Law and Disorder (24 page)

The cracking sound of the point of the judge’s pencil breaking reverberated around the courtroom long after judgement had been given against her client.

Monday 28 May 2007

Day 165 (week 35): Squaring up

There was a chambers party this evening to celebrate OldSmoothie being made a bencher. The pupils were all invited along to serve the booze. At one point we were in the small kitchen and for once there was a real sense of camaraderie, due partly to the demob-happy feeling of being away from sets of papers and partly to the fact that the room took us away from the constant glare of attention that pupillage brings with it. Worrier had already started giggling nervously and TopFirst was kicking back looking particularly smug as he poured himself a small glass of champagne.

With everyone together, I came up with the wheeze of a couple of little drinking games which ended up in most of us having to down a few glasses of wine in one. Worrier and BusyBody soon exempted themselves and TopFirst mysteriously disappeared after the first couple, claiming that he had to finish a piece of work, which was a pretty lame excuse, even for him. ThirdSix, on the other hand, was a veritable drinking machine. Perhaps it’s his rugby background or perhaps he was trying to win a point against me. Or even just maybe (shock horror) he was simply trying to make friends. Either way, my ears pricked up when I heard that he’d never been beaten at downing a pint.

‘Never been beaten? Never ever? That’s a bit much, isn’t it? Surely there must have been once?’

ThirdSix looked pensive.

‘Well, no, actually.’

For some reason, probably the couple of glasses she’d been forced to down, Worrier looked impressed.

‘Well, I’d have you any day,’ I jousted.

‘Yeah, right.’

There were a few exchanges of ‘yeah’ and ‘yeah, right’ until I said,‘Come on then,let’s have a go.Red wine,pint glass.I challenge you. Now.’

I think it might have been the word ‘challenge’ which made him step up to the mark, although I’m sure his intake up to that moment also had something to do with it. Whatever it was, ThirdSix said, ‘OK then, BabyB. You’re on.’ And so we squared up. I’d like to say it was like Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef, each weighing up the odds and staring death in the face, or at the very least a reckless bout of pistols at dawn. But it was far from either. A sloppy and rather quick pouring of the drinks in the kitchen followed by a ‘go’ from a worried-looking Worrier and we were off. Except I wasn’t quite as off as ThirdSix. To say the least. Within a few seconds he’d downed the pint, as might have been predicted, whilst I had finished, hmm, very little of mine, in fact.

‘Lightweight, BabyB. Nice try.’

Aw, shucks. I shrugged and extended my hand in congratulation.

‘You were right. Long live the king!’

So that was all going on behind the scenes whilst the rest of chambers continued their discreet little drinks party. That was until ThirdSix burst through the door and sidled up to TheVamp. ‘More champagne?’ he grunted, and put his arm around her waist. TheVamp immediately registered his state and palmed him off. After which he moved on to UpTights, who was slightly more forthcoming. ‘Hello, kind sir. Well, if you insist.’ She pawed at his chest and then asked, ‘So, how are you enjoying your third six?’

They became engrossed in conversation, if you can call it that on his part. UpTights didn’t seem to mind in the least, and was last seen with her arm around him walking down Chancery Lane.

Tuesday 29 May 2007

Day 166 (week 35): Hangovers

UpTights, I have to say, was far from living up to her nickname today. And that’s putting it mildly. She breezed in at 11 a.m. rather than her usual 8.30 with a very cheery,‘Good morning,BabyB.’ Top of the morning to you too, I’m sure. I was suspicious. Maybe my plan to get ThirdSix drunk had backfired and somehow worked in his favour. I kept my head down. No doubt I’d hear soon enough.

It didn’t take long. OldSmoothie took ThirdSix out for lunch and threatened him with cancelling his pupillage unless he gave him all the details. Well, turns out there were none. Or very few, anyway. He’d made a lunge at UpTights, who had slapped him in the face and then proceeded to drag him home. Well, to his home actually. Except that he passed out in the cab and woke up in his front garden several hours later.

Can’t work out whether it works for or against him, but at least we’ve started to get some sort of action. Gives me something to work on.

Thursday 31 May 2007

Day 168 (week 35): First offer

I got a call from FakeClaims&Co out of the blue today. They said that they’d had an offer of £1,500 for my injury and loss of earnings and advised that I accept it. This was all happening a little quickly. I needed to get a meeting and I didn’t actually want any money but they were adamant that there was no need to visit. I asked if I could ring them back and gave Claire a quick call.

‘Why don’t you exaggerate the size of the claim? That way they’ll need to get more evidence and to interview you.’

‘But again that’ll just get me in deeper.’

‘Which is the point. If you’re going to slay the dragon, you’ve first got to enter its lair.’

She was right, though I also think she is starting to like the intrigue a little. I phoned them back.

‘My injuries have actually been getting worse recently and I’ve not been able to work this last week.’

‘Oh. Well then. That’s different. I think perhaps you should come in.’

CHAPTER 9

June: HoneyTrapped

To subdue the enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence.

Sun Tzu,
The Art of War

Monday 4 June 2007

Day 170 (week 36): Attrition

After ThirdSix’s drinking episode, I thought it was time to start adding a little more pressure in this war of attrition that is pupillage. This time I aimed at TopFirst. Simple enough, this one. Looked up his solicitor for tomorrow’s case and set up a Hotmail account in her name. Then sent him an email this morning from her stating:

Dear TopFirst,

Please could you check the attached and confirm that it is all correct?

Many thanks.

Just enough to look personalised and yet general enough to be regarded on closer inspection and with the benefit of hindsight as spam. And yes, you guessed it. I attached a virus to the email attachment which I’d found within a few Google searches online. Not one which would kill the whole network, mind. Just one which would mean that it’d need fixing. Sure enough, this afternoon we all received a reminder email from HeadofChambers:

Not that I thought I needed to remind people but in the light of an incident this morning, it seems that I do. You are therefore all reminded that you must not open any email attachments unless you are expecting them. Tut-tut.

Tuesday 5 June 2007

Day 171 (week 36): What’s it all about?

‘What on earth’s it really all about?’

It was UpTights musing aloud as I’ve noticed she’s prone to do from time to time. It’s as if she’s spent so many years working in a job she despises that her little thought bubbles of resentment sometimes rise to the surface and gently slip out into speech without her even being able to stop them. As if the walls of her mind have slowly eroded away through years of making compromises. Today she was working on the case where the client was spuriously claiming he had blacked out. Seems the ‘tame neurologist’s’ report has come back saying that in his opinion this is the most likely explanation for the accident, which may well mean no money for the old lady.

‘Why do we dedicate our lives to this, BabyB? Why?’

‘Search me, UpTights. I kind of figure that you work to pay for the plastic surgery and health spas that you think will reduce the visible effects of your stressful job. You work to be able to afford to look like you don’t work. You climb on board your treadmill until it’s going so fast that you can’t jump off. You tell me, UpTights. Am I right?’

That’s what I’d like to have said. What actually came out was, ‘We search for the truth, UpTights. A noble endeavour.’

‘There are no heroes here, BabyB. We’re all just shadows. Dim reflections of the real world. Sitting around packaging it all into neat and tidy little issues.’ She got up and strutted. ‘I can’t stand it, BabyB. The law. The whole thing. It sucks the poetry from our souls. Boils it all down to cynical platitudes.’ She looked out the window. ‘You know. If it wasn’t for the money . . .’

She tailed off, returned to her desk and didn’t say another thing to me all day.

Wednesday 6 June 2007

Day 172 (week 36): Going backwards

Last week Claire was extolling her new theory for successful litigation.

‘Forget blinking. That’s just child’s play. If you’re going to really step up to the mark then playing Rewind’s where it’s really at.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Just get the witness to tell their story backwards. Start with the incident and work back from there. Screws their brains up.’

So for the last week, inevitably, we’ve been practising it whenever we’ve chatted, particularly down the pub. Always finishes with me saying, ‘And then I woke up in the morning,’ and Claire adding, ‘And then I was born.’

Today was the first chance I had to put all this hard work into practice. My client was a thief and the witness I was wanting to trip up had identified him leaving the scene of the crime. What I kind of figured was that asking even an honest witness to tell his story backwards might cause some difficulties. What I hadn’t counted on was the assistance of a certain eccentric district judge.

‘Perhaps,’ I asked, ‘you might just take us through your story backwards.’

‘What do you mean, backwards?’

‘Just what I say. No more, no less.’

‘Literally?’

‘Quite so.’

He went to his witness statement and very slowly he started reading. ‘2007, 14
th
April. Williams John. Belief and knowledge my of best the to true are statement this of contents the believe I.’

He was reading it word for word . . . backwards, as he said, literally, and was obviously confused about what I’d been asking. The magistrate wasn’t having any of it.

‘Why on earth are you doing that?’

‘Because I was asked to.’

‘No you weren’t.’

‘Yes I was.’

My client and I at this point became the audience to a very peculiar stand-off. The witness eventually got angry, the judge even more annoyed and despite my own efforts a miscarriage of justice was achieved. My client got off.

Thursday 7 June 2007

Day 173 (week 36): BigFatTramp

The trial against TheVamp is coming up next week and already she’s been around looking for offers. Of settlement, that is, though it’s true to say that her flirting has gone to level ‘trial minus one week and counting’. The temperature’s definitely increasing. Yesterday she offered to buy me a drink after work, but I was already booked, which is a shame since she’s been looking particularly attractive of late. Although the case is not particularly big, I’ve worked out that the reason it is so important is that this solicitor provides some of the juiciest cases at the Bar. How far she’ll go to secure a result remains to be seen. In the meantime, I made the mistake of mentioning the case to Claire after a couple of beers this evening.

‘What, against TheTramp? That same woman you got off with a few months ago?’

Being a simple-minded soul I didn’t spot this commenty-type question for what it was: a huge gaping ManTrap ready to strike. I was soon to find out after I replied in full ManBlindness mode with, ‘I don’t think that’s particularly relevant, although come to think of it I think she might be making hints and I guess I am trying to decide what I’d do . . .’

At which point the ManTrap closed around me and I spent the next hour or so trying to escape its barbs in the form of sarcastic remarks about myself, men in general, their egos and now and again, their lack of scruples. This was only tempered when, with her usual impeccably bad timing, TheBigFatTramp (as Claire was by this time calling her) nonchalantly strolled into the bar and spotted the two of us sitting at a table.

‘BabyB. How lovely to see you. Oh, and with your little pupillage friend. What’s her name?’ She hadn’t actually looked at Claire yet.

‘It’s Claire.’

‘Oh, that’s right. “JustGoodFriendsClaire”.’ Finally she turned to her and added, ‘How sweet.’

Not that Claire was going to take it lying down, so to speak.

‘Have you run out of tenants and solicitors or something? Only the pupils left, is it?’

‘Ooh. She’s terribly big for her little pupil boots, our Claire, isn’t she?’

‘Or maybe it’s just your own version of the Cab Rank Rule. Wouldn’t be right to turn down passing trade, would it? Except you don’t drop your wig for every guy in town now, do you? Only for whom exactly? Fellow members of chambers and solicitors with big fat juicy briefs to give you?’

‘Oh, perrrleeeease. Says who? Sanctimonious little MissPrissy over here? Hardly. Next you’ll be telling me that your intentions with your best friend here are wholly platonic.’