“Please Call Me Immediately Upon Receipt of the Foregoing”

Judge Donnie Smith, sent from Raleigh specially to handle this case, glared out at the roomful of lawyers. “Only one lawyer from Greensboro,” he pronounced, “wrote me about this case, and that was to ask me for a day certain for his motions to be heard.” That would have been me. The motion hearings were in Northampton County, NC, a two and a half hour drive to the east, and I hadn’t relished the idea of spending a week waiting on hard courtroom benches. His unspoken criticism of our gang of pirates hung over the room.

He flipped open a file and read for a second. “Is George Jarecke here?

I stood. “Yes, Your Honor.”

He stared at me over his half-glasses. “You filed this motion nine days ago. The rule is 10.”

What was I to say to that? Hey, I make mistakes like that all the time! In fact, I’d made a much worse one earlier in this very case. “Yes Your Honor.”

He cleared his throat. Judge Donnie Smith was in his late 40’s, with a mild comb-over, and a stern, military-like look. For some reason, the State Administrative Office of the Courts had decided that a Raleigh judge needed to preside instead of the locals.

“Now here’s what we’re going to do,” he said ominously. “I’m going to take these files into the other room.” He indicated the cart leaning sideways with files next to him. “And I’m going to go through them, and you’re going to sit here all day long”—in the days before the Internet and cell phones, a death sentence to an hour-billing lawyer—“until I figure out what’s going on.” With that he stood, motioned to the bailiff, and left the room.

After a second, the twenty or so lawyers stirred. The one next to me tilted his head toward me and said, “Don’t worry, he was just trying to show that he’s taken control of this.”

“This” was the biggest case ever seen in Northampton County, which isn’t saying much.

A county of around 20,000 souls, most of them no doubt saved, in the northeastern part of the state, it had become lucky enough to be the site of the construction of a Union Camp paper factory, which was the reason why all of us had been unlucky enough to gather there. (A Google search of Northampton County reveals no Union Camp facility there today.)

The contractor had defaulted and decamped to Louisiana, the story went, and subcontractors like my client were left unfulfilled, or, at any rate, unpaid. (My client provided scaffolding and similar metal things, I imagine.) Everyone filed a lawsuit, and, being lawyers, we took depositions, and then we filed motions. This week was to be devoted to hearing the motions.

I was not even a year out of law school, and this was my first case, and very few dollars were at stake. I presume the partners figured that if I messed up badly enough to be sued, they could cover the malpractice damages out of the change in their sofas.

Prior to one of the depositions, I had filed an amendment to my complaint to allege something that even a slightly brainless young lawyer (which I was, young, that is; I was completely brainless) would allege. During the depositions, my chief adversary, a fellow called L. Frank Burleson Jr., had referred to my filing, saying, I thought, that it was “not heartful”, which amused me, and I had smiled. Only later did I realize that he had said “not artful,” which actually is an insult to lawyers, who definitely have not the souls of artists. Well, at least I smiled. (Please refer to the posts dated May 30 and June 5, 2019, to understand my hearing problems.)

Burleson also noted what I had belatedly figured out and had hoped no one had noticed: I had screwed up how I filed the lien on the property to secure payment, and it wasn’t even effective. A partner in my firm told me to argue that no one was hurt by my mistake, as everyone knew that we had a claim. Later in my career, I realized that he was right: once a trial begins, enormous mistakes may not matter at all. Human incompetence washes right out, just like in every other industry except medicine.

That same partner told everyone that I had motions scheduled in far off Northampton County. “They’re going to eat him up over there!” another partner proclaimed. But no one offered to help in any way.

I had gotten to know L. Frank Burleson Jr. way too well before I met him. With all of the posturing going on, he wrote many letters, each of which ended with “Please call me immediately upon receipt of the foregoing.” Usually I didn’t want or even need to call him, but when I did, he was never available. When he called me, it was his secretary who handled the mechanics; I’d pick up my phone and hear, “Hold for Mr. Burleson.” I always wanted to hang up, but he was impossible to reach otherwise, so I waited dutifully.

True to His Honor’s word, we sat all day, chatting, calling our offices on the payphone out in the hall, getting very acquainted with the courthouse: old and musty, the ceilings were impossibly high; the equally tall windows were draped with dark maroon. The benches were the smooth wood of church pews.

Eventually Judge Donnie Smith came back to the courtroom and dismissed us, telling us he’d see us in the morning; he provided no guidance as to his thinking. We all filed out, and I drove back to the motel room I’d booked. There were a number of other lawyers there as well; Jackson, NC seemed not to have a lot of lodging, so I suppose some of them drove back to Raleigh, an hour and a half away.

As I was walking through the lobby to my room, a voice called, “George!” I turned; it was Judge Donnie Smith. “Come down to the bar and have a drink.”

I smiled and nodded, absolutely at a loss for words. You’re not supposed to talk to the judge out of the courtroom and in the absence of your adversaries. I hurried to my room, figuring to get room service for dinner.

After ten minutes, my phone rang, and I picked it up. “Hello?”

“George, it’s Donnie Smith. I’m in the bar! Come on and have a drink.”

With no excuse, I assented. Northampton County was, in 1986 or so, dry. You took your bottle to the bar—sure, there was a bar—and for some smallish amount they’d give you a glass, ice, the sugary carbonated drink of your choice, and water.

I found him at a table in the center of the bar, sat, and we commenced to drink and talk. It’s been 34 years, and, in all honesty, I got absolutely snozzled. Donnie Smith drank me under the table, out into the hall, and beyond the parking lot. He got more lucid as time went by. Given those circumstances, I have no idea what we talked about, save the following:

“There’s more than one way to skin this cat,” he told me, about the case that he was purportedly trying.

And I had told him, at his urging, that my wife was an environmental lawyer. He asked if she was aware of such-and-such a case. I said I didn’t know. “I know what,” he said. “I’ll bring you the citation in the morning. It’ll drive the other lawyers crazy. They’ll know we’ve been talking.”

Which was exactly not what I wanted, the implication of forbidden communications. Judge Donnie Smith had, of course, been a lawyer for about as long as I had been alive so presumably knew what he was doing.

Finally I excused myself; I don’t think I said, “You can drink like a horse”, but I thought it. I staggered back to my room and ordered a surprisingly excellent meal from room service: a perfectly-done steak, a baked potato, and some vegetables, not vegetables in the usual southern manner, boiled beyond recognition, but steamed. I don’t recall falling asleep.

The next morning, when we gathered in the courthouse hallway, L. Frank Burleson Jr. had modified his strategy; I didn’t understand it then, and now it’s been too many years. In any event, to my utter, ignorant relief, he pointed at me and proclaimed, “My position now is that you have a good lien.” It was absolutely not in his interest, on the surface, to allow this. To this day I have no idea what his scheming mind was going on about.

The rest of the day is something of a blur, sadly. With the wisdom of hindsight, I might now understand it a little. But Donnie Smith heard no motions; he maneuvered us into settling the case before noon. My client got over three quarters of their money, no credit to me—there was simply a pot of money divided ten or so ways. I called my client from a payphone; she was happy but wanted her attorneys’ fees. I didn’t explain that that wasn’t how it worked.

Early that morning, when we were all settling in, Judge Donnie Smith walked up to me in front of a crowd of lawyers and handed me a slip of paper and said, “Here’s the citation to that case we talked about last night,” and walked off. I got stared at a lot. A year later, when word got out that I was going to leave my firm, a couple of lawyers from the Raleigh firms present that two days called wanting to speak to me.

I never heard from or saw Judge Donnie Smith or L. Frank Burleson Jr. again; they’ve both gone to their rewards, Smith, a lifelong bachelor, in 2015, and Burleson in 2019, leaving behind five kids. As lost as I was and as confused as my good fortune left me, that week has stuck with me. The world is a completely weird and incomprehensible place.

The Northampton County Courthouse: Yo damn right justice goan get done here.