Read Night Secrets for Free Online Page A

ceaselessly along the midnight streets, he would sometimes see a man smoking sullenly in a doorway or moving with a quick, nervous gait down a deserted back street, and he would know with certainty that within only a few hours—at most, a few days—die man would end up behind the glass, and that nothing could be done about it, absolutely nothing, either for him or for those he was doomed to harm. For everyone involved, it was already too late.
    He thought of the bead again, then the woman who’d sent it to him, and he felt his body tense slightly as he began to search the room, trying to find her. He saw small knots of bleary-eyed lawyers, court stenographers and bailiffs, but the woman obviously had not been brought in for arraignment yet. He leaned back, lit a cigarette and waited, his eyes following the stream of people that shifted about the room in a way that seemed as random and directionless as the lives that had brought them there.
    He was on his third cigarette when he saw her come through the large wooden door at the front of the room. Instantly, he felt a tremor move through him, a gentle quaking that he acted quickly to control. He sat up immediately and blinked the long night’s tiredness from his faintly burning eyes.
    She was escorted by a policewoman in full uniform, and as she moved to her place before the bench, the men behind the glass snapped to attention, laughed and muttered to each other, their eyes fastened hungrily on the sway of her body as it moved into position before the bench.
    She stood very still and utterly silent while the judge took a moment to review her file. From where he sat in the smoky gallery, Frank could see only the blue prison dress they’d given her and the long black hair that fell across her shoulders. He already knew what had happened to her during the time that had passed since her arrest. They’d taken her to Manhattan North, stripped her of the black, blood-soaked dress, searched her body with a cool, methodical indignity, then tossed her the plain blue dress: Put this on, sister, before you catch a cold . The black dress was now the property of the district attorney’s office, and unless she copped a plea, it would be pawed over a thousand times before the prosecuting attorney finally waved it dramatically before the jury’s eyes, his voice rising in phony outrage: Look at this, a woman’s blood .
    The judge closed the file slowly, then stared directly at the woman’s eyes. “Do you still refuse to give your name, miss?” she asked.
    The woman did not move.
    â€œYou realize that your attitude will have no effect on our competence to proceed,” the judge told her.
    The woman said nothing.
    The judge cast a final quick glance in her direction, then went on with the arraignment. “You will be listed as a Jane Doe Defendant until your true identity can be determined. You are charged with a violation of the New York Penal Law PL 125.40. That is, murder in the first degree. How do you plead?”
    The woman did not answer, but Frank could see her shoulders lift slightly, her head rise as she looked squarely at the judge.
    â€œYou choose not to plead?” the judge asked.
    The woman did not reply.
    â€œVery well, then,” the judge went on matter-of-factly. “Let a plea of ‘Not Guilty’ be entered on behalf of defendant number 778224, and I assign Mr. Andrew Deegan as her attorney of record.” The judge looked out over the room. “Mr. Deegan, are you here?”
    â€œI’m here, Your Honor.”
    Frank turned and saw a short, somewhat stocky black man surge forward to the bench and take a stack of papers from the judge.
    â€œFor the record,” the judge said, writing it down as she spoke, “let’s show that Defendant Number 778224 will have assigned to her as her court-appointed attorney of record Mr. Andrew Deegan of the firm of Canton, Harrison and Meyer, 260 Broadway, New