Compelling Evidence (2 page)

Wong's is definitely a cut above his usual ghtly haunts. Harry Hinds has come with me this evening for little moral support. He has become my shadow of late. The ing voice of wisdom, Harry is a generation older than 1, another wyer eternally on the make for a good case. To Harry a good se is any fee‐paying client. He has the little office down the hall m my own. In recent months, it seems, Harry Hinds and I have ome soulmates. To look at Harry and his career, where he has en and where he is going, this does not bode well for me. "Mr. Madriani, it's good to see you again." Jay Wong's voice Lrries, even in the din from the crowded bar. He nods politely, hesitates for a moment, then reaches around for Harry. He taps him lightly on the shoulder and Harturns.

"Sir, there's no smoking in the restaurant." Wong points to a atly stenciled sign on the rostrum where reservations are taken. ity ordinance," he says. Harry's dangling a half‐spent cigarette from his lips. A dusting of ash covers the lapels of his dark blue suit coat.

"Oh, sure."

He takes the butt from his lips and for an looks absently down at the deep pile carpet. Wong produces ashtray before he can act, and Harry dutifully crushes the W, in the dish as it disappears behind the rostrum. Wong turns to me again. "We haven't seen you for some time," he says. "A few months." I lie. I've not been in the place since Prrj', P&S. I'd been a regular at Wong's for lunch at least Uff week for the three years I was with the firm‐authorized to the Potter, Skarpellos tab when entertaining clients. I can

"Ir that Jay Wong has missed me. I look

good, he says. I've lost some weight, he notes. We raw nerve. "How's your lovely wife?"

I'd forgotten. Nikki and I dined at Wong's on one srorw‐L@ in celebration, the night I was invited to join Potter's firm. amazed that, with the procession of traffic through these Wong can remember her. But then that is his special talent..1 "Oh she's fine‐fine." I say it with conviction, @s)ie‐#AWTU details‐that we are no longer living together, and that I M for several months, and despite my efforts to restore my viii,‐@ marriage, been anticipating the service of divorce papers. Then I see him moving from a table in the dining room roe the bar. Ben Potter. Tall, well over six feet, though I oremi‐3 " ever been accurately measured. He has one of those me1scm, shoulders rounded and hunched forward a little, the gait slightly lumbering. He wears his usual dark vested sweater li, his suit coat. Together with his bearing, this wrinkled bulk We the image of some mighty bear aimlessly foraging for meat I ‐t a tree. He has managed to exploit this awkward posture, ore, as his own, so that a generation of law students who have under him in the evenings at the'university now mimic this 4 when addressing juries. It's an attitude that on Ben is not M11 aging, but stately, deliberative. He stops at a table to chat with friends like some z M‐171.1my passing out dispensations. I hear hearty laughter from room.

Then a quiet retort by Ben. They laugh again. Wong says something, but I've missed it. "Hmm?" I look back at him. He's.tracked on my line ot like radar.

@ o : "How about that Ben Potter," he says. "Word is, he's on his w., to Washington, uh?"

From Wong, such rumors take on, credence. I've been considering this subject for days, anticipating phone Ml@, from the press. Ben Potter now heads a dwindling list of to fill a vacancy on the nation's high court, a position ‐(t, which he has aspired his entire professional life. It's now within grasp, the result of careful political alliances he's cultivated for %Yio‐ decades, and the considerate if sudden death of one of the MM‐suqt." The FBI's already hit me for a background check, for dirt. For the first couple of minutes with two agents in my office, I thought they'd gotten scuttlebutt about and me. I was satisfied by the time they left that they had M@W, on that score. "Can I get you gentlemen a table?" Wong is back to us. "Just gonna have a drink at the bar for now." With Harry ivii@ decided it's best to take it slow. If we're careful, he can Mrs r, the social bends. He's a good lawyer, but when it comes o,entertainment his comfort zone is limited to wide spots on @ roads, where red neon buzzes

"Miller" or

"Bud." Like his T‐Mhgii

Harry's learned to dodge challenges in the after hours. We negotiate the maze of small cocktail tables near the bar. his followed closely by Harry, like Bwana on safari. I scan the 1Y.I. for any vacant stools, an open space to park our bodies, to MT‐7v;@ from public view until I can find a quiet comer to talk Itew.‐ with Ben. The bartender, clad in starched white linen to the cuffs, cruises D111 and slips a cocktail napkin on the bar before me, all effii look to Harry. He orders a beer.

"Scotch over with a twist."

"Quite a place," he says. But I can tell he's uncomfortable. "Lotta deals cut here," I say. "I'll bet. Looks like they all have fleas." I look at him, a question mark. "Lotsa back‐scratchin' going' down." This is not the kind of iill uwi‐)tbri@ Harry's used to. I can tell from his tone that he prefers ,!‐ straightforward pitch of honest crime. The starched bartender returns with Harry's beer and my I leave an open tab.

To pay by the drink isn't done; IT s the sign of a tourist out for a look at the high rollers. 10 The place is peopled with the usual crowd of political =1:rt mostly lobbyists plying their trade. Few lawyers except for 1@" upper‐crust corporate set venture here. The freight is too. ‐imqj I ? : "But you'll be happy to know it's not terminal.‐ "is that right?"

just a

"Oh yes. Eight out of ten doctors will tell you it,s A;*; il‐‐in your pencil," he says. I take a sip of scotch, turn my head‐and I see her. She is a tawny perpetual tan, lustrous in blue silk with pearl

*‐loo.10, Disease."

I raise an eyebrow. "Today, the scientific literature refers to it as severe distended I an ether. She is, oblivious. She sits silent, detached, a surrounded by animation at the table. There's another, younger man, all dapper in an expensive dark hair slicked down in the style of a Madison Avenue ad, hint of five‐o'clock shadow gracing sallow cheeks. He sits U; IF‐ 1"9r toward ;;@. I can't believe it. It's as if the great giver of all ‐_ had landed one dead‐center with a meat cleaver on his chin, an instant I wonder. ,vater under die bridge," says Harry.

he only person I've told. "More like my career over the falls," I say.

"What's that I smell?" He sniffs the air. "Is it the Now. regrett' "You bet. Like burnt toast. What can I say? I was stupid.Z@ "You're too hard on yourself." He's making a careful mt appraisal of Talia, taking it all in‐the meets and bounds. "She is spectacular," he says. , 1

.1 11 and es good looks are undeniable, like the theorems L'I M

geometry. Her beauty is the kind that causes both mer;'aidvi, to stop and stare. Along with this, she exudes a sexual 101‐tuladvantage. "W.it up with Vour anaivsis though, There is," he *v certain degree of dementia involved in shtuppin' the boss's analysis. That's Harry. No sugar coating. it may be contagious."

As we talk, he's been eyeing Talia's tabli. He gestures with his head in her direction. Harry's intercepted one of her "come hither" looks wafted across the table like mustard gas. "The guy with the chipped chin, one of the firm's associates?" he asks. "That'd be my guess."

"Well, the poor man's suffering from chronic, dissociative, shortly.

Then he'll be looking for a new job. I think we're witnessing the outbreak of an epidemic."

Harry doesn't have a high opinion of Talia. To him my fall from complex.

She is, at least from my perspective, not the harlot he supposes. "Aside from humping your patron's wife, what did you do at the firmt' he asks.

"That's delicate."

"You want delicate, you talk to your Priest. You come to a iriend, you get candor. Tell me about the cases."

"A smorgasbord. Mostly business stuff, some crimes, a little at me over his shoulder. "H'Ien lbouoskisneqsusizazflictabileyperpetrators wear business suits and susfttmi.@@. They steal from investors with convoluted option clauses M., q m‐V A A :‐‐ 11 "Ah." He says it with relish, as if he's finally found someone q the world of, t‐ ... I.I tell Harry about Potter's formative5y‐ears . 1, @, US tt‐‐ : ‐ Ben had cut his teeth Ponzi scheme that ended in 774,' white‐collar scams‐a crude. Y"

ve 71M '"nt, 12 turned to the defense and started the firm. Now the clients ,I A ‐A the h@lsi ness I more complicated, some of them even legitimate. "Bet it pays well," says Harry. "In a heavy case, defending a corporation or its officers, common that you get a six‐figure retainer."

Harry whistles. "it, s what the polite criminal defense bar calls

'."fftv.T‐ 7Y M.% I say. "And there's no stigma. If you work it right, it ‐ TM, neatly into the folds between the firm's other more c4zi clients."

Harry has some difficulty comprehending this. In the last cade the criminal defense bar has taken it politically on the 11 0 .. ‐‐.7 ‐k, ‐N

they defend, passed over for judicial appointments, and lq@uexcluded from polite society and its upper‐crust functions. 0' Harry catches the bartender going by and orders another orq‐@ understand it, it can't convict. The art of defending a *)sitio e he trusted, under his nose.

When he found his out, Ben called me in, did a lot of shouting. When he'd ven.te@dwas sloing it with someon pleen, I left, went back to my office, and started packing boxes." I take a drink. "In the end, I guess you could say I fell on my own sword."

Harry laughs. I look at him and catch the unintended pun. "No doubt about it," he says. "Should've kept it sheathed."

"Next time I'll put a knot in it."

"Don't look now, but it's time for penance." Hany's looking up into the beveled olass . U‐ i tis my stomach. Potter's surveying the bar. He sees me, he i tes Us@ enough to tug a little, remove a few of the wrinkles frosmtahis I I @ e s eading a band across the floor. One of the summer intems coined A I 17V called it. Though Potter is as Gentile as Pontius Pilate, e I th 00 fit. His look, wrinkles around theiaw and neck, head I I‐A gravity. The chips always fall on your client's side of the ‐1 my back like a wave before I turn. float the Love Boat. He knew Talia was playing around." _k Ir's all very casual like a surprise. e For a moment I think to myself. It plays like a silent t‐1. "Ben." I smile @id extend a hand. I am almost stunned when my brain. Ben had talked to me one day over @P MWW@M,. v takes it. potter,s expression is an en, . Th_ ,!,I _r myself that he had no details, that he was in the dark 6witt, T "Been a while," he says. "After all the years we've known other, thought it was time we talked. Your departure was" searches for the right choice of words‐‐‐‐@'a little abrupt." '.7 notoriously understated, in his attire and in this case his tion of my wholesale flight from the firm. He smiles. "Can I get you a drinkt' I ask him. "Thought we might do that in Jay's office while we talk." 0' turns again to Harry. "You don't mind if I take Paul away i, few minutes?" ,"Oh no. No. Keep him as long as you like." There's a 1, M " grin on Harry's face, like he's warning me‐telling me to Potter's hands. I grab my glass. Ben turns toward the o1i begin to follow, do a quick pirouette and give a do" kind of shrug in Harry's direction. As I turn, Harry s 7,11 up a slip of paper.

Suddenly I comprehend the expression ‐c face. While I'm cloistered with Ben in Wong's office, be drinking on my open bar tab. Wong's office, it seems, is an appropriate setting for my ie@,! with Befi. It has the hushed earthy tones, the muted )stgfrtw1òf a tony funeral parlor. An imposing bronze Buddha, I life, sits in an alcove behind Wong's antique desk. I MITI'from the floor, it casts an ominous shadow across the 6AM;.1 some corpulent genie awaiting the order of its liberator. Ben leads me to another area of the room, toward two sofas facing each other, separated by a clear glass pedestal k@, table. He takes a seat on one sofa and gestures toward the t‐' "Sit down," His tone has lost the veneer of polite TMMI, that we're alone.

1@ He looks at me silently, soulfully, his lips drawn tight, @f slot to his inner thoughts. I sink into the sofa and wait 1W.. words to bury me, in wisdom‐‐or wrath. i

"Before I forget," he says, "what do you want to

‐ MMIV, picks up a phone on a sofa‐side table. "Oh, the same. Scotch over," I say. "This one's on me.@'@, "Nonsense. This is my party." He says it without IM"71, much grace, then places the order. Ben's not drinking Z‐,;7P This is no social outing.

.‐I We pass several seconds in idle chatter. He talks about a4l"111 at the firm since I left. He asks me how I like the solo He's killing time, getting my drink, the final interruption the way. I tell him honestly that it's a challenge. He admits that he made a mistake in hiring me. I can't tell whether he intends an insult by this. He hesitates for a moment, then explains himself7‐that born leaders don't fit the corporat'e mold, that I was destined for bigger things than hitching my wagon to someone else's star. it's awkward, I conclude, being patronized by someone I admire. The waiter comes in with my drink, and Potter tells him to, put t on his tab. There's a glaze of light off the flat horn‐rim. lenses Ben is wearing. These are new. I can't see his eyes clearly. The familiar half‐frame cheaters for reading are in his sweater pocket. I can see them sticking out. "I've done a lot of thinking during the past several months," he says. "That's two of us. What can L. He holds up a hand, cuts me off. Ben's not looking for confessions. "What's done is done," he says. "We can't change it. We can only diminish ourselves by wallowing in past mistakes., I think I know you well enough," he says. "I think I know how you feel."

He leaves no opening for me to respond but rises from the sofa and walks toward the desk: "In the end the ancients‐the Greeks‐always said it best. There really is no witness so terrible, no accuser so powerful as the conscience that dwells in each of us."

He's speaking now almost to himself, his back to me as he puts distance between us, as if absolution is to be my own Private, solitary affair. I sit silent on the couch, my gaze cast down at the ice floating n my drink. "What's said here, tonight, between us, is an end of it," he says. "We have an understandingt' "Sure," I say.. An easy concession. I have no desire to stoke these coals. What is happening here is necessary if I am ever to )e able to look Ben in the eye again. "We will never speak of this thing again, then."