The detective pursed his lips, then leaned forward and said, “As I said, since B positive is pretty uncommon, it’s highly unlikely, but I guess it’s possible.”

“Objection, Your Honor!” Potter said.

The judge glanced at the DA, sighed, and said, “Detective Billick, please just answer the counsel’s question.”

“I’m not going to be impeached by him.”

The judge leaned over his bench toward the witness and said, “Work with me here, Dick. No one’s impeaching you. Just answer the questions he asks. No extras.”

“So, it is possible, yes?” Potter asked, tilting his head back and closing one eye to better see the witness through the cleanest spot in his lens.

The detective looked up at the judge, then the jury, then at Potter, and said, “Yes.”

Potter slapped his hand on the corner of the defense table.

“And just because no one has been able to find the person outside Gilly’s Trackside Pub who my client did cut with a knife doesn’t mean that person couldn’t be the one whose blood was on my client’s knife, does it? Yes or no, sir. Yes or no.”

“Yes or no what?” the detective asked.

Potter coiled himself up a like a spring, as if the ill-conceived brown rug on his head might pop right off, his face reddening further as he looked to the judge.

“Just rephrase the question, Mr. Potter,” the judge said patiently, “so the witness can give you your answer.”

“I don’t have time for this,” Potter said, his pale blue eyes igniting as a yellowed forefinger popped up in the air. “I don’t like being played.”

“No one’s playing you, Jeremiah, just ask him again and cut to it, please,” the judge said. “I’m even confused by what you just said.”

Potter closed his eyes and mouth as if in prayer and stayed that way while he asked through pinched lips, “Is it possible the blood on my client’s knife came from a man outside the bar?”