He Asked The Jury To Trust His Badge Again

By the time Pell's trial began, snow lay along the courthouse steps.

I had carried his papers through three seasons. Their corners stayed square because I kept replacing the cardboard around them.

The town had dismissed him after its own hearing in July. His badge and keys had been returned. Rusk's redevelopment application had been withdrawn, and the town had canceled the agreement that let his firm negotiate for town-owned land in the corridor.

Those were changes I could see.

The criminal case still had to be proved.

Rusk had pleaded guilty to his part in the theft scheme. Under his agreement, he had placed $33,600 in a restitution account and agreed to testify truthfully. His sentence would come later.

Pell chose a trial.

His lawyer said he had acted badly under pressure but had not tried to steal. The payments, he said, were for private survey work done outside town hours.

"A poor record keeper is not always a criminal," he told the jury.

I thought of the care he had taken to invent 6:22.

Celeste sat behind me. She was there as my lawyer, but the prosecutor asked the questions now. Before court, Celeste had told me to answer only what I knew.

"You don't have to make the whole case from that chair."

The prosecutor showed my workroom photograph. Pell's demand lay beside the unfinished shroud, a clean rectangle of paper on pale linen.

"Why didn't you pay?" she asked.

"Because I hadn't dumped anything. And the van had records."

"Did you know those records would help before he came?"

"I knew where I had been. I checked what the camera saw that night."

Pell's lawyer asked about the leaf in the hem. He had seen it in the photograph.

"That's your personal mark?"

"Yes."

"You take pride in appearing careful."

I looked at him.

"The lifting loops have to hold a person. I take care with them."

He moved on.

The camera specialist testified again. So did the town technician, the yard worker, and the auditor. The nurse from Lisbon described signing my delivery receipt before her breakfast round.

Each witness brought one small piece. None had to know everything.

Tomas held his check copy in both hands while he spoke. Ruth described using her emergency savings. The florist had borrowed from her sister and paid $96 in interest before she could repay her.

The amounts sounded different out loud in that room. Pell's neat column had been made from people's groceries, winter heat, and money put aside for teeth.

Rusk testified on the fourth day.

He said Pell had promised to make the eight sites "expensive to keep." Rusk's company would collect settlements as supposed cleanup charges. Lower purchase offers would follow.

The prosecutor showed an email from Rusk to Pell. It attached the corridor map and asked which owners were ready to talk after their violations.

Mara's refusal to sell was in the same chain.

Pell's lawyer asked Rusk whether he hoped to avoid prison by blaming someone else.

"I hope the judge considers my cooperation," Rusk said.

The prosecutor did not ask the jury to trust that hope. She returned to the bank transfers, the pickup slip, the original complaint entry, and the video.

Pell testified that he had been protecting Littleton.

He used the same voice I had heard outside the funeral home, the one meant to carry beyond the person he addressed.

"Sometimes an official has to make unpopular choices."

The prosecutor put his closure notice on the screen beside the lab report delivered before he signed it.

"What chemical hazard did this notice correct?"

He said he had not trusted the lab.

"What testing did you order?"

He named none.

Then she showed the $1,200 transfer that followed Tomas's check.

Pell looked toward the jury instead of the screen.

"People know my years of service."

No one answered him.

The jury returned the next afternoon. They found him guilty of theft by extortion and falsifying official records. I heard each finding, but my hands remained folded until Judge Rowan dismissed us.

On the courthouse steps, Ruth took an old green paper tab from her wallet. I had given it to her for her receipt folder months earlier.

"I kept forgetting which pocket had the good papers," she said.

She put it away again, beside the verdict form her lawyer had handed her.

Outside, Tomas asked whether we should get a picture.

"You can," I said. "I want tea."

We found a place with thick mugs and a view of the snowy parking lot. Celeste sat beside me without opening her folder.

For once, there was nothing I needed to sign.

Then her phone lit up against the table. She read the message from the town's lawyer and turned it toward me.

"The settlement papers are ready," she said. "They've agreed to every correction."