He sees a dark beast’s shape, brown-black in the face, golden at the ruff, shaped by a long, rounded muzzle and peaked ears. Large ears standing alert, crowned by coarse brown hair. Yellow eyes close-set, eyes at a slant, pupils high over the ring of pale iris. Eyes cold, the eyes of a wolf. Ming cries out, whines, but the yellow eyes do not flicker or change. Then he sees someone coming for him, coming up behind him. The villagers.
(“Hey, Chao!” Footsteps thud nearby. They are boys. Hands grab him. He thrashes, swings wildly, but he is pummeling air, only now and then does his fist thud into an arm or belly. He’s not strong enough to overpower them, but his true flaw, he knows, lies inside—fear, cowardice, weakness. They’re dragging him through the alleys of the village.) He is thirteen years old. It is a brilliant, mellow autumn afternoon. “My dad’s gonna butcher you and string you up, gook.” Ming thrashes desperately, wildly, breaking free only to come crashing down against the ground. Pain shooting through his left wrist. He screams, and they seize him up again, they hustle him into the back door of a place that stinks of meat. “Gong bong, ching chong, king kong.” “Here, into the bathroom.” His feet jerk out from under him. His whole body swinging like meat on a hook; his head swinging. Crack. Colors shoot like stars, close to his face. He tries to scream. Blood dripping, blood blooming red in the water. Thrust into the toilet’s mouth, a faraway stench of stale urine and feces under the rim, then cold wetness, choking, coughing, screaming, soundless screaming into water.
(Something is pounding on the door. Ming sniffs: Not James. Who is it?)
Light floods his eyes.
“Ming? Are you all right?”
It’s Alice Wa. She grabs his arm, trying to pull him up, her grasp surprisingly firm. “It’s nine-thirty, it’s morning. I left the courthouse. I promised I would come to check on you. Dagou testifies today.”
“Fuck off.”
“Ming, are you sick?” There’s no gasp of surprise, no show of dismay. Although she is a flake, Alice has some stomach for this. Perhaps she understands, more than the others.
“Fuck off, Florence Nightingale.”
“Your voice is hoarse. Ming, you need to get into bed. Or maybe stay there on the floor.”
There’s the rough wool of a blanket against his chin; he throws it off.
“You look terrible. Wait here, I’m going to get someone.”
“No, no.”
“Then you need to go to the hospital.”
“No.” Ming sits up. “I’m going to the trial. Don’t try to stop me.”
A Character Witness
Straightening her shoulders in her eggshell linen suit, Katherine takes her place on the witness stand. For Winnie’s sake, she will be calm. Yet she can feel, emanating from her body, a palpable, shattering anxiety.
She affirms she is an attorney at the Chicago accounting firm Sims, Mauk, and Machado. She was the fiancée of William Chao. How long were they engaged?
“For twelve years.”
As the gallery takes this in, Katherine briefly imagines the article in the pages of the Sioux City Journal: How is it possible their former high school debate champion, who has succeeded in the world and achieved so much, could allow herself to be bamboozled by a dog eater? How is it possible she could be the unquestioning fiancée of a murderer for twelve years? What kind of a character witness will she make? Obviously, she lost perspective on Dagou’s character long ago.
Yet Katherine answers the questions without blushing. She ignores the jury, the community, and the people wearing Alf T-shirts. She’s focused on her one objective: That she will answer only the questions put forth in the examination and the cross-examinations. This has been her strategy for months, walking a delicate tightrope of the agreement she made with herself, over Winnie’s deathbed: that she wouldn’t lie to defend Winnie’s oldest and beloved son, her own former fiancée; but, for Winnie’s sake, she won’t reveal anything that isn’t asked of her. She’ll do what she can to stand up for Dagou—not for the sake of what they once were to one another, but for Winnie.
For several years, she has suspected the futility of her approach to the past. She knows this now: You can’t create it. You can try forever; you can fall into the process; you can devote yourself. But it isn’t a relationship, it’s not a work in progress. The past is gone.
The only option is to move forward and to do the best you can.
“During the twelve years you were engaged, was he ever violent toward you?”
“No.”
“Was he violent toward others or did he express violent tendencies in your presence?”
“He was sometimes loud, and very candid, but never physically violent.”
“Did he ever talk about a plan to kill his father?”
“No.”
There are lies, and lies of omission. She wasn’t asked the question: Had he ever wished his father dead? This statement she’d heard a hundred times, beginning shortly after his fateful mistake of returning to the Midwest—a decision he’d made for Winnie’s sake, and also (Katherine believed at the time) because she, Katherine, had received a very good job offer in Chicago. For years, she’d felt guilty, responsible, for his return to Haven.
Now Jerry is finished, and it’s time for the cross-examination. Assistant Prosecutor Corinne Udweala frowns through her glasses. She puts one hand skeptically on her hip for a moment while she’s checking her notes.
“Would you say he and his mother, Winnie, had a close relationship?”
Again, this question. “Yes.”
“To your knowledge, did she give William cash gifts?”
“Yes.” Katherine shifts on her feet. Strycker has been stealthily building an argument involving small amounts of money, but what is he getting at? “If you mean birthday presents. She gave him money for birthday presents.”
“How much money?”
“Five hundred, a thousand dollars.”
Udweala raises her voice ever so slightly. “In mid-December of last year, did you give William ten thousand dollars?”
A rustle of surprise comes from the front of the gallery. It’s James. Katherine can see him from the corner of her eye. He didn’t know about the money; Dagou did not tell him. He’s staring at her now, surprised, a little hurt. She retrains her gaze on Udweala. “Yes.”
“Why did you give him the ten thousand?”
“I knew he needed the money.”
“In this conversation, did the subject come up of a ring?”
A murmuring rises, then a shhhh.
“Yes.”
“Was it an engagement ring?”
“Yes.”
“What did you discuss, regarding the ring?”
“He asked me to give it back.”
“Was he ending the engagement?”
“I don’t know.”
A giggle breaks out from somewhere in the back of the gallery.
“He asked you to return the ring. Then what happened?”
“He admitted he was broke. He said he wanted to sell the ring. I gave him some money.”
She hears a rustle near the door: perhaps it’s Alice, returning with Ming. But it’s just someone fumbling with their inhaler.
“Were you paying him to continue the engagement?”
“Objection!” Jerry jumps in. “Irrelevant.”