Lisa Scottoline - Mistaken Identity

“So, you just quit ?” Mary asked, astonished as she strode beside Joy, who led a white pony named Frosty. Atop the pony perched a little boy who was about four years old, with densely black bangs. His thick glasses were slightly crooked under a black riding helmet and he clutched a spray of coarse white mane with a small fist as he bumped along. The four of them-pony, boy, and two lawyers-walked around in circles in a riding ring in an unassuming cinderblock arena. “ You quit law?” Mary repeated.

“Yes, I quit. I’m allowed, aren’t I?” Joy smiled. Her hair swung free and her expression was more relaxed than Mary remembered, though her clothes remained the same. White turtleneck and jeans, but no crease ironed down the middle.

“Why did you quit? You were so… good at it.”

“You know how being a lawyer is. It was too many hours, too much stress, and too little fun. Clients want everything yesterday, the world hates you, and you can’t please anyone. So I just quit.”

Quitting. The thought made Mary dizzy, but it could have been the walking in circles. She thought about quitting every day, but had never met anyone who had actually done it. “How did you do it?”

“I wrote a memo and said, ‘I resign. Take my federal rules and shove it.’ Now I do this, which I love.” Joy led the pony to the left by a pink nylon halter. Sunlight streamed through the open window, catching her hair and setting it aglow. The air was fresh and clean and swallows chirped from a tall oak outside the window. They were in the horse country of Chester County and the only other sound was the steady clump clump clump of the pony’s hooves on the soft footing. “It’s not that hard to quit. You just have to take a risk.”

“Did you have this job before you quit?”

“No, but I’d been riding since I was little. I knew I could teach it. To teach these kids, you have to learn all over again, though. It’s not the same.” Joy coaxed the pony to a cartoon-red mailbox set improbably beside the ring and patted the little boy’s leg. “Go for it, Bobby!” she said, and the boy bent over, opened the mailbox, and extracted a beanbag. He giggled and held it up in triumph, though he said nothing. “Good for you!” Joy told him. “Now put it back, just like yesterday, remember?”

The child bit his lip while he held the pony’s mane, squeezed his legs into the sheepskin saddle pad for balance, and thrust the bag back into the mailbox. Then he flipped the lid closed. Joy gave him a hug, which went unreturned. “You’re the best, you know that?” she said, though the boy didn’t answer. When Joy turned around, her face was flushed with happiness. “Yesterday he couldn’t do that. Today he can.”

“Congratulations.”

“Bobby did it, not me.” Joy clucked to the pony and they began walking again. “Why don’t you congratulate him?” she asked, so pointedly that Mary realized she’d been avoiding the child altogether. Why, she didn’t know, but whatever the reason, she felt instantly guilty about it. On many days, Mary woke up guilty.

“Congratulations, Bobby,” Mary told him, but she couldn’t determine if he’d heard. “Does he understand?”

“He understands more than you and me,” Joy answered tersely, then looked over. “When you called, you said you needed to talk to me about Jemison, for a case. You didn’t drive all the way out here to talk about quitting.”

“No? I mean, no.” Mary stopped daydreaming and remembered the Connolly case. “You were at Jemison when Judge Guthrie was there, weren’t you?”

“Sure. He was one of the gray hairs, in litigation. He was there from forever. He took care of all the old-line house clients. His billings were huge, all of it inherited from the gray hair before him.”

“Did you work for him?”

“Only a little, and I wasn’t even on the briefs. He was a nice man.”

“Then he became a judge.”

“Yes.” Joy nodded, keeping a hand on Bobby as the pony walked.

“Were you at Jemison when Henry Burden was there? He was a former D.A.”

“Sure. He’d been there a year or two when I got there. I never worked for him. He was muy macho. I didn’t need it.”

“Did Burden work for Guthrie at all?”

“Sure. He was Guthrie’s boy, totally.”

“So they were friends?”

“Not really. Guthrie was a loner in the firm, not political. He was into his family and was always the legal scholar. He wanted to be a judge for a long time. He even published while he practiced and wrote all the articles himself. How incredible is that?”

Mary put her head down, mulling it over. Dust covered her pumps as they marched next to the pony’s hooves. The clump clump clump was helping her think. “So at some point, Burden comes over from the D.A.’s office. Burden is very connected in city politics, but has no client base. Guthrie has a client base, but isn’t connected in city politics. Guthrie wants to be a judge, but you can’t be a judge without connections. Not in Philadelphia.”

Joy smiled at Bobby. “Sit up, buddy. Try to sit straight as a board.”

“So they formed an alliance,” Mary said, thinking aloud. “Burden got Guthrie a judgeship, and Guthrie turned over his clients. As a result, they owe each other, and they also owe a lot of powerful people in the city. Isn’t that interesting?”

“No, not at all. This is interesting. Ho, Frosty.” The pony halted next to a toy hoop mounted low on the cinderblock wall. Joy handed a lightweight basketball to Bobby, who squinted over his glasses and pitched the ball at the hoop. It veered wildly off course, arced into a wall, and rolled into the center of the ring. Joy ran to fetch it. “Put your hand on Bobby’s leg, Mary!” she called back.

“Huh? Why?”

“So he doesn’t fall off!”

“What?” Mary clamped a panicky hand on the boy’s leg. “Stay on, okay, Bobby? If you fall off, the guilt will kill me.”

Joy came back with the ball, panting. “You know, Mary, you could quit, too. If you don’t like your job, just quit. Just do it.”

“I can’t. I’ll fall off the edge of the earth. Now take this child. Put a hand on him. Save him from me.”

Joy handed Bobby the basketball and placed a confident grip on his leg. “You’ll find another job, you’ll see. In this economy, there’s tons of jobs. We have two openings. You want to work here?”

“Here?” Mary’s throat caught, and Bobby looked down at her, basketball between his hands, as if waiting for an answer. His eyes were brown, magnified by his dense lenses, and his gaze didn’t waver. Though his expression remained remote, Mary could see that he accorded her the same trust he did Joy, merely because she was an adult. She felt distinctly unworthy. “I don’t think I can,” she answered simply, and the boy turned away.

It was a business day at the prison and the interview rooms were full. Three-piece suits sat on the left side of the counter and orange jumpsuits on the right. Public defenders huddled with their clients next to tall stacks of accordion files. For their visits, the prison guards became air-traffic controllers, lining up the inmates like jets waiting to land.

“This is a surprise,” Connolly said. She stood up when Bennie banged into the interview room and let the door slam locked behind her. “I didn’t expect you today.”

“Expect me every day.” Bennie tossed her briefcase onto the Formica counter, where it landed with a loud thud, and she dropped into the chair behind it. “We got trouble. How did the press find out you might be my twin?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the way we look?”

“You didn’t tell them?”