THE FIRST MONTH IN BUSINESS WITH Deck has produced dismal results. We collected twelve hundred dollars in fees-four hundred from Jimmy Monk, a shoplifter Deck hustled at City Court, two hundred from a DUI case which Deck raked in by some shady and still unexplained method and five hundred from a workers' compensation case Deck stole from Bruiser's office the day we bolted. The remaining hundred bucks was produced when I prepared the wills for a middle-aged couple who stumbled into our office. They were shopping for antiques, took a wrong turn downstairs and happened to catch me napping at my desk. We had a pleasant visit, one thing led to another, and they waited as I typed their wills. They paid me in cash, which I duly reported to Deck, the bookkeeper. My first fee was ethically produced.
We spent five hundred dollars on rent, four hundred on stationery and business cards, about five-fifty on utility hookups and deposits, eight hundred for a leased phone system and the first month's bill, three hundred for the
first installment for desks and a few other furnishings procured from the landlord downstairs, two hundred on bar dues, three hundred for assorted and hard to pinpoint expenses, seven-fifty for a fax machine, four hundred for the setup and first month's rent on a cheap computer, and fifty bucks for an ad in a local restaurant guide.
We spent a total of forty-two hundred and fifty dollars, most of it, thankfully, being initial and nonrecurring- expenses. Deck has it figured to the penny. He projects a monthly overhead, after start-up, of around nineteen hundred dollars. He pretends to be thrilled with the way things are going.
It's hard to ignore his enthusiasm. He lives at the office. He's single, far away from his children and living in a city that's not his home. I don't imagine him spending much time partying around town. The only diversion he's mentioned is the casinos in Mississippi.
He usually arrives at work an hour or so after me, and spends most mornings in his office, on the phone, calling heaven knows who. I'm sure he's soliciting someone, or checking on accident reports, or just networking with his contacts. He asks me every morning if I have any typing for him to do. We realized quickly that he's by far the better typist, and he's always eager to do my letters and documents. He breaks his neck to answer the phone, runs out for coffee, sweeps the office, takes care of the copying at the printer. Deck has no pride and wants me happy.
He does not study for the bar exam. We've discussed this once, and he was quick to change the subject.
By late morning, he's usually making plans to go to some unspecified place and take care of some mysterious business. I'm certain there's a hive of legal activity, maybe bankruptcy or municipal court, where he finds folks who need lawyers. We don't talk about it. He makes his hospital rounds at night.
It was only a matter of days before we sectioned off our little suite of offices and established our turfs. Deck thinks I should spend most of the day patrolling the innumerable halls of justice, trolling for clients. I detect his frustration because I'm not more aggressive. He's tired of my questions about ethics and tactics. It's a rough and tumble world out there, lots of hungry lawyers who know how the cutthroat game is played. Sit on your butt around here all day and you'll starve to death. The good cases don't have a prayer of getting here.
On the other hand, Deck needs me. I have a license to practice. We may split the money, but this is not an equal partnership. He views himself as expendable, and this is why he volunteers for the grunt work. Deck is perfectly willing to chase ambulances and loiter around federal parlors and hide in hospital emergency rooms because he's content with an arrangement that allows him fifty percent. He can't find a better deal anywhere.
It takes just one, he says over and over. You hear that all the time in this business. One big case, and you can retire. That's one reason lawyers do so many sleazy things, like full-color ads in the yellow pages, and billboards, and placards on city buses, and telephone solicitation. You hold your nose, ignore the stench of what you're doing, ignore the snubs and snobbery of big-firm lawyers, because it takes only one.
Deck's determined to find the big one for our little firm.
While he's out shaking down Memphis, I manage to keep busy. There are five small, incorporated municipalities tucked along the Memphis city limits. Each of these little towns has a municipal court, and each has a system of appointing young lawyers to represent indigent criminal defendants in misdemeanor cases. The judges and prosecutors are young and part-time, most went to Mem-
phis State, most work for less than five hundred dollars a month. They have growing practices in the suburbs, and spend a few hours each week parceling out criminal justice. I've visited these folks, smiled and glad-handed them, pled my case about needing some business in their courts, and the results have been mixed. I've now been appointed to represent six indigents, charged with a variety of crimes from drug possession to petty larceny to public profanity. I'll get paid one hundred dollars max for each case, and they should be closed within two months. By the time I meet the clients, discuss their guilty pleas, negotiate with the prosecutors and drive to the suburbs for their court appearances, I'll spend at least four hours on each case. That's twenty-five bucks an hour, before overhead and taxes.
But at least it keeps me busy and brings in something. I'm meeting people, passing out cards, telling my new clients to tell their friends that I, Rudy Baylor, can solve all their legal problems. I shudder to think what problems afflict their friends. It can only be more misery. Divorce, bankruptcy, more criminal charges. The life of a lawyer.
Deck wants to advertise when we can afford it, thinks we ought to declare ourselves personal injury studs and get on cable TV, run our spots early in the morning in order to catch the working classes as they eat breakfast and before they go off to get maimed. He's also been listening to a black rap station, not because he likes the music but because the station is highly rated and, as-toundingly, no lawyers have tapped into it. He's found a niche. The rap lawyers!
God help us.
I LIKE TO HANG OUT in the Circuit Clerk's office, flirting with the deputy clerks, feeling my way around. The court files are public record, and their indexes are
computerized. Once I figured out the computer, I located several old cases handled by Leo F. Drummond. The most recent is eighteen months old, the oldest, eight years. None involve Great Benefit, but all involve his defense of various insurance companies. All went to trial, all resulted in favorable verdicts for his clients.
I've spent many hours during the past three weeks studying these files, taking pages of notes, making hundreds of copies. With these files, I prepared a lengthy list of interrogatories, written questions one party sends to another to be answered in writing and under oath. There are countless ways to word interrogatories, and I found myself modeling mine after his. I picked my way through the files and made a long list of the documents I plan to request from Great Benefit. In some of the cases, Drum-mond's opponent was quite good, in others, rather pitiful. But Drummond always seemed to have the upper hand.
I study his pleadings, briefs, motions, his written discovery and his responses to the same received from the plaintiffs. I read his depositions in bed at night. I memorize his pretrial orders. I even read his letters to the court.
AFTER A MONTH of subtle hints and gentle coaxing, I finally persuaded Deck to take a quick road trip to Atlanta. He spent two days there beating the bushes. He spent two nights in very cheap motels. The trip was firm business.
He returned today with the news I'd been expecting. Miss Birdie's fortune is slightly in excess of forty-two thousand dollars. Her second husband did indeed inherit from an estranged brother in Florida, but his share of the estate was less than a million dollars. Before he married Miss Birdie, Anthony Murdine had two other wives, and they produced for him six children. The children, the lawyers and the IRS devoured almost all of the estate. Miss
Birdie got forty thousand, and for some reason left it in the trust department of a large Georgia bank. After five years of fearless investing, the principal has grown by about two thousand dollars.
Only a portion of the court file has been sealed, and Deck was able to dig around and pester enough people to find what we wanted.
"Sorry," he says after he summarizes his findings and hands me copies of some of the court orders.
I'm disappointed, but not surprised.
THE DEPOSITION of Donny Ray Black was originally scheduled to be taken in our new offices, a scenario that caused me no small amount of anguish. Deck and I don't work in squalor, but the offices are small and virtually bare. The windows have no curtains. The toilet in the cramped rest room flushes sporadically.
I'm not ashamed of the place, in fact, it's almost quaint. A modest starter office for a rising young legal eagle. But it's destined to be sneered at by the boys from Trent & Brent. They're accustomed to the finest, and I hate the thought of enduring their snobbery as they slum here in the hinterlands. We don't have enough chairs to crowd around the narrow conference table.
On Friday, the day before the deposition, Dot tells me that Donny Ray is bedridden and cannot leave the house. He's been worrying about the depo, and it's left him weak. If Donny Ray can't leave home, then there's only one place to take it. I call Drummond and he says he cannot agree to move the deposition from my office to the home of my client. Says the rules are the rules, and I'll simply have to postpone it and renotify everyone. He's very sorry about this. He, of course, would like to postpone it until after the funeral. I hang up, then I call Judge Kipler. Minutes later, Judge Kipler calls Drummond, and
after a few quick remarks the deposition is moved to the home of Dot and Buddy Black. Oddly, Kipler plans to attend the deposition. This is extremely unusual, but he has his reasons. Donny Ray is gravely ill, and this might be our only chance to depose him. Time, therefore, is crucial. It's not uncommon in depositions for huge fights to erupt between counsel. It's often necessary to run to the phone and locate the judge, who's expected to settle the matter during a conference call. If the judge cannot be found, and if the dispute cannot be worked around, then the deposition will be canceled and rescheduled. Kipler thinks Drummond et al. will attempt to disrupt the proceedings by picking a meaningless fight, then storm off in a huff.
But if Kipler is present, the deposition will proceed without a hitch. He'll rule on objections, and keep Drummond on course. Plus, he says, it's Saturday and he has nothing else to do.
Also, I think he's worried about my performance in my first deposition. He has good reason to be concerned.
Friday night I lost sleep trying to figure out exactly how we could take a deposition in the Black home. It's dark, damp and the lighting is terrible, which is critical because Donny Ray's testimony will be videotaped. The jury must be able to see how tragic he looks. The house has little air conditioning, and the temperature runs in the mid-nineties. It's hard to imagine five or six lawyers and a judge, along with a court reporter and a video camera operator and Donny Ray, all being able to sit together in semicom-fort anywhere in the house.
I had nightmares of Dot choking us with vast clouds of blue smoke, and of Buddy in the backyard throwing empty gin bottles at the window. I slept less than three hours.
I arrive at the Black home an hour before the deposi-
tion. It seems much smaller, and hotter. Donny Ray is sitting in bed, his spirits improved, claims to be up to the challenge. We've talked about this for hours, and a week ago I gave him a detailed list of my questions and what I expect from Drummond. He says he's ready, and I detect a bit of nervous excitement. Dot is brewing coffee and washing walls. A group of lawyers and a judge are about to visit, and Donny Ray says she's been cleaning all night. Buddy passes through the den as I move a sofa. He's been cleaned and scrubbed. His shirt is white and the tail is tucked in. I cannot imagine the shrill bitching Dot laid on him to obtain this effect.
My clients are attempting to be presentable. I'm proud of them.
Deck arrives with a load of equipment. He's borrowed an obsolete video camera from a friend. It's at least three times larger than most current models. He assures me it will operate properly. He meets the Blacks for the first time. They watch him suspiciously, especially Buddy, who's been relegated to dusting a coffee table. Deck surveys the den, living room and kitchen, and confides quietly to me that there's simply not enough room. He hauls a tripod into the den, kicks over a magazine rack, draws a nasty look from Buddy.
The house is quite cluttered with small tables and footstools and other early sixties furniture covered with cheap knickknack souvenirs. It grows hotter by the minute.
Judge Kipler arrives, meets everyone, starts sweating, and after a minute or so says, "Let's take a look outside." He follows me through the kitchen door, onto the small brick patio. Along the back fence, in the corner opposite Buddy's Fairlane, is an oak tree that was probably planted when the house was built. It provides nice shade. Deck and I follow Kipler through the freshly mowed but un-
raked grass. He notices the Fairlane with the cats on the windshield as we walk in front of it.
"What's wrong with this?" he asks, under the tree. Across the back fence is a hedgerow so thick it prevents the view of the adjoining lot. In the middle of this unruly growth are four tall pine trees. They're blocking the morning sun from the east, making this spot under the oak somewhat tolerable, at least for the moment. There's plenty of light.
"Looks fine to me," I say, though in my hugely limited experience I have never heard of an outdoor deposition. I say a quick prayer of thanks for the presence of Tyrone Kipler.
"Do we have an extension cord?" he asks.
"Yes. I brought one," Deck says, already shuffling through the grass. "It's a hundred-footer."
The entire lot is less than eighty feet wide and maybe a hundred feet deep. The front yard is larger than the back, so the rear patio is not far away. Neither is the Fairlane. In fact, it's sitting right there, not far away at all. Claws, the watchcat, is perched majestically on top, watching us warily.
"Let's get some chairs," Kipler says, very much in control. He rolls up his sleeves. Dot, the judge and myself haul the four chairs from the kitchen while Deck struggles with the extension cord and the equipment. Buddy has disappeared. Dot allows us to use her patio furniture, then she locates three stained and mildewed lawn chairs in the utility room.
Within minutes of carrying and lifting, Kipler and I are both soaked with sweat. And we've drawn attention. Some of the neighbors have emerged from under their rocks and are examining us with great curiosity. A black male in jeans hauling chairs to a spot under the Blacks' oak tree? A strange little creature with an oversized head fighting
electrical cords which he's managed to wrap around his ankles? What's going on here?
Two female court reporters arrive a few minutes before nine, and, unfortunately, Buddy answers the door. They almost leave before Dot rescues them and leads them through the house to the backyard. Thankfully, they've worn slacks instead of skirts. They chat with Deck about the equipment and the electrical supply.
Drummond and his crew arrive precisely at nine, not a minute early. He brings only two lawyers with him, B. Dewey Clay Hill the Third and Brandon Fuller Grone, and they're dressed like twins: navy blazers, white cotton shirts, starched khakis, loafers. Only their ties refuse to match. Drummond is tieless.
They find us in the backyard, and seem stunned at the surroundings. By now, Kipler and Deck and myself are hot and wet, and don't care what they think. "Only three?" I ask, counting the defense team, but they're not amused.
"You'll sit here," His Honor says, pointing to three kitchen chairs. "Watch those wires." Deck has strung wires and cords all around the tree, and Grone in particular seems apprehensive about electrocution.
Dot and I assist Donny Ray from his bed, through the house, into the yard. He's very weak and trying valiantly to walk on his own. As we approach the oak tree, I watch closely as Leo Drummond sees Donny Ray for the first time. His smug face is noncommittal, and I want to snap something like, "Get a good look, Drummond. See what your client's done." But it's not Drummond's fault. The decision to deny the claim was made by a still undetermined person at Great Benefit long before Drummond knew about it. He just happens to be the nearest person to hate.
We seat Donny Ray in a cushioned patio rocker. Dot
fluffs and pats and takes her time making sure he's as comfortable as possible. His breathing is heavy and his face is wet. He looks worse than usual.
I politely introduce him to the participants: Judge Kipler, both court reporters, Deck, Drummond and the other two from Trent & Brent. He's too weak to shake their hands, so he just nods, tries his best to smile.
We move the camera directly into his face, the lens about four feet away. Deck tries to focus it. One of the court reporters is a licensed videographer, and she's trying to get Deck out of the way. The video will show no one but Donny Ray. There will be other voices off-camera, but his will be the only face for the jury to see.
Kipler places me to Donny Ray s right, Drummond on the left. His Honor himself sits next to me. We all take our places and squeeze our chairs toward the witness. Dot stands several feet behind the camera, watching every move her son makes.
The neighbors are overcome with curiosity and lean on the chain-link fence not twenty feet away. A loud radio down the street blares Conway Twitty, but it's not a distraction, yet. It's Saturday morning, and the hum of distant lawn mowers and hedge trimmers echoes through the neighborhood.
Donny Ray takes a sip of water, and tries to ignore the four lawyers and one judge straining toward him. The purpose of his deposition is obvious: the jury needs to hear from him because he'llte dead when the trial starts. He's supposed to arouse sympathy. Not too many years ago, his deposition would have been taken in the normal manner. A court reporter would record the questions and answers, type up a neat deposition and at trial we would read it to the jury. But technology has arrived. Now, many depositions, especially those involving dying witnesses, are recorded on video and played for the jury. This one will
also be taken by a stenographic machine in the standard procedure, pursuant to Kipler's suggestion. This will give all parties and the judge a quick reference without having to watch an entire video.
The cost of this deposition will vary, depending on its length. Court reporters charge by the page, so Deck told me to be efficient with my questions. It's our deposition, we have to pay for it, and he estimates the cost at close to four hundred dollars. Litigation is expensive.
Kipler asks Donny Ray if he's ready to proceed, then instructs the court reporter to swear him. He promises to tell the truth. Since he's my witness, and this is for evidentiary purposes as opposed to the normal unbridled fishing expedition, my direct examination of him must conform to the rules of evidence. I'm jittery, but comforted mightily by Kipler's presence.
I ask Donny Ray his name, address, birthdate, some things about his parents and family. Basic stuff, easy for him and me. He answers slowly and into the camera, just as I've instructed him. He knows every question I'll ask, and most that Drummond might come up with. His back is to the trunk of the oak, a nice setting. He occasionally dabs his forehead with a handkerchief, and ignores the curious stares of our little group.
Although I didn't tell him to act as sick and weak as possible, he certainly appears to be doing it. Or maybe Donny Ray has only a few days left to live.
Across from me, just inches away, Drummond, Grone and Hill balance legal pads on their knees and try to write every word spoken by Donny Ray. I wonder how much they bill for Saturday depositions. Not long into the depo, the navy blazers come off and the ties are loosened.
During a long pause, the back door slams suddenly and Buddy stumbles onto the patio. He's changed shirts, now wears a familiar red pullover with dark stains, and he car-
ries a sinister-looking paper bag. I try to concentrate on my witness, but out of the corner of my eye I can't help but watch as Buddy walks across the yard, eyeing us suspiciously. I know exactly where he's going.
The driver's door to the Fairlane is open, and he backs into the front seat, cats jumping from every window. Dot's face tightens, and she gives me a nervous look. I shake my head quickly, as if to say, "Just leave him alone. He's harmless." She-'d like to kill him.
Donny Ray and I talk about his education, work experience, the fact that he's never left home, never registered to vote, never been in trouble with the law. This is not nearly as difficult as I had envisioned last night when I was swinging in the hammock. I'm sounding like a real lawyer.
I ask Donny Ray a series of well-rehearsed questions about his illness and the treatment he didn't receive. I'm careful here, because he can't repeat anything his doctor told him and he can't speculate or give medical opinions. It would be hearsay. Other witnesses will cover this at trial, I hope. Drummond's eyes light up. He absorbs each answer, analyzes it quickly, then waits for the next one. He is completely unruffled.
There's a limit to how long Donny Ray can last, both mentally and physically, and there's a limit to how much of this the jury wants to see. I finish in twenty minutes without drawing the first objection from the other side. Deck winks at me, as if I'm the greatest.
Leo Drummond introduces himself, on the record, to Donny Ray, then explains who he represents and how much he regrets being here. He's not talking to Donny Ray, but rather to the jury. His voice is sweet and condescending, a man of real compassion.
Just a few questions. He gently pokes around the issue of whether Donny Ray has ever left this house, even for a
week or a month, to live elsewhere. Since he's above the age of eighteen, they'd love to establish that he left home and thus shouldn't be covered under the policy purchased by his parents.
Donny Ray answers repeatedly with a polite and sickly, "No sir."
Drummond briefly covers the area of other coverage. Did Donny Ray ever purchase his own medical policy? Ever work for a company where health insurance was provided? A few more questions along this line are all met with a soft "No sir."
Though the setting is a bit odd, Drummond has been here many times before. He's probably taken thousands of depositions, and he knows to be careful. The jury will resent any rough treatment of this young man. In fact, it's a wonderful opportunity for Drummond to curry a little favor with the jury, to show some real compassion for poor little Donny Ray. Plus, he knows that there's not much hard information to be gathered from this witness. Why drill him?
Drummond finishes in less than ten minutes. I have no redirect examination. The deposition is over. Kipler says so. Dot is quick to wipe her son's face with a wet cloth. He looks at me for approval, and I give him a thumbs-up. The defense lawyers quietly gather their jackets and briefcases and excuse themselves. They can't wait to leave. Nor can I.
Judge Kipler begins hauling chairs back to the house, eyeing Buddy as he walks in front of the Fairlane. Claws is perched on the middle of the hood, ready to attack. I hope there's no bloodshed. Dot and I assist Donny Ray to the house. Just before we step into the door, I look to my left. Deck is working the crowd on the fence, passing out my cards, just a good ole boy.