Swan Dive - Jeremiah Healy (4 page)

Arnold’s office was a little larger than the
conference room and even more tastefully appointed in Orientals and
leathers. On the corner of the building, one large window captured
the harbor while the other offered a more specific view of a couple
of magnificent
homes across the water on
Marblehead Neck.

"Please, sit down."

I sat and watched her ease into the large swivel desk
chair. She had a dancer’s body and a ballerina’s absolute control
of it. I decided to wait her out.

"Well?" she finally said.

I just watched her.

She dissolved to disgust. Picking up the telephone,
she pushed one button and said, "Paul? Now, please."

She hung up and seconds later a door on a side wall
opened. The bearded man I’d seen earlier came through it, pad in
hand.

Arnold said, "Mr. Cuddy, this is my associate,
Paul Troller. Paul?"

Troller spoke without reading from his pad. "The
Board of Bar Overseers lists no ‘John Cuddy’ or variation thereof
licensed to practice in the Commonwealth. The Board of Bar Examiners
shows no such name or variation sitting for any of the last three bar
exams." He regarded me in a superior way. "I haven’t had
time to research the penalty for impersonating an attorney."

I said to Arnold, "His batteries expensive?"

She toyed with a grin as he clenched his free list
and bent the pad lengthwise in the other. "I wouldn’t upset
Paul if I were you. He was a finalist in the Golden Gloves before
enrolling in law school."

I reached for my identification as Paul took a step
toward me. "I’m a private investigator. There was some concern
about Mr. Marsh’s good behavior here today. If Chris had seen a
copy of Paulie’s résumé, I’m sure I wouldn’t have been
necessary."

Troller’s next step was cut short by her saying
"Paul," stretching out the syllable with an authoritative
lilt at the end. She leaned forward and took my identification,
seeming somehow relieved as she read it.

"You were the one involved in the shooting at
Middlesex last month."

"Correct."

She glanced down at the ID again as she returned it
to me. "That still your address?" She was leering at me and
peripherally checking for Paul’s reaction. Lovely woman.

I stood up. "Just
call us when Marsh arrives."

* * *

He didn’t look like an insurance salesman. What he
looked like was a snake. .

Marsh came into the conference room dressed in old
corduroy pants and a windbreaker with a chamois workshirt underneath.
He had black hair, short but shaggy, with the kind of wispy mustache
that insecure nineteen-year-olds affect just after basic training. In
his thick-soled "tanker" boots, he was three inches over my
six two plus, but he was too lean and bony, as if someone had
siphoned the flesh on him.

Arnold said, "Roy, I believe the only person you
don’t know is Mr. Cuddy. John Cuddy, Roy Marsh."

Marsh sniffed and said, "Who’s he?"

I’d already prepared Chris for Arnold’s reply.
"Mr. Cuddy is a private investigator looking after Hanna’s
interests."

Marsh looked at me and sniffed again. "You got
any ID?"

I showed him. His mannerisms were herky-jerky. I
couldn’t read his eyes because of the opaque lenses on the aviator
sunglasses he wore, but I had a pretty good idea what I’d see in
them, especially if I could check for cartilage holes up his nostrils
as well.

Cocaine. And lots of it.

Handing back my identification, he grinned at Hanna,
who looked down. "How you plan on paying for him?"

Chris reddened but didn’t say anything. Marsh said,
"He sees those stretch marks, he won’t be too much interested
in your interests anymore."

Chris coughed and said, “Felicia, I really gotta
make that closing. Can we-"

"Just hold on, boy! This is my financial future
we’re going to be talking about, and I want things done nice and
slow and right. So we all know where we stand. Got it?"

It was pretty obvious where Hanna stood. But Chris
was the lawyer, not me.

Arnold said sweetly, "Roy, why don’t you pull
up a chair and we can get started."

Marsh having seized the initiative, Arnold exploited
it. In detail, she went over Roy’s financial statement, all typed
out with elaborate exhibits. She even managed not to laugh when Chris
produced his version of Hanna’s financials. As the talk centered on
Marsh’s income, Roy looked bored. I don’t think I would have been
bored.

According to Arnold, Marsh made over $200,000 in each
of the last three years working for the Stansfield Insurance Agency.
That built the waterfront house at 13 The Seaway in Swampscott, for
which Arnold had a written, certified appraisal of $150,000 against
an outstanding mortgage of $40,000. The appraisal seemed low to me,
but there was more to come: the BMW 633i that Marsh leased; the
Escort station wagon, purchased for cash, that Hanna had taken; a
twenty-six-foot inboard motor racer bought entirely on time; a
snowmobile and trailer; and thousands of dollars of video and stereo
equipment, hunting rifles, and club memberships. Rampant consumerism,
but no real investments. Life in the fast lane.

Chris looked at his watch and wanted to start talking
about more immediate things, such as temporary support, but he had
let Arnold set the conference agenda and now she insisted, gently but
firmly, on sticking to it. I suspected Marsh’s late arrival had
more to do with negotiating tactics than any business commitment he
had, and Arnold’s approach confirmed it. She was forcing Chris,
because of his other appointment, to plod through the property stuff
first, getting those long-term important matters resolved to Marsh’s
advantage before even considering the short-term issues.

Arnold represented that Marsh was maintaining
$250,000 in life insurance payable to Hanna for the benefit of
Vickie. Chris didn’t scrutinize the certificate Arnold waved at
him. Stupid. A guy in the business like Marsh could easily hoke one
up. Chris should have realized that and insisted on a letter directly
from the insuring company itself, postmarked at home ofiice.

Then Arnold committed Marsh to paying Chris’s legal
expenses ("Would ten thousand be satisfactory, Chris?" "Ten
. . . oh, yeah, sure, so long as we don’t gotta go to trial over
anything." "Oh, I’m sure we won’t. We’re all
reasonable people here"). Roy was getting more bored, and
impatient too, I expect because he had other things elsewhere that he
wanted to deal with now that he didn’t need to worry about Chris’s
efforts on his wife’s behalf Marsh, however, had underestimated
Hanna.

Just as Chris was about to agree that Hanna would
trade her half of the house for a cash buy-out of $55,000, Hanna
spoke for the first time. "No."

Chris and Arnold stopped talking. Marsh’s head
snapped to attention.

Arnold said, "But Hanna, the fifty-five thousand
represents a fair share. It’s half of the hundred-fifty fair market
value minus the mortgage of forty."

"Yeah," said Chris, "see, it’s half
the equity in the house."

Hanna stared down at her hands, clamped together and
whitening on the table top. "No. The house is worth more, much
more than that."

Arnold said, "But Hanna, we have an appraisal."

Hanna said to Chris, “Do we have an appraisal?"

"Well, no, we don’t. But jeez, Hanna, this
here is from a reputable real estate firm."

Hanna said, "You ever have business with them
before?"

"Well, no . . . but--"

"Then I want an appraisal, too."

Marsh started to say something but Arnold said,
"Certainly, Hanna. If that’s what you want, I can easily
commission another firm to do one. I must say though—"

"No."

"No?"

Hanna motioned at me. "No, I want the other
appraisal from somebody Mr. Cuddy picks."

Each person turned to look at me, and I thought,
"That’s just swell."

Marsh said to me, "Just who the hell do you
think you are?"

Arnold said, "Hanna, I’m sure Mr. Cuddy
wouldn’t be familiar with—"

"I trust him." No missing the implication
there. Marsh glared at her and started to say, "lf you think . .
."

I said, "What harm could it do?"

Marsh whirled over to me and ripped off the aviator
glasses. His pupils contracted from tea saucers to pinpoints. “The
fuck asked you?"

I said, "Marsh, which hand do you write with?"

"What?"

"Which hand do you use when you write?"

Nobody else said anything. Marsh put his glasses back
on with his left hand.

I said, "My guess is you’re a lefty. That
right, Hanna?"

"Yes."

"The fuck you want to know that for?"

“
Because my dad always told me never to break the
hand a man writes with. Especially here, since that’d restrict your
making money and signing support checks and all."

Marsh started flexing his fingers, then caught
himself.

Arnold said wearily, "Could we all drop this
macho posturing for a while and return to business?"

Marsh let her save face for him, sagging back into
his chair and folding his arms. He looked up at the ceiling as he
said in a low voice to Hanna, "You really ought to take the
fifty-five, honey."

Hanna said, "I want the house. The house
itself."

Marsh bolted forward and I got ready. He yelled, "You
what?"

Hanna’s voice quavered but she pressed on. "That
is the home that Vickie knows. Where she has grown and has her
friends. This divorce thing is already hard for her. She should get
to stay there with her mother." Marsh slammed both his palms on
the table and rose halfway out of his chair. "You fucking greedy
bitch!"

Arnold said, "Roy, please-"

"The fuck you letting her get away with here?
That house is mine! Goddamn it, I built that house. Every fucking
board and nail came from money I earned, busted my ass for while she
sat around trying to learn English off the soap operas and
embarrassing me in front of my friends and contacts." He sank
back down and refolded his arms. "No fucking house, and no
fucking appraisal by Mr. Shitface here."

Arnold said, "Why don’t we move on to—"

"Move fucking on all you want. The house stays
with me, and the offer just dropped to fifty, and it’s not looking
too steady there, either."

Chris said, tentatively, gaugingly, "Hey, hey,
we can come back to the house, all right? Felicia, how about the
temporary support now?"

Hanna was crying Not making any more noise than
labored breathing requires, but both eyes were pinched closed and
tears were sliding down her cheeks and onto the table. Arnold pulled
open a drawer in the console behind her and lifted out a box of
Kleenex. Daintily setting the box next to Hanna, Arnold touched her
arm to suggest taking some.

Hanna stabbed at the box.
Felicia, pretending to read Chris’s handwritten financial
statement, said, "I’m afraid the support’s going to be a
tough one, Chris."

* * *

"I’m really sorry about this, Hanna, but I
already postponed this closing thing twice, and the bank attorney’ll
kill me if I’m not at the Registry by two-thirty."

Chris rolled up the window and pulled away, leaving
Hanna and me standing on a street comer in Salem. We were only a
short hop by cab from Chris’s house in Peabody, and I wanted Hanna
to get a chance to compose herself and have something to eat before
she saw her daughter. On the ride from Marblehead, it had been
decided that I’d give Hanna and Vickie a lift home. Chris had spent
most of the ride gloating over what a great deal he’d worked out on
everything but the house, which he thought Hanna should "rethink."
l was a less than objective observer at the conference, but in my
opinion Arnold had stolen Chris’s pants without undoing his belt.
The problem was it was Hanna’s, and Vickie’s, future that was on
the line.

We found a small French restaurant called the Lyceum.
With exposed-brickwalls and high windows and ceilings, it was a
pleasant and airy place to hold a postmortem. It being the end of the
lunch hour, a few words whispered by me to the hostess got us a nice
table away from the boisterous Friday hangers-on ordering one more
carafe of the house white. I was pretty sure that if things couldn’t
be settled, Hanna and Roy would be litigating their differences in
the Essex County Family and Probate Court a few blocks away.

I tried to make small talk for a while, but received
only nods and one-word replies. Finally Hanna said, "Thank you
for trying to help."

"You handled a difficult time well."

She nudged the remains of a large spinach salad
around with a fork. "What do you think I should do?"

"Change lawyers by sundown" was what I
thought, but it wasn’t my place to say it. "It seems to me
that the house, even without seeing it, is probably worth more than
the appraisal said. I also think you’re right to want to have it
all, especially for Vickie’s sake."