Dada 153

The air conditioning had faltered again and the jury were wiping the sweat from their brow in the late afternoon. Most crimes he told them paled into significance besides the loathing inspired by my callousness to say nothing of the damage done to the wider reputation of these islands.. ‘This man who is morally implicated in his grandfather’s death and complicit by his own traitorous activity is no less fit to have a place in the community than those other men he resides with on the dark edge of our society and indeed.’ He returned to the unbroken necklace theme, my Dada’s death, the fight on the beach where Iskra was slashed and full of rage the hunting down and killing those two poor white boys who did nothing more than to be exorbitant with their voices. The murderous silence of the prisoners intentions as he parachuted back to reality amid the paranoid gloom of the drug locally entitled…..’ Here he took a cursory look at his papers, ‘Ya Bang’. ‘Yes ladies and gentlemen I am convinced one siege led to another, just as one fishing boat follows another to the sea that brought those two poor boys to our island and that also led to their deaths by the hand of this murderous son of Sarawak. He raised his voice a tone, ‘you will not find I am exaggerating the case against the prisoner when I say that he is guilty of a series of murders, to be sentenced by this court. I look to you for a verdict accordingly’. The prosecutor paused to wipe the sweat off his face. He then explained that his duty was a painful one but he would do it without flinching. ‘This man has no place in the community whose basic principles of law he flouts with such compunction. Nor heartless as he is, has he any claims to mercy. I ask you to impose the extreme penalty of the law and I do so without qualm. In the course of a long career in which it has often been my duty to ask for a capital sentence, never have I have felt that painful duty to weigh so lightly on my mind as it does with this case. It demands a verdict of murder without extenuating circumstances. I am following not only the dictates of my conscience and sacred obligation but those also of natural and righteous indignation I feel at the sight of a criminal devoid of even the least of human feeling’. When the prosecutor sat down there was that silence. This time it seemed to contain a greater resonance, a meaning beyond shock. I was quite overcome by the heat and drone of his voice and amazement at what I had been hearing. That was not me he was talking about but a shadow, some lurid memory of myself and the Dada he had woven into the fabric of his imagination. The presiding judge gave a low cough and asked me in a short voice if I had anything to say. I rose and as I felt in the mood to speak, I said that I had no intention of killing those white boys. The judge replied that this statement would be taken into consideration by the court. Meanwhile he would be glad to hear before my counsel addressed the court, what were the motives of my crime. So far, he had to admit, he had not fully understood the grounds for my defence.