Suspended Sentences

But he could hear it all right when Shirley whispered in his ear that she loved him.

When Bill got finished shooting the rats he handed the gun back to Deke and went down across the basement floor with a burlap sack to pick up the corpses so they wouldn’t make maggots and house-flies or stink up the house. They left the basement — it was then about two in the afternoon — and had a couple of sodas out of Deke’s ice cooler. They talked some, mostly about the dogs that kept jumping up and trying to lick Deke’s beard. Finally Deke slid the shotgun carelessly across onto the passenger seat, got in, and drove out of the yard. Behind him Uncle Bill carefully closed the six-foot-high gate to keep the dogs in.

A few miles down the road a state cop pulled Deke over because one of the bolts had fallen out of the rear license plate and the plate was hanging askew by one bolt, its corner scraping the pavement and throwing the occasional spark. Deke because of his hearing problem hadn’t heard the noise it had been making. The cop had to use the siren and the flashers arid get right up on top of the Microbus before Deke knew he was there. Deke hadn’t been speeding or anything. He figured it for another tiresome marijuana shake-down. He was glad he didn’t have beer on his breath; they’d had sodas back at Bill’s, not beers.

He pulled over against the trees and got out, reaching for his wallet. The cop was walking forward; behind him the lights on top of the cruiser were still flashing, hurting Deke’s eyes so Deke looked away and waited for the cop to come up.

“Your license plate’s hanging crooked,” the cop said. “A lot of sparks. Could hit the gas tank. You want to fix it.”

Deke was relieved. “Say, thanks.” He opened up the back of the Microbus and the cop saw all the tools and hardware in there. Deke got out a screwdriver and found himself a nut and bolt in one of the compartmentalized toolboxes. He fixed the license plate back in place. Meanwhile, the cop was hanging around. One of those beefy guys with a Texas Ranger hat and his belly hanging out over his Sam Browne belt. He wasn’t searching the truck exactly — he was just hanging around — but when Deke went to get back in, the cop saw the shotgun on the passenger seat.

The cop’s face turned cold. “All right. Get out slow.”

Deke stood to one side and the cop slowly removed the shot-gun from the seat. He worked the pump-action and a loaded cartridge flipped out of the breech. The cop stooped down to pick it up. “Loaded and chambered. Ready to fire. What bank you fixin’ to rob, boy?”

After that it was inevitable. The cop handcuffed Deke and locked him in the cruiser’s back-seat cage and drove him into the Croton barracks. There he was handed over to two other police types. They ran him on into Ossining and he was booked.

“Booked? For what?”

“Possession,” the sergeant said.

Deke still didn’t think much of it. He was a hippie type. They harassed hippie types on principle, these cops. They’d throw him in the tank overnight and tomorrow he’d have to hitch a ride back to pick up his truck.

Only it didn’t work out that way.

Stanley Dern figured himself a pretty good country lawyer. He’d known Harv Allen for several years, not well but as a lawyer knows a casual client: he’d drawn Harv’s will for him, done a few minor legal chores for him from time to time. When Harv called him about his son, Stanley Dern at first tried to put him off. “I’m not really a criminal lawyer, Harv.”

“Nor is my son a criminal,” Harv replied. He had an old-fashioned New England way of talking; the family — and Harv — was from New Hampshire.

“Well, I’ll be glad to go down there and talk with him. Have they set bail?”

“Twenty-five thousand dollars.”

Stanley Dern whistled through his teeth. “What’s he charged with?”

“I can’t remember the exact words. Possession of a deadly weapon, in substance.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

Stanley Dern had practiced in Ossining for thirty of his fifty-four years; he knew everybody in the district attorney’s office and he knew most of the cops in town. Criminal court activity in Ossining had always been more intense than in other cities of comparable size because Ossining was the home of Sing Sing, the old New York State penitentiary.

Stanley Dern went to the Criminal Part Clerk and found out that the prosecution had been assigned to a young assistant D.A. named Dan Ellenburgh. Stanley didn’t know this one; Ellenburgh was new.

He was also large, as Stanley found out when he entered the office. Ellenburgh was half-bald, small-eyed, and at least a hundred pounds overweight — a shame in such a young man, Stanley thought.

“Now it’s a Sullivan Law violation,” Ellenburgh said after he’d pulled out Deke Allen’s file and looked into it to remind himself which case they were talking about. “Possession of a deadly weapon. He had it on the car seat right beside him. Armed and charged. Ready to fire.”

“Now come on, Mr. Ellenburgh. That’s a ten-year rap. The kid could get ten years.”

“That’s right,” Ellenburgh said blandly. “Of course you’ll probably cop a plea and he’ll end up serving one-to-three and he’ll be out in nine or ten months on good behavior.”

“Nine or ten months out of the kid’s life just because he helped his uncle shoot some rats?”

Ellenburgh put on a pair of gra

“Mr. Ellenburgh, this young man isn’t a dangerous felon. He’s never been convicted of anything worse than a traffic violation. He runs his own business in this community. He’s well regarded by the people he’s worked for. He may not cut his hair the way you might prefer but he’s certainly not a menace. The facts in the case are clear enough, it seems to me.”

“The facts in the case — it seems to me — are that the man was caught red-handed with a loaded gun on his car seat. That’s in clear violation of the law. It’s a felony law, counselor, and a loaded cocked shotgun is nothing if not dangerous. Therefore I’ve got to disagree with you. I’d classify this case as a dangerous felon.”

“Come off it,” Stanley Dern said.

“You think I’m playing some sort of game with you, counselor? Well, you come to court and see whether I am.” And Ellenburgh got up and turned his back rudely, replacing the file in his steel cabinet, indicating plainly that the interview was ended.

Stanley Dern went down to the jail to see Deke Allen. He asked Deke if he wanted him to be Deke’s lawyer. Deke said, “I’d love it, Mr. Dern, but all I’ve got is about forty dollars to my name right now. If you’ll put me on the cuff I can pay you off in installments. Assuming it doesn’t cost too much.”

Stanley Dern didn’t have any remote idea whether it would cost forty dollars or forty thousand to defend Deke Allen in this case. He said, “Never mind the fee, Deke. Whatever it is, I’ll bill you not more than you can afford to pay. This idiot prosecutor’s got me mad and when they get Stanley Dern mad they’d better hunker down and watch out.”

Then Stanley Dern arranged with a bondsman to put up Deke’s bail; it cost Deke’s father $2,500 but there was no question of his not paying it — Deke’s father was a retired baker of no particular importance in the community and certainly no wealth, but he was a decent man and he loved his son even if he didn’t understand his son’s so-called lifestyle.

And finally Stanley Dern went into the law library at the firm where he worked and began to read up on the gun law.

The law stated quite clearly that it was illegal to carry a loaded weapon on one’s person or in one’s car except on one’s own premises — home or place of business. For the benefit of hunters a loophole had been built into the law whereby you could carry a “non-concealable weapon”— that is, a shotgun or rifle — on your person or in your car so long as it was unloaded and broken down in such a way as to be not easily assembled and fired. The wording of the loophole was quite strict and specific. There was no way to get around it: the weapon, in order to escape the provisions of the gun law, had to be unloaded and dismantled. Clearly Deke Allen’s case didn’t meet those criteria. Technically he was guilty. Or so it appeared.