Slate

Nathan Aldyne

F
ELONY
& M
AYHEM
P
RESS
• N
EW
Y
ORK

Part One

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

PART TWO

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

PART THREE

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

C
LARISSE LOVELACE STUMBLED into the main lobby of Beth Israel Hospital. Struggling to balance three bunches of flowers, a two-pound Whitman's Sampler, four paperback books, and a briefcase, she tripped over the threshold and slipped a contact lens. She staggered over to the information desk, squinted at the clock above the bank of cathode-ray tubes bristling with hospital information, and was relieved to find that half an hour of morning visiting hours remained.

Blinking violently in hope that the errant lens would slip back into place, she made her way to the elevators and deftly punched the up button with her elbow. In a moment, the green signal flashed with a resounding bong and the doors opened. She smiled to see the elevator empty and then stepped inside.

Before she could angle her elbow around to punch the button for the fourth floor, however, seven persons in the lobby caught sight of the open doors and rushed inside. Clarisse was pressed against the side wall; the box of candy, the flowers, and the books were crushed against her breasts. Because she was nearest the control panel, her fellow passengers barked demands that she press buttons for their floors. A large, determined-looking woman with a shopping bag swinging in the crook of her arm charged toward the elevator shouting, “Going up! Going up!” Frantically, Clarisse stabbed her elbow against the disk marked Door Close. The chrome doors slid smoothly shut, and the woman's curses followed them upward.

“I said two, lady!” snapped a man in the corner, as the elevator slipped past the second floor.

“Hey, I got to—” began another man, nearer Clarisse, but still out of reach of the panel. “If my brother dies before I get to see him, it'll be your fault!” he concluded acidly as the elevator rose past three.

“Did you push seven?” demanded a woman who was completely invisible to Clarisse. “Chemotherapy's on seven.”

When the doors opened at four, Clarisse pressed her arm against the panel so that buttons for all the floors were lighted. “Everybody satisfied?” she asked politely, and struggled out. In doing so, she lost one of her three bouquets—the one of white asters. A little boy in the front of the crowd jumped up and down on the flowers and then kicked them out into the corridor after Clarisse.

Glaring murderously at the child, Clarisse dropped everything she was carrying, picked up the smashed bouquet, and flung it into the elevator. The passengers were showered with petals, wet stems, and bits of green paper. Their outrage was cut short by the closing doors.

“Clarisse?” inquired a female voice curiously, as Clarisse knelt to retrieve her gifts.

She stood up and smiled uncertainly at a young nurse with a tumble of red hair. Her name tag read
K. Reardon
. The nurse smiled and adjusted the books in Clarisse's arms for better balance.

Clarisse looked at her for a few moments and then said authoritatively, “Appleton Street duplex. Garden and roof deck. Eight-fifty a month, plus utilities.” Then she apologized: “I'm sorry. I remember your apartment but not your first name.”

“Katherine,” said the nurse. “I haven't seen you around the office lately when I've gone to pay the rent.” The office was South End Realty where Clarisse had worked as an agent for several years.

“I spent the summer in P'town,” explained Clarisse. “And I've given up real estate. I'm starting law school—tomorrow, as a matter of fact. Portia School of Law, on Beacon Hill.”

“That's great,” said the nurse. “Criminal?”

“No, I think I'm going corporate.”

Katherine nodded approval and then, indicating the gifts, asked, “Who are you seeing?”

Clarisse told her the room number.

“Oh,” said Katherine Reardon, her smile draining away with dark implications. “The doll by the window or the martyr by the door?”

“Daniel Valentine,” replied Clarisse.

“The martyr.” The nurse sighed with sympathy. “I don't know if candy and flowers and books are going to be enough. I think that one's a job for Mother Theresa.”

“Well,” said Clarisse, turning around before Valentine at the foot of the bed, “how do you like the new me?” She wore a tailored gray suit and a white blouse. Her hose were a darker shade of gray than the suit; her high heels, belt, and tie were black. Vermilion lipstick, emphasizing her full mouth, was in startling contrast.

She had placed her briefcase at the foot of the bed and arranged the gifts on top of the metal table beside the door of the double room. She made a perfunctory and unsuccessful attempt to glance around the curtain that separated Valentine from his roommate. The roommate was talking volubly on the telephone, but unfortunately for Valentine and Clarisse's curiosity, in a low, unintelligible voice.

“Well?” she prompted, turning again.

Valentine didn't answer. A clear plastic oxygen mask covered his mouth and nose. An intravenous tube led from a needle buried in his left forearm up to a bottle of clear liquid suspended from a portable hanger. His eyes were heavy lidded and dull; his summer tan had almost faded, and his short blond hair and neatly trimmed beard had grown darker. The pneumonia that had put Valentine in the hospital had debilitated his body for the past eight weeks, but had only been diagnosed ten days before. He had entered the hospital the day after he was laid off from his job as a social worker at the Charles Street Jail. Daniel Valentine looked just about as bad as he felt.

“Well?” Clarisse repeated. “I'm not going to leave until I get a reply.”

“
Mmmmgggfffsssnnnnnn
,” said Valentine.

“What?” Clarisse asked. Leaning over, she pried up the oxygen mask.

“You look magnificent,” he answered in a husky, labored voice.

She smiled and withdrew her fingers. The mask snapped back into place. Valentine winced.

“Registration at Portia is this afternoon. I thought I might as well start out right, so Raymond cut my hair this morning. Don't you think it looks great?” Her black hair, previously worn in flowing waves or in intricate chignons, was now cut in a straightforward, fashionable style that brushed her shoulders. “Don't you think it says about me—vaguely, I mean—
This woman will make a great corporate lawyer. This woman is worth any amount of money at all in retainer fees. This woman will never lose a case in the entire span of her lengthy and brilliant career?”
She turned and glanced in the mirror. “That's what I think it says.” She turned back to Valentine. “And a new wardrobe—I got a new wardrobe. So far it has cost me more than the first year's tuition, and I haven't even looked at shoes yet. This is my power look,” she concluded with a ravishing smile. “The problem is that the power look has thrust me very deeply into poverty.”

Valentine rolled his eyes.

“Don't you want to know what I brought you?” she asked. He nodded. “Flowers,” she said, holding up the bouquets and waving them beneath his mask. “Whitman's Sampler—your favorite.” She pulled the ribbon off the box of candy and slit the plastic wrap with a sharp fingernail. “Some books—light reading for those hours that hang so heavy.” She held up the covers for him to see. Three were novels—one by Cornell Woolrich, one by James M. Cain, and one by Marion Zimmer Bradley—and the fourth was Lana Turner's autobiography. Valentine's eyes widened, and he pointed excitedly to the Lana Turner book. Clarisse handed it to him, and, with strength provided by an adrenaline rush, he heaved it over her shoulder so that it slammed against the far wall and slid neatly down into the trash can in the corner.

“I guess you've read it already,” said Clarisse. “Well, let me put these flowers in some water, and then we have to talk a little business.”

She took up the bouquets, then grabbed a couple of urine specimen bottles from Valentine's bedside table and started for the bathroom.

At that moment, a hand came around the curtain dividing the room, clutched the material, and pulled it back. The hoops clattered along the rod. Clarisse prepared a smile for “the doll by the window,” as Katherine Reardon had called Valentine's roommate.

Despite that description, Clarisse was mildly startled by how markedly handsome the man was. His curly hair was a couple of shades darker than Valentine's but still could be called blond. He had strong, clean-shaven features, a ruddy complexion, and pale blue eyes. His green johnny was open to the waist, and his smooth chest was plaited with defined muscle. His mouth was turned up in a half-smile as he studied Clarisse.

“I wanted to see the power look,” he said.

“You don't think it's too much?” Clarisse asked him without hesitation.

“I think you look just fine. Like Glenda Jackson when she's had enough sleep. My name's Linc. Lincoln, really, but everybody calls me Linc.”

“I'm Clarisse. I'm visiting Valentine.” She pushed the curtain all the way back to the wall. Valentine made a noise behind his mask as he busily discarded the peanut clusters from the Whitman's Sampler. “You haven't met?” Clarisse asked Linc.

“I was brought in late last night,” he explained. “Your friend was asleep.”

“Linc,” said Clarisse, “this is Daniel Valentine. Val, this is Linc…”

“Hamilton,” said the man, and waved to Valentine in lieu of a handshake. Valentine set the candy aside, waved back, and then collapsed against his pillows in apparent exhaustion.

“What's he in for?” Linc asked.

“Double walking pneumonia. He carried it around for almost two months.”

Linc looked puzzled.

“What is it?” asked Clarisse.

“I thought he was in for a nervous breakdown.”

“What?”

“That's what Sweeney Drysdale II said in his column in the
BAR
.”

“The bar?” echoed Clarisse vaguely. “Is that a new place?”

“No, it's a paper.
The Boston Area Reporter
. It's a free rag they give out in all the bars. It's down there in that pile of papers,” said Linc, pointing at a small stack of newspapers beneath his nightstand. “Hand them to me, and I'll find it.”

“And this man,” said Clarisse slowly, leaning over and gathering up the papers, “said that Valentine had had a nervous breakdown, and that was why he was in the hospital?”

“Right,” returned Linc.

Clarisse paused pensively. “Maybe we'll sue. Maybe I'll sue. Maybe it could be my first case.” She turned back to Linc. “Do lots of people read this paper?”

“Sure,” said Linc, picking through the newspapers. “Everybody does, 'cause they're free. There's
BAR
, and
Jason's Thing
, and there's a third one, but it's no good because all the articles in it are about Syracuse. Nobody reads that one.” He found the
BAR
and held it up for Clarisse to see the front page. Then, as he opened it and began leafing through, he continued: “These papers give the bar news, and listings, and somebody writes an article about how he got to shake hands with the man who's playing Daddy Warbucks at the Chateau de Ville Dinner Theatre, and some leather man writes a concerned letter to the community about how retarded children don't have enough toys. There's always a gossip column and they talk about bartenders and their friends, except nobody really knows who they are. Here it is.”