The Testament

by John Grisham

  of Troy Phelan. He’d rehearsed with Nicolette the bimbo.

  Snead was ready. The lawyers had anticipated questions about the money. If asked whether he was being paid to testify, Snead was trained to lie. It was that simple. There was no way around it. Snead had to lie about the half a million bucks already in hand, and he had to lie about the promise of $4.5 million upon settlement or other favorable outcome. He had to lie about the existence of the contract between himself and the lawyers. Since he was lying about Mr. Phelan he could certainly lie about the money.

  Nate introduced himself and then asked, quite loudly, “Mr. Snead, how much are you being paid to testify in this case?”

  Snead’s lawyers thought the question would be, “Are you being paid?” not, “How much?” Snead’s rehearsed answer was a simple “No, I certainly am not!” But to the question still ringing around the room he had no quick response. Hesitation sank him. He seemed to gasp as he looked wildly at Hark, whose spine had become rigid and his stare frozen like a deer’s.

  Snead had been warned that Mr. O’Riley had done his homework and seemed to know everything before he asked the questions. In the long painful seconds that followed, Mr. O’Riley frowned at him, cocked his head sideways, and lifted some papers.

  “Come on, Mr. Snead, I know you’re being paid. How much?”

  Snead cracked his knuckles hard enough to break them. Beads of sweat popped out in the creases of his forehead. “Well, I, uh, I’m not—”

  “Come on, Mr. Snead. Did you or did you not purchase a new Range Rover last month?”

  “Well, yes, as a matter of—”

  “And you leased a two-bedroom condo at Palm Court?”

  “Yes I did.”

  “And you just returned from ten days in Rome, didn’t you?”

  “I did.”

  He knew everything! The Phelan lawyers shrank in their seats, each cowering lower, ducking their heads so the ricocheting bullets wouldn’t strike them.

  “So how much are you being paid?” Nate asked angrily. “Keep in mind you’re under oath!”

  “Five hundred thousand dollars,” Snead blurted out. Nate stared at him in disbelief, his jaw dropping slowly. Even the court reporter froze.

  A couple of the Phelan lawyers managed to exhale, slightly. As horrible as the moment was, it could certainly have been bloodier. What if Snead had panicked even more and confessed to the entire five million?

  But it was a very small comfort. At the moment, the news that they had paid a witness a half a million dollars seemed fatal to their cause.

  Nate shuffled papers as if he needed some document. The words still echoed through all the ears in the room.

  “I take it you have already received this money?” Nate asked.

  Unsure whether he was supposed to lie or go straight, Snead simply said, “Yes.”

  On a hunch, Nate asked, “Half a million now, how much later?”

  Anxious to begin the lying, Snead answered, “Nothing.” It was a casual denial, one that appeared believable. The other two Phelan lawyers were able to breathe.

  “Are you sure about that?” Nate asked. He was fishing. He could ask Snead if he’d been convicted of grave-robbing if he wanted to.

  It was a game of high-stakes chicken, and Snead held firm. “Of course I’m sure,” he said with enough indignance to seem plausible.

  “Who paid you this money?”

  “The lawyers for the Phelan heirs.”

  “Who signed the check?”

  “It came from a bank, certified.”

  “Did you insist they pay you for your testimony?”

  “I guess you could say that.”

  “Did you go to them, or did they come to you?”

  “I went to them.”

  “Why did you go to them?”

  Finally, they seemed to be approaching familiar territory. There was a general relaxing on the Phelan side of the table. The lawyers began to scribble notes.

  Snead crossed his legs under the table and frowned intelligently at the camera. “Because I was with Mr. Phelan before he died, and I knew the poor man was out of his mind.”

  “How long had he been out of his mind?”

  “All day.”

  “When he woke up, he was crazy?”

  “When I fed him breakfast, he did not know my name.”

  “What did he call you?”

  “Nothing, he just grunted at me.”

  Nate leaned on his elbows and ignored the paperwork around him. This was a jousting match, and he actually enjoyed it. He knew where he was going, but poor Snead did not.

  “Did you see him jump?”

  “Yes.”

  “And fall?”

  “Yes.”

  “And hit the ground?”

  “Yes.”

  “Were you standing near him when he was examined by the three psychiatrists?”

  “Yes.”

  “And this was about two-thirty in the afternoon, right?”

  “Yes, as I recall.”

  “And he’d been crazy all day, right?”

  “I’m afraid so, yes.”

  “How long did you work for Mr. Phelan?”

  “Thirty years.”

  “And you knew everything about him, right?”

  “As much as one person can know about another.”

  “So you knew his lawyer, Mr. Stafford?”

  “Yes, I’d met him many times.”

  “Did Mr. Phelan trust Mr. Stafford?”

  “I suppose.”

  “I thought you knew everything.”

  “I’m sure he trusted Mr. Stafford.”

  “Was Mr. Stafford sitting by his side during the mental examination?”

  “He was.”

  “What was Mr. Phelan’s mental state during the exam, in your opinion?”

  “He was unsound, uncertain of where he was and what he was doing.”

  “You’re sure about this?”

  “I am.”

  “Who did you tell?”

  “It wasn’t my job to tell.”

  “Why not?”

  “I would’ve been fired. Part of my job was to keep my mouth shut. It’s called discretion.”

  “You knew Mr. Phelan was going to sign a will dividing his vast fortune. At the same time he was of unsound mind, yet you didn’t tell his lawyer, a man he trusted?”

  “It wasn’t my job.”

  “Mr. Phelan would’ve fired you?”

  “Immediately.”

  “Then what about after he jumped? Who did you tell then?”

  “No one.”

  “Why not?”

  Snead took a breath and recrossed his legs. He was rallying nicely, he thought. “It was a matter of privacy,” he said gravely. “I considered my relationship with Mr. Phelan to be confidential.”

  “Until now. Until they offered you half a million bucks, right?”

  Snead could think of no quick reply, and Nate didn’t offer much of a chance. “You’re selling not only your testimony but also your confidential relationship with Mr. Phelan, right, Mr. Snead?”

  “I’m trying to undo an injustice.”

  “How noble. Would you be undoing it if they weren’t paying you?”

  Snead managed to utter a shaky “Yes,” and Nate erupted in laughter. He laughed loud and long and did so while looking at the solemn and partially hidden faces of the Phelan lawyers. He laughed directly at Snead. He stood and walked along his end of the table, chuckling to himself. “What a trial,” he said, then sat down again.

  He glanced at some notes, then continued, “Mr. Phelan died on December the ninth. His will was read on December the twenty-seventh. During the interval, did you tell anyone that he was of unsound mind when he signed his will?”

  “No.”

  “Of course not. You waited until after the will was read, then, realizing you had been cut out, decided to go to the lawyers and strike a deal, didn’t you, Mr. Snead?”

  The witness answere
d, “No,” but Nate ignored him.

  “Was Mr. Phelan mentally ill?”

  “I’m not an expert in that field.”

  “You said he was out of his mind. Was this a permanent condition?”

  “It came and went.”

  “How long had it been coming and going?”

  “For years.”

  “How many years?”

  “Ten maybe. It’s just a guess.”

  “In the last fourteen years of his life, Mr. Phelan executed eleven wills, one of which left you a million dollars. Did you ever think of telling anyone then that he was of unsound mind?”

  “It wasn’t my job to tell.”

  “Did he ever see a psychiatrist?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “Did he ever see any mental health professional?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “Did you ever suggest to him that he seek professional help?”

  “It wasn’t my job to suggest such things.”

  “If you’d found him lying on the floor having a seizure would you have suggested to someone that perhaps he needed help?”

  “Of course I would have.”

  “If you’d found him coughing blood, would you have told someone?”

  “Yes.”

  Nate had a memo two inches thick with summaries of Mr. Phelan’s holdings. He flipped to a page at random and asked Snead if he knew anything about Xion Drilling. Snead struggled mightily to remember, but his mind had been so overloaded with new data that it failed him. Delstar Communications? Again, Snead grimaced but could not make the connection.

  The fifth company Nate mentioned rang a bell. Snead proudly informed the lawyer that he knew the company. Mr. Phelan had owned it for quite some time. Nate had questions about sales, products, holdings, earnings, an endless list of financial statistics. Snead answered nothing right.

  “How much did you know about Mr. Phelan’s holdings?” Nate asked repeatedly. Then he asked questions about the structure of The Phelan Group. Snead had memorized the basics, but the smaller details escaped him. He could name no mid-level manager. He did not know the name of the company’s accountants.

  Nate hammered him relentlessly about the things he didn’t know. Late in the afternoon, with Snead weary and punch-drunk, Nate, in the midst of the millionth question about financials, asked, with no warning, “Did you sign a contract with the lawyers when you took the half a million?”

  A simple “No” would have sufficed, but Snead was caught off guard. He hesitated, looked at Hark then looked at Nate, who was again shuffling through papers as if he had a copy of the contract. Snead hadn’t lied in two hours, and wasn’t quick.

  “Uh, of course not,” he stuttered, and convinced no one.

  Nate saw the untruth, and let it go. There were other ways to obtain a copy of the contract.

  ________

  THE PHELAN lawyers met in a dark bar to lick their wounds. Snead’s dismal performance seemed even worse after two rounds of stiff drinks. He could be propped up some for trial, but the fact that he’d been paid so much would forever taint his testimony.

  How did O’Riley know? He was so certain Snead had been paid.

  “It was Grit,” Hark said. Grit, they all repeated to themselves. Surely Grit hadn’t gone to the other side.

  “That’s what you get for stealing his client,” Wally Bright said after a long silence.

  “Shut up,” Ms. Langhorne said.

  Hark was too tired to fight. He finished his drink and ordered another. In the flood of testimony, the other Phelan lawyers had forgotten about Rachel. There was still no official record of her in the court file.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  _____________

  THE DEPOSITION of Nicolette the secretary lasted eight minutes. She gave her name, address, and brief employment history, and the Phelan lawyers on the other side settled into their chairs to await the details of her sexual escapades with Mr. Phelan. She was twenty-three, with few qualifications beyond a slender body, nice chest, and a pretty face with sandy blond hair. They couldn’t wait to hear her spend a few hours talking about sex.

  Getting right to the point, Nate asked, “Did you ever have sex with Mr. Phelan?”

  She tried to appear embarrassed by the question, but said yes anyway.

  “How many times?”

  “I didn’t count them.”

  “For how long?”

  “Usually ten minutes.”

  “No, I mean for how long a period of time. Starting in what month and ending when?”

  “Oh, I only worked there five months.”

  “Roughly twenty weeks. On the average, how many times each week did you have sex with Mr. Phelan?”

  “Two times I guess.”

  “So about forty times?”

  “I guess. That sounds like a lot, doesn’t it?”

  “Not to me. Did Mr. Phelan take his clothes off when you guys did it?”

  “Sure. We both did.”

  “So he was completely naked?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he have any visible birthmarks on his body?”

  When witnesses concoct lies, they often miss the obvious. So do their lawyers. They become so consumed with their fiction that they overlook a fact or two. Hark and the guys had access to the Phelan wives—Lillian, Janie, Tira—any one of whom could have told them that Troy had a round purple birthmark the size of a silver dollar at the very top of his right leg, near the hip, just below the waist.

  “Not that I recall,” Nicolette answered.

  The answer surprised Nate, and then it didn’t. He could’ve easily believed that Troy was doing his secretary, something he’d done for decades. And he could just as easily have believed Nicolette was lying.

  “No visible birthmarks?” Nate asked again.

  “None.”

  The Phelan lawyers were stricken with fear. Could another star witness be melting before their eyes?

  “No further questions,” Nate said, and left the room to refill his coffee.

  Nicolette looked at the lawyers. They were staring at the table, wondering exactly where the birthmark was.

  After she left, Nate slid an autopsy photo across the table to his bewildered enemies. He didn’t say a word, didn’t need to. Old Troy was on the slab, nothing but withered and battered flesh, with the birthmark staring out from the photo.

  ________

  THEY SPENT the rest of Wednesday and all day Thursday with the four new psychiatrists who’d been hired to say that the three old ones really didn’t know what they were doing. Their testimony was predictable and repetitive—people with sound minds do not jump out of windows.

  As a group they were less distinguished than Flowe, Zadel, and Theishen. A couple were retired and picked up a few retainers here and there as professional testifiers. One taught at a crowded community college. One eked out a living in a small office in the suburbs.

  But they weren’t paid to be impressive; rather, their purpose was simply to muddy the water. Troy Phelan was known to be erratic and eccentric. Four experts said he didn’t have the mental capacity to execute a will. Three said he did. Keep the issues dense and tangled and hope those supporting the will would one day grow weary and settle. If not, it would be up to a jury of laymen to sift through the medical jargon and make sense of the conflicting opinions.

  The new experts were paid well to stick to their convictions, and Nate didn’t try to change them. He had deposed enough doctors to know not to argue medicine with them. Instead, he dwelt on their credentials and experience. He made them watch the video and criticize the first three psychiatrists.

  When they adjourned Thursday afternoon, fifteen depositions had been completed. Another round was scheduled for late March. Wycliff was planning a trial for the middle of July. The same witnesses would testify again, but in open court with spectators watching and jurors weighing every word.

  ________

  NATE FLED the city. He went west
through Virginia, then south through the Shenandoah Valley. His mind was numb from nine days of hardball probing into the intimate lives of others. At some undefined point in his life, pushed by his work and his addictions, he had lost his decency and shame. He had learned to lie, cheat, deceive, hide, badger, and attack innocent witnesses without the slightest twinge of guilt.

  But in the quiet of his car and the darkness of the night, Nate was ashamed.