The Trial, page 20
part #91 of The Executioner Series
"Fine. So let's enforce the laws as written and invoke their penalties against the violators. If you start today, you should be finished with your present caseload in a hundred years or so."
"You have a better system?"
Bolan nodded gravely. "In selected cases, yes."
"Elimination?"
"Surgical removal of malignancies."
"How glib. But why not call it by its rightful name? You're advocating murder, sir."
"I'm advocating self-defense," he said. "Survival of the fittest."
"Social Darwinism?"
"Social sanity. The predators have had their way for too long. No civilized society can last indefinitely under siege."
"And the alternative?"
"Turn on your television, Counselor. Pick up a paper or a magazine. You may not have to look beyond the local news."
"You have a sense of mission then?"
"A sense of duty. Counselor. I'm no evangelist."
"A duty to eliminate the savages? The predators? The pushers and the murderers?"
She watched him closely, but the soldier made no effort to respond. She played her ace.
"The prostitutes?"
She was expecting a reaction from the witness, even an explosion as she pierced his mask of sanity, but she was not expecting laughter. Bolan shook his head, amused that she would try to trip him up so obviously, smiling at her with an understanding that was tinged with something else.
A sadness.
"No sale. You're talking victims now, and they have problems of their own."
"So, you're selective in your killing then?"
"I try to be."
"And Alma Jennings wasn't one of Bolan's chosen few?"
"She wasn't even close."
There was a sour taste in Amy's mouth, as if she might have bitten into something rotten, and she knew that it was time to end the game.
"No further questions at this time," she told the court.
Dan Fleming was already circling the table, moving in on redirect, but Amy Stone was only listening with half her mind. She should have been elated at the way in which her questioning had opened Bolan's mind, his twisted sense of justice to the court. And yet...
Why was she sympathizing with the man, for heaven's sake?
Why was she seeking ways to mitigate what he had done, the slaughter he had moments earlier confessed?
How could she question all the evidence compiled against him here, the crystal clarity of guilt as charged?
Goddamn it, how?
Too easily, it seemed.
His testimony had been startling, inflammatory, but his words had carried the essential ring of truth. There had been something in his manner, in his voice, that had begun to work on her emotions from the moment he had taken the stand.
But if the man was innocent...
She closed her mind to the alternatives, the implications. She could not afford to travel any farther on the road of sterile speculation. Danger lay that way, and loss of faith in everything she had been educated to revere.
But she was starting to believe him.
And it was still her job to see him locked away.
A throbbing headache settled in behind her eyes, and Amy Stone endeavored to ignore it, concentrating on the testimony under way. She had a job to do, a case to win, and that was all that mattered now.
The soldier had his duty, as he saw it, and the lady prosecutor had her own. She was as dedicated in her own way as the witness on the stand, and she could not turn back until her job was done.
She pushed the soldier's evident sincerity away and concentrated on the task of sending him to prison for the rest of what would almost surely be a brief and violent life.
25
"To reiterate your testimony, Mr. Bolan, you were not involved in Alma Jennings's death?"
"No, sir"
"In any way?"
"That's right."
The Executioner was tired of playing Twenty Questions, but he knew that Fleming had a job to do, and he admired the counselor's tenacity. It was a wasted effort — Fleming had to know that much by now — but he refused to let it go. He was a fighter, and Mack Bolan felt a surge of warm affection for the guy who didn't seem to know that he was beaten by the odds before he got to court.
The prosecution had some telling points against him now, but it had been a gamble going in. By introducing other jurisdictions, other crimes, they had permitted Amy Stone to range at will across the record, granting her a sort of legalistic free-fire zone. Dan Fleming had opposed the move, but Bolan was implacable. If nothing else, he meant to find a forum in the courtroom, let himself be heard.
"You still believe the victim was deliberately planted in your room to frame you on a murder charge?"
"I do."
"And thereby make you something of a sitting target in the county jail?"
"Yes, sir."
"The weapons confiscated from your room, your rental car..."
"Were mine," the soldier finished for him, reaffirming what would have been pointless to deny.
"But none of them were used to murder Alma Jennings, were they?"
"No."
"And as for any other charges, rising out of other jurisdictions, other incidents... they are completely unrelated to the matter now before this court?"
"They are."
"And when you chose this course of action..."
Bolan interrupted him. "I didn't choose this war," he said. "The war chose me."
Dan Fleming eyed him for a silent heartbeat, then finally nodded, deciding to go along with his client's instinct.
"Please elaborate."
The warrior hesitated briefly, and he scanned the gallery before he spoke.
"In Nam you came to realize the enemy was everywhere," he said. "The black pajamas, coolie hats... they didn't mean a thing. You couldn't tell the predators and prey apart by anything they wore, or anything they told you to your face. In a guerrilla war you recognize the opposition when they try to kill you, man or woman, night or day."
He paused, aware of eyes trying to penetrate his heart and mind to find the soul within. No matter. Every man or woman in the court would find precisely what he or she was looking for, and none of them would be precisely right... or wrong.
The soldier forged ahead, unmindful of the prying eyes.
"When I was briefed about my family, I realized the war was not confined to Vietnam. We had our own domestic breed of cannibals, and they were no damned different than the Vietcong. They prey upon their own, contaminate the lives of everyone they touch, and they can never get enough."
Dan Fleming frowned over the question he could not avoid.
"You sought revenge for what had happened to your family?"
"At first," the Executioner conceded. "But it didn't take me long to realize that I was flying blind. The injury to me was just an echo of the crimes against a thousand other families in any given year, and you can take that back a century or more in the United States alone. How many million victims in that time? How many more tomorrow?'*
Fleming shook his head, appearing honestly bewildered now.
"You had to realize that victory would be... impossible?"
The soldier smiled.
"Sometimes it's victory enough to stand and fight, to draw the line. It's stylish now to shrug and walk away from trouble, not to get involved. The cannibals encourage that. It gives them easy pickings. But the truth is, any man can make a difference, any woman with the guts to make a stand. Collect a few of them together, and you've damn near got the game sewed up."
"Except that you have been compelled to fight primarily alone against what must be seen as overwhelming odds."
Bolan shook his head. "Correction, Counselor. I haven't been compelled to fight at all. The war was waiting for me when I got back home from Nam. I fight because I can. Because the only clear alternative is unacceptable."
"That being?"
"Unconditional surrender to the savages."
"You've led a lonely life."
"It has its compensations."
Yeah. Like Val Querente, Toby Ranger, other brief and shining beacons on the shadow trail of Death. Like April Rose, damn right.
And like the young-old man who watched him from the gallery of journalists.
Like brother Johnny.
* * *
In his mind Johnny Bolan could recall a world of antiseptic white, where nurses whispered through the corridor on orthopedic treads, their voices faint and faraway. He could remember floor-to-ceiling curtains drawn around his bed, the rubber tubing with its needle planted in his arm.
And he could vividly remember pain.
The sedatives could only handle part of it, the physical extension of his anguish. They did nothing to erase the grief, the agonizing memories that haunted every waking moment and pursued him down the endless tunnel of his dreams.
His father's face, distorted through the haze of shock, still bellowing in anger from beyond the grave.
His mother, sobbing bitterly, until her sobs became one rising, swiftly strangled scream.
His sister, face uplifted to receive the bullet, almost smiling through her tears.
The young man expected — prayed — to die in the initial hours, drifting in and out of his delirium, the gunshot echoes ringing in his ears. If he could join them on the other side, his pain might finally recede. He might be whole again.
But he was doomed to live, and when his older brother came to visit in the semiprivate room provided by his father's union benefits, the haze dissipated, giving way to grim reality. That same reality was written on his brother's face. What did his brother see, what did he now suspect, to etch those lines around his mouth and eyes?
"What happened, Johnny?"
Simple, to the point. The way his brother Mack had always been.
Aware that officers considered it a "routine" murder-suicide, the young man took no steps to disabuse them. But he owed his brother more than that. He owed his brother truth, and he delivered it upon demand.
He could recall the cheap motel — so reminiscent of the Blue Oasis — with a crystal clarity transcending time. He would have recognized the laughing, red-faced customer in any crowd, the greasy hair and braying voice emblazoned on his youthful memory like acid etchings on a plate of steel. There were fantasies across the years of tracking down that face, of smashing it beyond repair... but time and circumstance always intervened.
And Johnny Bolan told his brother everything. The cheap motel, the laughing customer, and Cindy's stunned expression when he had barged in to find her nude and sobbing on the narrow, rumpled bed. He had bullied and coaxed the story out of her, then later had wished that something — anything — had stopped him short of bursting through that door. But it had been his fate to hear and understand.
And he spelled it out for Mack in halting phrases, speaking through his tears, avoiding contact with his brother's eyes. He told about the cheap motel, the laughing customer... and sister Cindy's brave attempt to save her dad by selling her body, her soul.
And there had been no respite from that day on.
Until this afternoon.
The young man had heard his brother speak of "turkeys," and he felt his stomach twisting at the thought of Sandy Darlow, of her one eye pleading with him, searching for the sweet release of death. The courtroom seemed to spin for just an instant, but he gripped the arms of his chair and clenched his teeth against the howling darkness.
No.
There was no respite, even now.
Whatever happened in the court, whatever verdict issued from the judge's chambers, it would bring no end to Bolan's war. And if his brother was incarcerated, executed, it would still be the Bolan war.
His brother's debt would be passed on, and with it the sense of duty, grim and inescapable, which set their feet along the path of everlasting war. While life remained, so long as there were savages at large, the struggle would continue.
The young man owed it to his older brother, to his parents, to the sister who had sacrificed her youth, her self-esteem, to look for answers on her own.
Whichever way it went this afternoon, he would be carrying the fire — and proudly — until they cut him down.
It was his destiny.
It was the only thing he had to call his own.
And it was all that he would ever need.
* * *
"Did you say compensations?"
"Yes."
"I wonder if you might explain?"
The soldier took his time. "It's difficult to itemize for a civilian, but the combat veterans and law-enforcement officers may understand. A feeling, mostly... when you know you've done the best you can to put a savage down and keep him there, when someone with their soul in hock to cannibals can catch a glimpse of daylight for a change."
"You draw some satisfaction from the acts of violence then?"
Dan Fleming looked concerned, as if he feared he had lost control, the testimony slipping through his fingers.
Bolan shook his head.
"The killing doesn't do it," he responded. "It's the end result."
"Ends justify the means?"
"You've got it backward, Counselor. Your methods sanctify the ends."
The lawyer looked confused.
"It isn't difficult to call for peace," Bolan continued. "You can achieve it overnight, providing that you're willing to surrender everything — your principles, your liberty, your life. I guarantee that any cannibal can be appeased, if you agree to meet his price without complaint."
The room was deathly silent, just as it had been when his counsel had first risen for redirect. Bolan had the floor, and Fleming gave him room to run.
"Remember Tehran. Remember Munich — either time — and realize that savages do not know how to deal with compromise. They understand triumph or defeat, but there is nothing in between. Hold out a hand in friendship, and they'll take your arm, your shoulder, everything."
Dan Fleming found his voice. "You advocate a right to kill?"
"I recognize a positive responsibility to kill in the prevention of atrocities. Humanity demands a violent intervention when there are no visible alternatives."
"But in today's society..."
"The system works on petty crimes — or most of them at any rate. It breaks down in your higher income brackets, though... your men behind the scenes, who pull the strings and reap the umpteen-figure profits. Mafiosi, major pimps, the big-league dealers, corporate cannibals. They know the loopholes going in, and if they can't escape conviction, you can bet your life that most of them escape hard time. Assuming that they draw a year or two in some suburban country club, they name a second-in-command, or run their operations from their dormitories.' It's an old, familiar story, Counselor."
"But the alternative..."
"Is a selective removal of the savages before they have a chance to eat their fill. A healthy body can't survive with tumors clotting every vital organ. And a civilized society cannot exist with savages in charge."
Dan Fleming frowned. "I think I speak for many of us here in saying that your answer to the problem is... well, rather frightening."
The soldier nodded, understanding.
"It's a scary world," he said. "But hiding from the predators and wishing them away won't make it any better. You don't invite a mad dog in to dinner, and you can't coexist with cannibals ... unless you want to wind up in the pot."
"If you could do it all again..."
Dan Fleming never got it out.
"No changes," Bolan told him curtly, shutting out familiar faces and the remembrance of ancient screams. "I wouldn't change a goddamned thing."
"No further questions at this time."
The gavel sounded in his ear, and it was done.
Almost.
26
Judge Price hung up the phone and rocked back in his swivel chair. He was troubled by the evidence against Mack Bolan, as impressive as it seemed, and by the man's dismissal of that evidence as part-and-parcel of a frame. It was unthinkable, of course, that anyone in the McLary County sheriff's office would deliberately frame a suspect on a murder charge, with all that it implied, but then again...
Price had listened closely while Dan Fleming had picked at Musgrove on the stand. The judge had been forced to interrupt the questioning, to reprimand the young defense attorney — and he should have put the questions and Musgrove's halting answers out of mind. How many times had Price instructed jurors to ignore a piece of evidence, a snatch of testimony or a leading question? Too many.
But you never really disregarded anything.
And something in the lawman's eyes, after Fleming had raised the Houston issue, had implanted nagging seeds of doubt in Price's mind.
And he had placed a call to Houston, to a colleague in the system there.
Now it was the answer that was preying on his mind.
Hank Musgrove had, indeed, once served with Houston's finest, working for the most part in the barrio. A year in uniform. Hank Musgrove had volunteered to work the burglary division — sometimes called the Shotgun Squad because its members, armed with riot guns, preferred to lie in wait for suspects, shooting first and asking questions later. In six months with the squad, Musgrove had used his shotgun seven times and had sent five suspects to the mortuary. There had been two more killings while Musgrove was assigned to traffic duty, and his uniformed superiors had been undismayed to hear that Mexican-Americans preferred to reach for nonexistent weapons in the face of an impending traffic fine.
It had been Julio Martinez, though, who had finally brought the curtain down. The youth had never seen Hank Musgrove, had never heard his name, before the summer afternoon when he was stopped for speeding, with a girlfriend in the car, just five short blocks from home. According to an affidavit — signed left-handed, while his right was in a cast — the officer had been abusive from the start, insulting Julio and making lewd suggestions to the girl. There was a smell of liquor on his breath, a too-familiar angry scowl upon his face, and Julio had been inclined to take the ticket.
Until Hank Musgrove had touched the girl.
