Vol I Part 96 (1/2)
”So what are we going to do?”
”Call you.”
”What about the delay?”
”What delay?”
Bosch nodded. There was no changing it. There would be no delay. He realized he had handled it badly. He had approached Belk the wrong way. He should have tried to make Belk believe it had been his own idea to go for a delay. Then it would have worked. Instead, Bosch was beginning to feel the jitters - that uneasy feeling that came with approaching the unknown. He felt the way he did before he climbed down into a VC tunnel for the first time in Vietnam. It was fear, he knew, blossoming like a black rose in the pit of his chest.
”We've got twenty-five minutes,” Belk said. ”Let's forget about delays and try to work out how we want your testimony to go. I am going to lead you down the path. The jury will follow. But remember, you have to take it slow or you will lose them. Okay?”
”We got twenty minutes,” Bosch corrected him. ”I need to go out for a smoke before I sit up there on the stand.”
Belk pressed on as if he hadn't heard.
”Remember, Bosch, there could be millions of dollars at stake here. It may not be your money but it may be your career.”
”What career?”
Bremmer was hanging around the door to the conference room when Bosch came out twenty minutes later.
”Get it all?” Harry asked.
He walked by him and headed toward the escalator. Bremmer followed.
”No, man, I wasn't listening. I'm just waiting for you. Listen, what's going on with the new case? Edgar won't tell me s.h.i.+t. Did you get an ID or what?”
”Yeah, we ID'd her.”
”Who was it?”
”Not my case, man. I can't give it out. Besides, I give it to you and you'll run to Money Chandler with it, right?”
Bremmer stopped walking beside him.
”What? What are you talking about?”
Then he scurried up to Bosch's side and whispered.
”Listen, Harry, you're one of my main sources. I wouldn't screw you like that. If she's getting inside s.h.i.+t, look for somebody else.”
Bosch felt bad about accusing the reporter. He'd had no evidence.
”You sure? I'm mistaken about this, right?”
”Absolutely. You're too valuable to me. I wouldn't do it.”
”Okay, then.”
That was as close as he'd come to an apology.
”So what can you tell me about the ID?”
”Nothing. It's still not my case. Try RHD.”
”RHD has it? They took it from Edgar?”
Bosch got on the escalator and looked back at him. He nodded as he went down. Bremmer didn't follow.
Money Chandler was already on the steps smoking when Bosch came out. He lit a cigarette and looked back at her.
”Surprise, surprise,” he said.
”What?”
”Resting.”
”Only a surprise to Bulk,” she said. ”Any other lawyer would have seen it coming. I almost feel sorry for you, Bosch. Almost, but not quite. In a civil rights case, the chances of a win are always a long shot. But going up against the city attorney's office always kind of levels the playing field. These guys like Bulk, they couldn't make it on the outside....If he had to win in order to eat, your lawyer would be a thin man. He needs that steady paycheck from the city coming in, win or lose.”
What she said, of course, was correct. But it was old news. Bosch smiled. He didn't know how to act. A part of himself liked her. She was wrong about him, but somehow he liked her. Maybe it was her tenacity, because her anger - though misdirected - was so pure.
Maybe it was because she wasn't afraid to talk to him outside of court. He had seen how Belk studiously avoided coming in contact with Church's family. Before getting up during recesses, he would sit at the defendant's table until he was sure they were all safely down the hall and on the escalator. But Chandler didn't play that kind of game. She was an up-front player.
Bosch guessed that this was what it was like when two boxers touched gloves before the bell. He changed the subject.
”I talked to Tommy Faraday out here the other day. He's Tommy Faraway now. I asked him what happened but he didn't say. He just said justice happened, whatever that means.”
She blew a long stream of blue smoke out but didn't say anything for a while. Bosch looked at his watch. They had three minutes.
”You remember the Galton case?” she said. ”It was a civil rights case, an excessive force.”
Bosch thought about it. The name was familiar but it was difficult to place in the blend of excessive force cases he had heard or known about over the years.
”It was a dog case, right?”
”Yes. Andre Galton. This was before Rodney King, back when the wide majority of people in this city did not believe that their police engaged in horrible abuses as a matter of routine. Galton was black and driving with an expired tag through the hills of Studio City when a cop decided to pull him over.
”He had done nothing wrong, wasn't wanted, just had the tag one month overdue. But he ran. Great mystery of life, he ran. He got all the way up to Mulholland and ditched the car at one of those pull-offs where people look out at the view. Then he jumped out and climbed down the incline. There was nowhere to go down there but he wouldn't come back up and the cops wouldn't go down - too dangerous, they claimed at the trial.”
Bosch remembered the story now but he let her tell it. Her indignation was so pure and stripped of lawyerly pose that he just wanted to hear her tell it.
”So they sent a dog down,” she said. ”Galton lost both t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es and had permanent nerve damage to the right leg. He could walk but he had to kind of drag it behind him....”
”Enter Tommy Faraday,” Bosch prompted.
”Yeah, he took the case. It was dead bang. Galton had done nothing wrong but to run. The response of the police certainly did not meet the offense. Any jury would see this. And the city attorney's office knew this. In fact, I think it was Bulk's case. They offered half a million to settle and Faraday pa.s.sed. He thought he'd get a minimum three times that in trial, so he pa.s.sed.