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  “I know a couple of guys who know him pretty well. Carter’s the type of guy who might be willing to talk about this, but I bet he’s getting a lot of pressure from the higher-ups to drop him from the team. The old do-right rule. With all the crap in the past, this is a real PR problem for the school.”

  “I know,” I concede, “but Cunningham’s the difference between the Sugar Bowl and another .500 season. All I want to do is talk to Carter. I’ve read that he sticks up for the players.” Years earlier Dale Carter had brought Houston a couple of almost undefeated seasons but had a problem with the bottle and got run off. He dried out and had been coaching quarterbacks with a number of teams when Jack Burke, the Razorbacks’ athletic director, tapped him in the spring to revive the team after a number of bad seasons.

  “He does,” Barton agrees.

  “In his interviews, he always says he knows what it’s like to be down. I’ll see if I can get his number. It’s probably unlisted.”

  “Thanks, Barton,” I say.

  “I appreciate it.”

  “I’m always glad to help a real lawyer,” Barton says slavishly.

  “Barton, you make more in a day than I make in a month,” I remind him. Barton (who was advised by our trial advocacy professor not even to try crossexamining a dead dog because he got so flustered in class), has the kind of mind that can trace a chain of title practically without pencil and paper. I could have five computers working night and day and never get a parcel of land back further than three owners without becoming hopelessly confused. The last time I saw him he had on a Rolex and a gold ring that ought to be locked up in Fort Knox. The metal on my body couldn’t even buy me lunch.

  “Don’t kid me, Gideon,” he says.

  “I read about you in the papers. You’re the real thing.”

  Why discourage him? If he wants to believe what he sees on the tube, that’s his problem.

  “Whatever you can find out,” I say, “I’ll be in your debt.”

  “No problem,” he says, his voice rushing on to another topic.

  “Here’s something that might help. Did you notice this case was actually filed by the assistant prosecuting attorney, a kid by the name of Mike Cash? Our prosecutor is on vacation for three weeks in the wilds of Canada.

  There’s a feeling that Mike should have waited until Binkie Cross got back in town to bring this kind of charge. There’s a rumor going around he has a sister who was raped and he’s got an itchy trigger finger when he comes to that kind of crime.”

  This is welcome news. There is nothing to say that a charge can’t be dismissed. I thank him and hang up so he can get on the phone. While I’m waiting, I call Sarah to let her know I’ll be coming up tomorrow. She answers on the fifth ring and sounds sleepy. It is only seven-thirty.

  She shouldn’t be tired this early on a Tuesday.

  “What’s wrong, babe?” I ask.

  “You sound exhausted.” I try to imagine her room. Unless she has improved her house keeping, there are more clothes on the floor than in her closet. At least she is living in a dorm. Apartments are nothing but trouble. The year I lived in one at Fayetteville my grades dropped a full letter.

  “I’m fine. Daddy,” she says, yawning audibly.

  “I had a math test yesterday and stayed up late. I was just taking a nap so I won’t be sleepy later on.”

  Damn, what is going to happen that she has to take a nap for? I know I shouldn’t ask. If she doesn’t want me to know, I couldn’t dynamite it out of her.

  “You have a party to go to in the middle of the week?” I yelp, knowing I sound stupid and old.

  There is silence on the other end.

  “It’s not a big deal,” she says finally.

  “I was just leaving.”

  So make it quick. Dad. I look down at Woogie, who is curled up on the cool linoleum. He isn’t giving me the bum’s rush.

  “How was your test?”

  “It was hard,” she admits.

  College algebra. I made a “D” in it almost thirty years ago at Fayetteville. An excellent student otherwise, Sarah has unfortunately inherited my math brains.

  “Hang in there,” I advise.

  “And don’t get behind.” The pearls of wisdom are really dropping tonight. I get to the point of why I called.

  “I’m coming to Fayetteville tomorrow to interview a client. Do you know Dade Cunningham?”

  “Dad!” Sarah shrieks into the phone.

  “You’re representing him?”

  “His uncle is James Cunningham, who lives down the street,” I explain.

  “I just talked to Dade’s father about an hour ago. Do you know Dade?”

  “This is so weird!” Sarah wails.

  “You’re really going to be his lawyer?”

  “Is it going to cause you any problems?” I ask. My daughter has never reconciled herself to the way I pay her bills. She concedes that in the abstract criminal defense work is a necessary evil, but like most people, she believes that once someone is actually charged with a crime, the only worthwhile thing left to do in the case is to figure out the length of the prison term. I should have realized Sarah wouldn’t be too thrilled about my taking this case. A kid goes off to school to get away from her parents, and here I am popping up again.

  “I guess not,” she says, her voice sounding even more tired than when we began the conversation.

  “I’ve seen him at pep rallies and stuff like that. He was in my west em civ class last year. I know him well enough to say “Hi,” but that’s all.”

  Not bosom buddies then. When I took WE, they might as well have taught it in Razorback Stadium.

  “People won’t even know,” I tell her, “that we’re related.”

  “Of course they will,” Sarah contradicts me.

  “This is like the stock market dropping three hundred points in one day up here. All anybody talks about is the Razorbacks.”

  An exaggeration, but I know what she means. Bill Clinton is the number one fan.

  “Have you heard anything about the incident?” I can’t help but ask, though I know she is anxious to leave.

  “Dad, please don’t try to get me involved,” she says impatiently.

  “I know how you’ve used Rainey.”

  Sarah is always accusing me of using people in my life to get information in my big cases. My off-and-on girlfriend Rainey, a social worker at the state hospital, seemed like a member of my staff she was so helpful.

  Sarah would become incensed when I asked Rainey to hide a client or witness for a night or two at her house as I had to do a couple of times. Rainey never complained.

  Other things about me upset her. But not my work. Invariably, she would get sucked in once a case got going.

  “Have you heard anything about what Robin is like?” I ask.

  “Dad!” Sarah pleads.

  I back off.

  “Be careful tonight,” I advise, unable not to have the last word. I let her go after telling her I will call her for dinner tomorrow evening. I assume I will be spending the night. It is too long a trip

  to make often. My fees will be eaten up in transportation and lodging costs.

  Yet, if I end up negotiating Dade’s pro contract, it will be the best time I ever spent.

  “I love you, Sarah,” I say, finally.

  “I love you, too,” she says, her voice full of exasperation, before she hangs up.

  After taking a Lean Cuisine out of the freezer and pop ping it in the microwave, I open a Miller Lite and sit at the kitchen table and wait for Barton’s call. I try to read (he part of the paper I missed this morning but give up because I’m thinking about the case and Sarah’s comments about the Razorbacks. Why are they so damn important? Not just to me, but to hundreds of thousands in the state. Including the President of the United States.

  And it is winning that is crucial. Not merely competing, not good sportsmanship, not the sheer athleticism of our players, imported or not. Winning, in our brai
ns, equates with respect. And this is what we crave. Why wouldn’t we feel as good about ourselves if we were to achieve the lowest infant-mortality rate in the country? Frankly, we’d rather beat Alabama in football or Kentucky in basket ball.

  At ten Barton calls back and gives me Coach Carter’s home and office number.

  “He still may be in his office,” he says.

  “The coaches stay up there late during the sea son. The two men I talked to said to call him immediately. It can’t hurt. Of course they are the type who would want Dade to play even if he had murdered the chancellor

  I laugh. Razorback football and basketball. The meaning of life. I thank Barton and tell him I will come by his office in the next couple of days. Then I dial Carter’s home number.

  “Coach Carter,” he says, answering on the first ring as if he were expecting my call. His voice, familiar through radio and TV, is raspy and tough like a drill sergeant’s.

  Carter has none of the slickness of the younger breed of coaches, who look and sound as if they were in constant rehearsal for later careers as sport announcers.

  I explain quickly who I am and why I’m calling.

  “From what I’ve heard, I think there’s a real strong likelihood that Dade didn’t rape this girl. Coach Carter. I’d very much like for you to talk to him yourself before you take any disciplinary action. I should have him bonded out of jail tomorrow afternoon and can have him in your office anytime you say.”

  “How do you know he didn’t rape her?” he demands, his voice hard as graphite.

  “His father’s talked to him,” I say.

  “Dade swears it was consensual. For whatever reason, it sounds to me like she was trying to set him up.” I tell him also that the rape charge may have been filed prematurely and why. He clears his throat a couple of times but hears me out.

  “This isn’t a cut-and-dried kind of case where you have a girl who’s been beaten up and raped. She waited until the next day to say anything and didn’t have a scratch on her.

  Everything I hear about Dade is that he’s a good kid. In my opinion, he deserves at least a conversation with you before anything else happens to him.”

  Carter clears his throat again and grunts, “Where can I reach you tomorrow afternoon about five?”

  My mind goes blank. I can’t even think of a single motel in Fayetteville.

  “I’ll call and leave a message for you.”

  I think I have my foot in the door, but I have no real idea. If Carter doesn’t want to talk to Dade, I sure as hell can’t make him. I thank him and hang up. As I begin to pack, I worry that I may be jeopardizing Dade’s criminal case by having him talk to Carter. He may say something to implicate himself. By trying to save his football career, I may end up helping to convict my own client. Human greed. I can feel it working in me like a virus. After I talk to Dade, I can always change my mind. I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.

  It is hard to get to sleep. When I try to quit thinking about Dade’s case, my mind automatically defaults to Amy. Damn, she looked good. I’ll call her when I get back or maybe sooner. Woogie, at my feet, moans in his sleep. Do dogs dream? I will. My life hasn’t had so many possibilities in quite some time. Better not seem too eager or I’ll scare her off.

  2

  “Is he giving you a plane, too?” Julia, the receptionist secreta for the lawyers on the sixteenth floor of the Layman Building, asks sarcastically when I hand her Roy Cunningham’s check to deposit for me.

  “If you’re looking for an excuse to learn some bankruptcy law, this case is it.”

  Julia, a relative of the owner, retains more job security than a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. If she has ever managed to repress a hostile thought in her life, none of the lawyers on our floor has witnessed the blessed event.

  “This is just the first installment,” I whisper cryptically, looking across the waiting room at my new client, a young woman who looks, as most women do these days to me, young enough to be my daughter.

  Julia tugs at the imitation black leather skirt that barely covers her crotch. Not a woman to let the weather dictate her wardrobe, she seems to outdo herself each day. Her hips should sweat off a couple of pounds before lunch, and she won’t even have to stand up.

  “Oh sure!” she says.

  “And the Tooth Fairy’s gonna place it under your pillow.”

  I resist the temptation to tell her why I took this case. If it doesn’t pan out, I’ll never hear the end of it.

  “What’s my new client’s name again?” I ask, bending my head so the woman won’t read my lips. From a distance of twenty feet, she looks as fresh and wholesome as the proverbial farmer’s daughter. With thick brown hair framing a face as round as a globe, her greatest asset is her youth.

  “Jeez!” Julia huffs.

  “When are you getting tested for Alzheimer’s?” She prints a name on her pad. I try to focus without my reading glasses. Gina Whitehall, I make out, squinting at Julia’s grandiose but nearly illegible handwriting.

  “Before long you’re gonna need a map just to get to work.”

  “You’ll be old one day, too,” I mutter, about to pass out from Julia’s overly sweet cologne. For the better part of every morning she will give off an odor that suggests she has spent the previous night swimming in a vat of artificially flavored fruit juices whose bottom is pure NutraSweet.

  “You’re not trying to look down my blouse, are you?”

  she asks suspiciously, as I straighten up.

  “Not for all the tea in China,” I assure her, dutifully smiling at my new client. About once every couple of months Julia wears a see-through blouse with a purple bra underneath and then threatens to sue for sexual harassment if any of the lawyers lose eye contact with her for even an instant.

  As I escort Gina Whitehall back to my office, Julia, apparently through for the day, frowns at me as she picks up one of the innumerable women’s fashion magazines she brings to the office. My friend Clan Bailey, whose office is around the corner from mine, has remarked that as Julia’s skirts get shorter and her blouses sheerer, the reception area is taking on the atmosphere of a cheap escort service. As little money as Clan and I make from practicing law, maybe we should consider starting one.

  “Mr. Page,” Gina Whitehall says in a shy voice as she sits down across from me, “I can’t pay you very much.”

  What else is new? I stare at this slightly plump, buxom girl, who looks as if she ought to be studying for a geometry quiz instead of sitting in a lawyer’s office. She is wearing the uniform of the young: jeans, a T-shirt, and tennis shoes without socks. She is fair-skinned and has bright Kewpie-doll blue eyes that will forever make her appear younger than her chronological age.

  “Well, don’t worry,” I lie boldly, making a virtue out of necessity, “you can’t be old enough to be in too much trouble.”

  Red splotches of color appear on both cheeks like warning lights on a dashboard; and as quickly as the most tormented of my female divorce clients, she bursts into tears. I push the box of tissue toward her, wishing I had canceled her appointment.

  “They want to take my baby!” she gasps between sobs.

  There is no mascara or makeup to smear, and the tissue comes away clean from her face. Though I am reconciled to the firestorm of raw sensations my female clients often bring to my office, I continually marvel at the differences between the sexes. Popular culture now teaches men we should be crying, too-”getting in touch with our feelings”-as if they were physical objects that could be aroused as easily as an adolescent penis. Yet, somehow, I doubt if women (despite what they say) would be quite as attracted to us if we, too, went around sobbing.

  “Your parents?” I guess. Though she seems on first glance more intelligent than this, she has probably dropped out of school and married a boy whose idea of success is fixing flats the rest of his life. Not so discreetly, I look at my watch. I’d like to be on the road by ten. Maybe one of my friends on the floor (Clan?) would
like this melodrama. It will probably be the kind of case that requires a mediator rather than a litigator.

  “No!” she wails.

  “The Department of Human Services.”

  I try not to wince, realizing how wrong I am. This is guaranteed to be a mess.

  “Neglect or abuse?” I ask as gently as I can. My prospects of getting paid even fifty dollars seem dimmer than ever. It is always the poor who end up losing their kids.

  Gina grits her teeth and then forces out the words:

  “They’re saying I deliberately burned Glenetta in a tub of hot water, but it’s not true!”

  Struck by the ferocity of her denial, I wait for additional tears, but there are none. Yet, almost no one, in my experience, unless confronted with indisputable evidence, would admit to such a horrible act. Surely she does not know I was once a caseworker for the same agency that is after her child. The burn cases were so nauseating I came to prefer investigating sex abuse.

  “How bad,” I ask, fearing the worst, “is she burned?”

  “Real bad,” the girl gasps.

  “They say she might die.”

  My stomach turns at the thought of the pain that has been inflicted on this child. If she does die, Gina will be facing a murder charge. And why not? No frustration, no matter how great, can justify an adult’s torturing a child.

  Even if it were an accident (and doctors can form an opinion by the pattern of the burns), the guilt she is surely feeling must be overwhelming. Even sixteen years later I remember the night I pinched Sarah’s leg because I could not get her to stop crying. I lied to Rosa when she came in from work, telling her Sarah had run into the edge of the living room coffee table.

  “Were you alone?” I ask, hoping she wasn’t. Sometimes, it is a boyfriend or babysitter who does these things.

  “Yes,” she says, her voice trembling.

  “I was giving her a bath and went downstairs to get a towel. I heard her scream. By the time I got back up to her, she was already burned. I pulled her out right away, but it was too late.”

  She seems believable. The stress in her voice gives it the tinny quality of an old woman’s; however, her anxiety could be the result of fear and guilt, a combination guaranteed to add years to even the most baby-faced suspect.