Big Easy Bonanza

Eddie.
    “He’s on the bench, but he keeps slipping back to his office. There’s some unfair trade practices trial going on, and Mrs. Maselli here,” Eddie smiled at Mrs. Maselli, “just told me they are reading forty-seven depositions to the jury. Can you believe that? Forty-seven depositions.”
    “You’re kidding me.” Tubby cracked open the side door to the courtroom and, sure enough, a lawyer at a podium was slowly reading questions from a transcript to another lawyer playing the role of the witness, who tonelessly read the answers from the same script to twelve jurors in various stages of catatonia. The judge had his face covered by his hands like he was weeping at a funeral. Boredom had driven off any spectators, but there were at least ten attorneys at the counsel table, staring off into space. One was surreptitiously reading a magazine folded on his knees.
    Tubby shut the door. “How long has this been going on?” he asked.
    “Mrs. Maselli says for two days, and one more day to go.”
    “How do you suppose they stay awake?”
    “They don’t. Hey, did you ever hear this story? Did you ever know Vick Borzey? He was Judge Christmas’s clerk for maybe twenty years. I think he’s retired now. Anyway, the judge is on the bench, and Fred Boudreau, or one of the lawyers with him, is examining this witness. It’s a maritime case. It’s dragging on, and they’ve just had their lunch break. Everybody’s sleepy, and Vick, you know, nods out. Boudreau asks the witness a question, and the other side’s lawyer cries out ‘Objection.’ Vick, the clerk, jerks his head up and yells, ‘Overruled.’ Judge Christmas holds up his hand and gets everybody up to the bench. ‘Victor,’ he says, ‘that ain’t your job. I’m the one who gets to rule on the objections.’” Eddie let out a whinny.
    “That’s funny,” Tubby said. “No, I never heard about that. Vick must have been dreaming he was the judge.”
    “Don’t we all, Tubby?”
    “Not me. I couldn’t stand the tedium.”
    “Sugar!” The judge’s voice boomed from his office. The Bitch jumped up—spry for a lady of advanced years—and pranced past the lawyers with her habitual triumphant sneer, like she had just beaten everybody in the room in some contest.
    “Yes, Judge,” she said when she disappeared inside. A moment later she stuck her head back out and asked whether everyone was present for the Sandy Shandell pretrial. Eddie said they were all here, and she told them to come on back into chambers.
    Judge Maselli was no intellectual wiz, nor was he especially hardworking. His day began late and ended early. Real court was held at the restaurant at the Warwick Hotel down the street, where he ate breakfast and lunch and enjoyed the afternoon happy hour, often in the company of lawyers who had cases on his docket. He held conferences in his chambers as rarely as possible because his mother was there. He genuinely appreciated her ability to manage that aspect of his life, but preferred to be elsewhere while she did it. Still, local rules of court adopted by his fellow judges required assembling lawyers shortly before trial to hash out details and arguments and, most importantly, to try to compel a settlement that would avoid trial. Already it took three or more years to get a jury trial. Without settlements it would take twenty.
    Maselli was scowling at the pretrial memoranda he was reading when the lawyers filed in and said, “Good morning, Your Honor.” They took seats in front of his massive desk like pupils at the feet of some great sage. The judge was in a foul mood because he had to be near the courtroom, if not physically in it, for at least four or five hours each day, trapped by impossible litigants presenting the thoroughly uninteresting testimony of accountants and engineers who were accused of cornering the market on some arcane piece of oil-field equipment the judge did not understand. The parties had rejected his settlement advice, and he was angry about that, especially with a defendant insurance company that had refused to pony up a million or two at his suggestion. There was only so much he could do to punish this defendant, since this was a jury trial, but he was getting in his jabs from the bench every chance he got.
    Now here was—guess what—another recalcitrant insurance company creating another mess that was headed for trial in two weeks. The judge ignored those seated before him for a minute, then he