Part 13 (2/2)
”I was at your trial,” I said. ”I was the prosecutor.”
Morgan slowly nodded his huge head up and down. He said nothing. I waited for a reaction, but there was none, or so it seemed.
”Ted Jaffe is my name. Do you remember me?”
Morgan nodded again. The eyes barely changed.
I fought against the instinct to lower my gaze. I could smell Morgan now, an alien bitter smell.
After a minute he said, ”Why're you here?”
”To try to help you.”
That was all I could think of after weeks of gnawing doubt that bordered on torture. Those five words.
”You help me best,” Morgan said, ”by getting the f.u.c.k out of here.”
I had expected that and believed I could deal with it.
”I understand how you feel, Mr. Morgan.”
”You do?”
Abruptly I felt drained. All that was left was my sense of foolishness. I was an intrusion here, my presence a terrible tampering with what remained of a condemned man's life. What I've got to remember, I thought, if I'm going to get through this and accomplish whatever is still worth accomplis.h.i.+ng, is that this man did in fact murder an innocent person. Whatever he is now, he was that then. Some outermost punishment was required, or there is no proper equation in events. But by law, not by error or judicial whim.
”Darryl,” I begged, ”please listen to me. I have some new information about your case. I know that your cellmate back in Duval County Jail, Jerry Lee Elroy, lied about overhearing you confess on the telephone. If this comes to light, it could win a new appeal for you-maybe even a new trial. I don't promise anything. I definitely don't promise that the verdict will be different. But there's always a chance that we can get the death penalty decision reversed. I met with the CCR group in Tallaha.s.see yesterday. They're willing to let me take over the case.”
Morgan, through all this, kept shaking his head. Not in denial so much as amazement.
”You're crazy, man.”
”I don't think so.” I almost added: ”Although quite a few others agree with you,” but I clamped my teeth together in time.
”You put me here, man.”
”Yes, I did. I was part of that process.”
”Something's wrong,” Morgan muttered.
”I need to ask you a lot of questions.”
”Suck my d.i.c.k.”
”You have nothing to lose.”
”You always got something to lose,” he said.
”Not at my hands.”
”Some kind of flimflam here. I told you, I ain't interested.”
”Darryl, I don't work for them anymore. I can't harm you. I can only help you.”
”Who you work for?”
”I'm with a law firm in Sarasota.”
”You still think I kill that man. Think William Smith stuck a knife in that lady.”
He was right, but I couldn't tell him that. ”What I think doesn't matter,” I said carefully.
”Better you split from here,” Morgan said. ”I kill you, what I got to lose?”
”Didn't you just say you always have something to lose?”
”Maybe you right and I wrong. Forty-four days, they gone kill me. What do I care if they kill me for doing you too? Who deserve it more than you and that snitch and that motherf.u.c.ker cop? Maybe my life have a purpose then. Least then I done something for what they done to me. I strike a blow for brotherhood. You know what Malcolm X say?”
There was a light in his eyes now for the first time since I had entered the room.
”Take it easy,” I said.
I had to dominate him. Every lawyer has to dominate his client. In this case, it was a little more necessary than usual. Morgan was a big, powerful man. I held my ground, and for the first time I locked eyes with him.
”I tell you how it is over on Q,” Morgan said. ”They take my cards and my magic stuff away from me when I get over there, and my cards and my magic was all I got. So I hook c.o.c.kroaches together, sort of like they was a team of mules. They drag a matchbox around on the floor. That pa.s.s the time. Then a little frog come up through the s.h.i.+t jack. I kept that little frog a couple of weeks and I give him my roaches to feed him. But froggy hungry, he ain't gonna last, so I flush him back down the s.h.i.+t jack. See what I'm saying?”
”I'm trying to,” I said.
”c.o.c.kroach, froggy, Jew lawyer-what the difference in the end? They hurting me over there, waiting on Big Wooden Mama. The real mean thing what they done in here is keep me waiting. You feel like, when you first get in, it ain't real. Got locked up for something I don't do, and I say, 'Hey, this can't be right, couple months I be out of this.' I get here, a dude tells me, 'Man, one night you gonna find yourself crying, there be tears in your eyes, and you gonna wonder why.' I said, 's.h.i.+t, I don't cry for nothing.' And three, four years slide by, I cry. I did, man, I swear. Twelve years gone by. You talking about another appeal? What do I need it for? Every day go round, it come in my mind, 'When all this be over with?' Feeding me to Mama, they ending my hurt. I get rid of you, dude who put me here, maybe they do me that much faster.”
I watched him rise from his chair and glide toward me. I didn't have the power to move an inch. I just waited for him.
Chapter 14.
THE ROOM SLOWLY resolved into focus; it had a sharp smell of Merthiolate and disinfectant.
”Rest here for a while,” a voice said. I didn't argue.
My fingers trembled when I held my hands out in front of me. I had been taken from the visiting cubicle to the prison hospital-I was conscious by then and, with a bit of help, could navigate. The doctor, a pale young man who was trying without much success to grow a goatee, said that nothing had been broken or damaged. My larynx was bruised, that was all. There would be some discomfort for a day or two; I would be better off talking only when necessary.
I asked the doctor, ”Do you know what happened back there?”
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