The Baxter Trust

35

Steve Winslow sat in the barbershop, waiting his turn and thinking about the case. The old man in the chair near the window looked about done. Then a quick clip, and he could get out of there and hunt up a clothing store and buy a suit off the rack- no time for alterations, thank god he was average build-and go home and hit the law books.

The case. The goddamn case. His first, his one and only case. Tomorrow he’d be in court.

Jesus.

Steve thought about what he’d told Sheila Benton. Stage fright. Opening-night jitters. Well, he had ’em all right. God was he nervous.

Nothing to worry about, he told himself. It’s just another play. You’re an actor, and it’s a play. Think of the courtroom as a stage set. That’s all it is. Just a bit of courtroom drama.

Then it hit him. A cold chill ran down his spine. It was a play all right. A play he hadn’t rehearsed. A play in which he didn’t know the lines. The actor’s nightmare come to life.

Steve felt a moment of panic. It was immediately replaced by something else. Anger. Anger at himself. Selfish bastard, he thought. So concerned about how he was going to look, what impression he was going to make in the court. A young girl’s future was at stake. A silly, irresponsible girl, perhaps, but still, one that deserved better. It was his job to defend her, and damn it, he had to be up to the task.

But what a task. To convince twelve people that Sheila Benton didn’t kill Robert Greely. Steve wondered if there were twelve people in all of New York City that didn’t believe Sheila Benton had killed Robert Greely.

There was a pile of old magazines and newspapers on the table next to him. On top was a copy of the New York Post. “BAXTER NIECE INDICTED” screamed the headline. “Baxter niece,” that was the thing. This wasn’t the Sheila Benton case. It wasn’t the Robert Greely case. It was the Baxter case, and the media wasn’t going to let anyone forget it. Maxwell Baxter’s niece killed someone, that was the message the media was putting out loud and clear, and the public was lapping it up. People always loved to see someone big, and rich, and powerful in trouble. An heiress with a multimillion-dollar trust fund killed someone. That’s what everyone believed. Even Mark Taylor. So how the hell was he gonna make anyone think different?

Sitting there in the barber shop, Steve thought back to the first time he’d ever dealt with a lawyer. The first and last time he’d ever been up against one. Steve remembered him well. That smug, oily son of a bitch, smiling and nodding and explaining to the arbitrator at the hearing just through what legal loophole, on what technicality the State of New Jersey would be able to get out of paying the grant money awarded by the Arts Council. Money on the promise of which Steve had organized and performed a tour of children’s theater to the New Jersey public schools. Money that was owed to six actors, including himself, who had subsidized the program themselves by drawing no salary for the three months of the tour, and who were now all hopelessly in debt. Steve had been the one who’d had to argue with the lawyer, since he’d been in charge of the tour and felt responsible. “What about the actors?” he’d argued. “They gave their services on the promise of that money. The work has been performed and has to be paid.”

“On your promise of the money,” the lawyer had answered. “On your mistaken belief that the money would be forthcoming. If you acted in ignorance of the law we can be sorry for you, but we can’t be held accountable.”

Steve had been stymied. He couldn’t argue the case on legal grounds. He couldn’t cite some legal precedent that could have swung the decision. He could only argue the case on what was fair and just. On the grounds that just because a loophole was there didn’t mean the state had to take advantage of it. That the state should feel compelled to do what was right.

The state did not agree.

And Steve had wound up paying off the other five actors himself, in some cases, in spite of their protests.

It had taken him four years.

Later, when he had finally given up all hope of ever making it as an actor, the incident with the Arts Council was not the only reason he decided on law school.

But it sure didn’t hurt.

Steve thought about that now, thought about how he felt standing in that hearing room, listening to the lawyer talk. The feeling of helplessness, the feeling of being totally at sea.

The feeling of being outclassed.

He knew the law now. Or thought he did. But he’d never been in a courtroom before.

He wondered if he’d feel that way tomorrow.

Snap out of it, he told himself. It’s just a play, and the jury is just an audience. A small audience, to be sure, but still an audience. And like any audience, their emotions could be swayed. They could be moved to laughter, to tears, to sympathy, to anger, to regret. It was just a question of dynamics. Whatever the prosecution was doing, do the opposite. Change the pace. Break the mood.

Give them a show.

The old man in the chair by the window got up. The barber snapped the apron, shaking off the hair.

“Next,” he called.

Steve got up and walked over.

“Changed my mind,” he said, and walked out the door.

He flagged a cab and took it home to study, to prepare himself for court. He stayed up till two in the morning, poring over his books. But he didn’t read his law books.

He read his Erie Stanley Gardners.