Tourist Trap (Rebecca Schwartz #3) (A Rebecca Schwartz Mystery) (The Rebecca Schwartz Series)

continued walking toward the kitchen, expecting me, apparently, to follow. I did, hoping I didn’t faint before we got there.
    Though Mickey’s red face meant she’d been crying, she was now quite composed, if sad and subdued. Kruzick, on the other hand, sobbed as he stirred, big sloppy tears splashing onto his T-shirt. Instantly, I realized Mickey hadn’t meant me to follow; she was simply so distracted she’d forgotten to tell me not to.
    Not seeming to notice me at all, Kruzick put his arms around Mickey, held her like a child hanging on to its teddy bear, and said thank God she was all right, he didn’t know what he’d do if he lost her, and more, I suppose, in that vein, but I wouldn’t know because I backed out discreetly.
    For a few uncomfortable minutes I waited, but Mickey didn’t join me. Finally I left a note saying I’d been in the neighborhood and had just dropped in to be sure she was all right, but really couldn’t stay, I was awfully sorry.
    I stopped for a burger on Geary Boulevard and found I had more than that to chew over. For the first time I was starting to see what Mickey saw in Kruzick, and that was such an unaccustomed sensation I felt giddy. Underneath all that showy schmuckiness, he actually had a human feeling or two. I might be wrong, but I’d gotten the preposterous idea he really loved her. When I thought about it, the evidence had been there all the time—he didn’t cheat on her; he wanted to marry her; in his own weird way, he was even there when she needed him. Which was more, I thought, than could sometimes be said of Rob. With the utmost chagrin, I realized that I was actually jealous of someone who called Alan Kruzick sweetheart. I nearly choked on my burger.
    And then, after another couple of bites, I developed a human feeling or two of my own—equally foreign ones. I started to be happy for Mickey; and to develop the slightest little shreds of affection for Kruzick himself. Unbelievable, but there it was. I was ashamed to think it had taken a miscarriage to come to this.
    When I got home, there was a call from Mickey. Returning it, I found her still slightly depressed, but philosophical: “I think I wasn’t ready to have a baby. I mean if I wasn’t ready for marriage, what was I thinking?”
    “I sort of wondered that myself.”
    “But you know what? There’s a good side to all of this.”
    “Don’t tell me. It’s brought you and Alan closer together.”
    “You think that’s a stupid cliché.”
    “Actually,” I said, “I don’t. I’m glad.” I never had more trouble getting two words out, but I meant them.
    * * *
     
    Dad and I made a deal: With his advice, I’d prepare Lou’s case, and he’d help me try it. The change of venue was easy—there wasn’t a judge in San Francisco who could be convinced he’d get a fair trial there. The case was put on the calendar in San Jose.
    During pretrial skirmishing, I got to know the enemy a little—and she was me. Or so much like me it was eerie. Deputy District Attorney Liz Hughes was trying the case for the people. Liz was about my height—though maybe a little thinner—only a couple of years older, and a fellow graduate of Boalt Hall of Law. She dressed conservatively, but behaved in any way at all that might help her win her case. (Any ethical way, that is—I didn’t know a thing against Liz, so far as her integrity went, and neither did anyone else.) But she’d cajole, bully, lose her temper, possibly even cry to sway judge or jury. Any lawyer might, of course, but Liz put so much energy into her court appearances she was downright colorful. I’m not at all sure that could fairly be said about me, but I will say there was one person who said it, regularly and ruefully—my mother. So in certain ways I identified with Liz.
    But I was also a little awed and intimidated by her—much more so than if she’d been a man my age. She had a reputation as a hotshot, and her record supported it—since she’d been in homicide, she’d never failed to get a conviction. That had a depressing effect, but Dad told me a tale that came out of the sixties, when so-called political trials were crowding the calendars.
    Members of a certain radical group, who’d allegedly engaged in a shootout with police, came to one of Dad’s celebrated colleagues. “We need a lawyer like Perry Mason,” they said. “You good as Perry?”
    “I’m better,” said the distinguished counselor. “His clients were