“I like to think we’re more than hired guns.”
“So, Victor, you show yourself to be a romantic. Very good.”
“I was wondering,” I said, trying to change the conversation to a safer subject. “How soon do you think we can close on the Saltz settlement?”
Prescott laughed. “Maybe I stand corrected. I’ll have Madeline work the night on it. We can close as soon as your clients sign releases.”
“Terrific,” I said, trying to fight the smile. “The sooner the better.”
“We’ll do everything we can to accommodate you. Everything.”
Normally I hated Republicans, there was something oily and insincere about them. I didn’t care much for weepy hearted Democrats, either, but it was Republicans who really set me off. Maybe it was that theirs was the party of big money and I had none. Maybe it was that their cure for every ill was a cut in the capital gains tax when I had never in my life had a capital gain. Or maybe it was just that when a Republican pulled you aside to explain that assault weapons were as wholesomely American as apple pie and DDT, or that ketchup really was a vegetable, the blather would all come out of a self-satisfied George Willian smirk that you would slug if you were on the fifth-grade playground. Normally I hated Republicans, but there was something about Prescott that I couldn’t help but like: his formality, his honesty, the way he exuded integrity. There was about him and his portrait gallery an air of noblesse oblige that I admired. Most likely my newfound affection derived from the fact that he had just given me forty grand, but for whatever reason I felt the glow of good fellowship in his office, even as we disagreed on the political issues of the day.
“Come over here,” he said, leading me to his desk. “Sit down for a minute, Victor.” He lowered himself into the deep maroon desk chair and leaned forward, hands clasped before him. I sat stiffly in one of the upholstered chairs.
“Now that your calendar has suddenly cleared for the next month,” he said, “I might have an opportunity for you.” That ominous word again. “I was impressed with the way you handled the Saltz case. Your tenacity. I read your briefs. Very solid. We pride ourselves on teaching our associates how to litigate here, but you can only teach so much. We can’t teach how to spin gold from straw; it is either innate or it will never be learned.”
“Our case isn’t mere straw.”
He waved away my comment. “We’ve settled.” He clenched his fist and shook it at me with affection. “Tenacity. Victor, I think you’re a terrific lawyer, yes I do.” He looked at me as if he were deciding something about my face. “Ever do any criminal work?”
“Some. DUI, a few drug cases that pleaded out. I tried one aggravated assault to verdict.”
“How did it go?”
“Fine, until the jury came back.”
“Juries can be like that. The only lawyers who never lose a case are the ones who won’t try the tough ones. Do much federal work?”
“Yes, sir. It’s the only way to get to a jury before the client expires from old age.”
“Ever appear before Judge Gimbel?”
“No, but I heard he’s a tough old bird.”
“Yes, he is,” said Prescott. “A little overdone for my liking, too.”
I rubbed my chin to wipe off whatever it was he was staring at. Then he leaned farther forward. His voice became conspiratorially soft. “Jimmy Moore, the councilman.”
“I know of him.”
“He and his chief aide, Chester Concannon, are under indictment for extortion and racketeering.”
“Yes. I know that also.”
“Moore is accused of using his City Council post to try to extort a million and a half dollars from the owner of the nightclub Bissonette’s.”
“That’s a lot of dollars,” I said.
“Yes, it is. He’s accused of actually getting five hundred thousand. He is also accused of brutally beating Zack Bissonette, the former baseball player who was also part owner of the club, because Bissonette had tried to interfere in the extortion plot. Finally, he is accused of burning down Bissonette’s because the payments stopped. All very serious charges that, if true, would make Jimmy Moore a monster. I represent him.”
“Good luck,” I said, without really meaning it. From everything I had read about the case in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Moore was guilty as hell and going to spend many, many years in a federal prison. And the whole city knew that Bissonette, a retired second baseman who had been a darling of the Veterans Stadium crowd, was still in a coma from the beating.
“Frankly, Moore’s politics are the exact opposite of mine,” said Prescott. “But in court that doesn’t matter. Now, Chester Concannon, the aide, was represented by my old friend Pete McCrae.”
“It’s a shame what happened to him,” I said. McCrae was an obese Republican politico who had recently died in a Chinatown restaurant. They had thought it was a heart attack until they cut open his throat at the autopsy and found a large, fatty piece of duck lodged there. Dr. Heimlich, I guess, was dining elsewhere that night.
“A tragedy,” agreed Prescott. “But now Chester Concannon needs new counsel. I was impressed with the way you handled the Saltz case and I thought you might want the opportunity.”
“I’m flattered,” I said.
“You should be. Trial is in two weeks.”
“Wait a second,” I said. “If trial’s in two weeks I won’t have time to prepare.”
“Everything you’ll need we have here for you, the documents, copies of the government’s tapes.” He gestured at the piles on his conference table. “We’ve done all the discovery already and McCrae’s files are readily available.”
“I’d be thrilled to handle it, Mr. Prescott. But I would need more time. What’s the chance of getting a continuance?”
“We don’t want a continuance. For political reasons the government indicted too soon, hoping to affect this fall’s election. Now they’re stuck going to trial with an incomplete investigation. And Bissonette is still in the hospital, unable to testify. They’re hoping he revives. We think, due to the weakness of their case, it’s to our advantage to get to trial before he does. We’ve opposed every motion for a continuance and asserted our rights under the Speedy Trial Act. The government wants a delay but the judge is holding to the trial date so long as the defense agrees. We need someone who can get up to speed quickly and be ready to go in two weeks.”
“I can’t be ready to try a major criminal case in two weeks.”
“Actually, you won’t have to. McCrae, before his visit to Ying’s Peking Duck House, was satisfied to let me present a joint defense on behalf of both defendants. He found, and I’m sure you will too, that if we stand together we can turn the government’s case into cheesecloth. I believe we could be a very effective team, Victor. And if you’re able to take this case, other work together could be arranged. I often used McCrae for outside counsel and gave him cases we couldn’t handle ourselves because of a conflict. He built up quite a lucrative practice that way. You could, too.”
“I’m very interested in the other work, Mr. Prescott, very, but I just don’t think I can accept this case. The Rules of Professional Conduct won’t allow me to take a case where I couldn’t be adequately prepared.”
He pressed his lips together and then began writing on a pad. Without looking up at me he said, “That’s fine, Victor. We’re not always ready to seize our opportunities, no matter how transient they may be. I understand completely. Janice will show you out.”
I waited for a moment, waited for him to look up and smile, waited for him to again tell me how good a lawyer I was and all that we could do together, but he didn’t say another word, concentrating instead only on the pad upon which he wrote. After more than a few moments of waiting I rose and headed for his door.