by Tim Dorsey
A sweet little retiree climbed into the witness box with the bailiff’s assistance. “You’re such a polite young man.”
Brook reached in her purse and handed something to Ziggy. “Use this?”
“Visine?”
“Your eyes are bloodshot. They look like road maps of Cleveland.” Brook snapped her purse shut. “You’re high, aren’t you?”
Ziggy held two fingers a short distance apart. “Just a teensy bit. But only to get my head centered for cross-examination.”
“You’re not saying anything.”
The judge cleared his throat. “There a problem?”
“No, Your Honor.” Brook stood and approached the witness stand with a warm smile. “Good morning.”
Mrs. Rogers smiled back. “You’re awfully young to be a lawyer.”
“Yes, I am . . . Now, I’d like to talk about when you first applied for your mortgage . . .”
A line of genteel questioning followed as Brook walked the retiree through the process of the home appraisal and income qualifying.
“It was such a nice house,” said Mrs. Rogers. “I couldn’t believe they said I would have no problems paying for it. It was almost too good to be true.”
“No further questions,” said Brook.
“You’re such a nice young lady.”
The defense attorney from Dartmouth got up. “Good morning, Mrs. Rogers.”
“Who are you?”
“An attorney for the mortgage company.”
“Oh.”
“I just have a couple simple questions. Did you sign an agreement to make your payments each month?”
“Yes.”
“And did you?”
“At first, but then something called a variable rate changed the amount—”
“Did you sign an agreement to pay a variable rate?”
“Yes, but I didn’t understand—”
“No further questions.”
“You’re not a nice man.”
Laughter from the gallery of locals attending for their morning entertainment.
The gavel banged. “Order! There will be no more reactions from this audience.”
Brook stood. “Redirect.” She approached again with a document in a plastic bag. “Do you recognize this?”
“Objection!” said the defense. “That should have been handled on direct.”
“Your Honor, he opened the door by asking what she agreed to,” said Brook.
The judge leaned forward. “What is that?”
“One of the documents Consolidated filed with the foreclosure.”
“Objection!” the defense repeated. “That’s not related to the agreement.”
“It’s my first trial,” Brook pleaded.
The judge noticed sympathy coming from the jury box. “The foundation’s questionable, but since it’s your first case, I’m willing to see where this goes before ruling . . . this time.”
“Thank you, Your Honor . . . Now, Mrs. Rogers, if you’ll look at this part—”
“I can’t see without my glasses.”
“I’ll help you. Is your middle name Mary?”
“No, Marie.”
“Is your address three-one-nine?”
“No, three-nine-one.”
Brook established several other discrepancies, then turned to the judge. “Plaintiffs would like to submit this exhibit as an example of robo-signing—”
“Objection! She’s characterizing!”
“Sustained. The jury will disregard that last remark.”
Brook maintained poise. “I would like to submit this as our exhibit A.”
The judge raised his eyebrows toward the defense table.
An attorney jumped up on cue. “Objection! Is plaintiffs’ counsel prepared to present an officer of Consolidated to testify that he actually signed that document?”
“Actually, no,” said Brook. “As a matter of fact, if defense will stipulate, I’ll agree that this document wasn’t signed by the person whose name is at the bottom, and therefore prevents me from admitting it as evidence—as well as that whole box of other damning documents under my table that I’d love to get in. But then, if they weren’t properly signed, it means Consolidated filed fraudulent documents with the court. And since the foreclosures were based on said documents, we can all go home. Except the defendants, who will be back in criminal court.”
The opposing attorney stared into high beams. “ . . . Objection withdrawn.” He sat meekly and folded into himself.
So went the rest of the tedious day, Brook methodically laying the premise for the class action.
A gavel banged. “Court is in recess.”
The defense team stood and repacked their briefcases.
“How do you think it went?”
“Hope that suite at the resort doesn’t have many more lamps.”
Chapter TWENTY-NINE
THE JOURNAL
Reevis crossed the newspaper’s lobby and approached the security desk. “He’s with me.”
“Name?”
“I’m Serge A. Storms! . . . Oooo, can I keep the visitor’s badge as a souvenir? . . . No? Can’t blame me for asking . . .” Serge pulled out his camera. “Where do you keep the Pulitzers?”
Reevis led him into the paper’s auditorium. “I thought Coleman was coming.”
“On a bender back in Miami. It starts innocent enough, and then the motel room is full of his ‘new friends from the underpass.’ ” Serge stopped and watched a loud mass of people file down rows of folding chairs. “When I asked if I could attend your libel seminar, I was expecting a small classroom.”
“No,” said Reevis, heading for a long table against the back wall. “It’s the quarterly libel tutorial conducted by the big Shapiro law firm.”
“But I thought the paper was slashing costs everywhere.”
“It’s no charge because we have the firm on permanent retainer.” Reevis grabbed a Styrofoam cup. “And the lawyers don’t mind because all the new inexperience at the paper has created a windfall of libel suits and billable hours.”
Serge raced for his own cup. “Free coffee!”
They filled to the brim and took seats in the back row.
“Who’s that guy?” asked Bilko.
“A friend,” said Reevis. “He’s going to be a lawyer and wanted to observe our libel class.”
The veterans disapprovingly appraised Serge’s tropical shirt with hula dancers, but didn’t say anything for Reevis’s sake.
An index finger tapped the microphone, signaling that it was time.
“Good afternoon. My name is Kent Pickering, and I’ll be conducting our seminar today. As you probably know, some of your co-workers have been keeping our firm pretty busy . . .” He stopped to chuckle and the audience laughed with him.
Danning elbowed Mazerek. “Check out that Italian suit.”
“It’s half my salary,” said Bilko.
Pickering walked out from behind the podium and leaned casually against its side. “I’d like to begin with two specific cases that we handled for the Journal in the last few months. The first involves a little mistake in a story about a vehicular homicide, which was generally correct except the article identified the driver as the suspect’s son, Junior. Now, we could have argued that reasonable people would recognize it was actually the father, and the ‘Jr.’ at the end of the name was a simple clerical error. Except the reporter, armed with the wrong name, also interviewed neighbors and printed quotes about the son, including his fondness for the Fast and Furious series of street racer movies . . . That last part was a nice detail, especially since it made my firm a nice chunk of change . . .” Chuckles rippled through the audience.
Danning folded his arms. “I fail to see the humor.”
Bilko folded his own.
“This is what happens when you make photographers write stories.”
Pickering strolled around to the other side of the podium. “Now, I can’t stress enough the extra care we need to take concerning minors, as well as insulating ourselves with official police reports instead of just talking to bystanders. As an aside, please ask to see the driver’s license of any witness who says his name is Mike Hunt or Dick Swells. They’ve been quoted nine times in the last year and I’m guessing it’s not just two guys . . .” Another wave of chuckles. “ . . . Anyway, in the case I was talking about, we had to set up a little college fund for Junior . . .”
Danning looked around at his laughing colleagues. “What is this, a comedy club?”
“I agree,” said Serge. “It’s a pox on your whole profession. Would you like me to take action?”
The trio looked down the row with twisted expressions. “Reevis, who exactly is this guy?”
“Relax, he’s harmless.”
Back up front: “Our second case went a little better. It involved your highly rated TV news segment, ‘Gotcha Live!’ . . .”
“Oh, this ridiculousness,” said Bilko. “We can’t write any more investigative pieces because they take too much time . . .”
“Except TV still can,” said Mazerek. “Because they only take ten seconds.”
Serge leaned toward Reevis. “What are they talking about?”
“Here’s TV’s idea of investigative reporting,” said Reevis. “Hide a film crew, then throw a wallet out in the middle of a mall and see what people do.”
Pickering slid back behind the podium. “. . . As you know, our ticket-scalping report . . .”
“Scalping?” asked Serge.
Reevis leaned and lowered his voice. “Another gem. Two of our TV reporters stood fifty feet apart outside the stadium. The first was selling fifty-dollar tickets, and the second wanted to buy tickets for a hundred. So some guy who is just taking his kids to the game notices them and takes the bait, buying from one reporter and selling to the other. Of course we also contacted the police in advance so we’d have great footage of them swooping in to arrest the dad . . .”
Pickering wrapped up the story from the podium. “ . . . After our story aired, the case was thrown out of court for entrapment, but the father had already been fired from his job and sued us. Unfortunately for him, there’s a little thing we call the First Amendment.”
The attorney smiled and laughed, and the audience laughed with him.
When the laughter died down, a hand went up in the back row.
“Reevis,” snapped Danning. “Put your arm down!”
“Are you crazy?” said Bilko.
Pickering peered over the podium. “Yes, you in the back row. What’s your question?”
Reevis stood up. “Why are you laughing?”
“What?”
“You were laughing. Why?”
Mazerek covered his eyes. “Jesus, kid.”
Pickering was stumped. “I don’t understand your question.”
“I appreciate that you have to represent us, even when we’re wrong,” said Reevis. “But do you have to make jokes about shoddy journalism that embarrassed an ordinary citizen in front of the entire community and cost him his livelihood?”
“Well, I, uh . . .”
“Have some shame.” Reevis sat down.
The auditorium was uncomfortably silent, especially the stage. The collective thought: Holy shit.
An hour later, a crowd had gathered around Reevis’s desk: Danning, Mazerek and Bilko, plus Serge and an equal number of security guards.
Reevis quietly emptied the belongings from his desk and placed them in a cardboard box.
“We’re real sorry, kid,” said Danning.
“Anything you need,” said Bilko. “References . . .”
“Are all the libel classes like that?” asked Serge.
Reevis examined a small plaque for third place from some forgotten article, then into the box it went. “I’ll be fine. I just couldn’t work here anymore if it meant keeping quiet.”
“What are you going to do now?” asked Mazerek.
“Don’t know.” Reevis picked up the box. “Maybe freelance.”
“I got an idea,” said Serge. “Follow me down to my car.”
“Why?”
“Let’s go for a ride.”
SUGARLOAF KEY
A married couple strolled down a secluded path, arguing about the husband watching too much football.
“But it’s the play-offs!”
“I have needs, too!”
“We’ll go out to dinner tonight. Someplace nice.”
“Are you going to wear that stupid Giants jersey again?”
“You don’t like it?”
From another direction. “Mildred, what are you doing?”
“Watching Law & Order.”
“You watch that stupid show too much. Come out here.”
“It just started. This couple is arguing in Central Park.”
“That’s how it always starts. Get out here!”
“But they’re just about to find a body in the bushes.”
“Mildred!”
Mildred and Gerard Lapierre, seasonal residents from Canada, owned a stilt house on the channel overlooking Cudjoe Key. It was a balmy day and all the Bahama shutters were propped wide. Mildred stepped out onto the wraparound porch. “What’s so important that I have to miss my show?”
“Will you look at that!” Gerard said with disgust. “Even way out here in nature, some jerk has to litter.”
“Where?”
“Those shoes down in the mangroves.”
“That’s what’s so important?”
“To me it is. The pristine view is why we picked out this place—”
“Gerard . . .”
“Then some idiot—”
“Gerard!”
“What?”
“Those shoes. They still have feet in them . . .”
An hour later, the Lapierres watched from their veranda as crime-scene technicians swarmed the shore. A black bag was zipped up over a face. A detective from Key West arrived and approached the medical examiner. “What are the details?”
“Adult male about thirty, single gunshot to the left temple.”
A police diver rose from the water. “Got something.” He held up a clear bag with a .38 revolver.
The coroner turned to the detective. “The stippling at the wound indicates the muzzle was in contact with the head. I’m guessing we’ll find residue on his left hand.”
“Suicide?”
“Here’s his wallet. Three hundred in cash, which pretty much rules out robbery,” said the examiner. “We won’t be missing dinner over this one.”
Chapter THIRTY
THAT AFTERNOON
Reevis Tome sat with a cardboard box in his lap, staring out the windshield of a ’76 Ford Cobra. “Where are we going?”
“Someplace cheerful!” Serge hit the gas and slalomed through city traffic. “You just got fired, so I’m on the case . . . Coffee?”
Serge poured himself a cup and passed the thermos. The car shook from an overhead roar as the shadow of a United jet swept across the road.
Serge smacked the steering wheel with joy. “Don’t you just love it when you time the airplane shadow perfectly?”
“Are you okay?”
“Drink more coffee. Life will snap into focus.” The Cobra whipped around a cement mixer on Belvedere Road. “Oooo! Oooo! Over there! The sign! Check out the sign!”
“You mean the old neon thing on Airport Liquors?”
“No, the other excellent sign. That retro job with interlocking orange shapes over a galloping greyhound. I love the Palm Beach Kennel Club!” Click, click, click. “Oh my God! They opened a p
oker room!”
“You play poker?”
“No.”
The Cobra skidded up in front of the entrance, and Serge killed the thermos. “Let’s get our cheer on!”
Serge ran inside, and Reevis raced to catch up, finally reaching him in a sprawling card room crammed with type A personalities and fevered intrigue. Cowboy hats, sunglasses, bolo ties.
Serge stood at a cashier’s window and removed a single dollar bill from his wallet. “I’d like a chip please.”
The cashier paused. “Just one? How do you expect to win?”
“It’s all I’ll need.”
She shrugged and handed over a round piece of plastic.
Serge held it over his head. “I won! I won!”
Reevis caught up again as Serge sprinted down a grandstand aisle and out onto the open spectator apron surrounding the track. “Hurry up!” Serge yelled and waved. “The only way to watch a race is standing right against the fence at the finish pole. I’m always surprised everyone isn’t down here.”
“What’s the deal with the poker chip?”
“The new card rooms have been a game changer in my life.” Serge opened his palm in reverence. “Instead of buying some expensive keepsake from their gift shop, these chips are durable, with all the requisite imprinted data of a righteous souvenir find. And I trick them into giving it to me for only a dollar. Then I walk away. They never expect that.”
Handlers emerged from the paddock and led a parade of athletic dogs with colorful numbers on their sides.
“Now this is Florida!” Serge waved an arm across the milieu. “Old-growth palms towering over the manicured infield with majestic lake and fountains. The rest of the world is making themselves crazy, stuck in office buildings and turning fluorescent under fluorescent lights. But we’re out here in paradise, the sun on our necks, enjoying fresh air and the smell of cut grass with hundreds of other people who don’t have jobs.” He turned and grinned awkwardly. “Sorry, that topic’s probably still a little raw for you. My point is, there’s something special about Florida’s betting palaces—horses, dogs, jai alai—frozen in time, like the old days when the Social Register would dress up and make a night of it. Can you believe that four thousand people packed this place on February seventeenth, 1932, to watch Broom Boy win the first race ever here? True story: Later that night one of the dogs actually caught the mechanical rabbit, causing parimutuel chaos and emotional turbulence.”