Why Do Birds

CHAPTER 40

Now, Mr. Stone," said Meredith, playing devil's advocate, "what was going on in the world in April, nineteen thirty-one?"

"There was some kind of disarmament conference m

Europe. Jimmy Walker was in trouble."

''Jimmy Walker was-?"

"Mayor of New York."

"And he was in what kind of trouble?"

"Corruption. They said he was on the take."

"Does 'on the take' mean that he was accepting bribes?"

"Correct."

"What nations took part in the disarmament conference, if you know?"

"Uh, England, Germany and France, I think. Maybe some others."

"What was the last moving picture you saw in nineteen thirty-one?"

"Wheeler and Woolsey, in Coco-Nuts. "

"Mr. Stone, who was the mayor of Harrisburg in nineteen thirty-one?"

"George A. Hoverter."

"And the governor of Pennsylvania?"

"Gifford Pinchot."

"What was your last home address in Harrisburg?"

"One ninety-one Elm Street."

"And the name of your last employer?"

''Jack Wintergarden. He owned a speakeasy down on Tenth Avenue."

"What was the name of the speakeasy?"

"It didn't have one. They just called it Jack's Place."

"Mr. Stone, you contend that you were always cleanshaven, is that correct?"

"Well, sometimes I let it go for a day or two."

"But you never grew a beard?"

"No."

"What brand of shaving cream did you use?"

"I used soap."

"What kind of razor?"

"Gillette."

"Where did you buy the suit you were wearing?"

"I got it from Monkey Ward. "

"Mr. Stone, how can you prove to us that you are not Howard Filer?"

"Look, I remember being on the spaceship. I remember what it was like growing up in Harrisburg. I don't remember this Howard Filer. Okay, if you want to say maybe I've forgotten all about that and remembered this other stuff because I'm crazy, okay, how can I say that isn't true? But how do any of you know that what you remember is true?"

"Now, Ed, this is the part of the procedure that we call 'discovery.' It's where each side shows the other side what evidence they've got and what witnesses they'll put on the stand. So it's almost like a trial, except there's no judge and no jury. "

"I never heard of that. "

"No, because you never see it in holos, but this is the way we always do it. And look at it this way, it's good for us to have this procedure, because if they score any points against you, we'll fix that and make sure it doesn't happen at the real trial. Okay?"

"I guess."

Mrs. Filer was wearing a modest blue suit with a Peter Pan collar, and a little pillbox hat. "That's the way they'll dress her for the trial," Meredith said. "Smart."

In the halo, he was saying, "Now, Mrs. Filer, when your husband left you, it caused you great distress, didn't it?"

"Yes." Her eyes reddened; she put a tissue to her nose.

"I'm sure we can all understand that. And did you make any effort to find your husband?"

"I asked all his friends."

"Anything more?"

"What do you mean, hire a detective? I didn't have any money.''

"I understand. And of course you got a job, and raised your two children without any help."

"Yes, I did."

"For eleven years."

"Yes."

"Mrs. Filer, when did Ed Stone first become a national figure, if you know?"

"I don't know. "

"It was in two thousand and two, wasn't it?"

"Mr. Meredith," Slattery said, " you're trying to lead and coerce the witness."

"Off the record," said Meredith. The halo went dark, then lighted again.

"Mrs. Filer, it was in two thousand and two that Ed Stone became a well-known figure, wasn't it?"

"If you say so."

"And that was the year after your husband disappeared?"

"If you say so."

"Well, Mrs. Filer, was it or wasn't it? In what year did your husband disappear?"

"Twenty oh one. I told you that."

"And twenty oh one was the year before twenty oh two, wasn't it?"

"One moment." Slattery hitched himself nearer and spoke into his client's ear. "You may resume."

"Yes," said Mrs. Filer.

"That's good. Now, Mrs. Filer, from twenty oh one to the time you filed this lawsuit, how many times would you estimate you saw Ed Stone on halo, or saw his picture in magazines?''

"Calls for a conclusion, Mr. Meredith."

"Noted. Please answer, Mrs. Filer."

"I don't know."

"Well, was it more than a hundred times? Was it more than fifty?"

"She said she didn't know, Mr. Meredith. This is harassment."

"Off the record." The holo went blank, lighted again.

"What's that for?" Stone asked.

"We can yell at each other off the record," said Meredith. "It's part of the game. Slattery is a decent man, in fact, but this is the role he has to play."

In the halo, his voice was saying, "Well, Mrs. Filer, you do recall that you saw Ed Stone on the news a certain number of times during those ten years, isn't that so?"

"I suppose so."

"That number of times wasn't zero, was it?"

"No."

"And yet you waited for ten years before you filed this suit, Mrs. Filer. Why was that?"

"I didn't know it was him."

"You didn't know it was him. And you don't know it's him now, do you?"

"Yes, I do."

"And how do you know?"

"Because I've seen a picture of him with a beard."

"Where and when did you see that picture, Mrs. Filer?"

"In my house, last year. "

"And who showed you that picture, Mrs. Filer?"

"Nobody. I used a computer program to put a beard on him."

"And nobody showed you that picture, Mrs. Filer?"

"No."

"Mrs. Filer, do you know what is meant by the word perjury?"

"Yes."

"Tell me what it is, if you would."

"Not telling the truth."

"And you took an oath to tell the truth, didn't you, Mrs. Filer?"

"Yes."

Meredith stopped the machine and tapped a key. "That's about what we expected," he said. "She's not a good witness, she's obviously covering up something, and I think the jury will sense that. But the other witnesses will be harder to shake." He started the machine again. "This is Albert Nims, a plumbing contractor. Filer was his employee, or rather had been."

Slattery was saying, "Mr. Nims, I show you a computer-enhanced picture and I ask you to identify it."

"No groundwork, Mr. Slattery. "

"Mr. Meredith, as you well know, I can show you groundwork. Do you want to be here over the weekend? I can oblige you."

"Off the record."

Meredith sighed. "Well, I can shorten this." He touched a key. In the halo, Nims said, "That's him."

"No doubt about it?"

"No doubt about it."

The halo flickered. "This is Claudia Westcott, the former proprietor of a grocery where Filer cashed a bad check before he disappeared."

"That's him."

"No doubt about it?"

"No doubt about it."

"This is crazy, " Stone said. "I never saw those people."

"I know, but they've got thirteen more. They were thorough. They tracked down every living person who knew Filer, and showed them all the same doctored picture. And that's going to have a devastating effect on the jury. "

"Can they get away with that-using a phony picture?"

"In fact, I can probably object to it, but it's likely that the judge will then order you to grow a beard. Are you ready to take the chance that your own beard will look about the same as the one in the enhanced photo?"

Stone said, "What about that list I gave you-all those kids I used to know in school? Some of them must be alive."

"We've tried to trace every name on that list. We did find a daughter of George Smith-"

"Yeah, I remember George."

"-but she doesn't remember her father ever talking about you, and, you know, why would she? She's an old woman, in her eighties. To find somebody you knew still alive-well, it could happen, but it just isn't likely. "

''I'm Gerald Shakespeare, and this is My Turn. It seems clear now that this whole fantastic story of Ed Stone's has been the invention of a sick mind. There aren't any aliens, and they aren't going to come and take us to another planet. But four billion people have already gone into that enormous cube, and we don't know any way to get them out. Effectively, they are dead. This is the most horrendous crime ever perpetrated on this planet. Not only has this one man murdered four billion people, but in order to satisfy his neurotic fantasies about overpopulation, he has destroyed Western civilization. We now have no hope of regaining our former level of technology for many years, if ever. We are being driven back on a pre-nineteen-forty way of living. Perhaps we will slide farther back than that, to a Colonial way of existence. And there is nothing to be done about it now. The only thing we can do is arrest this man and try him for mass murder and execute him in the most painful way the law allows, and even that won't be enough."

Meredith said, "If this case goes to trial and we lose, we can appeal the verdict all the way to the Supreme Court, and that might delay it long enough to make it moot, but now they're going to bring criminal charges, and once those charges are filed, Ed will be arrested and held without bail. I hate to say this, but we've got to get him out of the country. "

"Won't that look like an admission of guilt?"

"Yes, it will, but once he's out of the reach of extradition he can still move around, he can tell his side of the story. Remember that if he loses the civil case, that just means he has to pay damages to a woman who claims to be his wife. That won't mean much to most people around the world. But if they convict him of murder, that would be a different story. He's got to go."

"Where to?"

"I've got a list here of countries that have no extradition treaties with the U.S. China is one. Then there's Monaco, Luxembourg, a few places like that. Some others in Asia and Africa. I'd say for media access, Monaco or Luxembourg would be the best, but he might have something else in mind."