Balance of Power

    Mary sat straighter. 'If that's what's going on,' she said to Lenihan, 'and we can stop it, I want to.'

    'And those are good intentions,' Lenihan said respectfully. 'But speeding up the discovery process so drastically exacerbates our problems. It allows the lawyers for the SSA to play more games—withholding documents so we question witnesses like Dane without having the facts we need, then forcing us into a trial we're not ready for. And adding the SSA will turn a fiasco into a nightmare.

    'Sarah knows the drill as well as I do. We go in for a temporary restraining order, which we probably won't get. Then the judge will likely set a hearing on a preliminary injunction within ten days. Within sixty to ninety days, we'll have plowed through all of our discovery— getting jerked around at every turn, and be facing a trial we're not ready for.'

'Bob,' Sarah said, 'you've sued IBM, AT&T, and half the Fortune

500. What does your firm have all these lawyers for, if not to use them?'

    'So we can decide when to use them, and where using them makes sense.'

    'It's your money,' Sarah answered. 'No question. I can only hope that stopping the SSA, keeping more murders from happening, and helping President Kilcannon save lives will satisfy your sense of occasion.'

    To Sarah's surprise, Lenihan laughed aloud. 'I should let you say that to my partners,' he said with irony but less hostility. 'I'm sure they'd be delighted to put their money and our firm at your disposal.'

    Sarah spread her hands. 'That,' she said with a smile, 'is all I could ask. But let's put that aside. Assuming that we collectively decide to do all this, where and when do we file?'

    Though far too clever not to know what she was doing, Lenihan's ego was such, Sarah judged, that she might mollify him by ceding center stage. And so it seemed; as he answered her, Lenihan's manner resumed its usual placid self-assurance. 'When is simple—immediately. As for where, the same place I chose at the beginning: the Superior Court for the City and County of San Francisco.

    'My firm has an office here, and we're close to most of the judges. If we file in state court, the TRO will go before Judge Fineman or Judge Rotelli.' Lenihan smiled with satisfaction. 'They're both friends of mine, and they're up for re-election. Along with every partner in our local office, I've contributed to their campaigns.'

    Which, Sarah thought, is the problem with electing judges. 'And so,' she said wryly, 'you think they'll give us a fair hearing.'

    Lenihan shrugged. 'Even if we weren't friends, who do you suppose an elected judge is going to favor—the First Lady's surviving sister, a native San Franciscan, or an out-of-state merchant of death?'

    At this, Sarah noticed, Mary seemed to wince. Briefly, Sarah touched her arm. 'What about the trial judge?' she asked Lenihan. 'They're selected by lottery.'

    'Same reasoning,' Lenihan answered comfortably. 'But why leave things to chance. Presiding Judge Morrissey is another old friend, the last of the old-line liberals. We can go to him and say 'Your Honor, this is a complex case. We need a judge assigned specially, to take it from the preliminary through trial.' The local specialist in complex cases, Judge Weinstein, is also very progressive. I expect he's who Jack Morrissey would give us.'

    It was fascinating, Sarah thought, if a bit unsettling, to listen to Lenihan game the system. 'So you don't see any reason to take this to federal court?'

    'God, no. There's no way of knowing who we'd get. And at least half of them are conservatives and they're appointed for life—the kind of judge who'd screw us without mercy. That's another problem with your theories, Sarah: they may try to gin up some argument to remove the case to federal court.'

    Sarah shook her head. 'No grounds.'

    'So you say. Just remember who said it.' He sat back, his selfsatisfied gaze taking in both Sarah and Mary. 'Whatever we end up filing, we go to state court with a complaint so colorful the newspapers and talking heads will quote it. Right after that we call a press conference. And then we use my public profile to launch an ongoing PR offensive.'

    Lenihan's 'public profile,' Sarah thought dryly, was somewhat less important than that of the President and First Lady—or, for that matter, the victims. And then it struck her that, once again, Mary Costello had been shunted to the margins. Turning to her, Sarah said, 'You've been listening to us, Mary. Now it's your turn. Tell us what you want to do.'

    Mary looked from Lenihan to Sarah. 'The same thing you do,' she told Sarah. 'I don't want more people dying. And if the SSA's responsible, it should pay.'

    To Sarah's surprise, Lenihan gave a shrug of fatalism. Perhaps he, too, was responding to the challenge.

    'So when do we file?' Sarah asked him.

    'The day after tomorrow,' he said firmly. 'In the morning.'

SIXTEEN

At nine-fifteen in the morning, having notified Lexington, the SSA, and the media, Lenihan and Sarah filed their complaint. Shortly after two p.m., they entered the wood-paneled courtroom of Judge Angelo Rotelli.

    Jammed with media, the courtroom had the low expectant buzz of conversation which preceded a judge's appearance. Already seated at the defense table, John Nolan, the managing partner of Kenyon and Walker, Sarah's former firm, surveyed his adversaries with a barely concealed distaste. Beside him was Harrison Fancher, a senior litigator from another large corporate firm, Hartman & Miles, whose cadaverous appearance and relentless style of defense had earned him the sobriquet 'Angel of Death.' But while Fancher's presence signalled that the case would be as unpleasant as Lenihan had predicted, it was Nolan that Sarah feared more. In her experience, his utter ruthlessness, his adamantine belief that his clients' privileged status should be preserved by whatever means at hand, was concealed by a mandarin inscrutability and cloaked in an air of diplomacy which appealed to judges. As Sarah and Lenihan walked to the plaintiffs' table, Lenihan smiled broadly at Nolan and Fancher.

    'John,' he said, with a basso profundo which carried to the media. 'And Harry, too. What a pleasure. Which one of you has the gun nuts, and which the merchants of death?'

    Without standing, Nolan gave him a thin smile, though his eyes became slits in the broad plain of his face. In an undertone meant only for Lenihan, he said, 'It's back to the sandbox, I see. Or the cat box.' Turning toward Sarah, he added in a cool, patronizing manner, 'Hello, Sarah. Are you here to learn at the feet of the master?'

    This jibe, Sarah knew, was fresh proof how much Nolan detested her: she had forced Nolan to accept her pro bono representation of Mary Ann Tierney—wholly against his conservative instinct— only by fomenting a near rebellion among the firm's female partners. Though tense, Sarah managed to smile. 'Which one of you would that be?' she asked, just before Angelo Rotelli entered his courtroom.

    The buzz subsided. A stocky man with dark, curly hair, Rotelli nodded at the lawyers with a benign expression as he took his place behind the bench, pausing briefly to note the presence of the media contingent cramming his courtroom.

    'All right,' he began. 'This is the case of Costello versus Lexington