I nod. “And to tell her I want to talk to her brother.”
* * * * *
PRISONS AND HOSPITALS feel the same to me.
When I say “hospitals,” I’m not talking about the maternity ward, the tonsillectomy section, or even the emergency room. I’m talking about the cancer ward or the intensive care unit, the places where hope is scarce and resignation and sadness are for the most part the order of the day.
That same feeling exists in every prison I’ve ever visited; it’s a dreary world in which there is a tangible, ever-present feeling of life ebbing away. The surroundings, the people, the conversations are all etched in shades of gray, as if living in a black-and-white movie.
I am therefore not looking at all forward to this morning’s visit to Rahway State Prison. Not too much good can come out of it. I’ll likely determine that I can’t or don’t want to help Richard Evans, in which case I’ll be delivering crushing news to Karen. Or I’ll sink deeper into the quicksand that is sure to be this case, and I’ll spend six months of frustration futilely trying to reunite Reggie with his owner.
I pick up Karen at her house on Morlot Avenue in Fair Lawn, and if she shares my pessimism and dread, she’s hiding it really well. She is waiting for me at the curb and just about jumps into the car; if the window were open I don’t think she’d bother opening the door.
I try to start a normal conversation with Karen, asking her what she does for a living.
“I design dresses,” she says. “Then I make them myself and sell them to stores.”
“That’s great,” I say. “Which stores?”
She seems uncomfortable with the conversation. “If you don’t mind, I’d rather talk about Richard.”
“You don’t like to talk about yourself?”
“There isn’t any myself,” she says. “There hasn’t been one for five years… ever since they put Richard in that cage.”
“You think it helps him to deprive yourself of a life?”
“I checked you out a lot,” she says. “I know you defended your girlfriend, Laurie, when she was on trial for murder. What if you had lost? You think you’d have much of a life right now?”
Point to Karen, fifteen-love. If Laurie were in prison, my life would be a miserable, unbearable wreck. “We won because she was innocent, and we were able to demonstrate it.”
“And you’re going to do it again.” She smiles. “So can we talk about Richard?”
“If that’s what you want. But right now I know very little.”
“I know… That’s cool,” she says. “I spoke to Richard yesterday. I didn’t tell him anything about you. He thinks I’m coming to visit like I always do.”
“Why?” I ask.
“I want him to be surprised. Boy, is he going to be surprised.”
“Karen, these things are by definition long shots.”
“But they happen, right? Didn’t it happen with you and Willie Miller?”
She certainly has “checked me out” and is aware that I successfully got Willie a new trial and an acquittal after he spent seven years on death row for a murder he did not commit. “They happen rarely, but far more often nothing can be done.”
“I believe in you,” she says. “And I believe in Richard. This is gonna happen.”
There’s nothing for me to say to that, so I keep my mouth shut and drive. I’m not going to be able to dampen her optimism now, and I’d rather try and borrow some. It could even make the next couple of hours more bearable.
We arrive at the prison and go through the rather lengthy process of signing in and being searched. The reception area guards all know Karen; they greet each other easily and with smiles. She’s obviously been here a lot, and she brings an enthusiasm and energy that is much needed in here, and probably much appreciated as well.
We finally make it into the visitors’ room, which is like every visitors’ room in every prison movie ever made. We sit in chairs alongside other visitors, facing a glass barrier that looks into the prisoners’ side. Prisoners are brought in once their visitors are seated, and conversations take place through phones on the wall. In our case there’s only one phone on the visitor side, so we’ll have to take turns.
Richard comes out, and it’s no surprise that he looks considerably older than the pictures I have seen of him. They were taken five years ago, but those five years were spent in prison. Prison aging is at least two to one.
Richard brightens considerably when he sees Karen, then looks surprised when he realizes she is not alone. He picks up his phone and Karen does the same. I can’t hear Richard, but I can tell that he says how great it is to see her. Then he says, “Who’s that?” referring to me.
“His name is Andy Carpenter,” she says. “He’s a famous lawyer who’s going to help you.” It’s exactly what I didn’t want her to say, but I’m not calling the shots here.
In response to something Richard says that I can’t make out, Karen says, “I will, but I want to show you something first. Wait’ll you see this; you’re not going to believe it.”
She opens her purse and takes out the picture of Reggie, but for the moment holding it facedown so that he can’t see it. “Are you ready?” she asks.
He nods, and she holds the picture up to the window. “He’s alive,” she says. “I swear, he’s alive.”
You can fill an entire library with what I don’t know about human emotion, so I can’t begin to accurately read the look on Richard’s face. It seems to be some combination of pain and joy and hope and bewilderment that form the most amazingly intense expression I’ve ever seen on anyone.
Within five seconds Richard is crying, bawling unashamedly, and Karen joins in. Soon they’re both laughing and crying, and I feel like an intruder. Unfortunately, Karen hands the intruder the phone.
“Richard, I’m Andy Carpenter,” I say, not exactly the most enlightening thing I could have come up with. He wants to know what the hell is going on, and here I am telling him the one thing he already knows.
He composes himself and says, “Please tell me what this is all about.”
I nod. “I rescued a dog… the dog in this picture. Karen found out about it and came to see me. She said it’s Reggie… your dog.”
He closes his eyes for a moment and then nods. “It is; I’m sure of it.”
“Is there any way you can prove it?” I ask.
“To who?”
“To me, so that I can prove it to the authorities,” I say. “At this point I need to be completely positive.”
“And then what?” he asks.
“Then I’ll try and help you. If you want me to.”
“Can you bring Reggie here?”
I think about this for a few moments, though the possibility has occurred to me before. “I’m not sure if I could arrange it,” I say. “But even if I could, it would take a while.”
“Then how can I prove it to you?” he says, exasperation in his voice. “Karen knows him… She can tell you.”
I nod. “She has.”
“Wait a minute,” he says. “Let me talk to Karen for a second.”
I hand Karen the phone, and Richard talks to her briefly. Whatever he says is enough to make her light up. “I forgot about that! Will he do it for me?”
Richard answers her, nodding his head as he does so. She then hands the phone back to me, and Richard says, “Karen should be able to prove it. Then what happens?”
“Then you hire me, if that’s what you want. What about the lawyer who handled your trial-”
He interrupts. “Forget about him.”
“I read the transcript,” I say. “He did not do a bad job.”
He frowns. “I’m here, aren’t I?” It’s a point that’s hard to counter.
“Okay. After that, I come back here and interview you, and I learn everything about your case. Then we figure out how to proceed, if we proceed.”
“You think we have a chance?” he asks.
