Sara Paretsky - V.I. Warshawski 07 (3 page)

Max
handed me my ticket before unwinding himself from the backseat. Although I’d
put a blanket down to cover Peppy’s traces I could see red-gold hairs clinging
to his dinner jacket as he climbed out. I made an embarrassed face and
furtively looked at the skirt of Lotty’s tailored coral gown. It held a few
hairs too. I could only hope her annoyance kept her mind off her clothes.

I
made a sharp U, ignoring an outraged whistle, and zipped the Trans Am back up
to Monroe and the north garage. It was only half a mile from there to the
Auditorium, but I was wearing a long skirt and high heels, not the best garb
for jogging. I slid in next to Lotty in the box Michael had given us just as
the houselights went down.

Looking
austere and remote in tails, Michael came onto the stage. He opened the evening
with Strauss’s Don Quixote Variations. The theater was full—Chicago Settlement
had become a trendy charity for some reason—but it wasn’t a music-loving crowd.
Their whispered conversations created a background rumble and they kept
applauding at the pauses between variations. Michael scowled at the breaks to
his concentration. At one point he replayed the final thirteen bars of the
previous section, only to find himself interrupted again. At that he made an
angry gesture of dismissal and played the final two variations without stopping
for air. The audience applauded politely, although not enthusiastically.
Michael didn’t even bow, just walked quickly from the stage.

The
next performance evoked greater response: the Chicago Settlement Children’s
Choir performed a set of five folk songs. The choir held rigorous auditions and
the children sang with a beautiful clarity, but it was their appearance that
brought down the house. Some PR genius realized that native garb would sell
better than choir robes, so bright dashiki and velvet Afghan jackets gleamed
next to the embroidered white dresses of El Salvadoran girls. The audience
roared for an encore and gave a standing ovation to the soloists, an Ethiopian
boy and an Iranian girl.

During
the intermission I left Max and Lotty in the box and strolled to the foyer to
admire the costumes of the patrons—they were even more colorfully decked than
the children. Perhaps left to themselves Lotty and Max would sort out their
disagreement. Lotty’s ferocity creates periodic sparks in all her
relationships. I didn’t want to be privy to whatever conflagration she had
going with Carol.

On my
way out of the box I caught my heel in the threads of my skirt. I wasn’t used
to moving in evening clothes. I kept forgetting to shorten my stride; every few
steps I’d have to stop to disengage my heel from the delicate threads.

I’d
bought the skirt for my husband’s law firm’s Christmas party during my brief
marriage thirteen years ago. The sheer black wool, heavily shot with silver,
didn’t compare with Or’s custom-made gown, but it was my own most elegant
outfit. With a black silk top and my mother’s diamond drops it made respectable
concert attire, but it lacked the dramatic flair of most of the ensembles I saw
in the foyer.

I was
particularly fascinated by a bronze satin dress whose top resembled a Roman
breastplate—except that it was slit to the waist. I kept trying to figure out
how its wearer managed to keep her breasts from spilling out into the middle.
Starch, maybe, or Scotch tape.

When
the chimes sounded to announce the end of intermission, the woman in the
breastplate moved toward me. I was thinking that the diamond choker didn’t go
with the dress—that it was just a chance for someone with Trump-like ideas of
female adornment to display his wealth—when my heel caught once more in my skirt.
I twisted around to free myself as a man in a white dinner jacket hurried
toward us from the other end of the foyer.

“Teri!
Where’ve you been? I wanted to introduce you to some people.”

The
light, authoritative baritone, with its faint undercurrent of petulance,
startled me so much that I lost my balance and fell into the path of another
diamond-encrusted woman. By the time she’d disengaged her spikes from my
shoulder and we’d exchanged frosty apologies, Teri and her escort had
disappeared into the theater.

I
knew that voice, though: I’d woken to it every morning for twenty-four
months—six months of sweetly tormented eroticism as we finished law school and
studied for the bar, and eighteen of simple torment after we married. It was as
though by wearing my best outfit from those strange days I had conjured him up.

Richard
Yarborough, his name was. He was a partner at Crawford, Mead, one of Chicago’s
giant firms. Not just a partner, but a significant rainmaker in a place whose
clients included two former governors and the heads of most of Chicago’s
contributions to the Fortune 500.

I
only knew these facts because Dick used to recite them at breakfast with the
awe of a cathedral guide displaying his reliquaries. He might have done so at
dinner, too, but I wasn’t willing to wait up to eat with him at midnight when
he had finished salaaming to the prestige gods for the day.

That
kind of summed up why we’d broken up—my not being impressed enough with the
power and money he was wallowing in and his suddenly expecting me to drop
everything and be a Japanese wife when we finished law school and started
working. Even before our formal split, Dick had realized that a wife was an
important part of his portfolio and that he should have married someone with
more clout than the daughter of a beat cop and an Italian immigrant could ever
carry. It wasn’t my mother’s Italian-ness that bugged him, but the taint of
immigrant squalor that clung to me. He’d made that clear when he began
accepting invitations to Peter Felitti’s Oak Brook estate while I was doing
Saturday duty at women’s court—“I made your excuses, Vic, and anyway, I don’t
think you have the wardrobe for the kind of weekend the Felittis are planning.”

Nine
months after our final decree, he and Teri Felitti were married in a fanfare of
white lace and bridesmaids. Her father’s financial prominence made the nuptials
a major news item—and I couldn’t resist reading all the details. Which is how I
knew she was only nineteen at the time, nine years younger than Dick. He had turned
forty last year; I wondered if Teri at thirty-two was starting to look old to
him.

I’d
never seen her before, but I could understand why Dick thought she was a better
ornament for Crawford, Mead than I’d been. For one thing, she wasn’t sprawled
on the floor as the ushers were closing the aisle doors; for another, she
didn’t have to sprint, holding up her dirty hem to avoid her high heels, to get
inside ahead of them.

I
dropped back into the box just as Michael returned to the stage with Or‘.
Hearing my panting, Lotty turned to me, eyebrows raised. “Did you need to run a
marathon at intermission, Vic?” she muttered under cover of the polite
smattering of applause.

I
made a throwaway gesture. “It’s too complicated to explain now. Dick is here,
my old pal Dick.”

“And
that set your pulse racing like this?” Her astringent irony made me flush, but
before I could come up with a snappy rejoinder Michael started speaking.

In a
few simple sentences he explained the debt his family owed the citizens of
London for taking them in when Europe had become a hellhole in which they
couldn’t survive. “And I am proud that I grew up in Chicago, where people’s
hearts are also moved to help those who— because of race or tribe or creed—can
no longer live in their native lands. Tonight we are going to play for you the
debut performance of Or‘ Nivitsky’s concerto for oboe and cello entitled The
Wandering Jew, dedicated to the memory of Theresz Kocsis Loewenthal. Theresz
supported Chicago Settlement most ardently; she would be moved to see the
support you give this important charity.”

It
was a rehearsed speech, delivered quickly and without warmth because of the
coldness of the audience. Michael bowed slightly, first in the direction of our
box, then to

Or‘.
The two seated themselves. Michael tuned his cello, then looked at Or’. At her
nod they began to play.

Max
was right. The concerto bore no resemblance to the atonal cacophony of Or’s
chamber music. The composer had returned to the folk music of Jewish Eastern
Europe to find her themes. The music, forgotten for five decades, came to life
in fits and starts as cello and oboe made tentative passes at each other. For a
few poignant minutes they seemed to find each other in a measured antiphon. The
harmony shattered abruptly as antiphon turned to antagonism. The instruments
fought so fiercely that I could feel sweat on my temples.

They
built to a frantic climax and broke off. Even this nonmusical audience could
hold its breath when they paused at that peak. Then the cello chased the oboe
from terror to peace, but a horrible peace, for it was the repose of death. I gripped
Lotty’s hand, not making any pretense of dashing away my tears. Neither of us
could join in the applause.

Michael
and Or‘ bowed briefly and disappeared from the stage. Although the clapping
continued for some minutes, with more enthusiasm than had greeted the Don
Quixote Variations, the response lacked the vital spark that would have shown
they’d got the point. The musicians didn’t return, but sent out the children’s
choir for the set that concluded the concert.

Like
Lotty, Max had been shaken by his son’s recital. I offered to get the car at
once, but they felt they had to stay for the reception.

“Since
it’s in Theresz’s honor, it would look strange if Max wasn’t there, especially
as Michael is his son,” Lotty said. “If you want to leave, though, Vic, we can
take a cab home.”

“Don’t
be ridiculous,” I said. “I’ll keep an eye out for you—you give me a signal when
you’re ready to go.”

“But
you might see Dick again—could you stand the excitement?” Lotty strove to
steady herself with sarcasm.

I
kissed her cheek. “I’ll manage.”

That
was the last I saw of her for some time. The minute the concert ended a crush
of people poured into the stairwells. When Max, Lotty, and I finally struggled
into the upper foyer, we were immediately separated by the throng. Instead of
fighting my way through the mob to rejoin them I went to the balustrade and
tried following their progress. It was hopeless: Max tops Lotty’s five feet by
only a few inches. I lost sight of them .within seconds of their reaching the
main floor.

During
the second half, caterers had set up shop in the lobby. Four tables, formed
into an enormous rectangle, were covered with staggering amounts of food:
shrimp molded into mountains, giant bowls of strawberries, cakes, rolls,
salads, platters of raw oysters. The shorter sides of the rectangle held hot
dishes. From my perch I couldn’t make out the contents very clearly, but
thought egg rolls and chicken livers jostled next to fried mushrooms and crab
cakes. In the middle of the two long sides, white-capped men poised carving
knives over giant haunches of beef and ham.

People
were stampeding to get at the spread before it vanished. I noticed Teri’s
bronze breastplate in the first surge toward the shrimp mountain. She was
riding in Dick’s wake as he snatched shrimps with the frenzy of a man who
feared his just share would be lost if he didn’t grab it fast. While stuffing
shrimp into his mouth he talked earnestly to two other men in evening garb, who
were plunging into the oysters. As .they slowly moved toward the roast beef in
the middle they punctuated their conversation by stabbing at olives, crab
cakes, endives, whatever lay in their path. Ten bobbed behind, apparently
talking to a woman in a blue gown whose surface was tightly covered with seed
pearls.

“I
feel like Pharaoh watching the locusts descend,” a familiar voice said behind
me.

I
turned to see Freeman Carter—Crawford, Mead’s token criminal lawyer. I grinned
and laid a hand on the superfine broadcloth of his jacket. Our relationship
went back to those days when I used to bob along behind Dick myself at the
firm’s social functions. Freeman was the only partner who ever talked to the
womenfolk without showing what a big favor he was doing us, so I’d started
turning to him for my own legal needs those times the system looked like
mangling me.

“What
are you doing here?” I demanded. “I wasn’t expecting to see anyone I know.”

“Love
of music.” Freeman smiled sardonically. “What about you? You’re the last person
I’d look for at a hundred-and-fifty-buck function.”

“Love
of music,” I mimicked solemnly. “The cellist is the son of a friend—I’m sorry
to say I’m freeloading, not supporting the cause.”

“Well,
Crawford, Mead seems to have adopted Chicago Settlement as a pet. All partners
were encouraged to buy five tickets each. I thought it would be collegial of me
to join in—make it my last gesture of goodwill to the firm.”

My
brows went up reflexively. “You’re leaving? Since when? What will you do?”

Freeman
looked cautiously over his shoulder. “I haven’t told them yet, so keep it to
yourself, but it’s time I went into practice on my own. Criminal law has never
been important at Crawford—for years I’ve known I should cut the ties—but there
are so many perks in a big firm that I just coasted along. Now the firm is
growing so fast and so far away from the work I think is important, it just
seems to be time to go. I’ll notify you officially—notify all my clients—when
I’m actually on my own.”