Grisham, John - The Client

by The Client [lit]

  "I have a lawyer, you know. Have you told her?"

  "No. We're not required to notify the attorneys, but you're welcome to call her if you like."

  "Does he have access to a telephone?" the second one asked Telda.

  "Only if I bring him one," she said.

  "You can wait thirty minutes, can't you?"

  "If you say so," Telda said.

  "So, Mark, in about thirty minutes you can call your lawyer." Duboski paused and looked at his sidekick. "Well, good luck to you, Mark. Sorry if we scared you."

  They left him standing near the toilet, leaning on the wall for support, more confused than ever, scared to death. And angry. The system was rotten. He was sick of laws and lawyers and courts, of cops and agents and marshals, of reporters and judges and jailers. Dammit!

  He yanked a paper towel from the wall and wiped his eyes, then sat on the toilet. He swore to the walls that he would not go to New Orleans.

  Two other deputy marshals would serve Dianne, and two more would serve Ms. Reggie Love at home, and all this serving of subpoenas was carefully coordinated to happen at roughly the same time. In reality, one deputy marshal, or one unemployed concrete worker for that matter, could have served all three subpoenas at a leisurely pace and completed the job in an hour. But it was more fun to use six men in three cars with radios and telephones and guns, and to strike quickly under cover of darkness like a Special Forces assault unit.

  They knocked on Momma Love's kitchen door, and waited until the porch light came on and she appeared behind the screen. She instantly knew they were trouble. During the nightmare of Reggie's divorce and commitments and legal warfare with Joe Cardoni, there had been several deputies and men in dark suits standing at her doorway at odd hours. These guys always brought trouble.

  "Can I help you?" she asked with a forced smile.

  "Yes ma'am. We're looking for one Reggie Love."

  They even talked like cops. "And who are you?" she asked.

  "I'm Mike Hedley, and this is Terry Flagg. We're U.S. marshals."

  "U.S. marshals, or deputy U.S. marshals? Let me see some ID."

  This shocked them, and in perfect synchronization they reached into their pockets for their badges. "We're deputy U.S. marshals, ma'am."

  "That's not what you said," she said, examining the badges held up to the screen door.

  Reggie was sipping coffee on the tiny balcony of her apartment when she heard the car doors slam. She was now peeking around the corner and looking down at the two men standing under the light. She could hear the voices, but could not understand what they were saying.

  "Sorry, ma'am," Hedley said.

  "Why do you want one Reggie Love?" Momma Love asked with a suspicious frown.

  "Does she live here,?" "

  "Maybe, maybe not. What do you want?"

  Hedley and Flagg looked at each other. "We're supposed to serve her with a subpoena."

  "A subpoena for what?"

  "May I ask who you are?" Flagg said.

  "I'm her mother. Now, what's the subpoena for?"

  "It's a grand jury subpoena. She's supposed to appear before a grand jury in New Orleans on Monday. We can just leave it with you if you like,"

  "I'm not accepting service of it," she said as if she fought with process servers every week. "You have to actually serve her, if I'm not mistaken."

  "Where is she?"

  "She doesn't live here."

  This irritated them. "That's her car," Hedley said, nodding at Reggie's Mazda.

  "She doesn't live here," Momma Love repeated.

  "Okay, but is she here now?"

  "No."

  "Do you know where she is?"

  "Have you tried her office? She works all the time."

  "But why is her car here?"

  "Sometimes she rides with Clint, her secretary. They may be having dinner, or something."

  They gave each other frustrated stares. "I think she's here," Hedley said, suddenly aggressive.

  "You're not paid to think, son. You're paid to serve those damned papers, and I'm telling you she's not here." Momma Love raised her voice when she said this, and Reggie heard it.

  "Can we search the house?" Flagg asked.

  "If you have a warrant, you can search the house. If you don't have a warrant, it's time to get off my property."

  They both took a step back, and stopped. "I hope you're not obstructing the service of a federal subpoena," Hedley said gravely. It was supposed to have an ominous, dire ring to it, but Hedley failed miserably.

  "And I hope you're not trying to threaten an old woman." Her hands were on her hips and she was ready for combat.

  They surrendered and backed away. "We'll be back," Hedley promised as he opened his car door.

  "I'll be here," she shouted angrily, opening the front door. She stood on the small porch and watched as they backed into the street. She waited for five minutes, and when she was certain they were gone, she went to Reggie's apartment over the garage.

  Dianne took the subpoena from the polite and apologetic gentleman without comment. She read it by the light of the dim lamp next to Ricky's bed. It contained no instructions, just a command for Mark to appear before the grand jury at 10 A.M. at the address below. There was no hint of how he was to get there; no clue as to when he might return; no warning of what could happen if he failed to comply or failed to talk. She called Reggie, but there was no answer.

  Though Clint's apartment was only fifteen minutes away, the drive took almost an hour. She zigzagged through midtown, then raced around the interstate going nowhere in particular, and when she was certain she was not being followed, she parked on a street crowded with empty cars. She walked four blocks to his apartment.

  His nine o'clock date had been abruptly canceled, and it was a date with a lot of promise. "I'm sorry," Reggie said as he opened the door and she eased through it.

  "That's okay. Are you all right?" He took her bag and waved at the sofa. "Sit down."

  Reggie was no stranger to the apartment. She found a diet Coke in the refrigerator and sat on a bar-stool. "It was the U.S. marshal's office with a grand jury subpoena. Ten o'clock Monday morning in New Orleans."

  "But they didn't serve you?"

  "No. Momma Love ran them off."

  "Then you're off the hook."

  "Yeah, unless they find "me. There's no law against dodging subpoenas. I need to call Dianne."

  Clint handed her a phone, and she punched the numbers from memory. "Relax, Reggie," he said, and kissed her gently on the cheek. He picked up stray magazines and turned on the stereo. Dianne was on the phone, and Reggie managed three words before she was forced to listen. Subpoenas were everywhere. One for Reggie, one for Dianne, and one for Mark. Reggie tried to calm her. Dianne had called the detention center, but couldn't get through to Mark. Phones were unavailable at this hour, she'd been told. They talked for five minutes. Reggie, badly shaken herself, tried to convince Dianne everything was fine. She, Reggie, was in control. She promised to call her in the morning, then hung up.

  "They can't take Mark," Clint said. "He's under the jurisdiction of our Juvenile Court."

  "I need to talk to Harry. But he's out of town."

  "Where is he?"

  "Fishing somewhere with his sons."

  "This is more important than fishing, Reggie. Let's find him. He can stop it, can't he?"

  She was thinking of a hundred things at once. "This is pretty slick, Clint. Think about it. Foltrigg waits until late Friday to serve subpoenas for Monday morning."

  "How can he do this?"

  "It's easy. He just did it. In a criminal case like this, a federal grand jury can subpoena any witness from anywhere, regardless of time and distance. And the witness must appear unless he or she can first quash the subpoena."

  "How do you quash one?"

  "You file a motion in federal court to void the subpoena."

  "Lemme guess, federal court in New Orleans?"

  "That's r
ight. We're forced to find the trial judge early Monday morning in New Orleans and beg him to allow an emergency hearing to quash the subpoena."

  "It won't work, Reggie."

  "Of course it won't work. That's the way Foltrigg planned it." She gulped the diet Coke. "Do you have any coffee?"

  "Sure." He began opening drawers.

  Reggie was thinking out loud". "If I can dodge the subpoena until Monday, Foltrigg will be forced to issue u nave time to quash. The problem is Mark. They're not after me, because they know they can't force me to talk."

  "Do you know where the damned body is, Reggie?"

  "No."

  "Does Mark?"

  "Yes."

  He froze for a moment, then ran water in the pot.

  "We have to figure out a way to keep Mark here, Clint. We can't allow him to go to New Orleans."

  "Call Harry."

  "Harry's fishing in the mountains."

  "Then call Harry's wife. Find out where he's fishing in the mountains. I'll go get him if necessary."

  "You're right." She grabbed the phone and started calling.

  32

  Final room check at the juvenile detention center was 10 P.M., when they made sure all lights and televisions were off. Mark heard Telda rattling keys and givi-ing commands across the hall. His shirt was soaked, unbuttoned, and sweat ran to his navel and puddled around the zipper of his jeans. The television was off. His breathing was heavy. His thick hair was watery and rows of sweat ran to his eyebrows and dripped from the tip of his nose. She was next door. His face was crimson and hot.

  Telda knocked, then unlocked Mark's door. The light was on and this immediately irritated her. She took a step inside, glanced at the bunks, but he wasn't there.

  Then she saw his feet beside the toilet. He was curled tightly with his knees on his chest, motionless except for rapid, heavy breathing.

  His eyes were closed and his left thumb was in his mouth.

  "Mark!" she shouted, suddenly terrified. "Mark! Oh my God!" She ran from the room to get help, and fetched Denny, her partner, who took a quick look.

  "Doreen was worried about this," Denny said, touching the sweat on Mark's stomach. "Damn, he's soaking wet."

  Telda was pinching his wrist. "His pulse is crazy. Look at him breathe. Call an ambulance!"

  "The poor kid's in shock, isn't he?"

  "Go call an ambulance!"

  Denny lumbered from the room and the floor shook. Telda picked Mark up and carefully placed him on the bottom bunk, where he curled again and brought his knees to his chest. The thumb never left his mouth. Denny was back with a clipboard. "This must be Doreen's handwriting. Says here to check on him every half hour, and if there's any doubt, to rush him to St. Peter's and call Dr. Greenway."

  "This is all my fault," Telda said. "I shouldn't have allowed those damned marshals in here. Scared the poor boy to death."

  Denny knelt beside her, and with a thick thumb peeled back the right eyelid. "Damn! His eyes have rolled back. This kid's in trouble," he said with all the gravity of a brain surgeon.

  "Get a washcloth over here," Telda said, and Denny did as told. "Doreen was telling me this is what happened to his little brother. They saw that shooting on Monday, both of them, and the little one's been in shock ever since." Denny handed her the cloth and she wiped Mark's forehead.

  "Damn, his heart's gonna explode," Denny said, on his knees again next to Telda. "He's breathing like crazy."

  "Poor kid. I should've run those marshals off," Telda said.

  "I would have. They got no right coming on this floor." He jabbed another thumb into the left eye, and Mark groaned and twitched. Then he started the moaning, just like Ricky, and this scared them even more. A low, dull, pitchless sound from deep in the throat. He sucked hard on the thumb.

  A paramedic from the main jail three floors down ran into the room, followed by another jailer. "What's up?" he asked as Telda and Denny moved.

  "I think it's called traumatic shock or stress or something," Telda said. "He's been acting strange all day, then about an hour ago two U.S. marshals were here to give him a subpoena." The paramedic was not listening. He gripped a wrist and found the pulse. Telda rattled on. "They scared him to death, and I think it sent him into shock. I should've watched him after that, but I got busy."

  "I would've run those damned marshals off," Denny said. They stood side by side behind the paramedic.

  "This is what happened to his little brother, you know, the one who's been in the newspaper all week. The shooting and all."

  "He's gotta go," the paramedic said, standing, frowning, and talking into his radio. "Hurry up with the stretcher to the fourth floor," he barked into it. "Got a kid in bad shape."

  Denny stuck the clipboard in front of the paramedic. "Says here to take him to St. Peter's. Dr. Green-way."

  "That's where his brother is," Telda added. "Doreen told me all about it. She was worried this sne aimost sent tor an ambulance this afternoon. Said he's been slipping away all day. I should've been more careful."

  The stretcher arrived with two more paramedics.

  Mark was quickly laid on it and covered with a blanket. A strap was placed across his thighs and another on his chest. His eyes never opened, but he managed to keep the thumb in his mouth.

  And he managed to emit the painful, monotonous groan that frightened the paramedics and sped the stretcher along. It rolled quickly past the front station, and into an elevator.

  "You ever seen this before?" one paramedic mumbled under his breath to the other.

  "Not that I recall."

  "He's burning up."

  "The skin is normally cool and clammy with shock. I've never seen this."

  "Yeah. Maybe traumatic shock is different. Check out that thumb."

  "Is this the kid the mob's after?"

  "Yeah. Front page today and yesterday."

  "I guess he's gone over the edge."

  The elevator stopped, and they pushed the stretcher hurriedly through a series of short hallways, all busy and filled with the usual Friday night madness of city jail. A set of double doors flew open, and they were at the ambulance.

  The ride to St. Peter's took less than ten minutes, half as long as the wait once they arrived. Three other ambulances were in the process of depositing their occupants. St. Peter's received the vast majority of Memphis knife wounds, gunshot victims, beaten wives, and mangled bodies from weekend car wrecks. The pace was hectic twenty-four hours a day, but from sunset Friday until late Sunday, the place was in chaos.

  They rolled him through the bay and onto the white-tiled floors, where the stretcher stopped and the paramedics waited and filled out forms. A small army of nurses and doctors scrambled around a new patient and all yelled at the same time. People ran in every direction. A half dozen cops milled about. Three more stretchers were parked haphazardly in the wide hallway.

  A nurse ventured by, stopped for a second, and asked the paramedics, "What is it?" One of them handed her a form.

  "So he's not bleeding," she said, as if nothing mattered except flowing blood.

  "No. Looks like stress or shock or something. Runs in the family."

  "He can wait. Roll him to Intake. I'll be back in a minute." And she was off.

  They wove the stretcher through heavy traffic, and stopped in a small room off the main hallway. The forms were presented to another nurse, who scribbled something without looking at Mark. "Where's Dr. Greenway?" she asked the paramedics.

  They looked at each other, and shrugged at the nurse.

  "You haven't called him?" she asked.

  "Well, no."

  "Well, no," she repeated to herself, and rolled her eyes. What a couple of dumbasses. "Look, this is a war zone, okay. We're talking blood and guts. We've lost two people in that hallway right there in the past thirty minutes. Psychiatric emergencies do not get top priority around here."

  “Do u want us to shoot him?" one of them said, nodding at Mark, and this really pissed
her off.

  "No. I want you to leave. I'll take care of him, but you guys just get the hell out of here."

  "You signed the forms, lady. He's all yours." They smiled at her, and headed for the door.

  "Is there a policeman with him?" she asked.

  "Nope. He's just a juvenile." They were gone.

  Mark managed to roll onto his left side and bring his knees to his chest. The straps were not tight. His eyes opened slightly. A black man was lying across three chairs in one corner of the room. An empty stretcher with blood on the sheets was by a green door next to a water fountain. The nurse answered the phone, said a few words, and left the room. Mark quickly unhooked the straps and jumped to the floor. There was no crime in walking around. He was a nut case now, so what if she caught him on his feet.

  The forms she'd been holding were on the counter. He grabbed them, and pushed the stretcher through the green door, which led to a cramped corridor with small rooms on both sides. He abandoned the stretcher and threw the forms in a garbage can. The exit signs led to a door with a window in it. It opened into the madhouse of Admissions.

  Mark smiled to himself. He'd been here before. He watched the chaos through the window and picked the spot where he and Hardy had stood after Greenway and Dianne disappeared with Ricky. He eased through the door, and casually made his way through the snarled throng of sick and wounded trying anxiously to get admitted. Running and darting might attract attention, so he played it cool. He rode his favorite escalator to the basement, and found an empty wheelchair by the stairs. It was adult-size, but he worked the wheels and rolled himself past the cafeteria to the morgue.

  Clint had fallen asleep on the sofa. Letterman was almost over when the phone rang. Reggie grabbed it. "Hello."

  "Hi, Reggie. It's me, Mark."

  "Mark! How are you, dear?"

  "Doing great, Reggie. Just wonderful."

  "How'd you find me?" she asked, turning off the TV.

  "I called Momma Love and woke her. She gave me this number. It's Clint's place, right?"

  "Right. How'd you get to a phone? It's awful late."

  "Well, I'm not in jail anymore."

  She stood and walked to the snack bar. "Where are you, dear?"