The Best Defense by Kate Wilhelm Read Free Book Online Page B

her breath.
    Home, she decided. Someplace where she could pace, curse if she wanted to. She drove home and called Lucille. Then she called her own doctor and caught him on his way out to lunch.
    Without mentioning names or details, she described Paula and her condition.
    “A lot of stress, anxiety, fear, and grief. She lost a lot of blood and is about fifteen pounds underweight.”
    “Good grief.”
    “Tell me this. Am I right, that’s double the high end of the normal dosage?”
    “Probably. I don’t prescribe it; I’d have to look it up.”
    “Exactly. I want reports about side effects, the warnings you know the sort of thing. You guys get that stuff sent to you all the time.”
    “You know I can’t second-guess another doctor with out seeing the patient, and besides, what you want is in the library,” he said.
    “I need it now.”
    “Everybody needs whatever it is now,” he said with some sharpness.
    She could pick up the material at one forty-five, he agreed at last.
    While talking to him she had thumbed through the phone book and found the number for the public de fender’s office; she punched in the numbers.
    “I’m sorry,” a woman said.
    “Mr. Spassero is out of town. He won’t be back until Monday.”
    “He must have left a number where he can be reached.”
    “I’m afraid not. If you’ll leave your number, Ms.
    Holloway, I’m sure he’ll get in touch with you on Mon day.”
    Barbara hung up. She tried his home number, got a machine, and left a message. Monday, she thought bleakly. Monday.
    She walked to the kitchen and stood at the sink looking at the doomed rhododendron, but she was thinking of Paula Kennerman, who was equally doomed. Abruptly she went back to her office and again riffled through the phone book, took a deep breath, and then punched in some more numbers.
    “May I speak with either Judge Paltz’s secretary or his clerk?” she said to the woman who answered.
    She had met Judge Paltz many different times over the years, but she never had tried a case in his court. He and her father had been close in the past, until he had become a judge and her father had moved out to the country and gradually circumstances and distance had separated them. The judge was seventy-three, she knew, one year older than her father.
    He was heavily built, with thin gray hair and a deeply weathered face. A fisherman, she remembered. His chambers office looked like the ideal grandfather’s study: deep comfortable chairs covered with dark mohair, fine walnut tables, an even finer walnut desk cluttered with keepsakes—a porcelain clock, pictures in silver frames, a ceramic boot that held pens and pencils…. A reassuring sort of a room. The only surprising thing about it now was the presence of William Spassero, who had stood up when she entered.
    “Barbara,” Judge Paltz said, taking her hand, enclosing it in both of his.
    “How have you been keeping yourself?
    You look wonderful.”
    This time she was dressed for the occasion in a navy cotton dress with a white jacket and white sandals.
    “I’m fine. Judge Paltz, thank you. Mr. Spassero,” she said with a slight nod. His acknowledging nod was as cool as hers had been. The judge led her to a chair and saw that she was seated comfortably, as if she were his elderly aunt, brittle and frail.
    He sat in a chair between her and Spassero and then, with his hands on his knees, he said, “Barbara, the message I was given said there is an emergency situation with Bill’s client. Is there?”
    “Yes, sir. I believe there is.”
    “All right. Naturally, I couldn’t talk to you about the defendant without her attorney being present also.”
    “Of course,” she said.
    “I tried to reach Mr. Spassero, and when I couldn’t I had no recourse except to appeal to the court. Thank you for arranging the meeting, sir.”
    He inclined his head fractionally.
    “You both understand that under no circumstance can I permit any discussion of material that has