35
“I don’t believe you,” I said.
Except, of course, a part of me did. And he knew it.
“Syd, you know when I’m lying. You’ve probably known every moment when I was lying or hiding something, these past few weeks. Am I lying now?”
“Then tell me.”
We sat in his driveway, long enough for the motion sensing light to go to sleep. When the dark swallowed us, the words began spilling out, as if the wall that had held them back for thirty years had just given way.
“How many clients—murdering clients—have you had over the years who said it was a mistake? I didn’t mean to do it. And how many of them did you believe? My first few years doing criminal defense, I think it made me more sympathetic. But eventually, it made me even harder to convince. Why should I believe them when I didn’t believe
