He answered himself, as he definitely can’t afford a secretary. I said, “Hey, Harry, Drummond here. I need a favor.”
“Whatever. You got a friend who needs good representation? I’ve got a busy calendar but I’ll see if I can squeeze him in.”
Nice try-Harry hadn’t seen a busy calendar since law school, leave aside that I’d never commit a friend to his feeble hands. I said, “Actually, I’m looking for an attorney who speaks Russian, and speaks it really well. Know any?”
“A few.”
“I also need it to be someone who either has, or can get, a security clearance. Have I just made the problem too hard?”
“Nope. Katrina Mazorski… she used to have some kind of government job. She works out of her home in the District, doing criminal stuff mostly.”
“You know her, or of her?”
“Know her, Sean, but only vaguely. She hangs out sometimes at the Fourteenth Street precinct, scrounging scraps off what the night shift drags in. We’ve shared a few late-night cups of coffee.”
One of the things I love about Army law is that my clients fall into my lap off a conveyer belt. Spending all night in police stations begging pimps and whores and muggers for work is a part of the profession law schools don’t advertise. Funny thing, huh?
I asked Harry, “Would you happen to have her number?”
“Somewhere…” He began opening and slamming drawers. This lasted awhile, as organizational skills were another of Harry’s weaknesses. “Found it,” he finally mumbled.
I thanked him, jammed in another seventy-five cents, and she answered on the first ring. I said, “Katrina Mazorski?”
“Yeah.”
“My name’s Drummond. Harry Zinster gave me your name.”
“I know Harry.”
“Well, uh, Harry told me you speak Russian. Is that speak it like you can order a beer and hot dog or like you could have a long, frank discussion with a Russian rocket scientist?”
There was a quick, harsh chuckle. “Look, I couldn’t have a long, frank discussion with a rocket scientist in any language. If you mean, am I a native-quality speaker, yeah.”
I noted that she had an interesting voice-deeper than most female voices, husky even. A picture formed inside my head of a woman of about thirty, elegant, mysterious, seductive. It would be too much to try to add a physical description to that picture, although one can always hope.
I asked, “How’d you learn it?”
“From my parents.”
“How’d they learn it?”
“From their parents. I hope there’s a point to this discussion.”
“There’s a point. I’m a JAG officer, assigned a case that requires me to have a Russian-speaking co-counsel.”
“I see. And you’re thinking of me?”
“Harry also said you used to have a government job. What did you do?”
“I was a translations clerk at State.”
“Did you have a clearance?”
“Yes. A Top Secret.”
This was sounding too good to be true. I asked, “Can you drop everything and come meet me?”
“I, uh… is this an interview?”
“It’s only a temporary job, maybe a few months, and it’ll involve some travel. That satisfactory with you?”
“Maybe.”
I gave her the address for my office and then raced back to get ready. Imelda awarded me a testy frown, hrummphed a few times, and threw a stack of yellow phone message slips at me. She was very unhappy with me. Granted, she was being subtle, but I could tell. I killed time returning calls.
Then came a knock at the door and Imelda stuck her puzzled face in. “Some lady here… says she’s supposed to interview with you.”
“Katrina Mazorski?”
“Same one. She ain’t an attorney, is she?”
“Why?”
Imelda’s eyebrows merged with her hairline, and a moment later Katrina Mazorski stepped through the portal. I had stood up to shake, only my arm froze-call it a momentary paralysis. She had on skintight, hip-hugging, black leather pants, a halter top with a black bra peeking out, maroonish lipstick, a silver bead in her left nostril, and a silver hoop poking out of her naked navel. Her hair was dark and hung straight, and her eyes were brown, or possibly green. She had wide shoulders, no waist to speak of, long, slender legs, and she was pretty-and yes, okay, sexy, too, just not in the way I’m used to girls being pretty… or sexy. Along the lines of Sandra Bullock pretty, only clownishly made up, with a few bangles punched through her skin.
“You’re, uh, you’re Miss Mazorski?”
She slid into the chair in front of my desk. “My friends call me Kate, but you’re not my friend yet, so Katrina will do fine. What do I call you?”
“Sean Drummond’s my name. Of course my friends call me Sean. Why don’t you call me Major?”
She tipped back on the chair, grinned, and replied, “That’s cool. What’s the gig?”
“Gig?”
“Y’know, the case?”
We stared at each other a moment. I finally said, “I’d like to ask the questions. Silly as that might sound, I read a management book once and it said that’s the way these interview things are supposed to work.”
“Fire away,” she said. “That’s how you guys talk, right?”
I rolled my eyes. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-nine.”
“When’d you graduate from law school?”
“Two years ago. Maryland… night school.”
“And what have you been doing since graduation?”
“A little of this, a little of that.”
“I don’t mean to pry, but could you be more descriptive?”
“Okay… I spent the first few months passing the D.C. and Virginia bars and interviewing with firms. And then-”
“And did you get any offers?” I interrupted.
She appeared amused. “A few.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I got several invitations to sleep with the interviewers. Do you want to hear the details?”
“No, I, uh… let’s skip that. The firm route didn’t work out.”
“You got the picture.”
I was nodding when she asked, “What about you?”
“I’m sorry?”
She bent forward. “What about you? Where’d you go to law school? How long have you been a JAG officer? What do you expect from me?”
There still seemed to be some confusion about whose interview this was. I swallowed my irritation and replied, “Georgetown Law eight years ago. For five years before that I was an infantry officer. And I’m interviewing you to become a member of the defense team for General William Morrison.”
She slumped back in her chair. “Morrison… the spy?”
“Same guy. Interested?”
“Uh, yeah… I’m interested. What do you expect from me?”
“We’ll figure that out as we go along.”
She considered this a moment, then said, “Do I get involved in the criminal case or do you expect me to be a glorified paralegal?”
I have a good memory and was sure I told her I was interviewing her. I allowed a long, cold moment to pass. “This is a military case that involves espionage. The Army picked two top guns to prosecute. You said you went to U of Maryland night school, right? They have the top-drawer lawyers of the CIA and the Justice Department at their beck and call. There’s going to more Ivy League degrees trying to fry my client than you can count. So tell me… what can you contribute?”
She laughed. “I speak excellent Russian.”
“Well there you have it. Married?”
“No.”
“Ever been married?”
“No again.”
“A U.S. citizen?”
“My mother and father emigrated ten years before I was born.”
“Any limitations on travel or long hours?”
“No limitations. What’s it pay?”
“I can get you one-fifty a day, plus expenses. It’s no great shake, but the Army’s stingy. And incidentally, that’s about what the Army pays me.”
“I’ll take it.”
“Well, that presents a problem,” I politely noted. “I didn’t offer it yet.”
“You’re going to.” She chuckled. “You’re definitely going to.”