Code of the Forest

By Jon Buchan

When Wade McNabb, publisher of the Georgetown Pilot, exposes high-level political corruption surrounding a chemical plant on the South Carolina coast, a powerful senator, steeped in the ancient code of the state's insider politics, threatens to bring down McNabb and his newspaper. Wade turns for help to Kate Stewart, a young lawyer who has left a large law firm for a fresh start on her own in Georgetown. These two fiercely independent souls form a wary alliance for the legal battle that follows. It's a fight that shows them the power of connections--good and bad--to change their lives forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jon Buchan
• Release date: Nov 10, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311381729

Jon Buchan

Jon Buchan, a former South Carolina political reporter, is a lawyer with more than three decades of experience representing and broadcasters in courtroom battles. The NC press association the William C. Lassiter First Amendment Award in 2000 for his "tireless efforts to defend the First Amendment and to protect the public's right to know." Buchan, who grew up in Mullins, South Carolina, has spent most of his career in Charlotte, North Carolina. This is his first novel.

Book preview

PART I - GEORGETOWN

1995

1

Ducks in the Freezer

Senator Buck Ravenel hunkered in the chill of the Lowcountry dawn, pondering ducks and politics. There were always ducks at Bowman’s Forest. And there was always politics.

He glanced at the man sitting beside him in the duck blind and smiled.

Do-Good, you still got those cowboy boots I gave you? Judge Dupree Jones, squirrel-cheeked, bushy eyebrows at parade rest, squinted toward the tops of the longleaf pines lining the pond’s opposite shore. He warmed himself with a sip of Maker’s Mark from a metal hip flask sporting the South Carolina state flag, silver crescent and palmetto tree against a dark blue background.

You know I do, Buck.

Ravenel had given Jones the snakeskin boots - custom made by Ravenel’s favorite Texas craftsman and soft as a puppy’s belly - fifteen years ago. The nickname came with the boots, right after Jones had voted for a fellow the senator had promised a judgeship.

Helping you out put me in a pinch with some of my folks back home, but it all worked out. Made you happy.

Ravenel reached for the flask of whiskey and took a sip. You did good, Dupree. I can always tell which of the new young Turks understand how things work and know the right team to be on, he said. I like looking around the State House and seeing those boys wearing my boots. And I like giving out those names.

Judge Jones sucked in a sharp bourbon breath and wiped his lips with the sleeve of his camouflaged hunting jacket.

We’re ’bout to see some thirsty damn ducks coming this way, he said with a laugh. When they spot this pond, they’ll come right at us. It’ll be the last letter home, Momma.

He patted the senator on the shoulder and surveyed the peaceful setting.

Got-almighty, what a perfect morning, the judge said. Two hundred yards away, two score or so mallard ducks, quacking and jostling, the drakes’ iridescent dark-green heads bobbing, waddled through the open gate of their ground floor pen. They headed up a wire-enclosed ramp that sloped gently higher, spiraling up and around the three-story wooden tower hidden in the pine forest.

The Superintendent of Game for Bowman’s Forest had raised these ducks himself, breasts plumped by ample corn, for a day just like this January morning. Since the sun last rose, he’d given them neither food nor water.

When the duck parade reached the tower top, the superintendent deftly herded the first six ducks into an outside wire pen. From there, they could see Paradise through the tops of the pine trees - a freshwater pond baited with tender millet. Sweet Lord, here we come across the River Jordan! They whacked their wings against the sides of the pen, desperate to escape. They were still out of sight and sound of the hunters.

Judge Jones shifted his stiff legs in the duck blind. He blew his warm breath on the cold fingers of his trigger hand.

Buck, what’s been bringin’ you to Georgetown so much these past few weeks? the judge asked. I haven’t seen you in my courtroom.

The senator was quiet for a moment.

I’ve been helping out some old friends with that phosphate plant they want to build over on the Waccamaw River, he said finally. It’ll be a great deal for Georgetown. Damn good-paying jobs, the kind of company that gives back to the community and all that sort of happy crap.

He grunted and spat.

But right now, all those tree-huggers are trying to stop it, having little wine and cheese fundraisers to get everybody all worked up. Some piss-ant reporter for the Georgetown paper is fishing around like he’s after some big ole trophy bass.

Ravenel checked the chamber on his 12-gauge.

Well, we’ll get it all straightened out, though, I’m not worried about that.

Don’t tell me more than I need to know, Buck, the judge said. Ravenel gave him a tight grin.

Don’t worry, Dupree, I’ll tell you just enough, just like always.

They listened for a moment in the silence, hoping for the sound of ducks. Nothing yet.

Ravenel rested his shotgun across his knee and scratched the head of the judge’s chocolate Labrador retriever Muddy Waters.

Dupree, you know how I first heard about Bowman’s Forest? It was 1970. I was a year out of law school, and I had my first case set for trial in Marion County. My client had slipped on a wet spot in a grocery store and slammed his head on the floor. He was never quite the same, lost his job driving a long-haul truck. Buddy Beeson was the lawyer for the grocery store, and its insurance company wouldn’t offer us a nickel to settle. Said it was the man’s own damn fault for not watching where he was walking.

Beeson - he was the senator from Marion County back then? Judge Jones asked.

Yeah, but I didn’t give a good goddam about that. I was too green to know any better, Ravenel said, peering straight ahead at the tall pines across the pond. The early morning sun had begun to burn away the mist rising from the water.

"I had a damn good case. This was no ‘wino actor with a chiropractor’ kind of whining plaintiff. This was a hard-working man who had really been hurt. I just wanted a jury of twelve good people to hear my client tell his story and explain how his life had been taken away. Trial was set for the week before Christmas. You know how generous juries are around the holidays. The insurance company lawyers use every excuse in the book to avoid those Santa Claus juries. I was sure we could get a couple of hundred thousand dollars in damages.

When we got to the courthouse, I was one ready son of a bitch. I had my exhibits to show the jury. I had a specialist from the medical school set to testify about how my client’s mind had never recovered. I had the wife ready to testify how her husband was a different man, a lesser man, after his accident. My client and his whole family were there.

The quiet morning exploded with quacks and whistling that sounded like gridlock in Manhattan. Ravenel’s eyes caught the first flight of six mallards as they cleared the green tops of the pines. They were flapping for all they were worth, the leader setting the pace, necks stretched straight, lusting for the food, the water, the peace in the pond. Muddy Waters heard the racket and began to fidget.

Got-almighty-damn, exclaimed the judge. Here we go! Jones stood, pocketed his flask and released the safety on his own shotgun. Shots exploded from each hunter’s gun, but Muddy never left his spot. Two more groups of mallards, and eighteen shots later, the carefully trained, soft-mouthed retriever - better pedigreed than most race horses - had returned a dozen ducks, still warm to the touch.

There had been a time when coastal South Carolina’s winter skies were darkened with thousands of migrating ducks. The modern take at Bowman’s Forest was a mere nod to that era.

You didn’t finish your story, said Judge Jones, as he rubbed his proud puppy between the ears. What did Santa Claus bring you?

Ravenel was counting the ducks, dividing them up. Finally, he spoke, shaking his head at the memory.

Before we could start pickin’ a jury, the judge called us back to his chambers, he said. I sat down across from the judge and started to tell him about my case. Beeson, he just leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up against the edge of the judge’s desk. He asked the judge about his family and about how his daughter was enjoyin’ her first year at Clemson. Then the judge asked Beeson if he was takin’ folks down to Bowman’s Forest that winter to go duck huntin’. Told Beeson how much fun he’d had on last year’s trip. The judge said he’d eaten his last duck from that trip just a few weeks ago, at Thanksgiving.

Ravenel shook his head and laughed.

"I had no damn idea what they were talkin’ about. But then Beeson dropped his feet to the floor, slapped his thighs and said, ‘Judge, I gotta few of those ducks left in my freez-ah. I’ll bring some over to you this weekend. And we need to go huntin’ again.’

The judge smiled at Beeson. Then he frowned at me and said, ‘Mr. Ravenel, I’ve read your trial brief, and I believe your case has some problems. I think Mr. Beeson’s motion to dismiss has a great deal of merit. Now, I suspect he’s about to offer you $30,000 to settle this case. I suggest you go out there and have a come-to-Jesus meeting with your client and help him understand why he should accept that offer. You can tell him the judge appears to be on the verge of dismissing his lawsuit, in which case he’ll get nothing.’

Ravenel reached down to pick up his share of the ducks. He put his hand on the judge’s shoulder.

I left that room pretty shook up. My client couldn’t believe it. He knew how much we had prepared. I had told him the day before that I thought the case was worth at least a hundred thousand dollars. But he needed money bad, and $30,000 would at least pay some of his overdue bills. I cut my fee to almost nothing, but the whole family was crying when I left them. I tell you what, Dupree. I walked out of that courthouse hating the law, hating politics, hating judges and hating the state legislators who appoint them. I was just beginning to understand how things work.

"As I headed down the courthouse steps with my tail between my legs, Beeson came hustling up beside me. He threw his arm around my shoulder, all buddy-like and chuckled,

‘You know, Buck, that case of yours wasn’t half bad. But you know what your biggest problem was?’

"I said, ‘No, I guess I don’t.’

That sonovabitch brayed at me like a mule: ‘Buck, your problem was, you didn’t have no ducks in yo’ freez-ah!’

Ravenel lifted his three brace of ducks, their gray bodies and green heads dangling limply at his ankles. He smiled at Judge Jones.

Do-Good, my friend, that was twenty-five years ago, Ravenel’s blue eyes were wide and twinkling.

As they say in the country, I realized I needed to move up closer to the main road and start subscribing to the newspaper. I wised up some. And now here I am at Bowman’s Forest. My Senate committee picks the judges. I got ducks in my freezer. And I win most of my cases.

2

Kate Stewart

In the dimly lit Georgetown County courtroom, Kate Stewart could not read Judge Dupree Jones.

She had heard he was hard on what he still called lady lawyers, but she had never seen him in action before. And today’s hearing was not going well.

Your Honor, she said firmly, With all due respect…

She struggled to hide the sarcasm that almost leaked from her lips onto the word due.

"The State wants to tell the jury about a burglary conviction my client had six years ago. If my client takes the witness stand during his trial next week, the State may properly question his credibility by asking him about that conviction. But if he elects not to testify, the State cannot simply argue to the jury that his other burglary makes it more likely he committed this one. Rule 404 prohibits that."

Judge Jones rocked slowly in his chair behind the bench, his eyes locked on Kate’s. Decades of South Carolina’s Lowcountry cuisine had helped him fully fill his judicial robes. His hair was the gray of the Spanish moss that hung like giant spider webs in Georgetown’s oak trees. At 65, the judge’s cheeks had grown puffy, giving his eyes a slitted, sleepy look that disguised his mental acuity.

He watched Kate Stewart carefully, like a feral cat eyes a cornered mouse. Kate was clearly quick on her feet, but the judge knew he was going to win.

Ms. Stewart - do I have that right, or is it Mrs. Stewart? - the rule is not as clear cut as you and your client might like it to be.

Kate tried hard not to stare at Judge Jones’s massive white eyebrows. They swept up onto his forehead and leaned toward his temples. When he was angry, they took on a life of their own, dancing like agitated mice. When he widened his eyes, every hair in his eyebrows stood erect, like soldiers at attention. She wondered if he had trained them to do that.

The State relies upon the exception to Rule of Evidence 404, the judge continued. "If the State can demonstrate that there appears to be a pattern, a similar modus operandi, then the prior conviction may be introduced whether your client takes the stand or not. The Court will instruct the jury that it cannot consider the defendant’s other burglary conviction as evidence that he was more likely to commit this burglary. But the jury will get to hear about his burglary conviction."

It was a fine distinction, lost on jurors every time. That’s why the exception was sometimes called the Prosecutor’s Delight. Kate knew that once the jury heard that her client had committed a prior burglary, he was toast. The judge’s limiting instruction to the jury would just call additional attention to her client’s earlier crime.

The judge peered down at her over the top of his reading glasses.

I’m going to let that evidence come in at trial. It’s a week away. That’s plenty of time for a smart young lawyer like you to figure out how to explain it away.

Judge, she said, in a voice firm but pleading, I ask the Court to review the two cases I have handed up. They squarely support my position that the law does not permit the jury to hear about the prior conviction unless my client takes the stand.

Ms. Stewart, the judge responded sharply, It’s a little like that old country song. What part of ‘no’ do you not understand? Your theory is not the rule in my courtroom. I do not go easy on criminal defendants. The legislators of the State of South Carolina elected me to administer justice. I leave it to God to dispense mercy. If you want a different result, you can consider Rule 521-dash-378.

Kate’s cool almost cracked, and she felt her stomach knot. Ten years of practicing law, and she had never heard of Rule 521-378. She took a slow sip of water from the paper cup on the counsel table, stalling while she whirled silently through her mental Rolodex of legal principles. Before she could respond, the judge gave her a tight smile.

It’s not in your law books, Ms. Stewart, he said.

He was squinting at her now, his eyebrows quivering like porcupine quills.

I mean you should take Highway 521 until you get to Highway 378. Then you take 378 to Columbia. That’s where the South Carolina Court of Appeals sits. If my esteemed colleagues on that lofty bench agree with you, come back and we’ll talk about this some more.

The judge’s eyes darted to the government-issue clock on the back wall. He took a quick glance around the courtroom and gave a satisfied nod at the prosecutor and at Kate.

Looks like there’s nothing else to be heard, he said. It’s 5 o’clock. Bailiff, please adjourn court. Have a nice weekend, counsel.

His eyebrows relaxed and lay down, like old dogs after a long run. As the bailiff spoke, the judge gathered his robe and disappeared through the wood paneled door behind his high-backed leather chair.

Kate spoke briefly to her client and patted him on the shoulder of his orange jumpsuit before he was shuffled away by the deputies. She slid her legal pad and her files into the large leather briefcase and snapped the brass clasp shut. The briefcase had been a law school graduation gift from her father. Over the past ten years it had weathered to a deep tan, the color of a well-cured tobacco leaf.

She reminded herself that every case is a long war, and you don’t win every battle. But it was clear that the learning curve for representing criminal defendants who couldn’t afford to hire a lawyer was steeper than she had anticipated. She could hear her father reminding her not to get discouraged. He had always told her to be as stubborn as a snapping turtle: Don’t let go until it thunders.

* * * * *

Friday afternoon happy hour at Sliders Oyster Bar was a local ritual, and Kate had quickly made it part of her weekly routine after moving to Georgetown from Columbia. The small bar and restaurant opened onto a waterside courtyard shaded by four ancient live oaks, stunted by decades of heat and hurricanes but elegant in the unpredictable curves and angles of their wandering limbs. Visible from the courtyard was a long row of docked shrimp boats - ancient, low-riding wooden tugs with names like Stormy Seas, Geoffrey’s Gem and Ellie Belle, sea-scarred, patched and painted bright white, full of hope for the opening of shrimping season.

As Kate entered Sliders, the long table against the west wall was already getting rowdy. It was reserved on Fridays for the POETS Society, an informal alliance of young assistant prosecutors, Legal Services lawyers, and reporters for the Georgetown Pilot. They shared, over pitchers of beer, their sharply cynical political and social commentary. The name stood for their Friday night rallying cry: Piss On Everything, Tomorrow’s Saturday.

Kate waved at a couple of the lawyers and made her way through the tables to her favorite spot by a window overlooking the water. From there, the fading February sunlight gave Winyah Bay a serene, glassy look that always had a calming effect on her.

Kate settled into her seat and discreetly slipped off her shoes under the table. From behind her came Bobo Baxter’s familiar baritone, not quite Ray Charles, but not far off.

"Hey, good-lookin’… Whatcha got cookin’? How’s about cookin’ somethin’ up with me?"

Bobo, Sliders’ longtime proprietor, could make anyone smile, including Kate on a bad day.

As a young lifeguard in the late 1950s at Ocean Drive Beach - O.D. to that generation - he had survived on a diet of beer, chili dogs, and Krispy Kreme doughnuts, appreciating every detail of South Carolina beach life. By day, he had rented canvas floats, beach chairs and beach umbrellas to the resort town’s summer tourists and enjoyed the flirtations with each week’s new crop of teenaged girls. By night, he haunted The Pad, the South Carolina strand’s best-known den of young adult iniquity. As Bobo had watched the state’s most talented shaggers quick-step, spin, shoulder-slide and dirty-bump across The Pad’s sandy concrete dance floor, he had soaked up the lyrics of hundreds of beach and rhythm-and-blues songs.

Bobo quoted song lyrics the way a Southern Baptist preacher cites scripture. He had been known to give a wink to an attractive woman seated at his bar and softly sing, with a Buddy Holly hiccup and a Mick Jagger hint of abandon, "My love’s-uh-bigger than a Cadillac, and wait for her reaction. Or watching a patron’s subtle shift of affection from the man she had arrived with to the one she would soon leave with, he’d shake his head and quietly moan a little Percy Sledge: Lovin’ eyes can nev-er see-ee-ee." Every good song held a parable for him, every good lyric a life lesson.

Evenin’ Counselor, Bobo said, with teasing in his voice. It’s Friday night. You want the Goose with ice, right? And you’re expecting someone?

That’s just what I need, Bobo, she smiled back. Thanks. And Carolyn should be here shortly.

Back in a flash, he said and headed to the bar.

Her Friday night standard soon appeared before her, as welcome as an angel: a Grey Goose vodka martini, easy on the vermouth, with ice on the pond. That thin coating of ice and the frigid bullet behind it quickly separated Kate from the tensions of the week. And it put a little distance, for now at least, between Kate and her doubts about her recent choice - walking away from the large Columbia law firm after ten years to start a solo practice in Georgetown.

Kate glanced at the door, keeping an eye out for Carolyn. She was always in a hurry, but seldom on time.

They had met at the University of South Carolina their freshman year and become fast friends and sometimes quiet competitors. Kate had pledged Zeta, and Carolyn had joined Tri-Delt. Kate quickly became an academic star. Carolyn was a strong student, but her good looks and easy way with people had propelled her into campus politics. They had both dated SAEs and KAs, and had sometimes ended up on group weekends together at the beach or in the North Carolina mountains. By their junior year, they had eased away from the Greek scene and shared a house off campus. Kate had graduated summa cum laude in political science, and Carolyn was student body president her senior year. Carolyn moved to Charleston after graduation, working her way up the ranks of the state’s environmental groups. Within five years, she was state director for the Sierra Club, pushing the group into some of the toughest environmental battles in the region. Her energy had attracted more members and donations than the group had ever known. The national Sierra Club leaders had teased her with a bigger job in California, but her love for the South Carolina Lowcountry kept her anchored there.

Kate’s goals in law school had been more traditional. She had figured out that South Carolina’s rapid growth and development would spawn increasing environmental regulation and litigation. She devoured every environmental law class the University of South Carolina law school offered. She studied environmental law with the intensity of a medical student absorbing organic chemistry.

One summer during law school she interned at a large Manhattan law firm. She enjoyed the glitz and acquired a taste for martinis but found New York too fast, too loud, too brusque, too much concrete, just too damn much. She spent her second summer working at the Devereaux law firm in Columbia, and the partners there quickly recognized her mastery of environmental law and her ability to explain it to clients and judges in a practical way. They offered her a job.

Kate made partner at the politically well-connected law firm in just five years. The pace was grueling, but her hard work won her many loyal clients. She helped some of the state’s most powerful industries stay just inside the clear lines of environmental regulation and blurred those lines for some who might have strayed beyond them. The work had created some tensions for Kate and Carolyn over the years, but mostly they had put their friendship ahead of politics - until the fight over the Georgetown paper mill that had come up two years ago. Kate and Carolyn ended up head-to-head, and it had almost broken their bond. Kate had hoped that when she moved to Georgetown, they would find a way to put the issue behind them. A Friday night dinner at Sliders seemed like a good way to get their issues on the table.

When Carolyn arrived, she descended on Kate’s table with her usual high energy. She was now the county-appointed river keeper for the Waccamaw and Pee Dee rivers, which converged at Georgetown, along with the Black River, the Santee and the Sampit, to form Winyah Bay. On weekends, she earned extra cash by guiding kayak and canoe trips along the rivers for visitors to the coast interested in more than beach-sitting and porch-rocking. Carolyn’s company, Five Rivers, introduced them to the estuaries, where the fresh water rivers draining southeastward through the Carolinas meet the rising salt tides of the Atlantic Ocean. She taught them about the intricate food chains: dying spartina grass becomes food for fiddler crabs, which are gobbled by mullet and puppy drum, which are feasted upon by dolphin, osprey and bald eagles. Along the way, she pointed out the lingering elegance of Georgetown County’s ancient rice plantations.

Carolyn was a pretty, athletic blonde whose candor and take-no-prisoners humor kept even her friends off-balance. When she rushed into Batten’s Fish and Game to grab a cold drink after a day on the river, the old men would look up from their beers and video poker games, nodding and smiling. Even the crickets in their wire and wood hutches seemed to chirp a little louder. With two ex-husbands in her wake - both still drinking buddies - she kidded that she was no longer looking for Mr. Right, just Mr. Right Now.

Tonight she wore jeans and a tight blouse unbuttoned to reveal more than a hint of her breasts. As she sat down, Bobo appeared from nowhere. He had a smile in his eyes.

"Carolyn, I love it when you wear those Biblical outfits - low and behold, You Are The Wonderful One," he said with a wink and a grin.

Carolyn picked up a napkin to throw it at him. He backed away laughing.

Okay, that will cost me a free beer, he said. What can I bring you two lovelies tonight?

Carolyn ordered a Corona and a half-dozen raw oysters. Sliders boasted the best raw oysters on the Carolina coast, hand-picked straight from the oyster beds of McClellanville, a tiny fishing village 15 miles south of Georgetown. January and February had brought little rain to the coast, and the dry spell had improved the quality of the local oysters. It made them plumper, saltier, tastier. Some thought the dry weather gave the oysters a better chew. Kate ordered crab cakes, Tabasco on the side, and a Corona. One martini was her limit.

Carolyn read Kate’s glum face and gave her a sympathetic frown.

Tough day with Judge Eyebrows, huh? she asked. Don’t take it personally. He’s never going to give a criminal defendant the benefit of the doubt. You’re lucky he pretends to presume they are innocent. And we know he doesn’t think much of lawyers who weren’t born with the male equipment. Remember, the twentieth century hasn’t dawned in all parts of South Carolina.

Kate gave her a small smile.

He’s a peach, I’ll tell you. He asked me if I preferred to be called Ms. or Mrs." I almost held up my ring finger to show him it was empty. Good thing I didn’t. He might have thought I was giving him a one-finger salute and put me in the jailhouse." The beer, crab cakes and oysters arrived as Kate told Carolyn more about the day’s hearing. Carolyn squeezed the lime slice into the longneck, hooked her thumb over its mouth, deftly flipped it upside down, sending the lime slice to the bottom, then slowly righted it, all without losing a drop.

Try an oyster, she urged. They’re great.

Kate grimaced and pulled her brown hair back into a long ponytail. She looked younger than her thirty-four years.

I’ve never been big on raw oysters, she said. There are only two things I remember my father absolutely refusing to eat. Stewed okra was one. A raw oyster was the other. He always said he wouldn’t eat anything so slippery it swallowed faster than he could.

Carolyn nodded and slurped down another milky oyster. Kate swirled the martini residue in her glass and speared the olive. She was clearly thinking hard about something, and Carolyn waited for her to break the silence.

Kate swallowed the last of her olive, then dove in. Carolyn, since moving here I’ve been thinking a lot about those paper mill hearings again. We had a lot of tension between us and never really worked through it. I think we should talk it out and get it behind us. Can we do that?

Carolyn stared down at the Corona as though the label would give her the answer.

The conflict between them had started in the wake of mounting evidence that dioxin from the plant’s bleaching process might cause cancer. The federal Environmental Protection Agency had come down hard on the Georgetown paper mill, threatening to close it until it ceased discharging the chemical into Winyah Bay. The state’s conservation groups - led by Carolyn - had joined that fight.

Months before hearings on the issue, Carolyn had bumped into Kate in a Columbia restaurant and talked with her about the case. Carolyn told Kate that the expert witness she had hired to help the Sierra Club was angry. His daughter - who had worked for a public relations firm helping the paper mill - had been fired from her job because of her father’s criticism of the paper mill’s management. The expert witness thought that was dirty pool.

Six weeks later, the CEO of Georgetown Pulp and Paper Company had approached Kate, told her he was unhappy with the law firm that was representing the company and asked Kate to take over the case. It was the first time a big client had sought out Kate directly instead of one of her older partners. Being the rainmaker had increased Kate’s stature in the firm, and she had worked day and night to get up to speed quickly on the case.

Midway through the hearings, Kate used the information Carolyn had shared with her while cross-examining the Sierra Club’s expert witness. Kate then argued to the hearing panel that because of his daughter’s termination, the expert witness had given testimony biased against the paper mill. Kate contended that the incident had colored his testimony and he should be disqualified as a witness. Kate won her point and the case. But the victory had almost cost Carolyn her job and Kate her close connection with Carolyn.

Carolyn finally looked up from the Corona label, her eyes guarded.

Kate, I didn’t understand then, and I don’t understand now, how you could use that information against our witness when I had not given you permission to do that, she said. That’s not how friends treat each other. Maybe that’s okay under your code of ‘legal ethics,’ but it isn’t okay under my code of friendship.

Kate could see the hurt in Carolyn’s eyes and thought for a moment before responding.

Carolyn, you know that was a tough case. The plant was changing its bleaching process to eliminate the dioxin. And even though the EPA didn’t like the amount of dioxin in the water, the paper mill’s measurement showed it was within the federal limits.

"Barely within legal limits based on the company’s questionable measurements," Carolyn said quickly.

Yes, but still technically within legal limits. The key was I wanted the EPA to let the plant stay open while it put in the new equipment and keep those folks employed, Kate said. It’s not like there were a lot of ten dollar an hour jobs in Georgetown County.

You’re missing the point, Kate, Carolyn said. You traded on the information I gave you as a friend. I don’t understand why you don’t see how wrong that is.

"That was information I got honestly and legally, Carolyn. You know that. I got it long before I was asked to represent the plant.