Leo is all right with me now. If I’m nice to him, he’ll like me when he’s one, when he’s two. He will. He’ll love me until the day he gets old enough to ask my sister, What’s wrong with Auntie May?
Why does Auntie May work when the moon’s full? Why does Auntie May work for a bad place? Mommy, what does “bareback” mean? I can hear it now. And I can’t feel safe, I can’t place any trust in what Becca’s going to say.
Normally I like them a little older before they start breaking my heart. But this one’s going to do it at four or five, and it’s going to be worse than anything before.
I tighten my grip on him and lay his face against mine.
I worry and worry about Franklin.
I worry about Jerry’s new social worker, too, and it’s a surprise when he replies.
FROM: [email protected]
TO: [email protected]
SUBJECT: reality bites
Dear Lola,
Yep, you’re right. I met him before he got arrested, and he’s unpromising, to say the least. Burn this letter. Though I did like him. I guess if I pick on him enough, I can keep him on the dry for a while at least, and who knows—hope springs eternal in the human breast…Short term, though, do you know what judge he’ll be up against? And if so, do you think the judge’s innocence can be preserved?
Anyway, I know a good AA group for him, so you don’t have to worry about that end of it. Let me know when the trial date is, and I’ll see what I can do about character references and so on.
Thanks for your e-mail.
Paul
It doesn’t make sense. By all accounts, he should have sent me a stiff lecture, maybe even lodged a complaint with my superiors about my unprofessional attitude. Instead—“thanks for your e-mail”?
It’s a piece of good fortune I dwell on, to distract myself from the thought of Franklin coming to get me.
The appointed hour comes sooner than I expect; time flies by while I worry about it. Then, right on schedule, there’s a knock on my door, and I rise to meet my fate. The door opens, and ushers in Adnan Franklin, the man who’s going to crush me. There’s been no communication between us since the appointment was made. A few times, I’ve caught myself scanning the paper for mentions of his name; on the whole, I’ve been trying not to think about it. Now, finally, my hour has come. The door closes behind him with a respectful click, and I shake the great man’s hand, trying to take in as much as I can.
He’s smaller than I’d expected, though I ought to have allowed for the shock that goes with meeting a famous man in the flesh; there’s no way he could have been as big as his reputation. He’s under average height for a man, though still taller than me, and slenderly built; something about his movements suggests compactness of muscle, rather than slightness of bone. His dark hair is glossy and well cut, his tan skin doesn’t bear signs of aging—he must be fifteen years older than me at the very least, but it doesn’t really show. His suit is made of a gray fabric that almost glows, it’s so well woven. The hand that shakes mine has a light, steady grip, and he nods to me, swift, courteous, and assured.
I gesture him into a chair and get back to my desk as fast as possible, hiding my cheap knock-off pantsuit and worn shoes behind it. “I’m glad you could come to see me,” I say, telling myself that it’s true in a way—I might have had to brave his offices.
“I’m glad to meet you, Ms. Galley, since we have a client in common.” His voice is not loud: rather, it’s quick and clear, you have to pay attention to it. I rest my chin in my hand, taking possession of the desk.
“Richard Ellaway. Yes. I understand you’ve been his lawyer for some time.”
“I have indeed.” Franklin gives me a beady look. “I must ask you, if you’ll forgive me—have you never considered passing up this case?”
The man has barely sat down yet! This comes so suddenly that I blink at him, astonished into forgetting who he is. “It’s a bit early in the meeting for you to be suggesting that, isn’t it?”
He looks at me, puzzled, then gives a little laugh. It’s a perfect laugh, urbane and restrained. It’s so good that I wonder how it can be natural. Then I take another look at him, and feel obscurely sympathetic. I don’t think it’s his fault that he’s so refined looking—well, he chooses his clothes, I suppose, but his manner doesn’t seem forced. He’s so much what I expected, cultured, well dressed, confident, and so different—I mean, he’s actually flesh and blood—that I’m at a sudden loss. I’m supposed to have an opinion on this man, that was how I was planning to get through this interview. Actually, I just don’t know what to make of him.
“I mean no reflection on your abilities, Ms. Galley.” Franklin sits back in his chair. His hands, broader than his wrists would suggest, rest peacefully in his lap. “Only that I believe you have a personal interest in this case.”
“You mean I knew the victim?” I say. “Well, if you can find me a DORLA adviser in this city who didn’t know him, then maybe I will pass it on.”
Franklin frowns. “I don’t doubt that many of them knew this John Marcos by sight. You, however, were well acquainted with him. He was your friend. Do you really think you can be impartial?”
I shrug. “Maybe not, but I hope I can be professional.”
“Hm.” Franklin nods; it’s almost as if he’s conceding me a point. Then he leans forward. “And in your definition, professional involves sitting back and watching two men assault your client?”
“Assault?”
“The day of his arrest, Ms. Galley, and please let’s not pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
I feel a little pulse of nerves inside my chest, and then it goes away. My bread and butter is winos and derelicts, so I’m not used to proper, expensive lawyers, but this must happen to people higher up the ladder than me all the time. “I’m not pretending anything, Mr. Franklin. You’ll find the records show it was me who ended that interrogation. You can check it.”
“I have. And you did. Fifteen minutes after you entered. I have the testimony of my client, too, which is not favorable to you in the least.”
I smile. “Well, he doesn’t like me.”
“My client states that not only did you fail to intervene when he was assaulted, but you refused to allow him to call me, although he specifically asked to. You arrested him on suspicion of murder, held him without charge, during which time he was subjected to actual bodily harm and denied access to a lawyer. I assume you know how many human and civil rights decrees this contravenes? If you were responsible to the Bar Council, Ms. Galley, you would be disbarred. Is that your definition of professional?”
He does it awfully well. Some kind of protective detachment has taken hold of me. By rights I should probably be cowering: after all, without even mentioning the Middle Ages, he’s just accused me of breaking the laws of the land, the continent, and the democratic world, betraying the principles of my profession, and being a disgrace to civilization in general. It’s quite possible I’ll find I’m shaking after he’s gone. Right now, though, all that’s left in me is an impersonal admiration for his delivery. Really, he’s very good.
“I’m not responsible to the Bar Council, Mr. Franklin. I’m not a member.”
“I know. I’m familiar with DORLA legal practices. How many years of training did you have—two? It seems you qualified at twenty with only a basic grounding in the laws that apply to your narrow field of interest. That’s less than an undergraduate degree. I’d hardly say you were qualified to represent my client.”
“That’s a little hard, Mr. Franklin. I had the standard DORLA training—I know it’s not up to mainstream standards, but it’s better than you imply. It’s only short because we’re so understaffed, we just haven’t time to train for a full term. And our client violated laws that put him within DORLA jurisdiction. He was always going to be given an adviser with my qualifications.”
Franklin puts his head on one side and considers me.
“Would y
ou like some coffee?” I say.
“Coffee? Oh. Yes, please.”
I stand up and switch on my baby kettle. “It’s only instant, I’m afraid.”
“Thank you.”
I turn around and lean against the wall. He can’t do anything to me. I say this to myself several times, and then try an experiment. “Mr. Franklin, we do have a client in common. He may not like the way I’ve handled things, in fact I’m sure he doesn’t. And I doubt you do either. It isn’t the way I would have handled things if I had the resources. But in answer to your question, I think I have to say, yes. By the standards of my profession, by the standards of the Department for the Ongoing Regulation of Lycanthropic Activity, my behavior was professional.” I pour water into his cup.
“You really believe that it was fit behavior for a member of a government institution?”
I hand him the coffee. “DORLA’s an odd place, Mr. Franklin.”
“Not that odd, Ms. Galley. I’ve noted numerous cases where DORLA operatives were successfully sued. As I understand it, there are almost monthly demotions within your ranks. Please let’s not pretend DORLA isn’t accountable; I can produce a great many instances where your members were held responsible for their actions.”
My heart sinks a little; I manage not to sigh. “That does make us look accountable, doesn’t it. Mr. Franklin, I admire you, so I’m telling you this because it’s useful, not because I’m trying to get around you: those demotions are part of the system. People do get publicly punished here; it’s good for the government to make sure it happens. But they’ll never overhaul us. That would be too close to backing us up. Moon night’s too insoluble a problem, and we’re too good a scapegoat. It’s easier to punish us at intervals than to make us properly accountable.”
Franklin raises an eyebrow. “You’re telling me straight out that you can’t be held responsible?”
I shake my head. “I can. Personally, you can go after me. But if you’re thinking of making this a landmark, shake-up-the-system case…well, I’d advise you to do it with a better client. Because Mr. Ellaway did maul someone. Look, the point is, I have no doubt your client has much to complain of. If I was in his position I’d be no happier than he is now. But the thing is, he needs a DORLA representative. You can speak at his trial if you want to, I’m quite happy for that to happen. But I have to as well. You could get him another adviser within DORLA, but truthfully, I doubt they’d be any more…aggressive in protecting him than I have been.”
“Then God help the country, Ms. Galley, because DORLA is the most unethical, inconsistent, and unprofessional institution I can imagine.”
I sit back down, and prop my chin up again. “Maybe. But we have our own problems. Look, Mr. Franklin, I can’t compete with you. I’m laying my cards on the table here. We have a client in common, and you can pursue his grievance against me, or we can both focus on acquitting him. Personally, I’d just like to get this case over with. Does Ellaway want to sue me?”
Franklin looks at me with canny eyes. “He has talked of it, yes.”
I’m starting to feel tired. I can’t keep this up much longer. “Please don’t let him.”
“Ms. Galley, why should I feel any obligation to be dissuaded, by you, from the interests of my client?”
“I don’t think it will be in his interests. He can sue me, and it’ll go through a lyco court and they’ll hang me from the yardarm. It won’t do him much good. I don’t have any money he can sue me for, and if he wants to ruin me, then—well, I don’t think he needs to prove anything. I know my place. Outside of this office, it’s nowhere. But inside it—ruining me won’t change DORLA’s practices. It’ll just prejudice the court against him when he comes up for trial. And he’s looking at life imprisonment as it is. DORLA’s a bottomless pit, Mr. Franklin, and injustices slip into it without a trace…” I trail off. I don’t want to be ruined. As I’m talking, I hear what I’m saying, and I realize more and more that Ellaway can destroy me if he wants to, and he probably does. And since I want him to spend his life in jail, I can’t pretend he doesn’t have justification. I’m lost. I shouldn’t have messed with a rich man.
I look up, and find that Franklin is still regarding me. “It is your opinion that suing you would be bad for our client’s case?”
“Undoubtedly. And I can’t change that, so please don’t blame me.”
“You don’t think that his chances of appeal might not be better if he could claim he was improperly represented?”
“What, with you on his side?” Franklin almost laughs. I raise my head. Is he going to let me off? “That’s how it would work in a lyco—excuse me, in a mainstream court. But even so, the fact remains that all the…incidents…he wants to sue me for happened after he was arrested for the original crime, after I had already had one session advising him, and given him no cause to complain of my conduct. I don’t think he killed Johnny Marcos. I don’t think so. But he doesn’t deny he maimed him, and we have the victim’s statement, medical evidence, and the testimony of Marcos’s partner that night to back that up. That’s the case I’m representing him on. Not that that makes it any better from his point of view, but my behavior on the case of DORLA versus Ellaway for GBH and attempted murder has been perfectly adequate. So suing me for his interrogation on another charge might not stick.”
“I think it would, Ms. Galley. In the normal world. But I believe we have to negotiate certain—prejudices is not too strong a word, I think—which make for a rather extraordinary way of handling this case.”
“Mr. Franklin, you’re dead right. So—by your leave—are you going to sue me?”
Franklin puts his hands together. “No. Purely on the grounds that this is an unaccountable judiciary, that must be handled as carefully as possible.”
“Ohh.” I let out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding. I throw a quick, nervous look across the table, but either Franklin hasn’t noticed, or he has and he’s too well bred to let on.
“Ms. Galley,” Franklin says. “I have to inform you, I find your legal ethics incomprehensible.”
I should come up with a dignified response. I spend a little time searching, and find that I can’t think of one. In the end, I just shrug. “I don’t blame you.”
“Your attitude is a little cavalier, for one who is responsible for a man’s freedom.”
“Yes.” I uncross my legs and sit up. “Yes, I can see why you say that.”
The expression on Franklin’s face is almost quizzical. “You’re a rather strange young woman.”
“No, not really. Not if you look at it through my eyes.”
Unbelievably, Franklin shrugs. I didn’t know that a chess-player’s body could make such a movement. “However, I suppose we shall have to work together as best we can. I have another appointment now. May we meet later on to discuss our client’s case?”
And he reaches across the table to shake my hand.
After he’s gone, I sit down and laugh in sheer relief. Somehow I’ve escaped. I’ve met Adnan Franklin and I’m still alive to tell the tale. How I escaped, I don’t understand.
FOUR
This moon night it’s my turn. Standing in a line for equipment, already suited up, I stretch myself as best I can in the protective clothing and try not to think. The collar stick weighs heavy in my right hand. I’m loaded up like a fisherman. Maybe if I concentrate on feeling ridiculous, I won’t get the fear.
I spot my trainee across the room, leaning against the wall. Sean Martin, his name is, though everyone calls him Marty; I’ve been teaching him for a few months. His shoes are usually undone, but he remembers everything I say.
I raise my hand to get his attention. He waves back, and I manage to get through the crowd that fills the room. As he straightens up, I am surprised, as I always am, at his height. He’s a slight boy, narrow across, with a way of stooping a little to one side so his cowlick falls into his eyes. You forget he’s tall, unless you’re right up next to him.
&nbs
p; “Do I get to drive?” he says. His hopeful smile upsets me. I don’t want to have to watch it disappear.
“I don’t think so. Come on,” I say. We set out; it’s a lot easier to get through the crowd with Marty’s six foot one moving in front of me.
We’ve been assigned van thirty-two, which is the one with the crack across the windshield. Marty jostles my shoulder as we head for it; his breath billows in the cold.
“Ready to round up?” he says.
“Fight any lune in the house.” I say this mock-tough. My voice doesn’t shake at all.
“You can take them. Any lune messes with us is going to end up lining your gloves.” His voice is reassuring, which irritates me: no stripling gets to reassure me, however smart. I’m also disturbed that he sees through my joking that easily. At his age, it’s not natural.
“Keep my dainty fingers warm,” I say.
“I’ll cure the pelt. No sweat.”
His voice stretches tighter as he speaks. I toss the keys in the air to distract him, and miss them on the way down. Marty crouches and hands them back to me; once down, he stays crouched. I watch him for a few moments, then tug on his shoulder. “On your feet, kiddo. We’ve got dogs to catch.”
He rights himself. “Bring them on.” He says this without looking at me.
We settle into the van. Marty produces a flask of coffee; I take a pack of Pro-Plus out of my pocket, and use a swig from his thermos to knock one back. Marty shakes his head at the packet when I proffer it.
“You’ll be sleepy,” I warn.
He looks at me. An apologetic expression is on his face; the catching hood has squeezed it at the corners so it’s flushed. “I don’t need stringing out any further,” he says.
There’s a silence on these nights, which is like nothing you ever hear. It’s so quiet it’s almost musical. We sit in our van, the flood-lamps on top giving us a small circle of light. Lycos never see this. No one to run the power, no one to run the water, the gas, the telephones, the city. It all shuts down, the electricity grids go off, the world is black. Lycos lock their doors with bolts instead of coded security pads and hope nothing catches fire until morning. We run our shelters on generators and stock up on water and supplies, and the darkness outside lays siege. Our radios and tracking systems keep us reminded that there are other people in the world. We need reminding. First-aid workers at the shelters, skeletal staff at the DORLA offices. And no one else, no one else awake or tame. We dwell on the shelters, think about them a lot. It’s like knowing that down under the deep sea there is a bottom somewhere.
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