Three Classic Thrillers (99 page)

An election dispute from Bolivar County. Affirmed, with seven others.

An extremely dull secured-transaction brouhaha from Panola County. Affirmed, with a unanimous court.

And so on. With Ron preoccupied and showing little interest in the work, the first ten cases were disposed of in twenty minutes.

“Baker versus Krane Chemical,”
a clerk said.

“What’s the buzz?” Ron asked.

“Four–four split, with everybody throwing knives. Calligan and company are quite nervous about you. McElwayne and his side are curious. Everybody’s watching, waiting.”

“They think I’ve cracked up?”

“No one’s sure. They think you’re under a great deal of stress, and there’s speculation about some great cathartic flip-flop because of what’s happened.”

“Let ’em speculate. I’ll wait on
Baker
and that nursing home case.”

“Are you considering a vote to uphold the verdicts?” the other clerk asked.

Ron had already learned that most of the court’s gossip was created and spread by the network of clerks, all of them.

“I don’t know,” he said. Thirty minutes later, he was back at the hospital.

E
ight days later, on a rainy Sunday morning, Josh Fisk was loaded into an ambulance for the drive to Brookhaven. Once there, he would be placed in a room at the hospital five minutes from home. He would be watched closely for a week or so, then, hopefully, released.

Doreen rode with him in the ambulance.

Ron drove to the Gartin building and went to his office on the fourth floor. There was no sign of anyone there, which was precisely what he wanted. For the third or fourth time, he read Calligan’s opinion reversing the verdict in
Baker v. Krane Chemical
, and though he had once agreed with it completely, he now had doubts. It could have been written by Jared Kurtin himself. Calligan found fault with virtually all of
Baker
’s expert testimony. He criticized Judge Harrison for admitting most of it. His sharpest language condemned
the expert who linked the carcinogenic by-products to the actual cancers, calling it “speculative at best.” He imposed an impossible standard that would require clear proof that the toxins in the Bowmore water caused the cancers that killed Pete and Chad Baker. As always, he caterwauled at the sheer size of the shocking verdict, and blamed it on the undue passion created by Baker’s attorneys that inflamed the jurors.

Ron read again the opinion by McElwayne, and it, too, sounded much different.

It was time to vote, to make his decision, and he simply had no stomach for it. He was tired of the case, tired of the pressure, tired of the anger at being used like a pawn by powerful forces he should have recognized. He was exhausted from Josh’s ordeal and just wanted to go home. He had no confidence in his ability to do what was right, and he wasn’t sure what that was anymore. He had prayed until he was tired of praying. He had tried to explain his misgivings to Doreen, but she was as distracted and unstable as he was.

If he reversed the verdict, he would betray his true feelings. But his feelings were changing, were they not? How could he, as a detached jurist, suddenly swap sides because of his family’s tragedy?

If he upheld the verdict, he would betray those who had elected him. Fifty-three percent of the people had voted for Ron Fisk because they believed in his platform. Or did they? Perhaps they had voted for him because he was so well marketed.

Would it be fair to all the Aarons out there for Ron
to selfishly change his judicial philosophy because of his own son?

He hated these questions. They exhausted him even more. He paced around his office, more confused than ever, and he thought of leaving again. Just run, he told himself. But he was tired of running and pacing and talking to the walls.

He typed his opinion: “I concur and agree with Justice Calligan, but I do so with grave misgivings. This court, with my complicity and especially because of my presence, has rapidly become a blind protector of those who wish to severely restrict liability in all areas of personal injury law. It is a dangerous course.”

In the nursing home case, he typed his second opinion: “I concur with Justice Albritton and uphold the verdict rendered in the Circuit Court of Webster County. The actions of the nursing home fall far short of the standard of care our laws require.”

Then he typed a memo to the court that read: “For the next thirty days, I will be on a leave of absence from the court’s business. I am needed at home.”

__________

T
he Supreme Court of Mississippi posts its rulings on its Web site each Thursday at noon.

And each Thursday at noon quite a few lawyers either sat before their computers in nervous anticipation or made sure someone did so for them. Jared Kurtin kept an associate on guard. Sterling Bintz watched his smart phone at that precise hour, regardless of where in
the world he happened to be. F. Clyde Hardin, still a caveman with technology, sat in the darkness of his locked office, drank his lunch, and waited. Every trial lawyer with a Bowmore case kept watch.

The anticipation was shared by a few nonlawyers as well. Tony Zachary and Barry Rinehart made it a point to be on the phone with each other when the opinions came down. Carl Trudeau counted the minutes each week. In lower and mid-Manhattan dozens of securities analysts monitored the Web site. Denny Ott had a sandwich with his wife in the office at the church. The parsonage next door did not have a computer.

And nowhere was the magical hour more dreaded and anticipated than within the shabby confines of Payton & Payton. The entire firm gathered in The Pit, at the always cluttered worktable, and had lunch as Sherman stared at his laptop. On the first Thursday in May, at 12:15, he announced, “Here it is.” Food was shoved aside. The air grew thinner, and breathing became more difficult. Wes refused to look at Mary Grace, and she refused to look at him. Indeed, no one in the room made eye contact with anyone else.

“The opinion is written by Justice Arlon Calligan,” Sherman continued. “I’ll just skim along here. Five pages, ten pages, fifteen pages, let’s see, a majority opinion that’s twenty-one pages long, joined by Romano, Bateman, Ross, Fisk. Reversed and rendered. Final judgment entered for the defendant, Krane Chemical.”

Sherman continued: “Romano concurs with four pages of his usual drivel. Fisk concurs briefly.” A pause
as he kept scrolling. “And then a twelve-page dissent by McElwayne with Albritton concurring. That’s all I need to know. I won’t read this piece of shit for at least a month.” He stood and left the room.

“It’s not exactly a surprise,” Wes said. No one responded.

__________

F
. Clyde Hardin wept at his desk. This disaster had been looming for months, but it still crushed him. His one chance to strike it rich was gone, and with it all of his dreams. He cursed Sterling Bintz and his harebrained class action. He cursed Ron Fisk and the other four clowns in his majority. He cursed the blind sheep in Cary County and throughout the rest of south Mississippi who had been hoodwinked into voting against Sheila McCarthy. He fixed another vodka, then cursed and drank and cursed and drank until he passed out with his head on his desk.

Seven doors down, Babe took a phone call and got the news. Her coffee shop was soon packed with the Main Street crowd looking for answers and gossip and support. For many, the news was incomprehensible. There would be no cleanup, no recovery, no compensation, no apologies. Krane Chemical was walking free and thumbing its nose at the town and its victims.

Denny Ott received a call from Mary Grace. She gave a quick summary and stressed that the litigation was over. They had no viable options. The only avenue left was an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, and they
would, of course, file the obligatory paperwork. But there was no chance that the Court would agree to consider such a case. She and Wes would be down in a few days to meet with their clients.

Denny and his wife opened the fellowship hall, pulled out some cookies and bottled water, and waited for their people to arrive for consoling.

__________

L
ate in the afternoon, Mary Grace walked into Wes’s office and closed the door. She had two sheets of paper, and she handed one to him. It was a letter to their Bowmore clients. “Take a look,” she said, and sat down to read it herself. It read:

“Very nice,” Wes said. “Let’s get ’em in the mail.”

__________

K
rane Chemical roared to life in the afternoon’s trading. It gained $4.75 a share and closed at $38.50. Mr. Trudeau had now regained the billion he lost, and more was on the way.

He gathered Bobby Ratzlaff, Felix Bard, and two other confidants in his office for a little party. They sipped Cristal champagne, smoked Cuban cigars, and congratulated themselves on their stunning turnaround. They now considered Carl a true genius, a visionary. Even in the darkest days, he never wavered. His mantra had been “Buy the stock. Buy the stock.”

He reminded Bobby of his promise on the day of the verdict. Not one dime of his hard-earned profits would ever be handed over to those ignorant people and their slimy lawyers.

T
he guests ranged from hard-core Wall Street types like Carl himself all the way down to Brianna’s hair colorist and two semi-employed Broadway actors. There were bankers with their aging though nicely sculpted wives, and moguls with their superbly starved trophies. There were Trudeau Group executives who would rather have been anywhere else, and struggling painters from the MuAb crowd who were thrilled at the rare chance to mingle with the jet set. There were a few models, number 388 on the Forbes 400 list, a running back who played for the Jets, a reporter from the
Times
along with a photographer to record it all, and a reporter from the
Journal
who would report none of it but didn’t want to miss the party. About a hundred guests, all in all a very rich crowd, but no one at the party had ever seen a yacht like the
Brianna
.

It was docked on the Hudson at the Chelsea Piers,
and the only vessel larger at that moment was a moth-balled aircraft carrier a quarter of a mile to the north. In the rarefied world of obscenely expensive boating, the
Brianna
was classified as a mega-yacht, which was larger than a super-yacht but not in the same league as a giga-yacht. The latter, so far, had been the exclusive domain of a handful of software zillionaires, Saudi princes, and Russian oil thugs.

The invitation read: “Please join Mr. and Mrs. Carl Trudeau on the maiden voyage of their mega-yacht,
Brianna
, on Wednesday, May 26, at 6 p.m., at Pier 60.”

It was 192 feet long, which ranked it number twenty-one on the list of the largest yachts registered in America. Carl paid $60 million for it two weeks after Ron Fisk was elected, then spent another $15 million on renovations, upgrades, and toys.

Now it was time to show it off, and to display one of the more dramatic comebacks in recent corporate history. The crew of eighteen gave tours as the guests arrived and took their glasses of champagne. With four decks above water, the ship could comfortably accommodate thirty pampered friends for a month at sea, not that Carl ever intended to have that many people living so close to him. Those lucky enough to be chosen for an extended cruise would have access to a gym with a trainer, a spa with a masseuse, six Jacuzzis, and a chef on call around the clock. They would dine at one of four tables scattered throughout the boat, the smallest with ten seats and the largest with forty. When they felt like playing, there was scuba gear, clear-bottom kayaks,
a thirty-foot catamaran, Jet Skis, and fishing gear, and, of course, no mega-yacht is complete without a helicopter. Other luxuries included a movie theater, four fireplaces, a sky lounge, heated tile floors in the bathrooms, a private pool for nude sunbathing, and miles of mahogany and brass and Italian marble. The Trudeaus’ stateroom was larger than their bedroom back on land. And, in the formal dining room on the third level, Carl had finally found the permanent place for
Abused Imelda
.

Never again would she greet him in the foyer of his penthouse after a hard day at the office.

As a string quartet played on the main deck, the
Brianna
shoved off and turned south on the Hudson. It was dusk, a beautiful sunset, and the view of lower Manhattan from the river was breathtaking. The city shook with its frenetic energy, which was fascinating to watch from the deck of such a fine boat. The champagne and caviar also helped the view. Those on ferries and smaller vessels couldn’t help but gawk as
Brianna
moved by, her twin 2,000-horsepower Caterpillar diesels churning a quiet wake.