The Runaway Jury (52 page)

Peter Brant had also succumbed to the ravages of lung cancer.

Swanson made the call, but only after being repeatedly assured that the facts were correct.

FITCH TOOK THE CALL in his office, alone, with the door locked, and he took it calmly because he was too shocked to react. He was seated at his desk with his jacket off, tie undone, shoes unlaced. He said little.

Both of Marlee’s parents had died of lung cancer.

He actually scribbled this on a yellow pad, then drew a circle around it, with lines branching off, as if he could flow-chart this news, break it down, analyze it; somehow he could make it fit with her promise to deliver a verdict.

“Are you there, Rankin?” Swanson asked after a long silence.

“Yeah,” Fitch said, then continued saying nothing for a while. The flow chart grew but went nowhere.

“Where’s the girl?” Swanson asked. He was standing in the cold outside the county courthouse in Columbia with an impossibly small phone pressed to his jaw.

“Don’t know. We’ll have to find her.” He said this with no conviction whatsoever, and Swanson knew the girl was gone.

Another long pause.

“What shall I do?” Swanson asked.

“Get back here, I guess,” Fitch said, then abruptly hung up. The numbers on his digital clock were blurred, and Fitch closed his eyes. He massaged his pounding temples, pressed his goatee hard against his chin, contemplated an eruption with the desk flying against the wall and phones ripped from sockets, but thought the better of it. A cool head was needed.

Short of burning the courthouse or tossing grenades at the jury room, there was nothing he could do to stop the deliberations. They were in there, the last twelve, with deputies by the door. Perhaps if their work was slow, and if they had to retire for another night in sequestration, then perhaps Fitch could pull a rabbit from his hat and spark a mistrial.

A bomb threat was a possibility. The jurors would be evacuated, sequestered some more, led away to some hidden place so they could continue.

The flow chart fizzled and he made lists of possibilities—outrageous acts, all of which would be dangerous, illegal, and destined for failure.

The clock was ticking.

The chosen twelve—eleven disciples and their master.

He slowly rose to his feet and took the cheap ceramic lamp with both hands. It was a lamp Konrad had earlier wanted to remove because it sat on Fitch’s desk, a place of great chaos and violence.

Konrad and Pang were loitering in the hallway, waiting for instructions. They knew something had gone terribly wrong. The lamp crashed with great force against the door. Fitch screamed. The plywood walls rattled. Another object hit and splintered; maybe it was a telephone. Fitch yelled something about “the money!” and then the desk landed loudly against a wall.

They backed away, petrified and not wanting to be near the door when it opened. Bam! Bam! Bam! It sounded like a jackhammer. Fitch was punching the plywood with his fists.

“Find the girl!” he screamed in anguish. Bam! Bam!

“Find the girl!”

Forty

A
fter a painful stretch of forced concentration, Nicholas sensed some debate was needed. He elected to go first, and briefly summarized Dr. Fricke’s report on the condition of Jacob Wood’s lungs. He passed around the autopsy photos, none of which attracted much attention. This was old territory and the audience was bored.

“Dr. Fricke’s report says that prolonged cigarette smoking causes lung cancer,” Nicholas said dutifully, as if this might surprise someone.

“I have an idea,” Rikki Coleman said. “Let’s see if we can all agree that cigarettes cause lung cancer. It’ll save us a lot of time.” She’d been waiting for a crack in the door, and seemed ready to quarrel.

“Great idea,” Lonnie said. He was by far the most hyper and frustrated of the bunch.

Nicholas shrugged his approval. He was the foreman, but he still had only one vote. The jury could do what it pleased. “Fine with me,” he said. “Does
everyone believe cigarettes cause lung cancer? Raise your hands.”

Twelve hands shot up, and a giant step was taken toward a verdict.

“Let’s go ahead and take care of addiction,” Rikki said, looking up and down the table. “Who thinks nicotine is addictive?”

Another unanimous yes.

She savored the moment and appeared on the verge of venturing onto the thin ice of liability.

“Let’s keep it unanimous, folks,” Nicholas said. “It’s crucial that we walk out of here united. If we split, then we fail.”

Most of them had already heard this little pep talk. The legal reasons behind his quest for a unanimous verdict were not clear, but they believed him nonetheless.

“Now, let’s finish these reports. Is someone ready?”

Loreen Duke’s was a glossy publication prepared by Dr. Myra Sprawling-Goode. She’d read the introduction, which declared the study to be a thorough review of advertising practices by tobacco companies, especially how said practices related to children under the age of eighteen, and she’d read the conclusion, which absolved the industry of targeting underage smokers. Most of the two hundred pages in between had gone untouched.

She summarized the summary. “Just says here they couldn’t find any evidence of tobacco companies advertising to attract kids.”

“Do you believe that?” asked Millie.

“No. I thought we’d already decided that most folks start smoking before they’re eighteen. Didn’t we take a poll in here one day?”

“We did,” Rikki answered. “And all the smokers here started when they were young teenagers.”

“And most of them quit, as I recall,” Lonnie said, with no small amount of bitterness.

“Let’s move along,” Nicholas said. “Anybody else?”

Jerry offered a lame effort at describing the tedious findings of Dr. Hilo Kilvan, the statistical genius who’d proven the increased risks of lung cancer among smokers. Jerry’s summation sparked no interest, no questions, no debate, and he left the room for a quick smoke.

Then there was silence as they continued to plow through the printed material. They came and went at will—to smoke, to stretch, to use the rest rooms. Lou Dell and Willis and Chuck guarded the door.

MRS. GLADYS CARD had once taught biology to ninth-graders. She had a grasp of science. She did a superb job of dissecting Dr. Robert Bronsky’s report on the composition of cigarette smoke—the more than four thousand compounds, the sixteen known carcinogens, the fourteen alkalis, the irritants, and all that other stuff. She used her best classroom diction and looked from face to face.

Most faces cringed as she droned on and on.

When she finished, Nicholas, still awake, thanked her warmly and stood to get more coffee.

“So what do you think about all that?” Lonnie asked. He was standing in front of the window, his back to the room, eating peanuts and holding a soft drink.

“To me, it proves cigarette smoke is pretty harmful,” she answered.

Lonnie turned around and looked at her. “Right. I
thought we’d already decided that.” He then looked at Nicholas. “I say we get on with the voting. We’ve been reading now for almost three hours, and if the Judge asks me if I’ve looked at all that stuff, I’m gonna say, ‘Hell yeah. Read every word.’ ”

“Do what you wanna do, Lonnie,” Nicholas shot back.

“All right. Let’s vote.”

“Vote on what?” Nicholas asked. The two were now standing on opposites sides of the table, with the seated jurors between them.

“Let’s see who’s standing where. I’ll go first.”

“Go. Let’s hear it.”

Lonnie took a deep breath and everyone turned to watch him.

“My position is real easy. I believe cigarettes are dangerous products. They’re addictive. They’re deadly. That’s why I leave them alone. Everybody knows this, in fact we’ve already decided it. I believe every person has a right to choose. Nobody can force you to smoke, but if you do, then you suffer the consequences. Don’t puff like hell for thirty years, then expect me to make you rich. These crazy lawsuits need to be stopped.”

His voice was loud and every word got absorbed.

“You finished?” Nicholas asked.

“Yeah.”

“Who’s next?”

“I have a question,” said Mrs. Gladys Card. “How much money does the plaintiff expect us to award? Mr. Rohr sort of left it hanging.”

“He wants two million in actual damages. The punitive is left to our discretion,” Nicholas explained.

“Then why’d he leave eight hundred million on the board?”

“Because he’d take eight hundred million,” Lonnie replied. “Are you gonna give it to him?”

“I don’t think so,” she said. “I didn’t know there was that much money in the world. Would Celeste Wood get all of it?”

“You see all those lawyers out there?” Lonnie asked sardonically. “She’ll be lucky to get anything. This trial ain’t about her or her dead husband. This trial is about a bunch of lawyers getting rich suing tobacco companies. We’re stupid if we fall for it.”

“Do you know when I started smoking?” Angel Weese asked Lonnie, who was still standing.

“No. I don’t.”

“I remember the exact day. I was thirteen, and I saw this big billboard on Decatur Street, not far from my house, had this big, lean black guy, really good-looking, with his jeans rolled up, splashing water on a beach, cigarette in one hand and a slinky black chick on his back. All smiles. All perfect teeth. Salem menthols. What great fun. I thought to myself, Now there’s the good life. I’d like to have some of that. So I went home, went to my drawer, got my money, walked down the street, and bought a pack of Salem menthols. My friends thought I was so cool, so I’ve been smoking them ever since.” She paused and glanced at Loreen Duke, then back to Lonnie. “Don’t try to tell me anyone can kick the habit. I’m addicted, okay. It ain’t that easy. I’m twenty years old, two packs a day, and if I don’t quit I won’t see fifty. And don’t tell me they don’t target kids. They target blacks, women, kids, cowboys, rednecks, they target everybody, and you know it.”

For one who’d shown no emotion in the four weeks they’d been together, the anger in Angel’s
voice was a surprise. Lonnie glared down at her, but said nothing.

Loreen came to her aid. “One of my girls, the fifteen-year-old, told me last week she’d started smoking at school because all of her friends are now smoking. These kids are too young to know about addiction, and by the time they realize, they’ll be hooked. I asked her where she gets her cigarettes. You know what she told me?”

Lonnie said nothing.

“Vending machines. There’s one next to the arcade at the mall where the kids hang out. And there’s one in the lobby of the cinema where the kids hang out. A couple of the fast-food places have machines. And you’re gonna tell me they don’t target kids. It makes me sick. I can’t wait to get home and straighten her out.”

“So what’re you gonna do when she starts drinking beer?” Jerry asked. “You gonna sue Budweiser for ten million because all the other kids are sneaking beer?”

“There’s no proof that beer is physically addictive,” Rikki responded.

“Oh, so it doesn’t kill?”

“There’s a difference.”

“Please explain it,” Jerry said. The debate now covered two of his favorite vices. Could gambling and philandering be next?

Rikki arranged her thoughts for a second, then launched into an unpleasant defense of alcohol. “Cigarettes are the only products that are deadly if used exactly as intended. Alcohol is supposed to be consumed, of course, but in reasonable amounts. And if it’s taken in moderation, then it’s not a dangerous product. Sure, people get drunk and kill
themselves in all sorts of ways, but a strong argument can be made that the product is not being used properly in those instances.”

“So if a person drinks for fifty years he’s not killing himself?”

“Not if he drinks in moderation.”

“Boy, that’s good to hear.”

“And there’s something else. Alcohol has a natural warning. You get an immediate feedback when you use the product. Not so with tobacco. It takes years of smoking before you realize the damage to your body. By then, you’re hooked and can’t quit.”

“Most people can quit,” Lonnie said from the window, without looking at Angel.

“And why do you think everyone’s trying to quit?” Rikki asked calmly. “Is it because they’re enjoying their cigarettes? Is it because they feel young and glamorous? No, they’re trying to quit to avoid lung cancer and heart disease.”

“So how are you voting?” Lonnie asked.

“I guess it’s pretty obvious,” she answered. “I started this trial with an open mind, but I’ve come to realize that the only way to hold the tobacco companies responsible is for us to do it.”

“What about you?” Lonnie asked Jerry, hoping to find a friend.

“I’m undecided right now. I think I’ll listen to everybody else.”

“And you?” he asked Sylvia Taylor-Tatum.

“I’m having a hard time understanding why we’re supposed to make this woman a multimillionaire.”

Lonnie walked around the table, looking at faces, most of which tried to avoid him. There was no doubt he was enjoying his role as a rebel leader.
“What about you, Mr. Savelle? You don’t seem to say much.”

This would be interesting. No one on the panel had a clue about what Savelle was thinking.

“I believe in choice,” he said. “Absolute choice. I deplore what these corporations do to the environment. I hate their products. But each person has the power to choose.”

“Mr. Vu?” Lonnie said.

Henry cleared his throat, pondered things for a minute, then said, “I’m still thinking.” Henry would follow Nicholas, who for the moment was incredibly quiet.

“What about you, Mr. Foreman?” Lonnie asked.

“We can finish these reports in thirty minutes. Let’s do it, then we’ll start voting.”

After the first serious skirmish, they were relieved to read for a few more minutes. The shootout was clearly not far away.

AT FIRST he felt like roaming the streets in his Suburban with José at the wheel, up and down Highway 90 to no place in particular, no chance of catching her. At least he’d be out there doing something, trying to find her, hoping maybe to stumble upon her.