The Kills

'No, sir. But there were rules. Mr. Tripping was forbidden to discuss the allegations before this court, or anything to do with the criminal proceedings. And brief meetings. There were two meetings which I conducted at the hospital.'

Now I was as agitated as the defendant. ' What?When did this occur? There has been an order of protection in place since Mr. Tripping's arraignment. There was to be no contact with the child. I'm not even blaming the defendant for the violation-I have to find out here in court that it's two professional agencies that are responsible? Your Honor, it would appear that everyone except for me has had the opportunity to talk with this child. What more do you need to hear?'

Huang was nervous, biting her lower lip as she ran her fingers across the top page of her records, looking for dates.

'Were you aware of the order of protection?'

'Yes, sir. The family court judge said she was overriding it. In the best interests of the boy.' Huang gestured toward Ms. Taggart. 'The lawyers told me to arrange the meetings.'

Put that in the category of 'nice to know.'

'When were they held?' Moffett asked.

'I'm trying to find you an exact time. The first one was early on, when the defendant was still incarcerated. I remember that clearly. The second one was midsummer, before I left for my vacation in August.'

There must be one enormous stretch of beach on the Atlantic coast where every psychiatrist and psychologist in New York disappear for the month of August, hoping the city's supply of anti-depressants and mood elevators will hold all the patients at bay.

'How'd they go, these meetings?' Moffett asked.

'Perhaps you can understand my reluctance to respond to you, Judge. My conversations with the child are privileged in nature. If I betray that confidence to the court, especially in the presence of the father, I'm not certain I'll be able to get Dulles to speak with me again.'

'Well, was there any discussion of these criminal charges in your presence?'

'No, sir. Not these charges.' She spoke with hesitation. 'But others. That's why I terminated the conversation.'

'What did Mr. Tripping talk about?'

'Not him, sir. Dulles.' Huang spoke softly and stared at a spot on the floor in front of her. 'The boy asked his father whether it was true that Mr. Tripping had been involved in a plot to assassinate the president of the United States seven or eight years ago. The child had brought a news clipping with him. Something he had taken off the Internet.'

Robelon was on his feet, pounding his fist on the table. 'I'm going to object to this line of questioning, Judge. That case was never brought by the government. There's no need to add any mention of it to this record. I move to strike.'

Moffett seemed to miss the point about the gravity and magnitude of the accusation, as well as the boy's concern about his father's possibly violent history. The judge seemed more interested in the level of the child's intelligence.

'Motion denied. The boy was able to find that news article by himself?'

Huang was on firm territory here. 'On-line, on his computer. Dulles is a very smart young man. Tests way beyond his age range. Although he's only ten, he's capable of reading at a college level.'

'So I don't have to worry about swearability?'

A child of ten could not be presumed to understand the meaning of an oath. Moffett seemed relieved to know he would not have to grapple with that problem, too.

'He has the intellectual capacity to have an oath administered. What I can't guarantee is whether or not he will choose to give false testimony in your courtroom.'

'That puts Ms. Cooper in a very difficult position, Ms. Taggart. Suppose I let her call the boy to the stand, and you haven't allowed her to speak with him first. Suppose he testifies in an exculpatory fashion, denies that his father injured him. Let's say-and I never know what Ms. Cooper has in her arsenal-but say she knows the boy's statement is inconsistent with things he has said before.'

'That's possible.'

'Well, then Ms. Cooper's stuck. She can't cross-examine him. She can't impeach her own witness.'

Taggart glared at me. 'She can have Dulles declared a hostile witness.'

I was back on my feet. 'I don't know whether Ms. Taggart's ever tried a case to a jury. I would guess not. If you think I'm about to put a ten-year-old child through that experience, emotionally or legally, you need a refresher course in trial advocacy.'

'Judge Moffett,' she went on, 'Dulles Tripping is at massive risk for the development of a mental disorder-'

'Which I certainly have no intention of compounding,' I added.

'I've already told you to sit down, Ms. Cooper. How so, Ms. Taggart?'

'The risk factors start with the multiple loss of caretakers throughout his young life-mother, grandmother, and now father. Even a stepmother. You may not be aware, Your Honor, that Mr. Tripping remarried for a brief period, a few years back. Second, parental suicide increases the risk of his own suicidal ideation. Third, being abused-or witnessing abuse-by his father increases Dulles's risk of disturbing conduct. And-' Taggart's volume dropped as she made reference to Andrew Tripping.

'What?' Moffett asked, cupping his hand to his ear.

'I was talking about the paternal psychosis that's been diagnosed. Mr. Tripping is a schizophrenic. It increases some tenfold the probability that Dulles will inherit that same condition.'

The swinging doors creaked behind me again. Moffett had turned his chair toward the wall, tapping his fingertips together as he tried to settle on a Solomonic solution.

I swiveled to see who had entered the room this time. The man who stood with his back to the door, getting his bearings, seemed out of place in the drab surrounds of the criminal courthouse. There was an air of elegance about him, with his charcoal gray bespoke suit, horn-rimmed glasses, barrel-cuffed shirt, and tasseled loafers. I guessed him to be in his early forties, and at five-eight, a bit shorter than I am.

I watched as he sauntered down the aisle, Robelon and Tripping engaged in an animated discussion as they eyed him, too. There was in him none of the strident urgency that blanketed so many of the earnest young defense attorneys who walked these hallways every day.

The judge pushed his chair around so that he faced us again. 'This mention of schizophrenia by the doctors, Mr. Robelon, you're not gonna spring any kind of psych defense on us in the middle of the trial, are you?'

'No, sir.'

Tripping looked over his shoulder at the man in the gray suit, now seated three rows behind him, who mouthed something-several words-to the defendant. I could not make out what he said.

'Just a minute,' Moffett said, slamming his gavel on his desktop. 'Mr. Tripping, you wanna pay attention to these proceedings or you wanna play charades with the people in the peanut gallery? You, you got business here?'

The man answered, 'Yes, I do.' Moffett's courtroom was more casual than most. The fact that the man did not rise to respond to the judge was not taken as a sign of disrespect by the court, but there seemed a touch of arrogance about it to me.

'You a lawyer, too?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Jesus. I'm choking to death on lawyers here. Get me an Indian chief. Doesn't anybody go to medical school anymore? Who are you?'

'Graham Hoyt.' He reached in his pocket and pulled out a small leather case, black alligator, and removed a business card from it, standing to pass it to the clerk to give over to the judge. Then he looked at me and nodded, passing another card.

'I'm the guardian ad litem for Dulles Tripping. The family court appointed me to protect his interests during the pendency of this case.'

'You're late. Ad litem. Come latum. ' Moffett chuckled to himself.

'No one informed me about this hearing. I just happened to call Mr. Robelon's office this morning and his