The Only Good Lawyer - Jeremiah Healy

by Jeremish Healy

  Opening the envelope, I found photocopies of the seller-to-buyer conveyance documents on the Viet Mam restaurant building, the book-and-page references in stencil-like letters and numbers at the top. Each page of the printed documents contained a number of typographical errors, all corrected by hand, as though someone hadn't proofread the ribbon originals until the closing itself.

  I didn't find much to help the cause, the seller and his attorney—whose letterhead was on the deed—having Hispanic names that meant nothing to me. Nguyen Trinh apparently purchased the property through a straw, the "NT Realty Trust," probably to conceal his identity as buyer. No surprise there.

  In fact, the only real surprise came at the very end of that document. It was the part where a notary public signs and presses a notarial seal in taking the seller's oath that "the above-entitled conveyance is my free act and deed."

  The seller's name conformed to the typing at the beginning of the document, but the notary line Wasn't signed by his attorney. You had to read the signature carefully, and Without the seal's printing coming through in photocopy like a bad dot-matrix, I might not have taken the time to read it carefully enough. After three go-overs, though, I was pretty certain I'd gotten it right the first time.

  The deed conveying the Viet Mam building to Nguyen Trinh had been notarized by one "Deborah M. Ling."

  Chapter 13

  ON THE WALK over to Epstein & Neely's offices, I thought about how to handle Deborah Ling. Riding to the fourth floor in that small elevator, I settled on an indirect approach.

  When the door opened onto the reception area, Imogene Burbage was picking up a Federal Express packet from the desk staffed by a different woman than I'd seen only the day before. Burbage wore a gray suit, the style still conservative, the reddish hair still pulled into a tight bun.

  Turning around, she seemed taken aback. "Mr. Cuddy?"

  "Ms. Burbage. I'm glad to see you."

  A troubled expression as she came toward me, massaging the left wrist with her free hand. "Why?"

  I lowered my voice. "I'd hate having to explain myself to a new receptionist."

  Burbage frowned. "Well, you should have called first, given how late it is. Mr. Neely's attending a bar association event, Mr. Herman's away on a trip till tomorrow, and Ms. Ling's at a closing."

  Being able to account for all her charges. Control, fiber alles.

  "How about Ms. Radachowski then?"

  * * *

  "John Cuddy."

  I said, "Working late?"

  With one big hand, Uta Radachowski pushed back a hank of the brown-and-silver hair, using the other to close the file on her cherry-wood desk and tap a key on her computer. "Not really. I'm afraid the days of nine-to-five are but a distant and fading memory? The magnified eyes looked at me from behind her pop-bottle lenses. "What brings you back here?"

  Time for the indirect approach. "I've been trying to come up with possible suspects, and it occurred to me that Woodrow Gant might have had some clients who weren't part of the firm roster."

  Radachowski blinked once. "I'm not sure I follow you."

  "Everybody here told me Mr. Gant didn't have any other opposing clients who had threatened him. What I'm wondering is, could Mr. Gant have had some cases he was working on outside the firm structure?"

  Another blink. "You mean, that he was litigating on his own somehow?"

  "Yes, where he might have made enemies you all wouldn't know about."

  Radachowski shook her head. "No. No, I don't see that happening. Woodrow did divorce work, and he used a software program for tracking them." She placed her right hand on the computer monitor. "Like the one in here I told you about last time. If he had 'outside' cases, as you've called them, he'd have been crazy to enter them on the 'inside' program."

  "Why?"

  "His secretary, Imogene, is also our bookkeeper. If she were to go into Woodrow's computer as his secretary, Imogene might see a file she didn't recognize from her billing software. And if he'd tried to litigate a case off the tracking program, he'd have had a hell of job keeping all the commitments straight"

  "Couldn't Mr. Gant just have kept his own, separate calendar for the outside matters?"

  Radachowski paused a moment. "John, why is it you even think Woodrow might have done all this in the first place?"

  "How about to make money he didn't have to share with the rest of you?"

  She paused again. "No. No, it's just too big a risk. Even if Woodrow kept a separate calendar, he'd still have to be in court for hearings on your 'outside' cases when his docket program said he shouldn't be, and he'd have to double-bill some 'inside' client to 'hide' that time for bookkeeping purposes. Plus, there'd be disbursements, like discovery costs for depositions or fees for expert witnesses. And, secretarily, he'd still need pleadings and other documents generated at the firm for those cases, because Woodrow wasn't terribly talented at formatting formal paperwork on his computer. Not to mention all kinds of countering documents from the other side arriving here that Imogene might open first."

  I thought about the typos in the deed I'd seen for the Viet Mam building. "How about if Mr. Gant had the opposing attorney draw up all the paperwork?"

  "All of it? In a business deal, I suppose that might fly, assuming no long-distance calls from here that our billing program wouldn't find any 'inside' client to charge. But on a litigated case? No, the opponent would have to be crazy. Or Woodrow would have had to——"

  Radachowski stopped short.

  I said, "What is it?"

  "Nothing. It makes even less sense than what you asked about."

  I gave her a minute, because something had crossed my mind, too, as Radachowski was giving me what I needed for confronting Deborah Ling. "Were you about to say, 'Or Woodrow would have had to get Imogene to go along with the plan?"

  No blinking at all from behind the thick lenses now. "John, you'll have to excuse me. I really have a lot of work to do before I can go home tonight."

  * * *

  I asked the new receptionist if Ms. Ling was expected to return to the office from her closing. Given that Imogene Burbage had immediately ushered "Mr. Cuddy" in to see Uta Radachowski, the temp behind the desk probably thought it was okay to tell me that the real-estate associate had said she'd be back by six.

  I sat down on the love seat to wait. About 5:50, I heard the elevator moving up its shaft, the doors opening to spill Deborah Ling into the reception area. She'd traded the pinstriped suit for a fawn-colored dress today, accessorized by a matching briefcase and handbag.

  Race-walking to the desk, Ling never even glanced my way. "Any. calls?"

  "Three," said the temp, reaching into the plastic holder. "And Mr. Cuddy to see you."

  "Mr .... ?" Ling turned, her pixie-cut hair quivering a bit as I thought she tried to maintain a poker face. "Again?"

  "It'll just take a minute."

  A sigh as Ling accepted her pink message slips from the receptionist. "Come into my office."

  Circling around the black, lacquered desk, Deborah Ling sank into her swivel chair. "I've had a long, hard day, Mr. Cuddy."

  "That makes two of us."

  "Can we get on with it, then?"

  "Sure. The last time I was here, you told me you introduced Woodrow Gant to the restaurant where he ate dinner the night of his death."

  Very casual, but impatient. "That's right."

  "Coming back from Dedham. On a friend's recommendation, I think you said."

  Now just impatient. "Mr. Cuddy, we've already spoken about—"

  "But I'm afraid you forgot to mention something else."

  “What?" said Ling, impatience verging on exasperation. "That you handled the purchase of the building Viet Mam is in."

  For a moment, she didn't reply. Then, in a voice without inflection, "What are you talking about?"

  "The property is leased to a man named Chan, who's trying to make a go of the restaurant. But you represented Nguyen Trinh when he bought the build
ing."

  A laugh that didn't quite come off. "Who?"

  "Nguyen Trinh, though he told me he prefers 'Nugey.' Woodrow Gant prosecuted Trinh and a buddy of his named Oscar Huong for home invasion some years back."

  Ling made no attempt to laugh now. "What in the world makes you think I'm involved in any of this?"

  "You mean, because there wouldn't be any billing records here at the firm showing you ever worked on the transaction?"

  Now she didn't even reply.

  "Ms. Ling, your notary public seal and signature are on the deed to Trinh."

  She tried to recover. “Oh, that? I was at the Registry one day, and another lawyer had forgotten his seal, so he asked me to just—"

  "Do you really think the lawyer who represented the seller of the building is going to back you on that? Especially after you had him prepare all the conveyancing documents so there wouldn't be any embarrassing paper trail for Frank Neely or Imogene Burbage to stumble on here at the firm?"

  Ling closed down, eyes, face, even torso. Then she looked up at me. "Are you trying to ruin my career?"

  "No, but I would like the truth."

  "The truth." Ling bit her lower lip. "All right. The truth is that I met Nugey Trinh over the summer at one of the dance clubs in the theater district. We started talking, about me being a real estate attorney and him wanting to buy a building. Nugey asked me to represent him on the purchase, but he wanted it 'off the books'."

  "Why?"

  "Nugey said that since he met me at the club instead of through the firm, and if I was going to do all the work, why should Epstein & Neely get the fee? Then he—"

  "Wait a minute. Trinh knew where you worked?"

  Ling hesitated. "Yes. When we first started talking—about me doing real estate law—he asked where, and I told him."

  So if Trinh had known Gant was at Epstein & Neely, Trinh also would know that Ling worked with him there. "Go on."

  "Well, I told Nugey I'd have to think about it."

  "Why did you even consider it?"

  "Mr. Cuddy, Nugey Trinh is an attractive man. Exotic, with his racial background. And I'd broken away from my family, anyway, so I didn't have them to 'embarrass' by seeing someone who wasn't Chinese."

  "Which might explain why you'd want to date Trinh, but not why you'd represent him ‘off the books'."

  Ling looked away, out her window. "The first time you were here, we talked about student loans." She patted the lacquered wood in front of her. "Well, this desk was the last tangible help I got from my parents. They won't contribute to the loan payments, and the obligation isn't dischargeable in bankruptcy, even if I were willing to commit 'career-icide' by filing for it." Ling looked back at me. "Nugey's deal seemed so neat and clean. I'm in and out of the transaction with a few thousand in cash that neither the firm nor the IRS has to know about."

  "How did you handle things with the seller's attorney?"

  “I told him I was practicing out of my apartment. Enough recent law grads have to do that, it doesn't seem odd anymore. Only he forgot to send a draft of the deed to my home address for me to review, so the first time I saw it was at the closing, where I picked up on all the typos. I corrected them by hand, and then the incompetent fool didn't even have his notarial seal with him, meaning I had to take the seller's oath myself."

  "Which shouldn't have been a problem, except for somebody like me having the building's title traced at the Registry."

  "Yes. Why did you do that?"

  The Gang Unit, but I wasn't about to reveal my source to her. "I thought Chan and the waitress at Viet Mam were awfully nervous, and I wanted to see if the records gave them some reason to be."

  Ling sagged back into her chair, the eyes solemn. "So, what are you going to do now?"

  "Before we get to that, why did you really take Woodrow Gant to the restaurant for lunch that first time?"

  She straightened a little. "Just because I knew it was there. I wanted to try it, too."

  "Doesn't wash, counselor. The last thing you'd ever do would be to bring a partner from the firm you'd shorted to the building you'd shorted it on."

  Ling seemed to go inside herself for a minute. "Nugey and I had become . . . intimate. He's a very exciting man, Mr. Cuddy. Very different from the ones I meet through my work."

  She came out of her trance. "He wanted me to bring Woodrow there."

  "To Viet Mam?"

  "Yes."

  "Why?"

  "Nugey is . . ." Ling stopped, then started over. "Nugey had a very difficult life, one where because of his . . . heritage he was rarely in control of anything. I think the main reason he bought that particular building was so that he could exercise some control over a 'purebred' Vietnamese man, the kind who would have abused him back in Saigon."

  Trinh had told me basically the same thing. "Go ahead."

  "Well, I think there was some of that about having Woodrow and me in the restaurant, too. Nugey had been prosecuted by him, sentenced to a juvenile detention center for a long time. Now Nugey wanted to watch Woodrow eating in a building he controlled."

  "Watch him?"

  "Yes. When Woodrow and I ate lunch there, Nugey was kind of hiding in the kitchen, watching us through the swinging doors."

  Christ. "That was all Trinh did, watch?"

  Ling seemed confused. "Yes. I mean, Woodrow might have recognized him. What else could Nugey do?"

  I was thinking of the way Trinh and Huong dealt with Grover Gant at the coffee shop, but I said, "Have you had any more ideas about who the woman might have been with Woodrow Gant in Viet Mam the night he was killed?"

  "No. I don't even know why he'd go back there."

  "Because?"

  "In the parking lot that day after lunch, Woodrow mentioned he hadn't particularly enjoyed the food."

  Not what Ling had told me the first time I met her, but consistent with what Uta Radachowski had said.

  When I kept silent, Deborah Ling changed the tone of her voice. "I have a question for you, Mr. Cuddy."

  "Go ahead."

  She seemed to choose her words carefully. "Are you going to tell Frank Neely about all this?"

  "I don't see a reason to."

  Ling was visibly relieved.

  "However," I said, "there's a life sentence of reasons why I have to tell Alan Spaeth's attorney about it."

  Ling shook her head. "Nugey owns that building as a matter of public record."

  "Only as the 'NT Realty Trust'."

  "But he could testify he's the one behind the trust."

  I thought I could see where Ling was going. "Without involving you as the one who handled the transaction."

  A very steady, "Yes."

  "Ms. Ling, Steve Rothenberg hired me to find evidence establishing a reasonable doubt that his client killed Woodrow Gant. You're not a criminal lawyer—and I'm not a lawyer, period—but it seems to me that 'reasonable doubt' is kind of cumulative. And the facts that ex-gang-member Trinh was tied to the decedent as prosecutor and to the decedent's current law firm through you add up pretty persuasively."

  "Mr. Cuddy, please? It would be crazy for Nugey to kill Woodrow like a gang execution just minutes after Woodrow left a building Nugey owns."

  Trinh himself had made that argument to me. And it was a good one, unless Chan's landlord really was nuts.

  An imploring look in her eyes. “At least think about it for a while before ruining me?"

  I was tempted to tell Deborah Ling that was exactly what she should have done when Nguyen Trinh first made his "off the books" suggestion, but I couldn't see how it would do her any good now.

  * * *

  Precisely creasing correspondence toward insertion into envelopes, Imogene Burbage looked up at me from behind her desk outside Frank Neely's office. "You were talking to Ms. Radachowski for quite a while."

  "Only part of the time since I left you. The rest was with Deborah Ling."

  Burbage went back to her letters. "Well, I hope that you've now
found out everything you need."

  "Not quite."

  When I didn't continue, she looked back up at me, a sheaf of unfolded papers spread before her like a giant game of solitaire. "Meaning what?"

  "Meaning I still don't know the name of the woman having dinner with Woodrow Gant the night he was killed."

  "We already discussed that."

  I took a chance. "It's possible she was wearing sort of a disguise."

  "Disguise?"

  "Big blond wig, sunglasses."

  Burbage made no reply.

  I said, "Probably something that would be completely out of character for the woman, to throw people off on identifying her."

  "Mr. Cuddy," said Burbage very slowly, "I have no idea who your 'mystery date' could be."

  Five seconds went by, neither of us looking away. I leaned forward just a little, placing my palms on her desktop. "Could she have been you?"

  Burbage obviously didn't like me invading her space.

  "You're being rude, as well as redundant. I've told you I wasn't that woman." Then a softening I didn't expect. "From the way I behaved the last time you were here, I'm sure you can tell that I cared for Mr. Gant. Cared for him very much. But I didn't go out with him socially."

  "Never?"

  "Never. I don't behave like that."

  "Always in control, Ms. Burbage?"

  "Always." said a deep voice behind me.

  I turned to see Frank Neely standing squarely. I hadn't heard him approaching down the hall from the reception area. He said, "Weren't we helpful enough yesterday?"

  "A few more things have come up."

  Neely seemed to consider that. "Imogene, any fires that need putting out?"

  "They can wait till morning."

  He turned back to me. "John, I just left a bar reception because it was boring me to tears. As long as you promise not to do the same, we can talk in my office."

  "So, what are the 'few more things'?"

  Neely was seated behind his desk, me in front of it. No offer of drinks or view from upstairs this visit.

  I said, "Let's start with the public record part. When Woodrow Gant was with the D.A.'s office, he prosecuted a young hood named Nguyen Trinh."

  "Nguyen . . . Is that Vietnamese?"