The only good Lawyer by Jeremiah Healy

whispered something into her mouthpiece. I couldn’t hear what she said, which, given her controlled attitude so far, didn’t surprise me.

    “Mr. Cuddy, Frank Neely.”
    He extended his hand to shake, the full name “Francis Xavier Neely” on calligraphed diplomas from Boston College High School , Boston College , and Boston College Law in ascending order on the wall behind his own teak desk. Around here we call that a “Triple Eagle,” after the schools’ shared mascot. At the side of the desk, there was even an old bookbag-style briefcase, the kind the nuns preferred you to carry in grammar school, the initials “FXN” in faded gold near the handles on top.
    Neely next said, “Thank you, Imogene,” and his office door closed behind me. “Mr. Cuddy, have a seat while I just enter something on my time sheet here.”
    Sitting down, Neely tapped at a computer as though he were afraid it might explode on him-Standing between the teak desk and matching creden-za, Neely was a shade over six feet, maybe two hundred pounds. What looked like a closet door to the right wasn’t open, and while he might have put on the windowpane suit jacket just to greet me, I somehow didn’t think so. His eyes were blue—what an aunt of mine would have called “devilish”—in a ruddy face, the nose prominent. His hair was that straw-blond that skips gray and goes straight to snow at the sideburns. A sepia photo on the wall showed a youthful Neely in World War II combat fatigues, a Ranger patch stitched to one shoulder, his arm a horse-collar around the neck of another soldier in the same uniform. The horse-collar appeared to be a favorite pose of Neely’s, as he used it again in a color photo with a very slim, very distinguished, and very bald man, the neckties and hairstyles suggesting the shot went maybe ten years back. However, the Ranger one meant Neely would have to be pushing seventy, even if seemingly in better-than-fair shape doing it. “Leonard Epstein.”
    I brought my eyes back to Neely. “Which photo?” He actually turned to look. “Oh, the color shot there. Len and I founded this firm together seven—no, sweet Jesus, it’s eight years now.” A bittersweet smile with a head shake. “Heart attack took him early, never saw sixty-five. God wants the good ones sooner, I guess.”
    “I’m sorry for both your losses,” I said.
    Even the bittersweet smile disappeared now. “Imogene said you were here about Woodrow.”
    “That’s right. And I really appreciate your seeing me without any notice.”
    “Which must be the way you thought best.”
    Direct. “When I call first, people usually manage to be away from their desk.”
    Something rumbled in Neely’s chest, but he didn’t laugh out loud. “I’m a trusts and estates man, Mr. Cuddy, so I’m almost always in. But I take your point.” His left hand went up to scratch at his temple, the back of the hand matted enough with the snowy hair to cover any age spots. “Imogene said she’d seen a business card. How about a little more definite identification?”
    I drew out the leather folder, and then my wallet, flipping to the driver’s license photo before passing both across the desk. Neely compared them without reaching for any glasses, then passed both back.
    “So,” he said, “how about if it’s ‘John’ and ‘Frank’ for now?”
    “Fine with me.”
    “You’re working for Mr. Alan Spaeth, then?”
    The same inflection on “Mr.” as on each syllable of the name. “I am.”
    “Figured as much. You were with one of the insurance companies, somebody would have called first.”
    I said, “One of the companies?”
    “Woodrow had a couple of life policies, payable to family members. And of course we had firm insurance on him.”
    “As a key employee.”
    A nod. “Learned that lesson with Len. We didn’t have but five hundred on each of us back then, and it was tough sledding for a while after he died.”
    “Five hundred thousand?”
    Neely