“What has this to do with the murdered man and your friend in jail?”
“Nothing,” said Winn, adjusting his glasses. “Greg is a master of non sequiturs.”
“A connection will occur,” said Greg with enthusiasm. “String theory.”
“Any other connections between Ronnie Gerall and Philip Horvecki?”
“No,” said Greg, squirming in his seat.
The woman at the next table was trying not to listen for more talk about rods being applied to orifices. She was failing.
“Who else would want Horvecki dead?”
“Everybody,” said Greg.
“I didn’t want Horvecki dead,” I said.
“You didn’t know him,” said Greg.
“Lots of people are happy that Horvecki is dead,” said Winn.
“Can we narrow that down a little?”
“Horvecki had legal trouble with people,” said Winn.
“Like?”
“We don’t know for sure,” said Greg. “It was all kept quiet, but everybody knew. Okay, okay, you didn’t know.”
“Just talk to Ronnie, please,” said Winn. “Start there. What do you charge?”
“Eleven thousand dollars a week, but in your case I’ll give you a discount because I was recommended by Ettiene Viviase’s daughter.”
“Eleven thou…,” Greg began.
“He’s joking,” said Winn.
“I’m not good at jokes. I’m making a point. What would you pay for your friend to be found innocent?”
“Five hundred dollars a week plus expenses,” said Greg. “We can get lots of people to contribute. My grandfather could write a check for four thousand and not miss it.”
“That’s comforting,” I said.
“It is to Ronnie,” said Greg. “I’ve got cash.”
I let the bills he took out of his pocket rest on the edge of the desk.
“It goes back to you after I talk to your friend,” I said, “if I’m not happy with his answers to my questions.”
“Then you’ll find the killer?”
“Then I’ll try to find Rachel Horvecki.”
“And the killer,” said Greg.
“And the killer,” I agreed.
I got a paper brown paper bag from the counter and carefully placed coffees and biscotti inside and then neatly folded the top over before cradling it against my chest. The heat was lulling. I had told the two boys that I wanted to be alone to think and that I’d make it back to my place on my own. Greg wanted to say a lot more. Winn guided him out of the News and Books.
Normally, I would have turned the possible job down with thanks for the refreshments, but I could use the money. I was moving. It didn’t cost much but there were things I needed and my bike wanted repair. The number of court papers to serve for my lawyer clients was down for the summer. The snowbirds who came down to their condos, homes, and rentals wouldn’t be back to engage in and be the victims of crime for at least three months. There were fewer criminals being brought to justice or just being hauled before a judge for not paying child support. I didn’t need much, didn’t want much, but now I had Victor Woo to feed and a weekly dinner out with Sally Porovsky and her two kids at Honey Crust Pizza, which would eventually present a challenge even if Sally and I split the bill. And though I was a project for my therapist, Ann Hurwitz, I still had to pay something each time I saw her, even if it was only ten dollars.
When this meeting of the minds was over, I walked down the block to Gulf Stream Boulevard, across from the Bay, to get to my appointment with Ann.
I stepped through the inner door of Ann’s office and held out my ritual offering of coffee and biscotti. She looked up from her blue armchair, and I sat in its duplicate across from her as she removed the lid from the cup and dipped an almond biscotti into it. I took off my Cubs cap and placed it on my lap.
“Make me smile,” she said.
Ann is over eighty years old. I’m not sure how much over. I do know she doesn’t like it when people say she is “eighty years young.”
“I am by no stretch of the imagination young unless I have morphed into a tortoise. I’ve earned my years. It is the end of them I regret and not their number which I savor.”
She had said that to me once when I told her I wasn’t interested in growing old. Now she wanted a joke. For almost a year now, I had not only been responsible for refreshments but also for telling a joke. I do not smile. I do not laugh. When my wife Catherine was hit and killed by Victor Woo’s car, I had lost my ability to consider happiness. Ann worked to have me lose my hard-earned depression, and I struggled to hold onto it. A joke delivered was a concession. It took research on my part.
“ ‘I have of late, but wherefore know I not, lost all my mirth,’ ” I said. “ ‘This goodly frame seems to me a sterile promontory.’ ”
“Shakespeare,” she said.
“Yes, and Hair. Catherine liked Hair. We saw it four times.”
“You liked it?”
“No.”
“But you remember it.”
“Yes.”
“A joke, Fonesca. It is time to pay the toll.”
Ann was well groomed, wore colorful tailored dresses, and had her white hair neatly trimmed short. She always wore a necklace and a wide bracelet. She had dozens of baubles of jewelry either made by her husband, a long-retired investment broker, or chosen by them during one of their frequent travels all over the world.
She skillfully managed to get the soaked end of her biscotti from cup to mouth without dripping-a skill I admired.
“A psychologist’s receptionist says, ‘Doctor, I have a man out here who thinks he’s invisible.’ And the psychologist answers, ‘Tell him I can’t see him now.’ ”
“I’m sufficiently amused,” Ann said. “You think this joke is funny?”
“No.”
“But you understand why others might?”
“Yes.”
“Progress. Tell me about your house guest,” she said finishing the last moist bite of biscotti.
“Tell you what?”
“Whatever you wish to tell me. Does he like biscotti?”
She took a sip of coffee, looking at me over the top of her cup.
“I don’t know. He killed my wife.”
“Catherine.”
“Catherine.”
“And now he lives on the floor of your office and is going to live with you in your new office?”
“I think so.”
“Why?”
“Why do I think so?”
“No, why is he going to live with you?”
“He doesn’t say.”
“No, I meant, why are you letting him live with you?”
This struck me as a good question.
“I don’t know.”
“Think about it and give me the best answer you can in your next office visit.”
“No joke?”
“When you laugh and mean it, you can stop bringing me jokes.”
“I’ll bring you a joke.”
She finished her coffee, examined the bottom of the cup, daintily reached in with her little finger to retrieve a biscotti crumb, and deposited it on her tongue.
“Some boys want me to help their friend get out of jail.”
She looked up, definitely interested.
“What did this boy do?”
“They say he did nothing. He’s accused of killing a man named Philip Horvecki.”
She shook her head and said, “So I have read. He has a daughter?”
“She’s missing,” I said. “She may have witnessed the murder.”
“From what I have heard and read about him, Horvecki was an angry man, a very angry man, and proud of it. He could have used intensive therapy.”
“He was angry about Pine View School.”
She smiled. “And many other things,” she said. “Taxes, landfill, religion, the price of gasoline.”
“But mostly Pine View and Bright Futures.”
“So I understand.”
“You know something more about him, don’t you?” I asked.
“Nothing I can talk to you about.”
“He’s dead.”
“And you wouldn’t mind my talking about our sessions if you were to die?”
That gave me pause.
“I wouldn’t like it.”
“He was a patient of yours?”
“No,” she said.
“His daughter?”
I was about to push the issue when Ann rose from her chair with a bounce. I got up. “There’s someone in the waiting room who is here to see me. Do you mind going out the other way.”