Джо Горес - Gone, No Forwarding

“Respondent amends the submission to Respondent Information Exhibit A, with the request that this exhibit be put in evidence if direct testimony so indicates at a later time.”

“Noted.”

In turning back toward Franks, as if it were an afterthought, Tranquillini picked up two Xerox copies of Simson’s affidavit, and dropped one on Delaney’s table and slid the other across the bench to the Hearing Officer. “Respondent also wishes at this time to present Respondent’s Exhibit B, a holographic, signed, and witnessed deposition by a witness, Jeffrey L. Simson, as to events on the day in question.”

“How did you find...” Then Delaney, scanning the affidavit, yelled, “Objection, Your Honor! This is not only a purely hearsay document, it is presented out of order—”

“We are not a formal court here,” said Tranquillini blandly. His spur of the moment idea was working, by God. “As you pointed out this morning, this is a disciplinary action, not a trial.”

The Hearing Officer looked up from the document. “That’s all very well, counselor, but this is being presented out of order. Why wasn’t it among the Respondent’s documents presented to and filed with the Bureau of Private Investigators and Adjusters last week, preliminary to this hearing?”

“If you will note the date, Your Honor, this document was not obtained until this past weekend.”

Tranquillini glanced over at Delaney, expecting an objection, but there was none. Instead, he looked almost pleased. Which wasn’t right or reassuring. Something more to worry about after the session was finished.

“This is obviously a hearsay document, not connected up at this time,” said the Hearing Officer. “However, since I already have admitted two other hearsay documents and a good deal of hearsay evidence, I will accept this as Respondent Information Exhibit B. Please proceed.”

Tranquillini had, for the first time, been examining his copy of the letter Pivarski was supposed to have given to Kathy Onoda.

This is to acknowledge receipt of Two Hundred and no/100 Dollars to be held by you on behalf of the account of Kasimir M. Pivarski. In return for this payment you have promised not to attach the wages of Mr. Pivarski at this time. Your signature on this letter will constitute a receipt for the Two Hundred and no/100 Dollars.

He read it again, stared at it, unable to believe what was there. Or rather, what wasn’t there. He turned to the waiting Franks.

“Counselor, would you tell this hearing whether there is a space at the bottom of this letter where Miss Onoda was to sign on behalf of Daniel Kearny Associates?”

“Well, yes, but...”

“I see no such signature there, yet this purports to be a true copy of the original letter, does it not?”

Delaney was on his feet, his face scornful. “Objection, Your Honor. Obviously, this is merely a Xerox copy of Mr. Franks’s office carbon of the letter. If counsel insists on Mr. Franks producing the original with Miss Onoda’s signature, it will delay proceedings considerably and...”

Tranquillini went after Franks before the Hearing Officer could rule on the objection. “The original letter with Miss Onoda’s signature, offered as an exhibit, would have been direct rather than hearsay evidence, would it not, Mr. Franks?”

“Objection,” said Delaney again, quickly, realizing his witness was in trouble. “Calling for a conclusion from the witness.”

“Witness has been qualified as an attorney-at-law.”

“Even so,” said the Hearing Officer, “I must sustain.”

“As you wish, Your Honor.” To Franks, Tranquillini said, “Why didn’t you give the original letter with Miss Onoda’s signature on it to the State for submission into evidence?”

Delaney started up to object, then, frowning, sank back again. Franks was silent for so long the Hearing Officer said, “The witness may answer.”

“Uh... I don’t have the original.”

“Then Mr. Pivarski still has it.”

“I... don’t know.”

Now? Tranquillini asked himself; then rejected it. No. Not yet. Instead, he veered sharply in his attack. “You have testified that opposing counsel was not present at the hearing of your demurrer on November twelfth of last year — a hearing at which judgment was rendered in favor of your client.”

“That is correct.”

“Prior to that hearing, you of course served Respondent with the necessary notice?”

“My office served Respondent’s attorney. I didn’t personally wait around in a doorway to—”

“Quite,” said Tranquillini drily. He turned. “Your Honor, at this time I wish to be sworn so I can testify under oath that no such notice was ever received by my office.”

Franks said, very quickly, “We didn’t serve you , counselor. We served a Mr. James.”

“I have been attorney-of-record for Respondent Corporation for the past twenty-two months. Mr. James has not represented Kearny Associates for nearly five years.”

There was a moment of uneasy silence. No one doubted that Franks had known he was serving an attorney who would not pass on the service to Kearny or to Tranquillini, and that thus Franks would win his case by default. As he had. And now was the time to push again. Tranquillini turned to the Hearing Officer. “I once again, at this time, request on behalf of the Respondent that Mr. Pivarski be brought into this court, under subpoena if necessary, to testify as to the events of that day in November.”

The Hearing Officer nodded. “Noted,” he said. “I feel this hearing should be adjourned until Wednesday morning at ten o’clock, at which time the Hearing Officer will have had a chance to study this question of Mr. Pivarski’s possible appearance. Frankly, at the moment all I have before me is hearsay evidence.”

Tranquillini, starting to stuff papers into his attaché case, did not bother to lower his voice as he said to Delaney at the next table. “Your witness is lying his ass off, Johnny-me-bhoy. The question remains — why?”

“Sign here,” said the uniformed property clerk.

“Yessir,” said Sammy Rounds. He didn’t add any smart-ass remarks, either. His night and day in a holding cell had scared all that jive right out of him. He could write little else but his name, but he wrote that gladly, and gladly submitted to the embrace of those massive mammy arms which went around him as he emerged from the meshed enclosure.

“Samuel...” said the fat black woman.

He was even crying and not caring until, among the indifferent loungers in the basement of the Oakland Municipal Building, he saw a face which was not indifferent.

He pulled away. “Whut he doin’ here?”

The fat frantic black woman in the cheap cotton dress and black cloth coat turned to look, still snuffling, one pudgy hand still clutching her son’s arm as if afraid he might be ripped away. “Wasn’t for Mr. Heslip, you’d still be in there.”

Sammy snuffled defiantly. “Don’t need no he’p.”

Heslip got them up the stairs and out to the car and drove them home. It had taken him a number of hours to find out Sammy had been busted during a drug-store burglary the night before, locate Mrs. Rounds trying to make her quasi-hysterical way through the legal complexities of getting her fourteen-year-old son out of city jail after he’d convinced the authorities he was eighteen.

“Samuel,” the fat woman exclaimed as they came through the door of the run-down frame house, “you go straight to your room and get down on your knees and give thanks to God that you are home.”

“Aw, ma—”

“I don’t need no sauce from you, boy. Now!”

Sammy now ed. Her powers had miraculously returned as she had entered home territory, and Sammy knew that tone of voice and that glint in those usually loving brown eyes. He now ed. As she stared down the hallway after him, big tears started running down her cheeks. “Whut’m I gonna do?” she moaned. “Ain’t got no man to set him straight. The street’s gonna get him, same as Verna. Once we was a family...” She heaved a vast sigh. “That boy’s fourteen, can’t barely read, can’t write much ’cept his name.”