Forgiving Ararat by Gita Nazareth

started he became very efficient and caught the largest crayfish of the day—a wise old granddaddy of a crustacean the size of a small baby lobster. Although by far the biggest and most powerful crayfish in his collection, it was too heavy and slow to defend itself against the younger ones and became the first casualty in Lenny’s bucket. Lenny looked genuinely remorseful when the big crayfish died. I knew he’d be easy to convict for the murder.
    I called him to the witness stand—a flat piece of river rock resting on a platform of sticks—and told him to raise his right hand. We recognized no right against self-incrimination along the banks of the Little Juniata River; all defendants were forced to testify.
    “Do you swear to tell the whole truth, Lenny Basilio, so help you God?” I said.
    Lenny shrugged his shoulders and sat down.
    I placed his bucket before him, fetid and stinking, filled with crayfish parts. “Did you put these crayfish in this bucket?”
    Lenny looked into the pail and then over at his buddies.
    “Remember, Lenny,” I warned him, “you’re under oath. You’ll be struck dead by a bolt of lightning if you lie.”
    Lenny let out a whine. “But the crayfish pinched me first!”
    “Yes or no?” I said. “Did you fill this bucket with crayfish?”
    “Yes.”
    “That’s right, you did. And after you filled it, you stirred it up so the crayfish would snap at each other, didn’t you?”
    Before Lenny could answer, I dredged through the water and pulled out the lifeless granddaddy crayfish, already turning white in the heat like a steamed jumbo shrimp. Its right pincer had been amputated, just like my right arm. I showed the crayfish to the jury and made them take a good long look at it; although a few of them snickered and made coarse jokes, the expressions on most of their faces suggested that even they were appalled and saddened by what had happened. Then I showed it defiantly to Karen, who shook her head silently, and turned back to Lenny.
    “You did this, didn’t you Lenny Basilio?” I said. “You killed it. You put it in your bucket and killed it. Now it’ll never see its family again. What if somebody reached down here right now and pulled you off that rock and put you in a bucket?”
    “But I didn’t mean to,” Lenny pleaded. He looked like he was about to cry.
    I dropped the crayfish into the bucket and turned toward the jury in disgust. “The prosecution rests.”
    “Guilty! Guilty!” the boys all cheered.
    “Wait a minute,” I said sagely. “You’ve got to vote on it to make it official. We have to take a poll. John Gaines, what say you?” I spoke the way the courtroom tipstave spoke while polling the jury during my trial.
    John Gaines glared at Lenny. “Guilty,” he said, leaning forward and barring his teeth for effect. “Guilty as sin.”
    “Mike Kelly, what say you?”
    “Guilty!” he said with enthusiasm.
    “Ok,” I said. “Robby...I don’t know your last name.”
    “Temin.”
    “Robby Temin, what say you?”
    Robby looked sympathetically at Lenny. “Guilty,” he whispered.
    “Jimmy Reece?”
    Jimmy threw a rock at Lenny and laughed. “Guilty...and he’s a crybaby too!”
    The boys all laughed.
    I slid behind the judge’s bench and banged a stone against the river rock. “Order in the court!” I hollered. “Order in the court!” The boys became silent instantly. I was impressed with my newfound power.
    “Wally Nearhoof, what say you?”
    Wally glared back at me, full of insolence and venom. He was the biggest and meanest boy, the bully of the bunch. Everybody was afraid of Wally Nearhoof, including me. He had a look of malice about him, and he held it for a long time on me, boring through me like the twist of a drill.
    “Not guilty,” he said, keeping his fixed eyes on me.
    My jaw dropped. Before I could protest, the other boys chimed in: “What? Not guilty? No way! He’s as guilty as the devil!”
    “I said, not guilty,” Wally