Free The Laws of our Fathers by Scott Turow Page A

say, 'help me with your first name, so I don't mangle it when I introduce you to the jury. Tariq?'
        The question startles him. He stares up briefly, then pronounces the name. 'It's just on the license, Judge, I don't go by that much anymore. The second syllable's like "reek." As in odor.'
        He smiles at himself. The message is unmistakable: Don't worry, I'm not that way. He's magnificently groomed, a large man of substantial weight, his bulk gracefully draped in a splendid suit of a greenish Italian wool. He is all soft contours, a half-head of Afro hair, roundly sculpted, and a beard trimmed close to a broad cheeky face. He shows the slick courtroom poise of a big-city criminal defense lawyer. This is a man who has stood at many podia, making jokes at his own expense. For the moment, ingratiating himself, he is radiant as the sun. But the worm will surely turn. Between a judge, laboring to rule properly, and the defense lawyer, always criticizing her for the sake of appeal, there is a natural rivalry. The process starts at once.
        'If the court please, I have a motion.' From beneath his arm, Turtle slowly removes a newspaper, as if revealing a concealed weapon.
        'Before you start, Mr Turtle, let me spread one matter of record again.' I begin an oration about my past relations with the Eddgar family, but Turtle shakes his head amiably.
        'We're grateful for your sensitivity, Your Honor, but there's no problem. Mr Eddgar acknowledges his past acquaintance with the court, without objection. As, of course, do I.'
        'You do?' I ask. I have never been good at hiding my emotions. Instead, since taking this job, I have practiced letting them emerge with a certain confidence, as if I figure it was worth getting to forty-seven to know what I do about myself. Even so, I often find myself undone, as I am now, by the dumb impulsive things that escape me. I am still ruing my lack of control when, unexpectedly, I see what I have missed. Despite my resolve to show presence of mind, I find my mouth has actually fallen open.
        It's Hobie. Ho-bie!
        'Forgive me, Mr Turtle. It's been some time.'
        'Contact lenses, Judge,' he says. 'The name. The beard.'
        'The belly,' I hear from near the jury box, a lowered voice that nonetheless carries distinctly in the angled contours of the room. A few of the reporters join in collegial laughter, but it is brought to an immediate conclusion by a single astonishing clack of Annie's gavel on the block she stations on the lower tiers of the bench. You could probably do case studies about what happens when you give a person subjected to a lifetime of ethnic suppression a gavel and a uniform. Annie maintains relentless decorum. She does not permit reading, talking, chewing gum. Even the young gangbangers who come to catch a glimpse of their homies are forced to remove their hats. Now she scalds the offending reporter with a look so furious that he's dropped his face into his hands in shame. Hobie, too, has turned, arms raised imploringly, shaking his head until the man dares to look up again and I recognize Seth Weissman. He scoots himself half upright on the chair arms, faces me, and mouths, 'I'm sorry.' I find my jaw slackened again.
        It isn't really seeing Seth that's shocking. He's come to mind often enough with thoughts about the case that I'm vaguely prepared for his presence. It's his appearance that stuns me. My first impulse is that he's been sick. But that, I recognize, is my dismal inner urge to pull everyone down to my level. His injury is benign: he's gone bald, a smooth pink dome that nevertheless strikes a note of bathos on a man who used to wear his dishwater hair behind the shoulder. Otherwise, he appears only incrementally reduced by time, thicker in the middle, and still a little too tall for his slender limbs. He has a long, male face, nose-dominated, now more fleshy at the jaw. Gravity has done its work. He has