“You know I represent Chester Concannon.”
“Sure,” he said, webbing his hands behind his head. “You took Pete McCrae’s spot. Too bad about him, huh?” A broad smile hid his evident grief.
“On Concannon’s behalf,” I said, “I’m looking into the Bissonette murder.” Prescott had said it didn’t really matter who killed Zack Bissonette, but I couldn’t agree. My client had been accused of killing that man and it was my job to do what I could to defend him. Investigating Bissonette’s murder might not have been in strict accordance with my client’s orders, sure, but I didn’t figure I was risking much by snooping around. If it turned up nothing, no one would ever need to know, and if it turned up something, well, maybe I’d be a hero. So the night before, standing in my tuxedo in the Roundhouse courtroom, with derelicts staring down at me from the glass-enclosed bleachers up above, I had pulled Slocum aside for a few seconds while the defendants were in the lockup and Prescott was out raising bail and I had set up this meeting.
“Your federal trial starts in a week and a half,” said Slocum. “My advice, Carl? Go back to your office and finish preparing for that trial. This will keep.”
“My team’s working on the federal case,” I said.
“How many people in your office?”
“Two.”
“I thought so,” he said with a scornful laugh. “Make a discovery request and I’ll consider it in due time.”
“I don’t have due time. I was hoping I could get something right now.”
He dropped his feet from the desk and leaned forward, his hands now clasped angelically before him. He smiled a broad smile and his eyes, even through his thick round glasses, were glistening. “It’s a sad thing how often in this life our hopes go unfulfilled.”
My eyes started watering as he continued to flash that broad, dashing smile and for an instant I didn’t know what to do so I did what I sometimes do when I don’t know what to do, I laughed, and he laughed with me and we both laughed together, laughed loud and long, laughed hysterically at how he had all the power over me at this meeting and could send me home with nothing if he chose and it looked like he was choosing exactly that. We laughed so hard that he had to take off his glasses to wipe tears from his eyes and I pressed the palms of my hands into my own eyes as if I could squeeze back the water and we laughed some more at how wildly we were laughing. We let our laughter gear down into guffaws and into chuckles until finally we were only shaking our heads in amazement at how hard we had laughed before. And then I stopped even chuckling when I realized there was nothing funny about it.
“So,” I said. “What about it? Am I going to get some help?”
“File your motions,” he said. “The discovery judge should get to them maybe sometime next month.” He started laughing again, but this time I didn’t join in. Polite requests obviously weren’t going to work. I could think of only one gambit, weak though it was, that might.
“If I have to file the motions,” I said, “I’ll file the motions, but that will take a lot of time.”
“Which you don’t have. You agreed to the trial date, didn’t you?”
“I agreed, but I’ll tell the judge I’m not getting the cooperation I expected and I need more time. He’ll chew the hell out of me.”
“That he will.”
“But then he’ll give it to me.”
“Prescott will love that,” said Slocum.
“No, Prescott won’t be happy,” I said with a shrug. “But you know who will be thrilled?”
“Who?”
“Your buddy Marshall Eggert, who’s anxious as hell for some sort of delay because he needs more time to prepare for the biggest trial of his career as a federal prosecutor and he’s terrified of blowing it.”
As soon as I said Eggert’s name any remnant of Slocum’s smile fled from his face. “That skinny little bastard,” said Slocum. “I was good to go on the attempted murder charges when he got the Attorney General herself to convince the DA to let the feds try Moore first on his racketeering crap. Except for that your clients are scumballs, I’d like nothing better than to see him shoot a blank.” He stopped talking for a moment and gave me a strange look. It was a strange look coming from him because I sensed it was almost a look of respect. “But you knew that, didn’t you?”
“I suspected,” I said. “He seems to be concerned that there’s a lot of money he can’t account for, money that seems to have disappeared.”
“Only a quarter million,” said Slocum. “But Eggert’s concerned about more than just that. The murder evidence is pretty tight but there are other holes that he hasn’t yet filled and he knows it. They overreached in their indictment.” He rubbed his mouth for a moment and then said, “I assume, Carl, that you are now making a formal discovery request.”
“That’s right,” I said.
“And in view of extenuating circumstances you are seeking to receive the information immediately or the prosecution of a major racketeering case will be delayed, inconveniencing the court and all parties, including the Assistant United States Attorney, and delaying the swift and sure execution of justice.”
“Exactly,” I said.
“And these extenuating circumstances will be detailed in a letter that will be hand-delivered to this office first thing tomorrow morning along with a formal petition.”
“My secretary is typing it up this very instant,” I said.
“I’ll check upstairs and let you know by early tomorrow if I can free up a detective to sign out the evidence.” He rubbed his palm across his mouth again. “You know, Carl, my guess is you’re in way over your head.”
“Most likely,” I said.
“We are not lifeguards in this office,” he said. “Whatever trouble you get into, don’t be looking to us for help. My only goal here is to make sure that Jimmy Moore and Chet Concannon pay the steepest possible price for killing that man.”
“I understand,” I said.
“That’s good, Carl. You see, if I have to use you for a stepping stone as you flail about in the water, I don’t want you thinking you’ll get anything more from me than the bottom of my shoe on your face.”
12
I WAS IN MY OFFICE, on the phone to Dr. Louis Saltz, when she called. It was after hours, and Ellie was strictly nine to five, so I had to put Saltz on hold to answer the other line. When I realized who it was I felt the briefest moment of panic. “Hold on a moment,” I told her and then switched back to Saltz.
“Listen, Lou, something has come up. I have to run.”
“We’re set for tomorrow then, right?”
“Four-thirty in my offices,” I said.
“I got hold of the others and most will be there. I still have my doubts. You’re going to have to do some convincing to get me to agree, but I’ll wait for the others.”
“Lou,” I said. “Believe me when I tell you, this offer’s a gift. We should take it and be giddy.”
“Be good, pal,” he said and then he was off.
I sat at my desk for a moment, the light on my phone blinking to indicate a caller on hold, and thought about how much trouble that call could be, how disastrous it could turn out if I took it, but then, smack in the middle of my sensible thoughts, I punched her line. “Ho,” I said. “I’m back.”
“Mr. Carl? Jimmy told me to call you if I had any more troubles with my landlord,” said Veronica Ashland.
“I really don’t do much real estate work, Miss Ashland,” I said. “Maybe you should find someone else who knows what he’s doing. I could refer you.”
“I’m sure this isn’t too complicated for you,” she said. “It’s just that my landlord wants to evict me.”
“Have you been paying your rent?”
“Sort of.”
“Well, that’s sort of the problem, I guess,” I said. “Landlords generally want their rent paid on time.”