Lassiter 07 - Flesh and Bones by Levine, Paul (best fiction books to read TXT) 📗

puzzled, wondering where I was going.

"And that's been, what, almost fifteen years?"

"Yes."

"Subsequent to Emily's death, did you ever have dinner with Harry Bernhardt?"

"Not that I recall."

"Ever invite him to your home?"

"No."

"Ever go to a Dolphins game with him?"

"No."

"Did you ever pick up the phone and call him? 'Harry, how you doing?' Anything like that?"

He pulled at his goatee. "Harry Bernhardt was not a chatty person."

"So the answer is no. You never called Harry Bernhardt."

"No, I didn't."

"Then I wonder. Doctor, just how you could call Harry Bernhardt a friend."

"Objection, argumentative." Socolow sounded bored, but he was right.

"Sustained," Judge Stanger said.

"Isn't it true, Dr. Schein, that you were Emily Bernhardt's friend, not Harry's?"

"Objection," Socolow sang out. "Dr. Schein is Mr. Lassiter's witness."

"He's a hostile witness," I responded. At the word "hostile," Schein's left eye twitched.

"Come up here, both of you," the judge said, waving us toward the bench. When we got there, he pointed a bony finger at me. "Jake, if I understood your proffer, way back at the bond hearing, Dr. Schein was the treating psychiatrist."

"That's right."

"And he's gonna testify that your client was sexually abused as a child, causing her to lose control or some such thing and plug the decedent three times with a little pistol."

"That's about it."

"So how the hell is he hostile?"

"He's wrong. He's going to insist it happened that way in order to cover up his own wrongdoing. He's hostile now, and by the end of the day, he's going to be downright belligerent."

The judge looked at Socolow, who concealed his glee with a judicious semismile. "If Jake wants to impeach the only witness who can give him a defense, who am I to object?"

"Jake, I hope you know what you're doing."

"Do any of us, Your Honor? I mean, in the cosmic sense?"

"I'm not fooling around, Jake," the judge said, sending a clear warning. "If you're setting up some incompetency-of-counsel defense, I'll pin your license to the ass of a horse that's leaving town."

Trying to sound folksy, some judges end up with a bushel basket of messy metaphors.

"Judge Stanger, I assure you, if I'm incompetent, it's purely unintentional."

"All right, impeach to your heart's content." He sent us back to our tables, then turned toward the reporter. "Margie, please read back the last question."

The reporter thumbed through her pages, then read in a monotone that didn't do me justice,

" 'Isn't it true, Dr. Schein, that you were Emily Bernhardt's friend, not Harry's?' "

The doctor cleared his throat and glanced toward Chrissy. She sat at the defense table in a three-piece burgundy outfit: a banded turtleneck, a belted cardigan, and a matching pleated skirt that nearly reached her ankles. Tasteful and refined, but the wrong color. I had forgotten my lecture banning anything that resembled dried blood. "Yes and no," Schein said. "I mean, Emily was my patient. Her husband was . . . there, in the house. We knew each other, all of us."

"Cutting to the heart of it, Emily Bernhardt was more than a patient, wasn't she?"

"I'm not sure I understand the question."

I raised my eyebrows at Dr. Schein, but the gesture was intended for the jury. Then I waited. Sometimes the pause will do it. The silence fills the courtroom. The witness becomes nervous, aware the jury is waiting. A spectator coughs, the courtroom door squeaks open, feet shuffle. A witness in control will wait out the lawyer. After all, Schein just said he didn't understand. I could have rephrased, but I chose to wait. Ten seconds, fifteen, it seemed like an hour.

"Well, I have become close to a number of patients over the years," Schein said finally. Defensive, worried, shifty.

" I'm not concerned about other patients. Would you please answer the question? Was Emily Bernhardt more than a patient?"

After a pause. "Yes, she was."

"And more than a friend?"

"I don't know what you're implying."

"Yes, you do."

"Objection, argumentative." Socolow was starting to wake up.

Judge Stanger cocked his head. "Actually, there was no question at all. Next question, Mr. Lassiter."

"Dr. Schein, were you and Emily Bernhardt lovers?"

"Objection, irrelevant!" Now, Socolow was on his feet. Caught off guard, pissing off the jury by objecting to a juicy question.

"Denied. This is a murder trial, and I'll give the defense some latitude."

"Were you and Emily Bernhardt lovers?" I repeated.

"No."

I reached into a file and pulled out a faded sheet of paper. "Did you write her love poems?"

His face froze. His eyes were wide. What did I know?

"No."

This time I didn't have my laundry list or my old college letter-of-intent signed by Joe Paterno. What I had was the personal stationery of Lawrence B. Schein and a faded, handwritten note to "My Dearest Emily." I read aloud:

Wild Nights—Wild Nights!

Were I with thee

Wild Nights should be

Our luxury!

I paused a moment, then asked, "Did you write that?"

"No—I mean, yes. I didn't write it, but I copied it, out of a book."

"All right. You borrowed it. After painstakingly copying these breathless words of Emily Dickinson, did you give the poem to your Emily, Mrs. Emily Bernhardt?"

He reddened. "Yes."

" 'Wild Nights should be our luxury!' " I repeated. "Were they?"

"I resent your implication. You can't examine poetry as if it were an X ray. Ours was a cerebral relationship, not a physical one."

"Ce-re-bral," I said, as if it were a dirty word. Angling toward the jury, I let my voice fall into a whisper. If you really want them to listen, speak softly.

Rowing in Eden—

Ah, the Sea!

Might I but moor—Tonight—

In Thee!

Two jurors tittered.

"You were Emily Bernhardt's lover, weren't you, Dr. Schein?"

"No! Not the way you mean. No."

"Were you in love with Emily Bernhardt?"

He stared off into space. A vein throbbed in his forehead. "She was the finest woman I've ever known."

"Were you in love with her?" I repeated. Demanding now.

He mumbled something.

"Doctor?"

"Yes, I was in love with her."

"And she with you?"

"Yes."

"To your knowledge, did Harry Bernhardt know of your feelings for his wife?"

"She told him. She didn't love him, hadn't for years. But she wouldn't divorce him. Christina was just a