A Certain Justice

The door opened. He had his badge on but his weapon was not drawn. 'Mr Farrell, how are you? You got a client you'd like to surrender to me?'

'Is this really going to work?' Farrell said, stepping back.

Nodding more confidently than he felt, Glitsky walked to the window and raised the shade, the signal they were waiting for down below.

Melanie and Kevin were standing together, arms around each other. 'Are you ready for this?'

He nodded.

'I'm with you,' she said, a whisper now.

'I'm with you. Whatever happens, however this comes out. You got that?'

'I got it.'

Farrell was leading Glitsky over to them, talking logistics, the law, the deal. Then it was time.

'Kevin Shea,' Glitsky said, 'I am placing you under arrest for the murder…'

73

Loretta Wager stood on the steps of the fountain, bullhorn in hand, facing the crowd.

Mohandas had not liked it (Allicey Tobain had hated it), but the senator had prevailed with the argument that the march was all about apprehending Kevin Shea anyway, wasn't it? So Mohandas had succeeded – the march had succeeded. They all had what they wanted. And if he didn't introduce Loretta, if they didn't somehow get this thing defused, what then? Another riot, more violence? Who would that benefit?

She had cut Mohandas out of the group – three steps away – for long enough to get it said – did he want to be on the short list for administering the Hunter's Point Shelter, or did he not? If he did not come across right now, he could forget she had ever mentioned it.

One last thing Loretta wanted – and this was a good time to bring it up because the chief of police was right here… Mohandas must clarify that the original one hundred thousand dollar reward was not for the death of Kevin Shea – they'd all heard that rumor on the streets and it was false. It was for information leading to his arrest – that was all.

That was all.

'My brothers and sisters,' she began, looking up as the shade was lifted. 'Kevin Shea has been arrested.'

A roar, an outpouring of relief and anger and frustration bouncing off the U-shaped structure behind her, echoing through the courtyard back on itself, multiplying in a crescendo of noise that rolled on, picked up, rolled on again.

'My brothers and sisters,' she said again, and at last the wave of sound broke, flattened, became still. She raised her voice. 'No one has fought harder than myself to see this moment. No one has kept this issue on the table more faithfully than Philip Mohandas.' Another round of applause. 'And it has come to pass.'

She paused, then pushed on.' But this is not the end of the story for us. Nor is it for Kevin Shea.'

'Kill him!' someone yelled out. 'Lynch him!' And a chant – 'Kill Kevin Shea, kill Kevin Shea…'

'No!' The bullhorn amplified it again. 'No!'

Gradually the crowd went silent.

'We've got Kevin Shea. Hear me. We've got him.' They were listening. 'Philip Mohandas is here. I am here, and we are with you. Your interests are our interests. It is not the San Francisco police that have apprehended Kevin Shea. It is not the FBI. It is us. All of us…'

A roar went up. More 'kill him, kill him,' but something else, and Loretta rode it. 'And now I'm asking you, I plead with you, you've got to believe us. We're going to see justice done.' She raised her voice, pointing over the crowd. 'But justice is not going to be served by another lynching today.'

A hesitant chorus, a murmur of 'amen amen amen.' Then silence in front of her, until abruptly someone yelled, 'Not Kevin Shea, he's got to die!' A reverberation, the sentiment spreading, and then wearing itself low.

Loretta looked down at Rigby, Mohandas, Simms. They couldn't help her. This had been her suggestion (they thought) – the only way to pull it off, and she had to do it. 'No one' - she raised her voice – 'no one hates more than I do the bigotry and the hatred that Kevin Shea stands for.' Now, more quietly: 'But I'm telling you that it is over here. We have him. Philip Mohandas and I are walking out of here with Kevin Shea and taking him downtown. He is our prisoner. I promise you that neither of us will rest until justice has been done. You all have my most solemn word.'

'… I don't believe this, ladies and gentlemen, Senator Wager has gone back into the building with Philip Mohandas, and now they are coming out surrounding, yes, I think I can see clearly – it is! It is Kevin Shea! A handcuffed Kevin Shea – an unidentified black man – perhaps a police officer – is on one side, Philip Mohandas on the other. Senator Loretta Wager is leading them out. Behind Shea is Chief Rigby. With them is a young woman – that must be Melanie Sinclair – and another unidentified man – a white man – in a business suit. The crowd, ladies and gentlemen, is silent as the grave.

'They're moving now through the courtyard, across the fountain area where the senator just gave her powerful speech. They appear to be – yes, there's a black-and-white police car at the curb, the crowd is all over it, nearly swarming over it. The situation is highly volatile, as this reporter sees it. They're approaching the line of National Guard troops. You hear the anger, the outbursts of rage at Kevin Shea, but so far the crowd is… the troops are letting them through now. They're in the crowd. There is nothing between them and the fury we've been witnessing here all morning, especially the last half hour.

'Now they're actually making way for Kevin Shea and the rest of them. They've gotten to the police car, the back door is open, the senator – Senator Wager – is inside the car now. Now Shea. Mohandas. The car is starting to move now, slowly, its flashers on. The crowd is making way, slowly giving way. Amazing. I believe they're actually going to get through…'

74

There were two cars. The police car with Wager, Shea, Mohandas and Glitsky, and Simms's FBI vehicle with herself, Rigby, Melanie, Farrell. The lobby and front steps of the Hall of Justice were jammed by the time they arrived – to Loretta it looked as though they had gathered every television camera in the western hemisphere, all the newspapers and magazines, radio stringers, off-duty cops, staff members, transients and regular citizens. But it was not a mob anymore. It was a crowd.

Behind them, back at the park, they were getting the word that the people who had attended the rally were dispersing. Loretta felt vindicated. She had been right. They had needed the symbol of Kevin Shea. The embers might still be smoldering to flame again later, but at least there was a sense that, for now, the crisis had passed.

Loretta thought it was the strangest ride she'd ever taken. Sitting there right next to Kevin Shea, she was startled when he had turned to her and thanked her for her involvement, her courage. He was i

Even Mohandas, by the time they reached the Hall, seemed responsive at least to Shea's open nature. For all Shea had been through, he was remarkably gracious, with a kind of nervous humor, no trace of surliness. It certainly didn't seem to bother him to be tightly wedged between two black people. He seemed, in fact, glad to be there.

They didn't book him on the sixth floor but brought him immediately to Alan Reston's office, which no longer bore any sign of his predecessor. Reston, of course, had followed the drama at the park on television and was waiting for them when they arrived. So was Elaine Wager.

A discussion led by Wes Farrell and largely corroborated by Lieutenant Glitsky finally brought the flawed evidentiary package out into the open. Rigby wanted to know more about the investigation into the other suspects – O'Toole, Mullen, McKay, Devlin. They waited while Carl Griffin and Ridley Banks came down and did their little song and dance.