Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver

“I’ve decided to take your case.”
    â€œGood, good. How much is your fee?”
    â€œThree grand. Is that fair enough?”
    â€œFair enough. I rather thought it might be more.”
    â€œMaybe I’d better raise it, then. I always want my clients to feel satisfied.”
    â€œI’m real satisfied—three thousand is most fair and reasonable.”
    â€œGood. When can you pay it?”
    â€œIt’ll have to be later. Right now I’m broke.”
    â€œWhat!”
    â€œI’m broke. At this moment I couldn’t pay you three dollars.”
    â€œCan you raise it?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œHow about your trailer?”
    â€œBoth it and my car are mortgaged to the hilt.”
    â€œHow about your relatives? Everybody has a rich uncle.”
    â€œI don’t have any uncles, rich or poor. Both my parents are dead. My only close relative is a married sister in Dubuque. She and her husband owe me money. They have four kids and a mortgage.”
    â€œYou seem to spring from well-mortgaged stock,” I said. “Look, Manion, why did you call me down here if you knew you couldn’t pay me? Did you think perhaps I ran a veterans’ legal aid bureau?”

    â€œI needed a lawyer and I wanted the best.”
    â€œYou mean the second best, don’t you? Or have you forgotten about that eminent authority on unwritten law, old Crocker?”
    The Lieutenant shrugged and regarded me steadily. “Well,” he said slowly, “if you won’t represent me I suppose I’ll have to try someone else.”
    I stared at him. Was it possible that this man sensed that by now I would almost have paid him to stay in the case? “You let me waste a whole goddam day on this case when you knew all along you couldn’t pay me,” I said, trying hard to work up a pout.
    â€œYou didn’t ask me,” he said.
    The man had me there. He couldn’t be expected to know that any half-decent attorney could scarcely discuss his fee before he knew whether he wanted to enter a case. At the same time, though, I could well have probed him a little about his general financial condition when I first met him the morning before. And probably should have. Why didn’t I face it? Wasn’t it the solemn truth that I had suspected all along he didn’t have any money, as Maida had warned me, and had deliberately put off asking him until it was too late, until I was hopelessly enmeshed? As for Maida, how would I ever square all this with her and our depleted check book? The thought made me smile.
    â€œLook, Manion,” I said. “How much can you pay me and when?”
    â€œI can pay you a hundred and fifty dollars on account next week. It’s pay day then.”
    â€œYou realize, of course, that if I accept that I—that I’ve enlisted for the duration?”
    Coolly: “Yes. That’s why I’m offering it.”
    There was a kind of engaging frankness about this cool pirate. “When could you pay me the balance?”
    â€œI don’t know. If I’m acquitted I’ll give you a promissory note and I can pay you so much a month.”
    â€œFamous last words,” I said. “And suppose you’re convicted?”
    â€œThen I guess both of us lose. But isn’t that just another of those calculated risks—like pleading insanity?”
    The needling bastard … . I had to put in one more try, for Maida’s sake. “Supposing I said I won’t take your case till you pay me half my fee?”
    Shrugging: “I’d just have to regretfully get someone else, I’m afraid.”
    â€œYou’d risk that?” I said. “You’d actually risk it?”

    Smiling slightly: “I’ve got my legal defense now, haven’t I? I was insane, wasn’t I? How can I possibly lose?”
    I was now getting the Lecture in reverse. I stared admiringly at the man, at this shrewd,