Blue Eyes Far Away
MacKinlay Kantor
When neighbors climbed the steep hill road to bring
Esther Lee the news they did not want to bring, they
found their task easier than they had expected.
She was sitting on a bench under the old cedar tree.
Her blue eyes seemed very empty and blank behind her
glasses.
“Mrs. Lee,” said George Dutton uneasily, “we came to
tell you-there’s been an accident and your husband
was-. They took him to the hospital. I think you’d
better come, right away.”
Joseph Lee’s wife didn’t say anything. Slowly she
rose to her feet. The wide black purse on her lap slid
to the ground.
George Dutton turned away while his wife put her arm
around Esther Lee’s shoulders. “Now, Mrs. Lee-he’s
hurt bad, but maybe he’ll be all right.”
“It was an automobile accident,” the farmer said.
“The highway police have got the fellow that hit him,
too. If it’s possible to convict him, we’re going to
do it.”
Convict him, thought Esther Lee. That meant, then
that Joseph was--
“Can we go now?” she asked.
“Yes. Our car is right out here at the gate. Don’t
you want to lock your house? And what about your
purse?”
“Leave them be,” the woman said quietly.
It was a flimsy case, a weak case at best. It was
really no case at all-except that a man had been
killed when his car was struck by the powerful bright
red automobile of a young man.
The curse in the road had been deserted at the time
of the accident. The two men were the only ones there.
But noise of the crash had drawn people from all
directions.
The police checked the record of Archie Stolt, the
man who drove the red automobile. It was found that he
had been involved in several other accidents. His
reputation for wild and reckless driving was known.
But you can’t convict a man on his reputation, said
the young fellow’s lawyers.
The young man was charged with manslaughter. But
after that things moved slowly.
Interest in the case was not great. Joseph Lee was
neither a wealthy nor a well-known man. The courtroom
was not crowded. The defense knew that in the case of
the State of New Jersey versus Archie Stolt, matters
would be simple, routine. The case would cost Archie
Stolt money. But he could well afford it. The defense
did not know, however, that the night before the trial
began, a small, elderly woman in a shabby cloth dress
and old black hat went to see the prosecutor.
The defense lawyers for Mr. Stolt shrugged when they
was her sitting in court. A weak attempt, they
whispered, to get sympathy from the jury.
Esther Lee was the last witness called by the State.
Earlier they had tried to put in the record Archie
Stolt’s other accidents and his bad reputation. But
woman said she was Esther Lee, widow of Joseph Lee who
had been killed.
“Where do you live, Mrs. Lee:” came the prosecutor’s
question.
“On Watchung Mountain.”
“Were you home on the afternoon of June 20th, at
about 5:30 P.M?”
“Yes, sir,” said Esther Lee.
The lawyer cleared his throat. “Mrs. Lee, how long
have you lived there?”
“Well,” she said in her mild voice, “quite a while.
See, when Joseph and I were first married, we lived
down at Barnegat. He fished. We lived there for
thirty-one years. And then his nephew left him this
place up on Watchung Mountain. We were getting older,
so we moved up there. We lived there for nearly eleven
years. We...“
“Your honor,” said Archie Stolt’s lawyer, “I object.
The answers by the witness have nothing to do with
the case and are beside the point. They are only
intended to gain sympathy for...“
The judge rapped. “Objection sustained.”
The next question came like an explosion through the
close air of the courtroom. “Mrs. Lee, did you see the
accident in which your husband met his death?”
The woman nodded yes. Her reply was lost in the
sudden stir and scuffling as people moved forward.
“Tell the court what you saw.”
“Well,” said Esther Lee, “Joseph had gone to Union.
He drove there everyday because he had good customers
there. I sat out in front, always, to watch for him. I
always used to do that, when he fished at Barnegat_”
Archie Stolt’s lawyer was on his feet, but the
prosecutor motioned him into his chair. “Tell only
about the accident, please,” he said to Esther Lee.
Esther Lee’s blue eyes were wet. “I watched Joseph’s
old car come around a bend in the road,” she said
slowly, “and he was on the right side of the road. And
then the red car came from the other way- on the wrong
side of the road. And-Joseph’s car swung out toward
the middle-to try and miss it, I guess. But the other
car swung out, too…. They hit. That’s all, sir. But
the red car was on the wrong side of...”
“Your Honor!” cried the lawyer for the defense.
Archie Stolt settled back into his chair with a
scornful smile on his face. They couldn’t pull
anything like that and get away with it.
“I object!” said the lawyer for the defense. “It was
not possible for Esther Lee to have seen the accident
from so far away! Not possible! The scene of the
accident is miles from her home. I ...”
The judge turned and looked solemnly at the old
woman. “I must remind you,” he said, “that telling a
lie here is a very serious offense. You have sworn t
tell nothing but he truth. How far is it from your
home to the scene of the accident?”
“Must be a good three miles,” whispered Esther Lee.
Three miles… People in the courtroom shook their
heads.
The woman’s rough fingers fumbled as she opened the
black purse on her lap. “I always watched for Joseph,
though,” she said. “Just like I used to do when he’d
come in with his fish at Barnegat.”
She held up a shiny brass telescope. “This was his,”
she explained. “I always watched for Joseph, when he
came home.”