Art said, “Mother Rita had always had a nice time playing the ponies at Saratoga, and unfortunately after Carl died she apparently got it in her head that she could help make ends meet with her winnings at the track. One season she had actually come out ahead, and this must have clouded her judgment. But, well, you know how it goes with gambling. Lawn, I suppose you understand, since you are in a similar line of work.”
“That’s preposterous.”
“Anyway, one thing led to another, and apparently pretty soon Mother Rita had begun covering her losses at the track with CoCkeyed
39
money she — I’m sorry, Hunny, but I have to say the word —
embezzled at Crafts-a-Palooza.”
Hunny flinched.
“By the time Arletta and Clyde realized what was going on two years later, Rita had taken sixty-one thousand and some odd dollars from the business. When they confronted her, Rita begged them not to go to the police because it would be so embarrassing for Miriam and Lewis. Hunny, too, but especially Miriam and Lewis, who are active in the Epworth League and other Methodist organizations. Hunny, of course, has a forgiving nature, and also he has always had a soft spot for the criminal element.”
“I’m afraid that’s true,” Hunny said.
“The horrible Brienings unfortunately saw this as an opportunity, and they took it. They knew that Mother Rita would begin collecting over thirteen thousand dollars a year in Social Security in just a couple of months, and they made her sign a letter confessing to stealing their money and agreeing to pay them a thousand dollars a month until the sixty-one thousand had been restored — plus interest. Except, when you figured out the interest, it came to more than two hundred thousand dollars total. So every month Mother Rita’s Social Security has been going into her account from the government and then straight out and into Crafts-a-Palooza’s account. This has been going on for thirteen years.”
Lawn stood looking grim. “I have never heard of any of this.
I’m stunned. And I’m sure Nelson couldn’t have known either.
He would never have put up with extortion. He would have gone to the police, or he would simply have held his nose and paid these people off.”
“It’s true,” Hunny said, “that Miriam and Lewis decided not to tell Nelson. He had always thought so highly of Grandma Rita, and they were afraid it would break his heart. And also it might not be appreciated by Nelson’s investment clients that there was a crook in the family. It could have been bad for business.”
40 Richard Stevenson
“A crook in the family that got caught,” Art said by way of clarification.
I asked, “How did your mother live, Hunny? With no income to speak of.”
“We all helped out. I paid her oil and electric and cable, and Miriam and Lewis dropped off groceries. We all pitched in one time for a new roof. For a number of years Mom worked off and on at McDonald’s. Then her mind started slipping a couple of years ago and she became frail at around the same time. She had to get out of the house, so we sold it and that’s when we got her into Golden Gardens. The house proceeds paid for the nursing home until that money ran out, and then the home said Mom would have to turn over her Social Security every month.
We told the Brienings, and they got mad and said all the money hadn’t been paid back yet and they might have to go to the police.
That was last month. So I bought two hundred dollars’ worth of Instant Warren tickets, hoping I would win and could pay off the Brienings, and — praise de Lawd! — I
did
win.”
“But now, apparently,” Art said, “the Brienings want half a billion dollars to shut them up, not just what Mother Rita still owes.”
Lawn said, “This is just totally bizarre. It’s no wonder Nelson is so distraught that he missed a dinner engagement.”
“The Brienings have been leaving phone messages since I won the lottery,” Hunny said, “but I’ve just been tossing them in the laundry basket with the other requests. I did mean to get to them, but I thought it wasn’t going to hurt if we all did a little partying first and got mellow and the friggin’ Brienings could just wait their turn. But they must have gotten antsy and called Nelson. The poor lad. First he has to put up with his rude, crude, proud-to-be-lewd Uncle Hunny, and now he has to deal with these shakedown artists from Cobleskill. The embarrassments for Nelson just keep a-rollin’ in, poor sweetie-pie.”
The door to the living room opened again, and this time Nelson himself walked through it. He looked frazzled and bordering on the unkempt.
CoCkeyed
41
Nelson said, “Uncle Hunny, I don’t know if you want to go out there. Probably not. But there are some more TV people out front, and they say they want to interview you and it would be best if you agreed to talk to them.”
Hunny looked uncharacteristically nonplussed. “At two in the morning? Who are they? Channel Ten? Channel Thirteen?
Channel Six? What is this?”
Nelson said, “They showed me their ID from Focks News in New York. There are two of them — a woman and a cameraman
— and they say they’re from
The Bill O’Malley Show
.”
“This is a damned impertinence,” Hunny said. “Tell them I’ll only talk to Anderson Cooper.”
“Bill O’Malley is doing a report,” Nelson said, “on some organization that wants the lottery commission to take back your winnings because they object to a state agency providing money for immoral purposes. Have you not heard about this? When they told me, my heart just sank.”
“Oh, some PR woman from the lottery called this afternoon.
She said not to worry, that as long as I was eighteen years old and didn’t have a relative who worked for the lottery commission, I was the legal winner. Some other reporters called, too, but they went into the laundry basket.”
“These O’Malley people have just driven up from the city, they said. One of your neighbors is an O’Malley viewer and called them and said you were partying and driving everybody in the neighborhood crazy with the noise. I can only begin to imagine how accurate that description was.”
“That was earlier. Anyway, what immoral purposes? There’s nothing immoral about playing some peppy dance music and throwing a party in your own home.”
Lawn said, “I’d be willing to bet that there is a good deal more to it than that.”
“It’s some religious group,” Nelson said. “The Family Preservation Association of Albany County. I told the Focks News people it was too late for an interview, but they said they could see that a party was still going on and they refused to leave.
Donald, maybe you are the man to handle this. Would you mind?”
“Normally I don’t do press relations.”
Art said, “We could send the twins out to talk to them. They could tell about how Hunny is going to put them through medical school.”
44 Richard Stevenson
Lawn shut his eyes, and Nelson said, “Art, I don’t believe that will help. Having those two tarts speak for Uncle Hunny is exactly what we do
not
need at this point.”
Hunny leaped from his chair and shouted, “Tarts? Tyler and Schuyler are a couple of tarts? Why hasn’t anyone told
me
about this? It’s the shocker of the century. I think we should get them in here and all sing ‘The Battle Hymn of the Republic.’”
“Well, we certainly have to get these O’Malley people out of here,” Nelson said, “so that we can discuss a far more difficult matter. Do you know where I have just come from, Uncle Hunny?”
“Lawn told us Cobleskill.”
“Yes, Cobleskill. And can you guess who it was I was meeting with out there?”
“I was told it had to do with Mom,” Hunny said, and seated himself again and slugged down some more of whatever he was drinking.
Art asked, “Was it the Brienings?”
Nelson looked as if the weight of it all hit him all over again.
He said somberly, “Yes. Clyde and Arletta Briening.”
“Your parents decided a long time ago not to tell you about them — and about Grandma Rita,” Hunny said. “And rightly or wrongly, I went along. They all thought there was no need for you to be hurt. But Grandma Rita is only human, like Art and me, and like you, and like Lawn. And now you know the unfortunate truth.”
Lawn looked as though he did not like the sound of some of this, but he kept his mouth shut.
Nelson said, “I am sad for Grandma Rita, that’s all. She was devastated by the loss of Grandpa Carl, and in her grief she made a terrible mistake. Now she has paid for this lapse many times over, and other family members have paid also. If I had known, I would have found a way to deal with these wretched people. But now they are completely out of control. They are CoCkeyed
45
demanding the insane sum of half a billion dollars. And if they don’t receive it, they say, they will make public the letter Grandma Rita signed confessing to stealing sixty-one thousand dollars.”
Hunny said, “An incriminating letter. Just like in the Bette Davis movie. Wouldn’t you just know?”
I said, “Hunny, what exactly is your mother’s mental state at this point? If the embezzlement was revealed, would she even know it?”
“Most days, she would. Others, not so much.”
“I have to tell you that I spoke with my parents by phone,”
Nelson said, “and they think Hunny should pay the five hundred million. They think this would end the whole business with the Brienings and save them a lot of embarrassment in church. I don’t agree, and I think we have to find other ways to get rid of the Brienings. Don, you must have dealt with blackmailers before. What’s your advice?”
Everyone looked at me. Hunny lit another cigarette.
“Since this is plainly extortion at this point,” I said, “I could sit down with them and point out the serious legal consequences of what they are doing. Just laying it all out sometimes is sobering for people like this. There is also the possibility perhaps of negotiating with them. Offer them a hundred thousand or whatever relatively small amount you think you can part with in order to see the end of this. You’d need some kind of legal document signed by them, however, nullifying the agreement Hunny’s mother signed. What do they think they are going to do with half a billion dollars anyway? Build Cobleskill’s first aircraft carrier, or what?”
“They want part of it to expand Crafts-a-Palooza and open a branch in Albany at the Crossgates Mall. The rest of it, they said, was for what they called their nest egg. They want to retire in a few years, and they want enough for an RV and a house in Tavernier, Florida, where their grandchildren can visit them.”
Lawn said, “That sounds like maybe four hundred K. Five at most.”
46 Richard Stevenson
“Maybe,” Art said, “we could convince them to take five hundred million worth of tranches.”
Hunny couldn’t help but chuckle — as he did at nearly everything Art said — but then he remembered something and his face fell. “Tomorrow’s my day to visit Mom. The Brienings haven’t said anything to her, have they?”
“Not yet,” Nelson said. “But part of their threat is simply disgusting. If you don’t give them what they’re asking for, Uncle Hunny, they say they’ll send letters to all the residents at Golden Gardens warning them to be careful of Grandma Rita because she is a thief and people should watch their valuables when she is around.”
Hunny clutched his head and shook it. “No, no! Oh, poor Mom! Poor, poor Mom!”
“It’s too bad,” Art said, his jaw tight, “that these Brienings can’t just be…oh, I don’t know. Don, in your line of work do you ever play rough with bad guys? Or, if you don’t, do you know anybody who might?”
Composing himself, Hunny said, “Art doesn’t mean that.
Well, he means it, but he’s not
really
serious. Anyway, in
The
Letter
, it’s not the blackmailer that gets killed in the end. It’s Bette Davis, who only did what she did out of passionate infatuation.
And I don’t think any of us want to go down
that
road. No, this situation is different. More like
I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang
.
No offense to Mom.”
Nelson said, “The Van Horn family is not the Sopranos.
We’re going to have to deal with these dreadful people, and we have to be firm with them, but of course we’re not going to hurt them physically or otherwise do anything unlawful.”
I said, “How do the Brienings think they are going to explain to people their sudden vast wealth? To friends and family, not to mention the IRS?”
“They said they talked to a lawyer in Schenectady, and they can have the money held in a bank in the Cayman Islands. They told me not to be concerned about that, and they would work it out.
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47
They said they saw a report on ABC
20/20
about how people get away with this kind of thing all the time. They said they had worked hard all their lives, and other people were getting away with murder, and now it was their turn to make the system work for them, and it was time for them to clean up.”
The wall phone next to Hunny rang, and he picked it up.
“Good evening, Mr. Sands’ office. Susie MacNamara speaking.
May I help you?”
Hunny listened and said uh-huh several times, and then, “Just a minute.” He put his hand over the receiver. “It’s the Focks News people out front. They said they know I’m in here and if I don’t come out they will stay all night, and sooner or later I’ll have to talk to them. Maybe I should say something. They’ve already interviewed Marylou, and I doubt she told them anything helpful to our situation. Also, they may check and find out she isn’t the real Marylou Whitney, and this will only add to all our woes.”
Lawn said, “Well, you certainly can’t allow them into the house. The place is a pig sty, and there are people in the living room in varying states of undress, and they’re looking at some obscene video. It will just be fodder for what this busybody antigay, pro-morality organization is trying to do.”
Art said, “It’s a great video.
Carnival in Costa Rica.
But it’s not the one with Cesar Romero and Vera-Ellen.”