Due Justice

Chapter 35

Tampa, Florida

Monday 5:30 p.m.

January 25, 1999

I set it up carefully. I’d be spending half an hour alone with a nasty tempered man who was an accessory to murder.

I don’t know whether it’s easier to kill when you’ve got nothing more to lose, but I wasn’t interested in testing the hypothesis.

Unlike Dr. Morgan, I’ve never had the patience for science.

My clerk scheduled our meeting for 5:30, after the trial day. My bailiff would be close by. Security in Federal Buildings is tight since the Oklahoma City bombing. I was sure he wouldn’t be able to bring in a gun or a knife, and I also thought I could probably take him if I didn’t let him sneak up behind me again. Long enough for the bailiff to arrive, anyway.

Belt and suspenders: I scheduled Ben Hathaway for 5:45. Clever, eh?  That’s why they pay me the big bucks.

O’Connell arrived ten minutes early. I made him wait five minutes past his appointment time before I allowed my secretary show him in. Business as usual.

When he walked in, he looked around the room as if he was expecting someone else to be there.

I said, “O’Connell, please, sit down.”

Waved toward one of the green leather chairs. I didn’t need the elevated platform under my desk to enable me to tower over the normally nervous chair inhabitants. But I occupied the office my predecessor had decorated it. He was only about five feet tall, and I’m sure you’ve got your own ideas about little men with a little power.

In this instance, though, I confess that I felt more confident being a foot taller than I otherwise am.

O’Connell looked up at me from his chair. It put him a little more off balance, unsure.

“Judge Carson.”  He nodded.

Was he that cool, or reverting to forty years of training?

He said, “Good of you to see me. What can I do for you?”

Smooth.

But I had no intention of allowing him to take over this time.

Put two people in a room who are used to having complete control over their lives sometime and watch what happens. It’s a little like two male lions in the same cage. Right now we were circling. He watched for clues.

He hadn’t dared to ignore my “invitation” with a case currently in trial in my courtroom. But he wanted to know why I’d summoned him here and he wouldn’t ask twice.

I let him simmer a while longer. “Excuse me one minute while I review this order, O’Connell. I’ll be right with you.”

One of my former partners used to sit in a room with one other occupant in complete silence. Nature abhors a vacuum, he would say. Pretty soon, most people will talk to fill up the silence. O’Connell Worthington was too old and too crafty a player to chatter without purpose. But the silence worked its magic. He began to perspire; a little damp above his upper lip, but it was definitely there.

“Too warm in here for you, O’Connell?” I asked him, letting him know I’d noticed.

“I’m fine, Judge. Thank you.”

He clearly wasn’t fine.

I was winning round one, and we both knew it.

“O’Connell, I asked you here because I need a little advice.”  I said, after ten more minutes of silence, putting the order I’d been revising to one side.