A Time to Kill

"Yes, I do."

"And what is that opinion?"

"It is my opinion," Bass said slowly, "that the defendant had a total break with reality when his daughter was raped. When he saw her immediately after the rape he didn’t recognize her, and when someone told him she’d been gang-raped, and beaten, and almost hanged, something just snapped in Carl Lee’s mind. That’s a very elementary way of putting it, but that’s what happened. Something snapped. He broke with reality.

"They had to be killed. He told me once that when he first saw them in court, he could not understand why the deputies were protecting them. He kept waiting for one of the cops to pull a gun and blow their heads off. A few days went by and nobody killed them, so he figured it. was up to him. I mean, he felt as though someone in the system would execute the two for raping his little girl.

"What I’m saying, Mr. Brigance, is that, mentally, he left us. He was in another world. He was suffering from delusions. He broke."

Bass knew he was sounding good. He was talking to the jury now, not the lawyer.

"The day after the rape he spoke with his daughter in the hospital. She could barely talk, with the broken jaws and all, but she said she saw him in the woods running to save her, and she asked him why he disappeared. Now, can you

imagine what that would do to a father? She later told him she begged for her daddy, and the two men laughed at her and told her she didn’t have a daddy."

Jake let those words sink in. He studied Ellen’s outline and saw only two more questions.

"Now, Dr. Bass, based upon your observations of Carl Lee Hailey, and your diagnosis of his mental condition at the time of the shooting, do you have an opinion, to a reasonable degree of medical certainty, as to whether Carl Lee Hailey was capable of knowing the difference between right and wrong when he shot these men?"

"I have."

"And what is that opinion?"

"That due to his mental condition, he was totally incapable of distinguishing right from wrong."

"Do you have an opinion, based upon the same factors, as to whether Carl Lee Hailey was able to understand and appreciate the nature and quality of his actions?"

"I do."

"And what is that opinion?"

"In my opinion, as an expert in the field of psychiatry, Mr. Hailey was totally incapable of understanding and appreciating the nature and quality of what he was doing."

"Thank you, Doctor. I tender the witness."

Jake gathered his legal pad and strolled confidently back to his seat. He glanced at Lucien, who was smiling and nodding. He glanced at the jury. They were watching Bass and thinking about his testimony. Wanda Womack, a young woman with a sympathetic glow about her, looked at Jake and smiled ever so slightly. It was the first positive signal he received from the jury since the trial started.

"So far so good," Carl Lee whispered.

Jake smiled at his client. "You’re a real psycho, big man."

"Any cross-examination?" Noose asked Buckley.

"Just a few questions," Buckley said as he grabbed the podium.

Jake could not imagine Buckley arguing psychiatry with an expert, even if it was W.T. Bass.

But Buckley had no plans to argue psychiatry. "Dr. Bass, what is your full name?"

Jake froze. The question had an ominous hint to it. Buckley asked it with a great deal of suspicion.

"William Tyler Bass."

"What do you go by?"

"W.T. Bass."

"Have you ever been known as Tyler Bass?"

The expert hesitated. "No," he said meekly.

An immense feeling of anxiety hit Jake and felt like a hot spear tearing into his stomach. The question could only mean trouble.

"Are you positive?" Buckley asked with raised eyebrows and an enormous amount of distrust in his voice.

Bass shrugged. "Maybe when I was younger."

"I see. Now, I believe you testified that you studied medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center?"

"That’s correct."

"And where is that?"

"Dallas."

"And when were you a student there?"

"From 1956 to 1960."

"And under what name were you registered?"

"William T. Bass."

Jake was numb with fear. Buckley had something, a dark secret from the past known only to Bass and himself.

"Did you ever use the name Tyler Bass while you were a medical student?"

"No."

"Are you positive?"

"I certainly am."

"What is your social security number?"

"410-96-8585."

Buckley made a check mark beside something on his legal pad.

"And what is your date of birth?" he asked carefully.

"September 14, 1934."

"And what was your mother’s name?"

"Jonnie Elizabeth Bass."

"And her maiden name?"

"Skidmore."

Another check mark. Bass looked nervously at Jake.

"And your place of birth?"

"Carbondale, Illinois."

Another check mark.

An objection to the relevance of these questions was in order and sustainable, but Jake’s knees were like Jell-O and his bowels were suddenly fluid. He feared he would embarrass himself if he stood and tried to speak.

Buckley studied his check marks and waited a few seconds. Every ear in the courtroom waited for the next question, knowing it would be brutal. Bass watched the D.A. like a prisoner watching the firing squad, hoping and praying the guns would somehow misfire.

Finally, Buckley smiled at the expert. "Dr. Bass, have you ever been convicted of a felony?"

The question echoed throughout the silence and landed from all directions on the trembling shoulders of Tyler Bass. Even a cursory look at his face revealed the answer.

Carl Lee squinted and looked at his lawyer.

"Of course not!" Bass answered loudly, desperately.

Buckley just nodded and walked slowly to the table, where Musgrove, with much ceremony, handed him some important-looking papers.

"Are you certain?" Buckley thundered.

"Of course I’m certain," Bass protested as he eyed the important-looking papers.

Jake knew he needed to rise and say something or do something to stop the carnage that was seconds away, but his mind was paralyzed.

"You’re certain?" Buckley asked.

"Yes," Bass answered through clenched teeth.

"You’ve never been convicted of a felony?"

"Of course not."

"Are you as certain of that as you are the rest of your testimony before this jury?"

That was the trap, the killer, the deadliest question of all; one Jake had used many times, and when he heard it, he knew Bass was finished. And so was Carl Lee.

"Of course," Bass answered with feigned arrogance.

Buckley moved in for the kill. "You’re telling this jury that on October 17, 1956, in Dallas, Texas, you were not convicted of a felony under the name of Tyler Bass?"

Buckley asked the question while looking at the jury and reading from the important-looking documents.

"That’s a lie," Bass said quietly, and unconvincingly.

"Are you sure it’s a lie?" Buckley asked.

"A bald-faced lie."

"Do you know a lie from the truth, Dr. Bass?"

"Damn right I do."

Noose placed his glasses on his nose and leaned forward. The jurors quit rocking. The reporters quit scribbling. The deputies along the back wall stood still and listened.