Defense by D. W. Buffa

Author:D. W. Buffa
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.

xv

The telephone was ringing when I opened the door. Ignoring it, I put my topcoat in the hall closet and dragged myself upstairs to the bedroom. I kicked off my shoes, flopped down on the bed, and stared up at the ceiling, listening to the dying echo of the telephone like some remorseless reminder of time running out.

I pulled on an old pair of jeans and a torn, gray sweatshirt and went down to the kitchen. After rummaging through the refrigerator for something to eat, I sat down at the dining-room table with the unlit candles and a centerpiece of false flowers. There was something incongruous about sitting there barefoot with a peanut butter sandwich, a piece of pie, and a glass of beer on a glistening table with nine empty chairs around it. The interior decorator had known exactly what the room needed when she picked it out. Everything fit with everything else, everything but me.

After I cleared away the dishes and cleaned up the kitchen, I sat in the study, my legs propped up on the corner of the desk, a half-empty glass of beer in my hand. The telephone started to ring and again I ignored it. I was concentrating on Glenn Gould’s second recording of the Goldberg Variations, made near the end of his too-short life. It was a life I envied, the life of a solitary genius who needed nothing but the perfect sound that was there at the touch of his fingers on the keyboard. I had lived my own life surrounded by strangers, driven by a desire to be admired by people I never knew. Juries whose faces I could not remember five minutes after a verdict were all I really cared about.

The telephone rang again. “Hello!” I barked into the receiver, angry at the intrusion.

“Christ, you’re in a good mood,” the rumbling, familiar voice laughed. “I’ll call back in a couple of years.”

“Oh, hell, Horace,” I said, embarrassed. “I didn’t know it was you. Sorry.”

“You must have thought it was a client,” he said. Then he remembered. “But your number is unlisted. You don’t give it out to them, do you?”

“Not very often. But, you know, it’s hard to keep the crooks from stealing it.”

“Just don’t let them know where you live. Listen, I heard the Rothstein case came out all right.”

My glass was empty. I picked it up, and while I talked to Horace on the portable phone, wandered down the hallway and into the kitchen.

“Better than if he’d lost.”

“You must be having a bad night.”

“No, I’m all right. Look, Horace, you know how it works. Rothstein won today, but all anyone will ever remember is that he’s a guy who was accused of rape. He’ll never shake it. If he’s smart, he’ll move as far away from here as he can, change his name, and start over.”

“You need to remember something. If it hadn’t been for you all anyone would remember is that he was convicted of rape and sent to prison for twenty years.

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