the rest of us took the elevator to the roof garden restaurant. No one expected our clients to make a break for it, and we had arranged for the grand old man of the department, Chang Apana, to have the honor of being the nominal police guard.
Because of Chang’s presence, conversation was kept superficial and nothing related to the case was discussed. Leisure’s wife joined us, as usual, and the couple talked amongst themselves. Neither Tommie nor Mrs. Fortescue said much of anything, having finally fallen into a morose understanding of the gravity of their situation.
But Jones and Lord, smoking, laughing, were a cheerful pair of imbeciles. Curly-haired Lord didn’t say much, but square-headed Jones was a cocky, chatty son of a bitch.
“You see the shape on that girl reporter from New York?” he asked me.
“It got my attention,” I admitted, nibbling at my bacon-lettuce-and-tomato sandwich.
“I think she likes me.” He was cutting his minute steak eagerly. “She’s always wanting to talk to me.”
“You don’t think being a defendant in a murder trial could have something to do with it?”
“She’s got four of us to choose from, don’t she? And it’s me she flashes her peepers at, ain’t it?”
“Good point.”
“Did you see that little Chinese girl over by the wall, on the left? She’s a doll. And there’s some good-looking American girls in that courtroom, believe you me.”
This bastard was a bigger lecher than I was.
I looked at him with a tiny smile. “You mind a little advice, Deacon?”
“Not at all, Nate.”
“I saw you ogling those gals. Smiling at them. I don’t think smiles are all that appropriate in a situation like the one you’re in.”
He shrugged, spearing a chunk of O’Brien potato. “I don’t see the harm. Don’t I want people to know I’m a nice guy?”
Chang Apana, seated next to me picking at a small bowl of chow chow, said quietly, so only I would hear, “Owner of face cannot always see nose.”
After recess, Darrow led our contingent down the aisle, court resumed, and America’s most famous trial lawyer, in a wrinkled, baggy double-breasted white linen jacket, rose and addressed the bench.
“I waive my opening statement, Your Honor,” Darrow said, a rasp underlining the deceptive casualness of his drawl.
A ripple of disappointment rolled over the gallery at being denied their first extended sampling of the Darrow courtroom oratory.
“…And call my first witness, Lt. Thomas Massie.”
The disappointment disappeared in a rush of excitement as Tommie popped to his feet, jack-in-the-box style, and strode quickly to the stand, where he almost shouted his oath to tell the truth.
Tommie wore a dark blue suit with a light tan tie, an ensemble suggested by Darrow to seem vaguely naval, slightly military. The sharp features of his boyish face had fixed into a tight expression that fell somewhere between scowl and pout.
In a manner that may have been intended to relax the obviously tense Tommie, and lull the jury, Darrow began an unhurried journey through Tommie’s early years—born, Winchester, Kentucky; military school; Naval Academy; marriage on graduation day to sixteen-year-old Thalia Fortescue. On through his naval duties—the U.S.S. Lexington, the sub base at New London, Connecticut, his two years of further sub duty out of Pearl Harbor.
Then, in the same soothing, casual tone, Darrow said, “Do you remember going to a dance last September?”
“How could I forget it?” Tommie said.
Kelley was already on his feet.
“Where was that party?” Darrow asked.
“The Ala Wai Inn,” Tommie said. “My wife didn’t feel like goin’, but I persuaded her to.”
Kelley was standing before the bench, now. “Your Honor, I don’t intend to interrupt with constant objections,” he said quietly, earnestly, “but I feel entitled to know the relevance of this testimony.”
Darrow had drifted to the bench too, and Kelley turned to the old boy and asked, point blank, “Is it your intention to go into the Ala Moana case?”
“I do so intend.”
“Then, Your Honor, the prosecution should be informed at this time if one of the defendants will make an insanity plea—in which case, we will not oppose this testimony.”
“We do intend,” Darrow said, “to raise the question of insanity in relation to the one who fired the pistol.”
Kelley frowned and bit off the words: “Is a plea of insanity to be offered in behalf of Lt. Massie?”
Darrow smiled. “I don’t think it’s necessary at this time to single out any particular person.”
Kelley was shaking his head, no. “Unless the prosecution is informed that a plea of insanity is to be made on Lt. Massie’s behalf, I will object to any further testimony along these lines, by this witness.”
Darrow made a gesture with two open hands as if he were holding a hymnal. “Your Honor, Mr. Kelley in his opening statements linked all the defendants together as equally guilty. Now he wishes me to separate them for his convenience.”
The judge, pondering this, looked first from one attorney to the other, like a man watching a tennis match.
“It is common knowledge, Your Honor,” Kelley said, “that the defense has imported prominent psychiatrists from the mainland.” The prosecutor gestured first to Tommie, then to the other three defendants. “The prosecution has the right to know which of these four Mr. Darrow will claim insane.”
“I’ll gladly tell you,” Darrow said.
Kelley glared at him. “Which of them, then?”
Darrow beamed. “The one who shot the pistol.”
Kelley’s face was reddening. “The prosecution has the right to know the person for whom this insanity plea is to be made so that our alienists may also examine this individual.”
“These alienists of yours,” Darrow said, “would appear as rebuttal witnesses, of course.”
“Of course,” Kelley said.
“Now I’m a stranger here in your lovely land, Mr. Kelley, but if my rudimentary understanding of procedure in Hawaii is correct, I’m under no obligation to submit my clients to examination by rebuttal witnesses.”
“Your Honor, this is outrageous. I object to this line of questioning on grounds of relevance.”
“Now,” Darrow said, as if Kelley’s words were harmless gnats flitting about, “if the prosecution wishes to seat its alienist experts as spectators in the gallery, I’d certainly have no objection.”