The Only Good Lawyer - Jeremiah Healy Read Online Free

sat down as the trap to
the corridor closed behind me, wondering if I'd know what that was
supposed to mean.
    * * *
    One look at Alan Spaeth, and I knew what it meant.
    He said, "You're the investigator Steve
Rothenberg called me about, right?"
    "Right." We shook hands. "John Cuddy."
    "And you're wondering where I got this, too."
    Spaeth put an index finger to his left eye, the
purple-and-ocher blotch of a shiner not quite closing it, the
knuckles on both hands bruised and scabbed. Standing, Spaeth was
about six feet in plastic shoes, maybe a hundred-ninety under the
one-piece jumpsuit with no pockets. Only late thirties, his unshaven
cheeks were already jowls and sagging a little loosely, as though
jail chow wasn't agreeing with him. He had a wide, greedy mouth, and
a nose that showed more nostrils than bridge. His hair was black and
curly to the point of clotted, despite yesterday's "shower."
    I said, "What happened?"
    Spaeth grinned cruelly, though he must have hurt the
eye area some to do it. "End of the housing unit, we got five
showers. Five for all fifty of us in there. When it was my turn
yesterday, one nigger thought he was tough decided to whale on me
account of he heard I killed this nigger lawyer." A grunt. "He
found out I was tougher."
    "Three's the charm, Spaeth."
    A confused expression. "What?"
    "You've used the 'N'-word twice. I hear it a
third time, and you'll be sitting by yourself."
    "Hey, sport, who the fuck's paying the tab
here?"
    "Steve Rothenberg, if I decide to help him with
this case."
    Spaeth chewed on that. Literally, from the way his
jowls worked. Then his chin dropped to his chest. "Look, this
thing's got me all screwed up. I don't like what I'm learning about
'jailing' here, and so I'm showing off, trying not to act . . .
scared. But I am." Spaeth's head came back up. "Christ, I'm
scared shitless."
    A little twinge in my gut. "Okay. Here's the
deal. I'm talking to you because Steve asked me to. You tell me your
side of things, and I go back to him with whether or not I'm on
board. Clear?"
    Alan Spaeth straightened some in his chair, the
bruised hands folding themselves on the butcher block. "Clear."
    "Where do we start?"
    "How about with, I didn't kill the bastard."
    "I heard you threatened to."
    "What, at his law firm?"
    "If that was the only time."
    Spaeth raked a hand through his hair. "Look,
you're talking August, all right? Over two months ago. I was going
through a tough time. I mean, Gant's representing Nicole—my wife?"
    I nodded.
    "And he got this 'vacate the marital home' order
against me. Well, the company had laid me off from my marketing job
like three weeks before, so I had to go live in a boardinghouse. Try
to imagine that, sport. One day I'm coming home to this nice place in
West Roxbury I sweated blood to carry, and the next I'm sleeping with
the fucking derelicts in Southie."
    South Boston. "I grew up there."
    Spaeth put the hand to his face this time. "Christ,
I'm not doing such a good job of getting you on my side."
    Truth to tell, he wasn't. And yet . . . "That
day at his law firm, did you threaten to kill Woodrow Gant?"
    A nod before letting his hand fall back to the table.
"In front of like, I don't know, six, seven people. I really
made my fucking point." Spaeth looked up at me. "But you
gotta understand, he was fucking me over the coals, and he was
fucking . . ." Spaeth trailed off, shaking his head. "Fucking
me every way from Sunday. Poisoning Terry against me, too."
    "Terry's your son?"
    "Yeah, Terence, actually, after Nicole's father.
She got custody—so Terry could stay in the house and keep with the
same school. Not the school where she teaches, that's not . . .
That's not important. What is important is that Gant tells Terry,
'Look, your father has visitation rights, but that doesn't mean you
have to see him! The kid's fourteen, so the judge leaves it up to
him, but meanwhile Gant's poisoning my own son against me."
    Sounded like more motive, not less. "Back