The Baxter Trust

innocent?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Then how the hell am I supposed to do it?”
    “All right, then. Just try not to look guilty.”
    “Oh, hey,” she said, sarcastically. “Great advice. Thanks. And just what do I do when you put me on the stand?”
    Steve took a breath. “Look,” he said. “Let me tell you a little bit about our plan of attack. Right now, our best strategy is to sit back and try to poke holes in the prosecution’s case. There’s bound to be some, and we can find ’em. The money thing, for instance. How could you be blackmailed if you have no money? See what I mean? The prosecution has to prove you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Always remember that. All we have to do is raise a reasonable doubt.”
    Sheila was looking at him suspiciously. “Wait a minute. Are you trying to tell me you’re not going to put me on the stand?”
    “All right, look, we have a big problem here. You told your story to the police. And you lied. If you change your story, you have to admit you lied. Unless you have a damn good explanation, that’s suicide, and you don’t have one.
    “If you stick with your story, you’re sticking with a lie. And if the D.A. catches you in a lie in front of the jury, you’re done.
    “So the answer is no. I can’t afford to put you on the stand.”
    “But why not? They can’t prove I wasn’t window-shopping. Why, I can remember every store I went to.”
    “I bet you can. Unfortunately, there are other little matters, which you can’t explain.”
    “Like what?”
    “Your uncle gave you a hundred bucks. How much money did you have when you were arrested?”
    “About eleven dollars.”
    “Sure, cause you spent the hundred on cocaine. Well, the D.A. is gonna wanna know where that hundred dollars went.”
    “Can’t I say I bought something for my apartment?”
    “You don’t own anything worth a hundred dollars. That’s just the type of lie I’m talking about. They’d catch you in it right away. They’d want to know what you bought and where, and they’d check the stores for the sales records.”
    Sheila bit her lip. She thought a moment. Then she got a gleam in her eye. It was the old fire. The old spunk. Steve was glad to see it.
    For a moment.
    “All right,” she said. “I’ll say I gave it to you for a retainer.”
    “Whoa! Back up!” Steve said. “Now you’re asking me to commit perjury.”
    “Well, why not? You’re a lawyer, aren’t you? If anybody knows how to commit perjury, you ought to.”
    “Well forget it. I’m not putting myself on the witness stand. In the first place, it’s questionable ethics for an attorney to testify in behalf of his client, even when he’s telling the truth. In the second place, the jury would never believe me anyway.”
    Sheila put on a pout. “All right, be that way. But let me tell you something. If you can’t beat the prosecution’s case, you’ll have to put me on the stand. And when the D.A. asks me what happened to the money, I’m gonna tell him I gave it to you. Then if you try to prove that I didn’t, it’s gonna make you look like one hell of a lawyer, isn’t it?”
    Steve looked at her. Sighed. She was back in form, all right.

35.
    S TEVE W INSLOW SAT IN THE barbershop, waiting his turn and thinking about the case. The old man in the chair near the window looked about done. Then a quick clip, and he could get out of there and hunt up a clothing store and buy a suit off the rack— no time for alterations, thank god he was average build—and go home and hit the law books.
    The case. The goddamn case. His first, his one and only case. Tomorrow he’d be in court.
    Jesus.
    Steve thought about what he’d told Sheila Benton. Stage fright. Opening-night jitters. Well, he had ’em all right. God was he nervous.
    Nothing to worry about, he told himself. It’s just another play. You’re an actor, and it’s a play. Think of the courtroom as a stage set. That’s all it is. Just a bit of courtroom drama.
    Then it hit him. A cold chill ran down his spine. It was a play all right. A play he hadn’t rehearsed. A play in which he didn’t know the lines. The actor’s nightmare come to life.
    Steve felt a moment of panic. It was immediately replaced by something else. Anger. Anger at himself. Selfish bastard, he thought. So concerned about how he was going to look, what impression he was going to make in the court. A young girl’s future was at stake. A silly, irresponsible girl, perhaps, but