“I say we go for broke.”
I close my files and stuff them in a briefcase. “Let’s put it to the judge. He will shortly send Miss Lander packing back to the Slocan.”
“Hold it,” says Patricia. “What does your client have to say about this bondage stuff with Dominique Lander?”
“You’ll have to wait to find out,” I say.
“I can always get it out of him in cross.” She ponders. “Let me talk to Gundar.”
They walk a few paces away, but we can hear low snatches of conversation. “Don’t want to give him any grounds of appeal. . we could keep her in reserve….”
On her return, Patricia says, “Okay, this is the deal. When O’Donnell takes the stand, I’ll be asking him if he was into S and M and all this body-painting. I’ll call Dominique Lander in rebuttal only if he denies it. Agreed?”
I tell them that now I must speak alone with Augustina. We caucus by a window.
“Exactly what I was about to propose myself,” I say, pleased with my craftiness. “If Jonathan doesn’t testify, the Crown can’t call Dominique in rebuttal. That neatly gets rid of her.”
For appearances, we spend a few more minutes in quiet discussion, then return to the foe, and ask them to throw the polygraph results into the deal. Patricia protests. I accuse her of having something to hide. Her hasty denials seem suspect. I produce a copy of a recent legal brief on polygraph disclosure — authored by one Walter Sprogue.
After another conference of prosecutors, Patricia finally says, “All right, it’s a deal, but you have to undertake not to object to my calling Dominique to contradict your client.” She takes no chances, penning our promises to a scrap sheet of paper that we both initial.
Patricia may feel she has the better bargain — she keeps Lander in reserve. But with one swoop I have not only eliminated proof of previous kink but shortened the trial. I am on a fast-track schedule that may yet get me to the fair on time. But I must curb this otiose wanderlust for my island.
I return to the fifth-floor mezzanine and brief Jonathan, who greets this turn of events with an acerbic sense of humour. “Now Dominique is free to sell her story to the tabs. The National Enquirer will love it — ‘Law Prof Hits Bottom.’ “
Court reassembles without the jurors, the next order of business being a voir dire, a trial within a trial to determine whether the jury may hear Jonathan’s words to Sergeant Chekoff: “I did no such thing. Of course I touched her. I took her to bed.” “Or put her to bed”; he wasn’t sure at the preliminary inquiry. I do not fancy either version, however exculpatory. I would have preferred silence.
Chekoff is Patricia’s sole witness in the voir dire: a man of military bearing with grizzled hair who wasn’t particularly keen about making this collar and who failed to caution the suspect.
The officer begins to relate his conversation with Jonathan in his front yard. “Mr. O’Donnell said, ‘Is this some kind of practical joke?’ “
“How did you respond — ”
Wally impatiently cuts Patricia off. “Hold on. Was there a warning given? He was a suspect, wasn’t he? A very serious complaint had been made against him, and recited to him.”
“M’lord, the accused is a law professor. He may be presumed to know his rights.”
“Pauper or professor, Ms. Blueman, same rules apply to both. I’ll hear from the defence.”
“I have case law on the point,” says Augustina.
“And I know those cases. The Crown can argue until it’s blue in the face on this one.”
“Your mind is closed, m’lord?” says Patricia, her tone overpolite.
“Not closed, but only slightly ajar.”
He impatiently hears Patricia out before ruling. “The Crown has not proved beyond a reasonable doubt the statements are voluntary. They will not go before the jury. Okay, let’s have them in.”
“That was too easy,” Augustina whispers.
My sense that the trial has got off to a good beginning is eroded by the fact that Hedy Jackson-Blyth is leading the jury in — she has been elected forewoman. As such, she has been elevated from ordinary pawn to influential queen on this human chessboard.
I watch the jurors’ faces as Patricia makes her opening address. Eyes grow large and mouths fall open as the salacious allegations are described. I decide I do not like the fourth fellow in the back row: he smirks too much, a smart aleck. Goodman, a young investment broker. A woman in the front row — a nurse, according to the jury list — often smiles, too, but in a different way, with a slight frown, as if she senses absurdity here. Miss Jackson-Blyth is looking distrustfully at Jonathan, who sits with head bowed in the dock, his reading glasses on, occasionally writing notes.
Patricia’s opening is a rather flat summation of the evidence she proposes to call, and to her credit she does not use her speech as a platform to flog her case, to win votes for the prosecution.
After she concludes, Wally asks, “Would you like to defer your first witness until after the lunch break?”
“Well, I thought tomorrow — ”
I jump up. “Tomorrow? M’lord, we have half an hour left of the morning yet. Should we not plough on and allow Miss Martin to get off to her classes?”
“Mr. Beauchamp, you’re full of zip today.”
“According to my daughter, I’m in my second childhood.”
“Maybe that explains it.”
The jurors are chuckling — so important to relax them early.
“M’lord,” says Patricia, “I hadn’t expected Ms. Martin would be needed so early. She hasn’t been fully briefed.”
I leap at this chance. “If my learned friend needs time to rehearse her witness, can we not proceed with some of the other evidence?”
“Brief her, not rehearse her.”
“If she doesn’t know her lines by now, she never will.”
Patricia is aflame. “M’lord, that’s entirely improper! The jury is present!”
“That kind of comment is best reserved for argument, Mr. Beauchamp,” warns frowning Wally. “I wonder if counsel will oblige me by taking a few minutes in my chambers.”
I suppose I am in for it now. Wally will chide me and prohibit further displays of forensic misbehaviour. But when we enter his chambers, he is chuckling. “Beauchamp, you naughty bugger, I’m going to have to keep an eye on you. Very good opening, Patricia. Brief, to the point; we’re sledding right along. Well, this will be a very interesting case. Please, sit down.”
Wally’s eyes rove briefly to Augustina’s stockinged knee as she perches, dainty and cross-legged, on the edge of a chair. Melanie, his wife, is of a jealous bent, and with cause.
“This is a manner of date rape that you’re alleging,” Wally says. “Acquaintance rape, that’s the right term, I think. Too much of it going on. I’m not prejudging of course, but a lot of this stuff never even gets reported. Professor and student, boss and secretary — there’s still that power imbalance thing between the sexes. We’re part of it ourselves, Arthur, it’s ingrained in old-timers like us. The patriarchal male hierarchy.”
I fear he is warning me that if convicted my client will face the full measure of the law. I hope he does not see Regina versus O’Donnell as a test case — one in which his sentence must send a loud message to the patriarchal dictatorship.
“Now, Patricia, can we call someone other than Ms. Martin? One of the boys in blue? Or, ah, girls. Women. “Tangled among the thorn bushes of politically incorrect speech, Wally can find no escape, and silently surrenders.
“I’d like to put in the exhibits first.”
“We’ll admit all exhibits,” I say. “Just show them to the jury, and we’ll agree they are what they are.”
“You’re being awfully accommodating, Arthur. I get suspicious.”
The marking of exhibits consumes the remainder of the morning, the jurors examining each item in turn: an outlandish tropical tie and a simple, unadorned gold-cross pendant, larger than I expected, about three inches high. Items seized from O’Donnell’s house are tendered: coat, dress, spike heels, pantyhose, panties, bra, pair of small gold earrings, purse, a tube of Shameless lipstick worn to a nubbin, and various bedsheets. Photographs of O’Donnell’s home, inside and out, are marked and identified.