Free Temporary Sanity by Rose Connors Page A

without explanation. The new juror number nine is a young construction worker who does not have a seven-year-old son. But he does have a three-year-old daughter.
    Stanley’s concerns about the first juror number nine tell me that Harry and I are on the right track. We agreed weeks ago to keep as many parents as we could on the panel, more men than women, if possible. We use all of our peremptory challenges to oust three of the four candidates who don’t have children of their own. The one we opt to keep is an elderly woman who never married. She did, though, teach English literature at a private girls’ school for thirty-eight years.
    We impanel nine men and five women. We have twelve parents, the retired schoolteacher, and a young male pharmacist engaged to be married, planning a family. These fourteen people will be outraged by what happened to Buck’s son, by Hector Monteros’s crimes. But they are law-abiding citizens; they’ll be outraged by Buck’s crime as well. And his is the only one they will watch played out in living color.
    We’re not elated with our panel, but we’re satisfied. No criminal defense lawyer can ask for more. We explain all of this to Buck Hammond before the guards lead him away for the one-o’clock lunch break, but he doesn’t seem to care.

Chapter 14
    I was gone only ten minutes-fifteen tops. I filled a paper cup at the watercooler and downed it, then stood on the courthouse steps for thirty seconds of fresh air. Between the subfreezing temperature and the wind-whipped snow, that was about all I could stand. But now that I’m back in Judge Leon Long’s courtroom, it’s clear that I’ve missed something.
    Court’s in recess, of course. The room is quiet and the lights are dim. The judge, the press, and the curious onlookers are gone. But Harry, who normally mows down anything in his path to get to lunch, is seated in the front row of the gallery, not going anywhere, surrounded by Buck Hammond’s family.
    Buck’s wife, his parents, two of his three brothers, even his in-laws are here. They all look up at me expectantly, then turn their eyes to Harry. He’s supposed to do the talking, it seems.
    “You have to open,” he says.
    “What?”
    Harry arches his eyebrows. He knows I heard him.
    “I can’t open,” I tell the family members. “I’m not prepared to open. Harry’s ready. He’ll open.”
    Harry stands and stretches, loosening his tie. “They think you should open,” he says. “And I think they’re right.”
    “But you’re wrong,” I tell them. “Harry will do a fine job. He’s ready.”
    Patty Hammond steps forward and puts a hand on my arm. “We don’t doubt that,” she says. “We don’t doubt that at all. We know Harry would do a great job.”
    She looks to her relatives. They nod at her, and she turns back to me. “But this judge,” she says, “he likes you.”
    Murmurs of agreement come from the family members. “And the jurors like this judge,” a brother adds. “Every one of them. They hang on his every word.”
    They’re right about that, of course. Jurors love Judge Leon Long. Almost all of them do. That’s one of the things about Judge Long that drives Geraldine crazy.
    Harry takes over again. “Marty,” he says, pacing the front of the courtroom, “think about it. Judge Long has always liked you. Jurors have always liked Judge Long. And let’s face it, we need every point we can score in this trial.” He raises his eyebrows again.
    The relatives move closer to me as Harry continues, still pacing. “Besides”-he laughs-“I come with baggage, remember? Twenty years’ worth. I’m the creep they all know from TV news, the fast-talking public defender who’s always arguing some technicality, always trying to get some no-good hood off the hook.”
    Harry is a lot of things, but a fast-talking creep he’s not. He stops moving and winks at me. “You’re still known as the law-and-order lady,” he says. “They might listen to