Stranglehold. Part 23

"I'm sure he is-but that's not what I asked. As a teacher of what, twenty-two years is it? I'm sure you're aware how cruel kids can be. I mean, he stutters, he's shy, he goes to a therapist for one thing and a second therapist for another. He's different. He's an outsider. Isn't that the case here?"

"Robert has friends."

"But he does get teased, doesn't he?"

"Well, yes, he does get teased."

"And do they tease him about wearing a diaper too?" Sansom was on his feet. "Objection! Irrelevant. Council is going nowhere with this."

"If you'll give me a moment, Your Honor, I'll show where this is going."

"I'll allow it-for the moment. Witness may answer."

"I ... I honestly wasn't aware that he did wear a diaper, Mr. Wood."

"He wears one every night to bed, Mrs. Youngjohn. I'm surprised you didn't know. Since you and Mrs. Danse are working so closely together on all of Robert's problems."

"Objection. Now he's making a speech!"

"Sustained."

"Can you think of any reason Mrs. Danse wouldn't tell you about Robert wearing a diaper?"

"Not really, no. Unless she thought it would embarra.s.s him somehow."

"And would you consider this important for you to know? Despite the potential for embarra.s.sment? To understand his problems?"

"I ... maybe. I don't know."

Lydia saw a prissiness in the woman that she'd never seen before. On some level, she was offended that Lydia hadn't confided in her. His next question made it clear that Wood hadn't missed it either.

"So how do you feel about Mrs. Danse concealing it from you? Personally, I mean. Your feelings concerning Mrs. Danse's reliability, her cooperativeness. Does this change things in any way?"

Youngjohn saw where he was going on this and recovered, thank G.o.d. But Lydia was afraid the damage was done already. A character witness was supposed to come down firmly on the side of character.

"I have no feelings about it at all," she said. "I'd have to talk with Mrs. Danse. I'm just surprised to hear it, that's all."

"I'm sure. So to make a judgment on it, though, you'd have to talk with her further?"

"Yes."

"So it's an open question for you. How you feel personally about her concealing this from you, I mean."

"Yes."

Wood paused for a moment and walked back to his table.

"One final matter, Mrs. Youngjohn. Did Robert ever appear in school with cuts, bruises, sc.r.a.pes? That kind of thing?"

"Occasionally."

"Would you say he's clumsy?"

She smiled. "I'm afraid he is ... a little."

"You know this firsthand?"

"I've seen him fall a few times, outside playing." She smiled. "I've seen him fall over his own two feet."

"A few times?"

"Yes."

"Would that account for all these cuts and bruises?"

"No, not really. Most of them I think happened playing outside of school."

"Did you and Mrs. Danse talk about his clumsiness?"

"Yes."

"Did she tell you how he got this or that bruise, this or that sc.r.a.pe?"

"Yes. Sometimes."

"But not always."

"No. Of course not. Not always."

"And you felt she was telling you the truth?"

"Yes."

"You didn't think she might be concealing anything on this subject either, did you?"

"Objection, Your Honor!"

"Overruled. Witness may answer the question."

"No. I didn't."

"Nothing further for this witness."

"Redirect, Your Honor," said Sansom. He walked over to her, looking like a man who wanted to get this over and done with in a hurry.

"Mrs. Youngjohn, do you have any reason to believe that Mrs. Danse ever lied to you about Robert?"

"No."

"Or about how he hurt himself on any given occasion?"

"No."

"And wouldn't you say that Robert's clumsiness at home or wherever was completely consistent with what you saw of Robert at school?"

"Absolutely."

She was firm on that much, anyway.

Hessler, the proctologist, came off like someone's kindly grandfather. For all she knew he was. Dressed in a neat gray suit and conservative blue tie, he spoke with quiet authority. Wood could do almost nothing with him on cross-examination.

"You say this is consistent with a.n.a.l rape, Dr. Hessler," he said. "Yet you found no s.e.m.e.n. So couldn't it have been something else then? Some other form of penetration? An object other than a p.e.n.i.s? The boy's own finger, perhaps?"

"Very unlikely. I've indicated the degree of dilation. The boy couldn't do that with his own finger. I doubt that an adult's finger alone could do it-and even if it could, that's still abuse, isn't it? Or if it were done with any other object you care to mention."

"So you rule out self-infliction."

"Yes. Particularly since it was clear the muscle and the surrounding tissue had been damaged repeatedly, and over time. As I said, there was scarring. One could imagine the boy doing this to himself once for some reason, perhaps, with some foreign object. Unlikely but not impossible. Children, I suppose, will experiment sometimes in very odd ways. But not repeatedly and not over time. This caused pain, Mr. Wood. I would say a great deal of pain. So unless you conclude that the boy's a m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.t ..."

"I see," said Wood. "No further questions."

Andrea Stone stood up, eager to eliminate even that possibility from the judge's thinking.

"Dr. Hessler, did any of Robert's behavior indicate to you that he indeed might be a m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.t?"

"Quite the contrary. He was very timid about being touched. He is not a young man who enjoys pain."

"Thank you, Dr. Hessler. I have nothing further."

The bedroom was cold, though she'd already turned up the thermostat. Something wasn't working properly. She lay in the dark beneath the covers and considered getting another blanket out of the closet. Exhaustion kept her lying there instead and perversely, kept her awake as well. Worrying.

She thought that despite a few setbacks the day had gone fairly well, all told. So did Owen Sansom.

Tomorrow was the problem.

Tomorrow it was her turn.

If only he'd tell them, she thought. If only Robert would say.

She'd tried once again in the car, picking him up after court and driving him from Cindy's house back home. She'd tried to rea.s.sure him. Said that she'd protect him. That if he told nothing would happen to him.

She was losing patience, though.

It was impossible to understand his reluctance in the face of what was going on.

She'd pressed too hard. She'd made him cry.

It wasn't the first time.

It wasn't just worry but guilt that was keeping her awake nights.

She phoned Barbara afterwards as soon as they got home. She'd been somewhat out of touch with her sister lately. It was hard for her to talk about this over and over again, even with her. Barb had wanted to go to court for her as a character witness, but Sansom said that with Barbara being family it would carry little weight. Besides, she'd only just started a new job. So they'd decided she should stay where she was. Cindy was always there for her if she needed somebody.

But at that moment for some reason she needed family. She told her sister how guilty she felt.

"You're doing this for him," Barbara said. "Not for yourself. You're doing it to put a stop to what Arthur's been doing and you've got to remember that. Of course you're frustrated. How else could you possibly be?"

It was good advice. But Lydia knew she was also doing it to him. To Robert. There was no getting around that. Badgering him to say the most terrible things about a man he'd always loved. And probably, despite everything, still loved.

If he can't then he can't, she thought. Leave it alone. Make it happen without him.

You do it instead.

And the day to do it for him was tomorrow and that was keeping her awake.

She needed another blanket. The room was too d.a.m.n cold.

She got up and walked to the closet. The floorboards felt freezing under her feet. She took a heavy quilt off the shelf and spread it out across the bed and then slipped between the sheets. Better.

Something b.u.mped into a table downstairs.

She heard movement. A floorboard squeaked.

She thought about the cold. Maybe it wasn't the thermostat.

An open window?

They'd been closed when she went to bed. It was winter. They'd been closed for months.

An intruder.

Arthur.

She got up and moved back to the closet as quietly as possible. The Ladysmith .38 he'd bought for her was in a shoe box behind some shoes and linens. She hadn't looked at it once since he'd left. But she knew he kept it loaded. Safety on, bullet in the chamber.

The metal grip felt icy in her hand.

There was a choking sensation in her throat and her heart was suddenly pounding-as though the gun carried an electric current that traveled up from her hand and jolted her.

She moved to the stairwell. The urge was strong to check on Robert but his room was down the hall and the door was shut and whoever was down there was bound to hear the latch fall if she opened it.

If someone was down there.

If it wasn't just her imagination.

No, she thought. You heard something.

Maybe you heard Robert. Sure, that's it. It's him down there.