Little Deaths(88)

The bailiff passed back the paper and pen, and Mrs. Gobek made another mark.

“Will the record note that Mrs. Gobek has indicated an apartment approximately one hundred and eighty feet from hers.”

Again, the piece of paper was handed to the jury. They seemed to have little interest in it this time: every gaze was fixed on Mrs. Gobek.

“If your friend speaks to you—in a normal voice . . .”

Mrs. Gobek nodded. “Yes. Yes. A normal voice.”

“If your friend speaks to you in a normal voice, and you are in your apartment, you can hear her from one hundred and eighty feet away?”

He managed to make his tone incredulous, but this only seemed to provoke her. She leaned forward into the microphone, her eyes fixed on Scott.

“Of course I can hear her. My hearing is perfect. My eyesight, perfect.”

Scott looked at her for a long moment while Pete leaned forward, silently urging him to keep going. There must be something he could do, another angle he could push.

But Scott simply walked back to his seat, saying quietly, “No further questions, Your Honor.”

Hirsch was on his feet before Scott had reached the defense table. As Mrs. Gobek struggled with the gate to the witness stand, Hirsch was there to help her down.

“How was I? How did I do?”

He took her arm. “Beautiful. It was beautiful.”

And for a moment, her flushed and triumphant face was indeed beautiful. As the judge adjourned for the day and Ruth was taken down, Mrs. Gobek’s smile was like a wash of sunlight in the dim courtroom.





19


That night Pete sat on the floor of his room, surrounded by piles of notes and interview transcripts. Was this how defeat came: in the shape of a plump woman with badly dyed hair, in the memory of a dim room, curtains closed against the sun?

Pete dug the heel of his hand into his brow. There had to be something he could do. If only he could find another witness. Someone to counter Mrs. Gobek’s testimony.

For twenty-nine hours, he didn’t sleep. He listened to all his interview tapes again. Dug through his notes and reread the transcripts. He went out and knocked on doors. He scoured neighborhood bars, diners, Laundromats for someone he’d somehow missed two years before. He asked questions, took insults on the chin, kept going.

But the few people who agreed to talk to him gave him nothing new. No one was awake that night. No one saw anything, no one heard anything, to stand up to Mrs. Gobek’s account.

He went back to his apartment, looked over his notes. And around four in the morning, his hands lost their grip on whatever he was reading and he lost consciousness. He woke up five hours later, unrefreshed and dehydrated, ran a hand over his chin. He badly needed a shave.

And then he realized. No one was awake that night. No one saw anything. No one heard anything. And he knew what he needed to do.

He called Horowitz at the office.

“Wonicke? Jesus. Been a long time. How you doing?”

“Listen, can we meet? I need to talk to you. I need your help.”

There was a pause and then Horowitz said, “Sure. Tony’s?”

“No. Not Tony’s. Somewhere private. Somewhere we can’t be overheard.”

Another pause, longer this time.

“You know the old Regal Cinema off Park Drive East? The place they’re knocking down? I’ll see you in the parking lot in an hour.”

Pete washed quickly, shaved, put on a shirt with a cleanish collar. When he arrived, Horowitz was already there, leaning against the hood of his car, holding two paper cups of take-out coffee.

Pete took one, swallowed half of it in a single gulp. Shuddered.

“Thanks. I needed that.”

Horowitz eyeballed him.

“You look like shit. What you been doing?”

Pete sighed, ran a hand through his still-damp hair.

“I was in court last week. The Malone case . . . things aren’t going well.”

“What do you mean you were in court? You ain’t a reporter anymore—what were you doing there?”

Horowitz stood squarely and forced Pete to meet his eyes.

“The case isn’t going well for who? What the fuck have you been doing? What’s going on?”

Pete told himself not to look away.

“I went to see Mrs. Malone’s attorney.”

His face went pink. “What the fuck? Jesus, Wonicke . . .”

“I know, I know. Spare me the lecture. I wanted to help.”

“You wanted to help? Help who? You practically begged me to meet Devlin. The meet was on the basis you’d give him a decent write-up. Suddenly you’re fired from the paper, and now you’re . . . what the fuck are you doing?”

Then Horowitz paused and his face changed.

“Oh, I get it. You’re following your dick.”

“I’m not . . . It’s not like that.”

“It never is. Every single time, it’s different. When it happens to you, it’s always Romeo and goddamn Juliet.”

He sighed, looked away for a moment.

Then: “So what did you tell him, this attorney?”

“Not much he didn’t already know.”

A gull filled the silence with a scream.

“Then what are we doing here? Why did you call me?”

So Pete told him. He told him what he needed and he watched Horowitz’s face change again and his hand tighten around his coffee cup.