No Way Out

personally, claiming that it was consensual and that she couldn’t tell fantasy from reality.`

They might have done this even without Gene’s interference, citing the previous incident with Luke Orlando — as Andi herself had done, to her eternal shame. But the false accusations against Claymore and the ridiculous change in the rapist’s age from twenties to fifties and then back again, would undermine her case completely.

But there was something even more troubling to Andi. She realized that even now she wasn’t thinking about Bethel or even Gene as much as herself. She had been with Gene for so many years and now the fortress that they had built together — them against the world — had been destroyed.

But the hardest part to bear was that it was not Gene who had destroyed it. Gene could have had no way of knowing, when she embarked upon this crazy venture, that Andi would end up defending Claymore. That was why Gene had been so upset when Andi took on the case. Not because of what Claymore had done per se, but because it clashed with her plan for revenge. But by then it was too late to back out of it. By that stage there was no way she could stop it. She could hardly tell Bethel to withdraw the accusation against Claymore — not after she herself had urged Bethel to make that accusation in the first place.

But Andi had taken a conscious decision to go after Gene and force her to confess in public to suborning a witness. Yes, everyone would tell her that she had done her duty, that she had been right to put her emotions aside and act in strict accordance with the law and professional ethics.

Yet it feels so wrong!

She had done the “right” thing and in the process destroyed the woman she loved and thus also destroyed her relationship with her lover.

The phone rang. She couldn’t bear to communicate with a fellow human being, but instinctively she reached for the handset.

“Yes.”

“Andi… it’s Gene.”

“What do you want?”

Her voice was hardened by the edge of bitterness and guilt.

“Are you… are you coming home.”

Was it a cry for help or an offer of forgiveness?

Andi wasn’t ready for either.

“I don’t have a home,” she said, her eyes flooding with tears of regret, the moment the words were out of her mouth.

“Andi… baby… don’t let Don’t let that bastard Claymore destroy everything we had.”

“You don’t get it do you? The future belongs to the Claymore’s of this world. Everyone loves a repentant sinner. That’s why he lives in a beachfront property in Santa Barbara. That’s why he’s in a fancy suite in this hotel while I’m in a basic Business Plan.”

For a second Andi almost mellowed. But then she realized that Gene had said “had” rather than “have”. They were too far gone for things to be as they were. Gene knew it too.

You can’t bring a relationship back from the dead.

Andi put the phone down and took another swig of the vodka… and popped another pill.

Wednesday, 2 September 2009 — 13:40

“Hallo could I speak to Martine Yin please.”

Louis Manning was in a payphone and he felt uncomfortable. He didn’t like the feeling of not being mobile. He had lost his car — or rather Claymore’s car — and he didn’t have as much money on him as he would have liked. There was a bit on money in the cop’s wallet, which he had augmented by a couple of quick muggings across town.

But now he felt exposed. The cops would surely be looking for him and he had to lie low. He’d been living out of Claymore’s car when he first drove up to Oakland. But back in LA he had his own pad, albeit rented. His common sense told him that she should get on a bus and hightail it back to LA, where he could lie low for a while. But the BART station would be crawling with cops and they’d certainly be on the lookout for him. He had just about enough in his pocket for an old set of wheels and some gas. But like he had told the nurse, he had some unfinished business to attend to.

“She’s not yet back in LA. As far as we know she’s still in Oakland. May I ask who’s calling?”

“But I thought she stopped covering the Claymore case and was replaced by some one else? Besides, the Claymore case is over.”

“Yes but she stayed on in Oakland. That’s all the information we have at the moment. Could you tell me what this is about? There may be some one else here who could help you.”

“No I can’t do that. I only deal with Martine.”

He put the phone down, confident that he had not set off any alarms. They would assume that he was one of her sources of information and that he didn’t trust anyone else. He wasn’t surprised by what they had told him. Martine Yin had a thing going with Alex Sedaka and so it made sense that she’d stick around.

The question was, had she gone back to San Francisco with Sedaka or was she still in Oakland? On the phone they’d said the latter. But then again they probably didn’t know about Sedaka — or at least not the whole story. If she was staying with Sedaka, then she might be hard to get at. But he had try.

The first stage was finding out for certain. That meant he had a few phone calls.

Wednesday, 2 September 2009 — 14:25

“You want the light on Your Honor?”

Justice Ellen Wagner had been sitting alone in the dark in her chambers when her clerk entered. It was light outside, but the judge had closed the curtains against the early afternoon sun to sit there quietly, contemplating in peace.

“No that’s all right. I prefer the dark right now.”

The clerk was a girl of 23, full of the enthusiasm of youth and the excitement that a young person feels at the beginning of an adventure. In this case, the adventure was the start of her career. Ellen Wagner saw so much of herself in this girl. That bright-eyed look of wonderment at all that was possible, with all the hope and dreams for the future spread out before her. And this girl would grow up in a world made all the better by what Ellen Wagner’s own generation had done — by the battles they had fought and won.

But how much had they won? And how much had the world changed? Was it a case of plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose? Was it true that what goes around, comes around? Had they replaced one stereotype with another? Had they traded in rights for some with rights for others, yet still not achieved that elusive nirvana of rights for all?

Claymore had walked out of court a free man, legally innocent. But one of his victims was now facing the prospect of many years imprisonment for obstructing justice. Was that right?

Claymore might even be able to resume his life as a celebrity. It would be hard, but everyone loves a repentant sinner, especially in America. He had proved that before and he’d probably prove it again.

“Do you want to talk?” asked the clerk.

“No… no that’s all right. You can go home for the day.”

Wednesday, 2 September 2009 — 15:10

Smoke hung in the air and the sound of gansta rap filled the room, punctuated occasionally by the staccato sound of the cue ball ricocheting off its target.