Enchanted Isle (12 page)

“Mandy, I think that’s it.”

So said Mr. Wilmer.

“Of course it is.”

So said Steve.

“But I hate him!”

So said I.

“Have you ever seen a prison?”

So said Mr. Clawson, and I started to cry again. But he was the one that time who took the Kleenex from Mother and wiped my tears with it. He went on, “I have, Mandy. I’ve had to go there once or twice in connection with legal matters. There’s no such hell beyond the grave. There couldn’t be, as no decent God would ever create what men have brought forth on this earth. It stinks. It hasn’t one ounce of compassion from end to end, from top to bottom. No mouthful of decent food is ever served in it, no love is felt, no jokes are cracked, no hope ever shines in. And they keep you there years and years, so long it makes no sense, but you stay there just the same. Are you sure you hate that boy this much? That you’d go to prison to wreak revenge on him?”

“OK, I’ll do what I can.”

“You have to do better than that!”

“I’ll fight for him, then.”

“That’s better.”

“But I won’t want to.”

“Mandy, will you wake up?”

“Mr. Clawson, I’ll really hit it a lick.”

“That’s what I want to hear. Kiss me.”

I kissed him, and Mother started to cry. I started to cry. Mother gave him the Kleenex, but he wiped his own face off. Then we were laughing and pressing each other’s hand.

Turned out, though, that beating some sense into my head was just the beginning of it. “Now,” he went on, “we take up the next thing: who makes the pitch?”

“Break it down,” said Mr. Wilmer, “so we know what you’re talking about.”

“Who faces the state’s attorney for Baltimore City, or the assistant in charge of this case, the bank, and the police and pins them down to a deal—immunity for Mandy in return for what she knows, the help she’ll be able to give in the recovery of the money.”

“I thought that was your job, Jim.”

“It would be my job, except that in this case it can’t be. Because when I declare myself as her counsel, I have to surrender her or be charged with harboring a fugitive from justice. I can surrender her, that’s true, clam her up under the Fifth Amendment, and to that extent freeze the game—stand pat and leave the next move up to them. The trouble is they will move, and so fast it’ll take your breath. The second they know who she is, they’ll get the rest one, two, three, like that—Rick’s identity, his whereabouts quite possibly, and anything else they need to get the money back and bring these kids to trial. Ethics bind me hand and foot. I can’t make this pitch in the way it has to be made
if
we’re to get anywhere,
if
we’re to get a deal.”

“Go on, Jim. What’s the rest?”

“Someone must go to them, through me, of course, with news of a friend of his, sex as yet undisclosed; who helped out on that crime; who knows the police are off on a wrong scent trying to find the Rossi brothers; who is willing to help, with information that may be of value, in recovering that money; but who won’t talk, won’t say one word, one word of any kind, unless granted immunity.”

“Meaning me?”

“Ben, meaning you as I would assume, but you’re not involved in this crime, you can’t take the Fifth Amendment, and as a material witness you can be made to talk.”

“Yeah? How?”

“You can be jailed until you do.”

“Now I have it.”

He studied Mr. Clawson, trying to make up his mind whether to put his head on the block. He swears now he would have, and I believe him, but it didn’t get that far. Suddenly Steve spoke up, “How about me, Mr. Clawson?”

“You? Mr. Baker, is that your name?”

“Yeah. And I’d go to jail for Mandy.”

“You could stay there and stay there and stay there.”

“If
they
have
that much time.”

“He’ll do. This guy is elected.”

Mr. Wilmer went over and took Steve by the hand. He said, “Steve, my hat’s off to you.” Mother went over and kissed him. I kissed him.

N
EXT WAS TO FIGURE
out how we would do to get the thing in the works, and Mr. Clawson said Steve should stay there, right in his office with him, while he called the state’s attorney with his item of news. But while the discussion went on, he wanted me out of the way, as well as Mother and Mr. Wilmer, until the time would come for me to “do my stuff,” as he put it. But at the same time he wanted me near, so I would be on call and get there quick when told. That way, he said, no time would be lost, “and we could wrap it up, right here, this afternoon.” So Mr. Wilmer suggested a hotel, where we could be in a suite and at the same time be ready to come “as soon as we get your call and you give us the word.” So lo and behold, we walked around the corner, Mother and Mr. Wilmer and I, to the same old hotel Rick and I had stopped at two nights before. Mr. Wilmer asked for sitting room, bedroom, and bath but, of course, had no luggage, as the car was still on the parking lot and he hadn’t bothered to get it just to take us a block or two. So he took out his wallet to pay or show his credit card or whatever he meant to do, but the clerk held up his hand to stop him. He said, “Please, Mr. Wilmer! We don’t have such rules for you.”

What it means to be a big shot.

So the suite was even fancier than the room Rick and I had had, and as soon as the bellboy went Mother took off the green so it wouldn’t get mussed and stretched out on the chaise lounge in her black pantyhose, black shoes, and black bra, like in
Playboy
magazine—’specially around the bra and what she had in it, which was plenty. Mr. Wilmer threw me a wink, and maybe I winked back, but I didn’t take off my dress. Then he sat me down on the sofa and asked what was my favorite poem. I said, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”

“Really? Why?”

“It sends shivers down my back.”

“You know it?”

“Some of it. Not all. It’s awful long.”

“Let’s hear you recite what you know.”

It seemed like a funny idea, but turned out he had a reason, as he later explained to me, which I’ll tell all in due course, when I get to it. However, anything to please, and I commenced giving out. And he commenced watching me, not only listening but watching, as though he was seeing something about me that I didn’t know about. When I came to the line “I shot the albatross,” who got in it but Mother. “I’ll say she did!” she popped off, and I’m telling you that broke it up. We all three got to laughing so I couldn’t go on. So then, of course, we had kisses, and I had to kneel beside Mother to sniff her and touch her and feel how pretty she was. I said, “It’s a mess from beginning to end, and I hate myself that I ever got into it. And yet it’s almost been worth it, to bring me at last so close to my wonderful mother.”

“Yes, Darling, and I’ve been thinking the same.”

He sat on the edge of the chaise, holding one of her hands, while I kept kissing the other, and that’s how we were when the phone rang. He answered, then said, “Steve’s on his way up. Sally, get yourself dressed.”

She took her time, as she always did, getting up from the chaise and sashaying into the bedroom, but at lease the door was closed when Steve sounded the buzzer. Mr. Wilmer let him in, and he burst out very excited, talking to both of us but looking mainly at me, “They’re on their way over, Mr. Clawson, guy name of Haynes from the state’s attorney’s office, couple of detectives, a police stenographer, a guy from the bank, and a guy from the insurance company. But, Mandy, I put it over. It’s what I ducked out to tell you before they get here. They didn’t want any piece of a deal, tried to break me, tried to make me spell it regardless, and, hey, they handled me rough. But Mr. Clawson kept looking at me, like trying to telegraph something, which he couldn’t tell me about by whispering in my ear, as it would look like he was coaching me, which would have loused us, of course. Then at last I got it: no insurance man was there. But, the insurance company, of course, was the one under the boom. If the money was not recovered, they were the ones had to pay. So once I caught on to that, did I let them have it! I said, ‘So you don’t want money at all, just this person’s blood, so you see justice done? My, how noble of you. I’m fainting from admiration.’ Then I faced the guy from the bank, a vice president name of Clark, and cussed him out by the book. Then I said, ‘Will you kindly stop being funny? You want me to name this person, that’s Jake with me, but I do it to Mr. Big, not you. Get your bondsman in here! I won’t spill it to nobody else! If he wants blood, OK, but could be he’d rather have dough.’

“I’d played the right card, I could feel it, and when I looked at Mr. Clawson, he had this smile on his face. The rest of it went fast. The insurance man was called and got there in just a few minutes, little guy name of Richter. And when he got the straight of it all, what he said to Clark made what I said sound like a Sunday school. He really went to town, telling him what he’d forgotten, that unless he took all possible steps to help in the money’s recovery, ‘your goddam bond is canceled.’ And that did it. Mr. Clawson insisted they call a judge to get court approval by phone for immunity, but then at last the deal was made. That’s when I slipped out, like to the little boy’s room, to hightail it over here so I could tell you myself. Mandy, I did it. It was me.”

I went over and kissed him. Mother had come in by then, in time to hear the last of it, and she patted him on the head. Mr. Wilmer gave him a wave of the hand. When the phone rang he took it and told us, “They’re on their way up.”

Real quick Steve said, “Mandy?”

“Yes, Steve?”

“Kind of put it on me. You know?”

But Mr. Wilmer said “Steve” real sharp.

“Yes, sir?”

“Quit telling her what to say. It’s up to her who she puts it on. She’s in enough trouble already without any help from you.”

“OK.”

We sat down again on the sofa, me in the middle, Steve on one side, Mr. Wilmer on the other, each of them holding one of my hands. When the buzzer sounded Mother opened the door. She didn’t look like
Playboy
anymore, but more like the Ladies’ Home Journal, from being so elegant. And the black gloves topped it all off. They were cotton and elbow-length, but instead of wearing them she carried them, occasionally pulling them through one hand so she was oh, oh, oh, so casual, as though it was all of no real importance. And if you ask me, that helped. She let in quite a bunch, giving them each a separate smile, very friendly and warm: a bald-headed guy named Haynes, the assistant state’s attorney in charge of the case; a woman in police uniform, carrying a stenotype case; two detectives, one carrying a tape recorder, the other cans of tape; a middle-aged man from the bank, introduced as Mr. Clark; a small, gray-haired man from Patapsco Mutual, introduced as Mr. Richter. And, of course, Mr. Clawson, who did the introducing.

So Mr. Haynes no sooner saw Steve than he commenced bawling him out “for giving me the slip,” but Mr. Clawson cut him off. He said, “Jack, slipping over here first to help you out on this case is not giving you the slip! I suggest you quit hacking at him for what at worst was a breach of protocol, amounting to nothing. So he should have asked your permission to leave. So OK. Let’s get on.”

“Then, I stand corrected.”

He wasn’t too nice about it, but it gave me quite a buzz that even a state’s attorney would back down to Mr. Clawson. However, he kept on talking to Steve, “All right, Baker, where’s the guy?”

“What guy, Mr. State’s Attorney?”

“The one involved in this case?”

“I didn’t say guy. I said person. Right here.”

He held up my hand after kissing it, and Mr. Haynes stared, hardly able to speak. Then he said, “The...person? Is a girl? Is that girl?”

“That’s right, Mr. Haynes. Just gives you a nice rough idea how wrong a tree it is that you’ve been barking up.”

Mr. Haynes asked me, “What’s your name?”

“Amanda Vernick. Mandy, they call me.”

“Well, well, well!”

“I drove the getaway car.”

He kept staring at me, but during that the phone rang, and Mr. Wilmer, after answering, told him, “It’s for you.”

He said hello and right away took a looseleaf notebook from his pocket and wrote in it with a ballpoint. He asked questions like “When was this?” and “What hotel?” and at last hung up. Turning back to us he said, “We could even say chasing my tail. They found Vanny Rossi in the Rogers Hotel on West Fayette Street dead from an overdose of heroin. But the checkout showed he’d been in that room for a week, without leaving it once. So it’s clear: he didn’t drive that car.”

“I told you, sir. I did.”

“Then you’re a friend of Vito Rossi’s?”

“No, sir, I don’t know him.”

“But he helped out in the bank. He held the basket the money was thrown in. The girl, the teller who handled it, picked him out from one of our mug shots.”

“She made a mistake. The guy looked like Rick.”

“Who’s Rick?”

“The boy who did hold the basket.”

“How do you know Vito Rossi looked like him?”

“From his picture, the one that was in the paper.”

“Oh. Oh, that’s right, so it was.”

It was hard prying him loose from the idea the Rossis were in it, even with one of them dead, but at last Mr. Clawson said, “Jack, why don’t you let her get on? Tell you what actually happened? I assure you, from even the little I know, she was there, she knows, and can clear the thing up in ten minutes. So far as the tree goes, your tail, and the false scent the police have been on, it’s happened before and reflects no discredit on anyone, especially after that girl, from overeagerness to help, made her mistake on that picture. Mandy, if you’ll let her, can clear everything up.”

“OK, Mandy, start clearing.”

They set it up then for me. I moved to one end of the sofa, with Mr. Haynes at the other, both with mikes on our chests, and the tape recorder between. On the cocktail table in front of us the girl set her stenotype machine and sat on the floor beside it, so they had me two ways, on tape and on stenotype. Why, don’t ask me, I don’t know. The detectives, the bank man, and the insurance man all gathered around, some sitting, some standing, while Mother sat near me, holding my hand, on a chair by the sofa, while Steve and Mr. Wilmer stood by. Mr. Haynes said, “Mandy, will you give your name, age, and home address into the mike, and then go on in your own words and tell what happened Tuesday. What led to it and what it led to.”