JAYWALKER: Well, did that lawyer explain to you that by his actions, Mr. Firestone had made it impossible, legally impossible, for you to be charged, even though you continued to serve my client? Did he explain that to you?
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: And you understood that, didn't you?
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: And you believed it, didn't you?
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: So as you sit there now, you're immune from prosecution, right?
RILEY: Immune from prostitution?
JAYWALKER: They can't charge you, can they?
RILEY: No.
JAYWALKER: So did your lawyer instruct you, there fore, to go ahead and tell the absolute truth?
Pretty safe there.
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: And did Mr. Firestone tell you the same thing?
RILEY: I don't remember him saying that.
FIRESTONE: I said it.
JAYWALKER: Objection.
THE COURT: Sustained. The comment is stricken, and the jury will disregard it. Consider yourself warned, Mr. Firestone. Please continue, Mr. Jaywalker.
JAYWALKER: Thank you. In any event, Mr. Riley, you took an oath earlier today, did you not?
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: And that oath was to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Correct?
RILEY: Correct.
JAYWALKER: And when you testified a little while ago that in your opinion my client was not intoxicated, and that there was no question about it, was that in fact the absolute truth?
RILEY: Yes.
JAYWALKER: Thank you.
As he had with Amy Jo O'Keefe, Abe Firestone tried to rehabilitate Daniel Riley. He had some success, for example getting Riley's assurance that he hadn't watered down the tequila that evening, despite the knowledge and wherewithal to do so. But when it came to his opinion as to whether or not Carter Drake had been intoxicated, Riley wouldn't budge. Jaywalker had by that time so cemented the reversal of Riley's first answer that the poor guy was now unwilling to re-reverse himself, even if it meant going back to the truth.
FIRESTONE: And yet you insisted that he call somebody to come pick him up and get him out of there. Didn't you?
RILEY: I did.
FIRESTONE: Why did you do that?
It was a good point. That said, any question that begins with the word why has the potential of drawing a totally unintended, not to mention totally undesired, response. No doubt Firestone fully expected to hear his witness-for it was his witness, after all-say that he at least had harbored reservations about Drake's sobriety and his ability to drive home safely. But for once, he didn't get what he'd asked for.
RILEY: To tell you the truth, because I didn't like the way he was hitting on Amy Jo.
Splat!
It was as good a way to end the day as Jaywalker could have hoped for. Firestone could have chosen to leave well enough alone, and then argued in summation that Riley's actions had spoken louder than his words. Despite his denials, he had, after all, made Drake call for a ride. There's a legal expression, encrypted in ancient Latin to keep ordinary mortals from understanding it, that goes r es ipsa loquitor.
The thing speaks for itself.
Instead, by asking the why question, Firestone had seized defeat from the jaws of victory. He'd managed to inject an ulterior motive into Riley's testimony: that the bartender had been overly protective, and perhaps even jealous of the defendant's obvious interest in Amy Jo O'Keefe.
All this from a witness who should have been able to walk into court and say in plain English that Drake was drunk as a skunk, that he should have cut him off an hour before, and that he'd done the next best thing by making him call for a ride home.
'I hear you did great,' said Amanda, who once again had been forced to spend the day on a bench in the corridor outside the courtroom. 'The families were all muttering about the 'dumb Irish bartender.' And I overheard two of the jurors on the way out talking about how impressed they are with you.'
'That's nice,' said Jaywalker. 'But today meant nothing. Tomorrow we're going to get clobbered.'
'What happens tomorrow?'
They were standing out in the parking lot. Jaywalker had refused to say anything until they were well clear of the building, and out of range of jurors, reporters and anyone else with ears. Even then, he leaned forward to answer her question, close enough to breathe in the smell of her neck. And as smells went, it was a good one. Musk and a trace of lilac, he would have guessed.
'Tomorrow,' he said, 'we get the expert, the guy who's going to convert all those martinis and shots of tequila into a blood alcohol reading, and tell the jury that your husband was bombed out of his mind and had no business getting anywhere near the wheel of a car. That's what happens tomorrow.'
That night he stayed up well past two, knowing that the weekend was just around the corner, and he'd be able to catch up on sleep then. He read the latest edition of Peter Gerstenszang's tome on drunk driving cover to cover for the third time in as many months. He reviewed the expert witness's reports and calculations and rough notes until he all but had them memorized. He composed long lists of questions for cross-examination. But none of it mattered, he knew. They were going to get worse than clobbered tomorrow. They were going to get massacred.
And he had to admit to himself that there was a certain justice to that. Carter Drake had tanked up on gin and vermouth and tequila on an almost empty stomach, and then he'd gotten behind the wheel of his car. Whether there was any truth to the wasp-on-the-windshield story was beside the point. Drake had driven far too fast and, at the very best, far too carelessly. As a direct result, nine people had died.
So why was Jaywalker so bummed? Certainly not for Drake, whom he totally despised. For Amanda, who was already separated from Drake and no doubt better off without him? Hardly. But for whom, then?
And the thing was, he knew the answer. He always did. It wasn't about the client, not when he dug down deep to the core and was willing to be totally honest about it. It wasn't about the family, in this case the woman who'd sought him out and put her faith and money in his hands. And it certainly wasn't about Justice. Justice, in this particular case, was squarely on the side of the victims. She might have been blindfolded, but that didn't mean she couldn't hear. And if she'd been listening to the testimony, chances were she was rooting for a conviction on all charges, and a sentence to match.
No, it was all about him and his stubborn pride, his absolute unwillingness to lose. It was what had driven him from the trenches in the first place, along with a little assist from the Disciplinary Committee judges. But it was also what had brought him back. It was what made him obsessive and compulsive and certifiably insane. And it was what made him the very best at what he did.
But come tomorrow, he knew, it wouldn't be good enough.
18
Jaywalker had long felt that the prosecution's expert on alcohol metabolism would be the most important witness of the trial, with the possible exception of the defendant himself. His testimony might not prove to be the
