Part 26 (1/2)
”I'm sorry, Your Honor,” she said. ”I have nothing but respect for this court and I don't mean it to be. I only hope that you'll find ... that everyone will do the right thing here. I hope to G.o.d that I'll never have to make that decision. Ever.”
The judge studied her. Don't back off, she thought. And don't exactly fight him either. Meet his eyes. Be careful.
Burke sighed. ”All right, Mrs. Danse. We won't press this any further at this time. Mr. Wood, please continue.”
Wood seemed to feel he'd won his point. She wasn't sure. Burke was hard to read.
”This position you've made so much about. Did your husband ever force this position on you, Mrs. Danse?”
”Physically, you mean?”
”Yes.”
”No. Not physically.”
”He never raped you then, did he?”
”No.”
”But you think he raped your son. Forcing him to use the same position.”
”Yes. I do.”
”Because your son would a.s.sume that position or a similar position.”
”Yes.”
”How do you know he wasn't just copying what he saw?”
”Excuse me?”
”How do you know your son wasn't just copying a position he'd seen you and Mr. Danse use while the two of you were making love together?”
”Robert never saw us have s.e.x together.”
”Never? Surely you mean not to your knowledge.”
”I mean never.”
”How could you possibly know?”
”I'd know.”
”You consider yourself a good mother, don't you?”
”Yes, I do,” she said.
”You're considerate of Robert's feelings, aren't you?”
”I think so. Yes.”
”What about Robert's feelings the day following this ... incident you speak of?”
”What do you mean?”
Suddenly Wood went all theatrical, heaving a sigh and pacing the floor with the appearance of a man who had finally grown impatient with some recalcitrant naughty child.
”Come on, Mrs. Danse. You pull him out of his house in the middle of the night, you leave him somewhere while you go out and have a public row with your husband, then in the morning you pile him into a car for a round of visits to doctors' offices, a proctologist he's never met before, an unscheduled visit to his psychotherapist, all of them asking questions, prodding him for information-about his relations with his father-then that night there's Ms. Stone here asking him some more questions. It goes on all day long! Is putting him through all that what you'd call being considerate of his feelings? Wouldn't you say that this particular day was a little upsetting to him?”
”Of course it was. But it couldn't be helped. How else was I supposed to ...?”
”It couldn't be helped? You couldn't have waited one day or two days after this alleged incident for things to return to normal for the boy? You had to put him through this instantly?”
”That was my attorney's advice. To get this done right away.”
”But you wanted to get it done right away, didn't you? Personally you wanted to.”
”I thought it best.”
”So the answer is yes?”
”I personally thought it best to get it done right away.” Wood sighed again and shook his head.
”Was Robert crying when he left Dr. Hessler's office?”
”A little. It didn't last. A few moments.”
”And when he left Dr. Bromberg's office?”
”No.”
”And that night? After the interview with Ms. Stone?” She looked at Andrea Stone. She couldn't lie. Not with her sitting there.
”He may have been crying during the interview, I don't know. I thought he might have. But not afterwards. Not when I put him to bed.”
”So this was a long day of interview after interview, basically a wonderful, happy trail of tears for Robert, wasn't it?”
”Objection.”
Finally Owen Sansom was actually doing something. But this was a question she wanted to answer. Because how could you compare that day to the previous one with his father? How could you compare what she'd put him through to what Arthur had been doing to him that day and all along before that? You couldn't and it wasn't fair.
”Sustained,” the judge said.
”Isn't it true that this is personal with you, Mrs. Danse? That you'd have done pretty much the same without the advice of counsel?”
”I don't know what you mean by personal. But I'd probably have proceeded along the same lines on my own.”
”Even down to the proctologist?”
”I'm a nurse, Mr. Wood. I'd probably have thought of that, yes.”