Gleason pushed the pewter platter with its twelve empty oyster shells one inch closer to the center of the table, regarded the wreckage with satisfaction and took a drink of beer. He put the heels of his hands on the edge of the table and straightened his back against the booth. “Now,” he said, “what is bothering me, or was, at least, is: I know Fred, and Fred’s a nut, but Fred is not careless. Fred’s a carbuncle on the ass of every life he touches, but he’s thorough. Fred’s so careful that when you’re the lawyer on the case, you wish you weren’t. The bastard hovers. Everything you do, you get the feeling that the next thing he’s going to floss your teeth for you. Some guys, they make mistakes because they don’t ask questions. Not Fred: he asks you questions when he shouldn’t, like by calling in the middle of the night to check some obscure point of search-and-seizure law that’d never come up in a million years. That nobody but a Fred with nothing else on his mind’d ever even think of. He wants his cases made up like barracks beds, hospital corners so tight you can barely get under the sheets. Fred’s going to law school nights now, in the wintertime at least, because after all these years of scouting around for a lawyer he thinks worthy of his trust, he’s at last reached the conclusion that the only person reliable and precise enough to be Fred’s lawyer is, guess who? You got it: Fred.
“This means that if Fred’s got you bugged, and if Fred’s watching you, Fred’s already got enough evidence to’ve satisfied some young assistant that he buffaloed — or some older guy that just wanted to get rid of him — that he can prove a crime. And that prosecutor took Fred’s bale of hay in before a judge, and the magistrate, who also wants to go off to the beach, gave him a search warrant. Betcha nickel whole thing happened on a Friday afternoon, when the only person in the whole world with his mind on his job in the summertime is Cowboy Fred Consolo, scourge of evildoers. Fred loves Friday afternoons. But anyway, he got it, and that was when he put the bugs in — everything shipshape and no suppression worries down the line.
“Now I can guess who his primary source is,” Gleason said. “It’s one of James’s pals in the pen. James’s pal’s your basic ‘reliable informant who in the past has provided information that has proved to be reliable.’ Meaning: ‘The guy’s got a long history of ratting on his buddies in return for privileges.’ So consequently Fred can say that he believes the guy is shooting straight this time, without surfacing the fink.” He grinned. “Which is a trick Fred learned from me,” he said. “John and me and Doctor Frankenstein, ’cept the doc did it on purpose.
“In addition to the fink, though, Fred needs something more. Or he did, at least, before he could tap you. He had to give some reason to think that you know where Sam is. His informant’s told him James is set to hang Sam, but James doesn’t know where Sam is, so neither does informant. Fred in order to bug you must’ve provided something else that made the prosecutor and the judge think Christina does know.”
“Well,” she said, “but after all, he knows I used to be with Sam. Would he need more than that?”
“Your average buckaroo might not,” Gleason said. “Public record’d do it, trial transcripts and newspaper clippings, bang ’em in and bang ’em out. But our Fred’s not an average fellow. Fred’d look at the stuff and say: ‘Yeah, but down the road some crafty bastard in a suit’s gonna come into court and say: “This warrant ain’t no good, pal. That stuff was old hat.” ’ Fred maybe wins that one on appeal, but Fred doesn’t like appeals — they’re another chance to lose, after you have won. So Fred found something newer, left a little fresher taste.
“Which left me with my question: What did our Fred find, and how did he find it? Best rule, from my experience, is take the second question first. Work back to the first one. And the way you go about that is by saying: Has he done this before, and if so, how? And the answer is that he has, and he did by checking records back when we were hunting Sam. He thinks Sam’s not in the country. He thinks you know where Sam is. Therefore: find out where you’ve gone, assuming you saw Sam.
“He did it through Customs and Immigration,” he said.
“How do you know that?” she said.
“Because that’s what we taught him to do,” Gleason said. “He called up Customs and asked them to run your name through the computer to see where you’ve been recently. And if that didn’t work, and it often does not, well, he called in some chits with a credit card outfit. But one way or another, he found out you’d been somewhere he thinks that Sam might be. And that was what he told the judge, and how he got his warrant. And how he got into your hair and lair, and’s now looking up your ass.”
“Okay,” she said, eating the last of her oysters, “to this I say: So what?”
“So this,” Gleason said. “I practice law in this town. It’s how I make my living, which facilitates eating and staying dry nights when it rains. One of the things I have to be able to do is make deals. Almost everybody hires me did what he’s charged with doing. That’s one the facts of this life. It was that way when I did the charging, and it’s that way now, when I defend. It was true when Phil Ianucci’s clients bought the ranch in the back room of The Friary, and I put your brother in jail, and it’s true now, when the USA says Phil Ianucci’s no good either, and he should go to the can.
“I can’t try every case,” he said. “I’d lose most of them. Clients can’t afford it anyway, and it only makes sense when it’s someone like Phil who’s simply got to take a flier, ’cause if he pleads, he’s ruined. So I belt the bastards out. And that means when I say something, to a judge or prosecutor, it’d better be the truth. It’s the only way I can function.
“I get involved with helping your brother,” he said, “what I’m going to be doing is saying to the prosecutor, not so far down the line, that James’ll deliver Sam. Not only that Sam ordered Emmy killed; also that James or someone acting for him won’t tip off Sam what’s coming. So that he can run and hide. Because otherwise, James don’t get out, and that’s a natural fact.
“Basically what you’re asking me to do,” he said, “is trade your brother for Sam. And since I’ve now figured out that you know where Sam is, because Fred’s figured that out, what I have to wonder is whether you’re prepared to follow through. To make the trade, I mean. Because there’s no reverse gear on these things. Well, there is, but you’d better not use it. It’s like the automatic parking lots where the spikes come up after you drive through the gates — no backing up; severe tire damage will result.”
“Good,” he said, “I hope you do. My problem is different. I go to see James, and then cut a deal — you then have a change of heart and give old Sam the high sign and the bugger pulls a scoot, I’m out there in the cold wind with no pants on. Understand? James’ll languish in durance vile, and you can go and frolic in whatever mists you choose, but I will get my ass chapped. Permanently chapped. Fatally, in fact.”
“I won’t do that,” she said.
“You say you won’t,” he said. “But you’ve done it before.”