Instinctively, he bolted upright, shocked by the suggestion. “Of course not!”

“Sorry, but these things do happen. I guess I should frisk you.” Cristano looked him up and down quickly. Hoppy was horrified at the thought of being fondled by this stranger, alone on a boat.

“I swear I am not wired, okay,” Hoppy said, so firmly that he was proud of himself. Cristano's face relaxed. “You wanna frisk me?” he asked. Hoppy glanced around to see if anyone was within view. Look sorta odd, wouldn't it? Two grown men rubbing each other in broad daylight on an anchored boat?

“Are you wired?” Hoppy asked.

“No.”

“Swear?”

“I swear.”

“Good.” Hoppy was relieved and quite anxious to believe the man. The alternative was simply unthinkable.

Cristano smiled then abruptly frowned. He leaned in. The small talk was over. “I'll be brief, Hoppy. We have a deal for you, a deal which will enable you to walk away from this without a scratch. Nothing. No arrest, no indictment, no trial, no prison. No face in the newspaper. In fact, Hoppy, no one will ever know.”

He paused to catch his breath, and Hoppy charged in. “So far so good. I'm listening.”

“It's a bizarre deal, one we've never attempted. Has nothing to do with law and justice and punishment, nothing like that. It's a political deal, Hoppy. Purely political. There'll be no record of it in Washington. No one will ever know, except for me, you, those two guys waiting by the car, and less than ten people deep inside Justice. We cut the deal, you do your part, and everything is forgotten.”

“You got it. Just point me in the right direction.”

“Are you concerned about crime, drugs, law and order, Hoppy?”

“Of course.”

“Are you sick of graft and corruption?”

Odd question. At this very moment, Hoppy felt like the poster child for the campaign against corruption. “Yes!”

“There are good guys and bad guys in Washing-tori, Hoppy. There are those of us at Justice who've devoted our lives to fighting crime. I mean serious crime, Hoppy. I mean drug payoffs to judges and congressmen who take money from foreign enemies, criminal activity that could threaten (our democracy. Know what I mean?”

If Hoppy didn't know for sure, then he certainly was sympathetic to Cristano and his fine friends in Washington. “Yes, yes,” he said, hanging'on every word.

“But everything's political these days, Hoppy. We're constantly fighting with Congress and we're fighting with the President. Do you know what we need in Washington, Hoppy?”

Whatever it was, Hoppy wanted them to have it.

Cristano didn't give him the chance to answer.

“We need more Republicans, more good, conservative Republicans who'll give us money and get out of our way. The Democrats are always meddling, always threatening budget cuts, restructuring, always concerned about the rights of these poor criminals we're picking on. There's a war raging up there, Hoppy. We fight it every day.”

He looked at Hoppy as if he should say something, but Hoppy was momentarily trying to adjust to the war. He nodded gravely, then looked at his feet.

“We have to protect our friends, Hoppy, and this is where you come in.”

“Okay.”

“Again, this is a strange deal. Take it, and our tape of you bribing Mr, Moke will be destroyed.”

“I'll take the deal. Just tell me what it is.”

Cristano paused and looked up and down the pier. Some fishermen were making noises far away. He leaned closer and actually touched Hoppy on the knee. “It's about your wife,” he said, almost under his breath, then reared back to let it sink in.

“My wife?”

“Yes. Your wife.”

“Millie?”

“That's her.”

“What the hell—”

“I'll explain.”

“Millie?” Hoppy was flabbergasted. What could sweet Millie have to do with a mess like this?

“It's the trial, Hoppy,” Cristano said, and the first piece of the puzzle plunged roughly into place.

“Guess who contributes the most money to Republican congressional candidates?”

Hoppy was too stunned and confused to offer an intelligent guess.

“That's right. The tobacco companies. They pour millions into races because they're afraid of the PDA and they're fed up with government regulations. They're free-enterprise people, Hoppy, same as you. They believe people smoke because they choose to smoke, and they're sick of the government and the trial lawyers trying to run them out of business.”

“It is political,” Hoppy said, staring at the Gulf in disbelief.

“Nothing but politics. If Big Tobacco loses this trial, then there will be an avalanche of litigation the likes of which this country has never seen. The companies will lose billions, and we'll lose millions in Washington. Can you help us, Hoppy?”

Jolted back to reality, Hoppy could only manage, “Say what?”

“Can you help us?”

“Sure, I guess, but how?”

“Millie. You talk to your wife, make sure she understands how senseless and how dangerous this case is. She needs to take charge in that jury room, Hoppy. She needs to stand her ground against those liberals on the jury who might want to bring back a big verdict. Can you do it?”

“Of course I can.”

“But will you, Hoppy? We don't want to use the tape, okay. You help us, and the tape goes down the toilet.”

Hoppy suddenly remembered the tape. “Yeah, you gotta deal. I'll see her tonight, as a matter of fact.”

“Go to work on her. It's terribly important-important for us at Justice, for the good of the country, and, of course, it'll keep you outta prison for five years.” Cristano delivered the last line with a horselaugh and a slap on the knee. Hoppy laughed too.

They talked about strategy for half an hour. The longer they sat on the boat, the more questions Hoppy had. What if Millie voted with the tobacco company but the rest of the jury disagreed and delivered a big verdict? What would happen to Hoppy then?

Cristano promised to hold his end of the deal regardless of the verdict, as long as Millie voted right.

Hoppy virtually skipped along the pier as they returned to the car. He was a new man when he saw Napier and Nitchman.

AFTER DELIBERATING on his decision for three days, Judge Harkin reversed himself late Saturday and decided the jurors would not be permitted to attend their churches Sunday. He was convinced all fourteen would suddenly possess an amazing desire to commune with the Holy Spirit, and the idea of them fanning out to all parts of the county was simply unworkable. He called his minister, who in turn made more calls, and a young divinity student was located. A chapel service was planned for eleven o'clock Sunday morning, in the Party Room at the Siesta Inn.

Judge Harkin sent a personal note to each juror. The notes were slid under their doors before they returned from New Orleans Saturday night.

Six people attended the service, a rather dull affair. Mrs. Gladys Card was there, in a surprisingly nasty mood for the Sabbath. She hadn't missed Sunday School at the Calvary Baptist Church in sixteen years, the last absence caused by the death of her sister in Baton Rouge. Sixteen straight years without a miss. She had the Perfect Attendance Pins lined up on her dresser. Esther Knoblach in the Women's Mission Union had twenty-two years, the current record at Calvary, but she was seventy-nine and was afflicted with high blood pressure. Gladys was sixty-three, in fine health, and thus considered Esther catchable. She couldn't admit this to anyone, but everyone at Calvary suspected it.

But now she'd blown it, thanks to Judge Harkin, a man she didn't like from the start and now despised. And she didn't like the divinity student either.

Rikki Coleman came in a jogging suit. Millie Du-pree brought her Bible. Loreen Duke was a devout churchgoer, but was appalled at the brevity of the service. On at eleven and over by eleven-thirty, typical hurried style of white folks. She'd heard of such foolishness, but had never worshiped in such a manner. Her pastor never got to the pulpit before one, and often didn't leave it until three, when they broke for lunch, which they ate on the grounds if the weather was nice, then trooped back inside for another dose. She nibbled on a sweet roll and suffered in silence.

Mr. and Mrs. Herman Grimes attended, not through any calling of faith but because the walls in Room 58 were closing in. Herman in particular had not voluntarily gone to church since childhood.

Throughout the course of the morning, it had come to be known that Phillip Savelle was angered at the notion of worship. He told someone he was an atheist, and this news had spread in a flash. To protest, he positioned himself on his bed, apparently nude or certainly close to it, folded and tucked his wiry legs and arms into some type of yoga drill, and hollered chants at full volume. He did this with the door open.

He could be heard faintly in the Party Room, during the service, and this no doubt was a factor in the young divinity student's rather hastened wrap-up and benediction.

Lou Dell marched down the first time to tell Savelle to shut up, but backed away quickly when she noticed Savelle's nakedness. Willis tried next, but Savelle kept his eyes closed and his mouth open and simply ignored the deputy. Willis kept his distance.

The nonworshiping jurors hunkered down behind locked doors and watched loud televisions.

At two, the first relatives began to arrive with fresh clothing and supplies for the week. Nicholas Easter was the only juror with no close contact on the outside. It was determined by Judge Harkin that Willis would drive Easter in a squad car to his apartment.

The fire had been out for several hours. The trucks and firemen were long gone. The narrow front lawn and sidewalk in front of the building were strewn with charred debris and piles of soggy clothing. Neighbors milled about, stunned, but busily going about the cleanup.

“Which one's yours?” Willis asked as he stopped the car and gaped at the burnt crater in the center of the building.

“Up there,” Nicholas said, trying to point and nod at the same time. His knees were weak as he left the car and walked to the first cluster of people, a family of Vietnamese who were mutely studying a melted plastic table lamp.

“When did this happen?” he asked. The air was thick with the acrid smell of freshly burnt wood and paint and carpet.

They said nothing.

“This morning, about eight,” answered a woman as she walked by with a heavy cardboard box. Nicholas looked at the people and realized he didn't know a single name. In the small foyer, a busy lady with a clipboard was scribbling notes while talking on a cellphone. The main staircase to the second level was guarded by a private security guard who at the moment was helping an elderly woman drag a wet throw rug down the steps.

“Do you live here?” the woman asked when she finished her conversation.

“Yes. Easter, in 312.”

“Wow. Totally destroyed. That's probably where it started.”

“I'd like to see it.”

The security guard led Nicholas and the woman up the steps to the second floor, where the damage was quite apparent. They stopped at a yellow caution tape at the edge of the crater. The fire had gone upward, through the plaster ceilings and cheap rafters, and had managed to burn two large holes in the roof, directly over the spot where his bedroom used to be, as far as he could tell. And it had burned downward, severely damaging the apartment directly under him. Nothing was left of number 312, except for the kitchen wall, where the sink hung by one end and seemed ready to fall. Nothing. No sign of the cheap furniture in the den, no sign of the den itself. Nothing from the bedroom except blackened walls.

And, to his horror, no computer.

Virtually all the floors, ceilings, and walls of the apartment had vanished, leaving nothing but a gaping hole.

“Anybody hurt?” Nicholas asked softly.

“No. Were you home?” she asked.

“No. Who are you?”

“I'm with the management company. I have some forms for you to fill out.”

They returned to the foyer where Nicholas hurriedly did the paperwork and left with Willis.

Twenty-two

It was pointed out to Judge Harkin by Phillip Savelle, in a tersely worded, hardly legible message, that the word “conjugal” as denned by Webster covered husband and wife only, and he objected to the term. He did not have a wife, and had little regard for the institution of marriage. He suggested “Communal Interludes,” and he went on to bitch about the worship service held that morning. He faxed the letter to Harkin, who received it at home during the fourth quarter of the Saints game. Lou Dell arranged the fax through the front desk. Twenty minutes later she received a return fax from His Honor changing the word “conjugal” to “personal,” and relabeling the whole thing “Personal Visits.” He directed her to make copies for all jurors. Because it was Sunday, he threw in another hour, from 6 P. M. to 10, instead of 9. He then called her to ask what else Mr. Savelle might want, and inquired as to the general mood of his jury. Lou Dell just couldn't tell him about seeing Mr. Savelle all nude and perched on his bed like that. She figured the Judge had enough things to worry about. Everything was fine, she assured him.

Hoppy was the first guest to arrive and Lou Dell whisked him away quickly to Millie's room, where he once again delivered chocolates and a small bouquet of flowers. They kissed briefly on the cheeks, never considered anything conjugal, and lounged on the beds during “60 Minutes.” Hoppy slowly brought the conversation around to the trial, where he struggled to keep it for a while. “Just doesn't make sense, you know, for people to sue like this. I mean, it's silly, really. Everybody knows cigarettes are addictive and dangerous, so why smoke? Remember Boyd Dogan, smoked Salems for twenty-five years, quit just like that,” he said, snapping his fingers.

“Yeah, he quit five minutes after the doctor found that tumor on his tongue,” Millie reminded him, then added a mocking snap of her own.

“Yeah, but lots of people quit smoking. It's mind over matter. Not right to keep smoking then sue for millions when the damned things kill you.”

“Hoppy, your language.”

“Sorry.” Hoppy asked about the other jurors and their reactions so far to the plaintiff's case. Mr. Cris-tano thought it would be best to try and win Millie over with the merits, instead of terrorizing her with the truth. They'd talked about this over lunch. Hoppy felt treacherous plotting against his own wife, but each time the guilt hit him so did the thought of five years in prison.

Nicholas left his room during halftime of the Sunday-night game. The hall was empty of jurors and guards. Voices were heard in the Party Room, generally male voices it seemed. Once again the men drank beer and watched football while the women made the most of their personal visits and communal interludes.

He slid silently through the double glass doors at the end of the hallway, ducked around the corner, past the soft-drink machines, then bounded up the stairs to the second floor. Marlee was waiting in a room she'd paid cash for and registered under the name of Elsa Broome, one of her many aliases.

They went straight to bed, with a minimum of words and preliminaries. Both had agreed that eight consecutive nights apart was not only a record for them, but also unhealthy.

MARLEE MET NICHOLAS when both had other names. The point of contact was a bar in Lawrence, Kansas, where she worked as a waitress and he spent late nights with pals from law school. She had collected two degrees by the time she settled in Lawrence, and because she wasn't eager to initiate a career, she was pondering the option of law school, that great American baby-sitter for directionless postgrads. She was in no hurry. Her mother had died a few years before she met Nicholas, and Marlee had inherited almost two hundred thousand dollars. She served drinks because the hangout was cool and she would've been bored otherwise. It kept her in shape. She drove an old Jaguar, watched her money closely, and dated only law students.

They noticed each other long before they spoke. He'd come in late with a small group, the usual faces, sit in a booth in a corner, and debate abstract and incredibly boring legal theories. She'd deliver draft beer in pitchers, and try to flirt, with varying degrees of success. During his first year, he was enamored with the law and paid little attention to girls. She asked around and learned he was a good student, top third in his class, but nothing outstanding. He survived the first year and returned for the second. She cut her hair and lost ten pounds, though it wasn't necessary.

He had finished college and applied to thirty law schools. Eleven said yes, though none were top ten. He flipped a coin and drove to Lawrence, a place he'd never seen. He found a two-room apartment stuck to the rear of a spinster's crumbling house. He studied hard and had little time for a social life, at least during the first two semesters.

The summer after his first year he clerked for a large firm in Kansas City where he pushed interoffice mail from floor to floor with a cart. The firm had three hundred lawyers under one roof, and at times it seemed as though all were working on one trialthe defense of Smith Greer in a tobacco/lung cancer case down in Joplin. The trial lasted five weeks and ended with a defense verdict. Afterward, the firm threw a party and a thousand people showed up. Rumor was that the catered celebration cost Smith Greer eighty grand. Who cared? The summer was a miserable experience.

He hated the big firm, and midway through his second year he was fed up with the law in general. No way he would spend five years locked in a cubbyhole writing and rewriting the same briefs so rich corporate clients could be bilked.

Their first date was to a law school keg party after a football game. The music was loud, the beer plentiful, the pot passed around like candy. They left early because he didn't like noise and she didn't like the smell of cannabis. They rented videos and cooked spaghetti in her apartment, a rather spacious and well-furnished layout. He slept on the sofa.

A month later he moved in and first broached the subject of dropping out of law school. She was thinking about applying. As the romance blossomed, his interest in things academic diminished to the point of barely completing his fall exams. They were madly in love, and nothing else mattered. Plus, she had the benefit of a little cash, so the pressure was off. They spent Christmas in Jamaica between semesters of his second, and final, year.

By the time he quit, she'd been in Lawrence for three years, and was ready to move on. He would follow her anywhere.

MARLEE HAD BEEN ABLE to learn little about the fire Sunday afternoon. They suspected Fitch, but couldn't pinpoint a reason. The only asset of value was the computer, and Nicholas was certain no one could breach its security system. The important discs were locked away in a vault in Marlee's condo. What could Fitch gain by burning a run-down apartment? Intimidation maybe, but it didn't fit. Fire officials were conducting a routine investigation. Arson seemed unlikely.

They'd slept in finer places than the Siesta Inn, and they'd slept in -worse. In four years they'd lived in four towns, traveled to a half-dozen countries, seen most of North America, backpacked in Alaska and Mexico, rafted the Colorado twice, and floated the Amazon once. They had also tracked tobacco litigation, and that journey had forced them to set up housekeeping in places such as Broken Arrow, Allentown, and now Biloxi. Together, they knew more about nicotine levels, carcinogens, statistical probabilities of lung cancer, jury selection, trial tactics, and Rankin Fitch than any group of high-powered experts.

After an hour under the covers, a light came on beside the bed and Nicholas emerged, hair ruffled, reaching for clothing. Marlee got dressed and peeked through the shades at the parking lot.

Directly below them, Hoppy was trying his best to discount the scandalous revelations of Lawrence Krigler, testimony Millie seemed quite impressed with. She dished it out to Hoppy in heavy doses, and was puzzled by his desire to argue so much.

Just for the fun of it, Marlee had left her car parked on the street a half a block from the offices of Wendall Rohr. She and Nicholas were operating under the assumption that Fitch was following every move she made. It was amusing to imagine Fitch squirming with the idea that she was in there, in Rohr's office, actually meeting with him face-to-face and agreeing to who knew what. For the personal visit, she had arrived in a rental car, one of several she'd used in the past month.

Nicholas was suddenly weary of the room, an exact replica of the one he was confined to. They went for a long drive along the Coast; she drove, he sipped beer. They walked down a pier above the Gulf, and kissed as the water rocked gently below them. They talked little of the trial.

At ten-thirty, Marlee emerged from the car at a point two blocks from Rohr's office. As she walked hurriedly along the sidewalk, Nicholas followed nearby. Her car was parked alone. Joe Boy saw her get into it and radioed Konrad. After she drove away, Nicholas hurried back to the motel in the rental car.

Rohr was in the midst of a heated council meeting, the daily gathering of the eight trial lawyers who'd put up a million each. The issue Sunday night was the number of witnesses left to be called by the plaintiff, and as usual, there were eight separate opinions about what to do next. Two schools of thought, but eight very firm and very different inclinations about precisely what would be effective.

Including the three days spent selecting the jury, the trial was now three weeks old. Tomorrow would start week four, and the plaintiff had enough experts and other witnesses to go on for at least two more weeks. Cable had his own army of experts, though typically the defense in these cases used less than half the time of the plaintiff. Six weeks was a reasonable prediction, which meant the jury would be sequestered for almost four weeks, a scenario that troubled everyone. At some point the jury would rebel, and since the plaintiff used the bulk of the court time, the plaintiff had the most to lose. But on the other hand, since the defense went last, and the jury would tire at the end, then perhaps the jury's venom would be aimed at Cable and Pynex. This argument raged for an hour.

Wood v. Pynex was unique because it was the first tobacco trial featuring a sequestered jury. It was, in fact, the first sequestered civil jury in the history of the state. Rohr was of the opinion that the jury had heard enough. He wanted to call only two more witnesses, finish their case by noon Tuesday, then rest and wait for Cable. He was joined by Scotty Man-grum of Dallas and Andre Durond of New Orleans.

Jonathan Kotlack of San Diego wanted three more witnesses.

The opposing view was vigorously pushed by John Riley Milton of Denver and Rayner Lovelady of Savannah. Since they'd spent so damned much money on the world's greatest collection of experts, why be in a hurry, they argued. There remained some crucial testimony from outstanding witnesses. The jury wasn't going anywhere. Sure they'd get tired, but didn't every jury? It was far safer to stick to the game plan and try the case thoroughly than to jump ship in midstream because a few jurors were getting bored.

Carney Morrison of Boston harped repeatedly on the weekly summaries from the jury consultants. This jury was not convinced! Under Mississippi law, it would take nine of the twelve to get a verdict. Morrison was certain they didn't have nine. Rohr especially paid little attention to the current analyses of how Jerry Fernandez rubbed his eyes and how Loreen Duke shifted her weight and how poor old Herman twisted at the neck when Dr. So-and-So was testifying. Frankly, Rohr was sick of the jury experts and especially sick of the obscene sums of money they were getting. It was one thing to have their assistance while investigating potential jurors. It was a far different matter to have them lurking everywhere during the trial, always anxious to prepare a daily report to tell the lawyers how the case was trying. Rohr could read a jury far better than any consultant.

Arnold Levine of Miami said little because the group knew his feelings. He'd once taken on General Motors in a trial that lasted eleven months, so six weeks was a warm-up for him.

There was no coin toss when the vote was even. It had been agreed long before jury selection that this was Wendall Rohr's trial, filed in his hometown, fought in his courtroom before his judge and his jurors. The plaintiff's trial council was a democratic body to a point, but Rohr had veto power which could not be overridden.

He made his decision late Sunday, and the serious egos left bruised but not permanently damaged. There was too much at stake for bickering and second-guessing.

Twenty-three

The first order of business Monday morning was a private meeting between Judge Harkin and Nicholas, the topic being the fire and his well-being. They met alone in chambers. Nicholas assured him he was fine and had enough clothing at the motel to wash and rewash. He was just a student with little to lose, with the exception of a fine computer and some expensive surveillance equipment, all of which was, of course, uninsured along with everything else.

The fire was dispensed with quickly, and since they were alone Harkin asked, “So how are the rest of our friends doing?” Chatting off the record like this with a juror was not improper, but was certainly in the gray area of trial procedure. The better practice was to have the lawyers present and to record every word with a court reporter. But Harkin wanted just a few minutes of gossip. He could trust this kid.

“Everything's fine,” Nicholas said.

“Nothing unusual?”

“Not that I can think of.”

“Is the case being discussed?”

“No. In fact, when we're together, we try to avoid it.”

“Good. Any spats or squabbles?”

“Not yet.”

“Food's okay?”

“Food's fine.”

“Enough personal visits?”

“I think so. I haven't heard any complaints.”

Harkin would have loved to know if there was any hanky-panky among the jurors, not that it would carry any legal significance. He just had a dirty mind. “Good. Let me know if there's a problem. And let's keep this quiet.”

“Sure,” Nicholas said. They shook hands and he left.

Harkin greeted the jurors warmly and welcomed them back for another week. They seemed eager to get to work and finish this ordeal.

Rohr rose and called Leon Robilio as the next witness, and the players settled down to business. Leon was led from a side door into the courtroom. He shuffled gingerly in front of the bench to the witness stand, where the deputy assisted him in having a seat. He was old and pale, dressed in a dark suit, white shirt, no tie. He had a hole in his throat, an opening covered by a thin white dressing and camouflaged with a white linen neckerchief. When he swore to tell the truth, he did so by holding a pencil-like mike to his neck. The words were the flat, pitchless monotone of a throat cancer victim without a larynx.

But the words were audible and understandable. Mr. Robilio held the microphone close to his throat and his voice rattled around the courtroom. This was how he talked, dammit, and he did so every day of his life. He meant to be understood.

Rohr got quickly to the point. Mr. Robilio was sixty-four years old, a cancer survivor who'd lost his voice box eight years earlier and had learned to talk through his esophagus. He had smoked heavily for nearly forty years, and his habits had almost killed him. Now, in addition to the aftereffects of the cancer, he suffered from heart disease and emphysema. All because of the cigarettes.

His listeners quickly adjusted to his amplified, robotlike voice. He grabbed their attention for good when he told them he'd made his living for two decades as a lobbyist for the tobacco industry. He quit the job when he got cancer and realized that even with the disease he couldn't stop smoking. He was addicted, physically and psychologically addicted to the nicotine in cigarettes. For two years after his larynx was removed and the chemotherapy ravaged his body, he continued to smoke. He finally quit after a near-fatal heart attack.

Though obviously in bad health, he still worked full-time in Washington, but now he was on the other side of the fence. He had the reputation of a fiercely committed antismoking activist. A guerrilla, some called him.

In a prior life, he had been employed at the Tobacco Focus Council. “Which was nothing more than a slick lobbying outfit funded entirely by the industry,” he said with disdain. “Our mission was to advise the tobacco companies on current legislation and attempts to regulate them. We had a fat budget with unlimited resources to wine and dine influential politicians. We played hardball, and we taught other tobacco apologists the ins and outs of political fistfighting.”

At the Council, Robilio had access to countless studies of cigarettes and the tobacco industry. In fact, part of the mission of the Council was the meticulous assimilation of all known studies, projects, experiments. Yes, Robilio had seen the infamous nicotine memo Krigler had described. He'd seen it many times, though he did not keep a copy. It was well known at the Council that all tobacco companies kept nicotine at high levels to ensure addiction.

Addiction was a word Robilio used over and over. He'd seen studies paid for by the companies in which all sorts of animals had been quickly addicted to cigarettes through nicotine. He'd seen and helped hide studies proving beyond any doubt that once young teenagers were hooked on cigarettes the rates of kicking the habit were much lower. They became customers for life.

Rohr produced a box of thick reports for Robilio to identify. The studies were admitted into evidence, as if the jurors would find the time to plow through ten thousand pages of documents before making their decision.

Robilio regretted many things he'd done as a lobbyist, but his greatest sin, one he struggled with daily, had been the artfully worded denials he'd issued claiming the industry did not target teenagers through advertising. “Nicotine is addictive. Addiction means profits. The survival of tobacco depends upon each new generation picking up the habit. Kids receive mixed messages through advertising. The industry spends billions portraying cigarettes as cool and glamorous, even harmless. Kids get hooked easier, and stay hooked longer. So it's imperative to seduce the young.” Robilio managed to convey bitterness through his man-made voice box. And he managed to sneer at the defense table while looking warmly at the jurors.

“We spent millions studying kids. We knew that they could name the three most heavily advertised brands of cigarettes. We knew that almost ninety percent of the kids under eighteen who smoked preferred the top three advertised brands. So what did the companies do? They increased the advertising.”

“Did you know how much money the tobacco companies were making off cigarette sales to children?” Rohr asked, certain of the answer.

“About two hundred million a year. And that's in sales to kids eighteen or under. Of course we knew. We studied it annually, kept our computers filled with the data. We knew everything.” He paused and waved his right hand at the defense table, sneering as if it were surrounded by lepers. “They still know. They know that three thousand kids start smoking every day, and they can give you an accurate breakdown of the brands they're buying. They know that virtually all adult smokers began as teenagers. Again, they have to hook the next generation. They know that one third of the three thousand kids who sjtart smoking today will eventually die from their addiction.”

The jury was captivated with Robilio. Rohr flipped pages for a second so the drama wouldn't be rushed. He took a few steps back and forth behind the lectern as if his legs needed limbering. He scratched his chin, looked at the ceiling, then asked, “When you were with the Tobacco Focus Council, how did you counter the arguments that nicotine is addictive?”

“The tobacco companies have a party line; I helped formulate it. It goes something like this: Smokers choose the habit. So it's a matter of choice. Cigarettes are not addictive, but, hey, even if they are, no one forces anybody to smoke. It's all a matter of choice.

“I could make this sound real good, back in those days. And they make it sound good today. Trouble is, it's not true.”

“Why isn't it true?”

“Because the issue is addiction, and the addict cannot make choices. And kids become addicted much quicker than adults.”

Rohr for once avoided the natural lawyerly compulsion of overkill. Robilio was efficient with words, and the strain of being clear and being heard tired him after an hour and a half. Rohr tendered him to Cable for cross-examination, and Judge Harkin, who needed coffee, called a recess.

Hoppy Dupree made his first visit to the trial Monday morning, slipping into the courtroom midway through Robilio's testimony. Millie caught his eye during a lull, and was thrilled he would stop by. His sudden interest in the trial was odd, though. He'd talked of nothing else for four hours last night.

After a twenty-minute coffee break, Cable stepped to the lectern and tore into Robilio. His tone was strident, almost mean, as if he viewed the witness as a traitor to the cause, a turncoat. Cable scored immediately with the revelation that Robilio was being paid to testify, and that he had sought out the plaintiff's lawyers. He was also on retainer in two other tobacco cases;• “Yes, I'm being paid to be here, Mr. Cable, same as you,” Robilio said, delivering the typical expert's response. But the stain of money slightly tainted his character.

Cable got him to confess that he started smoking when he was almost twenty-five, married, with two children, hardly a teenager who could've been seduced by slick work from Madison Avenue. Robilio had a temper, a fact proven to all the lawyers during a two-day marathon deposition five months earlier, and Cable was determined to exploit it. His questions were sharp, rapid, and designed to provoke.

“How many children do you have?” Cable asked.

“Three.”

“Did any of them ever smoke cigarettes regularly?”

“Yes.”

“How many?”

“Three.”

“How old were they when they started?”

“It varies.”

“On the average?”

“Late teens.”

“Which ads do you blame for getting them hooked on cigarettes?”

“I don't recall exactly.”

“You can't tell the jury which ads were responsible for getting your own kids hooked on cigarettes?”

“There were so many ads. Still are. It would be impossible to pinpoint one or two or five that worked.”

“So it was the ads?”

“I'm sure the ads were effective. Still are.”

“So it was somebody else's fault?”

“I didn't encourage their smoking.”

“Are you sure? You're telling this jury that your own children, the children of a man whose job for twenty years was to encourage the world to smoke, began smoking because of slick advertising?”

“I'm sure the ads helped. They were designed to.”

“Did you smoke in the home, in front of your children?”

“Yes.”

“Did your wife?”

“Yes.”

“Did you ever tell a guest he couldn't smoke in your home?”

“No. Not then.”

“Safe to say, then, that the environment of your home was smoker friendly?”

“Yes. Then.”

“But your children started smoking because of devious advertising? Is that what you're telling this jury?”

Robilio took a deep breath, counted slowly to five, then said, “I wish I'd done a lot of things differently, Mr. Cable. I wish I'd never picked up the first cigarette.”

“Did your children stop smoking?”

“Two of them did. With great difficulty. The third has been trying to quit for ten years now.”

Cable had asked the last question on an impulse, and wished for a second he hadn't. Time to move on. He shifted gears. “Mr. Robilio, are you aware of efforts by the tobacco industry to curb teenage smoking?”

Robilio chuckled, which sounded like a gargle when amplified through his little mike. “No serious efforts,” he said.

“Forty million dollars last year to Smoke Free Kids?”

“Sounds like something they'd do. Makes 'em seem warm and fuzzy, doesn't it?”

“Are you aware that the industry is on record supporting legislation to restrict vending machines in areas where kids congregate?”

“I think I've heard of that. Sounds lovely, doesn't it?”

“Are you aware that the industry last year gave ten million dollars to California for a statewide kindergarten program designed to warn youngsters about underage smoking?”

“No. What about overage smoking? Did they tell the little fellas that it was okay to smoke after their eighteenth birthdays? Probably did.”

Cable had a checklist, and seemed content to fire off the questions while ignoring the answers.

“Are you aware that the industry supports a bill in Texas to ban smoking in all fast-food establishments, places frequented by teenagers?”

“Yeah, and do you know why they do things like that? I'll tell you why. So they can hire people like you to tell jurors like these about it. That's the only reason-it sounds good in court.”

“Are you aware that the industry is on record supporting legislation which imposes criminal penalties against convenience stores which sell tobacco products to minors?”

“Yeah, I think I heard that one too. It's window dressing. They'll drop a few bucks here and there to preen and posture and buy respectability. They'll do this because they know the truth, and the truth is that two billion dollars a year in advertising will guarantee addiction by the next generation. And you're a fool if you don't believe this.”

Judge Harkin leaned forward. “Mr. Robilio, that is uncalled-for. Don't do it again. I want it stricken from the record.”

“Sorry, Your Honor. And sorry to you, Mr. Cable. You're just doing your job. It's your client I can't stand.”

Cable was thrown off track. He offered up a lame “Why?” and wished immediately he'd kept his mouth shut.

“Because they're so devious. These tobacco people are bright, intelligent, educated, ruthless, and they'll look you in the face and tell you with all sincerity that cigarettes are not addictive. And they know it's a lie.”

“No further questions,” Cable said, halfway to his table.

GARDNER WAS A TOWN of eighteen thousand an hour from Lubbock. Pamela Blanchard lived in the old section of town, two blocks off Main Street in a house built at the turn of the century and nicely renovated. Brilliant red and gold maple trees covered the front lawn. Children roamed the street on bikes and skateboards.

By ten Monday, Fitch knew the following: She was married to the president of a local bank, a man who'd been married once before and whose wife had died ten years ago. He was not the father of Nicholas Easter or Jeff or whoever the hell he was. The bank had almost collapsed during the oil bust of the early eighties, and many locals were still afraid to use it. Pamela's husband was a native of the town. She was not. She may have come from Lubbock, or maybe it was Amarillo. They got married in Mexico eight years ago, and the local weekly barely recorded it. No wedding picture. Just an announce JOHNGRISHAM ment next to the obituaries that N. Forrest Blanchard, Jr., had married Pamela Kerr. After a brief honeymoon in Cozumel, they would reside in Gardner.

The best source in town was a private investigator named Rafe who'd been a cop for twenty years and claimed to know everyone. Rafe, after being paid a sizable retainer in cash, worked without sleep Sunday night. No sleep, but plenty of bourbon, and by dawn he reeked of sour mash. Dante and Joe Boy worked beside him, in his grungy office on Main, and repeatedly declined the whiskey.

Rafe talked to every cop in Gardner, and finally found one who could talk to a lady who lived across the street from the Blanchards. Bingo. Pamela had two sons by a previous marriage; it ended in divorce. She didn't talk much about them, but one was in Alaska and one was a lawyer, or was studying to be a lawyer. Something like that.

Since neither son grew up in Gardner, the trail soon ran cold. No one knew them. In fact, Rafe couldn't find anyone who'd ever seen Pamela's sons. Then Rafe called his lawyer, a sleazy divorce specialist who routinely used Rafe's primitive surveillance services, and the lawyer knew a secretary at Mr. Blanchard's bank. The secretary talked to Mr. Blanchard's personal secretary, and it was discovered that Pamela was from neither Lubbock nor Amarillo, but Austin. She'd worked there for a bankers' association, and that's how she'd met Mr. Blanchard. The secretary knew of the prior marriage, and was of the opinion that it had ended many years ago. No, she had never seen Pamela's sons. Mr. Blanchard never discussed them. The couple lived quietly and almost never entertained.

Fitch received reports every hour from Dante and Joe Boy. Late Monday morning, he called an acquaintance in Austin, a man he'd worked with six years earlier in a tobacco trial in Marshall, Texas. It was an emergency, Fitch explained. Within minutes, a dozen investigators were scouring phone books and making calls. It wasn't long before the bloodhounds picked up the trail.

Pamela Kerr had been an executive secretary for the Texas Bankers Association, in Austin. One phone call led to another, and a former co-worker was located working as a private school guidance counselor. Using the ruse that Pamela was a prospective juror in a capital murder case in Lubbock, the investigator described himself as an assistant district attorney who was trying to gather legitimate information about the jurors. The co-worker felt obligated to answer a few questions, though she hadn't seen or talked to Pamela in years.

Pamela had two sons, Jeff and Alex. Alex was two years older than Jeff, and had graduated from high school in Austin, then drifted to Oregon. Jeff had also finished high school in Austin, with honors, then gone to college at Rice. The boys' father had abandoned the family when they were toddlers, and Pamela had done an outstanding job as a single mother.

Dante, fresh off the private jet, accompanied an investigator to the high school, where they were allowed to rummage through old yearbooks in the library. Jeff Kerr's 1985 senior picture was in color-a blue tux, large blue bow tie, short hair, earnest face looking directly at the camera, the same face Dante had studied for hours in Biloxi. Without hesitation he said, “This is our man,” then quietly ripped the page from the yearbook. He immediately called Fitch on a cellphone from between the stacked tiers of books.

Three phone calls to Rice revealed that Jeff Kerr graduated there in 1989 with a degree in psychology. Posing as a representative from a prospective employer, the caller found a Rice professor of political science who'd taught and who remembered Kerr. He said the young man went to law school at Kansas.

With the guarantee of serious cash, Fitch found by phone a security firm willing to drop everything and began scouring Lawrence, Kansas, for any trace of Jeff Kerr.

FOR ONE normally so chipper, Nicholas was quite reserved during lunch. He didn't say a word as he ate a heavily stuffed baked potato from O'Reilly's. He avoided glances and looked downright sad.

The mood was shared. Leon Robilio's voice stayed with them, a robotic voice substituted for a real one lost to the ravages of tobacco, a robotic voice which delivered the sickening dirt he once helped hide. It still rang in their ears. Three thousand kids a day, one third of whom die from their addiction. Gotta hook the next generation!

Loreen Duke tired of picking at her chicken salad. She looked across the table at Jerry Fernandez, and said, “Can I ask you something?” Her voice broke a weary silence.

“Sure,” he said.

“How old were you when you started smoking?”

“Fourteen.”

“Why did you start?”

“The Marlboro Man. Every kid I hung around with smoked Marlboros. We were country kids, liked horses and rodeos. The Marlboro Man was too cool to resist.”

At that moment, every juror could see the billboards-the rugged face, the chin, the hat, the horse, the worn leather, maybe the mountains and some snow, the independence of lighting up a Marlboro while the world left him alone. Why wouldn't a young boy of fourteen want to be the Marlboro Man?

“Are you addicted?” asked Rikki Coleman, playing with her usual fat-free plate of lettuce and boiled turkey. The “addicted” rolled off her tongue as if they were discussing heroin.

Jerry thought for a moment and realized his friends were listening. They wanted to know what powerful urges kept a person hooked.

“I don't know,” he said. “I guess I could quit. I've tried a few times. Sure would be nice to stop. Such a nasty habit.”

“You don't enjoy it?” Rikki asked.

“Oh, there are times when a cigarette hits the spot, but I'm doing two packs a day now and that's too much.”

“What about you, Angel?” Loreen asked Angel Weese, who sat next to her and generally said as little as possible. “How old were you when you started?”

“Thirteen,” Angel said, ashamed.

“I was sixteen,” Sylvia Taylor-Tatum admitted before anyone could ask.

“I started when I was fourteen,” Herman offered from the end in an effort at conversation. “Quit when I was forty.”

“Anybody else?” Rikki asked, finishing the confessional.

“I started at seventeen,” the Colonel said. “When I joined the Army. But I kicked the habit thirty years ago.” As usual, he was proud of his self-discipline.

“Anybody else?” Rikki asked again, after a long, silent pause.

“Me. I started when I was seventeen and quit two years later,” Nicholas said, though it was not true.

“Did anybody here start smoking after the age of eighteen?” Loreen asked.

Not a word.

NITCHMAN, in plain clothes, met Hoppy for a quick sandwich. Hoppy was nervous about being seen in public with an FBI agent, and was quite relieved when Nitchman appeared in jeans and a plaid shirt. Wasn't like Hoppy's pals and acquaintances around town could instantly spot the local feds, but he was still nervous nevertheless. Besides, Nitchman and Napier were from a special unit in Atlanta, they'd told Hoppy.

He replayed what he'd heard in court that morning, said the voiceless Robilio made quite an impression and seemed to have the jury in his pocket. Nitchman, not for the first time, professed little interest in the trial and explained again he was just doing what his bosses in Washington told him to do. He handed Hoppy a folded sheet of paper, plain white with tiny numbers and words scattered on the top and bottom, and said this had just come from Cristano at Justice. They wanted Hoppy to see it.

It was really a creation of Fitch's document people, two retired CIA boys who puttered around B. C. enjoying the mischief.

It was a faxed copy of a sinister-looking report on Leon Robilio. No source, no date, just four paragraphs under the ominous headline of CONFIDENTIAL MEMO. Hoppy read it quickly while chomping on trench fries. Robilio was being paid half a million dollars to testify. Robilio had been fired from the Tobacco Focus Council for embezzling funds; had even been indicted, though charges were later dropped. Robilio had a history of psychiatric problems. Robilio had sexually harassed two secretaries at the Council. Robilio's throat cancer had probably been caused by his alcoholism, and not by tobacco. Robilio was a notorious liar who hated the Council and was on a crusade of revenge.

“Wow,” Hoppy said, showing a mouthful of potatoes. T “Mr. Cristano thought you should sneak this to your wife,” Nitchman said. “She should show it only to those she can trust on the jury.”

“Right about that,” Hoppy said, quickly folding and stuffing it into a pocket. He looked around the crowded dining room as if he was completely guilty of something.

WORKING from law school yearbooks and the limited records the registrar would release, it was learned that Jeff Kerr enrolled as a first-year law student at Kansas in the fall of 1989. His unsmiling face appeared with the second-year class in 1991, but there was no trace of him after that. He did not receive a law degree.

He played rugby for the law school team his second year. A team photo showed him arm in arm with two pals-Michael Dale and Tom Ratliff-both of whom had finished law school the following year.

Dale was working for Legal Services in Des Moines. Ratliff was an associate for a firm in Wichita. Investigators were sent to both places.

Dante arrived in Lawrence and was taken to the law school, where he confirmed the identity of Kerr in the yearbooks. He spent an hour looking at faces from 1985 through 1994, and saw no female resembling the girl known as Marlee. It was a shot in the dark. Many law students . skipped the picture taking. Yearbooks were sophomoric. These were serious young adults. Dante's work was nothing but a series of shots in the dark.

Late Monday, the investigator named Small found Tom Ratliff hard at work in his tiny window-less office at Wise & Watkins, a large firm in downtown Wichita. They agreed to meet in a bar in an hour.

Small talked to Fitch and gathered as much background as he could, or as much as Fitch would give him. Small was an ex-cop with two ex-wives. His title was security specialist, which in Lawrence meant he did everything from motel watching to polygraph exams. He was not bright, and Fitch realized this immediately.

Ratliff arrived late and they ordered drinks. Small did his best to bluff and act knowledgeable. Ratliff was suspicious. He said little at first, which was what could be expected from a person unexpectedly asked by a stranger to talk about an old acquaintance.

“I haven't seen him in four years,” Ratliff said.

“Have you talked to him?”

“No. Not a word. He dropped out of school after our second year.”

“Were you close to him?”

“I knew him well our first year, but we were not the best of Mends. He withdrew after that. Is he in trouble?”

“No. Not at all.”

“Perhaps you should tell me why you're so interested.”

Small recited in general terms what Fitch had told him to say, got most of it right and it was close to the truth. Jeff Kerr was a prospective juror in a large trial somewhere, and he, Small, had been hired by one of the parties to dig through his background.

“Where's the trial?” Ratliff asked.

“I can't say. But I assure you, none of this is illegal. You're a lawyer. You understand.”

Indeed he did. Ratliff had spent most of his brief career slaving under a litigation partner. Jury research was a chore he'd already learned to hate. “How can I verify this?” he asked, like a real lawyer.

“I don't have the authority to divulge specifics about the trial. Let's do it like this. If I ask something which you think might be harmful to Kerr, then don't answer. Fair enough?”

“We'll give it a shot, okay? But if I get nervous, then I'm outta here.”

“Fair enough. Why did he quit law school?”

Ratliff took a sip of his beer and tried to remember. “He was a good student, very bright. But after the first year, he suddenly hated the idea of being a lawyer. He clerked in a firm that summer, a big firm in Kansas City, and it soured him. Plus, he fell in love.”

Fitch desperately wanted to know if there was a girl. “Who was the woman?” Small asked.

“Claire.”

“Claire who?”

Another sip. “I can't remember right now.”

“You knew her?”

“I knew who she was. Claire worked at a bar in downtown Lawrence, a college hangout favored by law students. I think that's where she met Jeff.”

“Could you describe her?”

“Why? I thought this was about Jeff.”

“I was asked to get a description of his girlfriend in law school. That's all I know.” Small shrugged as if he couldn't help it.

They studied each other for a bit. What the hell, thought Ratliff. He'd never see these people again. Jeff and Claire were distant memories anyway.

“Average height, about five six. Slender. Dark hair, brown eyes, pretty girl, all the bells and whistles.”

“Was she a student?”

“I'm not sure. I think maybe she had been. Maybe a grad student.”

“At KU?”

“I don't know.”

“What was the name of the hangout?”

“Mulligan's, downtown.”

Small knew it well. At times he went there himself to drown his worries and admire the college girls. “I've knocked back a few at Mulligan's,” he said.

“Yeah. I miss it,” Ratliff said wistfully.

“What did he do after he dropped out?”

“I'm not sure. I heard that he and Claire left town, but I never heard from him again.”

Small thanked him and asked if he could call him at the office if he had more questions. Ratliff said he was awfully busy, but give it a try.

Small's boss in Lawrence had a friend who knew the guy who'd owned Mulligan's for fifteen years. The advantages of a small town. Employment records weren't exactly confidential, especially for the owner of a bar who reported fewer than half of his cash sales. Her name was Claire Clement.

FITCH RUBBED his stubby hands together with glee as he took the news. He loved the chase. Marlee was now Claire, a woman with a past who'd worked hard to cover it up.

“Know thine enemy,” he said aloud to his walls. The first rule of warfare.

Twenty-four

The numbers returned with a vengeance Monday afternoon. The messenger was an economist, a man trained to look at the life of Jacob Wood and put a concise dollar figure on it. His name was Dr. Art Kallison, a retired professor from a private school in Oregon no one had heard of. The math was not complicated, and Dr. Kallison had obviously seen a courtroom before. He knew how to testify, how to keep the figures simple. He placed them on a chalkboard with a neat hand.

When he died at fifty-one, Jacob Wood's base salary was $40,000 a year, plus a retirement plan funded by his employer, plus other benefits. Assuming he would live and work until the age of sixty-five, Kallison placed his lost future earnings at $720,000. The law also allowed the factoring of inflation into this projection, and this upped the total to $1,180,000. Then the law required that this total be reduced to its present value, a concept that muddied the water a bit. Here, Kallison delivered a quick, friendly lecture to the jury on present value. The money might be worth $1,180,000 if paid out over fifteen years, but for purposes of the lawsuit he had to determine what it was worth at the moment. Thus, it had to be discounted. His new figure was $835,000.—He did a superb job of assuring the jury that this figure dealt only with lost salary. He was an economist, quite untrained to place a value on the noneconomic value of one's life. His job had nothing to do with the pain and suffering Mr. Wood endured as he died; had nothing to do with the loss his family had endured.

A young defense lawyer named Felix Mason uttered his first word of the trial. He was one of Cable's partners, a specialist in economic forecasts, and, unfortunately for him, his only appearance would be brief. He began his cross-examination of Dr. Kallison by asking him how many times a year he testified. “That's all I do these days. I've retired from teaching,” Kallison answered. He took the question in every trial.

“Are you being paid to testify?” Mason asked. The question was as tired as the answer.

“Yes. I'm paid to be here. Same as you.”

“How much?”

“Five thousand dollars for consultation and testimony.” No doubt among the lawyers that Kallison was by far the cheapest expert of the trial.

Mason had a problem with the rate of inflation Kallison used in his calculations, and they haggled over the historical rise of the consumer price index for thirty minutes. If Mason scored a point, no one noticed. He wanted Kallison to agree that a more JOHNGRISHAM reasonable figure for Mr. Wood's lost wages would be $680,000.

It really didn't matter. Rohr and his blue-ribbon pack of trial lawyers would take either number. Lost wages were merely the starting point. Rohr would add to it pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, loss of companionship, and a few incidentals such as the cost of Mr. Wood's medical care and the price of his funeral. Then Rohr would go for the gold. He would show the jury how much cash Pynex owned and would ask them for a large chunk of it as punitive damages.

With an hour to go, Rohr proudly announced to the court that “The plaintiff will call its last witness. Mrs. Celeste Wood.”

The jury had been given no warning that the plaintiff was almost finished. A burden was suddenly lifted. The sluggish air of the late afternoon was immediately lighter. Several jurors couldn't conceal smiles. Several more lost their frowns. Their chairs rocked as they came to life.

Tonight would be their seventh in sequestration. According to Nicholas' latest theory, the defense would take no more than three days. They did the math. They could be home by the weekend!

In the three weeks she'd been sitting silently at the table, with hordes of lawyers around her. Celeste Wood had barely uttered a whisper. She'd shown an amazing ability to ignore the lawyers, ignore the faces of the jurors, and stare straight ahead with a blank face at the witnesses. She'd worn every shade of black and gray dress, always with black hose and black shoes.

Jerry had dubbed her Widow Wood during the first week.

She was now fifty-five, the same age her husband would have been but for the lung cancer. She was very thin, diminutive, with short gray hair. She worked for a regional library and had raised three children. Family portraits were passed to the jury.

Celeste had given her deposition a year earlier, and she had been rehearsed by the professional handlers Rohr had brought in. She was under control, nervous but not fidgety, and determined to show no emotion. After all, her husband had been dead for four years.

She and Rohr walked through their script without a flaw. She talked of her life with Jacob, how happy they'd been, the early years, the kids, then the grandchildren, their dreams of retirement. A few bumps in the road but nothing serious, nothing until he got sick. He had wanted to quit smoking so badly, had tried many times with little success. The addiction^ was just too powerful.

Celeste was sympathetic without working too hard for it. Her voice never wavered. Rohr had guessed, correctly, that false tears might not be well received by the jury. She didn't cry easily anyway.

Cable passed on any cross-examination. What could he ask her? He rose and with a sad countenance and humble air, said simply, “Your Honor, we have no questions for this witness.”

Fitch had a bunch of questions for the witness, but he couldn't get them asked in open court. After a proper grieving period, in fact it was over a year after the funeral, Celeste had started seeing a divorced man who was seven years younger. According to good sources, they were planning a quiet wedding as soon as the trial was over. Fitch knew that Rohr himself had ordered her not to get married until after the trial.

The jury wouldn't hear this in the courtroom, but Fitch was working on a plan to sneak it through the back door.

“The plaintiff rests,” Rohr announced after he'd seated Celeste at the table. The lawyers on both sides clutched one another and huddled into small groups of serious whispering.

Judge Harkin studied some of the clutter on his bench, then he looked at his weary jury. “Ladies and gentlemen, I have good news and bad. The good news is obvious. The plaintiff has rested, and we're more than halfway finished. The defense is expected to call fewer witnesses than the plaintiff. The bad news is that we're required at this point in the trial to argue a bunch of motions. We'll do that tomorrow, probably all day. I'm sorry, but we have no choice.”

Nicholas raised his hand. Harkin looked at him for a few seconds, then managed to say, “Yes, Mr. Easter?”

“You mean we have to sit around the motel all day tomorrow?”

“I'm afraid so.”

“I don't understand why.”

The lawyers unclutched and stopped their tiny conferences and gawked at Easter. It was rare for a juror to speak in open court.

“Because we have a list of things to do outside the presence of the jury.”

“Oh, I understand that. But why do we have to sit around?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I can think of a lot of things. We could charter a big boat, go for a ride in the Gulf, fish if we want to.”

“I can't ask the taxpayers of this county to pay for that, Mr. Easter.”

“I thought we were taxpayers.”

“The answer is no. I'm sorry.”

“Forget the taxpayers. I'm sure these lawyers here wouldn't mind passing the plate. Look, ask each side to put up a thousand dollars. We can charter a huge boat and have a wonderful time.”

Though Cable and Rohr both reacted at the same instant, Rohr managed to speak first as he jumped to his feet. “We'd be more than happy to pay half, Your Honor.”

“It's a great idea, Judge!” Cable added quickly, and loudly.

Harkin raised both hands, palms out. “Hold it,” he said. Then he rubbed his temples and searched his brain for a precedent. Of course there was none. No rule or law prohibiting it. No conflicts of interest.

Loreen Duke tapped Nicholas on the arm and whispered something in his ear.

His Honor said, “Well, I've certainly never heard of this. It seerns to fall into the discretionary category. Mr. Rohr?”

“It's harmless, Your Honor. Each side pays half. No problem.”

“Mr. Cable?”

“I can think of no statute or rule of procedure which would prevent it. I agree with Mr. Rohr. If both sides split the cost, what's the harm?”

Nicholas raised his hand again. “Excuse me, Your Honor. It's come to my attention that perhaps some of the jurors would rather shop in New Orleans than take a boat ride in the Gulf.”

Again, Rohr was a beat quicker. “We'll be happy to split the cost of a bus, Your Honor. And lunch.” “Same here,” Cable said. “Dinner too.” Gloria Lane hustled to the jury box with a clipboard. Nicholas, Jerry Fernandez, Lonnie Shaver, Rikki Coleman, Angel Weese, and Colonel Herrera opted for the boat. The rest chose the French Quarter.

INCLUDING THE VIDEO of Ja,cob Wood, Rohr and company presented ten witnesses to the jury and took thirteen days to do it. A solid case was built; now it was up to the jury to determine not if cigarettes were dangerous but if it was time to punish their makers.

Had the jury not been sequestered, Rohr would have called at least three more experts: one to discuss the psychology of advertising; one an expert on addiction; one ready to describe in detail the application of insecticides and pesticides to tobacco leaves.

But the jury was very sequestered, and Rohr knew it was time to stop. It was obvious this was no ordinary jury. A blind man. A misfit who did yoga at lunch. At least two strikes so far. Lists of demands at every turn. China and silver for lunch. Beer after work, paid for by the taxpayers. Communal interludes and personal visits. Judge Harkin was finding sleep difficult.

It was certainly not ordinary for Fitch, a man who'd sabotaged more juries than any person in the history of American jurisprudence. He'd laid the usual traps and gathered the usual dirt. His scams were proceeding flawlessly. Only one fire, so far. No broken bones. But the girl Marlee had changed everything. Through her he'd be able to purchase a verdict, a slam-dunk defense judgment that would humiliate Rohr and frighten away the legion of hungry trial lawyers circling like vultures, waiting for the carcass.

In this, the biggest tobacco trial yet, with the biggest plaintiff's lawyers lined up with millions, his beloved little Marlee would hand him a verdict. Fitch believed this, and it consumed him. He thought of her every minute and he saw her in his dreams.

If not for Marlee, Fitch wouldn't be sleeping at all. The time was right for a plaintiff's verdict; right courtroom, right judge, right mood. The experts were by far the best Fitch had encountered in his nine years of directing the defense. Nine years, eight trials, eight defense verdicts. As much as he hated Rohr, he could admit, only to himself, that he was the right lawyer to nail the industry.

A victory over Rohr in Biloxi would be a huge barricade to future tobacco litigation. It might very well save the industry.

When Fitch tallied the jury's vote, he always started with Rikki Coleman, because of the abortion. He had her vote in his pocket, she just didn't know it yet. Then he added Lonnie Shaver. Then Colonel Herrera. Millie Dupree would be easy. His jury people were convinced that Sylvia Taylor-Tatum was virtually incapable of sympathy, and besides she smoked. But his jury people didn't know she was sleeping with Jerry Fernandez. Jerry and Easter were buddies. Fitch was predicting the three of them-Sylvia, Jerry, and Nicholas-would vote the same. Loreen Duke sat next to Nicholas, and the two were often seen whispering during the trial.

Fitch thought she would follow Easter. And if Loreen did, then so would Angel Weese, the only other black female. Weese was impossible to read.

No one doubted that Easter would dominate the deliberations. Now that Fitch knew Easter had two years of law school, he was willing to bet that this information had been shared with the entire jury.

It was impossible to predict how Herman Grimes might vote. But Fitch wasn't counting on him. Likewise with Phillip Savelle. Fitch felt good about Mrs. Gladys Card. She was old and conservative and likely to be turned off when Rohr asked them for twenty million or so.

So Fitch had four in the bag, with Mrs. Gladys Card being a possible fifth. Flip a coin on Herman Grimes. Concede Savelle on the grounds that anyone so in tune with nature had to dislike tobacco companies. That left Easter and his gang of five. Nine votes were needed by either side for a verdict. Anything less would hang the jury and force Harkin to declare a mistrial. Mistrials become retrials, something Fitch did not want in this case.

The horde of legal analysts and scholars closely watching the trial agreed on little, but they were unified in their prediction that a unanimous, twelve-vote verdict in favor of Pynex would chill, if not completely freeze, tobacco litigation for a decade.

Fitch was determined to deliver one, whatever the cost.

THE MOOD in Rohr's office was much lighter Monday night. With no more witnesses to call, the pressure was momentarily off. Some fine scotch was poured in the conference room. Rohr sipped his mineral water and nibbled on cheese and crackers.

The ball was now in Cable's court. Let him and his crew spend a few days prepping witnesses and labeling documents. Rohr had only to react, to cross-examine, and he had watched every videotaped deposition of every defense witness a dozen times.

Jonathan Kotlack, the lawyer in charge of jury research, likewise drank only water and speculated with Rohr about Herman Grimes. Both felt they had him. And they felt good about Millie Dupree and Savelle, the strange one. Herrera worried them. All three of the blacks-Lonnie, Angel, and Loreenwere solidly on board. It was, after all, a case of a little person against a large powerful corporation. Surely the blacks would come through. They always did.

Easter was the key because he was the leader, everybody knew that. Rikki would follow him. Jerry was his pal. Sylvia Taylor-Tatum was passive and she'd follow the crowd. As would Mrs. Gladys Card.

They only needed nine, and Rohr was convinced he had them.

Twenty-five

Back in Lawrence, Small, the investigator, worked his list of leads diligently and got nowhere. He loafed around Mulligan's Monday night, drinking against orders, chatting occasionally with the waitresses and law students and succeeding at nothing but arousing suspicion among the youth.

Early Tuesday morning, he made one visit too many. The woman's name was Rebecca, and a few years back, while still a grad student at KU, she had worked at Mulligan's with Claire Clement. They had been friends, according to a source dug up by Small's boss. Small found her in a downtown bank, where she worked as manager. He introduced himself awkwardly, and she was immediately suspicious.

“Didn't you work with Claire Clement a few years back?” he asked, looking at a notepad, standing on one side of her desk because she was standing on the other. He had not been invited in, and she was busy.

“Maybe. Who wants to know?” Rebecca asked, arms crossed, head cocked, phone buzzing somewhere behind her. In marked contrast to Small, she was sharply dressed and missed nothing.

“Do you know where she is now?”

“No. Why are you asking?”

Small repeated the narrative he'd memorized. It was all he had. “Well, see, she's a potential juror in a big trial, and my firm has been hired to conduct a thorough investigation into her background.”

“Where's the trial?”

“Can't tell you that. You guys worked together at Mulligan's, right?”

“Yes. That was a long time ago.”

“Where was she from?”

“Why is that important?”

“Well, to be honest, it's on my list of questions. We're just checking her out, okay? Do you know where she came from?”

“No.”

This was an important question because Claire's trail had started and stopped in Lawrence. “Are you sure?”

She cocked her head the other way and glared at this klutz. “I don't know where she came from. When I met her, she was working at Mulligan's. The last time I saw her, she was working at Mulligan's.”

“Have you talked to her recently?”• “Not in the last four years.”

“Did you know Jeff Kerr?”

“No.”

“Who were her friends here in Lawrence?”

“I don't know. Look, I'm very busy, and you're wasting your time. I didn't know Claire that well. Nice girl and all, but we were not close. Now, please, I have things to do.” She was pointing to the door by the time she finished, and Small reluctantly left her office.

With Small out of the bank, Rebecca closed her office door and dialed the number to an apartment in St. Louis. The recorded voice on the other end belonged to her friend Claire. They chatted at least once a month, though they hadn't seen each other in a year. Claire and Jeff lived an odd life, drifting and never staying long in one place, never anxious to reveal their whereabouts. Only the apartment in St. Louis remained the same. Claire had warned her that people might come poking around with curious questions. She had hinted more than once that she and Jeff were working for the government in some mysterious capacity.

At the sound of the tone, Rebecca left a brief message about Small's visit.

MARLEE CHECKED her voice mail each morning, and the message from Lawrence made her blood run cold. She wiped her face with a moist cloth, and tried to calm herself.

She called Rebecca and managed to sound perfectly normal, though her mouth was dry and her heart was pounding. Yes, the man named Small had specifically asked about Claire Clement. And he had mentioned Jeff Kerr. With Marlee's prompting, Rebecca managed to replay the entire conversation.

Rebecca knew not to ask too many questions. “Are you okay?” was about the extent of her inquiry.

“Oh we're fine,” Marlee assured her. “Living on the beach for a while.”

Which beach would be nice, but Rebecca let it pass. No one dug too deep with Claire. They said their good-byes with the usual promises to keep in touch.

Neither she nor Nicholas had believed they would ever be tracked to Lawrence. Now that they had, the questions fell like hard rain around her. Who had found them? Which side, Fitch or Rohr? Most likely Fitch, simply because he had more money and more cunning. What had been their mistake? How did the trail ever leave Biloxi? How much did they know?

And how far would they go? She needed to speak to Nicholas, but he was, at the moment, on a boat somewhere in the Gulf trolling for mackerel and bonding with his fellow jurors.

FITCH, OF COURSE, was not fishing. In fact he hadn't taken a day of rest or pleasure in three months. He was at his desk, neatly arranging piles of paperwork, when the call came. “Hello, Marlee,” he said into the receiver, to the girl of his dreams.

“Hey, Fitch. You've lost another one.”

“Another what?” he asked, biting his tongue to keep from calling her Claire.

“Another juror. Loreen Duke was enthralled by Mr. Robilio, and now she's leading the parade to reward the plaintiff.”

“But she hasn't heard our case yet.”

“True. You have four smokers now-Weese, Fer-nandez, Taylor-Tatum, and Easter. Guess how many started smoking after the age of eighteen.”

“Don't know.”

“None. They all started as kids. Herman and Her-rera used to smoke. Guess how old they were when they started.”

“Don't know.”

“Fourteen and seventeen. That's half of your jury, Fitch, and all started smoking as minors.”

“What am I supposed to do about it?”

“Keep lying, I guess. Look, Fitch, what are the chances of us getting together for a little chat, private you know, without all your goons ducking behind bushes?”

“The chances are excellent.”

“Another lie. Let's do it this way. Let's meet and talk, and if my people see your people anywhere near us, then it will be our last conversation.”

“Your people?”

“Anybody can hire goons, Fitch. You should know this.”

“It's a deal.”

“You know Casella's, the little seafood joint with outdoor tables at the end of the Biloxi pier.”

“I can find it.”

“That's where I am now. So when you walk down the pier, I'll be watching. And if I see any character who looks the least bit suspicious, deal's off.”

“When?”

“Right now. I'm waiting.”

JOSE SLOWED for a second in the parking lot near the small-craft harbor, and Fitch practically jumped from the Suburban. It drove away, and Fitch, very much alone and unwired, strolled down the wooden pier with the heavy wooden planks shifting gently in the tide. Marlee sat at a wooden table with an umbrella above it, with her back to the Gulf, her face to the pier. Lunch was an hour away and the place was deserted.

—”Hello, Marlee,” Fitch said as he approached, stopped, then sat across from her. She wore jeans and a denim shirt, a fishing cap, and sunglasses. “A pleasure, Fitch,” she said.

“Are you always so surly?” he asked, settling his squatty frame into a narrow chair, trying his best to smile and be chummy.

“Are you wired, Fitch?”

“No. Of course not.”

Slowly, she removed from her bulky purse a thin black device resembling a small Dictaphone. She pushed a button and placed it on the table, aimed at Fitch's ample gut. “Pardon me, Fitch, just checking to see if you had time to stick a bug here or there.”

“I said I wasn't wired, okay,” Fitch said, very relieved. Konrad had suggested a small body mike with a tech van parked nearby, but Fitch, in a hurry, had said no.

She glanced at the tiny digital monitor on the end of the sensor-scan, then placed it back in her purse. Fitch smiled, but only for a second.

“I got a call from Lawrence this morning,” she said, and Fitch swallowed hard. “Evidently you've got some real meatheads up there banging on doors and kicking over trash cans.”

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Fitch said, somewhat unsteadily and without sufficient conviction.

It was Fitch! His eyes betrayed him; they fluttered and dropped and darted away quickly before returning to see her, then dropped again, all in an instant but with plenty of proof that she'd caught him. His breath was short for a second, and his shoulders jerked ever so slightly. He'd been nailed.

“Right. One more phone call from old friends and you'll never hear my voice again.”

He rallied adequately though. “What's in Law rence?” he demanded as if his integrity had been questioned.

“Give it up, Fitch. And call off the dogs.”

He exhaled heavily while shrugging in utter bewilderment. “Fine. Whatever. I just wish I knew what you were talking about.”

“You do. One more phone call and it's over, okay?”

“Okay. Whatever you say.”

Though Fitch couldn't see her eyes, he could feel them beaming at him from behind the thick glasses. She said nothing for a minute. A waiter busied himself at a nearby table, but made no effort to serve them.

Finally, Fitch leaned forward and said, “When do we stop playing games?”

“Now.”

“Wonderful. What do you want?”

“Money.”

“I figured. How much?”

“I'll name a price later. I take it you're ready to deal.”

“I'm always ready to deal. But I gotta know what I get in return.”

“It's very simple, Fitch. It depends on what you want. As far as you're concerned this jury can do one of four things. It can deliver a verdict for the plaintiff. It can split and hang and go home, and you'll be back down here in a year or so doing this again. Rohr isn't going away. It can come back nine to three for you, and you get a huge victory. And it can come back twelve to zero, and your clients can relax for several years.”

“I know all this.”

“Of course you do. If we rule out a plaintiff's verdict, then we have three choices.”

“What can you deliver?”

“Anything I want. Including a plaintiff's verdict.”

“So the other side is willing to pay.”

“We're talking. Let's just leave it at that.”

“Is this an auction? Your verdict to the highest bidder?”

“It's whatever I want it to be.”

“I'd feel better if you'd stay away from Rohr.”

“I'm not too concerned with your feelings.”

Another waiter appeared and noticed them. He reluctantly asked if they'd like something to drink. Fitch wanted iced tea. Marlee asked for a Diet Coke in a can.

“Tell me how the deal works,” he said when the waiter left.

“It's very simple. We agree on the verdict you want, just look at the menu and place your order. Then we agree on the price. You get your money ready. We wait until the very end, until the lawyers finish their closing arguments and the jury retires to deliberate. At that point, I furnish you with wiring instructions and the money is immediately sent to a bank in, say, Switzerland. Once I get confirmation the money has been received, then the jury returns with your verdict.”

Fitch had spent hours predicting a scenario remarkably similar to this, but to hear it come from Marlee's lips with such a cool precision made his heart pound and his head spin. This could be the easiest one yet!

“Won't work,” he said smugly, like a man who'd negotiated many such verdict deals.

“Oh really. Rohr thinks it will.”

Damn, she was quick! She knew just exactly where to stick the knife.

“But there's no guarantee,” he protested.

She adjusted her sunglasses and leaned forward on her elbows. “So you doubt me, Fitch?”

“That's not the issue. You're asking me to wire what I'm sure will be a large sum of money on the hope and prayer that your friend will control the deliberations. Juries are so unpredictable.”

“Fitch, my friend is controlling the deliberations even as we speak. He'll have his votes long before the lawyers stop talking.”

Fitch would pay. He'd made the decision a week earlier to pay whatever she wanted, and he knew that when the money left The Fund there were no guarantees. He didn't care. He trusted his Marlee. She and her friend Easter or whatever the hell his name was had patiently stalked Big Tobacco to reach this point, and they would happily hand over a verdict for the right price. They had lived for this moment.

Oh, the questions he wanted to ask. He'd love to start with the two of them and ask whose idea this was, such an ingenious, devious plan to study litigation, then follow it across the country, then plant oneself on the jury so a deal could be cut for a verdict. It was nothing short of brilliant. He could grill her for hours, maybe days, about the specifics, but he knew there would be no answers.

He also knew she'd deliver. She had worked too hard and had come too far with their plot to fail.

“I'm not totally helpless in this matter, you know,” he said, still holding his ground.

“Of course not, Fitch. I'm sure you've laid enough traps to snag at least four jurors. Shall I name them?”

The drinks arrived and Fitch gulped his tea. No, he did not want her to name them. He would not play a guessing game with someone who had the hard facts. Talking with Marlee was like talking to the leader of the jury, and though Fitch cherished the moment it made the, conversation quite onesided. How was he to know if she was bluffing or telling the truth? It simply wasn't fair.

“I sense you doubt whether I'm in control,” she said.

“I doubt everything.”

“What if I get a juror bumped?”

“You've already bumped Stella Hulic,” Fitch said, and drew the first and only very small smile from her.

“I can do it again. What if, say, I decided to send home Lonnie Shaver? Would you be impressed?”

Fitch almost choked on his tea. He wiped his mouth with the back of a hand, said, “I'm sure Lonnie would be happy. He's probably the most bored of the twelve.”

“Shall I bump him?”

“No. He's harmless. Plus, since we'll be working together, I think we should keep Lonnie.”

“He and Nicholas talk a lot, you know?”

“Is Nicholas talking to everyone?”

“Yes, at various levels. Give him time.”

“You seem confident.”

“I'm not confident in the ability of your lawyers. But I am confident in Nicholas, and that's all that matters.”

They sat quietly and waited for two waiters to set the table next to them. Lunch began at eleven-thirty, and the cafe was coming to life.

When the waiters finished and left, Fitch said, “I can't cut a deal if I don't know the terms.”

Without the slightest hesitation, she said, “And I'm not cutting a deal as long as you're digging through my past.”

“Got something to hide?”

“No. But I have friends, and I don't like getting phone calls from them. Stop it now, and this meeting will lead to the next. One more phone call, and I'll never speak to you again.”

“Don't say that.”

“I mean it, Fitch. Call off the dogs.”

“They're not my dogs, I swear.”

“Call them off anyway, or I'll spend more time with Rohr. He might want to cut a deal, and a verdict for him means you're out of work and your clients lose billions. You can't afford it, Fitch.”

She was certainly right about that. Whatever she planned to ask for would be a tiny sum compared to the ultimate cost of a plaintiff's verdict.

“We'd better move fast,” he said. “This trial won't last much longer.”

“How long?” she asked.

“Three or four days for the defense.”

“Fitch, I'm hungry. Why don't you leave and retrace your steps? I'll call you in a couple of days.”

“What a coincidence. I'm hungry too.”

“No thanks. I'll eat alone. Plus, I want you away from here.”

He rose, said, “Sure, Marlee. Whatever you want. Good day.”

She watched him saunter back down the pier to the parking lot next to the beach. He stopped there and called someone from a cellphone.

AFTER REPEATED ATTEMPTS to reach Hoppy by phone, Jimmy Hull Moke dropped in unannounced on Dupree Realty Tuesday afternoon and was told by a sleepy-eyed receptionist that Mr. Dupree was somewhere in the back. She left to fetch him, and returned fifteen minutes later with the apology that she had been wrong, that Mr. Dupree was not in his office and had in fact left for an important meeting.

“I see his car out there,” Jimmy Hull said, agitated, pointing to the small parking lot just outside the door. Sure enough, there was Hoppy's old station wagon.

“He rode with someone else,” she said, obviously lying.

“Where'd he go?” Jimmy Hull asked as if he might go after him.

“Somewhere near Pass Christian. That's all I know.”

“Why won't he return my phone calls?”

“I have no idea. Mr. Dupree is a very busy man.”

Jimmy Hull shoved both hands deep in the pockets of his jeans and glared down at the woman. “You tell him I stopped by, that I'm very irritated, and that he'd better call me. You got that?”

“Yes sir.”

He left the office, got in his Ford pickup, and drove away. She watched to be safe, then raced to the back to free Hoppy from the broom closet.

THE SIXTY-FOOTER with Captain Theo at the helm traveled fifty miles into the Gulf, where under a cloudless sky and amid gentle sea breezes, half the jury fished for mackerel, snapper, and redfish. Angel Weese had never been on a boat, couldn't swim, and got sick two hundred yards from shore, but with the help of a seasoned deckhand and a bottle of Drama-mine she recovered and actually caught the first fish—of any size. Rikki looked splendidly cute with shorts, Reeboks, tanned legs. The Colonel and the Captain were inevitably kindred spirits, and it wasn't long before Nap was on the bridge talking naval strategy and exchanging war stories.

Two deckhands prepared a fine lunch of boiled shrimp, fried oyster sandwiches, crab claws, and chowder. The first round of beer was served with lunch. Only Rikki abstained and drank water.

The beer continued throughout the afternoon as the fishing alternated between frenzy and boredom, and as the sun grew warmer on the deck. The boat was large enough to find privacy. Nicholas and Jerry made certain that Lonnie Shaver kept a cold beer in hand. They were determined to chat him up for the first time.

Lonnie had an uncle who'd worked on a shrimp boat for many years, before it sank in a storm and the entire crew was never found. When he was a kid, he'd fished these waters with his uncle, and, frankly, he'd had his share of fishing. Despised it, really, and hadn't been in years. Still, the boat trip sounded a bit more tolerable than the bus ride to New Orleans.

It took four beers to knock the edge off and loosen the tongue. They lounged in a small upper-deck cabin, open on all sides. On the main deck below them Rikki and Angel were watching the deckhands clean their catch.

“I wonder how many experts the defense will call,” Nicholas said, changing the subject from fishing with near total exasperation. Jerry was lying on a plastic cot, his socks and shoes off, his eyes closed, cold beer in hand.

“They don't have to call any as far as I'm concerned,” Lonnie said, gazing at the sea.

“You've had enough, huh?” Nicholas said.

“Pretty damned ridiculous. Man smokes for thirty-five years, then wants millions for his estate after he kills himself.”

“See what I told you,” Jerry said without opening his eyes.

“What?” Lonnie asked.

“Jerry and I had you pegged as a defense juror,” Nicholas explained. “It was difficult though, because you've had so little to say.”

“And what are you?” Lonnie asked.

“Me, I'm still open-minded. Jerry's leaning toward the defense, right, Jerry?”

“I have not discussed the case with anyone. I have had no unauthorized contact. I have not taken any bribes. I am a juror Judge Harkin can be proud of.”

“He's leaning toward the defense,” Nicholas said to Lonnie. “Because he's addicted to nicotine, can't kick the habit, but he's convinced himself he can throw them away whenever he wants. He can't, because he's a wimp. But he wants to be a real man like Colonel Herrera.”

“Who doesn't?” Lonnie said.

“Jerry thinks that because he can quit, if he really wanted to, then anyone should be able to quit, which he can't do himself, and therefore Jacob Wood should've stopped long before he got cancer.”

“That's about right,” Jerry said. “But I object to the part about the wimp.”

“Makes good sense to me,” Lonnie said. “How can you be open-minded?”

“Gee, I don't know. Maybe it's because 1 haven't heard all the testimony yet. Yeah, that's it. The law says that we must refrain from reaching verdicts until all the evidence is in. Forgive me.”

“You're forgiven,” Jerry said. “Now it's your turn to fetch another round.” Nicholas drained his can and walked down the narrow stairway to the cooler on the main deck.

“Don't worry about him,” Jerry said. “He'll be with us when it counts.”

Twenty-six

The boat returned a few minutes after five. The hearty band of fishermen staggered from the deck onto the pier, where they posed for photos with Captain Theo and their trophies, the largest of which was a ninety-pound shark hooked by Rikki and landed by a deckhand. They were gathered by two deputies and led down the pier, leaving behind their catch because there was certainly no use for it at the motel.

The bus with the shoppers would be another hour. Its arrival, as was the arrival of the boat, was duly watched, recorded, and relayed to Fitch, but for whatever purpose no one was sure. Fitch just wanted to know. They had to watch something. It was a slow day, not much to do but sit and wait for the jury to return.

Fitch was locked in his office with Swanson, who'd spent most of the afternoon on the phone. The “meatheads,” as Marlee had described them, had been called off. In their place, Fitch was sending in the professionals, the same Bethesda firm he was using for the Hoppy sting. Swanson had once worked there, and many of the agents were either ex-FBI or ex-CIA.

Results were guaranteed. It was hardly a job to get them excited-the uncovering of a young woman's past. Swanson was to leave in an hour and fly to Kansas City, where he would monitor things.

There was also a guarantee not to get caught. Fitch was in a quandary-he had to hold Marlee, yet he also had to know who she was. Two factors pushed him to keep digging. First, it was terribly important to her that he stop. There was something hidden back there that was crucial. And second, she had gone to such lengths to leave no trail.

Marlee had left Lawrence, Kansas, four years ago, after living there for three years. She was not Claire Clement until she arrived, and she certainly was not when she left. In the meantime, she met and recruited Jeff Kerr, who was now Nicholas Easter and was now doing hell knows what to the jury.

ANGEL WEESE was in love with and planned to marry Derrick Maples, a strapping young man of twenty-four who was between jobs and between wives. He'd lost his job selling car phones when the company merged, and he was now in the process of dispensing with his first wife, the result of a teenage romance gone bad. They had two young children. His wife and her lawyer wanted six hundred dollars a month in child support. Derrick and his lawyer waved his unemployment like a burning flag. The negotiations had turned bitter and a final divorce was months away.

Angel was two months pregnant, though she'd told no one but Derrick.

Derrick's brother Marvis had once been a deputy sheriff and was now a part-time minister and community activist. Marvis was approached by a man named Cleve, who said he'd like to meet Derrick. Introductions were made.

For lack of a better job description, Cleve was known as a runner. He ran cases for Wendall Rohr. Cleve's task was to find good, solid death and injury claims and make sure they found their way to Rohr's office. Good running was an art form, and of course Cleve was a fine runner because Rohr would have nothing but the best. Like all good runners, Cleve moved in shadowy circles because the soliciting of clients was still technically an unethical practice, though any decent car wreck would attract more runners than emergency personnel. In fact, Cleve's business card pronounced him to be an “Investigator.”

Cleve also delivered papers for Rohr, served summonses, checked on witnesses and potential jurors, and spied on other lawyers, the usual functions of a runner when he wasn't running. He received a salary for his investigating, and Rohr paid him cash bonuses when he landed a particularly good case.

Over a beer in a tavern, he talked with Derrick and realized quickly the guy had financial problems. He then steered the conversation toward Angel, and asked if anyone had beaten him to the punch. No, said Derrick, no one had come around asking about the trial. But then, Derrick had been living with a brother, sort of laying low and trying to avoid his wife's greedy lawyer.

Good, said Cleve, because he'd been hired as a consultant by some of the lawyers, and, well, the trial was awfully important. Cleve ordered a second round and talked awhile about just how damned important the trial was.

Derrick was bright, had a year of junior college and a desire to make a buck, and he picked it up quickly. “Why don't you get to the point?” he asked.

Cleve was ready to do just that. “My client is willing to purchase influence. For cash. No trail whatsoever.”

“Influence,” Derrick repeated, then took a long sip. The smile on his face encouraged Cleve to press the deal.

“Five thousand cash,” Cleve said, glancing around. “Half now, half when the trial is over.”

The smile widened with another sip. “And I do what?”

“You talk with Angel when you see her during the personal visits, and make sure she understands how important this case is to the plaintiff. Just don't tell her about the money, or about me or any of this. Not now. Maybe later.”

“Why not?”

“Because this is illegal as hell, okay? If the Judge somehow found out that I was talking to you, offering you money to talk to Angel, then both of us would go to jail. Understand?”

“Yeah.”

“It's important for you to realize that this is dangerous. If you don't wanna pursue it, then say so now.”

“Ten thousand.”

“What?”

“Ten. Five now, five when the trial is over.”

Cleve grunted as if slightly disgusted. If only Derrick knew the stakes. “Okay. Ten.”

“When can I get it?”

“Tomorrow.” They ordered sandwiches and talked for another hour about the trial, and the verdict, and how best to persuade Angel.

THE CHORE of keeping D. Martin Jankle away from his cherished vodka fell to Durwood Cable. Fitch and Jankle had fought bitterly over the question of whether or not Jankle could drink Tuesday night, the night before he testified. Fitch, the former drunk, accused Jankle of having a problem. Jankle cursed Fitch viciously for trying to tell him, the CEO of Pynex, a Fortune 500 company, if and when and how much he could drink.

Cable was dragged into the brawl by Fitch. Cable insisted that Jankle hang around his office throughout the night to prepare for his testimony. A mock direct exam was followed by a lengthy cross, and Jankle performed adequately. Nothing spectacular. Cable made him watch the video of it with a panel of jury experts.

When he was finally taken to his hotel room after ten, he found that Fitch had removed all liquor from the mini-bar and replaced it with soft drinks and fruit juices.

Jankle cursed and went to his overnight bag, where he kept a flask hidden in a leather pouch. But there was no flask. Fitch had removed it too.

AT 1 A. M., Nicholas silently opened his door and looked up and down the hall. The guard was gone, no doubt asleep in his room.

Marlee was waiting in a room on the second floor.

They embraced and kissed but never got around to anything else. She had hinted on the phone that there was trouble, and she hurriedly spilled the story, beginning with her early morning chat with Rebecca in Lawrence. Nicholas took it well.

Other than the natural passion of two young lovers, their relationship rarely saw emotion. And when it surfaced, it was almost always from Nicholas, who had a slight temper, which, regardless of how slight, was certainly more than she possessed. He might raise his voice when angry, but that almost never occurred. Marlee wasn't cold, just calculating. He'd never seen her cry, the one exception being at the end of a movie he'd hated. They had never been through a difficult fight, and the usual squabbles were snuffed out quickly because Marlee had taught him to bite his tongue. She didn't tolerate wasted sentiment, didn't pout or carry petty grudges, and didn't put up with him when he tried to.

She replayed her conversation with Rebecca, and she tried to recall every word from her meeting with Fitch.

The realization that they'd been partially discovered hit hard. They were sure it was Fitch, and they wondered how much he knew. They were convinced, and always had been, that Jeff Kerr would have to be discovered in order to find Claire Clement. Jeff's background was harmless. Claire's had to be protected or they might as well flee now.

There was little to do but wait.

DERRICK ENTERED Angel's room by wedging himself through the fold-out window. He hadn't seen her since Sunday, a gap of almost forty-eight hours, and he simply couldn't wait until tomorrow night because he loved her madly and missed her and had to hold her. She immediately noticed he had been drinking. They fell into bed, where they quietly consummated an unauthorized personal visit.

Derrick rolled over and fell fast asleep.

They awoke at dawn, and Angel panicked because she had a man in her room and this was, of course, against the Judge's orders. Derrick was unconcerned. He said he'd simply wait until they left for court, then sneak out of the room. This did little to calm her nerves. Angel took a long shower.

Derrick had taken Cleve's plan and improved on it immensely. After leaving the tavern, he bought a six-pack and drove along the Gulf for hours. Slowly, up and down Highway 90, past the hotels and casinos and boat docks, from Pass Christian to Pascagoula he had driven, sipping beer and expanding the scheme. Cleve, after a few drinks, had let it slip that the lawyers for the plaintiff were seeking millions. It took only nine of the twelve for a verdict, so Derrick figured Angel's vote was worth a helluva lot more than ten thousand dollars.

Ten thousand sounded great at the tavern, but if they would pay that much, and agree to do it so quickly, then they would pay more with pressure. The more he drove, the more her vote was worth. It was now at fifty, and rising almost by the hour.

Derrick was intrigued by the notion of percentages. What if the verdict was ten million, for example? One percent, one lousy little percent, would be a hundred thousand dollars. A twenty-million-dollar verdict? Two hundred thousand dollars. What if Derrick proposed to Cleve a deal whereby they paid JOHNGRISHAM him cash up front and a percentage of the verdict? That would motivate Derrick, and of course his girlfriend, to press hard during deliberations for a large verdict. They'd become players. It was a chance they'd never see again. Angel returned in her bathrobe and lit a cigarette.

Twenty-seven

Pynex's defense of its good corporate name got off to a miserable start Wednesday morning, through no fault of its own. An analyst named Walter Barker, writing in Mogul, a popular weekly financial, laid two-to-one odds that the jury down in Biloxi would find against Pynex, and return a large verdict. Barker was no lightweight. Trained as a lawyer, he had developed a formidable reputation on Wall Street as the man to watch when litigation affected commerce. His specialty was monitoring trials and appeals and settlements, and predicting their outcomes before they were final. He was usually right, and had made a fortune with his research. He was widely read, and the fact that he was . betting against Pynex shocked Wall Street. The stock opened at seventy-six, dropped to seventy-three, and by mid-morning was at seventy-one and a half.

The courtroom crowd was larger Wednesday. The Wall Street boys were back in force, each reading a copy of Mogul and all suddenly agreeing with Barker, though over breakfast an hour earlier the consensus had been that Pynex had weathered the plaintiff's witnesses and should close strongly. Now they read with worried faces and revised their reports to their offices. Barker had actually been in the courtroom last week. He'd sat alone on the back row. What had he seen that they'd missed?

The jurors filed in promptly at nine, with Lou Dell proudly holding the door as if she'd collected her brood after they'd scattered yesterday and was now delivering them back to where they belonged. Har-kin welcomed them as if they'd been gone for a month, made some flat crack about fishing, then raced through his standard “Have you been molested?” questions. He promised the jurors a speedy end to the trial.

Jankle was called as a witness, and the defense began. Free of the effects of alcohol, Jankle was primed and sharp. He smiled easily and seemed to welcome the chance to defend his tobacco company. Cable waltzed him through the preliminaries without a hitch.

Seated on the second row was D. Y. Taunton, the black lawyer from the Wall Street firm who'd met with Lonnie in Charlotte. He listened to Jankle while cutting his eyes at Lonnie, and it didn't take long to connect. Lonnie glanced once, couldn't help it as he glanced again, and on the third look managed to nod and smile because it seemed like the proper thing to do. The message was clear-Taunton was an important person who'd traveled all the way down to Biloxi because this was an important day. The defense was now speaking, and it was critical for Lonnie to understand that he should listen and believe every word now being said from the witness stand. No problem with Lonnie.

Jankle's first defensive thrust was on the issue of choice. He conceded that a lot of people think cigarettes are addictive, but only because he and Cable realized he would sound foolish otherwise. But, then, maybe they're not addictive. No one really knows, and the folks in research are just as confused as anyone. One study leans this way, the next one leans another, but he'd never seen positive proof that smoking was addictive. Personally, he just did not believe it. Jankle had smoked for twenty years, but only because he enjoyed it. He smoked twenty cigarettes a day, by choice, and he'd chosen a lower-tar brand. No, he most certainly was not addicted. He could quit whenever he wanted. He smoked because he liked to. He played tennis four times a week and his annual physical revealed nothing to worry about.

Seated one row behind Taunton was Derrick Maples, making his first appearance at the trial. He'd left the motel just minutes after the bus, and had planned to spend the day looking for work. Now, he was dreaming of an easy payday. Angel saw him, but kept her eyes on Jankle. Derrick's sudden interest in the trial was baffling. He'd done nothing but complain since they'd been sequestered.

Jankle described the various brands his company made. He stepped down and stood before a colorful chart with each of the eight brands,each with its tar and nicotine levels labeled beside it. He explained why some cigarettes have filters, some don't, some have more tar and nicotine than others. It all boiled down to choice. He was proud of his product line.

A crucial point was made here, and Jankle conveyed it well. By offering such a wide selection of brands, Pynex allowed each consumer to decide how much tar and nicotine he or she wanted. Choice. Choice. Choice. Choose the level of tar and nicotine. Choose the number of cigarettes you smoke each day. Choose whether or not to inhale. Make the intelligent choice of what you do to your body with cigarettes.

Jankle pointed to a bright drawing of a red pack of Bristols, the brand with the second-highest level of tar and nicotine. He conceded that if Bristols were “abused” then the results could be damaging.

Cigarettes were responsible products, if used with restraint. Like many other products-alcohol, butter, sugar, and handguns, just to name a few-they could become dangerous if abused.

Seated across the aisle from Derrick was Hoppy, who had stopped by for a quick update on what was happening. Plus he wanted to see and smile at Millie, who was delighted to see him but also curious about his sudden obsession with the trial. Tonight the jurors were allowed personal visits, and Hoppy couldn't wait to spend three hours in Millie's room with sex the last thing on his mind.

When Judge Harkin stopped for lunch, Jankle was completing his thoughts about advertising. Sure his company spent tons of money, but not as much as beer companies or car companies or Coca-Cola. Advertising was crucial to survival in a fiercely competitive world, regardless of the product. Of course children saw his company's ads. How do you design a billboard ad so that it won't be seen by children? How do you keep kids from looking at the magazines their parents subscribe to? Impossible. Jankle readily admitted he'd seen the statistics showing eighty-five percent of the kids who smoke buy the three most heavily advertised brands. But so do adults! Again, you can't design an ad campaign that targets adults without affecting kids.

FITCH WATCHED ALL of Jankle's testimony from a seat near the back. To his right was Luther Vandemeer, CEO of Trellco, the largest tobacco company in the world. Vandemeer was the unofficial head of the Big Four, and the only one Fitch could tolerate. He, in return, had the perplexing gift of being able to tolerate Fitch.

They ate lunch at Mary Mahoney's, alone at a table in a corner. They were relieved by Jankle's success so far, but knew the worst was yet to come. Barker's column in Mogul had ruined their appetites.

“How much influence do you have with the jury?” Vandemeer asked, picking at his food.

Fitch wasn't about to answer truthfully. He wasn't expected to. His dirty deeds were kept from everyone except his own agents.

“The usual,” Fitch said.

“Maybe the usual is not enough.”

“What are you suggesting?”