John Lescroart - The 13th Juror

Freeman was a step ahead of them. "If you're talking burning bed, I think the boy is a problem there."

The "burning bed" had been gaining a good deal of momentum in legal circles as a valid defense for killing. When a spouse had been battered long enough, juries in several cases had decided that killing the abusive spouse was justified as a form of self-defense, even if the actual event took place during a period of relative calm, as for example when the abuser was asleep. This was far beyond the usual legal standard for self-defense, when the person being attacked was in imminent danger of being killed.

"Why is Matt a problem?" Lightner asked.

"Because battered wives don't kill their children," Freeman said. "If she was a battered wife."

"She was. And it might have been unintentional, if it happened while she was defending herself."

"That would be a tough sell to a jury," Freeman said.

"You think she did it?" Hardy asked abruptly.

For the first time, Lightner appeared to think carefully about an answer. "She had reason to," he said.

Hardy didn't like this. Another person, not even in the prosecution's loop, with the so-called informed opinion that his client "had reason" to kill her husband. "Because her husband abused her?"

"Not, of course, that having a reason means she did it," Lightner was quick to add.

Hardy squared around on the psychiatrist. "What exactly are you saying?"

"I'm certainly not saying she did it, Mr. Hardy. I am saying you perhaps ought to read the literature. People become crazed in the situation Jennifer was in. Understandably so. I'm saying that if that happened to Jennifer, if she was as horribly abused as I suspect-"

"I thought you just said-"

"-then that should be a central part of her defense. And that's all I'm saying, Mr. Hardy."

Covering her both ways, Hardy thought.

The elevator arrived. "We're going up." Freeman dismissed him, then softened it. "Thanks for the input."

"You're very welcome. Please call on me any time." And Lightner disappeared behind the closing doors.

They were waiting for Jennifer to be brought into the women's visiting room. Freeman was going over more of the file; Hardy sat across the small table taking in the view through the window – a female guard filing papers in an ancient metal cabinet.

"You know" – he didn't turn around – "a man of your sensitivity and experience ought to be able to do this alone." Hardy had had to be talked into returning to the seventh floor. It was not a pleasant place.

"She hasn't met me yet." Freeman did not stop his reading.

"She just met you downstairs, remember? Department 22. Big room, judge in the front." Freeman raised his rheumy eyes. Hardy came around the table, hovering over him. "You know, one of my beliefs is that everybody should try to get some sleep every night."

"I get enough," Freeman growled.

"Beauty rest, then, you could use more beauty rest."

"Look." Changing tracks. "We may not be doing this at all. I want it, don't get me wrong, but if there's no fee… and then there's the fact that I wouldn't blame her at all if she dumped me right now on her own. Her reaction to me was something less than warm. To combat that eventuality I've asked you to accompany me – she seemed to relate to you for some unknown reason. Maybe you can at least buffer things at the beginning here. I explained this once."

"I know. I even understood it."

"What, then?"

"Just trying to lighten you up, David. We've already lost one downstairs. We want this case, we might want to slap on a little of the suave."

Freeman gave him a face. "I don't do suave." But he forced a weary grin. "That's why I need you."

They were getting through the first minutes. Jennifer, tight, said nothing while Freeman explained the bail situation – how there just wasn't much any attorney could do in a capital case such as hers. It was also a sales pitch of sorts – defense work might be Freeman's vocation, but it was also his livelihood, and he felt obliged to nail down the level of his involvement before he proceeded, but all she wanted now was for him to appeal the bail denial.

"You can't want me to stay in here?"

Hardy stood, back to the door, hands in his pockets. After a night in jail Jennifer's feelings about the relative importance of bail had only escalated, and understandably so.

Freeman folded his hands on the table in front of him, speaking very quietly. "Of course not, Mrs. Witt. But we have got realities to deal with, and I'm afraid one of them involves money."

"Money. It's always money, isn't it?"

For a moment Hardy thought she almost sounded like her brother.

Freeman spread his hands. In fact, he thought, it often was money. He felt obliged to lay it out for her now, however unpleasant it might be. "You might get a million-dollar bail on appeal. That's a hundred thousand to the bondsman. Plus the cost of the appeal. If you can't manage that you'll have to go with a public defender at trial."

Her glance – quick and frightened – went to the door. "Why not you and Mr. Hardy?"

Freeman's hands came back together. "Frankly, our retainer… it's my decision, is going to be two hundred thousand dollars, and anybody else would require as much. So if you can't raise the money you go with the public defender." In addition to believing it was better to be even brutally frank up front, Freeman also held the view that it was actually better for the client to show your tough side, on the theory that if you could be this difficult with your own, think how you'd eat up your enemies. He had long since stopped asking himself if this were a rationalization. He couldn't afford such thoughts, he told himself.

"But isn't a public defender just anyone?"

"No, they have to be approved by the court. And in capital cases there's a substantial level of competency."

"A level of competency," she muttered, shaking her head.

"I'm very sorry, but those are the facts of the matter-"

"But this is my life!"

"David." Hardy felt he had to break in here. All of what Freeman was saying might be important and even true, but the money wasn't the point for Hardy and he suspected that, at bottom, it wasn't really for Freeman either, though he put on a convincing act to the contrary.

Now the old man lifted his baggy eyes. "What?"

"Let's go outside for a minute."

They left Jennifer sitting at the table in the tiny room. Outside, in the start hallway, the jail noises now much louder, Hardy got to it. "How about we come back to the money later?"

"When?"

"Later."

"It's got to get settled, Diz. She doesn't want to change attorneys." He scratched at the lines around his right eye. "She doesn't have enough, then ethically we've got no business starting. I'm just trying to find out, get things clear."

"You're grilling her, is what you're doing."

Freeman waved that off. "Grill, schmill, we need to know and we need to know now." He patted Hardy's shoulder. "Look, I know, it's a good case. Hell, we could do it pro bono for advertising. But I want to know what we're dealing with, and this is the time to find out. After that… well, I'll make it up to her." He inclined his head. "Let's go back in. I'll make it short and sweet. Promise."

Freeman sat across from Jennifer. "Mr. Hardy and I are sorry to have to put you through this, Jennifer, but we do need to know your financial situation. That will help clarify where we go from here."

The muscles in Jennifer's jaw were working, her face blank. "Well, I don't think money's a problem… the insurance, you know?"

Freeman was shaking his head. "No, Jennifer. They'll hold it until you're finished with this. If you're found guilty, they won't pay."