The Exchange: After The Firm

There had been no contact in fifteen years. The internet made it easy to snoop around and see what folks were doing, especially lawyers, who as a breed, and regardless of their success or lack of it, enjoyed all the attention they could generate. It was good for business. Lamar’s website was rather simple, but then so was his practice: the bland offering of deeds, wills, no-fault divorces, property transactions, and, of course, Personal Injuries!! Every small-town lawyer dreamed of landing some good car wrecks.

There was no mention of such unpleasantries as Lamar’s indictment, guilty plea, and prison sentence.

His office was above a sporting goods store. Mitch lumbered up the creaky steps, took a deep breath, and opened the door. A large woman behind a computer screen paused and offered a sweet smile. “Good morning.”

“Good morning. Is Lamar around?”

“He’s in court,” she said, nodding behind her in the general direction of the courthouse.

“A trial?”

“No, just a hearing. Should be over soon. Can I help you?”

Mitch handed her a Scully business card and said, “Name’s Mitch McDeere. I’ll try to catch him over there. Which courtroom?”

“There’s only one. Second floor.”

“Right. Thanks.”

It was a handsome courtroom of the old variety: stained wood trimmings, tall windows, portraits of white, dead, male dignitaries on the walls. Mitch eased in and took a seat on the back row. He was the only spectator. The judge was gone and Lamar was chatting with another lawyer. When he finally saw Mitch he was startled, but kept talking. When he finished he slowly made his way down the center aisle and stopped at the end of the row. It was almost noon and the courtroom was empty.

They watched each other for a moment before Lamar asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Just passing through.” It was a sarcastic response. Only a lost idiot would be passing through such a backwater place as Sumrall.

“I’ll ask again. What are you doing here?”

“I was in Memphis last night, had some business that got canceled. My flight is out of Nashville in a few hours so I made the drive. Thought I’d stop by and say hello.”

Lamar had lost so much hair he was hardly recognizable. What remained was gray. Like a lot of men, he was trying to replace the thinness on top with the thickness of a beard. But it too was gray, as it usually is, and only added to the aging. He eased down the row in front of Mitch, stopped ten feet away, and leaned on the pew in front. He had yet to smile and asked, “Anything in particular you want to discuss?”

“Not really. I think about you occasionally and just wanted to say hello.”

“Hello. You know, Mitch, I think about you too. I spent twenty-seven months in a federal pen because of you, so you’re rather hard to forget.”

“You spent twenty-seven months in a federal pen because you were a willing member of a criminal conspiracy, one that tried its best to entice me to join. I managed to escape, barely. You got a grudge, so do I.”

In the background a clerk walked in front of the bench. They watched her and waited until she was gone, then resumed staring at each other.

Lamar gave a slight shrug and said, “Okay, fair enough. I did the crime and did the time. It’s not something I dwell on.”

“I’m not here to start trouble. I was hoping we could have a pleasant chat and bury the hatchet, so to speak.”

Lamar took a deep breath and said, “Well, if nothing else, I admire you for being here. I thought I’d never see you again.”

“Same here. You were the only real friend I had back in those days, Lamar. We had some good times together, in spite of the pressure and all. Abby and Kay hit it off nicely. We have fond memories of you guys.”

“Well, we don’t. We lost everything, Mitch, and it was easy to blame it all on you.”

“The firm was going down, Lamar, you know that. The FBI was hot on the trail and closing in. They picked me because I was the new guy and they figured I was the weak link.”

“And they were right.”

“Damned right they were. Since I had done nothing wrong, I made the decision to protect myself. I cooperated and ran like a scared dog. The FBI couldn’t even find me.”

“Where’d you go?”

Mitch smiled and slowly got to his feet. “That, my friend, is a long story. Can I buy lunch?”

“No, but let’s find a table.”

The first café on the square was crowded with “too many lawyers,” according to Lamar. They walked another block and found a table in a sandwich shop in the basement of an old hardware store. Each paid for his own lunch and they sat in a corner, away from the crowd.

“So how’s Kay?” Mitch asked. He assumed they were still married. His cursory internet sleuthing had found no records of a divorce in the past ten years. From time to time, Mitch would recall a face or a name from back then and waste a few minutes online digging for dirt. After fifteen years, though, his curiosity was waning. He took no notes and kept no files.

“She’s fine, selling medical supplies for a nice company. Doing well. And Abby?”