Breach Of Promise

“Excellent…” Nina said.

He turned her around, backing her onto the bed.

“… suggestion.” The light went off, but her eyes had closed anyway; there was only Paul’s clean-scented body beside her, burning.

BOOK THREE. TRIALS

You don’t approach a case with

the philosophy of applying abstract justice.

You go in to win.

-Percy Foreman

15

“Mrs. Lim fits. Age fifty-four, close to Lindy’s. Realtor, two grown kids, husband with heart problems. Member of the American Association of University Women. Her parents are both dead. Her questio

She left the courtroom for a moment to call him. Paul had ferreted out the fifty-five names in the jury pool, and was finding out what he could about the candidates to help Lindy’s team make more informed selections.

Nina stalled Susan Lim with a few more questions.

The jury box was against the left wall of the cavelike courtroom, closely attended by the bailiff. Nina’s station, the table on the left reserved for the side bringing the main action, was closest to the box and about ten feet from the court reporter and the witness box in front.

Milne’s roost occupied the right front corner. Over at the long table to Nina’s right, Riesner and his new associate, Rebecca Casey, put their heads so closely together, Nina could swear they touched. If he had done that to her-come to think of it, he had done that to her a couple of times-she would be cringing the same way she would from a scorpion in her shoe. In their encounters, Riesner usually edged up close, getting in her face, trying to intimidate.

Rebecca, pleasant-faced and professional-looking, was Riesner’s match for Winston Reynolds. Educated at Stanford, she was younger than Winston, somewhere in her late thirties. Her confident air and no-nonsense attitude must be helpful when negotiating the testosterone-laden halls of Caplan Stamp etcetera. She nodded at something Riesner was saying and passed a quick note behind Riesner to Mike, who also sat at their table in a spiffy suit he had surely never worn before, his thick neck bulging out of the collar.

In that suit, Mike didn’t look honest. Was it the perspiration dotting his forehead and the bashed-up nose? His jaw worked as he gritted and relaxed his teeth. The yellow-tinged lights in the ceiling of the paneled courtroom shone down on him without mercy. He looked unwell, the flesh on his face sagging more than Nina remembered from his deposition a few months ago.

Obviously he felt the pressure of the judgment facing him up front as well as the judgment behind him, which consisted of the corps of reporters and other media types jamming the courtroom. Lindy, who sat on Nina’s left, closest to the jury box, had been leaning over frequently to look at him, not a wise idea. Winston, who had handled the voir dire the day before, loafed in his seat next to her. He was relying completely on Genevieve, but Nina couldn’t do that.

Nina turned back to Mrs. Lim and asked a few more polite questions. Aside from the fact that she fit Genevieve’s profile of a “friendly” juror, Nina liked Mrs. Lim’s earnestness and the thought she put into her answers. She looked successful and smart in the tweed suit, like someone who would listen carefully to the judge’s instructions and think through the issues.

Genevieve returned in the nick of time, sliding in next to Nina, and said breathlessly, “Paul just found out that she filed an employment discrimination complaint with the Office for Civil Rights twenty-two years ago, when she was just getting started in the business world. Don’t look at me! We’ve got to have her. Look bored.” She yawned and opened her notebook. Nina looked at the clock above the jury seats. Eleven-eighteen, already well into the fifth day of jury selection.

“Thank you, Mrs. Lim,” Nina said. Using the prospective juror’s name was another of Genevieve’s i

Milne a

“The cross-defendants will thank and excuse Mr. Melrose,” Riesner said, offering Mr. Melrose the consolation prize of a simpering smile that said, nothing personal, I’m sure. He had chosen well. Nina had decided that Melrose, a Lutheran widower with a sad look in his eyes, would be kindhearted about the situation, a reaction that could only help Lindy. Poor Mr. Melrose edged his way awkwardly from the jury box and disappeared forever from the case.

Mrs. Lim remained. She wore her gleaming black hair short, tucked behind her ears, neat and businesslike. She would remain a sitting duck until-

“How many more peremptories do we have?” Nina whispered to Genevieve.

“Last one,” Genevieve scribbled. Nina bit her lip and searched the faces in the jury box. None of them looked back.

Lindy also scrutinized each person. Now and then during the selection process she had written a vehement NO! orYES! as various jurors were called to the jury seats and questioned. Most of the time Nina had agreed with Lindy’s assessments. And she had to admit that so far she also agreed more or less with Genevieve. The primary difference seemed to be that Nina never felt sure of anybody, while Genevieve watched, consulted her notes and profiles, and judged without doubt.

So far, their disagreements had been minor and resolvable. Of the eleven people seated in the box this morning, besides Mrs. Lim Nina liked four, had doubts about four, and feared two. Riesner’s team had unseated her strongest choices over the past few days, and she in turn had thanked and excused the ones he had to love, the ones who fit Genevieve’s other profile, the negative one. Avoid: her report read, Conservatives. No higher education. Divorced men. Hunters, fishers. Young married women. Republicans-since political and religious affiliations had been nosed out by Paul-follower types, wealthy types. There were many more such guidelines, graded by degree of hazard.

“Now this next one, Clifford Wright. What do we know about him?” Nina said from behind her hand as a light-haired, boyish-looking man with an engaging smile made his way to the chair still warm from poor Mr.-what had been his name?

Genevieve slid over the chart she had whipped together on Wright when they had received a list of jury pool members the week before. “Thirty-nine years old,” she said. “He scored high on his questio