"I take it all back, Henry," Paxton said comtemplatively as he sipped at the cold beer. "You better stick with Marie. At least she ain't gonna run off with your wallet afterward."
"Which brings us to the basic question," Lightstone said. "Who the hell's offering to pay the freight on this deal?"
"Alex Chareaux, if you care to believe that," Wheeler shrugged.
"What?" Lightstone blinked in disbelief
"Hey," Jameson Wheeler smiled as he brought his thin shoulders up in an exaggerated shrug, "all I know is that you and Roberto Jacall are being offered the use of one of the top legal firms in Washington, D.C., at no cost to yourselves, and I'm being offered a quarter of a million dollars to step aside and keep my mouth shut. And if that makes any sense to any of you here-" he raised his beer bottle in salute, "-then you're way ahead of me on beer."
"Sure as hell don't make any sense to me," Stoner said.
"Quite frankly," Wheeler confessed, "it's almost enough to make me wonder what I've been doing with my career all these years."
"Well, I should fucking well hope so," Paxton muttered.
"Uh, I'm not sure I'm following all this," Lightstone said, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion beneath the tape and bandages. "You mean that these people, whoever they are, don't even want you to be my attorney of record?"
"Absolutely not. Co-counsel at best, and even that in name only," Wheeler said emphatically. "As I understand it, there would be twelve trial attorneys from the firm, who would actually handle the case."
"Twelve fucking attorneys, for me?"
"For you and Alex, Butch and Sonny and Jacall," the Deputy U.S. Attorney nodded. "Package deal. I understand it works out so much easier that way."
"And Alex Chareaux is offering to pay the bill?" Lightstone laughed. "Come on, Jameson, you're trying to tell us that Alex Chareaux and his brothers have been making money like this from taking people out on illegal guiding trips?"
"Not unless they've been dealing cocaine in kilo lots on the side," Carl Scoby commented.
"That's exactly right, and, no, I'm not trying to tell you that," Jameson Wheeler said. "But what I am telling you, my friends, is that the firm of Little, Warren, Nobles and Kole does not come cheap. If for no other reason than the fact that they have a high overhead. The fact is, the senior partners can count on raking in a seven-figure income, clear, and a straight partnership is supposed to be good for at least a mid six. So you add up the cost of twelve criminal lawyers of that caliber over a period of several weeks, if not months, and figure out where that puts you."
"Never-never land," Lightstone grunted.
"And that doesn't even begin to count the support troops," Wheeler added. "Just as an example, I don't know what they pay Walter Crane, their chief investigator, but it has to be a bunch because I'd say he's probably more aggressive than the five of you put together."
"Sounds like a real nice guy," Stoner commented.
"To give you an idea of how nice a guy he is," Jameson Wheeler smiled, "I can tell you that if Walter Crane focused his team of investigators on Henry's cover, which I happen to know is pretty decent because I helped build it, I don't think it would take more than two days-maybe a week at the outside-to figure out two things: one, that Mr. Henry Allen Lightner does not exist; and two, that yours truly has been working as a poor but honest government lawyer in Denver for the past twenty years."
"Two days?" Scoby blinked.
"At best," the Deputy U.S. Attorney said. "I'm telling you, the man is good."
"So what does that do for our case?" Scoby asked.
"A very good question," Jameson Wheeler nodded, impressed by the realization that all five of McNulty's agents, who had been about half drunk and cheerfully celebrating when he'd walked in, were now stone-cold sober and listening carefully.
"First of all, it certainly forces us to move quickly in terms of Henry's cover if Paul wants to keep him working in the area. Fortunately," the Deputy U.S. Attorney added, "we don't have to expose Henry as an agent to prosecute the Chareauxs because, as much as I hate to admit it, managing to get himself shot like that and then making that nine-one- one call were strokes of pure genius."
"His fellow agents would prefer to think of it as dumbshit blind luck, but don't mind us," Larry Paxton smiled.
"Understandably," Wheeler chuckled. "Anyway, we obviously can't let Henry Allen Lightner go on trial, nor can I possibly put myself in a position to establish any sort of co-counsel relationship with the Little, Warren, Nobles and Kole team. As it is, I think we are dangling on the very precarious edge of confidentiality with respect to the client- attorney relationship. Judge Wu is pretty open-minded for a circuit-court judge, and he wasn't the least bit pleased when Paul told him about the probes on your team, but I can't see him allowing us to carry out this little game much further."
"So how do you figure it?" Scoby asked.
"Henry Allen Lightner completely disassociates himself from the Chareauxs and their attorneys and then offers to plead guilty to knowingly taking part in an illegal hunt, because there isn't any evidence to tie him into any other part of the case," Jameson Wheeler said offhandedly. "The U.S. Attorney and I agree to probation, with no requirement to assist the prosecution, and Henry Lightner simply disappears. Another satisfied customer of our criminal justice system."
"You think it'll work?"
"I don't see why-"
At that moment, Paul McNulty shoved the door open and entered the room, the furious expression on his face causing even Stoner to back away.
"They want to talk with you," McNulty growled at Wheeler.
"Me?"
"Yeah, you," McNulty nodded. "Right now."
McNulty waited until the puzzled Deputy U.S. Attorney had left the room, then looked over at his team.
"They want to drop the case," he said.
"What?" five agents yelled in unison, causing Paxton to wince in pain and Lightstone to grab at his head as McNulty held up his hand for silence.
"Who's 'they'?" Carl Scoby demanded.
"The Department of Interior, for one."
"Any particular reason?"
"Pretty much the classic reasons," McNulty shrugged. "Failure to follow proper procedures. Concern that Special Ops is running amok. Perception that severely limited resources have been devoted to a relatively minor case. Clear need for better oversight. It goes on, but I think you get the drift."
"You mean that somebody in the Department of Interior actually cares about the Chareaux brothers?" Lightstone asked.
"Apparently," McNulty nodded.
"Who do those bastards know?" Larry Paxton muttered.
"What about those three characters you guys took out on the hunt?" Mike Takahara suggested. "Any way they might be a reason?"
"I can't see how or why," Henry Lightstone shrugged. "They aren't even charged with anything. Why the hell would they care?"
"I don't know," Takahara admitted, "but somebody cares."
"That's right," McNulty added, tight-jawed. "Somebody cares a lot. The Department now thinks that two Special Ops teams may be one too many. So it's going to dismantle one team. Guess which one."
"Bravo team," Carl Scoby whispered.
"Can they do that?" Henry Lightstone asked.
"Oh, yeah, they sure as hell can," McNulty nodded. "It's called 'priority management.'"
"Can we fight it?" Lightstone asked.
"Sure we can," McNulty told him. "We can pull all of our stats together, document our cases, write it all up in one big, summary report. And then demand a hearing."