“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth…”
Jane couldn’t take her eyes off the court clerk, diminutive in a navy dress and mismatched jacket, her right hand raised, palm forward, just as she’d instructed Jane to do. Jane felt the seat of the witness chair against the back of her legs, knew that in thirty seconds she’d be asked to—
“Please be seated.” The clerk gave Jane a fleeting smile. Maybe she’d recognized her? And then turned back to her own seat in front of the judge’s bench.
Jane had covered many a trial in this very courtroom, 206 of Boston Municipal. But now she was the center of attention in the raised witness box. On this side, the dark wood was scuffed and dented, damaged by the restless feet of countless fidgeting witnesses and defendants.
Judge Francesca Scapicchio looked down from her higher vantage point. The Scap, as whispers called her, was carefully lipsticked, perfectly postured, hair in a gray chignon, the fluted edges of a pale green scarf showing under her black robe. Red nail polish.
“Let’s wait one moment, Ms. Ryland,” Scapicchio said, her voice low, then rustled through some papers on her bench. A tyrannical, no-nonsense judicial veteran, The Scap had once telephoned a newspaper reporter and yelled at him for calling her “feisty.”
Jane was happy to wait. Take all the time you want, she thought. She could wait forever, if need be.
Half an hour ago, she’d shown the “SAY NO MORE” letter to ADA McCusker, who’d examined it at his desk, frowning.
“This is why I asked if your suspect’s lawyers knew it was me who’s testifying,” Jane said.
“Huh.” McCusker had turned the letter over, then the envelope. “No markings, postmarked Boston, nothing traceable. No way to know if it’s connected, Jane.”
They’d sat in silence, McCusker staring at the letter, Jane’s toe tapping the office’s thin carpeting.
“You worried about this?” he finally asked.
“No. Well, maybe. I don’t know.” How was she supposed to answer that? “I get weird mail all the time. But…”
“Okay.” McCusker put the letter back into the envelope. “Never mind then. You go home. We’ll take the guy’s confession. Santora’s cracking down on hit-and-runs, but this one’s not a biggie. We’ll go with what we’ve got, see what the judge says.”
“But you might have the wrong guy.” Jane had tried to follow his reasoning. “You’d accept his confession, knowing that?”
McCusker shrugged. “Up to the judge. I could compel you to testify, of course. Your lawyers could fight it. We could make it a big public deal. But, hey. I’m the good guy. If you feel you’re in danger, I’ll make it your call.”
He stood, handed her the letter.
She didn’t take it. She stood, too, looking him eye to eye. “You’d let an innocent person be convicted?”
“If you don’t testify, we got nothin’.” McCusker put the letter on his desk. “Guy confessed. Why would he do that? Maybe you’re wrong.”
“I’m not wrong.”
“Your call,” McCusker said.
Now, in the witness box, she tried reassure herself. McCusker’s “your call” was an impossible decision, but she couldn’t let an innocent person be convicted. And McCusker was right. Why would he confess?
But she had a more immediate dilemma: Soon she’d be asked to look at each person in the courtroom and, maybe, point out someone. A guilty person. Her hands clenched in her lap, the bottom of one thumb rubbing against the top of the other, her feet planted flat like she was a kid called to the principal’s office. An ancient air conditioner struggled in a casement window, once-blue velvet curtains optimistically drawn aside, giving the relic some room to combat Boston’s relentless August.
“All you have to do is tell the truth,” the news director had assured her. “And show that letter to the DA. You’ll be fine.”
She’d be fine? As if they could know. ADA McCusker was now seated at one of the lawyers’ tables, turning pages in a loose-leaf notebook.
She stared at her hands again, couldn’t seem to unclench them. How many witnesses had she watched in this very box? How many personal Rubicons had been crossed from this very spot, how many bridges burned, how many lives forever changed? Now, with the rows of audience members in front of her, the gravity of her words to come weighed heavy. She might be about to accuse someone of a crime.
Strange, though. As a reporter she did that all the time. She did her research, produced her investigations, put her story in the paper or on TV. Naming names. She didn’t need to swear to tell the truth for television—she simply did it. Why did this feel so different?
Also strange, now that she thought about it, telling the truth was exactly what she was asking Tosca to do. She’d pressured the young woman a bit, she had to admit, and was thrilled when Tosca had agreed to be interviewed tomorrow.
Jane hadn’t told her anything that wasn’t true, of course. Tosca’s disclosures could certainly make a big difference, would change lives and reveal some frightening realities of college life.
But now, as the one who had to answer questions instead of asking them, Jane felt a twinge of regret for her manipulation. You’ll be fine—she’d actually said those words to Tosca.
Turnabout was fair play, she guessed. Still, with the lawyers waiting at their identical tables, court officers guarding the doors, the American and Massachusetts flags side by side and the darkly oil-painted portraits of John Jay and James Madison staring at her, it felt like—
“Miss Ryland?” Judge Scapicchio asked, her voice low but now amplified by the courtroom sound system. “Are you ready?”
ISABEL RUSSO
Who would be calling her? Isabel, startled by the ringing phone, lost a pink flip-flop as she scrambled back through the window, one foot poking through first, the other keeping her balanced on the ribbed metal floor of the balcony. She’d left her lunch, half a tuna sandwich on a paper plate, on the table outside, next to the flapped-open book she was reading, a biography of Maria Callas. The phone rang again. Her landline. That’s what made her skin crawl.
No one ever used this phone, an old-fashioned brick-red wall phone left over from the tenant before. Her mother had insisted she keep the hardwired system. “In case of emergency, for heaven’s sake, Isabella!” Had something happened to her mother?
She trotted the two steps to the wall, her mind racing, every possibility dire. Maybe it was some Adams Bay thing—a change, or demand, or calamity. The school’s admin office had this number, and it was the one in the student handbook, not that any student ever called her. No student called anyone, for that matter. They were all about texting. What if the caller was Edward Tarrant, telling her—her brain clamped down at the thought, and her fingers touched the red plastic.
“Hello?” Her kitchen reeked of tuna fish, disgusting, suddenly, and she was off balance in one flip-flop and one bare foot. “Hello?”
No one on the other end. Only a crackling, staticky sputter, then a muffled murmur of “hold music,” as if she had called someone and they’d put her on hold. She frowned, studying the flat red receiver. Then smiled, rolled her eyes at her own ridiculousness.
The one thing her paranoid self hadn’t considered. The one thing that made sense. Wrong number. Or sales pitch. Didn’t matter. Someone she didn’t care about.
She hung up, embracing the sound of the handset settling into place. She’d clean up the tuna fish stuff—not really so disgusting—go back outside, and live inside her book. It was for opera history class, happily, so she was actually studying. She was up to the part about—
But as she closed the dishwasher door, the phone rang again. Maybe a salesperson? And since she’d answered the phone the first time, now they knew they’d reached someone. That meant there’d be a human on the other end.
She grabbed the receiver, ready to order them to leave her alone. She didn’t want to buy anything. Unless they were offering freedom. In which case she’d pay anything.
“Hello?” The music, volume up a little louder this time, was all she heard. So insane. As if she had nothing else to do but answer the phone. “Hey,” she said, hearing her annoyance over the muted music, “you have the wrong number. Okay? Don’t call anymore.”
She slammed the phone back into place. At least it wasn’t her mother, or anything about her mother. And it wasn’t Tarrant, or anyone from Adams Bay.
“Geez,” she said out loud. The sound in the empty kitchen made her think about how long it had been since she’d had a real conversation. With a real person, face–to-face. The Gormay delivery guy didn’t count, even though she had to admit she looked forward, in a way, to his arrival. It wasn’t always the same person, but often it was. The young man with the red hair and the kind of seen-it-all face. He knew her only as “Isabel with the grilled chicken or lasagna.” But she knew his whole name, Grady McWhirter Houlihan.
She’d gotten up the courage to ask his name the night he forgot her salad dressing. She’d told him it was okay, but he’d made a special trip back to bring it to her. And after that, they’d chatted each time, about music, and the weather, nothing big, just … being themselves. She’d even invited him in, once, her insides fluttering. He’d stayed at the door, seemed to recognize, somehow, how skittish she was. Isabel and Grady, she thought. But there would never again be a man in her life. Never, ever, ever.
“Are you kidding me?” She said it out loud as the phone rang again, almost as if it were making fun of her.
“Good luck with that,” she told it. She stood, hands on hips, staring it down. Waited one ring, then two, then three. She had the power, she realized. Just don’t answer. Take that, whoever.
The ringing stopped, the message system taking over. Fish swam in a frantic circle, acting like the phone upset him, too. “Could that be?” she wondered aloud. “Do fish think?” She grimaced, embarrassed by her thoughts, and by her talking to herself out loud. Clearly she was losing it.
Maybe she really was. What if? She sat in her lone kitchen chair, thinking about solitude, hearing the rush of the Kenmore Square traffic through her open window, the hum of the fridge and the drone of her brain. She was … This was …
A tear laced down her cheek. She felt it before she even knew she was crying. She feared the world, and feared the time, and feared whatever would happen to her next. She talked to a fish, for Lordy’s sake. She was Isabel, talented and even pretty, and now, she was like a lost child, defeated by one adversity. One huge adversity, yes, but others had survived, hadn’t they? She wished she hadn’t promised to stay silent, but Tarrant had assured her silence was the prudent thing. Prudent.
Well, she was—she stood, whisked away another tear with a determined palm—finished with prudent. She’d handle her own life, she’d—she felt her heart beating so hard she had to touch one hand to the kitchen table to steady herself. Yes. She’d do it, she’d go out out out—out—and be herself again. For a start, she’d call Professor Tully, and actually attend class. In person! She’d call Professor Morgan, too, who’d complimented her and encouraged her.
And she’d … ha. She’d listen to the message, because what if it really was something important or life-changing? She smiled, imagining. Say it was Gormay calling. She strutted to the phone, imagining the scene. It would be Grady from Gormay, and he’d say, Oh, I was just inquiring about your order. And, he’d say, Wondering if you’d like me to bring it a little earlier? Or later?
Oh, she’d laugh and toss her head. What a lovely idea. Can you bring enough for two?
She tapped her message-retrieval code into the keys, EGBDF like the scales, and heard the message thing whir. It was a salesperson, no doubt, so she’d simply delete it. And, now she thought about it, maybe see what she could do about her hair. Jane and her producer, Fiona something, might be coming. Even though she wasn’t going on camera, she should look nice. For when she finally told her story and saved her own life. Yes, Isabel, Grady would say. You’re …
She paused her invented dialogue mid-scene to listen to the message.
Music. The same caller. She started to hang up, annoyed but relieved it wasn’t Mom or Adams Bay, then stopped, the receiver held midway between her ear and the wall. Music, recognizable now.
She clamped the phone back to her ear, eyes screwed shut, blanking out everything but the sounds from the phone, coming from somewhere, from someone, meant only for her.
A flush washed across her face, then a chill, her knees gone unreliable. She tapped the phone keys, 2-2, to replay the message from the beginning. And then again. She steeled herself each time, disbelieving, but needing to hear the whole message. The crazed scherzo of strings, then a swelling of orchestra, the opening measures of …
“O Scarpia, Avanti a Dio!” She heard it, perfectly, clearly, almost as if someone were raising the volume as the climax of the opera continued. So intense, so fiery, lasting less than a minute, but Isabel felt her lips mouth the words along with Anna Moffo—she’d recognize the lyric soprano’s voice anywhere. Moffo as Tosca, the doomed and deceived lover of Cavaradossi, the victim of the evil Scarpia. “O Scarpia,” the line Tosca wails in anguish, hitting that piercing high C before she flings herself to her death over the parapet of the Castel Sant’Angelo. “We will meet again before God.”
And then the music stopped.
Tosca. Who knew she was Tosca? And why would they call to torment her?
Isabel stood in her kitchen, alone alone alone, one foot in a flip-flop, one foot bare, the summer breeze teasing her white curtains and twisting her crystal in the open balcony window as she clutched the now-silent phone.