A Fool for a Client (13 page)

“Are you sure you
have
anything in common?
I mean, like you said, you
’
ve never met him before.”

“Rick, if you can
’
t see it then it
’
s just as well that I
’
m conducting my own defence.”

He carried on eating, not understanding why Justine
’
s words hurt him.

It was Justine who reconnected the lines of communication between them.

“We
’
ve talked enough about me.
Tell me about yourself Rick.”

“Do you want the full story of the condensed version?”

She looked at her watch.

“We
’
re due back in court at two thirty.
You
’
d better strip it down to the basics.”

“I grew up in the
New York City
and graduated from high school at seventeen.
I did well on my SAT
’
s and got into
Columbia
where I majored in psychology.
I graduated summa cum laude and got into
Harvard
Law
School
where I graduated first in my class.
I did my legal internship with the Chief Justice of the
United States
and then took a job at the Legal Aid office.”

Parker
’
s brief summary of his personal paper chase had made light of the extraordinary difficulties he had faced every step of the way.
His relentless march towards the bar had been a succession of tough but carefully planned stages.

The young Rick Parker had passed up basketball games and parties in order to study, encouraged and urged on by his wise old uncle whose lavish praise convinced him of his own worth.
He took little part in high school sports but was a keen member of the debating society.

It was a difficult struggle, although the academic aspect was the least of his difficulties.
He sailed through what was supposed to be hard work with a minimum of effort.
The only problems were his brother
’
s fists and the Old Man
’
s belt during the Old Man
’
s brief interludes out of prison.
He discovered that there was a fundamental difference between his approach to learning and that of his peers.
They tried to memorize first and understand later.
His method of learning was more economical.
He sought to integrate any new fact or principle into his existing knowledge.
Once he
understood
something new it was automatically committed to memory with no need for further effort on his part.
All this to achieve an ambition that he had settled upon at the age of ten: to become a lawyer.

“You know we haven
’
t really talked about you at all,” he said cautiously. “I don
’
t mean the case I mean you personally.
Who you are where you come from.”

“You mean with all your lawyer
’
s emphasis on preparation and reading you didn
’
t have me checked out by a private dick or go snooping around my friends.”

“That
’
s not the way we do things in Legal Aid.
Besides, I didn
’
t have the money to hire a private investigator or the time to do it myself.”

“So you come right out with it,” she said approvingly.
“Well I like your style.
At least you
’
re straight.”

“So what about it?” he asked, sensing that “being straight” was very much part of her creed.
“Will the real Justine Levy please stand up.”

In the space of a few seconds, two emotions vied for control in Justine
’
s mind: regret and joy.
She frowned, threw back her head, smiled and then looked at the space on the table between their plates.

“I was born in 1973 when my father was in the ROTC program and my mother was working as a secretary to a real estate broker.
When I was two my father was sent to
Vietnam
as an adviser.
It was 1975 and he was one the last people to be sent there before the war ended.
I mean before it
really
ended.
He saw the fall of
Saigon
and the mad scramble of the people to get out before the Barbarians took over.
Then they brought him out, or at least what was left of him”

“In a coffin?”

“Yes and no.”

“Paralysed?
Injured?”

“He was blinded by a shell.”

“Shrapnel?”

“Rick for God
’
s sake will you stop trying to guess and let me tell it like it was!”

He swallowed nervously and mouthed a brief apology.

“It was concussion blindness.
Physically he made a complete recovery before he was even brought back.
He got his sight back within a few days.
But when you
’
re stuck out there on a battlefield with shells falling all around you, and you can
’
t even see what
’
s going on it does something to your mind.
That
’
s what happened to my father.
He was never the same.”

She broke off, as if fighting some inner conflict.
But she wouldn
’
t share it with Rick.
There was a part of her that still had to remain private.

“He came back suffering from what they now call
‘
post-traumatic stress disorder
’
.
He went through seven years of alternating passivity and violent spells.
Finally he splattered his brains all over the wall with his service revolver.”

Rick winced.
For all his legal work with street punks and the scum of the Earth he was still squeamish.

“Seven years?
That would have made you nine at the time.”

“That
’
s right.
I walked into the room just in time to see him do it.”

“Oh God...”

It was an unfamiliar feeling, the lump in his throat.
He stopped speaking, unwilling to trust his voice.

The enigma of Justine Levy was beginning, just beginning, to unravel.

“Wait, it gets worse later.
Anyway, that was the day I decided to study medicine.
Well, it was a good enough ambition, and I figured it was a good way to help people, and there was money in it which didn
’
t hurt either.
My mother gave me all the encouragement in the world.
She studied and took her real estate exams and became an real-estate agent herself.
Now I
’
m living in a duplex penthouse that we got for seven fifty grand, and it
’
s probably worth one and a half million now.
Then my mother got ill and it all started to fall apart.”

“What did she have?”

“Infiltrating lobular carcinoma.
It had already metastasized by the time it was detected.”

“What happened then?”

“I wanted to quit my studies and just stay home and take care of her, but she wouldn
’
t hear of it.
We had medical insurance and some money put aside, but to cover the costs of a day nurse and my medical studies we had to sell off some of her jewellery.
Only she refused to sell the apartment.
She wanted to keep it for me.
She didn
’
t know it, but I took a job as a waitress to supplement the income.
It was just as well because I wanted to make sure that she got a private room when it reached the point that she required hospitalization.

“And
then
what happened?” asked Rick, now wary of trying to anticipate the twists and turns of Justine
’
s life-history.

“I should think that
’
s obvious.
She died.
And now, at the ripe old age of twenty three, here I am all set to end my days of freedom on a murder rap.”

“How did you feel about not spending much time with your mother?”

He was looking for signs of guilt.

“I wanted to.
But she insisted that my studies must come first.
She knew that she wouldn
’
t be around much longer and she wanted to be sure that I had a secure future.
She didn
’
t want me to spend my whole life regretting the lost opportunities that had passed me by.
On her deathbed she told me that whatever I decided to do, I should do it well.
She told me that my good looks could be both a blessing and a curse.
I could use them to give me the pick of the men, but I could also lapse into a safe marriage for security and never get to make the most of my mind, because the alternative was all too easy.
She knew what it was like being married to the wrong man, I mean he
became
the wrong man, and she didn
’
t want me falling into that trap.”

“Did it come as a shock to you?”

“What?”

“Your mother
’
s death.”

“No, of course not.
I knew it was coming, even without my medical studies I knew it.
At first when it wasn
’
t clear how advanced the malignancy
was she tried to play it down and dismiss it from my mind.
But once she knew that it was terminal she made sure that I confronted reality and didn
’
t try to hide from it.
She made sure that I was prepared for the inevitable.
But it was still painful.
It was harder on me than for her.
She could take it, I couldn
’
t.
She forced me to accept it and prepare for what was to follow.
Even in her illness she was still the pillar that I had to lean on.”

“Did you resent it?”

“The fact that she gave me strength?
The fact that she showed me how to face up to tragedy?
The fact that she taught me how to stand on my own two feet so that I could give her the strength when the time came?
Would you have resented it?”

“I
’
m sorry.
It was a stupid question.”

He took a deep breath and let a moment of silence pass.

“Did anything happen to hasten her death?”

“No.
But nothing happened to stop it either.”

There was a trace of sharpness in the tone, a cutting edge of anger.
It seemed to strike at odd intervals, defying any pattern of expectation.

“When you objected to me defending you, was it because I
’
m a man?”

“You
’
re asking me if I hate men?” she asked incredulously.

“I
’
m trying to figure you out,” he admitted, too desperate to hide behind the stalking horse of small talk.

“You
’
re barking up the wrong tree.”

“I just thought that if your mother never remarried after your father
’
s death, maybe she was man-shy... and maybe it was contagious.”

“My mother was one of a kind.”

“Were you close to her?”

“Most of the time.”

He leaned forward again, but this time only slightly, almost imperceptibly.

“You mean you were estranged before she died?”

“No, nothing like that.
It
’
s just that there were times when we couldn
’
t talk too each other, at least about certain things.”

“Did you patch it up before she died?”

“Long before.
This was when I was in my early teens.”

“Can you talk about it now?”

She flicked her hair back girlishly and looked up at him.

“What do you want to know?”

“What was the problem?”

“It wasn
’
t
one
problem, it was lots of things.
I guess that was part of the problem.
I had too many things on my mind all at once. I was going through a bad patch at school and I swore I wasn
’
t going back there.
I don
’
t mean academically, it was what they call inter-personal relationships.
I was fourteen at the time and just starting to get interested in boys.”