The historic sense of the day is inspiring, and the sentences and paragraphs begin to flow for me. But Kate is underwhelmed. When she slides back the draft, half of it is crossed out, the rest festooned with notes. “It’s going to be great, Tom,” she offers as encouragement.
Grateful for standards higher than my own, I churn out draft after draft, and until a car pulls into the empty lot outside, I have no sense of the time. I suddenly notice that the afternoon is long gone, and our one window has turned black. In fact, it’s close to 10:00 p.m.
Car doors open and slam shut, and then heavy footsteps clomp up the steep stairs. It sounds as if there are three or four people coming, and based on the creaking, they’re all large and probably males.
I reach for the baseball bat I’ve been keeping beside the desk and look over at Kate. She returns my nervous smile and shrugs, but the glint in her eye says, “Bring it on.”
Chapter 83
Tom
THE HEAD THAT pokes through the door doesn’t belong to a drunken local lout. It’s Calvin Coles, the minister at Riverhead Baptist. Calvin has been over a couple times in the last few months and apologizes for the lateness of the visit as two other formidable black men, both wearing dark suits, follow him into the room. The heads of all three nearly scrape the low ceiling.
Coles smiles awkwardly and introduces his companions, as if it’s necessary. One is Reverend Marvin Shields, the other Ronnie Montgomery, the dapper black attorney who became a celeb after winning the acquittal of former Major League Baseball star Lorenzo Lewis for the murder of his wife.
“I’ve got some very exciting news,” says Reverend Shields, stepping forward and clasping my hands in both of his. “After some serious cajoling and arm twisting, Mr. Montgomery has generously volunteered to take over Dante Halleyville’s defense.”
“The trial starts in a few days,” says Kate, her voice calm, her eyes red hot.
Ronnie Montgomery responds with a condescending smile. “Obviously, I’m going to ask for an extension,” he says. “And I have no reason to believe I won’t get it.”
“Have you spoken to Dante?” I finally say.
“I wanted to come here first,” says Montgomery, “as a professional courtesy.”
Montgomery takes in our modest office, conveying with a shrug what it suggests about our inappropriateness for this huge case and about our chances in the upcoming trial.
“I know you mean well, and I’m sure you’ve worked terribly hard. And both of you are welcome to stay on to help with the transition. But you’re way out of your depth here, and Dante Halleyville deserves more.”
When Montgomery serves up another condescending smile, I’m kind of sorry I put down that baseball bat.
Chapter 84. Tom
THE NEXT MORNING as Kate’s Jetta pulls into the lot behind the Riverhead Correctional Facility, Ronnie Montgomery’s black Mercedes limo pulls out. This is the end of the line for us. It’s like arriving for your last day of work to find your replacement already sitting in your chair, cleaning out your desk.
But Kate and I adhere to our routine. We park in our spot, exchange pleasant greetings with Mike and Billy at the front desk, and stash our watches and keys in locker number 1924.
For presumably the last time, Sheila, the only female guard at the maximum-security jail, who has somehow worked here twenty-three years, escorts us through the sliding steel gates into the purgatory of the attorney rooms. Dante, having just met with Montgomery, is already there.
He looks at his feet and says, “We’ve got to talk.”
Kate and I sink into our seats at the small metal table. I bite my tongue and wait for the ax. I haven’t felt this awful in a long time.
“I just had a visit from Ronnie Montgomery,” says Dante. “The brother that got off the baseball player Lorenzo Lewis.”
“He stopped by our office last night,” says Kate.
“Then I guess you already know he’s offered to take the case. He said he hasn’t lost a trial in fifteen years.”
“Might be true,” says Kate.
“He said that this is the most important decision I’ll ever make. That I need to take some time with it.”
“What’d you say?”
“Time’s up, Mr. Montgomery. I already lost ten months in here. I know what I got to do.”
“Which is what?” I ask.
“You got to understand this ain’t personal. Lorenzo Lewis’s clothes were smeared with his wife’s blood. When the cops arrived he locked himself in his bathroom, took thirty sleeping pills, and called his mama. Montgomery still got him off.”
“That was a unique case,” says Kate, “but we won’t take it personally.”
“You sure?”
“For Christ’s sake, Dante, what did you tell him?”
“I told him, no thanks, bro’. I like the lawyers I got.
“You think I’m crazy?” says Dante, pointing a long finger at Kate and smiling as though she’s just been Punk’d. “I hire Montgomery, and everyone, including the jury, is going to assume I’m as guilty as Lorenzo Lewis. Plus, I figure Montgomery used up his luck for three lifetimes on that other case. Kate, you crying on me, girl?”
Chapter 85. Kate
DANTE’S GRANDMOM MARIE bows her head and reaches for my hand, which I gratefully give her.
“Thank you, Lord, for the abundance we are about to receive,” she says. “Thank you for the strength to endure this terrible, terrible ordeal and most of all for delivering such dedicated attorneys as Tom and Kate. Bless this meal, oh Lord, and please find it in your heart to keep an eye out for my grandson Dante. My innocent grandson. Amen.”
Saturday evening, two days before the trial, and every friend Tom and I have left sits around Macklin’s dining room table. With only Mack and Marie; Tom’s brother, Jeff, and nephew Sean; Clarence and his wife, Vernell, there’s plenty of leg and elbow room.
“To this time next year,” says Mack, raising a glass and trying as always to lighten the mood. “When Dante sits next to us, stuffs his face, and tells barely believable tales of Shaq and Kobe, Amare and LeBron.”
The guest list for the meal is short, but the table groans under a rarely seen combination of Caribbean and Irish standards. After almost a year in near isolation, the company means more than the food to me. But the food is wonderful too. We’re in the process of eating way too much of it when the ringing of Tom’s cell pierces the room. “I better answer it,” he says.
He pulls it from his pocket and raises one hand in apology as the blood drains from his face.
“We’ve got to turn on Fox News,” he tells everybody.
Half of us are already in the living room with our desserts, and the rest shuffle over and twist a chair to face Mack’s antique Zenith. Sean finds channel 16 just as the anchor turns it over to a field reporter.
“I’m live in Queens,” says a perky blonde, “directly across from St. John’s Law School, alma mater of Tom Dunleavy, cocounsel in the capital murder trial of Dante Halleyville. According to documents just obtained by Fox, Dunleavy, a star basketball player at St. John’s, was accepted into the law school despite grades a full point below the admission minimum.”
“Quite a scoop,” says Macklin, snorting.
“Despite graduating in the bottom fifth of his class,” continues the reporter, “Dunleavy was hired by the Brooklyn Public Defender’s Office, where he received mediocre evaluations.
“The most troubling allegation, however, is that in 1997, Dunleavy had someone take the Law Boards for him.
“According to copies of the test obtained by Fox and examined by independent handwriting experts, Dunleavy’s exams, on which he scored surprisingly well for a student with his grades, were taken by someone who is right-handed. Dunleavy, a two-time All-American, is left-handed.