out. He threatened her and her kids. Sharon Hatch looked at Dale Davidson. Daddy looked at Sharon Hatch. She said Daddy never hit her. He never threatened her before she dumped him. I followed Davidson’s logic. He was establishing Daddy’s psyche pre- and post-breakup. Daddy was calm before. Daddy wigged out after. I distrusted the before-and-after line. It was a coded cause-and-effect indictment aimed at an innocent woman. The line might hit the men on the jury square in the gonads. They might commiserate with Daddy. The poor guy got fucked by a cold-hearted cunt. I looked at Sharon Hatch. I tried to read her. She seemed passably smart. She probably knew that Daddy was wigged out well in advance of their breakup. He was a strongarm loan collector. He was an armor fetishist. His chivalry to women was a symptom of his hatred for women. He was a sex psycho hibernating. He knew that he wanted to rape and kill women. The breakup gave him a justification. It was based on one part rage and two parts self-pity. You could not date his gender-wide hatred to the moment Sharon Hatch said, “Walk, sweetie.” Daddy Beckett was working toward his explicative flashpoint already. He was like the Swarthy Man in the spring of ’58. I felt a little jolt of empathy for the Swarthy Man. I felt a big jolt of hate for Daddy Beckett. My mother was 43 years old. She was caustic. She could put weak men in their place. Tracy Stewart was utterly helpless. Daddy Beckett trapped her in his bedroom. She was a lamb in his slaughterhouse.
Dale Davidson and Sharon Hatch worked well together. They set Daddy up as a frayed fuse about to unravel. Dale Rubin raised some objections. Judge Cowles overruled some and sustained some. The objections pertained to points of law and flew right over my head. I was back in the South Bay in 1981. I was a half-step from that night 23 years before.
The judge called a recess. Daddy walked to his holding booth outside the courtroom. Two plainclothes cops brought Robbie in. He was handcuffed and shackled. He was wearing jail denims. The cops sat him down in the witness box and uncuffed and unshackled him. He saw Bill Stoner and Dale Davidson and waved. They walked up to him. Everybody started smiling and talking.
Robbie was rough trade. He was tall and broad. His body fat ran about .05%. He had long brown hair and a long, droopy mustache. He looked like he benched 350 and ran a hundred yards in 9.6 seconds.
Court reconvened. The plainclothes cops sat near the jury box. A bailiff waltzed Daddy in. He sat down beside Dale Rubin.
Robbie looked at Daddy. Daddy looked at Robbie. They checked each other out and looked away.
The clerk swore Robbie in. Dale Davidson approached the witness stand. He asked Robbie some preliminary questions.
Robbie talked with a swagger. He was here to vent a patricidal grudge. He emphasized words like “ain’t” and phrases like “He didn’t have no.” He was saying, I know better and I don’t give a fuck. The implication was, I’m me and my father made me who I am.
Daddy watched Robbie. The Stewarts watched Robbie. Davidson led Robbie back to Redondo Beach and Tracy’s house and Daddy’s apartment. Dale Rubin raised several objections. The judge overruled or sustained them. Rubin looked bewildered. He couldn’t divert Robbie’s momentum. Robbie started looking straight at Daddy.
Davidson worked slowly and deliberately. He took Robbie right up to
Robbie lost it. He faltered and tripped over his words. Dale Davidson paused. He suspended his questions for a superbly calculated little pocket of time. He asked Robbie if he could talk now. Robbie wiped his face and nodded. Davidson fed him some water and told him to continue. Robbie plugged away at his story like a trouper.
He got drunk. Daddy raped Tracy. Daddy said, We’ve got to kill her. They walked her downstairs. He hit her with the sap—
Robbie faltered again. He faltered on cue. Nobody fed him the cue. He pulled an internal boo-hoo number and choked himself up. He wept for his own misspent life. He didn’t intend to kill a girl that night. His father made him do it. He wasn’t weeping for the girl he killed. He was weeping for his own forfeiture.
Robbie was good. Robbie understood dramatic displacement. He reached for the old self-pity and pulled out some tears and hit the old redemption seeker chord molto bravissimo. He was bad—but not as bad as his father. His wretched character and beautifully feigned remorse gave him instant charisma and credibility. I time-traveled back to 8/9/81. A man had to kill a woman. A boy had to please his father. Daddy only killed women with other males present. Daddy needed Robbie. Daddy couldn’t kill Tracy without him. Robbie knew what Daddy wanted. Did you rape her, too? Did you rape her because Daddy raped her and you hated him and you couldn’t stand to see him have more fun than you? Did you rape her because you knew Daddy would kill her and what’s one more rape then? Did you lay out some garbage bags and dismember her in the back of the van?
Davidson led Robbie through the rest of the night and his initial mop-up procedures. Robbie stuck to his often- told and formally recorded story. Davidson thanked him and turned him over to Dale Rubin. Robbie got real then. This was Robbie versus Daddy—with no expendable piece of ass to distort the goddamn issue.
Rubin tried to discredit Robbie. He said, Didn’t you bring Tracy home for yourself? Robbie denied it. Rubin rephrased the question repeatedly. Robbie denied it repeatedly. Robbie raised his voice with each denial. Robbie was all pride now. He strutted from a sitting position. He said “No” with exaggerated inflections and bobbed his head up and down like he was talking to a fucking retard. Rubin asked Robbie if he got in fights back then. Robbie said he was a red-blooded guy. He liked to kick ass. He learned it from his father. He learned all the bad things he knew from his father. Rubin asked Robbie if he beat up on his girlfriends. Robbie said no. Rubin expressed disbelief. Robbie told Rubin he could think what the hell he liked. Robbie bobbed his head harder and harder each time he said “No.” Rubin persisted. Robbie persisted with much greater flair. He had at least ten stock readings for the word “No.” He stared at Daddy Beckett. He smiled at Dale Rubin. The smiles said, You can’t win because I’ve got nothing to lose.
Daddy Beckett stared at his hands. He looked up and locked eyeballs with Robbie a few provocative times. He always looked down first. He didn’t look down from fear or shame. He looked down because he was tired. He had a bad heart. He was too old to play mind games with young buck convicts.
Robbie spent a day and a half in the box. He was questioned and cross-questioned and coddled and badgered. He endured. He never wavered. He never appeared to dissemble. It was patricidal performance art. Robbie was bravura. Robbie sang grand opera. Robbie probably overestimated the effect on his father. Daddy Beckett was yawning a lot.
Davidson brought up the Sue Hamway case. Robbie told the court what he knew. Davidson brought up Paul Serio. Robbie portrayed him as a quiff and Daddy Beckett’s stooge. Rubin brought up Serio. Robbie satirized the quiff’s body language and worked it into his head-bob routine. Rubin could not shake Robbie. His hate filled the room. It was generically infantile hatred reasoned out over time. Robbie was starring in his own life story. Tracy Stewart was the ingenue lead. Robbie felt nothing for her. She was just a bitch who sideswiped two men and made things go blooey.
Robbie finished his testimony. The judge called a recess. I almost applauded.
Daddy’s first ex-wife testified. She said Daddy was an awful daddy. He was brutal with Robbie, David and Debbie. David
