Kill All the Lawyers

And the guy coughs up five grand to make you go away. One-third of which was $1666.67. Not a bad day's pay, even if he had to listen to the newly wedded Minkins piss and moan, kvetch and noodge.

'First the rabbi said traffic was blocked getting over the Rickenbacker because of the tennis tournament. Then he said a Purim festival in Aventura ran late. But I did a little sleuthing.'

Sheila Minkin paused, as if waiting for applause. 'The big k'nocker triple-booked. He had another wedding at the Diplomat in Hallandale and a third at the Church of the Little Flower in the Gables.'

'A Catholic church?'

'A mixed marriage,' Sheila explained. 'Finsterman's reform.'

'A thousand bucks in extra booze,' Max Minkin repeated. 'My uncle Sol got so shikker he pinched Aunt Sadie instead of a bridesmaid.'

'I have to tell you,' Steve said, 'this isn't a big-money case. Not much in hard damages.'

Working his clients. Preparing them for pin money. And hoping to get them out of his office as quickly as possible.

Just where the hell is Victoria, anyway?

'What about my emotional distress?' Sheila insisted. 'I broke out in hives when the band played 'Hava Nagila.''

'A lot of brides experience tension and stress.' Steve played devil's advocate, the devil being the opposing lawyer.

'There's more. Tell him, Max.'

Her husband reddened but didn't say a word.

'Okay, I'll tell him. Max couldn't get it up that night. A six-hundred-dollar suite at the Ritz-Carlton, and he couldn't get it up. A groom, on his wedding night! There's a name for that in the law, right?'

Buyer's remorse, Steve thought, but what he said was: 'Lost consortium.'

'Right. We didn't consort for two days. That's hard damages, right?'

Or soft damages, as the case may be.

'It's a cognizable claim,' Steve said, trying to sound like a lawyer. 'I just don't want you to think we're talking big money here.'

The door opened, and Victoria walked in. Cheeks pink. Her fair complexion showing the effects of the wind. Meaning she hadn't just gotten out of her car.

She'd been walking. Alone. As she did when troubled. Not a good sign. He needed Victoria on so many different levels, and here she was, going all introspective on him.

'Sorry to interrupt,' Victoria said softly. 'Steve, don't you have to go to court?'

'We do.'

'Do you need me? It's all worked out, right?'

True, the hearing would take all of five minutes. The state had agreed to lower the charges to a misdemeanor; Steve would plead nolo contendere and take an anger management course. Adjudication would be withheld, and when Steve got his certificate saying he was gentle as a pussy cat, all records would be expunged. In a strict legal sense, he didn't really need Victoria to stand alongside him in court, but he wanted her there. Saying that was something else. He wasn't going to beg.

'Nah. You don't have to go, Vic. Why don't you finish up here?'

He introduced her to Max and Sheila Minkin and described the facts, which he termed 'a shocking case of rabbinical malpractice.'

'Shocking,' Victoria agreed, with just a smidgen of sarcasm. She turned to the lovebirds and said, 'I'm sure we'll be able to achieve a fair and just result for you.'

'Fuck that,' Sheila Minkin said. 'I want you to put that rabbi's nuts in a vise and make him squeal.'

Sixteen

DISORDER IN THE COURT

Harry Carraway, a young Miami Beach cop, was riding his Segway down Ocean Drive, looking like a complete dork in his safari shorts and shades.

'Morning, Steve,' he called out, above the hum of the machine.

'Dirty Harry,' Steve called back. 'Catch any jaywalkers?'

'No, sir. You walk any felons today?'

'Day ain't over yet.'

The cop waved, gave the Segway some juice, and buzzed down the street.

The bicycles were bad enough, Steve thought, the Beach cops pedaling up and down Lincoln Road in their tight shirts and canvas shorts, flirting with sunburned coeds. But the sissified Segways were just too much. Cops should be straddling Harleys or driving big ugly Crown Vics.

Steve hopped into the Mustang and headed to the Criminal Justice Building.

Alone.

Victoria had jumped ship. Not that he couldn't handle this himself. But he never would have left her alone if the situation were reversed. Of course, it never would be reversed. Victoria would never have to step into a courtroom to enter a plea to a crime. But that aside, he wondered, what's going on here? Approaching the civic center, listening to 'Incommunicado,' Jimmy Buffet singing about driving solo on a road with a hole in it, Steve asked himself yet again: Just what the hell is going on?

'What's cooking, Cadillac?' Steve said as he crossed the courthouse patio.

'Baby backs, oxtail soup, ham croquettes,' answered Cadillac Johnson, an elderly black man with a thick chest and a salt-and-pepper Afro.

Steve stopped at the counter of the Sweet Potato Pie, a trailer permanently parked on the patio. Cadillac, former blues musician, former client, current owner emeritus of the Pie-he was officially retired- slid a cup of chicory coffee across the counter to Steve. 'You want me to save you a slab of ribs, Counselor?'

'Nah. I've become a vegan.'

'Sure. And I've become a Republican.' Cadillac poured a cup of coffee for himself. 'You hear Dr. Bill on the radio this morning?'

Steve shrugged. 'I listen to Mad Dog Mandich talk football and Jimmy B sing about tequila.'

'The doc was talking about you.'

'I know all about it. Solomon the Shyster. Steve the Snake.'

'Not anymore. Today he said you had psychological issues you needed to deal with, but underneath, you were a good person.'

'You're kidding.'

'If I'm lying, I'm dying.'

Five minutes later, Steve walked along the fourth-floor corridor, sidestepping cops and probation officers, court clerks and bail bondsmen, girlfriends and mothers of the presumably innocent hordes who were being led in shackles from the jail tunnel to the holding cells.

'Hey, boychik! Hold your horses!'

Marvin the Maven Mendelsohn toddled up. A small, tidy man around eighty, Marvin had a neatly trimmed mustache and a gleaming bald head. His black eyeglasses were too large for his narrow face, and his powder blue polyester leisure suit must have been all the rage in the 1970s. 'What's your hurry, Stevie? They can't start your arraignment without you.'

'You still reading the dockets, Marvin?'

The little man shrugged. 'State versus Solomon. Assault and battery. In front of that alter kocker Schwartz.'