“Guilty,” Mr. Anthony spoke.
Judge Bovine stared out at the defendant who was no different than all others.
“Mr. Anthony. You realize that by pleading guilty you have no right to appeal,” she stated rather than asked.
Mr. Anthony looked at his public defender, who nodded. Mr. Anthony returned his attention to the judge.
“Yes, sir,” he said.
Laughter was scattered among those awake and alert. Mr. Anthony realized his egregious error and grinned sheepishly.
“I’m sorry, ma’am. My eyes ain’t what they once was.”
More laughter.
Judge Bovine’s big flat face turned to concrete.
“What says the state,” she ordered as she sipped from a two-liter bottle of Evian.
ADA Pond looked over his notes. He glanced at Hammer and West, hoping they were attentive and impressed. This was his opportunity to be eloquent, no matter what a dog of a case it was.
“Your Honor,” the ADA began as he always did, ‘on the night of July twenty-second, at approximately eleven- thirty, Mr. Anthony was drinking and socializing in an establishment on Fourth Street near Graham. ”
“The court requires the exact address,” Judge Bovine interrupted.
“Well, Your Honor, the problem is, there’s not one.”
“There has to be one,” said the judge.
“This is an area where a building was razed in nineteen- ninety-five, Your Honor. The defendant and his associates were back in weeds..”
“What was the address of the building that was razed?”
“I don’t know,” said the ADA, after a pause.
Mr. Anthony smiled. His public defender looked smug. West was getting a headache. Hammer had drifted farther off. The judge drank from her bottle of water.
“You will provide that for the court,” the judge said, screwing on the cap.
“Yes, Your Honor. Only, where this transaction occurred isn’t precisely at the old address, but rather farther back, approximately eighty feet, and then another fifty feet, I’d say, at a sixty-degree angle, northeast, from the Independence Welfare building that was there, that was razed, in a thicket where Mr. Anthony had set up a hobo camp, of sorts, for the purposes of buying and selling and smoking crack cocaine and eating crabs with associates on that night. Of July twenty-second.”
ADA Pond had the attention, however briefly, of Hammer, and West, plus Johnny Martino’s mother, and the conscious courtroom, in addition to two bailiffs and a probation officer. All stared at him with a mixture of curiosity and lack of comprehension.
“The court requires an address,” the judge repeated.
She took another gulp of water and felt contempt for her psychiatrist, and for manic-depressive people everywhere.
Not only did lithium necessitate drinking a tub of water daily, but it caused frequent urination, which by Judge Bovine’s definition, was double jeopardy. Her bladder and kidneys were a drip coffee maker that she could feel and measure as she drove back and forth from Gaston County, and sat on the bench, and went to the movies, and flew on crowded airplanes, or walked on the track and found the field house locked.
Because she was a superior court judge, she could adjourn every fifteen, twenty, or thirty minutes, or until after lunch, if her need was great and she so chose. She could wheel in a damn Porta-John, do whatever she liked, ipso facto. But what she would never do, not once during this life and on this planet, was to interrupt a case after it was started, because above all else, the judge was a well-bred lady who had grown up in an antebellum house and gone to Queens College.
Judge Bovine was tough, but never rude. She did not tolerate fools or classless people, and no one could accuse her of anything less than impeccable manners. There was nothing more important than manners, really.
ADA Pond hesitated. Hammer had faded away again;
West could not get comfortable. The bench seat was wood, and it pressed her police belt and the small of her back. She was perspiring and waiting for her pager to vibrate. Brazil was decompensating. It was something West sensed, yet she wasn’t certain why, or what to do about it.
“Mr. Pond,” the judge said, ‘please continue. ”
“Thank you. Your Honor. On this particular night of July twenty-second, Mr. Anthony did sell crack cocaine to an undercover Charlotte police officer.”