Mistress of Justice

teasingly.
    “Just seeing some friends.”
    “I don’t think it’s ‘okay.’ Not tonight.”
    Lillick said nothing for a moment. Then: “It’s pretty important. I’ve really got to.”
    Clayton examined the young man. Like most denizens of the East Village, he seemed damp and unclean. “One of your performances?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Yeah,” the partner mocked.
    “Yes,” Lillick corrected himself instantly though in a tone that approached rebellious.
    “We’ve got so much to do.…”
    “I mentioned it a week ago.”
    “And what a busy week it’s been, don’t you agree?”
    “It’ll just be a few hours. I’ll still be at the office at six if you want.”
    Clayton had let him dangle enough. He said, “This once, I suppose, it’s all right.” He had plans of his own tonight and didn’t give a rat’s rosy ass what Lillick did after they were finished here.
    “Thanks—”
    Clayton waved him off and gave a reserved smile to Randy Simms, who now walked through the revolving door of the club.
    Ignoring Lillick, as he always did, Simms said, “I saw Ralph Dudley outside. With a woman.”
    Piqued again by the reference to the old partner, Clayton snapped, “Appreciate the weather report, Randy.”
    Simms was six feet three, thin and solid. Ralph Lauren might have designed a line of Connecticut sportswear around him. A mother and her teenage daughter entered the lobby. They eyed the young lawyer with similar degrees of desire.
    “How’d they get the lowdown on our witness?” Clayton was referring to the evisceration of Dr. Morse on the witness stand in the St. Agnes Hospital case.
    “Reece used some private eye in San Diego.”
    “Fuck, that was good,” Clayton said with admiration. He didn’t know Reece well but he’d make sure the associate was guaranteed a partnership slot next year or the year after.
    “When’s our guest arriving?” Clayton asked him.
    “Any minute now.”
    “Give me the details.”
    “His name’s Harry Rothstein. Senior partner in the general partnership that owns the firm’s building. He’s got full authority to go forward or pull the plug. He and Burdick are planning to sign the new lease on Monday. Rothstein doesn’t seem to have any mistresses but I found some accounts in the Caymans. Son’s got two drug convictions.”
    “What kind?”
    “Cocaine.”
    “I mean what kind of
convictions?”
    “Felony. One sale, one possession.”
    “Is he a good friend of Burdick’s?”
    Simms’s face eased into a faint smile.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?” Clayton snapped again.
    “How can he be a friend of Donald’s?” Simms asked. “Rothstein’s a Jew.”
    A tall, bald man walked through the door and looked around.
    “That’s him,” Simms said.
    Clayton’s face broke into a huge smile as he strode forward. “Mr. Rothstein. I’m Wendall Clayton,” he called. “Come join us, my friend.”
    At the corner of Madison Avenue and Forty-fourth Street Taylor and Ralph Dudley paused and shook hands.
    He inclined his head toward her in a Victorian way she found quaint and said, “Which train’re you taking?”
    “I’ll walk.”
    “I’ll cab it, I suppose. Good luck to you. Let me know how you fare with Yale.” He turned and walked away.
    Taylor had thought she’d have to do a private-eye number:
Hey, follow that cab; there’s a fiver in it for you
. But no: Dudley didn’t flag down a taxi at all. He was on foot, going to meet the mysterious W.S., whom he had visited the night the note was stolen.
    When he was a half block away, Taylor followed. They moved west through the eerie illumination of a city at night—the glossy wetness of the streets and storefront windows lit for security. Still plenty of traffic, some theaters letting out now, people leaving restaurants en route to clubs and bars. Taylor felt infused with the luminous energy of New York; she found that she’d sped up to keep pace with it and had nearly overtaken Dudley. She slowed and let him regain a long lead.
    Out of the brilliant, cold, fake daylight of Times Square. Only now did Taylor feel the first lump of fear as she crossed an invisible barrier, into pimp city. The public relations firms hired by New York developers called this area Clinton; almost everyone else knew it by its historical name—the more picturesque Hell’s Kitchen.
    Taylor continued her pursuit even when Dudley hit Twelfth Avenue, near the river, and turned south, where the streetlights grew sparser