“How would you describe yourself as a parent? What do you think you do best? What’s the hardest thing for you to do? Tell me the same things about their father.”
“I think I’m very involved in my children’s lives. I’m very supportive of their efforts. I try to help them believe that they can do anything they want. I think I’m a good teacher to the kids. I’m patient. I think that what’s hardest for me to do is keep after them when they don’t do their chores or they break a rule. Sometimes it’s just easier to do it myself, and I do. That just makes it harder to set a limit. I know that I’m just not real good at doing it all the time. I am getting better though.
“Their dad. What does he do best? When he remembers they’re around, he will shower them with affection. Then he’ll ignore them. Tom really hasn’t taken care of them at all. That’s why I know this is just an attempt to hurt me. He likes them when they do well. When Tina is cute or when Tommy scores a goal. But all the stuff that goes on before that, he has no time for. I don’t know what he’d be good at if he put his mind to it. He just hasn’t really tried to be a father. I think that probably answers what’s hardest for him. Putting somebody else’s needs before his own. He also gets really frustrated with the kids. When they don’t behave, he starts yelling and threatening them. I think they’re afraid of him, already. I did everything I could to keep the kids away from him unless they were showing him something they’d done at school and he was in a good mood.”
“Your attempt to see Tommy at school, how do you feel about that now?”
“It was stupid. I know that. I hurt myself big time, by doing that. I look like I only care about myself, not the kids or the law. That’s not true. I know I should have just put Tommy down and given him to his father. It was terrible for him to see me and his father like that, to put him in the middle of that. He was so frightened. I was just overcome with panic and desperation. Tom and his lawyer had thrown me out of my home, cut me off from my children, taken all the money. I just wanted to hold Tommy and tell him I loved him, and tell him it would be okay. It was wrong but I didn’t know what else to do. My attorney was telling me to go along with everything they were suggesting. Do it their way. It was for the best. I didn’t have any choice. Doing things their way was killing me.”
Reece finished with his notes and looked at the asterisks in the margin. Items to pursue with Mr. Tully or by third-party informants. “Ms. Tully, that ends our interview for today. I’m going to discuss many of these things with Mr. Tully. Once I’ve heard his perspective on them, I may have you back in to address inconsistencies or contradictions in your perspectives. After Mr. Tully is interviewed, I’ll be talking to the children. Before I do that, I’ll discuss with you and Mr. Tully how I’m to be introduced to the children.”
“Fine. I’ll wait to hear from you then?”
“Yes. Right now I’m going to check and see if your husband has finished the testing. If so, he’ll come in for his interview and I’ll set you up with the tests.”
“Can I ask you a question, Dr. Reece?”
“Sure.”
“I’m starting to have second thoughts about my attorney. Tom seems to be getting everything his way. Everyone says that Tom’s lawyer is very ‘effective’ and he’s lived up to that reputation. Mine doesn’t seem to be. Do you think I should change lawyers?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t answer that question. I’m not a lawyer. I don’t know what your lawyer should be doing for you. If you’re unhappy with your lawyer, it’s always a good idea to get a second opinion. Call some experienced domestic relations attorneys who know Garfield and see what they say.”
“I did. None of them can talk to me. My husband contacted them all first and now there’s a conflict of interests if they talk to me.”
Reece rattled off some names.
“I’ve talked to them all. Everybody gives me the same names.”
“How about Lou Carlson?”
“No. Nobody ever mentioned him. Who is he?”
“He’s a law professor downtown. He used to be one of the very best domestic relations lawyers in this town. He closed his practice up a couple of years ago. He’d had a heart attack and he was only in his mid-forties. Lou was a real hard charger. I’ll bet your husband didn’t call him because he’s not practicing these days. Why don’t you call him for a second opinion? He’s extremely knowledgeable. If he thinks you aren’t being well represented, he can probably find you some up-and-coming attorney who can deal with Garfield but who your husband missed.”
“Do you think that was something my husband thought of, or did his attorney suggest that?”
“I’d rather not speculate, but Albert Garfield is ‘effective.’ How he does that leads to a lot of other descriptions. I’ll let Lou Carlson give you his take on Albert Garfield. They’ve tangled many times.”
Reece went to his desk, flipped through his Rolodex and copied Lou Carlson’s phone number at Georgetown University Law School.
“Call him, today. Each day you’re badly represented can result in ground being lost that cannot be regained.”
“Thanks.”
Serena Tully’s smile was a tentative thing.
Morgan Reece hoisted one up in response. It hung there for a moment, then slid away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Tom Tully had just finished his testing when Morgan Reece and Serena concluded their interview. Reece had Mr. Tully go into the waiting room, then he motioned Mrs. Tully to come down the hall to the testing room. He gave her the instructions to the tests and closed the door to the room.
Tully preceded Reece into the office, went straight to one of the recliners and sat down. Reece went to his, took Tully’s questionnaires, read through the answers and highlighted those of interest. He handed him the consent forms that his wife had already signed and had him co-sign.
“Those will go out today. Let’s start with the history of the marriage. What attracted you to your wife?”
Tom grinned. “You’ve seen her. She’s a beautiful woman. She was a lot of fun to be with. She loved to party, to dance. She and I just fit perfectly. She liked all the same things that I did. She was tremendous in bed. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. What a laugh.”
“Did you know about her suicide attempts?”
“Nah. She hid all of that from me. Until after the wedding.”
Reece frowned. “What about her wrists? How did she explain those?”
Tully hesitated a moment. “Oh, yeah. Those. Yeah, I guess I knew about that attempt. I just figured, you know, she got dumped on by this guy. I wasn’t gonna dump her so there’d be no call for that kind of thing.”
“Why did your wife want to get into therapy? How did you feel about that?”
“I gotta tell you, Doc, I don’t have a lotta use for this head-shrinking stuff. You gotta problem, you fix it yourself. I never saw the use of talking to somebody else about it. She was unhappy with the way things were going. She wasn’t getting her needs met, we weren’t being intimate. That’s what she said. Hell, we were having sex as often as we ever did. There weren’t any problems as far as I could see. So I told her no way was I going to see some shrink. She had a problem with her life, she could go. So she did. I don’t know, I thought it was doing her some good. She wasn’t unhappy all the time, complaining about everything. I figured, hey, it’s a female thing. They’re always talking about their problems. Now that I look back on it, I should’a figured everything wasn’t right. She stopped being interested in sex. Man, it was like pulling teeth to get her in bed. After a while I gave up on it. I wasn’t gonna beg for what I had a right to. All the therapy was doing was cooling her on being married. I could see it in lots of other ways, too.”
“Such as?”
“The kids. She got obsessed about them. She devoted her whole life to them, but it wasn’t healthy. Tina was turning into a little ‘Nervous Nelly.’ She couldn’t discipline the kids. I was always having to step in and be the bad gu
y. That was the only way she let me be a part of their lives. She cut me out of everything else. That’s why I started pushing for a nanny.”
“Why was that?”
“To try to break that bond they had. She and the kids. It wasn’t healthy. I hoped by her getting out of the house, getting a job, maybe she’d get a better balance to her life. You know the way she’d cut me out of her life and the kids, it was like she was having an affair with them. I’ll admit it, I was jealous. I loved my wife. I wanted her back. I thought this would help.”
“You know, your wife believes you’re having an affair. That’s why she thinks you’re doing all this.”
“That’s rich. She thinks I’m having an affair. Let me show you something.” Tully opened his briefcase and handed two pieces of paper to Reece. “There’s no harm in you seeing these. My attorney is filing for divorce right now on grounds of adultery. Hers. Not mine. She’ll find out about it as soon as she talks to her attorney. Take a look. That’s something to find, isn’t it?”
Reece glanced down at the papers.
“I’m trying to win her back ’cause I think she’s over-bonded to these kids and she’s out doing the tubesteak boogie with some other guy. That other thing is some piece of poetry he sent her. I don’t know who the guy is. She’s pretty careful. Shopping, workout, therapy, that’s about all she’s doing these days, but I’ll find out who it is and he’s gonna pay too, believe it. I may look like I’m playing hardball here, but you gotta understand where I’m coming from. You find something like that, it undoes you. Everything you think you’ve known or believed about this other person who you’ve trusted more than anyone is all a lie. It’s enough to make you crazy. You spend your life trying to make someone happy, trying to be there for them and this is how they repay you.”
Reece read the poem and the letter. Bad things getting worse. Albert Garfield loved adultery cases. He’d have a shadow on her night and day. He handed the papers back.
“No, you can keep them. They’re copies I made for you.”
“So you’re going to sue for divorce on grounds of adultery. You petitioned for custody on grounds that your wife was a danger to you and the children. I find that a bit incongruous, given your reputation.”
“My wife wasn’t threatening to punch me out. She said she’d cut off my dick while I was sleeping. I think to even threaten somebody with that is crazy. It just clued me in to how sick she was.”
“Her history is one of suicide attempts, not violence directed at other people. Why do you think that’s changed?”
“Because she’s got some other guy. She’s not interested in making our marriage work. She wants me out of the picture. I just beat her to the draw. Once I found out about the affair, lots of stuff began to make sense.”
“It doesn’t sound like you think your wife is crazy, just angry at you and no longer hiding it.”
“No. I think she’s crazy. She assaulted me after she violated a court order. She has no respect for the law. No thoughts about the kids, just herself. She tried to bite me. She was lucky I pulled my punch. Not only is she crazy, she’s a terrible role model for the children. She’s broken our marriage vows and the law. What kind of moral influence is she going to be on the children?”
“Your wife says you’ve had fights where you put people in the hospital. That for a while you slept with a gun under your bed. What was that about?”
“I had a reputation as a hard guy when I played. That was a game. It had rules. Everybody knew the risks. I’m sure you know I killed a guy, Cisco Conway. I hit him legally. I was never fined. He just landed badly. I’d hit plenty of guys harder than that. I felt real bad about that. In fact, I probably wasn’t the same player after that happened. I was always holding back a little. Well, there are guys who always want to find out how bad you really are. I was just defending myself. I was never charged with anything. There were always plenty of witnesses. One of those guys threatened me after he got out of the hospital. Told me he’d shoot me. I bought a pistol to protect myself and my family. After nothing happened for a while, I put it away. That’s all there is to that.”
Reece went over the same detailed questions that he’d asked Serena Tully about school, preferences, daily activities and habits, rules and discipline. Based on her report of his lack of involvement, he expected him not to know many of these and he was surprised when he answered them exactly as his wife did. Reece would not have been surprised if he’d known that last night Tom Tully had sat down and gone over the answers to all the interview questions in Reece’s book with the two children.
After discussing the possibility of a second interview and how to prepare the children for their interviews, Morgan Reece finished with Tom Tully. A little later Serena Tully finished her testing and told him that she had a four o’clock appointment with Lou Carlson.
When they had both gone, Morgan Reece went over his notes and planned the next step in the evaluation. In some cases one parent would come in and tell him that the glass was half full of water; the other would tell him that it was half empty. They’d both be right. Accurate but different. Some cases one parent would come in and tell him the glass was three quarters full and the other would say one quarter full, and he’d find that one was accurate and the other was not. Every once in awhile the parents would tell him what they saw in the glass and he’d find that there was no water at all. He wondered how this one would turn out.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Serena Tully stopped at the pebbled glass door and read G. Louis Carlson, Associate Professor of Law. She knocked on the door, heard a voice mumble something and opened the door.
The man sitting with his feet up on the desk smiled at her.
“Ms. Tully?”
“Yes.”
“Have a seat.” He pointed to the only chair not filled with books, papers or journals. Three of the walls of the office were shelves, filled with magazines and books, most vertical, some horizontal across their tops, and manila folders swollen with Xeroxed journal articles. The fourth wall was a blackboard. Carlson’s desk was a compost heap. The bottom layers of paper were yellowing and on their way to mulch. The desk had a photo of his wife and children, a huge Rolodex, mail to be read, correspondence to be typed, and papers to be graded. Perpendicular to the desk was a computer with a work in progress on its screen, modem, fax and a phone with an answering machine.
Serena Tully expected the man in the middle of this paper maelstrom to look like Lieutenant Columbo. Lou Carlson was surprisingly thin and crisp in his charcoal gray pinstripe suit, gray shirt, and red silk tie. Prematurely graying at the temples, his badly mended nose was a reminder of his collegiate boxing career.
“So you want a second opinion on your case and Morgan Reece recommended me, is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you that I no longer practice?”
“Yes, he did. He said you’d had a heart attack.”
“Yeah, about two years ago. I’ve got two little kids, three and five.”
“What are they?”
“A boy and a girl.”
“So are mine. They’re four and six.”
“And a wife who threatened to divorce and kill me, not in that order, if I didn’t start to cut back on my practice. I found that I couldn’t practice that way, so I retired and became a teacher. So I can’t take your case. If I think you’re being badly represented, I’ll tell you and try to recommend some good people to you. Who’s your husband’s attorney?”
“Albert Garfield.”
Carlson shook his head. “What does that mean, Mr. Carlson?”
“It means I’m sure you’ve been having a bumpy ride.”
“Bumpy ride? I have no home, no money, I cannot see my children. I think that’s more than a bumpy ride.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. It sounds like Albert’s been having his way so far.”
“Everybody says he’s very ‘effective.’ You can hear the quotation marks aro
und that. Dr. Reece said you’d tell me what that really means. What am I up against, Mr. Carlson?”
Lou Carlson put his feet down and leaned forward. “Albert Olen Garfield, is known as ‘Agent Orange.’ What he puts his hand to withers and dies. He’s a formidable foe. There are only a few really destructive attorneys in this town. Generally they’re pompous blowhards who promise their clients things they can’t deliver, or who give them bad advice that escalates conflict unnecessarily. They don’t often prevail, but they create havoc that lasts long after they are gone. Garfield is something else. He’s sui generis, one of a kind. He’s a psychopath with a work ethic. The practice of law is perfect for someone like that. The job description reads: attack without restraint, demonize, and then destroy what you have made. That may work for some kinds of law, but not domestic. You’re not sending people to jail for twenty years. You’re sending them back out to raise a child together. It just doesn’t work. There is very little that he would not do to beat a person down. Some of the things he does are probably unethical, but he’s so cunning you can’t prove them. You just know his handiwork when you see it, like the leaves falling off the trees. You cannot go up against him unless you are completely prepared and ready to do battle.”
“Who can do that? My lawyer can’t, I’m sure of it.”
“Joe Anthony can do it. Joe prepares as well as Albert, and he’s very good in court. Law is one half chess, one half poker. You’ve got to be able to play both.”
“I don’t understand.”
“What you do outside of the courtroom is chess. Assessing strengths and weaknesses, devising strategy. It’s mastering the known. Poker is what you do in negotiations and the courtroom. It’s how you manipulate the unknowns, your anxiety, your client’s, your opponent’s. Sometimes you only need one to win a case. Not with Al Garfield. He can do it all.”
“Joe Anthony is someone my husband already called. He can’t help me. Who else is there?”
Predictably he gave her the same names she’d already heard. She told him that she’d been locked out of using those attorneys.
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