Thirty Days of Justice
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I'm guessing the letter found me. Thanks to a bit of research from someone at the jail. Maybe a counselor, maybe a priest. Whatever the letter is hunted me down. It came to my office here in Washington, D. C. I worked for the U. S. Attorney. A current assignment is the prosecution of terrorists. I work out of a secluded office and I'm guarded 24 7 by the U. S. Marshals Service for this letter to have found me scrolled away behind the Washington Beltway. It's a minor miracle, but here it iss centered among the piles of legal files covering my desk in my wood paneled, windowless office. And there it remains for hours. Lunch comes and goes My chance. I noticed the letter again, so I pull it out of the envelope and re read it. Letters like it are common. Prisoners across the country are desperate for someone to come Save them. This letter in the small white envelope with his upside down stamps looks to me like one Maury 11th hour cry for help by someone who figures she is somehow related to me or has a special bond with me because she read about me or whatever, so I instinctively back off. It isn't the first time someone has tried to draw me in with a lost child scheme. Now here we are again, a new daughter. I don't think so. I try to imagine where the young woman came from his I read it yet again, but this time I'm struck by one gotcha She knows about Millicent. My Millicent Detour was nearly 30 years ago. That's a long time in reverse for appear stranger to know about. I re read the crude handwriting and try to imagine the writer's predicament. But then I catch myself. First degree murder charges are terrible cases for any lawyer, at least 10 times more so for the defendant. This is calm, pounded by the fact that police aren't out there just randomly arresting people who might have killed someone 99% of the time. They've got the goods, eyeball up the letter and toss it into my waste basket. But that isn't conclusive enough, so I I fish it out smooth wrinkles that run it through my shredder. I turned back to my real work, the job that makes it possible for me to feed and shelter my real family, the same job that keeps fertilizer bombs beyond the White House fence. Our usual quitting time rolls around. It's summertime here in Washington. July 3rd. Actually, tomorrow is fireworks and a picnic on the Capitol Mall with my wife and kids, followed by a movie at home. A war war to feature about stalwarts sub Mariners just after Pearl Harbor. HBO runs it every year on July 4th. The kids have seen it before. It's become our July 4th ritual. Are Relaxing Day, a lazy family day for this father, the wife he adores and their three Children. Plus it falls on a Tuesday, which means most staff will take off the rest of the week. I won't be one of those playing hookey, however, because I'm a newbie here and have drawn some duty days no one else wanted. I turned back to my chores, but the letter from someone claiming to be my daughter won't stay away. It has surfaced again in my thoughts. What if she really is your child? What would you do about it? And I draw a deep breath and stare at the paper shredder. Too late. Whoever you are. But there is one thing I want to know about Washington State law. And so I checked the Washington murder statute. I read how a murder charge can be enhanced, and so a defendant will face execution of convicted. It raises the hairs on my neck to think of anyone dying at the hands of any state. These are the same governments that screw up just about every service they offer, maybe 100 times every day. So how can they be trusted with someone's very life? It's bad enough how often they convict the wrong guys over and over until the innocent project hopefully steps in. Makes things right. Well, suddenly I'm anxious. I'm disturbed. My stomach burns. Something inside of me just won't leave it alone. Hi. Swallow down a Prilosec and I shoved my normal job to the back burner. My conscience forces me to consider the letter problem with the most open mind I can muster. Millicent, the writers mother was a woman I'd had a two week thing with after my first divorce. Now someone's claiming that fortnight produced a child. Never once, I swear it. Did Millicent contact me to tell me I'd fathered a child. If she had, I would have stepped up and been a good dad. But she didn't contact me. Not a call, not a card, not a lawsuit for fraternity. Nothing, Which doesn't surprise me. Actually, the Millicent Evans I knew had been fiercely independent. She would never marry. She swore terribly, influenced by watching her mother's abuse at the hands of millicents. Stepfather. Raging alcoholic. I'm interrupted by Warner Johns, who mans the office next to mine. He's holding a Slurpee and a briefcase, clearly leaving for the week, and I'm annoyed. Jealous, actually. Don't let the marshal shoot anyone till I get back. Michael, can you do that? Not to worry. I've collected all their guns and locked them in my desk. Good Onya. You want me to drop by with backyard burgers on Sunday? Don't father. Have you dared open the kitchen refrigerators? There's enough moldy cheese in there to start a health food restaurant. I'll survive. Maybe have my urinary tract infection cured. Funny man, I mean the mold. Like penicillin for infections. He nods. Sadly, Say hi to Verona. Do the same with Angelina Warner. Have yourself a grand old time later Hey, one thing. What would you do if someone claiming to be your daughter wrote you a letter? What if she asked you to come savour from first degree murder charge? I'd go. Why? What if you didn't know if she was really your daughter? I go find out. You get a letter like that? I did. Then go and see. You won't sleep until you do. How would you know if she really your daughter, find out if she's a chronic worrier? If she is, you've got your kid, right? Who's her mother? A Millicent. Somebody. What? You don't even know her last name? It was a long time ago, Warner. Sheesh. He walks off shaking his head when I knew her. Millicent was working part time as a medical researcher at the University of California in San Diego and had a second job in Loya. I met her when I was taking a little get over it time. Following a hateful divorce, I was burned out in California, looked like the place toe walk on the sand and listen to the waves and let my heart bleed out all its agony and pain. One wave of the time which I did. But while I was there settling in Loya, I met Millie. We spent 10 of my 14 days together. Meli was brilliant, an engaging conversationalist, a biology theorist. Plus, she spotted the kinds of wicked humor that has always turned my head. She had come to California from Mississippi, where her father was a sharecropper. He owned a team of mules, three goats, nothing more. While she was growing up after saving every penny for a year, he bought her a Greyhound ticket, put together three lunches and three suppers that wouldn't need refrigeration past your 5 $20 bills and kissed her goodbye. That was so long ago that Millicent boarding the bus and we've learned, was told by the driver to sit in the rear with the other colors. Four days later, she climbed down off that bus in San Diego. She stretched and gulped down her first Pacific air, then made a vow. Millicents swore the ride from Waveland to San Diego would be the last time she ever rode in the back of any public transportation. She was free of south by God, and that meant she would be riding up front from then on turned out. Millicent had a brain. A great brain. Eight years after climbing down out of the Greyhound, she had earned a PhD in microbiology. She graduated with honors high honors. On graduation day, she was plucked from the roles of the unemployed by a startup genetics lab in Loya. This was way before the world was sequencing D N a. T eliminate a teeming Petri dish of frightening diseases that a long plagued mankind. So this cash Evans, I retrieved your name from the back side of the envelope. His millicents daughter. Well, she certainly hasn't learned spelling under her mother's tutelage. Sure, it's Justice J U S. T. I. S. Seriously, whatever happened to the common spelling of the word justice? G u S t I C E. Which is where I have to catch myself. I've just learned I maybe have another daughter, and the best I can come up with is a critique of her spelling. For the love of my hands automatically dial the phone number on the flap, a short burst of ringing in another on the third ring of voice answers Spokane County Detention Services. My name is Michael Gresham. I need to speak to a prisoner by the name of Cash Evans. I'm sorry, Mr Gresham, but we're not operating a switchboard for inmates. Please call during the regular visiting hours. She's about to hang up. I can hear it in her tone, but I catch her. I'm Miss Evans. Attorney like to speak with my client. Please, let's not complicate this fine July day The line goes silent. I hope I'm on hold, But I don't know The voice comes on the line A voice I've never heard before A voice that claims to be passed down from me Hello, Cash Evans. Who's this? Michael Gresham. You sent me a letter. Oh, my dad. Long pause. Then who actually called me? Evidently I did. I have a few questions for you. Shoot, sir. First off, first off you say Millicent Evans was Your mother is my mother. She's still alive and kicking down in La Hoya. Is she? Ah. Is she married? My goodness, You don't waste any time, do you? Must be where I got my hot blood. It sure wasn't my mom. She never met a man she didn't hate. I'm just the opposite. I live for engaging with the male species. Great. She lives for men. That's just what a fund father wants to hear out of the gate.