The Client (16 page)

“Perhaps you’re right.”

“I am.”

“I would like you to go with us at three to her office, if you can work it in.”

Sharpinski looked at Ord for guidance. Ord was
deeply involved with the stapler. “I can’t do it. I’m very busy. Anything else?”

“No. You can go now,” Ord suddenly said. “Thanks, David.” Sharpinski left the office.

“I really need him to go with me,” Foltrigg said to Ord.

“He said he was busy, Roy. My boys work,” he said, looking at Boxx and Fink. A secretary knocked and entered. She brought a two-page fax to Foltrigg, who read it with Boxx. “It’s from my office,” he explained to Ord as if he and he alone had such technology at his fingertips. They read on, and Foltrigg finally finished. “Ever hear of Willis Upchurch?”

“Yes. He’s a big shot defense lawyer from Chicago, lot of mob work. What’s he done?”

“It says he just finished a press conference before a lot of cameras in New Orleans, and that he’s been hired by Muldanno, that the case will be postponed, his client will be found not guilty, etc., etc.”

“That sounds like Willis Upchurch. I can’t believe you haven’t heard of him.”

“He’s never been to New Orleans,” Foltrigg said with authority, as if he remembered every lawyer who dared to step on his turf.

“Your case just became a nightmare.”

“Wonderful. Just wonderful.”

     11     

THE ROOM WAS DARK BECAUSE THE SHADES WERE PULLED. Dianne was curled along the end of Ricky’s bed, napping. After a morning of mumbling and thrashing and getting everyone’s hopes aroused, he had drifted away again after lunch and had returned to the now-familiar position of knees pulled to his chest, IV in the arm, thumb in the mouth. Greenway assured her repeatedly that he was not in pain. But after squeezing and kissing him for four hours, she was convinced her son was hurting. She was exhausted.

Mark sat on the foldaway bed with his back against the wall under the window, and stared at his brother and his mother in the bed. He, too, was exhausted, but sleep was not possible. Events were whirling around his overworked brain, and he tried to keep thinking. What was the next move? Could Reggie be trusted? He’d seen all those lawyer shows and movies on TV, and it seemed as if half the lawyers could be trusted and the other half were snakes. When should he tell Dianne and Dr. Greenway? If he told them everything, would it help Ricky? He thought
about this for a long time. He sat on the bed listening to the quiet voices in the hallway as the nurses went about their work, and debated with himself about how much to tell.

The digital clock next to the bed gave the time as two thirty-two. It was impossible to believe that all this crap had happened in less than twenty-four hours. He scratched his knees and made the decision to tell Greenway everything that Ricky could have seen and heard. He stared at the blond hair sticking out from under the sheet, and he felt better. He would come clean, stop the lying, and do all he could to help Ricky. The things Romey told him in the car were not heard by anyone else, and, for the moment, and subject to advice from his lawyer, he would hold them private for a while.

But not for long. These burdens were getting heavy. This was not a game of hide-and-seek played by trailer park kids in the woods and ravines around Tucker Wheel Estates. This was not a sly little escape from his bedroom for a moonlit walk through the neighborhood. Romey stuck a real gun in his mouth. These were real FBI agents with real badges, just like the true crime stories on television. He had hired a real lawyer who’d stuck a real tape recorder to his stomach so she could outfox the FBI. The man who killed the senator was a professional killer who’d murdered many others, according to Romey, and was a member of the Mafia, and those people would think nothing of rubbing out an eleven-year-old kid.

This was just too much for him to handle alone. He should be at school right now, fifth period, doing math which he hated but suddenly missed. He’d have a long talk with Reggie. She’d arrange a meeting with
the FBI, and he’d tell them every stinking detail Romey had unloaded on him. Then they would protect him. Maybe they would send in bodyguards until the killer went to jail, or maybe they would arrest him immediately and all would be safe. Maybe.

Then he remembered a movie about a guy who squealed on the Mafia and thought the FBI would protect him, but suddenly he was on the run with bullets flying over his head and bombs going off. The FBI wouldn’t return his phone calls because the guy didn’t say something right in the courtroom. At least twenty times during the movie someone said, “The mob never forgets.” In the final scene, this guy’s car was blown to bits just as he turned the key, and he landed a half a mile away with no legs. As he took his final breath, a dark figure stood over him and said, “The mob never forgets.” It wasn’t much of a movie, but its message was suddenly clear to Mark.

He needed a Sprite. His mother’s purse was on the floor under the bed, and he slowly unzipped it. There were three bottles of pills. There were two packs of cigarettes and for a split second he was tempted. He found the quarters and left the room.

A nurse whispered to an old man in the waiting area. Mark opened his Sprite and walked to the elevators. Greenway had asked him to stay in the room as much as possible, but he was tired of the room and tired of Greenway, and there seemed little chance of Ricky waking anytime soon. He entered the elevator and pushed the button to the basement. He would check out the cafeteria, and see what the lawyers were doing.

A man entered just before the doors closed, and seemed to look at him a bit too long. “Are you Mark Sway?” he asked.

This was getting old. Starting with Romey, he’d met enough strangers in the past twenty-four hours to last for months.

He was certain he’d never seen this guy before. “Who are you?” he asked cautiously.

“Slick Moeller, with the
Memphis Press,
you know, the newspaper. You’re Mark Sway, aren’t you?”

“How’d you know?”

“I’m a reporter. I’m supposed to know these things. How’s your brother?”

“He’s doing great. Why do you want to know?”

“Working on a story about the suicide and all, and your name keeps coming up. Cops say you know more than you’re telling.”

“When’s it gonna be in the paper?”

“I don’t know. Tomorrow maybe.”

Mark felt weak again, and stopped looking at him. “I’m not answering any questions.”

“That’s fine.” The elevator door suddenly opened and a swarm of people entered. Mark could no longer see the reporter. Seconds later it stopped on the fifth floor, and Mark darted out between two doctors. He hit the stairs and walked quickly to the sixth floor.

He’d lost the reporter. He sat on the steps in the empty stairwell, and began to cry.

FOLTRIGG, MCTHUNE, AND TRUMANN ARRIVED IN THE small but tasteful reception area of Reggie Love, Attorney-at-Law, at exactly 3 P.M., the appointed hour. They were met by Clint, who asked them to be seated, then offered coffee or tea, all of which they stiffly declined. Foltrigg informed Clint right properly that he was the United States Attorney for the Southern District of
Louisiana, New Orleans, and that he was now present in this office and did not expect to wait. It was a mistake.

He waited for forty-five minutes. While the agents flipped through magazines on the sofa, Foltrigg paced the floor, glanced at his watch, fumed, scowled at Clint, even barked at him twice and each time was informed Reggie was on the phone with an important matter. As if Foltrigg was there for an unimportant matter. He wanted to leave so badly. But he couldn’t. For one of the rare times in his life he had to absorb a subtle ass-kicking without a fight.

Finally, Clint asked them to follow him to a small conference room lined with shelves of heavy law books. Clint instructed them to be seated, and explained that Reggie would be right with them.

“She’s forty-five minutes late,” Foltrigg protested.

“That’s quite early for Reggie, sir,” Clint said with a smile as he closed the door. Foltrigg sat at one end of the table with an agent close to each side. They waited.

“Look, Roy,” Trumann said with hesitation, “you need to be careful with this gal. She might be taping this.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Well, uh, you just never—”

“These Memphis lawyers do a lot of taping,” McThune added helpfully. “I don’t know about New Orleans, but it’s pretty bad up here.”

“She has to tell us up front if she’s taping, doesn’t she?” Foltrigg asked, obviously without a clue.

“Don’t bet on it,” said Trumann. “Just be careful, okay.”

The door opened and Reggie entered, forty-eight
minutes late. “Keep your seats,” she said as Clint closed the door behind her. She offered a hand to Foltrigg, who was half-standing. “Reggie Love, you must be Roy Foltrigg.”

“I am. Nice to meet you.”

“Please be seated.” She smiled at McThune and Trumann, and for a brief second all three of them thought about the tape. “Sorry I’m late,” she said as she sat alone at her end of the conference table. They were eight feet away, huddled together like wet ducks.

“No problem,” Foltrigg said loudly as if it was very much a problem.

She pulled a large tape recorder from a hidden drawer in the table and set it in front of her. “Mind if I tape this little conference?” she asked as she plugged in the microphone. The little conference would be taped whether they liked it or not. “I’ll be happy to provide you with a copy of the tape.”

“Fine with me,” Foltrigg said, pretending he had a choice.

McThune and Trumann stared at the tape recorder. How nice of her to ask! She smiled at the two of them as they smiled at her, then all three smiled at the recorder. She was as subtle as a rock through a window. The damnable micro-cassette could not be far away.

She pushed a button. “Now, what’s up?”

“Where’s your client?” Foltrigg asked. He leaned forward and it was clear he would do all the talking.

“At the hospital. The doctor wants him to stay in the room near his brother.”

“When can we talk to him?”

“You’re assuming that you will in fact talk to him.” She looked at Foltrigg with very confident eyes.
Her hair was gray and cut like a boy’s. The face was quite colorful. The eyebrows were dark. The lips were soft red and meticulously painted. The skin was smooth and free of heavy makeup. It was a pretty face, with bangs, and eyes that glowed with a calm steadiness. Foltrigg looked at her, and thought of all the misery and suffering she’d seen. She covered it well.

McThune opened a file and flipped through it. In the past two hours they had assembled a two-inch-thick dossier on Reggie Love, aka Regina L. Cardoni. They had copied the divorce papers and commitment proceedings from the clerk’s office in the county courthouse. The mortgage papers and land records on her mother’s home were in the folder. Two Memphis agents were attempting to obtain her law school transcripts.

Foltrigg loved the trash. Whatever the case and whoever the opponent, Foltrigg always wanted the dirt. McThune read the sordid legal history of the divorce with its allegations of adultery and alcohol and dope and unfitness and, ultimately, the attempted suicide. He read it carefully, though, without being seen. He did not, under any circumstances, want to make this woman angry.

“We need to talk to your client, Ms. Love.”

“It’s Reggie. Okay, Roy?”

“Whatever. We think he knows something, plain and simple.”

“Such as?”

“Well, we’re convinced little Mark was in the car with Jerome Clifford prior to his death. We think he spent more than a few seconds with him. Clifford was obviously planning to kill himself, and we have reason to believe he wanted to tell someone where his client,
Mr. Muldanno, had disposed of the body of Senator Boyette.”

“What makes you think he wanted to tell?”

“It’s a long story, but he had contacted an assistant in my office on two occasions and hinted that he might be willing to cut some deal and get out. He was scared. And he was drinking a lot. Very erratic behavior. He was sliding off the deep end, and wanted to talk.”

“Why do you think he talked to my client?”

“There’s just a chance, okay. And we must look under every stone. Surely you understand.”

“I sense a bit of desperation.”

“A lot of desperation, Reggie. I’m leveling with you. We know who killed the senator, but, frankly, I’m not ready for trial without a corpse.” He paused and smiled warmly at her. Despite his many obnoxious flaws, Roy had spent hours before juries and he knew how and when to act sincere.

And she’d spent many hours in therapy, and she could spot a fake. “I’m not telling you that you cannot talk to Mark Sway. You cannot talk to him today, but maybe tomorrow. Maybe the next day. Things are moving fast. Mr. Clifford’s body is still warm. Let’s slow down a bit, and take it one step at a time. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Now, convince me Mark Sway was in the car with Jerome Clifford prior to the shooting.”

No problem. Foltrigg looked at a notepad, and reeled off the many places where fingerprints were matched. Rear taillights, trunk, front passenger door handle and lock switch, dash, gun, bottle of Jack Daniel’s. There was a tentative match on the hose, but it was not definite. They were working on it. Foltrigg
was the prosecutor now, building a case with indisputable evidence.…

Reggie took pages of notes. She knew Mark had been in the car, but she had no idea he’d left such a wide trail.

“The whiskey bottle?” she asked.

Foltrigg flipped a page for the details. “Yes, three definite prints. No question about it.”

Mark had told her about the gun, but not about the bottle. “Seems a bit strange, doesn’t it?”

“It’s all strange at this point. The police officers who talked to him do not recall smelling alcohol, so I don’t think he drank any of it. I’m sure he could explain it, you know, if only we could talk to him.”

“I’ll ask him.”

“So he didn’t tell you about the bottle?”

“No.”

“Did he explain the gun?”

“I cannot divulge what my client has explained to me.”