Suspicion of Innocence (15 page)

She knocked at Larry's open door and went in.

Larry had a stunning office, twenty feet square, thickly carpeted, and decorated with polished antiques. There were a couple of Cubist paintings by minor but respectable French artists, which the firm—Larry's grandfather, Reginald Black, to be accurate—had purchased back in the forties. By the windows Larry kept a brass telescope on a stand. He could watch the cruise ships heading out from the Port of Miami. All of this had been in place long before he made partner, as if the designation were only a formality—which, given his bloodlines, it probably was.

Larry himself stood by his desk, snapping shut his briefcase. He glanced around.

"Gail. Just in time. I have a flight to Tallahassee, but I wanted to speak to you first. Close the door, would you?"

"What's up?" Gail asked.

He motioned her toward the striped settee under the windows and sat beside her. "I ran into Doug Hartwell last night."

"Did you?" She knew immediately where this conversation was going: Nancy Darden, Hartwell's daughter.

"Yes, Doug flew down from D.C. for a congressional fundraiser. A group of us from the firm went. Big party at the Hyatt Regency afterwards."

Gail smiled. "How exciting."

Larry casually crossed his legs. "Doug says Nancy's a little concerned about her case. He asked if I'd see what's going on." Larry's gray eyes told Gail there was hot water somewhere, but he would be damned if he'd be the one to fall into it.

She spoke slowly. "Do I understand that Nancy Darden has gone over my head to speak to her
father?"

"I know." Larry lifted a long, thin hand off his knee. "I mentioned to Doug that you've had some family obligations to attend to recently, after losing your sister."

"My sister's death has not affected my job one iota," Gail said. "If Nancy Darden is concerned about her case, the least she could do is speak to me directly."

"I'm not yelling at you. I want to understand where the conflict lies."

"You know the real problem as well as I do. Senator Hartwell's darling daughter doesn't have to pay two cents in legal fees. She sends me in to get bloodied while she watches from the hill with her parasol and box lunch."

Larry pursed his lips. Gail wondered why she had bothered making a joke. The man had no sense of humor.

She started again. "As I explained to you and Jack Warner over lunch last week, the other side has been putting up roadblocks for months. I managed to set a date for taking depositions, but the case may be settled first."

His high forehead puckered into a frown. She continued. "Nancy and I have been playing telephone tag for days. I got in touch with Bill Darden at his medical office this morning—finally—and he told me to go ahead and see what the other attorney and I can work out. What more can I do, Larry? Tell me. Would Nancy like to review my time sheets?"

He looked uncomfortable. "The loss of revenue is a problem. We count it under JNR—justifiable nonrecoverable—but it's going to adversely affect our division's year-end totals."

"Look, if Nancy Darden doesn't like the way I'm handling the case, give it to Bob Wilcox. It wouldn't hurt my feelings."
 

One corner of Larry's mouth rose. "It has been suggested—not by myself—that a male attorney might have more success dealing with Hispanics."

Gail laughed. "Fine. Take the case yourself.
Buena suerte."

Larry was silent for a few moments, then said, "You say the other side is being stubborn as well?" She nodded.

He pulled on his earlobe. "I think what we have to do is put pressure on this Pedrosa fellow from another angle. He still wants to purchase Judge Strickland's property, doesn't he?"

"As far as I know. Why?"

"And there's no contract yet?"

"No. Ben's trying to decide how much he really wants to sell it for." Gail paused. "Wait a minute. If you're suggesting that we connect these two transactions ..."

"As long as Ben is fully informed, it's worth considering." He arched his eyebrows, waiting for a response.

It was also, Gail knew, clearly against the rules. "I wouldn't be comfortable with that," she said. "And I'm sure the other attorney would have something to say about legal ethics."

"There are ways to be subtle." Larry's eyes seemed to glide along the fringed border of his oriental rug. "One thing about Cubans—they're quick to understand subtleties. A very pragmatic people. Carlos Pedrosa isn't the only buyer out there, and he should know that."

Gail finally said, "Let me see what I can work out with the other attorney this afternoon before we start panicking."

"Ethics can't be viewed narrowly," Larry said. "You have to remember that you are
right.
Your clients are difficult, granted, but they are in the right. That's the basis for legal ethics, knowing that what you do is
right."
 

She and Larry looked at each other for a few seconds. Finally he gave her what he might have intended as a professorial smile. She idly noticed that his bottom teeth overlapped, too crowded in his narrow jaw.

"You know, Gail, as attorneys we're all going to get into difficult situations. That's what we get paid for, isn't it? To be able to handle them. And we can't resort to abstractions to make the decisions for us. We have to rely on experience in the real world as well as on our inner belief. Do you follow?"

"I'll certainly do my best, Larry."

"I have consummate faith in your abilities." He pulled back his cuff. "Well, time to go." At the door he patted Gail's shoulder. "Keep me posted."

Her mind churning, Gail made her way along the corridor past other attorneys' offices, hearing through open doorways a few snatches of conversation, a message dictated, an unexpected peal of laughter. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly, then took a breath. The corridor seemed to go on forever, its end vanishing at a pinpoint.

She muttered to herself, "God almighty, how did I get into this line of work?"

It occurred to her, as she took a shortcut through the library, zigzagging between shelves of the
Southern Reporter,
that she ought to toss the damn case in Jack Warner's lap. He was the senior partner in the litigation division. She should make him decide what to do with it. If, however, she could also avoid making Larry Black look like the flaming idiot he was. Larry wouldn't forgive her for that, and it was Larry, after all, who wrote monthly reviews of her performance.

At the top of the stairs, Gail caught her heel on the first step. She grabbed at the curving balustrade and righted herself, then took a long, slow breath. She felt the familiar tickle in her chest, heart thudding against her breastbone.
 

Even if she went to Jack Warner, he would expect her to handle the Darden case to its conclusion. That was his way—trial by ordeal. She was in a pit and he would be waiting to see whether she could climb out of it. The last thing she should do was ask him to throw her a rope. Partners could levitate themselves upward on will alone.

The word around the office was that of half a dozen associates being reviewed for partnership, only two would be chosen. A credible estimate, given the sad facts of life in the legal profession these days: too many attorneys scrabbling for business in a saturated market. It wasn't enough, she realized, to be good at her job. She would have to be more than good. She would have to be brilliant.

On the way into her own office, Gail found Miriam on the telephone.

"... toda la noche,
and I slept not even an hour.
El niño me vuelve loca,
I'm telling you.
Pero
you can see where the tooth is coming in,
¿tú sabes?,
a little bump,
entonces
in a few days he'll be okay, my
mami
says.
Pobrecito, cómo llora."

Gail tapped on the glass partition and Miriam waved.
"Te llamo después,
okay? Bye." When Miriam looked back at Gail, her smile faded.

"Don't we have things to do besides chat with our friends on the telephone?" Gail spun around and crossed the corridor to her office.

Miriam followed, dumping a stack of files on Gail's desk. Her brown eyes snapped with anger.
"¿Qué te pasa?
I don't like to be talked to like that. I do my work, don't I?"

After a moment, Gail sank back into her chair. "Yes. I'm sorry. You do your work very well. Just try to remember there are other people around here to please besides me, okay?"

Miriam's chin was still raised, and she looked at Gail haughtily before she relented. "Okay."

Gail wanted to make amends. "Is Berto sick?"

"No, just teething." Miriam laughed, her bubbly humor back again. "He was screaming so loud Danny had to sleep on the couch last night, the first time we've slept apart since we got married. He says he's going to buy Berto a set of false teeth."

"I want a picture of that." Gail smiled, pulling the files across the desk. "Anybody call?"

Miriam held up four pink message slips. "That Metro-Dade policeman, Frank Britton, wants you to call him back."

"He'll have to wait."

"And the Indian, Jimmy Panther. He didn't say what it was in regard to." Gail only nodded. Miriam continued to flip through the messages. "Ben Strickland says he has some papers for you to sign. And your husband can't pick up Karen from ballet this afternoon."

Gail groaned softly. "Just great."

After Miriam went back across the hall, Gail angrily punched in the number for the marina and asked to speak to Dave. When he answered, she said, "This is Gail. I got your message about Karen."

"Yeah, I have to do an estimate up in Lauderdale."

"You were supposed to pick her up. I can't possibly leave work so early."

"What, have you got a trial or something?"

"You know very well I don't have a trial. I have a meeting. I have appointments. There is work I simply have to do today."

"Ask Irene. Maybe Irene can help."

"Irene is in no condition to go driving around Miami. She won't even leave the house to do her own grocery shopping."

"Jesus. Look, I have to go. I'm with a customer." "Damn it, Dave."

"I'm not the family chauffeur. You're her mother. You've got some responsibility in this, too."

"I know that. I know." Gail dug her fingers into her hair. "Okay. Can you take her with you?"

"What?"

"Pick her up on the way and take her with you. She likes to ride in the truck. I'll come by the marina on my way home."

After a long silence, Dave said, "All right. Try to get here before seven. I'm playing tennis tonight." He hung up.

Gail let the phone drop back into the cradle. She swiveled her chair around to face the window. What in God's name would she do if he left her?

As she continued to stare across her office, the cold possibility settled into her mind that he might do just that. She couldn't pretend they were riotously happy. Their marriage might die. And her first thought had not been how to save it, but what a separation would do to her schedule.

Gail shook her head as if to clear it. "I can't think of this now." She reached for the files, then remembered she had to call Ben.

Turner, Brown, Widdeman, Young & Strickland.

The brass letters spelling out Ben's last name shone more brightly than the others because they had been added more recently to the wood panel outside his sixth-floor office. The other names belonged to old buddies of his, men Ben used to go fishing with, or take up to Gainesville in his Winnebago for the University of Florida homecoming game.
 

Still flushed from her dash across Flagler Street, Gail opened the door to the waiting room, which was unoccupied except for a UPS delivery man talking through the little window to one of the secretaries. The room had dark green vinyl-covered chairs and a bookcase with an outdated set of
American Jurisprudence.
Framed prints of British barristers in wigs and billowing black robes were lined up over the long sofa. Gail had seen them advertised in the
Bar Journal.

When the delivery man moved away from the window, Gail stepped forward before the secretary could slide the frosted glass back into place. "I'm Gail Connor, here to see Judge Strickland." Ben wasn't a judge anymore, but he liked the title.

The woman looked at her in a blank but friendly way, obviously having forgotten Gail had been here before. "I'll tell him. Sit down." She pulled the window shut with one finger. Her red dress wavered behind the bubbly glass, then disappeared.

Gail leaned on the counter and read the titles of the brochures displayed in plastic holders.
Should I have a will? What if I am arrested? How will title insurance protect my home?

Ben had said if he'd known private practice was this good, he'd have left the bench years ago. Gail often wondered whom he was trying to convince. She knew he had enjoyed his position on the circuit court. Now he was just one more late-middle-aged attorney in a firm of them.

The inner door opened. "Gail, come on in." It was Ben. He wore no jacket and his tie was loosened. She followed his long strides past the secretarial area, then around a corner to his office.