Alex Cross's Trial

thought of us living apart was something you had come to believe was a mistake. That you once again believed in the two of us. But that letter never arrived. I am alone, as separated from you and Amelia and Alice as if I were dead—or, perhaps, as if I’d never existed.

    Meg, much has happened in the time we have spent apart. I have been involved in a highly provocative trial here in Eudora. I’m sure you’ve read about it in the newspapers. I will not waste time in this letter describing the trial, except to say that as I write to you now, the jury is deliberating the outcome.

    I know that this might anger you, but I must tell the truth. I am convinced beyond any doubt that I am doing the right thing when I try to use my skills as a lawyer to help those who can’t find justice anywhere else.

    Meg, I know that I alone cannot right the wrongs of this society. But I cannot and will not stop trying. I know you feel that effort takes too much energy and time away from you, our girls, and my love for the three of you.

    Should you decide to continue our marriage, I promise I shall try to be a better husband and father.

    But I must also warn you that I will not (and cannot) abandon my ideals. As much as you may long for it, I cannot become just another government lawyer.

    Please, Meg, give it another chance. We have so much to lose if we abandon each other. We have so much to gain if we try to move forward together.

    My time here in Eudora is drawing to an end. Soon I will be coming back to Washington, and to you. I know now—I have learned—that Washington is my home. You are my home, Meg. The girls are my home.

    I pray that when I open that front door, I will hear your sweet voice again, and you will speak to me with love.

    Till I see you again, I remain

    Your loving husband,

    Ben

    Chapter 125

    THE JURY HAD A VERDICT.

    My father banged his gavel furiously, but it did no good. “Quiet!” he bellowed. “I will clear this courtroom!”

    Spectators pushed this way and that, tripped over one another, stumbling to find seats. My father continued hammering away at his bench. The jurors began to make their way to the jury box, blinking nervously at the uproar their appearance had provoked.

    “I will clear this courtroom!” my father shouted again, but this had no effect at all on the level of noise and excitement in the room.

    “Very well,” he said. “Bailiff, get ’em all out of here. Get ’em all out! ”

    Those were the magic words. Instantly the courtroom came to perfect attention. The crowd fell silent, and everyone sank into the nearest available seat.

    “Very well. That’s much better,” said Judge Corbett. “Mr. Foreman, has the jury reached a verdict?”

    “Yes, Your Honor, we have.”

    The foreman handed a white slip of paper to the bailiff, who handed it up to my father. Though this took only seconds, it seemed much longer than that. Time was slowing, and my senses were unbearably acute.

    My father opened the paper and read it with no visible emotion. He raised his head and looked my way, still betraying nothing about the verdict.

    Then he spoke. “Mr. Foreman, in the matter of the State of Mississippi versus Madden, North, and Stephens, how does the jury find?”

    In that moment, it seemed to me, all life stopped on this earth. The birds quit chirping. The ceiling fans stopped spinning. The spectators froze in midbreath.

    The foreman spoke in a surprisingly high-pitched whine.

    “We find the defendants not guilty.”

    As he uttered those impossible words, I was staring at the piggish face of Henry Wadsworth North. The hardest thing of all was seeing the joy that broke out all over his hateful visage.

    A smattering of cheers went up from the white audience. Reporters rose and sprinted for the doors. A collective groan, and then sobs, arose from the Negroes in the gallery.

    My father banged his gavel again and again, but no one seemed to care.

    Chapter 126

    AFTER THE COURTROOM HAD CLEARED, I sneaked out a side entrance to avoid the crowd of journalists out front, and did what I had done so many times lately. I got my bike and headed for the Eudora Quarters.

    The first person I saw was the old man in the blue shack who had showed me the way to Abraham’s house the first time I came out here.

    “You done your best, Mist’ Corbett,” he called. “Nobody coulda done better.”

    “My best wasn’t good enough,” I called back. “But thank you.”

    He shook his head. I continued down the dirt