At the door I remind Miss Tucker of something she whispered to me my last day at Hayes.
"‘Don't think you can snatch a leaf from the laurel tree of art without paying for it with your life.’"
"Yes, of course," she says, beaming. "From Tonio Kroger by Thomas Mann. It's still one of my favorite quotes." She turns to Helen. "It's true too, don't you think?"
Helen nods. "Oh, so true," she agrees.
6
A different feeling in Waldo's tonight. People seem to be in a rotten mood. I learn that an hour ago a CNN cameraman and a local soundman got in a fistfight.
Tony the barman fills me in. Seems that while competing for position to pick up the day's crucial sound bite, the local stepped on the network guy's foot.
"It wasn't about his foot."
Tony and I look up. This offering comes from Sylvia Browne, the black reporter from Chicago under contract to write a book. She's perched on her usual stool at the end of the bar.
"What was it about, Sylvie?" Tony asks.
"A woman," she says.
Tony rolls his eyes. "Isn't it always?"
"What woman?" I ask.
"Actually your girlfriend."
"Pam?"
Sylvie grins. "More than one girlfriend, David?"
"What'd it have to do with Pam?"
"This afternoon she elbowed the local station's girl reporter aside. The foot stamping was retaliation."
"How do you know this?"
Sylvie beams. "I observe. What's interesting here isn't the trial, it's the media battles surrounding it. It's all going into my book. By the way, David – you better watch out. This morning CNN fired Henderson. I hear they're bringing in Washburn. He's good." She giggles, then turns away.
I step out to the lobby to call Pam on my cell phone.
"Where are you?" I ask when she picks up.
"Production suite."
"Hear about the fight?"
"Yeah. Boys'll be boys."
"Is it true Henderson's out and Washburn's in?"
"You've got good sources, David. I'm with Wash now."
You really call him that?"
"Hey, Wash!" she says. "It's David Weiss. He doesn't like your nickname."
I hear a male voice mutter something in the background.
Pam conveys the message: "Starrett says Wash'll cream your ass."
So… Pam, her producer, Jim Starret, and their new courtroom artist hire, Lee Washburn, are in a strategy meeting upstairs plotting my professional demise. Chastened, I return to Waldo's for a second Margarita.
Washburn, I know, could be a serious competitor. One of the two or three top courtroom artists in the country, he's known for his powerful compositions and incredible speed. Well, he may draw faster than me, but I'm confident I'm better at characterization. Since this'll be the first time we've covered the same trial, I also know I can expect a battle. And no mercy from Pam, though she's been especially sweet and ingratiating since I dressed her down for snooping in my room.
I'm fairly well lubricated by the time they come downstairs – Pam, Starret, and the famous Wash whom I recognize from photographs that accompanied a profile in TV Guide. He's got himself up like an artist – long, black hair, drooping black mustache, black pants, and black silk shirt billowing around his cadaverous arms.
Pam gives me a quick peck on the cheek.
"Hi," Wash says, extending his hand. "Really love your work."
I nod. We shake. His eyes, I note, are soft and liquid, sensitive artist's eyes.
As Starret pulls him toward a table across the room, Pam perches beside me and orders a margarita.
"Nice guy," I tell her. "All he lacks is a beret."
She grins. "You're not worried, are you?"
"I wish you'd told me you were bringing him in."
"Starret's decision. Anyhow I try to keep my private life separate."
"Yeah, I understand. I do that myself. Which is why I haven't told you my secrets yet."
"I know something's going on with you," she says. "I even think you enjoy cutting me out. You've got that smug, cut-out look."
I flip open my sketch pad, press a pencil to the paper. "Describe it."
"What?"
"That look."
"Oh… you know." She shrugs. "The knowing little twinkle in the eye. The secretive little curl to the lip."
I quickly draw a pair of eyes and lips. "Like this?"
"No, worse," she says. "The tight I'm-going-to-scoop-you grin."
This girl's not only smart, she's got me psyched.
"What's the matter, David? Can't draw it?"
"Show it to me."
She makes a couple of awful faces, then sticks out her tongue. "Nya-nya-nya!" She drains off half her margarita. "If you really want to know what I'm talking about, take a look in the mirror."
At that she lightly pats my shoulder, picks up her glass, and saunters off toward the CNN table across the room, giving me just the flimsiest little wave before sitting down with Starret and Wash, my new rival in the courthouse drawing wars.
Four hours later, after dinner at a seafood restaurant in Irontown and a bout of lovemaking that leaves us sweaty and spent, I turn to her, ask if she's ready to hear my story.
She perks up immediately, props her head on her elbow, and tells me, yes, she's ready.
I lie back, stare up at the blank ceiling of her hotel room, and spill.
"There was a double murder here when I was a kid. I went to a private day school out in the country. Turned out one of my teachers was having an affair with the mother of a classmate. One hot summer afternoon, when they were making love at a sleazy motel, someone burst in with a shotgun and blasted them both to bits. Huge local scandal. The woman was a socialite and a great beauty, divorced in-law of one of the richest families in town. The prime suspect was another man she'd been having an affair with, a guy who owned a nightclub across the county lien. No arrests, nothing was proven, and the nightclub guy himself was gunned down within the year. That was more or less the end of it. Interest wound down. But me and my best friend at school were fascinated by the crime. For one thing, we'd been particularly fond of the teacher. He was a gentle guy – or so we thought. Also because his death was so shocking to us, we spent a huge amount of time talking the murders through, thinking we could solve them like you can solve a puzzle in a mystery novel."
"There was other stuff. Everyone at school was upset by what happened… as was everyone in Calista society. But the murders seemed to affect my parents to an unusual degree. It was about that time that my family came apart. My mom and dad were at dagger points. Dad was a doctor, a shrink. Turned out he was treating the victim, Mrs. Fulraine. Turned out he'd met her the same day she met the teacher, spring Parents Day at our school. There's the coincidence – this incredibly glamorous woman appears at Parents Day and, within a couple hours, meets a shrink with whom, shortly thereafter, she begins a course of psychoanalysis, and a young teacher with whom, shortly thereafter, she starts a tumultuous and ultimately tragic affair."
I turn from the ceiling to look at Pam. Fascinated, she peers into my eyes.
"What happened?"
"I told you – they were killed."
"I mean with your folks."
"They separated. A few months after the murders. Mom decided she wanted to move back to California where she'd been brought up. I didn't want to leave my school and friends, but Mom was determined. We – Mom, my sister Rachel, and me – left Calista that January in the middle of a blizzard. The following week, I started at a new school in L.A. Six weeks later, Dad committed suicide."