Death on a High Floor (16 page)

Oscar began to pace back and forth, hands behind his back.

“Robert, let me explain something to you,” he said. “You are going to be arrested. Soon. Spritz thinks he’s got everything he needs now. They probed the hard drive on Simon’s home computer and found deleted e-mails between the two of you. E-mails where Simon accuses you of defrauding him in a coin sale and demands his 500K back. Rather vehemently. E-mails where you refuse to give the money back. Vehemently. So there’s a motive.”

“But, I said . . .”

Oscar ignored me and continued. “And Simon’s blood on your suit cuff, and maybe his blood in your office, so there’s physical evidence. And your elevator key card coming up to eighty-five—with you in tow—at 4:30 in the morning. According to Spritz, you came up at 4:30 a.m. to kill him and then again at 6:00 a.m.—if you ever left at all—to call 911 and make it seem like you had just stumbled on the body. So there’s opportunity. Which we could also call the nail in your coffin.”

Oscar stopped pacing, turned and swept his right hand toward me, index finger outstretched and jabbing at me.

“But even in the face of all that, Robert, you’re just going to go out and do exactly what you damn well please. Well, I’m too old for that. I need to have clients who are not nuts. Clients who follow my advice. I quit.”

Then he aimed his finger at Jenna. “You can be his lawyer all by yourself, sweetie. If you’re not indicted as a co-conspirator.”

He lowered his hand. “I wish you both the best of luck.”

With that, he simply walked out. Since he was already standing up, he didn’t need to worry about how to push back from a table. He didn’t try to retrieve his jacket from the back of the chair, and he didn’t look back. It was a perfect exit.

I didn’t blame him for leaving. There’s nothing worse than a client who simply ignores his lawyer’s advice. And nothing
twice as worse
as a client who insists on doing his own investigations, unbidden and unsupervised. The legal profession requires that clients submit. I had refused to submit to Oscar. Truth is, had I been my lawyer, I would have dumped me as a client in a heartbeat.

I realized that Jenna was still standing there, looking at me. She was holding an envelope in her left hand.

“What’s in the envelope?”

“My key card. It was still in my desk drawer, right where I always keep it.”

“How do you know it’s really yours?”

“Years ago, I pasted some tiny fake jewels on the back. So I could tell it apart from my parking card, which looks just like it. The little jewels are still there. It’s mine, for sure.”

“Why the envelope?”

“To keep from smudging any fingerprints on it.”

“You going to send it to Uncle Freddie to dust for prints?” As soon as I said it, I knew that I was being a jerk.

Jenna gave me a disgusted look. “No. I’ve hired an investigator. He’ll take care of it. Probably, it’s got only
my
prints on it. But if somebody else’s prints are on it, the somebody else will have some explaining to do.”

“Do you suspect someone?”

“Uh huh. Stewart.”

“Stewart?” I wrinkled my nose. “You still think he did it?” It did not seem even remotely possible to me, even though I’d accused him of it at the
DownUnder
.

“He could have,” she said. “He admitted to being here.”

“And his motive?”

“I don’t know. Maybe we should burgle his office and find out.”

“When?”

“Well, soon if I’m going to be the lead burglar. I’ve been told that Monday is my last day. So after that, I’m going to lose my access here. Maybe we could do it late tonight.”

“What do you mean Monday’s your last day?”

“Caroline came to see me when we got back today. She told me that representing you is a conflict of interest. She told me to get off your case or get out of the firm.”

“That’s crazy. The firm isn’t even a party in my case.”

“Not according to her. She called it a
business
conflict. Something about too much attention on the firm already. Something about your taking a leave of absence. Something about keeping a low profile.”

“I’m not taking a leave of absence.”

“Neither am I. I’m staying on your case, and I’m quitting the firm.”

“No, you’re not. You have a great future here. You’ll probably be a partner next year. You shouldn’t throw that away on my case. I’ll find someone to replace Oscar. You and I can always chat informally about the case.”

“Get real, Robert. This murder is already stuck to you like tar. Even if you avoid indictment, you’ll always be the ‘lawyer suspected of killing Simon Rafer.’ It will follow you all your days. It will stick to me, too. The newspapers are already calling me one of your Dream Team. And when the Blob finds out about me and Simon . . .”

“Maybe it won’t.”

“Oh, it will. It will. There are already fifty reporters in town looking at every inch of his life. They’ll find it. Once they do, I’ll be front page fodder for the tabs. Right beside alien babies. So I’m toast here. They’ll never make me a partner.”

“Of course they’ll make you a partner. Your work is first rate, and clients love you.”

“No, they’ll just trump up ways to say I’m no longer any good and fire me. You know how they do that to associates they don’t like. Used to be fabulous. Flamed out at the last minute. So surprising. So too bad. It’s all subjective. If I stay I’ll be gone in a year. I know it. I might as well go now and try to have some fun.” She paused. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean fun. It’s just that . . .” She burst into tears.

I have never been very good at trying to comfort people who are crying. Maybe I lack the gene for it. Usually, I just sit there and wait for it to stop. But I felt I ought to do something, so I got up and stood beside her and hugged her to me. She sobbed into my shirt. If I’d followed my father’s lead and carried a handkerchief, I could have taken it out of my pocket and offered it to her. It’s what they always do in old movies. But I had never even owned a handkerchief.

Eventually, the crying stopped, and she pulled back from me. “I’m just so ineffably sad, Robert. So sad.”

I tried to make light of it. “Ineffably? Is that one of those twelve-dollar words you learned at Oxford?”

“Cambridge, you big shit. I went to Cambridge. And you know it.” We were back to joshing. It seemed to help both of us.

“Jenna, I don’t think you should leave the firm.”

“I’ve made up my mind.”

“Will you at least sleep on it?”

“Yes. But it won’t change anything.”

“All right,” I said. “On other fronts, I assume you were joking about burgling Stewart’s office.”

“Yes, of course. But it wouldn’t be beyond me to call Spritz and suggest he take a closer look in that office himself.”

“Good idea,” I said.

“Maybe I’ll go call him right now,” she said. “Which reminds me, speaking of calls. The news director at KZDD called me back. They watched Harry check his baggage at the ticket counter at American Airlines and then go through security.”

“Where was he going?”

“They don’t know, exactly. They couldn’t follow him through security to his gate. Could have been any one of American’s destinations. We’ll need to figure it out, somehow,” she said.

“Yeah, and we’ll need to figure out how to replace Oscar.”

“You still think I can’t do it alone.”

“Right.”

“Okay, I’ll think about who might be good while I start to pack up my office.”

“Need help?”

“No, but maybe when I’m done I could give you my door.” She laughed. “I won’t be needing it anymore.” And then she left.

I picked up the phone and dialed Caroline Thorpe. Her voice mail answered. I left an exceedingly rude message, the gist of which was that giving me a dumpy office was not going to push me out the door, and, speaking of doors, they should find my damn door and bring it back. Only seconds after I dropped the phone back into its cradle, it rang. I picked it up.

“Robert Tarza here.”

“Good evening, Robert.”

It was Serappo.

“Good evening Serappo. Sorry I wasn’t able to call you back.” Then I got right to the point. “So what do you want?”

“I would be delighted if you were to come and see me.”

“This isn’t exactly the greatest time to travel to Chicago.”

“The weather here has not been too inclement as yet. No snow. Reasonable temperatures.”

“I wasn’t referring to the weather.”

“Ah, well, yes. Perhaps I might be able to help mend your personal weather as well. One never knows.”

I didn’t want to travel to Chicago. I didn’t want to see Serappo. I had never liked him, and he tended to be a bullshitter. “Maybe, Serappo, you could mend my weather, as you put it, right over the phone, right now.”

“Telephones are so uncivilized. I would strongly prefer to interact with you in person, Robert. Come to Chicago.”

“I will think on it,” I said. “But don’t hold your breath.”

“At my age, holding my breath might not be the wisest thing to do. But will you seriously think on paying me a visit?”

 
“I will.”

“Good. Well, then, my young friend, I will wish you a pleasant evening.”

I hung up the phone. I had to smile at having been referred to as his young friend. It’s all relative, I guess.

I sat there and thought about his invitation to go to Chicago. On the one hand, Serappo might actually know something useful, since he’d apparently appraised the
Ides
for Simon. On the other hand, leaving town right now to pursue another will-o’-the wisp lead didn’t seem like the most prudent thing to do. I could just have Jenna call him and try to wheedle out of him what he knew and what he wanted. She’d probably even enjoy talking to the old geezer.

I plucked my suit jacket off the back of my chair, walked to the elevator bank and headed down. When I got to the ground floor, I walked through the lobby and out the big glass doors that lead to the street. I expected to see the Blob outside, but it was still gone. Oddly, I kind of missed it.

Then I hoofed it the few blocks over to the
Yorkshire Grill
. I had eaten my first dinner in Los Angeles there back in 1973. I had been in town to interview for a possible first-year associate’s job at M&M, starting the next year. Crusty old John Jordan, who didn’t believe in fancy recruiting dinners, had taken me there, saying, “There’ll be time for fancy later if you turn out to be more than a flash in the pan, sonny.”

Since I first set eyes on the place in 1973, the management of the
Yorkshire
has changed it hardly at all. At max, they’ve replaced the vinyl in the booths a few times, refurbished the sit-at counter a bit, maybe even hired a new cook or two or three. But that’s about it. It’s still a small, classic deli with very good, but hardly gourmet, food. Ambience? If a guy from 1952 were somehow parachuted into the twenty-first century and plunked down in the
Yorkshire
, he might not notice that almost sixty years had gone by. He might even be able, still, to understand the menu. No free-range chicken. No arugula. No organic non-fat soy milk.

I ordered a Coke and a grilled cheese sandwich. American cheese. On white. A
real
grilled cheese sandwich. I knew that it was bad for me, but I was happy that it didn’t have a secret name or a secret menu companion, or come wrapped in lettuce with no bread. It was extraordinarily tasty.

When I finished dinner, I walked back to the office. As I swiped my card to activate the elevator I was acutely conscious that I had just made a record of my entry. Something I didn’t used to think about. Or even be aware of.

I went up to eighty-five, then walked down three floors of internal stairways to my new office on eighty-two. There was now a door leaning against one of the office walls. Waiting to be installed, I hoped. My message to Caroline had apparently paid off. At least temporarily.

Looking around, I saw that someone had put my ‘incoming’ box in the middle of my desk. It was piled high with almost a week’s worth of mail. I sat down and went through it. The most interesting things in the stack were half a dozen notes from friends trying to buck me up in my time of trouble.

There are apparently no “So Sorry You’re a Person of Interest” cards in the stores, so people had had to make do with short, hand-written messages penned inside those blank no-message cards. Most people had written, “Hang in there,” or something equivalent. One, from an old girlfriend, said, “Kick ‘em in the balls.” I visualized doing just that to Detective Spritz and found the thought almost as satisfying as the grilled cheese sandwich.

Less than an hour after I began, the box was empty. I felt oddly at peace. There is something quite soothing about doing a familiar, repetitive task that takes no effort. Meanwhile, it had gotten dark out, and very quiet, even on the dorm floor. The Christmas season had depleted the ranks. They were probably off spending their overly munificent salaries on the latest consumer electronics. Or on Blackberries that would fit inside your decoder ring. Or whatever. My thoughts were wandering. I had nothing left to do except sit and think.

Normally, I am not very contemplative. Or, as Gwen once put it to me in a moment of unusual candor and intimacy, I am not “in touch with my inner feelings.” That has always seemed to me a good thing. Most of the people I know who are in regular touch with their inner feelings are seriously miserable.

Every few years, though, my inner feelings start yelling at me. Usually late. Suddenly, it was one of those nights. As best I could tell, what my inner feelings really wanted was simply to have me go away somewhere so they could go back to sleep for another few years.

I fantasized, maybe seriously, about going to Mexico. With enough money, of which I had an ample supply, no one in Mexico would want to find me, let alone return me. I could just get in my car and drive across the border. Then I emerged from my reverie. I didn’t want to live out my life as a fugitive in Mexico. I’d spend my whole life washing everything I ate in bottled Evian.

Then I started to think about Jenna. Why
weren’t
they after her? I thought about the
Ides
,
which I stupidly still had in my pocket. Was it a fake? Did the police even know I had it? Should I give in and go see Serappo? I wondered what he really wanted. I doubted it was to wish me a Merry Christmas in person.

My state of grilled cheese-induced serenity was beginning to fade, so I did what I always do when I need to try to master the universe. I took out a pad of yellow legal paper and sketched out a little chart. Four columns along the top for suspects. Four rows down the side for the evidence on each. I love charts. So orderly. So informative: