Witness for the Defense by Michael C. Eberhardt

examiner?”
    “Exactly.”
    Patterson stared at me as if he was considering it, but I was sure he wasn’t.
    “You see, Mike, I have nothing to hide. I’m telling the truth, and I’m ready to prove it.”
    Patterson’s face turned cold. “You know our office will only allow a police examiner.”
    “Well, then,” I said, “do what you have to because I’m not going to let one of your examiners get their hands on me.”
    Patterson reached for his telephone. “And you’re not willing to discuss what was said between you and either that boy or Martinez?”
    I knew what all this was leading up to, and I was going to put in my last two cents before it happened. “You know as well as I do it doesn’t matter if I discuss each and every detail of my conversation with that boy and Martinez. You aren’t going to believe a damn thing I say anyway. So why don’t we top screwing around here? This interview is over with as of this second.” I grabbed his recorder and punched the off button.
    Patterson immediately flipped on his intercom. “Send the detectives in.”
    We both sat glaring at each other.
    “Aren’t you being a little premature?” Ogden said when the door burst open and two plainclothes detectives stood just inside the doorway. Their coats were open—holstered guns exposed—just in case I had any ideas.
    “Hunter Dobbs,” Patterson said, “you are under arrest for subornation of perjury.” He then waved his two thugs toward me. “Take Mr. Dobbs into custody.”

Chapter 9
    I can’t count how many times I’d been in a municipal court lockup, but it was the first time I had ever been on the other side of the glass. As I waited for Sarah, my forehead was slick with beads of sweat, yet my hands and feet were cold as ice. I’d always tried to appreciate the anxiety my client experienced during an initial interview, but only at that moment did I fully understand how being handcuffed and shackled, with a guard watching your every move, could make someone feel so impotent, so utterly helpless.
    Subornation of perjury. Christ. That’s first-year law school stuff. That was something we were taught they used to do in the twenties and thirties during the reign of Al Capone. I remembered some of the stories told around The Gavel about the days of the labor wars down on the docks and the crackdown on the city’s crime bosses. A few flamboyant defense lawyers would have off-the-shelf eyewitnesses at their fingertips who would prove their client was on the East Coast at any given moment of any given day.
    But that was folklore, and this was the era of post-Watergate ethics and the strict compliance with a lawyer’s ethical duties. Today, even the sloppiest and most crooked lawyer didn’t finagle testimony. But a slimeball and a scared juvey had me by the short ones. I was facing not only sure disbarment, but serious jail time.
    Thankfully, the detectives brought me straight to an interview room while I awaited my appearance in court. I had the impression they didn’t like their jobs at that particular moment, but that was probably just my way of rationalizing my predicament. I thought the absurdity of the charges would be obvious to all—but clearly I was wrong or I wouldn’t have been there.
    “You won’t believe it,” Sarah said, closing the door. She looked disheveled, her hands trembling as she placed my file on the counter. I was sure it hadn’t occurred to her that she would run into such a buzzsaw. She looked around at the filth and stench we found ourselves in. It wasn’t bucolic Ukiah.
    “Remember when I told you about the glass partition Martinez shattered?”
    At this mention, she looked uneasy. “Is this the room?”
    I looked up and down at the glass between us. “One good thing came of it.”
    Sarah gave me a puzzled look.
    “New glass.”
    After a pained smile, she got straight to why she was there. “You are going to be arraigned in Kellogg’s court.”
    I thought for sure she