45
Dante Mulvaney had left a message and marked it urgent.
“I caught the Nazami thing,” he said when I called him back.
My gut reaction was, Oh, no! Poor Ahmad. Dante’s a lifetime member of the “meet ’em and plead ’em” club.
“It’s a big case,” I said, trying to pump him up. “Make a name for yourself.”
“Nah, it’s a piece o’ shit,” Dante said.
“I’m telling you—” I began.
“Don’t tell me,” he said, like a guy who’s upended his piggy bank for bus fare and doesn’t want to hear about the express that’s just twenty bucks more.
“Well then?” I asked.
“Kid insisted—insisted—I bring you.”
“Bring me?”
“Yeah, I show the kid gold—I’m talking a pile of shinin’ shekels—and he says, no, he has to talk to you first. Whaddaya you two got, a thing goin’?”
“Dante, would you tell me what’s going on—in order?”
“Yeah, sure. Caught the case. Lo and behold, DA’s office calls me. They got an offer. Man two. For a guy put a gun to another guy’s ear and capped him, that’s lower than as low as it can go. And all he does is seven to fifteen. Keeps his nose clean, he’ll be out in five ’n’ a half. What’s not to love?”
“Have you seen the state’s material yet?”
“Nah, but everybody knows, the kid confessed.”
“Have you seen the confession?”
“What? What’s to see? I’m gonna overturn a confession? Come on, come on.”
“I think the kid’s innocent,” I said.
“And I think my daughter’s a virgin.”
“So what happened?”
“So, I schlep all the fuckin’ way up the fortress of stone—for just one case,” he said, wanting sympathy and commiseration, because the game, when you’re getting the state rate of $35 an hour, is to have at least three or four guys to see, give them each fifteen minutes, then bill for full hours, and maybe bill the travel time in multiples too. “I offer him the deal, and he says no. So how about you help me out, run up there, and tell him this thing’s golden, and let’s wrap it up. Whaddaya say, Carl?”
“Yeah,” I said. I didn’t think I was interested in convincing Ahmad to take a deal, but I did want to talk to him. “When?”
“No time like the present,” Dante said, which I took to be a sign of how little work he had. “Let’s put a bow on it and deliver it to the judge.”
“You set it up?”
“Yeah,” he said, “I’ll ding ’em right now.”
“Fine,” I said. “Call me back, give me the time, and I’ll meet you up there.”
“Why’n’t you swing by. I’ll go up with you,” he said.
I knew he wanted a free ride and then he’d bill for the mileage. I understood. Every nickel counts. Especially since the price of gas more than doubled this year, and the state won’t raise the mileage allowance until the legislature votes on a new budget next January. But I was driving around with one eye in the rearview mirror, and who knew, maybe Mulvaney was setting me up. He’d do it for fifty bucks. Why not? It was more than his hourly rate.