Angel's Verdict Part 10

He brought the parchment back and laid it on the counter.

Bree picked it up and unrolled it. "Well, well," she said after a moment. "This is very interesting."

Ron looked over her shoulder. "How was she sentenced?"

"She's in the first circle, for a millennium. The charges are third-degree treachery, third-degree malice, bigotry in the fourth degree . . ." She looked up. "Nothing about murder."

"First circle," Goldstein said. "That's like temporal traffic court. Hardly worth your while."

"Now, now," Ron said. "We never turn away a client. Rather, we haven't yet."

Bree rolled up the parchment. "Good grief. Well, we have to proceed on the a.s.sumption that's she's innocent, right?"

"Florida Smith doesn't agree," Ron said. "She's doing everything she can to pin Haydee's murder on Consuelo."

"She sure is." This was a pickle. What if Consuelo had murdered Haydee? Bree could hardly investigate a case that might land her client a tougher sentence. Mitigating circ.u.mstances might help reduce the sentence. Get her into Purgatory, perhaps, which was a lot cooler. No manual labor, either. Perhaps her client would settle for that. "Goldstein, could we have the other Bulloch files as well?"

"Have they retained you as counsel?"

"Well, no. But the information might help us with our current client's case."

Goldstein tramped back to the cubicles, brought two more rolls of parchment, and handed them over. They were slimmer than Consuelo's.

"And the file for Haydee Quinn?"

Goldstein sighed.

"Please," Bree added.

Goldstein trudged back down the aisle with a put-upon air. His sandals slapped heavily on the stone floor. The roll he brought back was slim, too. "Anything else?" he asked. "Maybe the file on Idi Amin, which is all the way to the end of the row? And then on Xerxes II, which is all the way to the other end of the row and a back file, to boot?"

"If you got yourself a good IT system," Ron began.

"Hey!" Bree said. She had unrolled Alexander junior's parchment while the two angels squabbled. She flipped it around so that the other two could see it. "All this says is 'Pending.'"

Goldstein made a "so what?" gesture.

"There's nothing in this file but his personal data and this big fat red stamp that says . . . 'Pending.' " Bree's voice rose in frustration on the final word. She made an effort to lower it. "Alexander died in 1978. After working in a bank and having three kids. How come he hasn't had his Judgment Day?"

"Obviously, there are some unresolved temporal issues," Goldstein said. "When they've been taken care of, he'll be eligible for disposition."

"Where is he now, Goldstein?" Bree demanded.

"Limbo is as good a description as any."

Bree unrolled Alexander senior's file. "This one says 'Pending,' too. The poor guy's father! He's been dead a long time, too! He hasn't had his Judgment Day, either? Why aren't these folks guaranteed the right to a speedy trial?"

Goldstein opened his mouth to speak.

Bree held up her hand. "Stop right there. I know what you're about to say to me, Goldstein, and I don't want to hear it."

Goldstein said it anyway. "What is time to an angel?" Then, "Limbo's not so bad. I can think of a lot worse places to twiddle your thumbs. You don't start to serve time until the sentence comes down."

She eyed Haydee's file with misgiving. She unrolled it. She said, "Oh h.e.l.l," which sent a rustle of disapproval around the room. She held out the parchment for Ron's inspection.

" 'Pending,' " Ron read aloud.

"That poor woman was stabbed to death in 1952 and her soul hasn't been disposed of yet!" Bree slapped the files together and then used them to smack Goldstein on the head. "I'm filing a complaint."

Goldstein took a prudent few steps backwards, out of Bree's reach. "What kind of complaint?"

"Not a complaint," Bree said. "Forget the complaint. The issue of time is a nonstarter. I can see that right away. I'm filing a pet.i.tion."

Goldstein backed a few steps farther away. "Like your other pet.i.tion? The one that demanded, what was it-'the right to direct and unambiguous communication between counsel and client'? Good luck with that one!"

"Tell me you're not snickering," Bree said in an ominous way.

"No, no, no," he said hastily. "You won't hear the slightest snicker from me. Actually, Bree, I admire your revolutionary spirit."

"You do, huh."

"Just as long as it doesn't go too far. After all . . ."

He was snickering, Bree thought furiously.

"Revolution has been known to be carried to excess. I refer you, of course, to case file 1.1 in the Corpus Juris Ultima."

"Case 1.1," Bree said. Her memory for famous temporal case precedents was a lot better than her recall of celestial ones. "Oh," she said flatly. "Right."

Lucifer v. the Celestial Courts.

She grabbed the only Bulloch file that was going to be of use to her. "Till the next time, Goldstein."

He twiddled his fingers. "Bye-bye."

"We should feel good about this, in a way," Ron said as they rode down the elevator to the first floor. "Look how important the caseload's getting. If we tie this one up, we're going to affect the disposition of at least three souls. Maybe even more than that."

Bree stamped her foot. "d.a.m.n. I should have asked for the file on Bagger Bill Norris, too. If he's in the eighth circle, we'll have a pretty good idea that he's involved somehow. It'll help the temporal investigation a lot to know who actually did it."

"Shall I go back up and get it?"

"Yeah. But look at it before you check it out. If it says 'Pending,' too, give it back to Goldstein and tell him to ..." Bree stamped her other foot. "Oh, tell him I'm sorry I lost my temper. I suppose just knowing Norris is in Limbo along with everyone else helps a bit. But I am going to write out a pet.i.tion, and I am going to see a little decent reform if it's the last thing I do. Jeez." Then she muttered, "Limbo."

Ron very rarely touched her, but he did so now. He put his hand on her cheek and smiled at her. "It's not just a flip saying, 'What is time to an angel?' It's a very profound truth. Time is meaningless. There is no past. No future. Just the now. If you're imagining Haydee in Limbo crying out for a justice that's been delayed, it just isn't so."

"I get the metaphysical part just fine," Bree said. There was something about Ron's smile that was better than any antidepressant devised by man, and that, Bree thought, included a nice slug of gin. She smiled back at him. "It's the people here in this time and this place that are waiting unfairly."

"Who, for example?"

"Dent, for one."

"Dent's problems are well within his control."

She was still arguing with Ron when the elevator doors opened on the first floor and she very nearly cannoned into Cordelia Eastburn.

"Hey, Bree! Back from your holidays, I see." The district attorney looked past Bree into the elevator. "It's Ron Parchese, isn't it?"

"Par-chay-see," Ron said. "Not like the game. How are you, Ms. Eastburn?"

"Finer than a frog hair, as my daddy used to say. Can I borrow your boss for a minute, Ron?"

"She's all yours. I've got to dash upstairs for a second anyway."

Cordy pulled Bree out of the current of people swirling around the room. She was in her midforties and had held the post of district attorney for just a few years. If Bree were a betting woman, she'd put a large sum on Cordy's stated goal: to become the first female black governor of Georgia.

"You're looking a little ruffled, girl. Everything okay?

"I'm pretty well, thanks, Cordy. How are you doing?" Bree c.o.c.ked her head. "Love the new earrings."

Cordelia's one concession to fas.h.i.+on was an indulgence in handmade earrings; this pair was a handsome swirl of blown gla.s.s. Cordy touched them and gave her a cool smile. "Christmas present."

"Nice," Bree approved. "Is it a serious kind of present?"

Cordy wriggled her left hand. The third finger was ringless. "Might be. Might be at that. Speaking of might-be's, have you seen much of Sam Hunter lately?"

Bree gave a guilty start. "Lord. I was supposed to give him a call. Have you seen him?"

"More than I'd like. Not that I don't appreciate the man. I surely do, and," she added, her tone a little more stern, "he's one of the best cops we've got on the force. But what with these movie people in town, we've been . . . what's a good way to put it . . . interfacing more than usual between the police and populace, which means Sam's been up to see me on a pretty frequent basis. Which brings me to the question I have for you, actually." Her tone was crisp, and slightly disapproving.

"Okay," Bree said. "What's up?"

Cordy's gaze was flinty. "You involved in dragging up a cold case?"

"The Haydee Quinn murder?"

"The very one. Are you involved with it?"

Bree hesitated. "Not officially."

"I don't think I heard you, Bree. Officially? Are you an employee of the State of Georgia? A member of my staff? Or, G.o.d forbid, of the police department?"

Bree's cheeks were warm. "No, of course not. But some concerns about that case have been raised, and I got interested. Are you upset with me, Cordy? If so, I'd like to know why."

"Who raised what concerns?"

Bree didn't say anything.

Cordy waited her out and then said, "We've been through this drill before. With the Skinner case and the Chandler case and the Lord knows what else you're getting into that I don't know about. So I'm saying again what you've heard before. You find anything out that should be brought to the attention of the State of Georgia you're going to let me know. Correct?"

"Correct."

"I don't have a problem with putting myself in the public eye, Bree. You've got to, if you're going to get anywhere with the kind of reform I want to have happen. But there's setting forward in the right way and then there's sheer opportunism. I'm not so fond of opportunism, and I don't think your daddy is, either. Am I correct in this?"

Bree was completely mystified, but she said, "Of course you're correct. Do you think I'm behaving un-professionally in any way?"

"Not now. But I'd sure hate to see it in the future."

"I'm starting to feel a lot of sympathy for Alfred Dreyfus," Bree said a bit tartly. "Are you accusing me of something specific?"

"Just that you're the last person I'd accuse of being tacky. Ambulance chasing, so to speak."

"I should hope so," Bree said indignantly. "Who says I'm chasing ambulances? What ambulances?"

Cordy's fierce stance relaxed a bit. "Mind if I say something off-the-record?"

"I wish you would," Bree said fervently. Cordy off-the-record was much easier to deal with than Cordy the Crusader.

"Those Bullochs are not nice people. As for John Stubblefield . . ." She chewed on her lower lip for a moment. "One of these days that boy is going to regret his att.i.tude. And it won't come soon enough for me. Anyway." She gave Bree's shoulder a friendly buffet. "Give Hunter a call one of these days if you feel like it. And it's been too long since the two of us got together for a girl's night out. Call me, soon, okay?"

"Soon," Bree promised.

Cordy walked away. On her way out the front door, she stopped and spoke to the security guards (leaving appreciative chuckles in her wake), greeted two attorneys with a nicely judged chilliness that didn't bode well for whatever pending cases they had, and patted three babies.

"You've cheered up," Ron said in her ear.

"Cordy always cheers me up, even when she's hollering at me." Bree thought about why, before she spoke again. "She's so decent, I guess. I'd sure like to know what set her off, though."

"An ally in the good fight," Ron agreed. "I always like to see her myself. Well, I took a look at the Norris file." He spread his hands to show they were empty. "Pending."

Bree sighed. "Great. Now we don't know if he murdered Haydee or not."

"Your day's about to get even better." He waved his Blackberry at her. "Petru sent me an e-mail. Last things first. Florida Smith will be glad to go to dinner. She'll meet you at today's shoot around seven, and you can walk on over to B. Matthew's from there. Right now, you've got a meeting at Stubblefield, Marwick in thirty minutes. They want you to bring the brooch."

"How is that going to make my day better? I've come back from every meeting I've ever had with John Stubblefield wanting to take a nice hot shower."

"You might feel better about meeting them if you read Petru's e-mail. Consuelo's will was probated ages ago."

"And?"

"Petru's read it, summarized it, scanned it, and sent it to you. You can bring the whole thing up on your iPod, if you want. But all you really need to do is read Petru's summary."

Bree took out her phone and pulled up Petru's message. She read it and then snapped the phone shut. "Well, well, well. This is going to make things interesting."

"Isn't it just," Ron said.