The Advocate's Devil Read Online Free Page B

have to try
     to understand. I was brought up in a different world. We never talked about those kinds of things. I’m not good at it. If
     you have to talk to someone, could you talk to Rendi?”
    “Dad, that’s the whole point. I don’t want to talk to Rendi. I mean, I love Rendi and I’m glad you two are, you know, well,
     whatever it is you two are, but I need a parent to talk to.” Emma paused. “You don’t know how it feels to grow up without
     Mom.”
    Oh, yes, I do, little one, Abe said to himself. He had hardly been a grown-up himself when Hannah had died. At least that’s
     what he thought looking back on it now. These were not emotions he could share with Emma. Or anyone. Abe had worked hard to
     keep himself one step removed from the rest of the world. It was part of the advocate’s territory. And perhaps more to the
     point, it served to remove him from the never-ending pain over losing Hannah. Seeing his daughter’s face, her eyes like Hannah’s,
     suddenly glinting with the tears that came so quickly in adolescence, he realized that he couldn’t use his distancing tactic
     with her.
    Abe glanced at the old-fashioned watch his father had given him as a Bar Mitzvah gift. “You have only so much time on this
     earth,” his father had said. “Always make the most of it. Don’t waste a precious minute. You’ll never get it back.”
    Abe had lived by those words. He was one of those people who was always doing something productive. He squeezed a tennis ball
     to strengthen his hands as he read a good novel, listened to classical music while enjoying his art. Abe was something of
     an overachiever, a man who tried hard to do the right thing, even though he sometimes had difficulty figuring out what the
     right thing was these days. He yearned for the black-and-white simplicity of his youth and even his young adulthood. During
     the late 1960s and early 1970s he really thought he was at peace with himself about the moral issues of the day. Then along
     came the feminists, the radicals, the black separatists, the gay activists. Part of him resented these young upstarts for
     complicating his life, for making new and sometimes incomprehensible demands on his moral bank account. Even his own daughter
     confused him. “Isn’t it time for you to be off to school?”
    “Yeah, I guess….” Emma was small-boned, and when her thoughts grew cloudy, her whole face seemed to close down. These were
     the times Abe would have lain down and died for her, if only she would smile. “Come on, kid, what’s bugging you?
    Without a word, Emma came over and hugged her father. Not knowing if Jon still liked her was what was eating her—not knowing
     why he hadn’t telephoned last night and feeling too proud to call any of her friends to talk about it, not wanting the hurt
     to show. That was bothering her. And her difficulty with calculus was really bothering her. And her painful period. Everything
     was bothering her, and she didn’t know how to get started. If she did get started, would her father even listen? That’s the
     way it always was. He’d give her attention for a minute and then he’d be off, to the office, to the phone, to his briefs,
     to wherever he went when he wasn’t being her father.
    Over the years Emma had learned the secret passageways to Abe’s soul. Either she had to provoke him, as she was doing this
     morning, or she had to engage his lawyer’s mind, as she had done several months earlier while Abe was totally focused on a
     murder trial.
    The case involved a businessman named Hamilton who had taken out a life insurance policy on his partner ten days before the
     partner was gunned down by a professional hit man. The DA was finding it easy to persuade the jury that the timing could not
     possibly be coincidental, and Abe had been racking his mind for an answer. Emma, finding that she simply couldn’t get his
     attention, had decided to try to help him figure out a commonsense