look, i don't wanna waste your time so i'll eat while we talk. ya mind? *you* don't mind. so while i'm in town i'll be staying at the hotel metropole, the turandot suite. yeah, it's goofy, the suites're named after operas; room's ok though, i poked around. i'm having 'em hold it for me on account of i'll be back and forth. in addition to my retainer, you're paying hotel, living expenses, secretarial, private eye if we need to make inquiries, headshrinker should we go that way. we'll talk about appeals if, as and when. for right now, has she confessed?
good! that helps. not that she didn't do it, that she didn't confess. of course, there's ways to deal with a confession, but that's good!--one less thing to think about. now. interview. i'm seeing her tomorrow. you should be there. three o'clock. one more thing: you keep your mouth shut. i get the lay of the land, i tell *you* what to say. no talking out of school. what's out of school? everything's out of school. i do the talking; you keep your trap shut. i'm an attorney, you're a barber; you don't know anything. understood?
good! any questions give me a ring-- turandot suite; if i'm out leave a message. you sure you don't want anything? no?
you're ok, pal. you're ok, she's ok. everything's gonna be hunky-dory.
and the flapjacks, honey.
it stinks.
i don't care it's true, it's not true; it stinks. you say he was being blackmailed; by who? you don't know. for having an affair; with who? you don't know. did anyone else know about it? probably not; you don't know.
terrific. your husband backs you up. that's terrific.
you've gotta give me something to work with. freddy riedenschneider is good, but he's not a magician. he can't just wave his little wand in the air and make a plausible defense materialize. look. look at what the other side is gonna run at us. they got the company books, prepared by you--*cooked* by you--that's motive. they got a murder scene *you* had access to. that's opportunity. they got that little trimmer thing he was stabbed in the throat with--a *dame's* weapon--
--don't interrupt me--that's means. they got a fine upstanding pillar of the business community as a victim, and then they got *you*, a disgruntled number-juggling underling who on the day in question was drunk as a skunk and whose alibi for the time in question is being passed out at home, alone.
like i say, it stinks.
ok, we forget the blackmail. *you* killed him. how come?
ok, how did you know?
will anyone else say they knew?
how did you get into the store?
will anyone say they saw you there? on your way there? in there? on your was back?
will anyone corroborate and goddamn part of your story at all?
come on, people. you can't help each other like that. let's be realistic now. let's look at our options. well, frankly, i don't *see* any options.
i cannot present story a.
i cannot present story b. i could plead you for a nutcase but you look too composed. i could offer a guilty plea and in return they don't give you the juice, but i don't think you want to spend the rest of your life in chino and i know you didn't hire freddy riedenschneider to hold your hand at a sentencing hearing. hell, you could've gotten lloyd garroway for that. no, we're not giving up yet; you hired freddy riedenschneider, it means you're *not* throwing in the towel. i litigate, i don't capitulate. all right, no options, we gotta think. all right, we go back to the blackmail thing. it titillates, it's open ended.
and it makes *him* the bad guy-- ya dig around, ya never know, something unsavory from his past, he approaches you to help with the money, it's too late, his past comes back to haunt him, who's to say.
yeah. ok. forget the jealous husband thing, that's silly; we're going with the blackmail. i'll be in touch.
we plead not guilty, your honor.
they got this guy, in germany. fritz something-or-other. or is it. maybe it's werner. anyway, he's got this theory, you wanna test something, you know, scientifically--how the planets go round the sun, what sunspots are made of, why the water comes out of the tap--well, you gotta look at it. but sometimes, you look at it, your looking *changes* it. ya can't know the reality of what happened, or what *would've* happened if you hadden a stuck in your goddamn schnozz. so there *is* no 'what happened.' not in any sense that we can grasp with our puny minds. because our minds.  out minds get in the way. looking at something changes it. they call it the 'uncertainty principle.' sure, it sounds screwy, but even einstein says the guy's on to something.
science. perception. reality. doubt.
reasonable doubt. i'm sayin', sometimes, the more you look, the less you really know. it's a fact. a proved fact. in a way, it's the only fact there is. this heinie even wrote it out in numbers.
burns?
yeah, yeah, couple of fistfights. go to his service record.
thank you, burns, get lost.
so? *so?!* this could be your dolly's ticket out of the deathhouse, so!
look, chum, this is a guy, from what i understand, told everybody he was a war hero, right? island hopping, practically liberated the pacific all by himself with a knife in one hand and a gun in the other and twenty yards of jap guts between his teeth.
and now it turns out this dope spent the war sitting on his ass in some boatyard in san diego. you asked for blackmail, let me give you blackmail: mr hale-fellow-well-met, about to open his own business here, has been lying to everybody in this town for the last four years, probably including half the people sitting on that jury. well, it finally caught up with him--these dopes, it always does; someone threatened to spill it. somebody knew his dirty little secret, just like your wife says. they called, they demanded money.
did big dave mention that it was something about his war service? i don't know, i wasn't there, *you'll* have to tell *us*. maybe he specified, maybe he didn't; i'm not putting words in your mouth; the point is that this liar, this cynical manipulator, this man who through his lies sneered and belittled the sacrifice and heroism of all our boys who *did* serve and bleed and puke and die on foreign shores, and who made a fool out of this entire town, turns to *you* to help him out of his jam. fat-assed sonofabitch!
who? *who?!* i don't know who! but the point is that if mr prosecutor over there had devoted half the time he's spent persecuting *this* woman to even the most cursory investigation of this schmoe's past, then we might *know* who! but we can't *know* what really happened! because of fritz, or werner, or whatever the hell his name is! and because me prosecutor is *also* a lazy fat-assed sonofabitch who decided it's easier to victimize your wife! because it's easier *not* to look! because the more you look, the less you know! but the beauty of it is, we don't *gotta* know! we just gotta show that, goddamnit, *they* don't know. reasonable doubt. science. the atom. *you* explain it to me. go ahead. try.
yeah, freddy riedenschneider sees daylight. we got a real shot at this, folks. let's not get cocky.
the judge comes in last. he'll come in when doris gets here.
she's late.
i don't understand.  we had a real shot at it.  we could have won this thing.
it doesn't make any sense.
not guilty, your honor.
a puny player on the great world's stage.
who among us is in a position to say.
move for a mistrial, your honor! move for a mistrial! this outrageous display cannot help but prejudice.
and inflame the passions of these twelve fine men and women.