“What’s really going on between you and Lauren?” I said, steering the subject to where I wanted it. “I was really saddened to hear about the problems.” I lied, yes, but with sincerity.
“They’re only temporary, trust me,” he said, but the way his face fell into a strange, sad cast I knew he was lying too.
“Were you playing around on her, Sam?”
“Jesus, no,” he said quickly. “It wasn’t like that at all.”
“Then what?”
He swiveled in his chair to look out the window. “It just happened. Come on, Vic, you of all people know what she’s like.”
“Which is what?”
He took in a breath of frustration. “Flighty. Maddeningly independent. With the attention span of a mosquito.”
“So she was cheating on you, was that it?”
“I don’t think I want to talk about it, Vic.”
“You don’t think your problems with her will affect you here at your firm, do you?”
He didn’t answer right off, but I had suspected the answer. Married to an Amber, the partnership decision on him, two or three years hence, was assured. If he was just a Guthrie, with no name, no contacts, nothing but ability, he would be out on his butt within six months. “We’ll work it out,” he said. “I know we will.”
“Well, at least Bissonette’s out of the way, right?”
It was the way he turned and looked at me that said everything I wanted to know. His head swiveled and his eyes were so full of pain and fear. His jaw quivered, his face paled, the sweat on his forehead glistened with an oily sheen. It was on his face as clear as an affidavit. His wife had been screwing Zack Bissonette and he knew it, he knew it, he knew all about it, and the knowledge was killing him. I was ready to bet then and there that it had killed Bissonette, too.
I walked into the courtroom the next morning deeply distracted. It wasn’t just that I suspected my former partner of being a murderer. That was almost a pleasant thought. I had no idea of how to prove it, of course, except by talking it over with Lauren, with whom I had already set up a dinner at a far too expensive restaurant, but I figured that when I found out enough I’d simply put Lauren on the stand, have her identify the picture, have her tell about her husband’s violent rages, and then stand back and let the jury draw its own conclusions. Afterwards, I’d turn whatever I had over to Slocum and let him do the legwork to clear up the murder charges. But that wasn’t all that was on my mind. My distracted air that day arose from the offer that had been magically bestowed upon me.
The night before I had lain in my bed thinking of being at Blaine, Cox. Veronica hadn’t called and I hadn’t been able to sleep, but I didn’t miss her or my sleep that night. I stayed warm into the early hours thinking about my own burnished desk and leather couch, thinking about my visitors waiting for me under the fake portrait of Josiah Blaine, thinking of my name on that letterhead. It was coming, it was coming, late maybe, but coming all the same. I would call Bismark, Tom, now that we would be working side by side, I would call Tom when I had a chance and set up an interview.
“Good morning, Victor,” said Prescott as I set my bag on the table. “Eggert’s putting on an accountant who did work for Citizens for a United Philadelphia today. In a few days it will be the executive director of the committee. We have to be very careful in questioning these witnesses, since CUP is in a very sensitive position. It’s almost here as a defendant. I’ll handle both examinations.”
“Of course, sir.”
“Fine. And I don’t expect you’ll be speaking to my client outside my presence again, do you understand?”
“I asked the councilman if he wanted his attorney there and he said no.”
“Do it again and I’ll pull your ticket,” he said rather sweetly. “And don’t doubt that I can.”
I set out my notebooks and papers and pads and placed my briefcase underneath the table. When I was set I turned around to scan the audience. Chester was standing in the corner of the courtroom talking with the councilman and Chuckie Lamb. I noticed Leslie Moore and her sister, Renee, seated side by side behind the defense table. There was Herm Finklebaum, the toy king of 44th Street, in the back. And then I saw someone I didn’t expect to see at all.
On the aisle, alone, sitting erect, a tall, bald man, wearing a very fine suit. I recognized him right off. He was Tom Bismark, managing partner of Blaine, Cox, my new boss to be, here, I assumed, to see me at work. He would be disappointed to find I was asking no questions today, or any day really. I smiled and he smiled back, so I went over to formalize our introduction.
“Mr. Bismark, hello. I’m Victor Carl.”
He stood and shook my hand. “Yes, I know, Victor.” He spoke quite crisply. “Or is it Vic?”
“Whatever.”
“Sam Guthrie has spoken very highly of you, Vic.”
“Good old Guthrie,” I said. “If you’re here just for the show, I won’t be doing much today. We’ve agreed that Mr. Prescott will be handling today’s examinations.”
“That’s fine,” said Tom Bismark. “Just fine. That’s exactly as Bill and I discussed it.”
“Bill and you? I don’t understand.”
“Oh, I’m not here for the show, Vic,” he said. “I’m working. Blaine, Cox is corporate counsel to CUP. I’m here to make sure the reputation of our client is not besmirched in this trial.”
“I see.”
“I’m certain, Vic, that you’ll cooperate in every way possible.”
“Sure, Tom,” I said, and I actually winked. “Anything I can do, you let me know.”
I sat down at the defense table and started doodling on my yellow pad. So it wasn’t just the Saltz money, or my fees, or my deal with the Bishop brothers that were at risk. And it wasn’t just my prospective directorship on CUP or the councilman’s grand dreams of good works, either. A job had been added to the mix, not a job at Talbott, Kittredge, no, that would have been a bit too obvious, but at Blaine, Cox, yes. Stay quiet, smile, stop asking those foolish questions, stop barging in on the councilman’s morning shvitz, just sit back and let Chet take the rap and the future was mine. I could do that, yes I could. I could play ball, yes I could. Yes I could. Maybe.
There was something so wrong here, and not just the idea that I was for sale. I knew what I was, knew it in my pained heart: I was small-time. There are those in the world destined to be names, those who might fight their way to near namehood, and those, like myself, who would give it all up for a handful of change. And that’s what troubled me here. I wasn’t being offered a handful of change, I was being offered everything. The price was far too high. Play ball and your dreams will all come true could only mean that playing ball involved something bigger and dirtier than I could now imagine. Dreams don’t come true on the cheap. And it could also only mean that there was an opportunity for me not to play ball. I didn’t see it yet, couldn’t see any other option but to follow along in court like a lap dog, but it was there, it had to be, or so much pressure would not have been brought to bear. As I drew ferociously on that pad, circles and diamonds and six-cornered stars, I decided then and there to keep looking for answers. See, I could play ball, I could sit back and keep my mouth shut and be the best little cabana boy these pricks had ever seen, but only when I knew all that I would have to kick under the carpet for my lucre. If I had any nobility at all it was this: I would not sell myself short.
38
THAT VERY EVENING I DROVE through the wilds of Northeast Philadelphia, huge shopping plazas and multiplexes and rows of stores selling pizza and pharmaceuticals and Buster Brown shoes. As I searched for one specific address on Cottman Avenue I passed the Toys ’$$$ Us, passed the Herman’s World of Sporting Goods, passed the Clover discount store, passed the John Wanamaker’s department store. This was the part of the city that looked like every other place in America, strip malls and chain stores, glowing plastic signs held high over the landscape by great metal stanchions. I passed the Northeast High School grounds and then spied the numbers I was looking for and turned left into the lot. It was a low brick building, L-shaped with only one entrance, right in the crook of the L. I drove around the lot a bit, just to get my bearings, and then parked near the entrance. The metal letters bolted into the brick above the door read: ST. VINCENT’S HOME FOR THE AGED.