Marked Man (37 page)

Due to the funeral,
I was late for Beth’s closing, obviously later than I thought, because when I charged into our conference room, expecting to see the sellers and the real-estate agents, the title guy with his stamps and stacks, all I saw was Beth, sitting alone among a welter of paper.

“Did I miss it all?” I said.

“You didn’t miss much,” said Beth.

“How’d it go?”

“It didn’t,” said Beth. “I backed out.”

“Excuse me?”

“I backed out. I didn’t buy. I remain unencumbered, unmortgaged, utterly homeless.”

“You decided you didn’t like the house after all?”

“No, I loved it, really. It was perfect for me.”

I sat down next to her, looked into her eyes. I thought she’d be upset or distraught or something, but she seemed happy, almost giddy. “Then why, Beth?”

“Do you think people can really change?”

“I don’t know. Charlie gave up a boatload of cash to do the right thing with the painting, even though it didn’t quite work out. That seems like a real change for him. But then again Theresa Wellman lapsed right back, didn’t she?”

“I was devastated when I found her that night, drunk and high, totally oblivious to the fact that her daughter was in the next room. I was so wrong to take her case.”

“You saw a need in her and tried to fill it.”

“I saw a need in myself and tried to use her to fill it. But when I saw her lolling and insensible, for the first time in a long time I saw my life clearly.”

“What did you see?”

“I’ve been miserable to be with for the last couple of years, haven’t I?”

“A little.”

“More than a little. I’ve been whiny and dissatisfied and paralyzed, everything I never wanted to be. And buying a house with all my little plans to fill the little rooms would only make it worse. I love being your partner, Victor, but the firm has become something I never expected it to be. I think I need a break.”

“Take a few weeks.”

“I need more than that.”

“I’ll stop doing criminal law.”

“But you love criminal law, and you’ve become great at it. You’ve found your place, I’m still looking for mine.”

“We’ll find it together.”

“I don’t think so. How long have I been talking about traveling the world? Khartoum. Cambodia. Kathmandu.”

“I thought it was just talk.”

“It was, but not anymore. I’ve always wanted to be the kind of woman who can find herself in Kathmandu. That’s not what I am now, that’s not what the house could ever change me into. But that’s exactly what I’ll be the moment I set foot in Nepal.”

“So you’re really going?”

“I can’t wait.”

“When will you come back?”

“When the money runs out, I suppose.”

“I got a fee out of the Kalakos case. Give me a little time and I’ll get you your share.”

“A little time? What, is the check postdated?”

“Well, it wasn’t quite a check. We were working the barter system.”

“Victor.”

“Don’t worry, I know a guy who knows a guy who can take care of it for me. I think it’s worth a lot.”

“Keep it, all of it, I have enough for right now. The thing I feel most terrible about is leaving you in the lurch. Use my share to keep the firm going.”

“Derringer and Carl.”

“You’ll have to take my name off the letterhead.”

“Never. You’ll be our foreign office.”

“It’s a shame, really, because I did love that house.”

“It had ghosts. Sheila told me. There was a suicide that haunted the place.”

“She didn’t tell me.”

“She didn’t want to spook you.”

“But I like ghosts.”

We sat there for a moment, quiet, together and apart, thinking about our diverging futures. Then I started laughing.

“What?” she said.

“I’m imagining Sheila’s expression when you told her you were backing out of the deal.”

“She wasn’t happy.”

“Oh, I bet not. I can just see her throttling your neck.”

“It wasn’t that bad. She actually said she understood. Said she was thinking about backing out of a deal of her own.”

I turned to Beth, thought that one out, started laughing again.

And that, right there, was how I became a sole practitioner. I’d been afraid of becoming just that for a long time now, left alone to my own pale devices, but when the news finally hit, it didn’t feel so bad. I had an office, a career, a pile of swag in my desk drawer that I didn’t have to share with anyone. I would miss Beth, absolutely, but I figured the cash would go a long way to assuage my bruised feelings.

Though not as long a way as I had hoped.

“F
AKE,” SAID
Brendan LaRouche in his small third-floor office above Jewelers’ Row as he pawed through the pile of jewels and chains I had dumped on his desk. “Fake, fake, fake.”

“What are you saying?”

“What do you think I’m saying, Victor? They are all fakes, and not very good fakes at that. Didn’t you examine them closely?”

“I don’t know enough to know what to look for.”

“The chains are too heavy for gold. Lead, most likely, plated in some cheap brass. The diamonds are glass. No sparkle, no depth. I don’t even need a loupe to tell. And the color, the rubies and sapphires, bad imitations. With the technology now, you can fake color so that only the most sophisticated gemologists can tell the real from the manufactured, but we don’t need a gemologist for these. Fake, fake, fake, fake.”

“What are they worth?”

“Trinkets like these are sold by the pound.”

“Yikes.”

“You were maybe expecting better news?”

“I was hoping.”

“From where did you ever receive such junk?”

“From a Greek shark,” I said, “with teeth like razors.”

“Perhaps you should introduce me. I like dealing with ruthless businessmen.”

“Brendan, even as hard as you are, this woman is out of your league.”

And so that was that, the payment for my adventures with Charlie the Greek turned out to be no more valuable, pound for pound, than a chunk of prime chuck. And with Beth readying to hop a plane east and my boondoggle turned to ash, I was left alone in my dingy little office, with the rent to pay and the utilities to pay and my secretary’s salary to pay and the bar fees to pay and the copier lease to pay, left alone with nothing but a tattoo on my chest and my prospects dimming by the minute. I figured I had enough for a month, two at the most, before I had to fold the tent. Failure was staring me in the face when a tall, lugubrious man with a black suit and black fedora stepped into my office.

“I am ashamed to admit, Mr. Carl, that I am in need of a lawyer,” said the man. He had introduced himself as Samuel Beauregard.

I asked him what kind of trouble he had found.

“In the course of my travels, I have been involved in certain activities in this city that have drawn the attention of the authorities.”

I asked him what kind of activities.

“I’d rather not specify,” said Beauregard, “but they are unsavory to say the least. Quite enjoyable to a man of my temperament, but unsavory.”

I said that I bet they were.

“What I need,” said Beauregard, “is to have an attorney in this very city I can consult with. Someone who knows the rules, who knows the players, someone I can call on at a moment’s notice, anytime, day or night, to deal with my situation should the need arise.”

I asked if he wanted me to make a recommendation.

“Oh, no, Mr. Carl. I want you. From what I hear, you are the one. No, sir, I have done my research and have chosen you for this rather delicate assignment.”

I told him I was flattered.

“And of course, Mr. Carl, in order to have you on board, and at my beck and my call, should the need arise, I would be willing to pay a generous retainer.” Beauregard reached into his long black jacket, pulled out a check. “I hope this is sufficient.”

I took the check, examined it, almost swallowed my tongue.

It didn’t require much brainpower to realize what was happening here. Lavender Hill, that strangely honorable man, was keeping his part of a bargain I had never agreed to. This was my finder’s fee for the Rembrandt, which he had swiped from Ralphie Meat’s house and sold to his private collector. To accept such an improper fee for an illegal transaction would violate every precept of the bar association, along with a myriad of sections contained in the Penal Code of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Beth had been the conscience of our firm, and I knew what she would have done, but Beth was no longer here to advise. It was up to me, on my own, to make the decisions now.

This whole story of Charlie and Chantal and Monica and my tattoo was about change. After my visit to Hollywood, I thought I knew what kind of man I wanted to change into. I thought I would step up and turn ruthless, morph into a Sammy Glick as I grabbed hold of my success. But that hadn’t worked out, not for Teddy Pravitz or Hugo Farr,
not for Charlie or Joey or Ralphie Meat. Not even for my grandmother, Gilda. And not for me. The lesson, I suppose, is that change may be possible, but with a dangerous caveat: How you change goes a long way to determine what you change into.

So maybe I should find a different route. Maybe I should follow Charlie’s lead and become a simpler, more trustworthy person. Maybe I should become a man of admirable virtues. I liked the way that sounded. A man of admirable virtues. I could be that. I could. Really. Why not? And who knew, it might change my life in ways I never imagined. Maybe good flows from good, maybe karma rules. Change for the better, that was the ticket. While Samuel Beauregard waited for my response, I examined the check one more time.

Did I cash it?

You tell me.

New York Times
bestselling author
W
ILLIAM
L
ASHNER
is a graduate of New York University School of Law and the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He is the author of five previous Victor Carl novels that have been translated into more than a dozen languages. He lives with his family outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

www.williamlashner.com

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