Lizzie! (10 page)

 

 

CHAPTER 21

R
ob the Scarecrow had news for us the next day. He had agreed to take Julio's case
pro bono
, which is short for
pro bono publico
, which means doing it for free for the good of the public. “But as it turns out, there is no case. Yes, he is on probation at the moment but it looks like Julio will be a free and independent citizen very soon.”

“Is this because Jeb Blanco was holding him prisoner? Even though he paid for his groceries, is it still involuntary servitude?”

“Well, that would be a good reason Lizzie. But that's not why. He will be on his own the minute he turns eighteen. Then he will no longer be a minor and he will not need the Hammersmiths
in loco parentis.
There are no outstanding charges against him for the robbery because it was a first offense and no assault took place, so he can come and go as he wishes as of his eighteenth birthday.”

“That's only a month away!”

“Right. It appears that his birthday is Bastille Day, July 14th.”

Mom said, “How appropriate.”

“Bastille, that was a prison in Paris, right?”

“Right. It's the day the people stormed the Bastille, the fortress where all the political prisoners were kept.”

I could see why Mom said
appropriate.

“Julio is essential to the prosecution of the case,” Digger said. “Because he is the only person besides Jeb Blanco himself who knows who the victim is. Was. Even though he only saw him that one time, Julio is positive he recognized the victim.”

“Wasn't he scared of seeing a dead body?” I asked Rob.

“On the way over I asked him how he felt about going to the morgue. He said, ‘No, I've seen dead bodies before.' I didn't ask him where. Some things are none of my business.”

I would have asked him where, I thought to myself.

And then Digger said to Rob, “Well, it won't be a piece of cake. You know how unreliable eyewitness testimony is. And we still don't know who Carlos is or what part he played in this business.”

“And now he can't tell us,” I said.

Rob agreed. “It won't be easy to have Julio's identification accepted without any corroboration. But I think we can make it stick.”

Corroboration.
Digger used it earlier, so it was time to look it up.
Well, who would guess that the root goes all the way back in Latin to
robur,
literally oak. To make strong as oak
.

By the time
Trippy arrived it was really summer. Hot. Humid. Showers followed by rainbows. Too hot to hang out on the beach but we did go swimming every day even when there was lots of grungy seaweed to squish through. She described her graduation with the high school orchestra playing “Pomp and Circumstance” as the class came forward one by one for their diplomas. How two of the boys had upended a bottle of cherry brandy filched from one of their houses just before the ceremony started and they staggered so badly lining up that they had to be escorted from the premises. Trippy's mother said it was a scandal but her father said, “Boys will be boys.”

“Did they get to graduate? Or were they expelled?”

“No. I mean, they didn't get to graduate with the rest of us or go to the class party after but they're going to North Side High in the fall. I know this because one of the mothers belongs to the same book club as my mother. That boy's mother says entirely too much is made of finishing middle school and transitioning to high school. There is absolutely no need for a graduation ceremony.”

“Especially if your kid gets drunk for it.”

One afternoon Mom drove us over to visit the Hammersmiths and let Trippy meet the dogs. The big white friendly dog with the bushy tail was gone.

“She got adopted into a terrific new home,” Julio said. “Three kids and a big backyard with a fence. They've had dogs before, their last one also came from a shelter and lived to be sixteen. So they were sad, but ready.”

“Is sixteen old?”

“Very old for a big dog. Little dogs live longer. Come see who took her place.”

A big ribby sort of part greyhound and part collie stood quivering by the kitchen door. “It's all right Sasha, we can all go out—” And then Julio realized there were three steps from the back door down to the ground.

Trippy was quick to act. “You get in front and catch the chair on each step and I'll bump it down one at a time.”

“Good job, goonie,” I told her. Once Julio turned to her, Sasha raced to the fence waiting for the rubber ball he threw. She leaped in the air and caught it cleanly, then raced back to the steps.

“She hasn't learned how to bring it to me and drop it yet. But for a dog that was found locked in a cellar and starved almost to death, she's doing well.”

I remembered the root cellar and shuddered. Then I remembered Julio waiting for his uncle to bring him food, never knowing when he might come or when he might turn him over to the gang.

We played with the dogs all afternoon. The shy one who hid under the table during our last visit seemed to be one of the gang now. Julio was kept busy throwing balls and Frisbees and playing chase. When it was time to go he wheeled me around the side of the house to the walkway.

“Julio's really cool, isn't he?” Trippy said once we got into Mom's car and headed home. “He's so much fun to hang with. Remember how scared he was talking to us that first time?”

Mom said, “People change. When you give them a chance they can change.” I thought of that first scared dog at the Hammersmiths who is now such a happy camper but I didn't say anything.
Julio, Julio
, I hummed to myself. I wouldn't be surprised if Trippy had been humming the same thing.

Well, we just had a few more days before Trippy had to fly back to Wisconsin and it rained almost every day. We spent a lot of time on the computer. We read everything we could find about sanctuaries for primates. We Googled Old Harmony Refuge for New World Primates in Georgia and I decided then and there to save half of my allowance from now on to contribute to their fund.

For Julio's birthday Mom and Martha Hammersmith took him shopping for some new clothes. They had to practically drag him to the mall but he ended up with two new T-shirts, sweatpants, a hoodie, and new sneakers. We had ice cream and a cake with nothing written on it. Just before she brought it to the table, Mom lit nine candles—“Each one stands for two years because the cake will fall apart if I put any more on it”—and we sang “Happy Birthday.” Julio got up and walked away from the table and for a second I thought we had hurt his feelings. But then I realized he was feeling cared for and it was hard to handle after all that time in the Bastille.

It took almost another month to catch Jesús Ernesto Blanco. Even though there was an APB on him, he had melted into the general Miami population and there was no sign of him. APB stands for all points bulletin, which is information that goes out to all points where a criminal might try to get away, like airports and the ticket counters of train and bus stations and to state troopers who patrol highways. Miami is a big city and a lot of people come and go in it all year round. Snowbirds start coming in November to get away from the cold. They start leaving in March to get home in time for the daffodils. A lot of families come over spring break to walk on the beach and swim and salesmen and CEOs fly back and forth all year. All it took to catch Jeb Blanco was a smart guard checking everybody's papers. He saw something fishy about the passport, I don't know how he knew it was phony but he quietly signaled to a policeman standing nearby and Blanco was captured.

“ ‘The suspect was
apprehended
standing in line at the Miami airport, holding a ticket to Cat Island in the Bahamas. Blanco, his head shaved and sporting a trim goatee, was wearing mirrored aviators. He was carrying a false passport in the name of Ricardo Jimenez, a deceased fisherman, and offered no resistance. He has retained Fletcher Rockingham to represent him. Rockingham is famous for representing several notorious criminals in the past decade, chief among them the triple-murderer Rabbit Dykeman from South Carolina, who walked away on a
technicality
. Dykeman then flew to San Francisco and one week later committed suicide by jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge. His motive was never made clear, but it is
conjectured
that he was overcome with remorse.' ” I was reading this aloud to Mom and Brianna and Rob from the
Miami Clarion & Bugle
.
Technicality
was easy but I had a little trouble with
conjectured.
It comes straight from the Latin.
Con
means together, and
jicere/jacere
means to throw, and some of the things thrown together to make the word
conjectured
were never solved.

Mom said, “Lizzie for Pete's sake! Will you stop reading us every grisly detail you come across?”

“Will I have to testify?” I asked Rob the Scarecrow, who was now practically living with us and was eating clam chowder with us that night. “Because I don't think I could stand to see him. Like if I had to go past him my whole body would shake so hard I wouldn't be able to speak.”

Mom said, “Think how it will be for Julio. Having an uncle who is accused of murder, an uncle who kept you prisoner for a year. He has to tell the whole story all over again in court.”

“You will have to testify because you are a witness, but I'm sure you won't have to go right past him,” Rob said spearing the last piece of garlic bread out of the basket. “Anybody else want this? You'll have an advocate assigned to you by the court and whoever that is, he or she will keep you well away from the accused. Your advocate will not let them put you through the wringer. So let's cross that bridge when we come to it Lizzie.”

I sort of knew
advocate
, from the Latin
ad
, for, and
vocare
, to speak. As for putting through a wringer, that's what women had to do in the old days before they had washing machines with spin cycles. Then I stopped and thought about all those women who have probably never even seen a washing machine and the millions of people who have to wash their clothes in the nearest river. I heard on the eight a.m. news on our local public radio station that Blanco
was going to be arraigned this morning at ten. And then on the TV evening news there was a whole lot more. He was asked whether he
pled
guilty or not guilty to the list of charges that included holding his nephew in involuntary servitude, trafficking in endangered animals, which are the tamarins, and murdering the man named Carlos who had helped import them. He
pleaded
not guilty and was led away in shackles. (You have a choice of
pled
or
pleaded
and since I couldn't decide which, I used them both.) Even though I know he is a terrible man I hated to see those shackles. They made me think of slaves coming out of ships' holds and being taken to the auction block.

 

 

CHAPTER 22

M
om has been investigating the trip to the primate refuge in Georgia. In fact she and Jenna have been conspiring to arrange for a caravan of all of us to drive there. We would have to stay overnight in a motel because it is approximately 470
miles from Woodvale, Florida, to Old Harmony, Georgia, not too far from Savannah, and we would be on the road one night each way. Mom says some of the good motels have swimming pools, which is an attraction, but I'm already thinking that they may have cable TV and we might get to see some good movies.

Then I overheard her on the phone with a woman at the refuge in Old Harmony. She had a voice as loud as a sports announcer so it was hard not to overhear her. It went something like: “Good wukkers? They'ah ahnt eny good wukkers eny moah. They'ah just cum in an' one wik lateh they'ah wantin' they'ah paycheck an' they'ah outah heah.”

Then I heard Mom describing Julio. “It's a long story but he ended up caring for the thirty-two tamarins you took in several weeks ago all on his own, and it is only thanks to him that they survived, so would you consider?”

And then that roaring voice saying, “Hail yes if he's legal ah'd bless him raht inta tha' job a' keepin' the birthin' cages clean an' the new mothas looked afta. We'ah got ten new'uns—five sets'a twins. We'ah very strict heah, that means he'd hafta mejjuh up to ah stannarts.”

So that was how I found out that the tamarins were reproducing.

Mom said, “I don't want to get his hopes up, but if Julio wants to travel to Georgia to see his monkeys . . .”

And then Teresa said, “Absolutely, we'll come too. I think it's a wonderful idea since Digger and I haven't had a real vacation for ages.” Well, Rob was all in favor of Julio coming and I quote: “An excellent way to get this boy out of reach of the tentacles of
Los Pícaros
.” And I think he wanted to be within reach of my mom. So that's how we got to be a caravan of three cars. Digger, Teresa, and Julio rode in one, Jenna and Josh in another, and my mom and me and Rob the Scarecrow, who had suddenly declared that he desperately needed to get out of Miami for a few days, in the third. All heading for the Old Harmony Refuge for New World Primates in Old Harmony, Georgia.

I guess we were quite a sight en route. I mean, at every stop out came two wheelchairs and in them the two crips and then the grown-ups and Julio, who got a lot of suspicious looks because he's Latino. It makes me pretty mad when I see people who are bigots. I never got to use the word
bigot
before. You might like to know there's a story about it that it goes back to Rollo, who was a Viking and became the first duke of Normandy. He supposedly refused to kiss the foot of the French King Charles III in the year 911 and said, “
by got
.” Probably he meant
by God I won't.
Charles was also known as Charles the Simple but I couldn't find out why. It may just be a story to explain how bigot got to mean somebody who for no reason hates people who aren't just like him.

It was pretty comical sometimes, all of us unloading just to buy some sandwiches and juice or iced tea at the convenience stores attached to the gas stations, where “the facilities” were sometimes okay and sometimes disgusting. When they were disgusting I made a point of wheeling up to the cash register and telling the clerk loudly enough to be heard all through the store. I mean, I wasn't exactly the shot heard 'round the world but I think I made a tiny difference.

As for the motel going and coming, Josh and I did actually go swimming twice. This neat pool had steps with a big pole to hold onto and Josh and I could boost ourselves right into the shallow end. Julio did an awesome belly flop from the deep end to start us off. We stayed in taking turns playing Marco Polo till our fingers were prunes and we all were really bushed. In case you don't know the game, it's a kind of tag and the person who is “it” has to swim around with his eyes closed. The other person with his eyes open tries to stay away from him. The “it” player calls out “Marco” and the other player has to answer “Polo” and this goes on until the “it” player catches up with the other and tags him and then they change places.

 

And at night we got to see two terrible movies—sci-fi, which I hate, but Julio and Josh both love them, so I suffered along. I mean, I just can't get into these characters from different galaxies. I have enough trouble with our own mortals. “Mortals from Earth”—that's what they always call us and it gives me goosebumps every time.

Finally and none too soon, our destination! We didn't need the GPS to tell us we had arrived, with Old Harmony Bank on one corner and Old Harmony Feed and Grain Store cattycorner to it. The Old Harmony Café two doors down advertised sandwiches and cold drinks along with the coffee. Everything else in Old Harmony was the sanctuary. It had a special campus set aside for little New World monkeys, squirrel monkeys, spider monkeys, capuchins, and several kinds of tamarins. Most primate refuges deal with chimps, sometimes left over from the entertainment industry, and rhesus macaques, discarded from medical experiments. Old Harmony had some of these on a separate campus but the main focus was on the tamarins. Once we were all installed in a nearby motel which incidentally didn't have a pool, we went over to meet the director, Ms. Marybel Goodspeed, who turned out to be the woman with the loud voice.

Digger wore his chief of police uniform to make the visit look more official but as it turned out he didn't need to because Marybel Goodspeed was used to all kinds of official visits from governors to health officers to the FBI tracking down points of origin for stolen primates.

What I liked about Marybel was she never once asked about the wheelchairs. She talked to us like normals. She took one look at Julio who saved all those tamarins and hugged him! He just stood there wrapped in her arms wondering what had happened. Her Southern accent was harder than Spanish but we gradually got the hang of it. And let's face it, think how we sound to her. Like creatures from a foreign country, I bet. We talk through our noses and people in New England put
r
's on the ends of things like
parkar
and
drawr
. And what about
sawr
? I sawr a bird. That made me think about Henry and his
flors
and
strub-bries
and wanting
a'sister livin'
for his mother. I sort of wished he could have come along and seen Old Harmony.

Then we all got a tour of the campus where lots of the monkeys had been used in the Air Force space experiments and in medical research, which you don't want to know about, believe me. Some with only one hand, two blind chimps, some looking starved from having been used to test the toxic effects of certain medicines. Those crippled monkeys had been through a lot.

After that, she took us out to the New World's forest, that's what she called it, only it came out
fahest
, and at first I thought she was saying
farthest
but then I caught on. There were several rescued capuchins—some people call them organ-grinder monkeys—and squirrel monkeys she said had been captured in Colombia and put up for sale. The tamarins were living in a cluster of live oaks with lots of nests up high and plenty of bushes growing in what is known as the understory. It wasn't a rain forest but it looked very airy and nice and it was clean. There was a moat all around and a tall fence around the moat. Marybel said we couldn't go in because we would contaminate the monkeys and if Julio took the job he would have to be thoroughly disinfected before he could begin work. So he just stood outside their sanctuary and called to them in the same sort of chuckles and trills Trippy and I had heard that first day. He sounded just like them. You couldn't really be sure they were answering him or that they recognized his voice but the level of their chatter definitely went up. Marybel was impressed. She didn't say anything but there was an admiring look on her face so I thought that was a good sign.

There wasn't any paperwork involved because as Marybel said, “We'ah operatin on good faith.” She and Julio shook hands on it. I thought he looked a little afraid she was going to hug him again. He was promised time off and airfare from Savannah to Miami when Jeb Blanco's case came to trial, which according to the Scarecrow might take a year, so we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. I think that's his favorite expression.

Another sweet thing is, the job came with an apartment on the grounds, which we did get to see. I thought it was pretty grim—one room with a bed, a table, and a lamp. And second room with the smallest fridge ever made plus a microwave and a hot plate, which is two burners to cook stuff on. Julio said, “This is a palace compared to the shack I was living in.”

I had to agree. I can't really think of that shack without thinking of the trapdoor and the ladder and the whole . . . abduction.

Marybel said, “I think if things
wukk
out I might could locate a couch and a TV.” She also said she would help him with his study plan for the GED exam. It turns out that The Hammer had already been helping him with his algebra, so he was rounding second base on the way to third. That was Rob's call.

Marybel thought the office computer could be freed for Julio's use after five p.m. Mom said, “If you email me your English essays I will send them back with comments. Be sure you use the spelling and grammar app on the computer. It will help you to see where your mistakes are.”

Still, it was hard saying goodbye to Julio. Everybody acted very cheerful but I felt sad. I've never been good at goodbyes so when he bent down to give me a half hug I had to pinch myself to keep from letting any tears leak out.