The Jodi Picoult Collection Read online

  Katie frowned. “You confess anyway.”

  “Even though you didn’t do it?”

  “Yes. If you don’t show how sorry you are, if you try to make excuses, it just gets more embarrassing. It’s hard enough walking up to the ministers with all your family and friends watching. You just want to get it over with, take the punishment, so that you can be forgiven and welcomed back.”

  “So . . . in your church, you have to confess in order to be forgiven. Even if you didn’t do it?”

  “Well, it’s not like people get accused of sinning for nothing. There’s a reason for it, most of the time. Even if the story isn’t quite right, usually you still did something wrong. And after you confess, the healing comes.”

  “Answer the question, Katie,” Ellie said, smiling tightly. “If your deacon came to you and said you’d sinned, and you hadn’t, you’d confess anyway?”

  “Yes.”

  “I see. Now—why did you want to be a witness in your trial?”

  Katie looked up. “To confess to the sin that I’ve been accused of.”

  “But that’s murder,” Ellie pointed out. “That means you intentionally killed your baby, that you wanted it dead. Is this true?”

  “No,” Katie whispered.

  “You had to know that coming here today and saying you killed your baby was going to make the jury believe you were guilty, Katie. Why would you do that?”

  “The baby is dead, and it’s because of me. It doesn’t matter if I smothered him or not, he’s still dead because of something I did. I should be punished.” She brought the hem of her apron up to wipe her eyes. “I wanted everyone to see how sorry I am. I wanted to confess,” she said quietly, “because that’s the only way I can be forgiven.”

  Ellie leaned on the edge of the witness box, blocking everyone else’s view for a moment. “I’ll forgive you,” she said softly, for Katie’s ears alone, “if you forgive me.” Then she turned to the judge. “Nothing further.”

  * * *

  “Okay, so this is all twisted around now,” George said. “You killed the baby, but you didn’t murder it. You want to be punished so that you can be forgiven for something you didn’t mean to do in the first place.”

  “Yes.” Katie nodded.

  George hesitated for a moment, as if he was considering all this. Then he frowned. “So what happened to the baby?”

  “I made it sick, and it died.”

  “You know, the pathologist said that the baby was infected, but he admitted there were several reasons it might have died. Did you see the baby stop breathing?”

  “No. I was asleep. I don’t remember anything until I woke up.”

  “You never saw the baby after you woke up?”

  “It was gone,” Katie said.

  “And you want us to believe you had nothing to do with that?” George advanced on her. “Did you wrap the baby’s body in a blanket and hide it?”

  “No.”

  “Huh. I thought you said you don’t remember anything after you fell asleep.”

  “I don’t!”

  “Then technically, you can’t tell me for certain that you didn’t hide the baby.”

  “I guess not,” Katie said slowly, puzzled.

  George smiled, his grin as wide as a wolf’s. “And technically, you can’t tell me for sure that you didn’t smother the baby.”

  “Objection!”

  “Withdrawn,” George said. “Nothing further.”

  Ellie cursed beneath her breath. George’s pointed statement was the last thing the jury would hear as part of testimony. “The defense rests, Your Honor,” Ellie said. She watched Katie open the gate of the witness box and step down, crossing the room with studied caution, as if she now understood that something as stable as solid ground might at any moment tilt beneath her feet.

  * * *

  “You know,” Ellie said to the jury. “I wish I could tell you exactly what happened in the early hours of the morning of July tenth, in the Fishers’ barn, but I can’t. I can’t, because I wasn’t there. Neither was Mr. Callahan, and neither were any of the other experts you’ve seen paraded through here during the past few days.

  “There’s only one person who was actually there, who also spoke to you in this courtroom—and that’s Katie Fisher. Katie, an Amish girl who can’t remember exactly what happened that morning. Katie, who stood up here wracked with guilt and shame, convinced that the accidental transmission of a disease in utero to her fetus made her responsible for the baby’s death. Katie, who is so upset over losing her child she thinks she deserves to be punished, even when she’s innocent. Katie, who wants to be forgiven for something she did not intentionally do.”

  Ellie trailed her hand along the rail of the jury box. “And that lack of intention, ladies and gentlemen, is quite important. Because in order to find Katie guilty of murder in the first degree, the prosecution must convince you beyond a reasonable doubt that Katie killed her child with premeditation, willfulness, and deliberation. First, that means she planned this murder. Yet you’ve heard that no Amishman would ever consider such violence, no Amishman would choose an action that valued pride over humility or an individual decision over the society’s rules. Second, it means that Katie wanted this baby dead. Yet you’ve witnessed the look on Katie’s face when she first saw the father of her child again, when she told you that she loved him. Third, it means that she intentionally murdered her baby. Yet you’ve been shown proof that an infection transmitted during pregnancy could very well have caused the baby to die—a tragedy, but an accident all the same.

  “It is the prosecution’s job to prove to you that Katie Fisher’s baby was killed. My job is to show you that there might be a viable, realistic, possible reason for the death of Katie’s infant other than first-degree murder. If there’s more than one way to look at what happened that morning, if there’s even the slightest doubt in your mind, you have no choice but to acquit.”

  Ellie walked toward Katie and stood behind her. “I wish I could tell you what happened or did not happen the morning of July tenth,” she repeated, “but I can’t. And if I don’t know for sure—how can you?”

  * * *

  “Ms. Hathaway’s right—but only about one thing. Katie Fisher doesn’t know exactly what happened the morning she gave birth.” George surveyed the faces of the jury. “She doesn’t know, and she’s admitted to that—as well as to killing her baby.”

  He stood up, his hands locked behind his back. “However, we don’t need the defendant’s recollections to piece together the truth, because in this case, the facts speak for themselves. We know that Katie Fisher lied for years to her family about her clandestine visits to the outside world. We know that she concealed her pregnancy, gave birth secretly, covered up the bloody hay, and hid the body of her infant. We can look at the autopsy report and see bruises around the baby’s mouth due to smothering, the cotton fibers shoved deep in its throat, the medical examiner’s diagnosis of homicide. We can see the forensic evidence—the DNA tests that place the defendant and the defendant alone at the scene of the crime. We can point to a psychological motive—Ms. Fisher’s fear of being shunned from her family forever, like her brother, for this transgression of giving birth out of wedlock. We can even replay the court record and listen to the defendant confess to killing her child—an admission made willingly, which the defense then desperately tried to twist to its advantage.”

  George turned toward Ellie. “Ms. Hathaway wants you to think that because the defendant is Amish, this crime is unthinkable. But being Amish is a religion, not an excuse. I’ve seen pious Catholics, devout Jews, and faithful Muslims all convicted of vicious criminal acts. Ms. Hathaway also would like you to believe that the infant died of natural causes. But then, why wrap up the body and hide it under a pile of blankets—actions that suggest a cover-up? The defense can’t explain that; they can only offer a red-herring testimony about an obscure bacterial infection that may have led to respiratory failure in a new