Part 8 (2/2)
”And suddenly, nothing was the same. He had constant headaches. He couldn't think clearly. He couldn't concentrate at work. He was suddenly irritable, impulsive. He wasn't himself. All because of the piece of metal that pierced his skull as he was serving his country.”
There was a righteous anger now in Nigel's voice. His eyes were strong and clear, but they were watering too. He pointed an accusing finger at us.
”And when a man named Russell Connor tried to take advantage of Arnold, tried to exploit his handicap and steal his business, something unpredictable happened. This piece of metal, this foreign object, interrupted the electricity in Arnold's brain and sent it in a direction it never meant to go. And so his body committed an act that this kind, gentle man never would have done in his forty years on earth. That was his crime: having a piece of metal shot into his brain while defending his country.”
Nigel fixed the jury with a holy stare.
”I ask you to focus your powers of compa.s.sion and ask yourself: what if that piece of metal had been shot into your head? What if your good thoughts were suddenly hijacked? Would we be right to strip you from your family and send you to jail for the rest of your life?”
Nigel leaned back on his table again, looking exhausted. He smiled sadly, cautiously.
”Well, now you have the power. And I beg you--I beg all of us--to use it with mercy and wisdom.”
And he sat down and wiped his brow with a handkerchief.
The law was clear. If you know right from wrong, if you are awake and you intend your actions, then you are responsible for them. It doesn't matter if you were born angry or mean or impulsive. So why should it matter if you were born kind and gentle and then changed by a bomb?
As with any good mock trial, we were on the verge of blowing our fragile categories wide open. Do we have minds, capable of choice and free will? Or do we have brains, made of cells and electricity, firing like pinball machines with only the illusion of free will?
In one fell swoop, Nigel had swept aside hundreds of years of criminal law and asked, how can we punish this man? And he spoke like a Shakespearean actor. His client wasn't even real, and when I saw one of the jurors dab at her eyes, I knew I was in trouble.
11.
If Daphne were just gorgeous, or just smart, she would be amazing. But the combination of both seemed unfair, statistically boggling, almost mystical; she took the air out of the courtroom. And yet in front of the jury, she seemed softer than I'd ever seen her--except maybe for that brief, sleepy moment at the end of Nigel's dinner party, her hair down, her contacts out--then and now, she was warm and likable, someone you could curl up with by the fire in pajamas and read a book.
”Mrs. Reid, you told us your husband was a kind and gentle man, is that right?”
”Yes,” said the actress playing the defendant's wife.
Daphne was near the witness stand, close to her--just two ladies talking.
”He wasn't violent at all before the accident, right? Night and day? That's what you said?”
”Night and day.”
”And that's important, right? It's important because you believe it was the accident that made your husband commit this crime?”
For a second, the witness tried to look at Nigel and John, but Daphne stepped casually into her view.
”Right?”
”Yes.”
”Kind and gentle. Those are the same words the attorney used to describe your husband, aren't they?”
”If you say so.”
”Are they your words or the attorney's?”
”Excuse me?”
”What I'm wondering is, who decided to call your husband 'kind and gentle'? Was that your phrase? Or did the attorneys tell you to call him that?”
”Objection,” John said, standing. ”Counsel is asking about privileged attorney-client communications.”
”Mrs. Reid isn't the client,” Daphne answered calmly. ”Her husband is. And she volunteered to testify as a character witness.”
”Overruled,” the justice replied.
”Thank you, Your Honor.” Daphne turned back to Mrs. Reid. ”I can repeat the question,” she said gently. ”Did the attorneys come up with the phrase kind and gentle, or did you?”
Mrs. Reid mumbled something.
”Could you repeat that, Mrs. Reid?”
”The attorneys,” she answered, glaring at Daphne.
”I see. So you've told us what the attorneys think of Mr. Reid.”
”Objection,” Nigel and John said at the same time.
”Withdrawn,” Daphne said. ”Mrs. Reid, would it be fair to say that your husband never raised his voice at you?”
”I didn't say that.”
”So he was a kind and gentle man who yelled at you?”
”We had fights like everybody else.”
”Big fights or little fights?”
”I don't understand.”
”Mrs. Reid, please, my question isn't difficult. Did you and your husband have big fights or little fights?”
”Little, I guess.”
”So he yelled at you during little fights?”
<script>