“It would be highly improbable that you had ten thousand dollars,” Judd remarked, and everyone laughed at the jibe.

Dr. Ball asked the boys to tell their story, and Artie began to relate it all over again in every detail. There were elaborate shiftings around, Judd using a filing cabinet as a table. There were thank-yous at the water cooler. All this, we learned at the trial, was being noted down by Dr. Stauffer – the responsiveness, the well-oriented behaviour, the ability to carry on the complex recital through incessant interruptions.

When Artie had completely finished his story, Dr. Ball looked from one to the other and inquired, in a tone of unaffected curiosity, “But can you tell me why you did it?”

“I don’t know why on earth I did it!” Judd blurted out.

Artie was silent.

At that moment, Judd’s father entered the room.

That morning was the first time Judah Steiner had called for the car since the thing had happened. He had not seen Emil since the papers had said it was the chaufeur’s unexpected story that had proved to be the last straw causing Artie to break down and confess.

Emil stood holding the car door open, as always. Judah Steiner stopped for a moment before getting into the car. “I don’t blame you, Emil,” he said. “You did what your conscience told you.”

Emil gulped some words, how sorry he was. They drove downtown.

Judah Steiner went up to the same door where, a few nights before, he had appeared as a proud man to make his presence felt. Today he walked uncertainly, dazed, bewildered. All his measurements of life had proven wrong. As he entered, he heard those words of Judd’s in the high clacky voice, “I don’t know why on earth I did it!” and at the same moment their eyes met.

Judd said, “Hello, Dad.”

The State’s Attorney was the first to break the silence. “Is there anything we can do for you, Mr. Steiner?”

“No, no, sir.” Perhaps Steiner felt he had already received the answer to whatever had brought him there.

“Did you wish to speak with your son alone for a few moments?”

“Did you get me a lawyer?” Judd demanded, without waiting.

“Yes,” his father said. “That is arranged. We have engaged the best. Mr. Jonathan Wilk will defend you.”

A look of triumph came onto Judd’s face. He turned involuntarily to Artie, forgetting for the moment their estrangement. Artie was grinning.

The father was still looking at his son, his head beginning to shake slightly from side to side. Judd said, “I’m sorry this happened.”

“Yes,” Steiner said. “We are all sorry.” He turned and withdrew.

From there, he had Emil drive him to the Wilk apartment. Max was there, with the rest, in the library with its overflow of books in piles on the floor.

Judd’s father inquired after Mr. and Mrs. Straus. How were they?

“Lewis took them to Charlevoix,” Gerald said. “Doctor’s orders.” Randolph Straus had a bad heart. Mrs. Straus had fallen into a state of depression. “It’s best for them to leave. What can they do here?” And the hounds, the stupid dirty hounds of the public had already started on them, Gerald said bitterly. Anonymous phone calls, even telegrams.

Judah Steiner listened. Yes, it was better they should go.

With all this hysteria, said Ferdinand Feldscher, there was only one course – to delay. To wait for things to die down.

“Horn will scream his head off if you try any delay,” Wilk said. “We all know him.” No, they had to get right to work on a defence. Unfortunately, Dr. Ball had already been nabbed by the state. So had Dr. Ralph Tierney. Of course there were others.

Edgar Feldscher had his intent, concentrated look. He offered his thought. “Why can’t we both use them, if they’re the best?”

Wilk’s eyes lighted up as he caught the idea, but the others were all staring at Edgar Feldscher, uncomprehendingly. He elaborated. Why not make a truly honest, serious attempt to get the best, the latest that modern science could offer, to have a joint comprehensive study made of the boys? Wouldn’t it inspire public confidence, reduce some of this hostility, if both sides agreed to use the same scientific study?

“And after all that,” Wilk said with melancholy humour, “some totally ignorant layman on the jury will decide on their sanity according to how he likes their faces.”

All looked to Wilk, the swayer of juries. He drew his hand slowly along his cheek. Just then Mrs. Wilk, with a slight groan, passed him a copy of the Sunday Examiner, pointing to an account of Judd’s conversation while retracing the trail of the crime. Wilk read it aloud: “Young Steiner also discussed the possibility of a guilty plea, saying the best thing for him and for Artie might be to avoid a jury and go before a friendly judge. With their family millions-”

“Well,” said Wilk dryly, “if we don’t get at those boys and make them stop talking, they’ll hang themselves for sure, judge or jury.”

“If they haven’t already,” Ferdinand Feldscher muttered.

Meanwhile an item in another column had caught his brother’s eye. It was about a meeting of psychiatrists, opening in Atlantic City. The top men in the country would all be there. Edgar pointed out excitedly.

Gerald spoke decisively. “Somebody better take the night train to Atlantic City.”

Judah Steiner seemed scarcely to have been following the details, but as the group broke up he drew Edgar Feldscher aside. In an almost ashamed voice, he asked, “Could it be that we are doing wrong to try to defend them?” Edgar Feldscher studied him, his large serious eyes seeming to know the full meaning. “I am trying to think,” Judah Steiner said, “if they were not our sons.”

Edgar Feldscher placed his hand on the older man’s shoulder. “Our conception of justice requires a defence. That’s why justice holds the scales blindfolded. So as not to see the monsters.”

Judah Steiner’s head was beginning to shake again. “You feel that anybody has to be defended, no matter what he did?”

“Yes,” Feldscher said with his small, rather worried smile. “Everyone. That is the basis of our law. Everyone is entitled to a defence.”

Steiner’s head steadied. “Then you believe we are not responsible for what we do?” he asked, heavily.

“Yes, we are responsible. But when our behaviour becomes abnormal, there are causes, pressures from outside and from inside, and the individual needs help to overcome such terrible pressures. Besides, there is the whole question of the kind of punishment. Take these boys-” and the way he said it, they could be strangers. “What would be served by their execution? Judd has already shown so much creative power.”

Again, the father’s eyes filmed. He did not try to hide the tears from Feldscher. “If he is allowed to live, even in prison he might repay with some good-”

“Yes. That is what I thought.”

“But what made them do it?” the father asked.

“Who knows?” the lawyer repeated. “I look at all this as human energy we’re dealing with, free energy, a natural force, which we try all our lives to control. Like electricity, which we use and control, even if we don’t understand its nature. What we have in us, this energy, is a flow of force, and sometimes a part of it flashes out, like lightning.” Judah Steiner was staring at him, unhappily. “I know it doesn’t exactly fit, but it seems to me, and the newer psychologists try to explain it this way, we all have this psychic energy, and we have to channelize it, but sometimes, like a baby – a baby doesn’t know good from bad – it lets through every impulse, what it wants it does, what it wants it seizes.”

“But how can they be still like babies? They are grown, brilliant, intelligent boys.”

“Some parts of us can stay ungrown; in some parts of us we are still like babies,” Feldscher said. “We use it in our daily conversation – we say someone is infantile. You can’t blame a baby for what it does.”