Emerson Lake, newsdealer, sixty-five. If not born in a cool pocket of the White Mountains, he should have been. Humanity gleamed in him like an ember under the crust of a clotted briar pipe.
Emma Beales, forty, housewife. Smooth round conscientious face, all hell on civic duty. Never plagued with an original idea, capable of talking both arms off at the deltoids, but not a bad old girl. Edith estimated that she must have made about twenty portraits of Emma every year; it was only in the bad moods that they all looked alike.
Stella Wainwright, thirty-seven, grade school teacher. Her brown hair curved in what Edith decided was a natural wave, not helped by her dowdy muddy-brown dress. The kids probably liked her; she would not be expected to teach them much about the passion and confusion of the world: not for Stella the sweat and garbage, the sunrises and the music of moon-drenched nights, the labors of love, the fields of cornflowers, the screaming in the disturbed ward. They had people to take care of all that stuff while Stella taught social studies. But on this jury Stella would do her best, and it might be good enough.
Elizabeth Grant, twenty-six, housewife. How could life write on a face of dough? Unfair, maybe; nevertheless Edith distrusted Mrs. Grant, reflecting what atrocious cruelty can be accomplished by well-meaning souls devoid of humor and imagination. The woman was opaque, her simplest answers under voir dire examination sounding like quotations from a wholesome family magazine.
Ralph LaSalle, thirty-one, shoe-store clerk. Cecil Warner and Hunter, Edith supposed, would both have recognized the minority he represented. His mask was good, the too-long blond hair and somewhat mannered accent betraying it. Cecil Warner might be counting on LaSalle to show fairness toward a white crow of another sort; Hunter possibly expected him to be hostile toward all women. Both lawyers could be wrong; Edith expected LaSalle to act and think simply as a human being with a good intelligence and rational sympathies.
Rachel Kleinman, housewife, forty-eight. They would be needing Mother Rachel at home; Edith hoped there was a daughter old enough to cook. But Rachel would stay with it; warmth and gentleness were in her; she would not knowingly burn another woman for a witch. And when Edith took the stand, she might look for this woman Rachel to understand why Callista Blake had smashed the heater and poured ice-water into her tank of tropical fish when she knew she was to be arrested.
Emmet Hoag, hardware salesman, twenty-nine. A little bit handsome, Edith noted—like a healthy pig. He would consider himself hell on the women until snared and housebroken by some broad-beamed breeder who knew what she wanted. A born No. 12 sure to go along with the majority: what else could he do? Well, Edith thought in a gust of weariness, he could drop dead.
Dolores Acevedo, secretary, twenty-nine—and actually not over thirty-five. Hair midnight black and skin of honey brown, born to be beautiful and surely knowing it with a simplicity too placid for vanity. By rights Dolores should be a rich man's mistress, maybe was. Edith also guessed that anywhere outside the region of sexual competition Dolores might be generous and kind, even very kind—and admitted that it was no more than a guess. For that matter, would a woman as outrageously lovely as Dolores ever get far enough from the sex arena for other elements of her nature to dominate? Nothing cold or contrived about that kind of beauty—warm as tropic night, Dolores. Yet she might also think, and reason, and be kind—she just might.
Helen Butler, fifty-two, gift-shop proprietor. And a Sunday painter, Edith doubtfully remembered. She had met Miss Butler a few months ago, when prowling the gift shop for book ends. Callista had not gone along, and Edith recalled she had not given Miss Butler her name, though they enjoyed a quarter-hour of small talk. Books mostly; some deprecating mention by Miss Butler of her landscape painting, or was it still life? Nothing in that to make the lady disqualify herself from the jury, if she remembered. A salty spirit with independent opinions, laughter wrinkles at the eyes, unmalicious wit. A bit old-maidish, maybe no great force of character. But intelligent, moderate, good.