Embroidered Truths (14 page)

“Whereas you don’t think two lawyers in a row would do that,” said Mr. Whistler, his grin showing again.

Betsy laughed. “I guess I was thinking something like that. You are kind not to take offense.”

“My dear, you would not believe what you’d have to say to make me take offense. I deal with difficult people having a difficult time.”

“I want to help you.”

“How’s that?”

“I have a talent for investigating. Seriously, I have helped other people wrongly charged with a crime.” She quickly described a case in which she found a contractor popularly suspected of murder to be innocent. He listened, his eyebrows going higher and higher.

“How remarkable,” he said, sounding impressed. “I may indeed need someone with a talent like that.” He glanced at his watch.

Betsy stood. “I understand you have somewhere to go. I want to thank you for talking with me on such short notice.”

“You are very welcome. You’ll let me know soon about Mr. DuLac, right?”

“Yes, probably this afternoon.”

As she climbed into her car for the drive downtown, she thought,
The other one is going to have to go some distance to beat Mr. Whistler.

Betsy had a quick lunch at Peter’s downtown, a very old-fashioned restaurant with its original forties décor intact. Before she left, she dialed Excelsior PD again, to find Mike Malloy was still out. She sighed, over-tipped the waitress, and walked the four blocks to the Wells Fargo Center Building, a new skyscraper built in the Art Deco style.

Mr. Lebowski worked on the tenth floor with a much larger law firm, Franklin, Morris, and LeBarge. His name was on the door, fourth in a list of nine partners. The receptionist was Asian, with quiet manners and too-correct English, which made Betsy think she might be Japanese-born. She directed Betsy to an office at the end of a high, narrow corridor. Mr. Lebowski had his own secretary, a black woman who reminded Betsy of Claire Huxtable on the old Bill Cosby show. She had the same pleasant voice and air of intelligent competence. She checked Betsy’s name against a list or calendar on her computer and asked her to be seated for a moment.

The outer office was as beautiful as Mr. Whistler’s inner sanctum, though the painting on the wall looked to be an original Erté, and the carpet was also Art Deco. The walls were paneled in a wood stained mahogany. Or maybe it was real mahogany. Certainly the desk looked like real mahogany.

Betsy couldn’t decide if this was conspicuous consumption or a way of reassuring clients they were buying the services of a top-flight attorney.

The secretary returned and said, “Mr. Lebowski will see you now.” She gestured at the open door.

Mr. Lebowski stood right inside the door, his hand extended to greet her. He was very tall, with a barrel chest that went all the way down to the top of his legs. Where Mr. Whistler was the color of dark chocolate, this man was milk-chocolate. His hair was white, cropped short, his eyes light brown and very penetrating. His hand was enormous; it engulfed Betsy’s entirely. His suit was two shades darker than his skin, his shirt snow white, like his hair. His necktie was many colored flowers on green.

He led Betsy to a very comfortable chair and went behind a desk. A big desk, which he nevertheless dominated.

Betsy finally realized that she was staring, blinked, and looked into her lap. When she raised her eyes, he was smiling at her. “I—” she began, and stopped there.

“My mother was the great-granddaughter of a slave, my father was the son of a Polish immigrant,” he said. His smile broadened, as if he’d pulled off a clever practical joke, and Betsy laughed.

“I bet you enjoy watching people meet you for the first time,” she said.

“Yes, I do; I really, truly do. Now, what can I do for you?”

“I have spoken with Attorney Frank Whistler, and am here to speak with you, to decide which of you will represent Godwin DuLac, who has been arrested for murder.”

“You are assuming the cost of an attorney, is that right?”

“Yes, Godwin couldn’t afford someone like you or Mr. Whistler. I rely on Godwin, he is my most valuable employee, so I’m hoping also to bail him out. Do you know when he will be arraigned?”

“No. They haven’t started to interrogate him yet, because they’re waiting for counsel. I hate to pressure you, but we really need to get that question settled quickly. What questions do you have for me?”

“Both you and Mr. Whistler asked me if I thought the police had enough evidence to convict Goddy. Were you trying to find out if I thought he was guilty?”

Mr. Lebowski laughed softly. “Yes, that’s right. It’s a question I will ask Mr. DuLac, too. It is never a good idea to ask a client directly if he is or is not guilty. But the reply to that question often tells me what I want to know.”

“I see. Do you think bail will be high?”

“Depends on what he’s charged with. I think the first thing we ought to do is get me down there to talk to him, and allow him to be interrogated with me present. Get this show on the road, so to speak, so we’ll know where we’re headed.”

“There’s a process called ‘discovery,’ right? Where you get to see the evidence against him.”

“Yes, but that’s not something that will happen very soon, either.”

“You see, I have a talent for investigating crimes. And I want to know what they know, so I can understand what they’re thinking happened. That will help me find out what really happened.”

His look was very keen. “A ‘talent’?”

“Yes.” Betsy quickly relayed some of her experiences with sleuthing. His eyes never left her face.

“That’s very good,” he said when she had finished. “It’s not uncommon for an attorney for the defense to hire a private investigator to look into the circumstances of a case. I might want to do that here—but if I can rely on you to do that, it will save expenses. And”—his eyes twinkled—“I suspect it will relieve some of the anxiety you are feeling to be doing valuable things for me and for Mr. DuLac.”

“Yes, you understand that, don’t you? All right, you may act as Goddy’s attorney. Your retainer—” She opened her purse. “Do you take Visa?”

He did.

Thirteen

THE courtroom was small and low-ceilinged. The judge’s desk was of honey-colored wood, very plain—it looked made of sheets of varnished plywood. The jury box was empty, of course, this being an arraignment. The judge looked bored, the bailiff looked bored, the attorneys looked bored as they came forward to announce they were representing this client or that. They often had several clients, and had to read their client’s name off a file folder.

It was all routine, and terrifying.

Betsy sat in the front row—there were only six rows of seats, mostly empty—with Jill beside her in civilian clothes, and Lebowski on her other side in a dark blue suit and bright yellow tie.

“How is Godwin doing?” Betsy asked Lebowski in a low voice.

“As well as can be expected,” he replied quietly.

“When do you think—”

He touched her arm. Godwin was being led in. He looked small and frightened in his too-big orange jumpsuit, and didn’t seem to see Betsy, Jill, or his attorney. Without an “ah, ah,” of warning, Jill sneezed. It was a big, loud sneeze. Betsy jumped, the two people sitting behind them giggled, the judge looked up repressively—and Godwin looked over his shoulder. He saw Betsy, and his face lit up. Betsy smiled and gave a thumbs-up. The judge smacked his gavel once, and Godwin returned his attention to the podium. But his shoulders were straighter; even, somehow, his hair was brighter. Jill, following through, wiped her nose with a wrinkled Kleenex she’d pulled from her purse, and sniffed three times. Betsy bumped her with a “that’s enough” elbow. Jill had her coolest Gibson Girl look going, but her eyes were shining.

The charge was second-degree murder, and Godwin said, “Yes, your honor,” in a low voice when asked if he understood. And he said it again when asked if he understood his rights when read aloud by the judge.

When the judge asked if Godwin was represented by counsel, he turned to look at the big black man sitting beside Betsy. Lebowski rose and said in a firm voice, “Counsel is present, your honor.” He made his way to the low wall and then through the swinging door in the center of it.

He stood beside Godwin and the judge asked, “Do you wish to confer with your client before you enter a plea?”

“I want to say right now that I am innocent, your honor,” said Godwin.

Lebowski said, “My client pleads not guilty, your honor.”

“A plea of Not Guilty will be entered in the record,” said the judge.

The next item of business was bail. The prosecution rose first to make a statement. The prosecuting attorney was a lanky young man with thick brown hair at the top and cowboy boots at the bottom, the two connected by a cheap blue-gray suit. He talked earnestly about the heinousness of the crime, the defendant’s lack of family in the area, and the fact of his recent trip to Mexico City. Further, he noted, a grand jury would be considering first-degree murder charges against Mr. DuLac. All this, he was sure, added up to a certainty that Mr. DuLac should be held without bail.

Lebowski countered that his client had no criminal record of any kind, that he had lived in Minnesota for fifteen years, at one address for eight, and had held the same job for nearly six. He said that he was confident that a modest bail would ensure the appearance of his client. The judge studied Godwin, who was looking as un-dangerous as he could, and said he was setting bail at one million dollars. Smack went the gavel, and Godwin was led away, Lebowski following behind.

Betsy turned to Jill and said, “Where do I find a bail bondsman?”

 
 
THE answer to Betsy’s question was, “Around the corner.” It was like learning a new word: Suddenly you see it everywhere. Driving around the several blocks that held City Hall, the County Courthouse, and the Adult Detention Center, Betsy was surprised to see that there was a bail bondsman’s office at or near every intersection.

She picked one that had a parking space across the street from it. A neon sign in the window said it was Bookman’s Bail Bonds, and printing on the window offered 24-hour service and a phone number.

The office was a little shabby, with acoustic-tile ceiling and a worn, no-nap carpet on the floor. There were harsh lights set into the ceiling and a faint smell of despair. A stocky man with hair dyed black sat behind a low counter that separated his much bigger side of the room from Betsy. He was talking on the phone.

“Thirty thousand for weapons,” he was saying. “The house is valued at seventy-four thousand, but she has a mortgage for one twenty, so nothing there.”

There were a great many file cabinets making a maze of his side, and on a back wall T-shirts were advertised for sale:
Dad, I’m in Jail,
read one. Who could possibly think a stint in jail deserved a souvenir?

A black woman with a sad, worn face sat on a bench on Betsy’s side of the counter, and from the back came the in-and-out sound of a vacuum cleaner.

“Yeah, a long history of DUIs and weapons. Yeah? Okay, in about an hour.” He hung up, made a notation on his computer, and looked up at Betsy.

“May I help you?” he asked.

“A friend of mine has been arrested, and the bail was set at a million dollars. I want to know what I have to do for you to bail him out.”

“We’ll need ten percent of that amount, in advance,” said the man promptly.

“That’s one hundred thousand,” said Betsy, who had already heard that bail bondsmen wanted ten percent.

“Correct, in cash or securities,” he said.

“Hmmm, I think I can manage that,” said Betsy, whose net worth was a little over three million. It would be a strain, but it was temporary, after all. “What is your fee for arranging bail?”

“A hundred thousand.”

“Yes, for a hundred thousand.”

“The fee for a million dollars bail is one hundred thousand dollars.”

“No, that’s the amount I have to give to the court to get Goddy out.”

“No, ma’am,” said the man patiently. “The amount you have to give to the court to release your friend on bail is one million dollars. We will do that for you, at a cost of one hundred thousand dollars.”

Betsy stared at him. “But . . . but, you . . . I understand you get the money back when the person charged turns up for his trial.”

The man nodded. “That’s correct. We get the million back, less certain fees. You pay ten percent of the bail to us for giving the court the bail money. That’s our fee.”

“I see.” Without meaning to, she blurted, “But I don’t think . . . I mean, I could raise that much, if I knew I’d get it back, but I don’t think I could take a loss of a hundred thousand dollars right now!”

“Ma’am, if I might be so bold as to offer you some advice?”

Betsy nodded faintly, still looking at one hundred thousand dollars flying away, like birds heading south in autumn. Only these would not be back in the spring.

“Let your friend sit. He’ll be fine. Use the money to hire a good lawyer.”

“Thank you, I’ll think about that.”

Betsy stumbled back out to her car and sat behind the wheel for a couple of minutes. A hundred thousand dollars! It would take weeks, maybe months to free up that much money! That goldfish bowl, filled even eleven times a day, wasn’t going to amount to a hundred thousand dollars. Besides, that money should go to pay attorney fees, not to allow Godwin to come back to work.

His sad face rose before her. Standing humbly in the courtroom, while all the might of law and law enforcement ganged up to put him in prison forever. . . .

She put her head down on the steering wheel, but before the first tear escaped, she remembered Shelly’s advice: kwitcherbellyachin. Don’t whine, go find the evidence that would set him free.

All right, but first, she had to tell Goddy he wasn’t getting out on bail.