Member-only story
A Taste of Justice
A work of faction, with details made up after 30 years with due regard for the essential facts.
The hotel room door flew open on my first tap, so my plan to be ready fell into confusion.
“Hey, Arch! Good to see you.” Pulling myself together, I started again. “I mean, G’Day, Mate.” I did my best to twist the vowel like Crocodile Dundee, but it was probably lame.
The Australian judge and I had become fast friends at the National Judicial College in Reno. Among other things in common, we had our eyes on second careers teaching. He planned half a dozen years before to spend more time in the U.S. and use his NJC connections to get some trial-watching done in several states. I was his Texas guy.
As we caught up, I had to tell him my wife Donna had died. She had been along on the trip that sealed our friendship. We drove him around the highway that circled Lake Tahoe. The scenery is spectacular and he seemed to have a good time, so I’ll never understand why he tried to poison us with some crap called “Vegemite.” The Aussies I had met in the military were seriously into recreational fisticuffs, and I supposed that I would be aggressive too if all I had for a snack was dog puke on a saltine.
