Scott Turow - Personal injuries

"So I'm supposed to start reading this stuff at eleven at night?" He murmured in Yiddish under his breath. "You know what that means? A horse should have such luck. Wait. Where are my glasses?" He found the spectacles in his pocket. "All right, all right," he said. He tossed his head back and forth as if he were reading a score, mumbling a few of the phrases aloud. There was no indication he was really taking them in. "Yeah, so okay, so there's a problem here?"

In his perpetual blue suit, Sennett was implacable. He turned his face for one second to scratch at his cheek.

"Judge, do you know a lawyer named Robbie Feaver?"

Skolnick sat back. Sennett finally had his full attention.

"Feaver?" Skolnick's tongue, like some furtive animal, appeared briefly and circled his lips. "I know Feaver. I know thousands of lawyers.

"Judge, did you have any private meetings with Feaver while you were presiding over this case?"

"Talk to him, sure. He's a likable fella. You tell him a joke, he tells you a joke. Did I see him on the street? In the courthouse somewhere? Of course. You should pardon me, Mr. Sennett, Stan, but that's not exactly a federal case."

"No, Judge, I'm asking if you ever met privately with Feaver to discuss the merits of this lawsuit and the outcome?"

"You mean without- Who's on the other side of this thing?" He thumbed through the papers. "This guy, McManis?" Skolnick paused, his heavy face slowly gravitating through the motions of thought. Was that his problem? This new guy, McManis? Was he beefing? Recognition suddenly flooded his expression. He pointed at Jim, finally drawing the intended impression, albeit far later than anyone might have predicted. "That's you! I see, I see! So you ran to the U.S. Attorney without even a how-do-you-do to me? I'm a reasonable fella. Tell me what's on your mind. You think we need this in the middle of the night?"

Sennett asked again if Skolnick met privately with Feaver during the case and Skolnick did an unacceptable version of what was meant to be a hearty laugh. His breath got caught up and he could not manage the kind of heaving exhalation he'd intended. His color, too, was rising.

"Well, I certainly don't remember anything like that."

"You'd remember that, wouldn't you, Judge? Discussing privately with a lawyer how you're going to rule on his motion?"

"Well, you know, lawyers can say most anything, Stan. They're not timid creatures. The baytzim, balls, on some guys, frankly. Sometimes I leave court, I say to myself, Barnett, you're too nice, you should have held that young fellow in contempt. But I don't." His bovine form rose and fell with his shrug, as if he himself were baffled by his benign nature.

"Judge, didn't you meet with Feaver on March 5 in your automobile?"

"Oh!" said Skolnick suddenly. He was happy as a child. He remembered now: Feaver had a flat and Skolnick picked him up while Robbie was flagging a taxi. He laughed as he gestured toward Jim. "So you saw that and got the wrong idea? Silliness," said Skolnick. "Stan, my friend, may I make a suggestion? Just be plain, Stan. Tell me who said what and I'll give an honest answer. As best I can. To the best of my recollection."

Sennett asked again if Skolnick had talked to Robbie about the outcome of the painter's case on March 5 in his Lincoln. Skolnick finally denied it.

"Did you meet with him in your car again on April 12?"

"This is a crazy discussion. We're playing ring around the rosy. If Feaver was there-and I said 'if'-then he was there for a good reason. That's all I know. That's all I can say. "And giving you two bribes-$10,000 on March 5 and $8,000 on April 12-wouldn't be good reasons, would they, Judge?"

Skolnick took quite a bit of time, apparently weighing the correct response, and then forced himself through the motions of outrage. After a slight quaver to start, he became quite convincing.

"You come here, in my home, and say such things to me? I took a bribe? Me? Barnett Skolnick? After twentysix years on the bench? Me, who could have retired with a full pension four years ago? I don't need this tsouris, Stan."

"You're saying those things didn't happen, correct, Judge? You never met with Robbie Feaver to discuss the painter's case? You didn't receive a $10,000 payoff from him in March, or $8,000 in April because you'd forced McManis to settle before he was able to conduct any discovery? Is that what you're saying?"

"You're darn tootin that's what I'm saying. You're darn tootin. Nobody gives Barnett Skolnick money. That I would throw a case?" His face appeared on the verge of crumbling; a lip wiggled and his eyes watered at the ugly insinuation. He pointed again at McManis. "You go to hell," Skolnick said to him. "Go ask Feaver, for crying out loud. This is a complete bubble meize, a wives' tale. He'll tell you that."

Stan nodded to McManis, the faintest foreshadowing of a smile apparent. Evon figured he had stifled a naughty impulse to simply lean back and call, "Come a-w-w-n down."

Robbie's tread was deliberate. He arrived looking quite drawn, ducking his head to avoid a soffit where the acoustical tile ceiling dropped to box out a heating duct. Evon gave Robbie credit. He looked straight at Skolnick and he did it with no smugness, no anger or pride. He wouldn't play it Sennett's way. He was unhappy to be here. Then, when Sennett lifted a finger, Robbie opened the button of his suit coat, undid his shirt, and displayed the FoxBlte, which had been positioned for show just under his heart. Even though she knew what was coming, the moment had the piercing effect of one of those sci-fi movies where a totally appealing character is revealed as a robot or some other creation with a mechanical brain and no blood, rather than a person.

Even as Feaver continued to face Skolnick, there was a certain vacancy to Robbie's expression. After six months of skipping along the government's tightrope, he was starting to lose his balance. Of course, he'd had a day to remember, starting at 6 a.m. with a revolver pointed at his forehead in a serious way. He'd told all of them in the van afterwards that, given what had happened at Evon's place, he'd realized as soon as he saw the cop that Tuohey had sent him. He saw it for what it was, a clever pretext for a frisk, one he couldn't complain about. He was still thinking Tuohey would show up, when the revolver was drawn.

`I heard the snap on the holster, and I was like, Well, okay, so this is how it's going to be. And I was actually all right with it, and then I thought, Oh my God, Rainey, how can I do this to Rainey?'

He cried at that point. McManis, Sennett, Evon, and I were all in the van with him, and I took the tears as a sign of the overwhelming terror he'd endured. I'm sure only Evon understood the full implications. Sennett, who'd remained visibly upset by the way things had gone awry, dispatched Robbie for home. He would be under twenty-four-hour guard now and there was a tap on his phone. Were it not for Rainey's condition, McManis would have preferred to move both of them.

As Robbie had disrobed, Skolnick had actually stood up from his seat on the family sofa. He issued a tiny, stifled outcry, ticking his head in disbelief. Barnett Skolnick, however, was not entirely without resources.

"You crummy son of a bitch," Skolnick said to Robbie. He seemed momentarily surprised by his own show of gumption. He coughed then and grabbed at his chest and, finally, in pure frustration began to weep. The extraordinary pile of creamy white hair resembled the topping on a soda fountain creation, almost luminescent against the sanguine hue that rose through his brow.

As Skolnick continued crying, Sennett directed Tex to play back some of the recorded output from the Lincoln. Tex turned on the TV Skolnick had been watching and found the VCR. He replayed the section in which Skolnick acknowledged the envelope Robbie had buried in the seat, saying to Feaver, 'Genug. We're friends, Robbie. We've done a lot together.' Skolnick rocked on the sofa with his eyes closed, weeping and murmuring, "Oh God, oh God, oy vay, oh God." He could not have seen much of it. But he'd already gotten the point.