Client Privilege (19 page)

“That you are, Mickey.”

“Reason I called.”

“The Churchill thing, huh? Mickey, please don’t ask me questions.”

“Why Brady Coyne, you big shit. What do you think I am?”

“Sorry, Mickey.”

“Are we becoming paranoid?”

“Why does everybody accuse me of being paranoid?”

I heard her raspy laugh. “I won’t ask you any questions, sweetheart. I thought you might like to know what I’ve found out. Still interested?”

“Sure.”

“Just a few names that might help you. Current and/or recent girlfriends. Turns out old Wayne was quite the cocksmith. Got a pencil?”

I fished one out of my desk drawer and slid a pad of paper toward me. “Yes.”

“Okay. First, Gretchen Warde. Spelled with an
e
on the end. Chick who found the body. Assistant producer over at Channel Eight, where Churchill worked. God knows she had a motive to snuff the guy.”

“Jealousy, right?”

“Right. The man was juggling three of them at the same time. None was supposed to know about any of the others. Each had a key to his condo. Each had been promised they would soon be permitted to move in and keep house.”

“So all three would’ve had the same motive.”

“Sure. They’re all prime suspects, for obvious reasons, though what I hear, the cops’ve got another hot one. Right?”

“Right,” I said. “Me.”

“Anyway,” she said, “this Gretchen Warde claims she called the cops within five minutes of arriving, and the M.E. placed the time of death at least an hour earlier.”

“Like about what time?”

“Somewhere between ten-thirty and eleven. The girl says she got there a little before midnight.”

“If so, she’s clear, then.”

“Assuming her story holds up.”

“Okay. Who are the others?”

“One named Megan Keeley. Owns a boutique on Newbury Street.”

“Good-looker, I bet.”

“Oh, yeah. Seems to be the kind Churchill specialized in. She says she’s covered for the entire night. She claims she was playing Churchill the same way he was playing her, and has a boyfriend to back her up. I betcha the cops are grilling the two of them. Third name—”

“Suzie Billings,” I said.

Mickey, for once, was silent for an instant. “Hey, I’m impressed.”

“Don’t be. It was an accident.”

“I get most of my good stuff by accident, too.”

“Tell me about Suzie Billings.”

“Secretary in the Clerk Magistrate’s office at the East Cambridge courthouse. Kinda ditzy, what I hear. Probably the best-looker of the three, actually.”

“And she’s got a story, too, huh?”

“My sources are a little vague on that, Brady. None of ’em is exactly clear. This Billings broad’s got the same motive as the other two. More dubious alibi, I hear, though I don’t know what it is. But evidently they don’t see her as the type.”

“There’s a type?”

“You know what I mean.”

“They think I’m the type and she isn’t?”

“Hey,” she said. “I just work here. You want this stuff or don’t you?”

“I do.”

“Then don’t get pissed at the messenger.”

I sighed. “I’m sorry, Mickey. It’s getting downright irritating, that’s all.”

“So maybe you and I should go get drunk.”

“Yeah. Being suspected of murder is one helluva good reason to go get drunk.” I remembered Friday night with Gloria. “In fact, I already tried it.”

“Did it work?”

“For a little while.”

“Yeah, that’s the thing about getting drunk.”

“You got anything else, Mickey?”

“You probably heard, Rod Dennis over at Channel Eight’s offering a reward.”

“I heard that, yes.”

“I’d really love to scoop the bastards.”

“Mickey, if I could help you, I would.”

“You hear the cops’re looking for a drug angle?”

“Yes, I heard that.”

“How? It’s not in the papers.”

“I’ve got sources, too, Mickey.”

“Mmm. I bet.”

“What about the drugs?”

“Hey, Coyne. You’re the one with the sources. This a one-way street here?”

“It has to be for now, Mickey. I hope you’ll continue to fill me in.”

“Oh, sure. In memory of Granny Hill and the back seat of that old Volkswagen of yours. Anyhow, that’s all I got for now. I still got my feelers out.”

“Keep ’em out, please.”

“I will. Have I earned a dinner? At least a drink?”

“Both, I think. Soon, okay?”

“I’ll have to accept that.”

I
T WAS A LITTLE
before four-thirty. It would take half an hour to wend through the commuter traffic to Zerk’s office in North Cambridge. I went to my office door and poked my head out.

“Hang out the Gone Fishin’ sign,” I said to Julie. “I’m about to depart, and you might as well too.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but I held up my hand. “I’ve got a meeting with Zerk at five.”

“Those policemen, huh?”

I nodded.

“Okay,” she said, shrugging. She switched off her word processor and tugged on its dust cover. “It’ll give me a chance to get some shopping done.”

I went back into my office, hefted the big Boston white pages out of the drawer, and plopped it onto my desk. I looked up Gorwacz. There was a Gorwacz, Michael R., listed for Medford. Peter Roland’s parents, I guessed. Gorwacz, Peter R., had a number in Somerville. There was also a listing for Gorwacz, K. L., on Seventh Street in Cambridge. That was it for the Gorwacz clan. Not a household name in Greater Boston.

It took very little pondering for me to figure out that Karen Gorwacz, née Lavoie, was either separated or divorced from Peter Roland.

I copied down the Seventh Street address and phone number of K. L. Gorwacz into my little breast-pocket notebook. Then I retrieved my coat and went down to my car.

Commuter traffic clogged Copley Square, as I had anticipated. I shoved a Sibelius tape into the deck and turned up the volume and inched my way onto Commonwealth Ave. heading toward Mass. Ave. and the Harvard Bridge across the Charles. I kept glancing into my rearview mirror to see if the dark blue sedan had pulled into the traffic behind me, but it was impossible to tell. There were dozens of dark blue sedans back there. Any one of them might be my tail. I hoped so. Eventually I would lead him to Karen Lavoie Gorwacz.

Of course, the clever rascal could have changed cars on me.

Zerk’s office is on Massachusetts Avenue in North Cambridge. It’s in an old refurbished colonial next to a funeral home set close to the street behind a neatly trimmed hedge, which presently lay buried beneath a mound of the weekend’s snow, already stained with dog pee. Zerk had the entire first floor for his suite of offices—one for each of his secretaries, one for himself, and a large conference room.

The upstairs of his building was shared by an accountant and an architect.

Mary was at the receptionist’s desk when I got there almost on the dot of five. She was a big, solid woman with a hard face and a soft smile. I could easily imagine her whacking her kids around and then hugging them to her considerable bosom.

She greeted me with her gap-toothed grin and told me to go on in, Mr. Garrett was waiting for me.

Zerk was at his desk when I pushed open his door. His gray chalk-striped suit jacket hung from a coatrack in the corner. His vest was unbuttoned. His ecru button-down Oxford shirt was loose at the collar. His cuffs were rolled halfway up his thick, ropy forearms, and the knot in his green paisley tie had been pulled loose. He had his feet up on his desk, and he was tilting back in his chair. His dark brow was furrowed as he spoke softly into the telephone that was tucked against his shoulder. He raised his eyebrows when he saw me. A quick grin showed in his dark face. He beckoned me in with a jerk of his head.

I took the chair in front of his desk. His office had once been a living room. There was a fireplace in the corner into which Zerk had had a wood-burning stove installed. It glowed warmly on this chill February afternoon. A nice homey touch.

Keeping the phone snugged in the crook of his neck, he bent to the bottom drawer of his desk and came up with a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and two glasses. He poured a couple fingers into each and shoved one toward me.

I lit a cigarette and sipped. In a minute Zerk hung up. He reached across the desk and we shook hands.

“Troubles, huh, bossman?” His handsome face crinkled with concern.

I nodded. “Troubles, indeed.”

He grinned. “I expect you’re gonna tell ’em to me.”

“I’d like to.”

He sat back and laced his hands behind his head. “Go for it, then,” he said.

So I did. I told him how exactly one week earlier Judge Chester Y. Popowski, my client, had persuaded me to meet a mystery man at Skeeter’s, and how the mystery man had intimated that he intended to blackmail the judge over some matter concerning a woman named Karen Lavoie, who Pops had admitted having a brief affair with seventeen years earlier, and who, I learned, although Pops had omitted this part, had filed a complaint against him and then dropped it. I told Zerk that the next day a Boston homicide detective and a state policeman appeared in my office to query me about Wayne Churchill the television newsman, who had been murdered and who was the selfsame man I had met with at Skeeter’s shortly before his death. I told Zerk that I had answered some questions inaccurately. Others I refused to answer at all.

I told him that Mickey Gillis and Rodney Dennis had learned that the police were questioning me, too. That someone had leaked the fact that I was a suspect.

I told him the cops had been back twice to interrogate me. On their second visit, they simply rehashed the first interrogation. The third time they came, they had recited my Miranda rights for me. They had taped the interview. And they had brought an assistant district attorney along with them. For purposes of intimidation, I assumed.

I told him a cop or else a reporter in a blue sedan was following me around.

“You answered their questions,” he said, interrupting.

I shrugged. “Just those unrelated to Pops.”

“Just those,” he said, “that might incriminate you.”

“They can’t incriminate me. I didn’t do anything.”

“After I told you not to.”

“Actually, by the time you told me not to it was too late.”

“You didn’t know better.” He rolled his eyes.

“I knew better.”

“Real dumb.”

“I know. I thought I could handle it. I
am
a lawyer.”

“Shee-it!” he blurted. “They tell you you’ve got a right to counsel. You’re a lawyer, you know how important that is. I even already told you this, not really thinking I needed to. Thinking I was insulting your intelligence by even mentioning it. And you go ahead and talk anyway.”

“I admitted it was dumb. I don’t think I did any harm.”

“You’re one stubborn honkie.”

“I know.”

He sighed. “Glad we agree. So, what else?”

“That’s about it,” I said. “I’m reluctantly assembling the evidence. I think Pops did it. He had a motive. He had opportunity. He even had a patsy.”

“You.”

“Yeah. Me.”

“He sure as hell did.”

“I know. If he planned it that way, it’s damn clever. Elegant, even.”

“And you can’t say a damn thing about him on account of client privilege,” said Zerk.

I spread my hands and lit another cigarette. “That’s about it. You’re the only one I can talk to about it.”

“Because of client privilege,” he said. “You being my client.”

“Yes.”

He leaned back in his chair and laced his fingers behind his neck. He gazed up at the ceiling for a moment, then looked at me. “You just filling me in, or are you looking for advice?”

I shrugged. “I’m not sure. Both, I guess.”

“Well, first off, next time those cops come by, don’t for crissake talk to ’em until I get there.”

“Right,” I said. “Though I haven’t told them anything so far. At least nothing incriminating. Hell. There is nothing incriminating.”

“You haven’t helped yourself by what you’ve told them. Answering some questions, refusing to answer others. You’d’ve been better off saying nothing.”

“I’ve got nothing to hide.”

“Wrong. You’ve got the judge to hide. Looks to them like you’re hiding plenty. You haven’t exactly allayed their suspicions.”

“Can’t help it. The point is, I’m innocent.”

Zerk grinned. “Boy, lawyers can be as dumb as anybody when they get in a spot like this. Since when did innocent mean anything?”

I nodded. “I know. You’re right. That’s why I’m worried.”

“You should be worried.”

“This makes me feel much better.”

He smiled quickly. “Did you ask the judge to release you from your obligation?”

“I hinted. He didn’t bite. I can’t ask.”

“You’re right about that.” He frowned. “Worse comes to worst, you can violate privilege.” He fixed me with a stare.

“Nope. Just can’t do it.”

“Didn’t figure you would. Had to ask. Still, I am obliged to remind you of your other sacred obligation.”

“To the law, you mean.”

He nodded. “You’re an officer of the court, Counselor. That imposes some pretty damn important responsibilities, too.”

I nodded miserably. “I know. I’m conflicted, believe me. The thing is, right now all I could say about Pops was that I think he did it. I mean, in my mind, I know he did it. Because it just fits together. But I don’t have anything you could call evidence. Just my theory. Am I obliged to share that with the police?”

“If he weren’t your client, would you?”

I shrugged. “I suppose I would, yes. I sure as hell don’t like the idea of his getting away with this, any more than I’m particularly fond of finding myself a murder suspect.”

“Then you’ve got what we thoughtful types call a moral dilemma.”

“You’re telling me.”

“You probably already knew that, huh?”

“Hell, Zerk. My whole practice is based on the sanctity of the attorney-client relationship. You know as well as I do that I’m not a hot-shot lawyer like you. I’m a decent negotiator, I know my limits, and I take good care of my clients. I pay attention to them. I listen to them. I can nod sympathetically with the best of them. They like to talk to me. They know I can keep my mouth shut. I’m discreet. Discretion is about the only thing I’m really good at. Most of my clients, that’s mainly what they pay me for. Discretion. And client privilege is the taproot of discretion. So right now I’m stuck with protecting Pops. Even if he murdered a man. Even if I end up accused of it. But,” I added after a moment, “it burns my nether cheeks, I don’t mind telling you, and I wouldn’t mind if the cops glommed on to his tail instead of mine.”