The Disposable Man Read online

  I’d been using the knife as a baton throughout this speech. Gail pointed to it and said gently, “Cut the cantaloupe, Joe.”

  I did as she asked, my confusion unabated. “This might make some sense if I thought it was leading anywhere. But even sniffing around the inn, we still don’t have enough for a warrant.”

  “You might with time.”

  I scooped the contents of the cantaloupe out into the compost bucket. “Maybe, but that misses the point. I was mugged in DC before I knew much of anything, and whoever ordered that couldn’t have known a ginkgo seed was going to suddenly appear to lead us to the inn. That’s too crazy.”

  Partly to my regret, that quieted her down. I sliced and prepared the rest of the melon in total silence.

  Finally, Gail checked her watch again, opened the griddle, and extracted four waffles, which she placed on two plates. Her voice missing its earlier strength, she asked, “So what’s the department do now?”

  I set out the mugs, syrup, and utensils and sat opposite her. “They have to find out if the brooch came from the store. Maybe, if the manager’s as much of a jerk as his boss thinks he is, that’ll be the end of it. But I doubt it. After that, it’ll be by the numbers, and you know what they are—paid suspension, while everyone sets out to prove at least possession of stolen property, and maybe grand theft. They have to come up with intent, knowledge that I knew it was hot, but the way things’re going, I’m sure they’ll be able to do that. Christ knows how.

  “If whoever called this in had phoned the PD instead of Derby, I might’ve had some slack to play with. But he obviously knows how things work. Derby’s hands are tied, and the whole department’s been cut out of the loop. This’ll have to go to external investigators.”

  Neither one of us had made a move to eat the breakfast we’d prepared. It sat there between us, looking increasingly unappetizing. Gail finally let out a deep sigh. “You want to blow this off?”

  I merely tilted my plate over the compost bucket and set it in the sink. I turned on the water to wash things up, but Gail placed her hand over mine to stop me. “Leave it. Let’s go to bed.”

  · · ·

  Two hours later, Gail had left for work, and I was sitting on the back deck, under the large, ancient maple tree that thrust up through its middle, my feet propped on the railing, a cup of cold coffee forgotten in my lap. I heard a car park in the driveway around the corner, but I didn’t move or call out. My mood was such that I didn’t much care who it was, or if they discovered my whereabouts. So much else was being done without my involvement, I figured this could take care of itself, too.

  It did. Within a minute of the engine’s dying, Sammie Martens appeared on the lawn below me. “I figured you’d be out here,” she said, climbing the wooden steps.

  I didn’t bother answering.

  She dragged another Adirondack chair next to mine and settled into it with a sigh. “How’re you holding up?”

  “Great,” I answered. “Want some coffee?”

  She shook her head, keeping silent.

  “Am I officially dead in the water yet?” I finally asked.

  “They established the brooch was theirs,” she admitted. “But I wouldn’t worry about it. It’s not like you haven’t been walking the straight and narrow for longer’n I’ve been alive.” She paused and added, “You have any ideas?”

  I thought of the gist of my long conversation with Gail, wondering how many times I’d have to repeat it with others. “Nope.”

  Blessedly, Sammie took me on faith. “We gotta dig deeper,” was all she said.

  “How’re things at the office?” I asked after a moment.

  “Confused. It’s too early yet. The younger crowd’s looking for the bogeyman. When they find him, they’ll settle down, either believing you’re dirty or you were set up. That’ll make ’em all feel better. The rest of us—the chief included—see this as a no-brainer. Some klutzy kind of frame.”

  I glanced at her profile, impressed at the total confidence in her voice. “How are you doing?”

  She gave me a tired smile. “Pissed off says it best right now.”

  I laughed and squeezed her forearm. “Thanks, Sam.”

  · · ·

  Later that morning, close to noon, it was Tony Brandt’s turn. I was on the couch, unsuccessfully trying to nap. This time the sound of a car engine sent me to the kitchen door in my stockinged feet, more eager now for company, even if—as I sensed was likely—he was the bearer of poor tidings.

  “Hey, Joe,” he said, passing by me into the house. “How’re you holding up?”

  I followed him in, pointing to the coffeemaker, to which he nodded. “That’s kind of up to you, right?”

  He accepted the cup I handed him, and sat heavily on one of the stools parked around the island. “I hope you weren’t thinking this would just fade into nothing. Derby’s involvement pretty much guaranteed that.”

  I heard the words with sadness. We were old friends, and had shared many a trench against politicians, bureaucrats, and adverse popular opinion. That was not the case now. Tony was here as my boss, to lower the boom—however gently and reluctantly.

  “So what’s the verdict?” I asked him.

  “Paid suspension for the moment. Derby says he’ll pass because of Gail—kick it over to the attorney general’s office. I haven’t heard who’s going to handle it there, yet. It’s up to them whether they use the state police, or have their investigators run the case.” He sighed heavily. “I can’t believe it… ” He turned and looked me straight in the eyes. “I know you left the office this morning ’cause you could see the writing on the wall, but do you have any idea what happened? Why it happened?”

  I hesitated before answering, hoping to suppress all the emotions that rose inside me like a flock of startled birds. I went to pour yet another cup of coffee for myself but didn’t. I crossed instead to the kitchen window and looked out onto the maple tree. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Tony, but given how things’re looking, would you answer that question if you were me?”

  He didn’t comment, but I’d made his job a little easier—officially at least. He quietly slid off his seat, placed the half-full mug on the counter, and walked toward the back door. “Better get a lawyer, Joe, and watch your back.”

  He paused on the threshold. “If you need any department resources—under the table… ”

  “I know,” I answered quickly, before he said any more that he shouldn’t. “Thanks.”

  · · ·

  Gail called that afternoon. “You heard about it going to the AG?”

  “Yeah. Tony dropped by.”

  She was suddenly concerned. “You tell him anything?”

  Gail hadn’t been a deputy state’s attorney for very long, but I was by now very much on her turf. She more than anyone knew the rules of engagement.

  “No, counselor,” I said with a short laugh. “I told him to go away—nicely.”

  “I’m sorry, Joe.” Her voice was soft, supportive. The irony was, she was in much the same position as Tony. She was just taking her time coming to grips with it.

  “Well,” she resumed, “they’ve made up their minds. It’s going to Fred Coffin. You know him?”

  “Not personally, but what little I’ve heard isn’t good.”

  “He was a guest lecturer when I was in law school. He’s not a nice man. Very arrogant, very ambitious.”

  I felt my stomach turning sour, only partly because of a wholly caffeine diet. “I take it he’s not going to let VSP do the investigation.”

  “No. He wants total control. His people should be down here pretty soon.”

  The AG’s office was a busy place, having the entire state as its jurisdiction. Cases submitted to it sometimes took weeks to reach the top of the pile. The fact that two investigators were possibly already on their way was not a good sign.

  Gail took advantage of my silence to ask, “Have you eaten yet?”

  “Yeah,” I lied.
“I had a little snack. I’m doing okay. You?”

  Her voice dropped a notch, implying an open office door. “It’s a little weird. I can’t figure out if it’s like I just lost a family member, or came down with a communicable disease. It’s about as cheerful as a funeral parlor. I can’t wait to come home.”

  “I can’t promise you much of an improvement.”

  “I love you, kiddo,” she said. “That’s always been a godsend to me.”

  I looked at the floor for a moment, at a loss for words. “I love you, too,” I finally answered, knowing the words were a pale reflection of what lay behind them.

  · · ·

  Kathleen Bartlett, a no-nonsense pragmatist and a friend from years back, was head of the Attorney General’s Criminal Division. She was also Fred Coffin’s boss. I called her immediately after my conversation with Gail.

  “This is Joe Gunther.”

  She didn’t answer at first, obviously choosing her words. “Not a good idea, Joe.”

  “Pretend I’m a law student, just after the basics.”

  “What kind of basics?”

  “Tell me about Fred Coffin.”

  “He’s good. He’s a climber.”

  “Where’s he aiming?”

  “Probably a judgeship. Probably more after that. He’s got to move fast, though. The governor likes tough prosecutors, but he’s ambitious, too. If he leaves office and some wimp takes over, Fred’s out of luck.”

  “Why was I given to Coffin?”

  For the first time, I sensed the concern Bartlett had been masking. “It wasn’t my call, Joe. The AG knew you and I were friends, and Fred lost no time making a play for it.”

  “You make it sound like I’m in trouble.”

  “You are, regardless of the facts. You trust the system here, and Fred’ll tear you apart, ’cause guilty or not, by the end, he’ll try to make sure you’re out of a job and that he’s smelling like a rose. I recommend you hire a barracuda of a lawyer, play dirty if you have to, and don’t call me till you’ve been certified one of the good guys again. Okay?”

  “Thanks, Kathy.”

  “Don’t thank me. Just cover your ass.”

  Chapter 10

  RICHARD LEVAY HAD BEEN A CRIMINAL LAWYER for the better part of two decades. In the compact, often interchangeable legal world of Vermont, he’d also done stints as a prosecutor, a judge, and a law professor, but criminal law remained his first love—and the profession to which he paid the most fealty. He came to my house within thirty minutes of my calling him.

  There is a perception about cops and lawyers that makes them as compatible as oil and water. It is often accurate, certainly for some. Willy Kunkle, for example, was not a man I sought out to hear nice things about lawyers. I, on the other hand, had become—very slowly—a little less quick to condemn. A necessary evil, like anything from prisons to warning labels, lawyers still represented a service that almost all of us, sooner or later, would end up using—some of us more reluctantly than others.

  Physically, Richard Levay was an unimpressive man. Small, slight, balding, and perpetually looking either startled or confused, he compensated for his appearance with an infectious enthusiasm and a focus bordering on magnetism. He made no excuses for defending the amoral, the degenerate, and the criminally aimless. In fact, he cheerfully admitted that most of his clients were crooks. But they had as much a right to a defense as the rest of us, he claimed, and while his goal had never been to set the guilty free, he felt honor-bound to make sure the prosecution stayed on its toes. In the past, that had often pissed me off. Right now, it was just what I was after.

  I invited him into the living room as the phone began ringing. I pointed to the couch and picked up the receiver.

  “Joe? It’s Katz.”

  “I’m not talking to you, Stanley.”

  “You shitting me? You’re in so deep, what harm could I do?”

  “Thanks for the vote.”

  “I’m the only hope you got. Think about it. Cop gets caught, people assume he’s dirty—no ifs, ands, or buts. The prosecution’s not going to listen to you, your lawyer’s going to tell you to shut up, and everyone else is buying tickets to ringside. You talk to me, you talk to the world, Joe. I’m the only way you get the truth out—”

  Richard had gently removed the phone from my hand. “Stanley?” he said politely. “This is Richard Levay. My client doesn’t want to speak with you.”

  I saw Richard nod his head several times and then add, “Anytime. You know how I like a good debate.”

  He hung up the phone, although I could still hear Katz’s voice. Richard resumed his seat. “Lesson number one: don’t talk to anyone.”

  I sat opposite him. “Thanks for coming so fast.”

  He waved that away. “Happy to help, and just so you know up front, I’m waiving my fee.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but he interrupted. “If I start losing my shirt, I’ll let you know. Till then, those are my terms.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Okay, in a nutshell, what happened?”

  I told him, virtually minute by minute, everything I did the night before. Occasionally he took notes; rarely he asked a question; but mostly he simply listened. At the end, he took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and said, “Not good. You have any idea how the brooch got in your pocket?”

  “A few theories I kicked around with Gail, the best one being that somebody slipped it to me when Willy and I pushed through the crowd to get into the store. But that doesn’t hold much water, and I can’t prove it anyhow. A better bet is probably the CIA, and I doubt they’ll be too forthcoming.”

  Levay looked at me as if I’d just admitted to seeing pink elephants. “The CIA?”

  I told him about Boris, my visit to DC, the mugging, the near-shooting on Western Avenue, and the off-chance that John Rarig was somehow connected to it all.

  Richard rose and walked over to the double glass doors, his hands behind his back. He rocked on his feet a few times and then faced me. “You think you could maybe not mention that little story again?”

  “Too wacko?”

  He tilted his head in acknowledgement.

  “May be a bit late for that,” I conceded. “Both the chief and my squad know about it. It’s an ongoing case, after all.”

  “But there’s no connection between it and last night’s smash-and-grab.”

  “Not yet.”

  “Let’s keep it that way,” he said decisively and returned to his chair. “The fewer complications, the better. Who have you spoken with since you left the PD this morning?”

  I thought a moment and suppressed an urge to lie. Kathy Bartlett had told me right off she didn’t want to be pulled into this and had spoken to me purely out of friendship. But my loyalty to her was matched by my trust in Richard. What we said here was privileged, and he would have no reason to mention Kathy later. On the other hand, he might need to know about that conversation in case someone else tried to blindside him with it.

  “I talked to Sammie Martens about what was going on with the squad, to Tony, who just dropped by to give me an update, and confidentially to Kathleen Bartlett to get some feedback on Fred Coffin.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “How confidentially?”

  “Very. Just the two of us, briefly, and we didn’t discuss the case. She said I was in up to my neck, but that was about it. She told me to hire a barracuda, and to break the rules if I had to.”

  “Ouch,” Richard said softly. “All that on an open line.”

  I was suddenly hit with a chilling notion. “You think my phone’s tapped?”

  His eyes narrowed slightly, and he hesitated before answering. “No. Actually, I was wondering about a big office like the AG’s, with all those lines, all those extensions. Wouldn’t be the first time someone picked up a phone and accidentally eavesdropped.” He leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees, looking more like a shrink than a lawyer. “You were thinking the CIA again?”<
br />
  I caught the tone of concern in his voice. “Not necessarily.”

  “Joe,” he said slowly, “I’ve got only one thing to worry about here, which is that trinket in your pocket. I think we might be able to deal with that—maybe even duck it. A jury, for example, might be made to love that theory about someone in the crowd planting the thing on you, regardless of what you think of it. But if the CIA and mugger-hit-men come into it, that’s going to introduce a whole other dimension, and I’ll be honest with you, I’d prefer that didn’t happen.”

  He began wandering around the room again, idly touching lampshades and photographs and the leaves of various plants with his fingertips. “And there’s something else. You mentioned Gail. Have you and she discussed all the permutations of this together?”

  I stared at him, feeling a sense of dread wash through me.

  “She’s a deputy state’s attorney, Joe,” Levay continued. “And you and she are not married. None of what you two talked about is protected, and I seriously doubt Fred Coffin will overlook that. She will be deposed.”

  I rubbed my forehead, that odd humming back in my brain. “I think we even touched on that—watching what we said. Maybe I’m making that up. But we went ahead anyhow.”

  “Through that deposition, the CIA angle will probably come out, along with your somewhat unfortunate overreaction on Western Avenue. Witnesses to that should have some pretty colorful descriptions.”

  I didn’t say a word.

  “Did you tell Gail you were going to call Bartlett?” he asked.

  “No,” I answered with relief. “That was spontaneous. I only thought of it after Gail and I talked on the phone this afternoon.”

  “Good. At least he can’t reach Kathy that way.” He smiled. “Well, don’t worry about it. I can probably stop the CIA from being mentioned in court. And, if not—given the right jury—we’ll just make the CIA look like the KGB. Who knows? This is a business for the nimble-footed. We’ll have to be better at it than he is.”