The Wrong Gun

30

“Double-think.”

“What?”

Steve and Tracy had driven back to the office to pick up the mail and check the answering machine. At least, ostensively to do that. Actually the answering-machine messages could be picked up from any touch-tone phone and there was never any mail. Steve just needed to touch base. He was sitting tilted back in his desk chair with his feet up and his eyes closed, a position he often assumed during a case when he needed to think something out.

“Double-think,” he repeated. He opened his eyes, shook his head. “That’s the problem with this damn case. I keep second-guessing myself.”

“Why?”

“Vaulding. Vaulding, of course. He’s young, he’s smart, he’s aggressive. He’s not going to make any stupid moves.”

“So?”

“So everything he does I’m second-guessing him. Which means I’m second-guessing myself. And the result is I drive myself crazy.”

“Be specific,” Tracy said. She was having a hard time containing herself. Steve had refused to discuss anything during the car ride, and she was bursting to know what was up.

“O.K.,” Steve said. “Take the witness. Manning. The ballistics expert. I stood up in court and said I didn’t know if I wanted to cross-examine him. Did you think that was a ploy?”

“I didn’t know what to think.”

“That’s the problem. Neither do I. It’s no ploy. It’s the straight goods. Frankly, I don’t know.”

“Why?”

“I told you why. Vaulding. Now, Dirkson I could handle. I know him, and I know what to expect. But this guy. I don’t know what his game is and I don’t know what’s what.”

Tracy nodded. “The thing with the doctor got you spooked.”

Steve looked at her, then nodded too. “A little. I make a big stink, recall the doctor, get him to bring his photographs. What do I prove? Nothing. The jury gets an eyeful of gore and yours truly strikes out. I got to admit, that got me rattled.

“The kicker is Vaulding. I don’t know if he did it on purpose. If he’s really that good. I don’t know if he said to himself, ‘I’m not gonna have the doctor introduce the pictures, I’ll make Winslow ask for ’em so he’s the one who brings ’em out and hangs his own client.’”

“You think he did?”

“I don’t know. It’s double-think. First I think that, then I think, no. He left out the pictures because he didn’t want me to see the blow on the head.”

“But was the blow that important?”

Steve threw up his hands. “That’s the thing. This doctor says it isn’t. Vaulding acts as if it isn’t. How the hell should I know? Is Vaulding playing it straight or not? On the other hand, is Vaulding double-thinking me? Is he saying, ‘This blow to the head is totally unimportant, but let that son of a bitch Winslow get a hold of it, he’ll blow it out of all proportion and make a federal case out of it. So I gotta keep the pictures out.’” Steve looked at Tracy, shook his head. “You see what I mean? I think the thing around in a big circle and come back to where I started.”

“Right,” Tracy said. “So the ballistics expert?”

“Same thing. Vaulding doesn’t bring out the evidence. All he does is have the guy give his opinion as an expert that the bullet came from that gun. He leaves it to me to bring out the evidence. And I have to ask why? Is it because the evidence is conclusive so he wants me to bring it out so I’ll crucify my own client? Or is it because there’s a defect in the evidence that he wants to cover up? Or if not a defect, at least a side issue, something he thinks I’ll pick up on and make a big deal about like the blow on the head.”

“And there again, is it because he thinks it’s important, or because he thinks I’ll try to make it important?”

Tracy shook her head. “Jesus Christ.”

“Yeah, and it gets worse. There’s this goddamned file. That’s the other pitfall here. The minute I start cross-examining this guy on his identification of the bullet, he’s going to tell me how hard it was to get a match because someone had tampered with the gun barrel. There I’ll be, schmuck-of-the-month again, because as soon as that happens, for his next witness Vaulding will call the police officer who searched Timberlaine’s room and found the file.”

“Right,” Tracy said. “But you know that’s going to happen sooner or later.”

“Yeah, but in the eyes of the jury it hurts us ten times worse if I’m the one who brings it out.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah. So that’s what’s hanging me up,” Steve said. “The simple fact is, I don’t know how to play it.”

There was a pause.

“Bullshit,” Tracy said.

Steve’s head snapped up. He turned, looked at her.

Tracy had taken off her large round-framed glasses and folded them up. She stood there, tapping them into her other hand. She shook her head. “Sorry,” she said, “but I can’t buy it. The way I see it, the simple fact is you hate to lose.”

“What?”

“Come on,” Tracy said. “Give me a break. All this double-think, and should you cross-examine this guy or not, and what’s Vaulding pulling on you, and does Vaulding want you to do it or not, and the bottom line is who gives a shit? The simple fact is, you don’t like to lose. You stood up in court this morning and you took a beating. You had the doctor bring in his pictures and that should have been a victory for you, but it wasn’t, it was a defeat. And you sit back and rationalize and try to figure out why that happened, and then you say it’s because it wasn’t Dirkson it was Vaulding and you’re not sure what Vaulding’s doing so you don’t know how to play it. But the simple fact is you lost one, and you hate to lose. What’s more you’re not used to losing. So you start second-guessing yourself and the whole bit.”

Steve looked at Tracy a moment. Then he smiled. “Wow,” he said. “Do I really do all that?”

“It’s not funny,” Tracy said. “You got a duty to your client. Now you may think all this agonizing you’re going through is trying to figure out what your duty to your client is, but it’s not. It’s counterproductive.”

“Say you’re right,” Steve said. “So what should I do?”

“First off, stop second-guessing Vaulding. The hell with him. Who the hell cares what Vaulding wants you to do?”

“That’s the first thing? What’s the second?”

“This ballistics expert?”

“Yeah. What about him?”

“Rip his can off.”