Legal Tender

36

Renee Butler’s rowhouse was a typical Philadelphia trinity, so called because there were three floors with a single room on each floor. It looked like a tiny brick box with pale white shutters; white flower boxes over-flowed with leggy purple pansies and vinca vines. A women’s house, and tonight its owners, Renee and Eve, were throwing a party.

I stole into a dark alley across the street and watched, disappointed. Even I didn’t have the moxie to break and enter during a house party. But what kind of party was this? And so soon after Mark’s death?

Music floated from the open windows, a syncopated jazz rhythm, not Green Day. Odd. Nobody was dancing, either, and in the windows I could see people chatting over iced drinks. I spotted a waiter through the window on the second floor, serving hors d’oeuvres to guests in shirts and ties. A waiter? What gives? This wasn’t the type of party the associates usually gave at R amp; B. But then again, there was no more R amp; B.

A head turned suddenly on the first floor. Renee. Her coarse hair was slicked back into a glossy twist and huge silver hoops dangled from her ears. She wore a long dashiki, looking like she’d lost some weight. Suddenly she walked to the window and lifted the sash.

I dodged back into the alley and waited a beat. Except for the party, the street was quiet and still, one of those cobblestoned Philadelphia backways that’s too narrow even for a car. I popped out again. I wanted to see what Renee was doing.

She appeared to be chatting up a good-looking man in a suit. Who was he? Who were these people? I heard voices coming down the street and flattened against the building, edging into the alley.

A couple approached, the man holding the woman by the elbow. She was giggling as she negotiated the cobblestones in pumps. When they got closer I could see it was Bob Wingate, dressed in a real tie, with the ever-perky Jennifer Rowland. I turned my head to the darkness to avoid being seen.

So there were other R amp; B associates at this shindig. Did they know about Grady’s arrest? I waited until I could hear the front door close and Wingate’s voice had disappeared inside. Then I peered out again.

On the second floor, I could see Eve in a tight tan dress, flanked by a tall man. I couldn’t tell who it was because his back was to the window, but when she leaned over to whisper something to him, I caught a glimpse of his steely-glassed profile. Dr. Haupt from Wellroth. Beside him stood Kurt Williamson, the general counsel, with a chiffoned battle-ax I assumed was his wife. Around them stood a circle of sycophants, like corporate ringworm.

Of course. This wasn’t the usual associate party. The faces were older, the hair was silvered, and the couples were married. These people were corporate clients. No wonder nobody was having any fun.

“Quiet, please!” someone shouted inside. The music stopped abruptly and the conversation trailed off. Heads turned in the direction of Dr. Haupt, who raised his glass in a toast I couldn’t hear. Eve beamed and everyone sipped their champagne. Then I understood. The joint venture must have gone through. Everyone was clapping and Eve mock-curtsied. Only Renee, watching her roommate, barely smiled behind her goblet.

What was going on behind those dark eyes of hers? I had to find out, but I didn’t know what to do if I couldn’t search the house. I needed a Plan B. I took an inventory of what I knew. Renee Butler was connected with Eileen Jennings and their connection was Penn’s legal clinic. If I couldn’t find out this way, I’d find out another.

Either way you looked at it, the party was over.

I cleared my throat, squared my shoulders, and prepared to confront my umpteenth security guard in a week’s time. I’d met old ones, young ones, black ones, and white ones, and yet was rapidly coming to the conclusion there were too many guards in the world and not enough security. Too many police and not enough safety. How could it be otherwise, when a girl like me was on the run?

I pushed through the glass doors to Penn’s law school and confronted my latest guard. This one was a civilian; short, spectacled, and seated behind a wooden dais studying corporation law. A law student, in his second year if he was taking what we fondly called “corpse.” He looked up, blinking through thick hornrims as I approached. He wouldn’t be the best-looking security guard, but I was guessing he’d be the smartest. Shit. I’d have to find his pressure point. A second-year student? In this economy? Piece of cake.

“I have a problem and so do you,” I said, leaning on the dais with a weariness that came easily.

“I have a problem?”

“I’m a partner at Grun amp; Chase. You know the firm.”

“Sure, I know the firm.” He swallowed visibly and closed the thick red casebook, squishing his index finger in the middle to mark his place. If it hurt, he didn’t show it. No feelings? He’d make a fine suit. “Everybody knows Grun amp; Chase,” he said.

“Of course they do. As I was saying, I interviewed here the other day and, unfortunately, left my résumés and my entire file in the law clinic. You have a key to let me in, I assume.”

“Sure.”

“Good. Let’s do it.”

“Uh, I didn’t know they held interviews in the clinic.”

“Well, they do. They’re for clinic students.”

“Weird.” He cocked his head. His dark brown hair had been buzzed into an old-fashioned cut, from when the styles had names. I was guessing his was The Geek.

“What’s weird?” I asked.

“It’s summer. I didn’t know they did on-campus interviewing in the summer.”

Think fast, stupid. “It’s not the normal interviewing. It’s of select second-year students. Clinic students. I didn’t interview you, did I?” I flashed him an arrogant, Grun-patented should-I-know-you squint.

“No. I, uh, didn’t know about the interviews.”

“They’re very hush-hush. We like it that way.”

“I don’t take clinic either.”

“Too bad.”

“And I’m not veryselect, anyway, I guess.” He looked away, his thin shoulders sloping dejectedly in their Nine Inch Nails T-shirt He reminded me a little of Wingate. I felt momentarily sympathetic.

“Did you interview with Grun?”

“Yes, during the year. But I didn’t get a call back.”

“How are your grades?”

“Not Law Review.”

“Okay, but are they good?”

“Well, they’re not terrible.” He bit his lip.

“Not terrible?” If this kid didn’t learn to present himself better, they’d eat him alive. “You mean they’re improving.”

“Improving, right.” He punched his glasses up at the bridge.

“Do you have some sort of experience? Grun likes that, all firms do. Practical experience, you know.”

“I worked at my father’s office first year summer and I got a lot of practical experience. Also, I’m a very practical person. I approach problems in apractical -”

“I get it. Do you have a job lined up for after you graduate?”

“No,” he said. His face reddened as if it were a source of deep shame, which in the law school culture, it was.

“Where are you working now, this summer?”

“Uh, here.”

“Even during the day?”

He swallowed. “I couldn’t get a law job.”

I looked at him and he looked at me. We both knew what this meant. He was about to graduate at least a hundred grand in the hole, with no hope of paying it back. This kid needed help. I almost found myself believing my own scam. “What happened with your grades?” I asked. “Didn’t you study?”

“I did, I studied really hard. But when the tests came, I just kind of… froze.” He shook his head, biting his lower lip again. “Maybe I’m just not good enough to be a lawyer. Maybe I’m not cut out for it.”

“Maybe you just don’t think well on your feet.”

“I don’t. That’s what my dad says.”

“All that means is that you can’t be a trial lawyer. But there are other kinds of lawyers.”

“But litigation is the coolest-”

“Forget what’s cool. What’s your favorite course?”

“Corporate tax.”

“Tax?” It was almost inconceivable. What was it with this younger generation? Tax, instead of constitutional law? “You actuallylike tax?”

“It’s like a puzzle, a big puzzle, and you can put it together and it all makes sense.” He smiled for the first time, lost in the beauty and wonder of the Internal Revenue Code.

“How did you do in tax?”

“I got an E, an excellent. It was my only one.” He grinned with pride, and I, with relief.

“So why don’t you apply for a tax program, like at NYU? Get your master’s in tax. You’ll do well, then you can slip right into any firm. You’ll get forbearance on your school loans and another year to find a job.”

“You think I can do it?”

“Of course you can.”

“Maybe it’s not too late to apply?”

“Not if you do it now.”

He beamed. “Then I will!”

“There you go,” I said, buoyed until I watched his expression change from ebullience to confusion.

“Wait. Why are you telling me this?”

It caught me up short. “Because I like you.”

He eased back in his chair, frowning behind his hornrims. “You don’t work at Grun, do you? You can’t, you’re too nice.”

I paused. The lobby fell deathly silent. No one was around. I felt exhausted, suddenly. I’d had twenty minutes’ sleep in three days. Maybe, just for a change, I’d go with the truth. I wanted to kick out the jambs, and the kid had a face I trusted, like Wingate’s.

“You want the truth?” I said. “I’m not a hiring partner or a hookeror a murderer.”

“O-kay. What are you then?”

“I’m a lawyer and I really, really, really need to get into that clinic.”

“Why?”

“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you on the way.”

He paused, considering it. Then he opened the middle drawer. Maybe he didn’t think so badly on his feet after all.