Steve Martini - The Arraignment

Under my arm I’m carrying a thin leather folder. I open it and take out a single typed sheet I prepared before leaving the office. With a pen I print her name under the signature line at the bottom.

“This is an authorization and an agreement for legal services,” I tell her. “It allows me to represent Michael. Here.” I hand her the pen. We juggle the baby and I end up holding it while she takes the folder, paper, and pen.

“Where do I sign?”

“On the bottom. The line above your name.” I point with one finger from under the baby. It is still screaming, pangs of hunger.

She doesn’t ask why I need this, if I’ve already seen her husband. Instead when she looks up she says, “How am I gonna pay you?”

We exchange baby and briefcase. I put the signed paper back inside, then I lift my wallet from the inside pocket of my coat and open it. In the billfold I have four hundreds and some smaller bills. I pull the hundreds out and hand them to her.

“Here, this is for you. Michael and I will make arrangements. Don’t worry about it.”

Her eyes light up. “Get some food for the baby, and groceries for yourself.”

Mid June and we are huddled in Adam Tolt’s walnut-paneled conference room.

“Glenda. Adam here. You can show them all in.” Tolt replaces the receiver in its cradle and settles against the high back of the tufted leather chair as he looks at me. We are seated against the glistening surface of the table in the executive conference room that adjoins his office. This is the holy of holies, the place where the firm’s management committee meets quarterly to chart the bottom line, where it doles out bonuses and inducts new partners into the fold, no doubt with secret handshakes.

“I’m gonna let you handle it,” says Tolt. He’s referring to the negotiations about to start.

“I’ll just make the introductions, and then if there’s anything I can do… well.” He makes an aristocratic gesture, a sweep with the back of one hand you might expect from a Venetian doge. His hand passes over the leather folder with its gold corners and the black Mont Blanc pen resting atop it like a sleek torpedo.

Tolt’s eyes study the door behind me as the fingers of one hand, adorned by a gold university ring, tap the tabletop in a drumroll one might expect as a prelude to an execution.

Adam has by instinct taken the place of honor at the head of the table. It is his turf. He does not think much of my chances here today, particularly in light of the intractable positions taken by the two women, Dana and Margaret Rush. Neither is willing to settle for less than two million, the full face amount of the policy on Nick’s life, though I suspect I could cause Dana to buckle if I pushed. I have not shared my arguments with Tolt. I am not sure whether I can trust him. So he will be hearing everything for the first time as I lay it out.

The door across from me opens, and I look up. Tolt’s administrative assistant plays usher, shepherding them in. The first face through the door is ruddy, red with rosacea, a man about six feet tall, well built, I would guess in his late forties, with close-cropped blond hair, combed over and parted on the left like a prairie banker. He wears a well-turned dark suit, power pinstripes for whatever psychological advantage it might provide. He studies me briefly through searing blue eyes offering nothing but the confidence of his grin, the kind you get from politicians feeling their oats and business types who have climbed over other bodies on the way to the top.

According to the playbook and the descriptions I have been given by Tolt, I am guessing that this is Luther Conover, senior adjuster and vice president for claims at Devon Insurance, the principal underwriter on the key-man policy for Nick’s life.

“Luther. Good to see you.” Tolt gets up out of his chair. “It’s been a while.”

“It has. Too long. When was the last time? I think it was up at the northern regionals when our board met. When was that? Two years ago?”

“Sounds right. How’s Julie and the kids?”

“Oh, they’re fine. The twins are headed to college next year.”

“No.” Adam loads his voice with doubt.

“Eighteen,” says Conover.

“I can’t believe that. They were just little things.” Tolt holds his hand at a level even with the tabletop. “It has been a while,” he says.

“Thank God for little favors,” says Conover. “It’s not that I don’t like to see you,” he says, “but I’m not sure my wallet can handle the stress.”

“Nonsense,” says Adam. “We always have a wonderful time. Besides, it’s not your money.”

“Yes, but your hands keep stretching my pockets out of shape.” Conover looks at me and laughs, the signal for me to join in. It’s all very cordial, chuckles all around. I have no idea what they’re talking about other than to gather that Tolt has put his own mark on Devon Insurance in the past.

“I want to introduce you to Paul Madriani.” Just like that Tolt acquaints Conover with the hand aimed at his other pocket.

We shake. He gives me the same solid grin he offered charging through the door, the once-over to assess the latest lawyer trying to shake him down. He quickly turns his attention back to Adam and they talk golf, kibitzing and quizzing each other on current handicaps.

“We’ll have to get you over to Temecula,” says Conover.

“Seems I only get to play these days when I’m on vacation,” says Adam.

“Where’s that?”

“Out at de Anza.”

“You have a membership?”

Tolt nods. “We bought a condo on the fourteenth fairway. We spend some time there.”

“How is Margo?”

“She’s good. Healthy. She keeps me in shape.”

“De Anza. That’s a little rich for my blood.” Conover looks again in my direction. “You play golf, Mr. Madriani?”

“Sorry to say it’s not one of my vices.”

“Good. We’ll have to get you out on the course. I need somebody I can beat. Adam here chops the legs out from under me every time we get near the greens. Whatever he lacks in his drives, he more than makes up for with his putts.”

“Putz is the right word,” says Adam.

We laugh again as the line piles up outside the door to the conference room.

Behind Conover, a slender guy in his thirties is hauling a briefcase in both hands, trying to lift it over Conover’s shoulder as he slides in behind him to get to the table across from me.

“Excuse me,” says Conover. “Like you to meet Larry Melcher, house counsel with Devon. Paul Madriani. Is it Madriani? I am pronouncing it correctly?”

“That’s right.” I’m shaking Melcher’s hand as I talk to Conover. When I turn to look at the lawyer, he gives me the insurance eye, a play for dominance. There is much mutual sniffing here. This is well practiced by every indemnity lawyer I’ve ever met. He would frisk me if he thought he could get away with it. Instead he tests my hand for grip as if any contest between us will be settled by arm wrestling on the conference table.

“Now who exactly is it you’re representing here today?” Melcher hasn’t even taken a seat and he’s plumbing for information, trying to nail down my client. It wouldn’t do to be playing too many sides of the same fence.

“My firm represents Dana Rush. You may have met my partner out in the reception area?”

“I don’t think we had that opportunity.” He says it with a kind of fraternity grin that makes me think that whatever happened out in reception wasn’t that cordial. With Dana and Margaret in the same room, they may have to chip the ice off the walls.

Dana is next through the door, followed by Harry. I had to twist his arm to get him to come. I needed somebody to referee in the event Margaret and Dana decided to do best two-out-of-three falls while they were waiting.