Isolated Judgment

by Jonathan Watkins

  Early on in his twenty-seven years with the little ten-man department he had decided that a single fifty-page notebook must be filled completely each week. Every Friday afternoon at five, Chief Fish filed a completed notebook away and, with keen satisfaction, slipped a virgin notebook into his breast pocket. It was not, in and of itself, good police work. But as he tried to drill into the eight men and one woman beneath him, good police work was an accumulation of little professionalisms, and not the rare instance when physical bravado was required.

  It wasn’t a particularly popular philosophy, but Chief Fish was not the sort to let a room full of rolling eyes keep him from repeating a maxim he believed was correct.

  The downtown was empty; the only sound his cruiser’s engine. The shops and restaurants wouldn’t open until noon, some even later. September was, at best, the tail end of the tourist season. And weekdays in September were positively low-energy. The year-round residents of Put-in-Bay knew when to rush and scramble for the tourists’ attentions and when to stay home with a book or putter around the lake with a cooler full of beer.

  Chief Fish sighed and, not for the first time, yearned to be that carefree. There were two types of permanent residents on the island: those who had enough money to treat their life on the lake as one easy, meandering ride and those who couldn’t. Chief Fish could take some pride in knowing his family was considered among those who had founded Put-in-Bay, but that fact alone wouldn’t pay the bills or ever allow him the freedom to idle his afternoons away on the water.

  He was a man who had to work among a community of people who were on permanent vacation.

  The police department was housed in the basement of the Clock Tower Town Hall Building, in the center of the village. Chief Fish glanced up at the big white-faced clock that sat just under the steepled peak of the building, noted the time and went inside.

  Casper was on dispatch duty at the other end of the big room where the officers had their desks and personal lockers. Chief Fish returned the young man’s nod from across the room and continued into his office. He allowed himself a few minutes to check his email, retrieve a cup of coffee from the break room and take his blood pressure pills.

  He paused for a moment at the keyboard of his computer, mentally checking through his list of priorities. He’d need to do a follow-up with Ben Roth to see if anyone had returned his boat yet. The Roths were taciturn and private people. If some joyrider did return the boat, Chief Fish wasn’t confident that Ben would bother to phone it in. But that visit would have to wait until a decent hour. He needed to run Casper through the “objectives and protocols” verbal test he’d created, which was to be administered every three months so that the officers kept the policies fresh in their minds. One of the cruisers needed an oil change. There were other minor matters, but none of those things were particularly pressing.

  Satisfied that he had catalogued his day, allotting appropriate time for each of his duties, he pulled out the business card the lawyer had handed him. He stuck it up in the space between the monitor screen and its plastic housing and started typing, occasionally pausing to either sip his coffee or thumb his glasses back up into place.

  Darren Fletcher. Issabella Bright. Okay, kids. Let’s get acquainted.

  * * *

  Judge Prosner’s thirty-five-foot yacht was called Learned Hand. Lou, taking heed of Issabella’s brimming excitement, gave them a little tour—showing them the hardwood-floored cabins below deck, the little bathroom and letting her sit in the cockpit chair.

  “She is not often used,” he explained as Issabella held the wheel and stared excitedly out at the lake. “The Judge is very old, like me. Older. His legs are very bad. In younger years she got much use. Now, not so much.”

  As they got underway, Darren and Issabella huddled on one of the cushioned benches on the deck while Lou sat under the cockpit canopy and piloted them away from Put-in-Bay. The lake was choppy, stirred by a robust northeastern wind, so that their journey was characterized by a rhythmic pitching and rising against the water. Issabella leaned in close to Darren and huddled against the chill.

  “That was nice when you gave me your blazer earlier,” she said. “That was very gentlemanly of you. Then. You know...before. In the past.”

  Darren slipped out of his suit coat and draped it over her. She wormed in under his arm and buried her head against his side.

  “Heat thief,” he chided.

  “What? I’m snuggling.”

  “You’re leaching every bit of warmth I have. You’re a heat thief.”

  “Whatever. Label me as you like. I’m warm.”

  The sun was visible now, indistinct behind the curtain of morning haze.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong—” he began.

  “Of course.”

  “—but I think we have another game to play, Izzy.”

  She peered up at him.

  “We don’t know enough yet,” she said. “And you always think there’s a game to play. This might be very mundane. Most things are mundane. Not every client is going to be a Vernon Pullins. Besides, I won that game. I don’t think you want to play with me again. Your self-image might get bruised.”

  Darren looked back at their wake, toward the island of Put-in-Bay, which was no more than a slim line on the horizon now. His eyes were bright and alert. Peering up at him, she realized that Darren had seized on something. Whatever it was, it had dispelled the weariness of his night in the jail cell and left him looking animated and eager.

  “Okay. Tell me.”

  Darren clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and favored her with a wry grin.

  “Share what I know before we’ve even begun? For shame, counselor. If you want in on the game, just say so.”

  “For all we know, he just wants us to write his will or something. There’s no call for a game, yet.”

  “I understand if you’re timid. I am, by any objective evaluation, a formidable adversary. There’s no shame in surrender. Are you warm enough? I could see if there’s a blanket down below. You deserve to be warm. And comfortable. And uncurious.”

  Issabella pinched his side and made an exasperated huffing sound.

  “Fine,” she declared into his armpit. “Game on. Okay?”

  “Loser arranges the winner’s file cabinet.”

  “My files don’t need arranging. I have a system.”

  “Loser arranges the winner’s file cabinet.”

  “Fine. What’s the winner get?”

  “Bedroom rights.”

  “What are bedroom rights?”

  “I’ll explain them when I win, Izzy.”

  “I hate this game already.”

  Darren tugged the suit coat up over her shoulders and hugged her closer to him.

  Wailing Isle materialized slowly, becoming distinct and real as the sun rose and burned the morning haze away. It was as Captain Hugh suggested—small and supporting a single large mansion in its center.

  As Lou piloted the yacht up alongside the dock that extended out from the island, Darren and Issabella stood up and took in the sight. The island rose steeply, so that the stone and brick mansion of the Judge was clearly visible from the shore.

  “So, yeah,” Issabella said, “I am totally envious right now.”

  “Maybe he’ll let us touch the china.”

  Lou held out a hand for each of them as they stepped up onto the dock. His grip was startlingly strong for a man who looked as old and weathered as he did.

  “What do you do here, Lou?” Darren said.

  Lou made a waving gesture that encompassed the full length of the island.

  “I do it all,” he said. “The Judge is a busy man. I keep his home and grounds. With these hands. And much work. I work very hard.”

  Lou led them down the dock to t
he shore. A small prefabricated shed squatted in the sand and beside it sat a golf cart with a white canopy and oversized wheels.

  “Here,” he said, and motioned for them to sit on the rear seat of the cart. “It is a steep journey.”

  Issabella started to sit, but Darren put a hand on her arm.

  “We’re gonna walk up, Lou. Izzy’d love to see a little of the island before we meet the Judge.”

  Lou pulled his cap off and glanced around. He held it down in front of him and wringed it with his vein-thick hands.

  “I think it is best to go together,” he mumbled.

  “I’m sure the Judge won’t mind. We’ll be there straightaway.”

  “He says to bring you to him.”

  “Thanks, Lou.”

  Darren took Issabella by the elbow and guided her away from the golf cart. There was a paved lane that began nearby, winding up and quickly disappearing in the press of trees.

  “What are you doing?” she said under her breath.

  “Looking around. Come on. It’ll be fun.”

  They continued on. In a moment, the electric whine of the golf cart’s motor announced Lou, and the groundskeeper zipped past them. He had his cap back in place and was hunched over the wheel as if leaning forward could make the cart go faster.

  “That’s a nervous man,” Darren said.

  “You think?”

  “On occasion. You know, Izzy, this is probably a good time to split up and look around. How about you meet with the Judge and get the formalities out of the way while I get a peek at this place. We can switch after...hmmm, half an hour? Does that sound like enough time? The island isn’t that big, so my guess is half an hour would be plenty.”

  Issabella stopped walking.

  “You’re not going to come meet the client? Seriously?”

  “Well, eventually.”

  “Darren, you can’t just go wandering off and leave me with all the work.”

  “I’ll be working. Observation. Analysis. Snooping. That’s work.”

  “What aren’t you telling me? Why don’t you want to go meet the Judge?”

  “First impressions,” he said, shrugging. “You make better ones than I do. So you go be your charming, professional self. I’ll look around and poke my nose where it doesn’t belong. That’ll give you enough time to get the fee agreement signed and locked in. Then I’ll meet with him as long as he wants. It’s a good plan.”

  “It’s not a plan. It’s irresponsible. You can’t strand me with the client.”

  Darren’s grin grew wider and a self-amused light shone in his eyes.

  “Watch this,” he said, and stepped into the woods.

  “Darren.”

  “Half an hour, kiddo,” he called back. “Make sure to get that agreement signed. Also, you’re beautiful. Ciao, Izzy.”

  He ducked under a branch and was quickly out of sight.

  “Darren.”

  Nothing.

  Issabella stared after him. She did a slow pirouette, as if looking in all directions might help her understand what had just happened. It didn’t, so she started walking up the drive again. Darren was convinced that something strange was going on. He was playing his game. Rational persuasion would not work on him.

  It never works on him. Fine. You go get yourself lost in the woods while I get real information from the client. Game on.

  She quickened her pace and shouted over her shoulder, “You could have let me ride on the golf cart, you know!”

  * * *

  “He will be reading, I think,” Lou said. “He is retired, but still a judge. Always reading and writing. Wait here. I will bring him.”

  Issabella noticed him glance toward the front doors, as if he might spy Darren beyond them. He was wringing his knit cap again.

  “Darren will be here soon,” she repeated.

  “Why does he not listen? I said to him the Judge wanted him here. Not out there.”

  “Well, I’m here. So...”

  Lou scowled and mounted the stairway that ran up along one wall of the foyer. She watched him shake his head in consternation the whole way up. Once she was alone, Issabella looked around.

  The foyer led into a hallway with a high, arched ceiling. On the wall opposite the staircase, a doorway led into some sort of sitting room that was full of what looked like antique sofas, chairs and bookcases. When Lou had been gone awhile, she wandered into that room.

  The shelves were lined with legal books; some she recognized and some she didn’t. Many of them were extremely old, and when she plucked one from the bunch she found it had a publication date of 1872 and was titled On Tortious Conduct and Remedies at Law. The author was Herman Prosner.

  On the next shelf she found a framed black-and-white photograph of a World War Two soldier. Issabella took it down and held it up to the soft light of the standing lamp in the corner of the room. The GI was tall and very slender, almost sickly thin. There was a bandage wound tightly around one of thighs. He had his arm over the shoulders of a boy who was wearing half pants and a torn, ragged shirt. They were standing in front of a big truck with a Red Cross symbol on the side. The GI’s expression was a mixture of relief and elation, his eyes trained somewhere just off camera. The boy’s eyes stared straight at her, sullen and shrouded under the bill of a flat cap that was pulled low over his brow. His mouth was a tightly pursed smear of consternation.

  Lou. That’s Lou as a little boy.

  As old as he was now, his eyes were still the same. The nervous frustration the boy wore so openly had, apparently, stayed with him all the decades since the photograph was taken.

  A mechanical whirring sound started, and Issabella stiffened in surprise. She set the photograph back on the shelf and stepped into the foyer again. She was smoothing her skirt when a voice drifted down to her from the top of the stairs.

  “Ah. Good. You were snooping.”

  The mechanical whirring was from the motor of the wall-mounted chair that was descending down along a track that ran parallel to the angle of the stairs. She hadn’t noticed the rail before. It had been disguised with a coat of paint the same color as the molding that began where the track ended.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said.

  “No need. I require a snoop.”

  Judge Bernard Prosner was very thin and utterly bald. When his descent was complete, Issabella could see that one of his eyes was milky, its pupil submerged beneath a thin, translucent film. As his other eye moved to focus on her, the white one did not follow.

  She struggled to find her bearing. He was the single oldest-looking human she had ever seen. His skin was covered in liver spots, and there was a severe fragility in his spidery hands and bony frame. A thick terry-cloth robe was draped over his shoulders and, beneath it, he was wearing silk pajamas.

  “You’re too pretty to be a lawyer,” he said, the one eye looking her up and down. “They didn’t make them as pretty as you when I was admitted to practice. What am I saying? Of course they didn’t. We were all men.”

  “Your Honor, I—”

  “Where is Darren Fletcher?”

  “He thought...” she started, but a polite lie didn’t leap to mind.

  The Judge sniffed loudly.

  “He thought to disobey. That’s his nature, isn’t it?”

  “You...you know Darren?”

  When he smiled, only one side of his mouth curved upwards.

  “He won’t discover anything I don’t want you to find. That is what this is about, after all: laying everything bare for you to pick over. Ludolf is retrieving my wheelchair. Go down the hallway and turn left. Three doors down on the right is my first-floor study. Have a seat there. I’ll be along.”

  His tone had shifted, so that the instructions were seemingly delivere
d from atop the courtroom bench he had once ruled over. It left no room for dispute, and Issabella found herself nodding once and walking away down the hall with the uneasy feeling she’d just been sent to the office like a schoolgirl.

  When she turned left, she stopped and stared down the hallway. She pulled her phone out and snapped several photos with it. Then she sent a text to Darren: There is a suit of armor in the hallway. I am not joking. Also, you’re a jerk.

  The study was a small room with little more than an old desk that was made of dark, cherry-stained wood and looked like it weighed as much as a small car. Issabella sat in the chair opposite the desk and noted that though it was cluttered with papers and books, the only piece of modern technology to be seen was a lamp with a green glass shroud.

  She stared out the window behind the desk, at a clean plain of grass and rounded rows of shrubbery, and was quickly bored.

  When the Judge eventually appeared, he was in a wheelchair and being pushed by Ludolf. The groundskeeper positioned Judge Prosner behind his desk and walked out of the room without looking at Issabella. He seemed intent on being somewhere else.

  “First, the formalities,” Judge Prosner said, and his spidery hands moved over the heap of papers in front of him until they came up with a single sheet. “You’ll have to lean over to take it. Here. A fee agreement tailored to my needs.”

  Issabella scanned the document. It was written in a sweeping cursive.

  “I don’t understand,” she said, and looked up into his one good eye. “Why all the specificity about disclosure and confidentiality? That comes as a matter of course.”

  “Ms. Bright, thirty-seven years on the bench taught me otherwise. I’m sure Chelsea explained this is a sensitive and personal issue. That agreement reflects it.”

  She looked the page over again, this time reaching the final paragraph, which spelled out the rate at which she and Darren would be paid. She read the paragraph twice.