Lawyered to Death

by Michael Biehl

  The clerk was short and pasty-faced. He wore a translucent short-sleeve shirt that buttoned up the front. “Need a room?”

  “How much for a single?”

  “Twenty-eight fifty—in advance.”

  Jake got out his wallet and handed two twenties to the clerk.

  “Do I need to sign a register?”

  The clerk reached under the counter and pulled out a large leatherette-covered logbook. Like a lot of old-style motels that did not belong to a chain, the Sleepy Time used a handwritten guest register. Jake made a show of trying to write with the dry-tipped ballpoint.

  “Pen’s out of ink,” he said.

  The clerk tested the pen on the margin of the register, grunted and tossed it in a wastebasket. He disappeared into the living quarters.

  Jake flipped the pages of the register back to the date he saw Arthur Winslow at the Caledonia Club. Only two guests had signed in that day. No Arthur Winslow, of course, and no “John Smith.” But Jake smiled at one of the entries: Elihu Yale of New Haven, Connecticut. Jake knew Arthur was a Yalie and figured that to use that alias he must have been pretty buzzed when he signed in.

  Jake flipped the pages forward. There were no more than one or two guests registered on any given day. Jake figured most of the patrons of the Sleepy Time rented by the week or month.

  One entry leaped off the page at him. On June 16, Elihu Yale of New Haven had been back.

  Jake returned the register to the current date, then walked to the office pay phone and picked up the receiver. When the desk clerk came back in, Jake started talking.

  “Cairo? That’s seven hours from here. You sure? I better get going.”

  He hung up and walked back to the counter. “My dispatcher from Advance says I’ve got to be in Cairo by morning. Good thing I got the two-quart thermos for coffee.”

  The desk clerk glumly refunded Jake’s money. Jake correctly guessed that the guy was enough of a businessman not to alienate the Advance Transport Company.

  “I HAD NO idea you were so devious ” said Karen, her voice filled with admiration.

  “Does it help Arthur?” asked Jake.

  “It might help on the harassment claim. In fact, if we could show he was with Shari Billick on the sixteenth, it would blow her case right out of the water. It tends to undermine your credibility if, after you make a sexual harassment claim, you meet the defendant at a motel. It’s hard to believe Arthur would get anywhere near Shari with the harassment claim hanging over his head.”

  “Is it any easier to believe he went to the Sleepy Time Motel with somebody else?”

  “No.”

  It was a bright Sunday afternoon, and Karen and Jake were picnicking with McKinley in the state forest on a bluff overlooking Lake Weyawega. They had spent the morning moving boxes from Karen’s office at Shoreview Memorial to her new one at Van Dyke ~ Eddington. They spread a blanket in a sunny patch, opened a bottle of wine and watched gulls and hawks circling over the lake, casting shadows on the feathery waves. The wine was making Karen’s fatigued muscles relax, and she barely noticed McKinley stuffing a handful of grass into his tiny mouth.

  “It might cut the other way on his wife’s murder,” Karen continued. “Matt thinks it looks worse for Arthur to be carrying on an affaire d’amour than just harassing an employee, especially with Lorraine about to become a colossal burden.”

  “Harsh. But I see his point.”

  “I’ll talk to Matt about your news. He’s very canny; who knows what he can do with it?”

  “Sounds like you’re impressed with the Mattster.”

  “He has a lot of gumption and confidence. You know, he never feels the need to explain himself. If he doesn’t want to do something, he just says, ‘sorry, no can do.’ I envy his self-assurance, his self-esteem.”

  “Sounds a bit arrogant to me,” said Jake. “I think there’s too much self-assurance going around, and too much self-esteem. Whatever happened to humility as a virtue? To pride as a deadly sin? What this country needs is more self-doubt.”

  Karen cocked her head and touched Jake’s face. “Why, Jake Hayes,” she said with a bad southern-belle accent, “Ah do believe yoah jealous.” She gave him an exaggeratedly passionate kiss.

  On the morning of their wedding day, Jake had shown Karen this remote spot in the state forest and a nearby oak that was easy to climb. The giant tree had once been used as a deer stand, and a few weathered steps remained embedded in the trunk. Before they went to church to be legally and publicly married, Karen and Jake had scaled the giant tree and privately exchanged their wedding vows in a nest of grape ivy above the canopy of the woods. They returned to their special place often and had never seen a trace of another human being there. It was accessible only by a confusing maze of narrow trails, some nearly overgrown.

  No one around for miles. Karen gave McKinley his bottle. It would take him ten minutes to down it, then another fifteen minutes before he started crying. Just enough time . . .

  KAREN SPENT MONDAY morning going through “orientation,” a tedious process designed to familiarize new attorneys at Van Dyke ~ Eddington with the office computers, firm procedures for intaking business, form files and, most important of all, how to complete time charges. A young office administrator with a buzz cut and an eastern European accent gave her a gigantic three-ring binder called the “Firm Manual” to “familiarize” herself with. Karen was most interested in the section entitled “History of the Firm.” Since the name partners were both alive and in their sixties, she wondered, how much history could the firm have? It turned out that Van Dyke ~ Eddington claimed to have its origins in the mid-nineteenth century and to have been integrally involved in nearly every important event in the development of Illinois. Karen supposed the firm wanted to create this mythology of itself as a venerable institution with deep roots in the state, since clients thought old firms were more stable and less likely to rip them off.

  At noon she went to the corner conference room on the top floor for the meeting of the marketing committee. She was surprised by the sumptuousness of the decor and the sensation she got from the 180-degree floor-to-ceiling view.

  Trevor Van Dyke and Lyle Eddington rose and greeted Karen with enthusiasm. Shirley Roach stayed in her seat and eyed Karen warily. Matt Stoker was distributing sandwiches that had been delivered by a deli.

  “Lettuce and tomato, no bacon. No butter, no mayo. That has to be yours, Karen.”

  The rest of the committee laughed at this for no reason Karen could comprehend. She sat down and Trevor called the meeting to order.

  “We invited Karen here today to help us develop a strategic plan for growing the firm’s health care practice. Health care is the fastest growing part of the economy in our market, but we’re doing less than a million a year in billings to health care clients.”

  Matt broke in. “What did Shoreview Memorial pay outside counsel last year, Karen?”

  Karen thought she ought not to divulge information she had learned as the hospital’s attorney. Already, an ethical problem.

  “Not much,” she said.

  “I expect you handled most matters yourself,” said Lyle. Karen nodded. The sour look on Lyle’s face gave the impression that he was a fuddy-duddy, which at that moment she found comforting.

  Matt spoke. “Well, I’ve got a friend at Kirk & Houston, the biggest outfit in Chicago. They represent the Benevolent Health System, and they billed it over five million last year.”

  “That’s a ten-hospital system,” said Karen.

  “Right,” said the lawyer. “So it comes to half a million per hospital. There have to be some economies of scale, so I propose we make 600K in billings our goal for Shoreview in the next twelve months.”

  “Sounds good to me,” said Trevor.

  “Me, too,” said Shirley.

  Lyle rubbed his cheek twitch, and asked Karen what she thought of the proposal. Karen knew that amount was ten times what she had been spending for legal services, and
vastly in excess of both the hospital’s means and its needs.

  “I don’t understand this,” she said. “Our billings to the hospital for the next twelve months will depend on what legal services the hospital needs, how many lawsuits, major business transactions and such it encounters. It won’t be determined by some artificial goal we set. And it won’t be anywhere near $600,000.”

  Karen noticed Trevor and Matt eye each other and smile. Trevor said, “Now that you’re in the firm, Karen, you’ll have to learn to be more proactive. You can’t just sit back and wait for the phone to ring. You’ve got to learn to create demand for the firm’s services.”

  Shirley said, “That’s right. Be proactive. Create demand.”

  Karen sat quietly, feeling uncomfortable. They expected her to say something, but she had nothing to say. Matthew finished chewing a hefty bite of his sandwich, washing it down with a slug of diet cola.

  “Let me give you an example, Karen,” he said. “You could contact Arthur Winslow and your board chair and recommend a legal audit. We send in a team of attorneys to go over the hospital’s contracts, bylaws, policies and so forth, to see if there are any legal compliance issues. We charge $30,000 for the audit, but we bring in quadruple that amount handling all of the legal problems we identify.”

  “I understand that might be appropriate for some clients,” replied Karen slowly, feeling her way, “especially if they have reason to believe there may be problems. But you know, I’ve been the in-house counsel at Shoreview for the past fourteen years.”

  “That’s why,” said Matt, “you’ll have credibility if you say they need an audit.”

  “But Matthew,” Karen said, gesturing with both hands, “I personally wrote or reviewed all of the hospital’s legal documents. I’ve been auditing its legal compliance.”

  “I hope,” said Trevor, “you’re not letting your ego get in the way.”

  “My ego isn’t the point,” said Karen, clenching her fists under the table and trying unsuccessfully to keep her voice from rising. “The point is, I know for a fact that the hospital does not need a legal audit. It would be a complete waste of money.”

  “Money,” said Trevor, “which would end up on Van Dyke ~ Eddington’s bottom line. Yes, you’ve been in-house at Shore-view for a long time. It may take you a few days to change gears.” He jabbed the table with his index finger. “Your duty is now to this firm!”

  “In law school I was taught that it was a lawyer’s fiduciary duty to place the client’s interest above his own when recommending legal services.” Karen noticed Lyle Eddington’s usually pursed lips draw into a thin smile, and he gave her an avuncular nod.

  Trevor said, “You were in law school a long time ago.”

  Shirley added, “Times change.”

  Karen sat back in her chair and crossed her arms. A host of self-preservative notions floated across her mind like a fog bank. First day on the job. Need to make a good impression. They have expectations. Nice fringe benefits. The fog cleared momentarily.

  “I won’t do it,” she said.

  “Well,” said Matt, “there’s more than one way to skin a cat. Karen, I’ll stop by your office later and we can kick some ideas around. Now the committee has a couple of other items to discuss, so . . .”

  Karen stood and walked from the room, feeling like a dismissed schoolgirl.

  CHAPTER

  18

  Karen’s office at Van Dyke ~ Eddington had been furnished K in anticipation of her arrival. For the first time, she had what she considered the office of a successful attorney. The Chippendale guest chairs were covered in a striped fabric that matched the curtains. Framed lithographs of colonial scenes and a Kittinger desk as solid as a block of granite faced a window that was many times the size of her little double-hung at Shoreview; it was also cleaner and had a better view.

  But the window didn’t open. Karen sat in her well-decorated, sealed-up box, watching cars crawling along the city streets below, reproaching the hell out of herself. This office, these people, this job—all felt foreign. It looked as if she did not belong here. When Matt Stoker showed up in the doorway, she was ready to tell him to call the whole thing off.

  “That was great,” said the impeccable attorney, touching what Karen recognized as an Hermès yellow and black tie. “How you stood your ground. Lyle and Trevor like you.”

  “Are you joking? Trevor looked like he wanted to have me beheaded.”

  Matt settled into a guest chair, totally at ease and as loose-limbed as a cheetah. “Don’t worry, I can handle Trevor, and you can, too. One thing you have to know about him is he believes in the ‘lawyer versus client’ model of law practice.”

  Karen wrinkled her nose. “The what?”

  “Some lawyers think they’re on the client’s side, and the opposing counsel is their adversary. Trevor views the other side’s lawyer as his ally because the opponent helps Trevor achieve his goal, which is to get as much of the client’s money as possible. His real enemy is the client because the client is trying to hold on to his money. That’s the ‘lawyer versus client’ model.”

  “That’s disgusting.” Karen felt a chill in spite of the weather.

  Matt laughed. “You might see it differently once you’re an equity partner and you’ve been through a couple of annual distributions. Whatever you guess the top partners here make, you’re way low. You may never buy into Trevor’s model, but you might be grateful for its results.”

  A peregrine falcon swooped past, drawing Karen’s eyes to the window. This place even had better birds than the hospital. Matthew was not persuading her, but his relaxed manner was calming her down. She asked about the ideas he had said he wanted to kick around.

  “We can start small,” said Matt. “When you meet with the hospital board to get authority to settle the Billick claim, just drop some of our marketing materials on them. Fair enough?”

  It was fair. Matt understood. Karen agreed, then asked what authority she should try to get from the board to settle the Billick case.

  “Fifty thousand should do it. Arthur will go that high, and I’m sure we can get the Billicks and Gary Wickwire down under a hundred grand. We’re meeting with them tomorrow to discuss settlement. Block out your late afternoon.”

  Karen mentally reviewed her schedule for Tuesday. She had planned to interview Dr. Treacher, the neurologist with the suspiciously high mortality rate, in the morning, then attend the hospital board meeting at noon. “Block out your late afternoon.” This was a part-time job?

  “Y-Y-Y-ELLO,” SAID JAKE.

  “How’s my little snookum-wookunis?”

  “Sleeping like the baby he is. How come you never ask how I am anymore?”

  “Jake, I’m bummed. I screwed up big time.”

  “I was joking. You don’t have to ask how I am.”

  “No, I mean changing jobs. I think I made a mistake.”

  “You’ve only been there four hours.”

  “I had a meeting with the big shots,” Karen explained. “The avarice and amorality around here is shocking.”

  “Not the same gig as working for a nonprofit hospital, eh?”

  “You got that right. Plus my work schedule is out of control already. I’ll be home late tomorrow.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “I was hoping you’d have some words of wisdom to make me feel better.”

  “Hmmm. Let’s see. How about, ‘To err is human, but if you wear out the eraser ahead of the pencil, you may be overdoing it.’”

  “No good.”

  “Okay, then. Try this. ‘There is no failure except in no longer trying. There is no defeat except from within.’”

  “That’s . . . not bad. One of your Buddhist guys?”

  “No, Ken Hubbard, a World War I-era cartoonist from Indiana.”

  “Boy, Jake, that is really some trivia. Can we have martinis when I get home?”

  “I’ll have a beakerful in the fridge and stemmed glas
ses in the freezer.”

  “My knight in shining armor,” said Karen. “With shining barware,” replied Jake.

  AS KAREN WAS packing up her briefcase, Matt Stoker appeared at her door. He was slightly out of breath. “Sorry, Karen. You can’t go home yet.”

  It was part of the deal that Karen could leave early to take care of McKinley. So Matt thought he could break the deal her first two days in a row? Guess again. She looked at him with a raised eyebrow and a curled lip. “This had better be damned important.”

  It was. “We’re going to the county jail. Arthur Winslow has been arrested.”

  As Matt drove his Jag to the jail, way too fast by Karen’s reckoning, he explained the basics of pretrial procedure for a felony case filed in circuit court. That Arthur was sitting in jail meant that Lopopolo had presented the results of his investigation to a prosecutor, who had filed a complaint. Soon Arthur would be brought before a judge who would inform Arthur of the charges and decide whether he should be released on bail. There had been no grand jury, so the next step would be a probable cause hearing, followed by the arraignment, where Arthur would enter his plea. Karen listened without asking questions, flushed with excitement and trepidation.

  Matt had arranged to meet with Arthur Winslow in an attorney-inmate visiting area, which at the Weyawega County Jail consisted of a booth adjacent to the holding cell. The walls of the meeting booth were wire-reinforced safety glass, enabling Karen to view the occupants of the men’s holding cell and allowing them to observe her. She assiduously avoided eye contact. The men in the holding cell were all about the same age and similar in appearance, a bunch of young derelicts, save for Arthur, who stood out like a stately home in a trailer park.