Brush Back

“Why did you let him do it, then, instead of handling it yourself?” I asked.

Eunice shook her head. “Joel wasn’t working here—we thought he should have wider experience, and if he’d been here, he’d have always been in Ira’s shadow. Joel started with Mandel & McClelland, doing general law. The girl, A

“And that something included providing her mother with a defense attorney?” I was puzzled, not to say incredulous, but I tried to keep my tone one of polite inquiry.

“It’s a tight-knit neighborhood, or it was. You should know that, having grown up there.”

“Yes, but—”

“Mr. McClelland went to the same church as the Guzzo family,” Eunice said. “He thought, at least I believe he thought, that the murder, including the mother’s defense, was the community’s business. Ms. Guzzo couldn’t afford an attorney, and he probably believed that even someone as inexperienced as Joel would be better for her than an overworked, underprepared public defender.”

There was a scrabbling at the lock as she was speaking. Joel Previn came in before she finished.

“And of course, we all know how wrong he was,” Joel said. “Why are we rehashing my earliest failure? There are so many others, more recent, that would be worth recounting.”

MINOR LEAGUE

Joel Previn was taller than his father, but he had the same heavy cheeks. On Ira they were sagging, like kangaroo pouches, but Joel’s were still upright, pushing his eyes up so that he almost had to squint. The likeness between father and son was remarkable, but so was the resemblance to his mother: Joel had Eunice’s high round forehead, her short flat nose, her biscuit-colored skin. What belonged to Joel alone was the unhealthy beading of sweat across his face. His appointment outside the office had been with a bottle.

I walked over to him, holding out my hand and introducing myself. He ignored the hand. I felt foolish, as one does.

“Did you know Stella Guzzo had been released from prison?” I asked.

Joel looked from Eunice to Ira, not the silent signals his parents shared, but as if he were seeking guidance. If they’d sent him to another law firm to keep him out from under Ira’s shadow, the strategy hadn’t worked well.

“I knew, yes,” he said. “Her parole officer told me, in case Stella wanted any legal advice.”

“Did she?”

“Not from me. Why would she? I’m the guy who couldn’t keep her out of prison in the first place.” He had his father’s baritone, too, but in him the undertone held a whine.

“So would you be surprised to learn she’s thinking about trying to get exonerated?”

“Am I on the stand here? Do I know, am I surprised, do I care? No, no and no.”

“I know it was a long time ago, Mr. Previn, but I’m wondering what she said during the trial to help with her defense.”

“She was impossible,” Joel cried. “I wasn’t the right attorney for her. Like my mother said, I was too inexperienced, not even for the crime so much as for working with someone like her. A

“I grew up with A

“She said it must have been an intruder, but she also told me she’d hit A

“Was there any sign of forced entry?”

“It was so long ago,” Joel said. “I don’t remember all the police evidence. Dad would, of course, if it had been his case. And if he hadn’t been tied up with some big federal suit, he’d have been in court and made sure I asked all the right questions. Or leapt up and asked them himself.”

“Joel, please,” Eunice said. “Please don’t bring all that up now. We know it was an impossible situation, one which we should have tried to stop—”

“What difference does it make now? Mr. Mandel, Dad—the two of them tutted about it at shul. Mr. Mandel and Mr. McClelland both said— Oh, never mind what they both said. In the end, we all agreed I’d be happier elsewhere. Mr. Mandel sent me to a downtown firm as an associate, but after a few years we all once more agreed I’d be happier elsewhere. Ira feels the same way, but there’s no other elsewhere for me these days.”

Ira held up a hand, not trying to stop his son, trying to ward off the pain of the words.

“Did you keep a transcript of the trial?” I asked.

“No. When I left Mandel & McClelland, they kept all my files.” He looked at Eunice. “Someone wants to rent 206. I came back to get a lease.”

“Someone you met at the Pot of Gold? Can I talk to them first?” Her eyes were pleading with him not to have a tantrum, but he went to a filing cabinet, pulled out a couple of forms and slammed out of the office, saying he was tired of being treated like a mental incompetent.

I followed him quickly—the pain in his mother’s face was hard to take. Joel was disappearing into a tavern half a block up the street.

The Pot of Gold was a small room, with a narrow bar ru

Joel was sliding onto a stool when I walked in. Three other people were in the room, a heavy woman tending the bar and two men, seated on adjacent stools near the back. They were older. Every now and then one of them would say something, the other would respond, then they’d relapse into silence.

Joel looked up when I sat next to him, but his expression wasn’t welcoming. “You can tell my mother that the rental prospect took off before I could show him the lease. She doesn’t need to guard the assets any longer.”

“I’m not interested in that. I’m curious about how Stella behaved at the trial.”

“It was a long time ago. I don’t remember.” He signaled to the heavyset woman, who came over with a bottle of vodka. She looked at me questioningly, but I shook my head.

“She’s like one of those unstable chemical reactions they teach you about in school. You have to keep her behind a bulletproof shield so you don’t get acid in your eyes when she explodes,” I said. “At least, that’s the way she seemed when I was a kid. When I saw her last week, she slugged me. Even though she’s eighty, she would have killed me if she’d co

“I did, but the priest and Mr. McClelland jumped on me like I was a cockroach on the bathroom floor. But, Christ, she was so fucking out of control that Judge Grigsby kept cautioning me. It wasn’t the worst thing that happened to me, just one of the bad ones. He said if I couldn’t control my client’s behavior in court, he’d have to fine me.”