The Trial of Callista Blake

re competent, honest, not deliberately wasting time. Hunter himself was not really unduly slow at this business of hammering home what was already clear and established: Callista had be

were solemnly finished with that apparent futility. It had never occu

with their casts and photographs of the Volkswagen's tire marks on the shoulder of Walton Road. They liked things complete, well wrapped. But it couldn't matter, for in her statement to District Attorney Lamson Callista had adm

a miscarriage in secret like a wounded animal and have done with it. To Edith, on the first occasion when with Warner's help Edith had broken through the barriers and won a visit with Callista in the detention cell, Callista had said tersely, in haste to change the subject: "The brambles were the worst of it." And that visit was n

ht-eyed was down there swearing to tell t

ame and occu

n Duke Street, uptown-you know, repairs, gas, body work

t, and it paid off-oh-yes, he'd been watching the time that evening because he had to pick up his wife after a church supper; got talking with that (completely satisfied) Emmetville client, and besides, the car he'd taken in exchange was kind of a sad heap that wouldn't safely do anything over forty, and you know how women are if you keep them waiting, not that she-yes, he had passed the junction of Summer Avenue and Walton Road between 9:10 and 9:15, no later. He had seen a maroon Volkswa

astonished look in

ner asked: "You do

etty tricky machinery. Still, the

ior fi

ostly factory. Of

begin snarling: "Wh

e sure Mr. Clipp hadn't left out

face of Judge Terence Mann. But foreman Peter Anson, she saw, was not amused, nor Hoag, nor Francis Fielding. Bus

icense JD1081, on Walton Road two miles beyond the city line, at 8:34 P.M., Sunday, August 16th. The driver was a young woman who gave her

ng fast, excee

ther slow. J

command of herself w

sk if she'd been

atisfactory to you

s, sir,

ny smell of alcoh

rgio fidgeted. "Jus

vation, she wasn't what you'

poke coherently, understood what

r appearance sugges

, and I thought her eyes looked very slightly inflamed. Enough to suggest she might be-oh, perhaps coming down

remembered and could not say. Warner's dark eyes had narrowed to cold watchfulness, and Judge Mann's pencil was still. There wasn't any hearsay rule in Mr. Lamson's office. Bu

ogical) to make no essential difference. For there was no defense, he said, except a reasonable doubt as to criminal intent. "Reasonable doubt!" he said, and set down his glass because his fat hand was shaking. "You see it, Red? T.J. can say that criminal intent and preme

it, don't we? She h

Old Man had said: "Red, do you unders

uite understood

e her a tick

about a mile to go. I told her she'd better head straight for home, an

ed into the house for a quick check on burglars and a little drink? Oh, probably not. Ann had carried an obvious flag of con

car, as far as the h

at the driveway, and since she

note th

sir:

War

uesti

he legend that the law court is a place devoted to search for truth? Answer, lawyers of course. But not counsel for the defense, Red. W

flatly: "The

t it out of a hypothesis, Red-not abstract truth, but working hypothesis. I say a human being once born has a right to live, if the word 'right' is going t

n to play with as a notion; if it worked, we'd run screaming. "A.B. Columbia, 1930, M.D. from College of Physicians and Surgeons." And maybe soon, another century or so, there'll be no such thing as privacy on earth except in the dark center of a few minds not quite overwhelmed. The desert shall blossom like the rose: distilled sea wate

hed as one often finds them in drowning cases. The conjunctivae were congested. Cutis anserina-gooseflesh-was pronounced on the thighs and upper arms. Gooseflesh," said Dr. Devens politely and patiently to the jury, "is frequently evident after death by drowning, if the water is far enough below body temperature, as it ordinarily is even in the tropics. To sum up that p

eing thrown into the water, and then perished by drowning, would you expect to find the body, after twelve to thirte

ers, and she was leaning to Cecil Warner, whispering. She looked, Edith thought, more disgusted tha

inconsistent. Of course, Mr. Hunter, I looked for any sign of h

ead injury, perhaps from a padded thing li

hink you'd find post-mortem evide

blow that mer

I'm not too versed in the lore of sandbags. But I think that a blow heavy enough to st

ok for such

d

by the way, when there's conv

suppose you want those details. Head, neck vertebrae, all perfectly normal, uninjured. In fact the one and only injury on the entire body surface was a trifling abrasion on the right anklebone, which could have been caused in any number of ways-a fall, or the anklebone scraping against something: impos

Go on,

a possibility Mrs. Doherty had drunk poison, thought to be aconitine. I therefore had this in mind before beginning the examination, and I consulted by telephone with the toxicologist Dr. Walter Ginsberg, and prepared the organs, blood samples and so on, that he told me he would need for his study. The body weight was one hundred and ten pounds, slightly undernourished. There was an appendectomy scar, old; no other scars, no evidence of chronic illness or disor

tic?-congestion

pear in many ot

ome kinds of

Mr. Hu

poisoning b

es

ploy the Ge

m chloride than the blood on the right. If that difference had been pronounced, you could call it fair

a positive findin

occur from pharyngeal shock-a spasmodic throat contraction that causes asphyxia before much water is

se for evidence of

d be working on it, I simply bore it in mind, prepared what he needed, and kept my eyes open. I can say under oath that I found nothing inconsistent with aconite po

escription of the effects of aconit

usea, burning sensation in stomach and throat." Edith moved in her seat, and smiled, and tried to call in silence: I'm here. But Callista's eyes, searching, immense, drowned, passed over her. "A slow, irregular, weak pulse is characteristic, with rapid shallow breathing, muscular weakness, a general collapse. Nausea and vomiting are usual; sometimes there are convulsions. The poison depresses the medullary centers of the brain

she could not help it. Knowing where he was seated, she was forced to turn until a sidelong look gave her the image of him, completing at that instant the

nimum lethal do

e than six milligrams would likely finish anyone, unless there was immediate medica

istakable words: "Go away!" There would be no sound, Edith thought, even for Cecil War

readily solub

Mr. Hu

He can't hear you. H

ligrams of the poison, Dr. Devens, he could s

of Dr. Devens, the words indistinguishable, blotted out by his: "Certainly, sir, the patient could probably be saved. Stomach pump. Tannic

vens. Cross examin

rgently quick-spoken. "Your Honor, in view of my clie

ista's voice, not loud, not really a cry, was surely hea

stily: "The Court stands adjo

tables, and the jolly excite