"You're from Phoenix?"
"New York, originally. My husband got a job in Phoenix. We separated a year after we moved. I was never crazy about Arizona, especially with my ex living there, and I fell in love with Portland while I was covering your case. So, a month ago I quit my job and moved.
I'm living on savings and looking for a job and I decided now was as good a time as any to write this article. I ran the idea by Gloria Douglas, an editor at Pacific West magazine, and she's definitely interested. But she wants to see a draft of the article before she commits."
"What exactly will the article cover?"
"Women litigators. And I want to use you and your cases as the centerpiece."
"I hope you're not going to make too much of me."
"Hey, don't get bashful on me," Sloane said with a laugh. "Until recently, women attorneys were relegated to the probate department or handled divorces. Stuff that was acceptable as 'woman's work." My whole point is that you're at the vanguard of a new generation of women who are trying murder cases and getting million-dollar verdicts in civil cases. Areas that have traditionally been m-ale-dominated."
"It sounds interesting."
"I'm glad you think so, because people want to read about you. You're really the hook for the article.
"What will I have to do?"
"Not much. Mostly, it will be talking to me about Hammermill and your other cases. On occasion, I may want to tag -along when you go to court."
"That sounds okay. I think talking through my cases might help me put them in perspective. I was so close to what was happening when they were going on."
The waiter arrived. Sloane ordered a Caesar salad and a glass of white wine. Betsy ordered yellowfin tuna on pasta, but passed on the wine.
"What did you want to do today?" Betsy asked, as soon as the waiter left.
"I thought we'd go over some background material. I read the piece in the Times, but I felt it was superficial. It didn't tell me what made you the way you are today. For instance, were you a leader in high school?"
Betsy laughed. "God, no. I was so shy. A real gawk."
Sloane smiled. "I can understand that. You were tall, right? I had the same problem."
"I towered over everyone. In elementary school, I walked around with my eyes down and my shoulders hunched, wishing I could disappear. In junior high, it got worse, because I had these Coke-bottle glasses and braces.
I looked like Frankenstein."
"when did you start to feel self-confident?"
"I don't know if I ever feel that way. I mean, I know I do a good job, but I always worry I'm not doing enough.
But I guess it was my senior year in high school that I started believing in myself I was near the top of my class, the braces were gone, my folks got me contacts and boys started noticing me. By the time I graduated Berkeley I was much more outgoing."
"You met your husband in law school, didn't you?"
Betsy nodded. "We're separated, now."
"Oh. I'm sorry."
Betsy shrugged. "I really don't want to talk about my personal life.
Will that be necessary?"
"Not if you don't want to. I'm not writing this for the Enquirer.
"Okay, because I don't want to discuss Rick."
"I understand you one hundred percent. I went through the same thing in Phoenix. I know bow difficult it can be. So, let's move on to something else."
The waiter arrived with their food and Sloane asked Betsy some more questions about her childhood while they ate.
"You didn't go into private practice right out of law school, did you?"
Sloane asked after the waiter cleared their plates.
"No."
"Why not? You've done so well at it."
"That's been all luck," Betsy answered, blushing slightly. "I never thought of going out on my own, back then. My law school grades were all right, but not good enough for a big firm. I worked for the attorney general doing environmental law for four years. I liked the job, but I quit when I became pregnant with Kathy."
"How old is she?"
"Six.
"How did you get back into law?"
"I was bored sitting home when Kathy started preschool. Rick and I talked it over and we decided I would practice out of our home, so I would be there for Kathy.
Margaret McKinnon, a friend of mine from law school, let me use her conference room to meet clients. I didn't have much of a caseload. A few court-appointed misdemeanors, some simple divorces. just enough to keep me busy.
"Then Margaret offered me a windowless office about the size of a broom closet, rent free, in exchange for twenty hours of free legal work each month. I agonized over that, but Rick said it was okay. He thought it would be good for me to get out of the house, as long as I kept my caseload low enough to pick up Kathy at day care and stay home with her if she got sick. You know, still be a mom. Anyway, it worked out fine and I started picking up some felonies and a few contested divorces that paid better."
"The Peterson case was your big break, right?"
"Yeah. One day I was sitting around without much to do and the clerk who assigns court-appointed cases asked me if I'd represent Grace Peterson.
I didn't know much about the battered woman's syndrome, but I remembered seeing Dr. Lenore Walker on a TV talk show. She's the expert in this area. The court authorized the money and Lenore came out from Denver and evaluated Grace. It was pretty horrible, what her husband did. I'd led a sheltered life, I guess. No one where I grew up did things like that."
"No one you knew about."
Betsy nodded sadly. "No one I knew about. Anyway, the case attracted a lot of publicity. We had the support of some women's groups and the press was behind us. After the acquittal, my business really picked up.
Then Andrea hired me because of the verdict in Grace's case."
The waiter arrived with their coffee. Sloane looked at her watch. "You said you had a one-thirty appointment, didn't you?"
Betsy glanced at her own watch. "Is it one-ten already? I really got wrapped up in this."
"Good. I was hoping you'd be as excited about the project as I am."
"I am. Why don't you call me and we can talk again soon.
"Great. I'll do that. And thanks for taking the time. I really appreciate it."
Randy Highsmith shook the rain off his umbrella and laid it on the floor under the dashboard as Alan Page drove out of the parking garage. The umbrella hadn't helped much in the gusting rain and Highsmith was cold and wet.
Highsmith was slightly overweight, studious-looking, a staunch conservative and the best prosecutor in the office, Page included. While earning a law degree from Georgetown he'd fallen in love with Patty Archer, a congressional aide. He then fell in love with Portland when he traveled there to meet Patty's family. When her congressman decided not to run for reelection, the newlyweds moved west, where Patty opened a political consulting firm and Randy was snapped up by the office of the Multnomah County district attorney.
"Tell me about Darius," Page said as they got on the freeway.
"He moved to Portland eight years ago. He had money to start with and borrowed on his assets. Darius made his name, and increased his fortune, by gambling on the revitalization of downtown Portland. His first big success was the Couch Street Boutique. He bought a block of dilapidated buildings for a song, converted them to an indoor mall, then changed the area surrounding the boutique into the trendiest section in Portland by leasing renovated buildings to upscale shops and restaurants at low rents. As business increased, so did the rents. The upper floors of a lot of the buildings were converted to condos. That's been his pattern.
Buy up all the buildings in a slum area, set up a core attraction, then build around it. Recently he's branched out into suburban malls, apartment complexes, and so on.
"Two years ago, Darius married Lisa Ryder, the daughter of Oregon Supreme Court justice Victor Ryder.