Primary Justice

by William Bernhardt

  Maggie found her feet and walked to the door. Her knees seemed weak and barely able to support her. Tears had finally sprung forth and were rolling down her cheeks. Christina quietly followed her out of the room.

  “And shut the door behind you.”

  Christina shut the door.

  Derek scrutinized Ben in silence. Ben wondered what his punishment would be. Copying dictionary pages, perhaps, or maybe he’d have to stay in during recess.

  Several uncomfortable seconds elapsed before either of them spoke.

  “How old did you say you are, Kincaid?”

  “Twenty-nine.”

  “Mmmm.” He sank back and stroked his chin. “I think I was older than you when I was twenty-nine.”

  Ben bit his tongue.

  “You grew up in Nichols Hills, right? In the suburbs.” Derek chuckled. “I’ll bet your father never spanked you when you were a kid.”

  Ben kept on biting.

  “I’ll get to the point, Kincaid. I don’t think you’re going to cut it here. This isn’t something that just occurred to me. I’ve been concerned about this since you arrived. I try to help the people I work with, Kincaid. I care about people. But I look across at you and I think: does this kid have the fire to be a successful litigator? And every time, I come up with the same answer: no.”

  Ben continued to stare back in stony silence.

  “It’s as if you don’t know how to fight. You’re not willing to be mean. I’ll put it to you blunt, kid—in litigation, sometimes you have to be a bully, an out-and-out asshole. When you’re a litigator, you’ve got to remember that every second of misery you can bring to the opposition is a second that will make them consider settling. Being an asshole is always in your client’s best interest.” He shifted positions. “But I don’t see you doing that. You’re too damn nice.” He shook his head and formed a steeple with his fingers. “I guess I just don’t see the fire.”

  After a few silent moments, Derek continued. “You know the adoption hearing is tomorrow morning.”

  “Yes.”

  “I want you to handle it. I don’t mean just on paper. The whole shebang. Witnesses, argument, everything. Start to finish.”

  Ben’s eyes grew to twice their normal size. “But, sir, I’m not prepared—”

  “You see, Kincaid?” Derek sprang forward from his chair. “That’s exactly what I mean. Most young associates would be chomping at the bit to do a hearing on their own. But not you. You hang back.”

  “It’s not that, sir. It’s just that it’s an important matter and I haven’t prepared—”

  “So start preparing! You’ve got almost twenty-four hours. How much time do you need?”

  Ben didn’t say anything. He and Christina already had plans for the evening, but he could hardly reveal them to Derek.

  “This is your big chance, Kincaid,” Derek said, smiling. He propped his hands behind his head and stretched. “Prove me wrong.”

  22

  BEN AND CHRISTINA STOOD on the front porch and rang the bell. The sun was setting on the other side of the Arkansas, a spectacular pyrotechnic display that Ben barely noticed, much less appreciated. His mind was on the other side of the door, and on the next stop after this one.

  No answer. Ben rang the bell again.

  “Is this really necessary?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Christina said. “Don’t be a wimp.”

  “Maybe we should wait a few more days.”

  “We’ve waited too long already. We need to go tonight.”

  Ben frowned. “We probably won’t learn a thing.”

  “Probably. But we have to follow all our leads. Particularly the ones we risked life and limb to get.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

  Inside the house, Ben could hear music playing at full volume. Something symphonic. Beethoven’s Ninth, unless Ben was mistaken. He rang the bell again.

  Someone had to be home. They probably just couldn’t hear the doorbell over the loud music. He tried the door; it wasn’t locked.

  No harm in poking my head in, Ben thought. He opened the door and stepped inside. Christina followed.

  “Hello,” he said loudly. Still no response.

  In the center of the living room Ben saw Emily, sitting on the floor, eyes closed, listening to the music. Listening was an understatement; she was completely absorbed. It wasn’t the pretentious, show-off absorption exhibited by snobs at the Philharmonic, Ben realized. She wasn’t even aware they had come in.

  The movement ended. Slowly coming out of her reverie, Emily opened her eyes, looked in Ben’s direction, and screamed. The scream was uncommonly piercing, more than Ben would have thought possible from an eight-year-old girl!

  Bertha Adams came running from the back room, her heavy legs thumping against the carpet, her right hand pressed against her chest. “Mr. Kincaid,” she said, flushed and breathless. “I didn’t hear you come in. Afraid I was napping again.”

  She saw Emily cowering on the floor. “It’s all right, Emily. I’m here now. Remember me?” Emily responded to her voice by crawling across the carpet and clinging to Bertha’s legs.

  Ben crouched down to Emily’s level. “It’s okay,” he said softly. “We’ve met before. I’m Mr. Kincaid. I’m your friend.”

  Emily looked pensively from Ben to Bertha. Bertha nodded and stroked the girl along her shoulders.

  “You remember Mr. Kincaid, don’t you, child?” She smoothed down the tiny girl’s hair. “It’s always hard when she comes back from the music. She’s at her happiest when the music’s playing. She’s at peace. But when the music’s over, it’s like dragging the poor girl back from another world.”

  Emily still clung tightly to Bertha’s leg.

  “We came for a specific purpose,” Christina reminded Ben.

  “We came,” he said hesitantly, “because I need … a photograph.”

  Bertha looked at the floor and said nothing. Poor woman, Ben thought. I bring it all back to her.

  “You mean of my husband,” Bertha said quietly after a moment. “You can say it. I won’t turn to mush. You want a picture of my dead husband.”

  Ben nodded. “For identification purposes.”

  Bertha’s brow wrinkled slightly. “I already gave a snapshot to the police.”

  “Yes, I know. I need another one.”

  Bertha surveyed the living room. “I’ve always said this is the best picture he ever took.” She removed a sepia-toned photo in a gold frame from a tabletop. In the picture, she stood next to her husband—she in a lace-covered white dress, he in a double-breasted brown suit. The picture was at least thirty-five years old. It was obviously their wedding picture.

  Ben cleared his throat. “I think, perhaps, something more contemporary might be appropriate. …” His voice trailed off.

  “Well, I have these wallet-size black-and-whites that were taken about a year ago. A photographer came to the office to take pictures for a Sanguine public relations brochure. Took a lot of personal photos while he was there.”

  She withdrew a photo from a drawer beneath her china cabinet. “Not very flattering, but you can tell it’s him.” She continued to stare at the photograph and seemed lost in thought. After a moment, she passed it to Ben. “I do miss him,” she said simply.

  Ben took the photo and thanked her.

  “The hearing is tomorrow morning at ten,” he reminded her, “Even though she probably won’t be called into the courtroom, you need to bring Emily.”

  Bertha nodded.

  Ben crouched down and smiled at Emily. “Would you like me to turn the record over?”

  Emily nodded eagerly. Ben flipped the record on the stereo.

  The music swelled. Emily’s eyes closed and once more she was a part of the symphony. Ben’s last sight, as he and Christina walked out the front door, was of Emily, the girl with no past, no future, barely a present, sitting in the middle of the living room, joining the music in a reverential symbiosis.

  T
hey walked silently down the sidewalk to Ben’s Honda.

  “You’re not saying very much,” Ben said to Christina as he started the car.

  “No.”

  Ben placed his hand on her shoulder. “She’s quite a girl, isn’t she?”

  Christina nodded. “How old is she?”

  “Eight, we think.”

  Christina stared at the road straight ahead. “Is that right?” She released a soft laugh. “That’s how old my little girl would be.”

  “You never told me you had a baby.”

  “I didn’t,” she replied. She pressed her fingers against her left temple and stared out the passenger-side window for the remainder of the drive.

  23

  THE RED PARROT WAS not quite a cowboy bar, but Tulsa was not quite a cowboy town. Tulsa did have equivalents—transient oil rig hands, truckers, bikers, construction workers, miscellaneous unemployed, your basic criminal element—and all of them apparently frequented the Red Parrot.

  Ben and Christina stepped into the smoke-filled bar. Ben kept telling himself to be bold, but he knew he wasn’t convincing anybody, including himself.

  They had both dressed down for the occasion, in blue jeans, cotton western shirts, and boots. Ben even had a western belt with BEN branded on the back. Something his grandmother had given him that he’d never worn until now. Ben thought Christina looked outrageous in her pink suede cowgirl jacket, but then, he reflected, no more so than she did in her daily work clothes.

  Ben observed that the Red Parrot was roughly divided into four quadrants. Quadrant one: the bar, where dirty men and dirtier women stood shoulder to shoulder quaffing longnecks and complaining about the day’s events. Quadrant two: the tables and booths, the intermediate step between picking a woman up at the bar and taking her home for a quick but purposeful encounter. Quadrant three: the two pool tables, each with a trail of quarters on the side and men lined up waiting to play. Finally, quadrant four: the games area, where menacing-looking men tossed menacing-looking steel darts in the general direction of an oversized dart board. In the center of the bar was a multicolored Wurlitzer jukebox wailing some Hank Williamsesque tune about sixteen-wheelers and cowboys and the day “my mama got out of prison.”

  “This joint ain’t big enough for the two of us, pilgrim,” Christina said.

  Ben looked at her blankly.

  “Get it? Pilgrim? Sleazy western saloon, thugs, bad side of town. It just seemed to follow—”

  “I understood, Christina.”

  “Oh. Pardonnez moi.” She looked hurt.

  His lips turned up slightly. “Smile when ya say that, pardner.”

  She did.

  Ben scoped out the clientele. The crowd looked seriously tough. Lots of muscle, tattoos, and stubble. Several men were wearing jeans jackets with matching emblems on the back. They were all members of something and Ben suspected it wasn’t the Moose Lodge. At the table closest to the bar, two men were taking turns stacking upended shot glasses. The tower already rose above the level of their shoulders.

  Meanwhile, over in the darts area, the game had taken a nasty turn—the dart board was replaced by human beings. It was a local variant on mumblety-peg; players alternated between standing against the wall and throwing the darts. Apparently, the object was to throw the dart as close as possible to the sucker on the wall without touching him. Two throws, then the players switch places. Closest throw wins. Thrower’s option as to what part of the body to aim toward. Flinching was an automatic forfeit, although striking the target body with the dart merely resulted in a reduction in points.

  “Well, I’m thirsty,” Ben said. He and Christina wedged themselves into a small opening at the bar. “I believe I’ll have an amaretto sour.”

  “Get a beer,” Christina said curtly.

  “What?”

  “You heard me. Beer.”

  Ben looked confused. The bartender, a burly mustachioed fellow in a red-checkered shirt, walked up to them.

  “What kind have you got?” Ben asked him.

  “Just say beer,” Christina whispered.

  “Beer,” Ben obeyed. “Two.”

  The bartender nodded and moved toward the taps.

  “An amaretto sour,” Christina muttered. “These guys would use you for a dust mop.”

  The bartender brought two mugs of beer and set them in front of Ben and Christina. Ben tossed a five onto the bar.

  A thin, wiry man with a red steel wool beard and a cap saw the five go down. “Were you in the service?” he asked. His voice was like gravel.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  The man’s teeth were tightly clenched, even as he spoke. “Don’t beg my pardon, man. Don’t ever beg my pardon. I hate beggars, man. Fuckin’ hate ’em.”

  He pounded his fist against the bar so hard that Ben’s beer wobbled and bounced. “I asked if you were in the goddamn service!” He was shouting. The smell of beer and booze and tooth rot was thick on his breath.

  “Uhhh, no,” Ben said quietly, not looking him in the eye. “Were you?”

  “Damn right I was. Damn right.” He pounded the bar again. “I don’t suppose you fought in the war?”

  “N-no—”

  “Hell, no. Too goddamn good to be in the war!”

  Ben had the distinct feeling he wasn’t handling this very well. “I spent a year in the Peace Corps,” he said softly.

  “You think that’s an excuse?” The man spat as he yelled. He emphasized the last word by knocking over his beer with his fist.

  “Let’s go,” Christina whispered in Ben’s ear. She tugged at his sleeve. “Pronto.”

  Ben took a step back from the bar.

  “You know what I ought to do with you? Do you?” The man followed Ben. They were practically nose to nose. Ben took another step back. The wiry man followed.

  A few others at the bar turned around to watch the fun. The man who had been standing to the right of Redbeard jabbed a friend and pointed.

  “Leave him alone,” the bartender said as he popped the lid off another longneck. “He’s too young. He doesn’t know. Here, have a beer on me.”

  God bless the bartender, Ben thought. But the bartender’s offer didn’t seem to make any difference. The man kept coming. Ben kept backing up.

  There was a sudden, loud smashing sound. Ben whirled. He had backed into the nearest table and knocked over the tower of upended shotglasses. The supreme effort of the combined lifetimes of the two bikers lay dashed and broken into a million pieces on the floor.

  “Sonovabitch!” the larger of the two men exclaimed. He was wearing a jeans jacket with a skull-and-crossbones appliqué on the back and had silver chains looped around his waist. He threw his chair back and stood up, pounding one fist against his hand. A dark-haired woman from the back of the room came forward and laid her hands on his shoulder. Ben couldn’t see either of them clearly in the dark haze of the bar.

  “Oh, God,” Ben mumbled, trying not to sound too pathetic. “I was just backing up. I—I—”

  “He didn’t mean it,” Christina said, stepping between the larger of the two thugs and Ben. “This brain-dead bully over here was forcing him backward.”

  “This what?” Redbeard echoed. “Whaddas that mean?” He shoved Christina aside, not gently.

  By this time, most of the people in the bar were rubbernecking for a better view of the show. Ben had nowhere left to maneuver. Opposing hands clamped down on both his shoulders. He knew he was finished. What Redbeard didn’t do to him, Skull-and-Crossbones surely would.

  “All right, nobody moves,” Ben said, swallowing hard.

  Skull-and-Crossbones laughed heartily. “What the hell?”

  “Nobody moves,” he repeated, taking a deep breath. “I’m an undercover cop. Kincaid, Tulsa PD, Vice. Badge number 499.”

  The two men looked skeptical. “Yeah?” Redbeard said. “So show us your badge.”

  “Can’t you see I’m in disguise, idiot?” Ben muttered. “Undercover cops don’
t carry badges.”

  Skull laughed. “The one that busted me last year did. Nice try, though.” He snapped his fingers. “Hey, guys, I got an idea. I think it’s time for a game of darts.”

  He dragged Ben into the darts quadrant and shoved him against the wall. Two other thugs wearing matching jeans jackets held Ben in place in the target area.

  “I don’t play darts,” Ben protested. “I wouldn’t be a challenge for you.”

  “Not true,” Skull said as someone handed him a fistful of darts. “I haven’t played in years.” He aimed a dart at Ben’s face.

  “Ben!” someone squealed. It seemed to come from the dark-haired woman hanging on Skull’s shoulder. “It’s Benjy!”

  Ben squinted his eyes and peered into the darkness. “Mona?” he whispered.

  It was Mona. It wasn’t a face he was likely to forget. The current spouse of the senior partner in his firm was there, at the Red Parrot, with this biker. She was dressed in a dark-blue denim jacket and a black, hip-hugging, leather miniskirt, with some cheap metal jewelry dangling from her ears and wrists.

  Skull asked, “You know this weasel?”

  “Yes, yes,” Ben said quickly. “I know her. We go way back.”

  “You been with my woman?”

  Ben stuttered. “Buh … well, no … I mean, not—”

  “Hell, what do I care?” A deep and scary laugh erupted from Skull’s lips. “Who hasn’t been? She’s older than this bar!”

  Mona’s face seemed to melt. The product of hours of skillfully applied cosmetics disintegrated in an instant.

  “I do know him,” she said softly. “You’d better leave him alone. He is an undercover cop.” She winked at Ben.

  “Really? Christ. Why didn’t you say so?” He turned halfheartedly toward Ben. “I thought we knew all the narcs around here. No hard feelings, huh? Just having some fun.”

  “Right,” Ben said, nodding.

  Christina appeared behind his right shoulder and whispered in his ear. “Show him the picture. While we’re buddies.”

  “Oh, right.” Ben saw that most of the bar’s attention was fixed in his direction.

  “Look,” he said loudly, “I’m going to pass around a photograph and I want to talk to anybody who knows anything about this man. And I mean anyone.” He cast a mean look in the direction of his former adversaries.