And he didn’t like what he saw.
During the trial, Bancroft did a masterful job of passing the buck. The negligent party was not in the courtroom. An anesthesiologist with emotional and financial problems had been asleep at the switch. No, worse than that: he wasn’t even present for most of the routine surgery. He administered three times the customary level of ketamine, knocked the kid out, then failed to monitor anything during the thirty-minute operation. A week before, he had allowed his medical malpractice insurance to lapse. A week after, he filed for bankruptcy and fled the area. The hospital could be blamed for hiring him, but for his first eight years his work had been stellar. A terrible divorce ruined him, and so on. The bottom line was, he wasn’t in the courtroom. GateLane Hospital was, and it had done nothing wrong.
Carl knew the jurors were sympathetic—who wouldn’t be? But Rusty had proven a weak case of liability against the hospital.
（7）
For the second time in an hour, Diantha barged into Kirk’s office with hardly a knock. She announced, “The hospital withdrew the offer. They’re doing closing arguments.”
As always, Kirk was buried in paperwork. He shoved some of it away and threw up his hands. “What happened?”
“How am I supposed to know? Just a quick text. No deal, offer withdrawn, closing arguments.”
She fell into a leather seat on the other side of his desk and shook her head.
Kirk said, “So, let’s keep things clear. The offer came late last night and Rusty, drinking as always, rejected it. Said no, or something to that effect. He did not inform his client. So, if he loses again, then the client will have a beautiful lawsuit against Malloy & Malloy. Right?”
“That’s pretty clear, isn’t it?”
Kirk exhaled in defeat and frustration and slid lower in his chair. He shook his head at Diantha, who looked just as irritated.
Kirk said, “Well, maybe Rusty can win one for a change.”
“Maybe so. A win would be nice. We could pay off some of his litigation loans.”
“I think you should go watch the trial. It’s just around the corner.”
Diantha actually laughed at this. “You couldn’t pay me to get near that courtroom.”
“I wasn’t serious. This is probably catastrophic, don’t you think?”
“Probably, yes. I got a bad vibe in the meeting early this morning. The jury is not with him.”
（8）
The jurors watched him closely. About half seemed convinced. The other half, skeptical.
He stood at a large whiteboard and held a blue marker. “Now, according to our experts, Trey has a life expectancy of fifteen years. That’s pretty sad for a young man who’s twenty-three years old and was racing dirt bikes before he encountered GateLane Hospital. So, give him fifteen years. To properly care for Trey, he needs to be in a facility with round-the-clock monitoring. His parents can no longer do it. That’s plain and simple. I mean, how much more convincing could a witness be than Jean Brewster? The poor woman is exhausted and cannot go on. So, let’s put Trey in an adequate facility, one with nurses, orderlies, housekeepers, technicians, plenty of medicine and that formula that somebody calls food. The average rate for such a place in the metro St. Louis area is forty thousand dollars a month, half a million a year, for fifteen years.”
Rusty masterfully scrawled on the whiteboard, tallied it all up, and showed the number of $7,500,000. But he wasn’t finished.
“Factor in inflation at three percent a year over fifteen years and the figure comes to…” In bold numbers he wrote and said, “Nine million dollars.”
He paused and walked away to allow that number to rattle around the courtroom. He took a drink of water from a paper cup at his table, then took his time returning to the podium. “Nine million dollars just to take care of Trey.”
The courtroom was silent because everyone knew bigger numbers were on the way.
（9）
Kirk said, “The old man called last night.”
“Whose phone?” Diantha asked.
“His. He has another cell phone.”
“I thought he was in solitary because they caught him with a cell phone.”
“They’ve caught him with several. He bribes the guards and they sneak in cell phones. Evidently it’s a big business in prison.”
“I’m sure he’s bribing everyone.”
“No doubt. One minute he’s playing poker with the warden, the next minute he’s in solitary, phoneless.”
“Why’d he call?”