Byron, impressed by Rana’s well-tempered agility, decided to hold back. He was tense. Ali Hussein was even more tense, a taut presence at Byron’s side. Byron hadn’t looked at Ali; he was entirely riveted to the exchange between Justin Goldberg and Hal Rana.
“I’m not about to engage you in that, Mr. Rana. The correct way to have done this was for the government to have advised me that this video existed. In other words, for the United States to have taken the initiative in disclosing this, and then to have presented in an orderly way the national security concerns that you have.”
“Again, it was never our intention to use the video at trial.”
“Let me make this clear to you, Mr. Rana, so that you can take it back to your supervisor. There may not be a trial.”
“We don’t believe Mr. Johnson’s client will plead guilty.”
Byron felt an almost unbearable anticipation. He stared at Justin Goldberg. He waited for the words that would surely follow Goldberg’s pause.
“That’s not what I mean, Mr. Rana, and you know it. Whether Mr. Hussein pleads guilty or continues to maintain that he’s innocent is up to him. I know nothing about that. What I do know is that I’m considering and will consider appropriate sanctions for the government’s failure to disclose the video and failure to comply with the order to produce the report that was due yesterday. You didn’t even give me the courtesy, Mr. Rana, of notifying me in writing yesterday that no report would be filed.”
“We apologize.”
“Don’t apologize. Apologies are a waste of time. I’m prepared to give the government two more days to file the report I required, and it can include any national security concerns the government may claim. It may be that the government could avoid the sanctions I’m considering if it takes this last opportunity to obey my orders.”
“Sanctions?” Hal Rana asked.
Byron had heard the word sanctions invoked so often against him during the long life of the case that for a second he thought Justin Goldberg was now speaking to him.
“Yes,” Justin Goldberg said, “sanctions. And what kind of sanctions, Mr. Rana, will depend in part on what your report says, if you take the opportunity I’m giving you. I can’t sanction you personally, Mr. Rana. I can, however, sanction the government. One alternative is to preclude the use at trial of some or all of your evidence. Another choice I have is to dismiss the case for prosecutorial abuse. Or I could just reprimand the government.”
“We don’t think any of that is appropriate.”
“Of course you don’t. And at this stage I’m warning you. Not only do I look forward to the report I’m allowing you to give me two days from now-in other words, Mr. Rana, I’m offering you a reprieve-but I’m also giving you a week to respond to Mr. Johnson’s papers asking for dismissal of the case, and the release of his client, on the basis of a litany of horrors he has rehearsed about the deliberate mistreatment of his client over the last seven years.”
“Mr. Johnson’s papers were just given to us two days ago. We’ve only had a short time to review them, but it’s clear to us that Mr. Johnson has put forward a great deal of wild accusations.”
“Has he? I’m not so sure. But that’s why I look forward to your written response.”
“It will take us six weeks to respond, Judge.”
“It will take you one week. I want your papers next Friday.”
By this point, Hal Rana appeared depleted. Byron Johnson had never before seen him even look tired. Ordinarily his tie, white shirts, blue and charcoal suits, turban, and hand-made black shoes were always in place, even in hot weather. That had changed, almost imperceptibly. Hal Rana verged on weariness.
“I’ll report all of this, Your Honor, to people with higher pay grades than I have.”
“Of course you will, Mr. Rana.” Justin Goldberg at last looked at Byron. “Is there anything you want to say, Mr. Johnson?”
Gracefully, Byron Johnson rose to his feet. “No, Judge.”
43
SHE WAS A COMELY fifty-year-old with her brown hair swept and enfolded, Katherine Hepburn-style, upward from the nape of her neck. She came to his apartment after responding to a small ad Byron had placed in the classified section of the Village Voice advertising for a word-processor to type a book-length manuscript. There must have been something intriguing, he thought, to the world at-large about doing secretarial work for an anonymous writer, since more than eighty people had emailed resumes to the address at the Voice that passed the resumes on to him. They may have thought they were sending their resumes to Philip Roth. No wonder writers were legendary for all their sexual opportunities.
Her name was Helen Wilson. She said she was an actress and that she would have to work with him on a flexible schedule since she frequently went to calls and, at times, got assignments. They were local, primarily small roles in television commercials. Byron liked the simplicity of her name. And he appreciated her hair and the striking blue eyes in her pale, well-structured face. She said she had been raised in Iowa, and given her looks he wasn’t surprised.
She didn’t seem concerned when she saw that the work would be done in his apartment, not an office. It was Byron who appeared awkward, as if wondering about the propriety of a woman having to come to her boss’s home to work.
He had numbered each page of the six hundred and three yellow sheets on which he had written. He placed them on the work table in front of her after he had taken them out of the bank vault. Helen flipped through some of the pages, glancing only at the handwriting. It was shapely and clear.
“Are you Catholic?” she asked.
“Catholic?”
“Kids in parochial school learn great penmanship.”
“My mother was Catholic,” he said. “Mexican.”
His volunteering of the word surprised him, not her. “So that’s where the Carlos comes from. Not from William Carlos Williams?”
“It might. My mother loved poetry.”
There was a fine web of gray hair at her temples. “Did she read you the Williams poem about the wheelbarrow and the rain?”
He laughed. “She had a red wheelbarrow that she used on a flowerbed.”
She touched the neat stack of yellow paper. “Back to business,” she said lightly. “It will take fifteen hours or so to do this.”
“Is that all?”
“Perhaps less.”
“When can you do the work?”
“Do you really want me to do it here? I could get it back to you quickly if I brought it to my apartment. We could make a copy.”
“Helen, it has to stay here. No copies.”
“You authors are so protective. My schedule, as I said, is unpredictable. I’ll be back and forth. Irregularly.”
“Don’t worry, I never leave. The door’s always open.”
She wore very simple clothes-a black sweater, black pants, delicate slip-on shoes, and a red and black scarf draped over her shoulders.
“I know who you are,” she said.
He smiled. “So, who am I?”
“You’re the lawyer who represents that Arab man.”
“I am.”
“I see you on television. I read about you in the paper. You’re probably all over YouTube and the Internet, although I don’t look at those.”
“I don’t either.”
Over the next few days he looked forward to her visits. Helen had a life that belied her settled, attractive, and very pleasing appearance. Sometimes she arrived at seven in the morning. Byron woke every day at five-thirty: “I’m an urban farmer,” he told her when she asked whether he was bothered by such an early arrival. On other days she would appear at seven at night, entering with that cold scent of winter.
She told him that she was in rehearsal with a small group in the East Village for The Cherry Orchard. They performed one night each week in the auditorium at the Washington Irving public high school on Irving Place. “I play a matron,” she said. “You should come by soon. The tickets are five dollars each.”