The yelling frightened Mrs. Willard, and she cried louder.
"Admonish him, Judge! He must be admonished!"
"I'll withdraw the question," Jake said on his way back to his seat.
Buckley pleaded with his hands. "But that's not good enough, Judge! He must be admonished!"
"Let's go into chambers," Noose ordered. He excused the witness and recessed until one.
Harry Rex was waiting on the balcony of Jake's office with sandwiches and a pitcher of margaritas. Jake declined and drank grapefruit juice. Ellen wanted just one, a small one she said to calm her nerves. For the third day, lunch had been prepared by Dell and personally delivered to Jake's office. Compliments of the Coffee Shop.
They ate and relaxed on the balcony and watched the carnival around the courthouse. What happened in chambers? Harry Rex demanded. Jake nibbled on a Reuben. He said he wanted to talk about something other than the trial.
"What happened in chambers, dammit?"
"Cardinals are three games out, did you know that, Row Ark?"
"I thought it was four."
"What happened in chambers!"
"Do you really want to know?"
"Yes! Yes!"
"Okay. I've got to go use the rest room. I'll tell you when I get back." Jake left.
"Row Ark, what happened in chambers?"
"Not much. Noose rode Jake pretty good, but no permanent damage. Buckley wanted blood, and Jake said he was sure, some was forthcoming if Buckley's face got any redder. Buckley ranted and screamed and condemned Jake for intentionally inflaming the jury, as he called it. Jake just smiled at him and said he was sorry, Governor. Every time he would say governor, Buckley would scream at Noose, 'He's calling me governor, Judge, do something.' And Noose would say, 'Please, gentlemen, I expect you to act like professionals.' And Jake would say, 'Thank you, Your Honor.' Then he would wait a few minutes and call him governor again."
"Why did he make those two old ladies cry?"
"It was a brilliant move, Harry Rex. He showed the jury, Noose, Buckley, everybody, that it's his courtroom and he's not afraid of a damned person in it. He drew first blood. He's got Buckley so jumpy right now he'll never relax. Noose respects him because he's not intimidated by His Honor. The jurors were shocked, but he woke them up and told them in a not so subtle way that this is war. A brilliant move."
"Yeah, I thought so myself."
"It didn't hurt us. Those women were asking for sympathy, but Jake reminded the jury of what their sweet little boys did before they died."
"The scumbags."
"If there's any resentment by the jury, they'll forget by the time the last witness testifies."
"Jake's pretty smooth, ain't he?"
"He's good. Very good. He's the best I've seen for his age."
"Wait till his closing argument. I've heard a couple. He could get sympathy out of a drill sergeant."
Jake returned and poured a small margarita. Just a very small one, for his nerves. Harry Rex drank like a sailor.
Ozzie was the first State witness after lunch. Buckley produced large, multicolored plats of the first and second floors of the courthouse, and together they traced the precise, last movements of Cobb and Willard.
Then Buckley produced a set of ten 16 x 24 color photographs of Cobb and Willard lying freshly dead on the stairs. They were gruesome. Jake had seen lots of pictures of dead bodies, and although none were particularly pleasant given their nature, some weren't so bad. In one of his cases, the victim had been shot in the heart with a .357 and simply fell over dead on his porch. He was a large, muscular old man, and the bullet never found its way out of the body.