cuts the young defender off. “These proceedings will not continue with Mr. Sax present.” She nods to the bailiff. “Escort Mr. Sax from my courtroom.”
The armed bailiff steps to Noah and pulls him up by the arm from his chair. Noah shakes free from the bailiff and faces the judge. “I’m not here as an attorney. I’m here as the defendant’s interpreter. The defendant has a right to an interpreter of his—”
The judge jabs her finger at Noah. “It’s at the court’s discretion to appoint the interpreter. I certainly did not appoint you.”
“But under Florida law the defendant has a right to an interpreter of his own choosing. It specifically sets forth in State Statute Number—”
“Mr. Sax, don’t push your luck. If you’re out of order here today, I’ll jail you for contempt.”
“Count on me, Your Honor, I’ll be a model citizen.”
“No wisecracks. I won’t tolerate it. If it were possible to disbar you twice, I would.”
Noah sits back down between Rimbaud and the defense attorney.
The judge bangs her gavel. “This hearing is postponed until the autopsy of the deceased victim, Pat Judy Benson, is complete. The defendant, Rimbaud Mesrine, is to be held without bail.”
Noah jumps up. “That’s not fair. If it please the court, I would like to—”
“No, it does not please this court. Nothing you do will ever please this court. Be seated.”
Noah stays on his feet. “I just wanted to say that I have information from the defendant regarding—”
The judge glares. “No more warnings, Mr. Sax. I’m locking you up right now if you don’t shut up.”
The defense attorney rises quickly. “Your Honor, if it please the court, may I—”
“Counsel, I already told Mr. Sax, this court is not pleased!”
The judge bangs her gavel. “Court adjourned!”
Beneath the sway of palm trees the cemetery is a crowded maze of granite gravestones and cement-plastered tombs bleached by the sun to an otherworldly bone-white. Family plots are decorated with reposing stone lambs, winged angels in alabaster, and limestone Christian crosses. Tall white-feathered ibises stalk ghostlike on spindly legs across the sparse grassy turf. The birds’ long curved bills are held ready as they stare down to peck a scuttling brown roach or squirming grub. On top of a twenty-foot marble obelisk, a red-shouldered hawk is perched, alert for rodent prey among the bouquets of faded plastic flowers scattered in the weeds of unkempt graves. The hawk swivels its head and stares down from its lofty perch at Luz below, as she follows a meandering pathway through the city of the dead. Luz pushes Nina in her wheelchair; Chicken trots alongside. Luz stops and looks up at the hawk on the point of the obelisk. The hawk stares back with amber eyes and screeches a high-pitched whistle.
Nina’s thin fingers nervously fidget with the stems of the fresh bouquet of white lilies held in her lap. She gazes at the hawk and winces. “It won’t hurt us, will it, Mom?”
“Not unless you’re a mouse, honey. Nothing to worry about.”
“Well, with no hair on my head, my ears look really, really big. Maybe the hawk will think I’m Minnie Mouse.”
Luz smiles at Nina’s lightheartedness. The hawk whistles shrilly again. It spreads its wings and wheels off the granite point, soaring from sight into the blur of sun-bleached sky.
Luz continues pushing Nina down a path between rows of old and neglected graves with tilted and crumbling headstones. She stops Nina’s wheelchair at a well-kept site beneath the lacy green spread of a poinciana tree in full bloom with sashes of red flowers. The names carved into the surrounding headstones all read ZAMORA. Luz kneels and makes the sign of the cross. Her eyes mist over, and her lips move reverentially in silent prayer. Nina hands Luz the bouquet of lilies. Luz places one lily before each of the Zamora headstones and turns to Nina. “Our family has been on this island for five generations. We’ll be the last Zamoras buried here. After us the cemetery will be full up—no more plots left, even for the grandchildren of Cuban heroes.”
“I know, Mom. You tell me that each time we come here. But I don’t want to think about where I’ll be buried, it’s creepy.”
“Tradition is important. Tradition makes us all part of one another, part of something bigger. I don’t want you to forget your heritage. There were slaves in Cuba. Zamoras fought against Spain to free Cuba in the 1868 rebellion. That’s the problem today.”
“What do you mean, that’s the problem today?”
“No one