An Old Man's Game

by Andy Weinberger

  “So tell me, what did you take away from Rabbi Ezra’s last few sermons?” I ask Esther very quietly when I catch her eye. “Pretty wild, huh?”

  “You know, young man, my late husband taught me a long time ago that politics was a personal matter.”

  “Oh c’mon now. That’s the only thing we Jews ever talk about, don’t you think? It’s all politics.”

  “Well,” she says, squinching her mouth into a tight smile. She’s trying her best to be tolerant. I can’t tell you how annoying that is. “He was an explorer, our rabbi. It’s true, he was always asking us to go beyond our old comfortable form of Judaism. That’s how you learn.”

  “So you agreed with what he said about the Jews and Egypt? That we were never there to begin with? That didn’t bother you?”

  “Me? No. I’m open to all sorts of ideas. Some other people, though, not so much. There was grumbling at the oneg afterwards, let me tell you.”

  “Those were the very same people who objected to the cantor playing guitar, if you’ll remember,” Lillian leans over and whispers. “Anything new they hate.”

  That’s where it ends then, partly because the rabbi is about to launch into his own sermon, and partly because the whole room has gone silent and a few sharp-eyed women two rows in front are turning their heads and glaring at us.

  I couldn’t get much out of Esther or Lillian. An hour later, we’re in the reception room standing around under bright lights at a long narrow table sipping from little paper cups filled with Israeli wine and nibbling on challah. I notice Dov Boorstein and Alan Ross, the two doughnut kings, over in a corner. I wave to them gently, but they look right past me. Alan has his hand on Dov’s elbow. It’s nothing too overt, just a simple gesture, but all at once it’s clear to me that they’re gay, and I wonder why I didn’t pick up on that before, when we talked at their office. You’re getting old, Parisman, says a nasty voice in my head. You’re really starting to lose it. That’s when I hear the conversation I’ve been searching for all evening long.

  The adamant one is named Maury. He’s a short, balding guy with a solid paunch and stubby fingers that jab at the air whenever he makes a point, which is often. There’s an unmistakable urban sound to his voice, New York or Philadelphia maybe, and when he opens his mouth and lifts his arms, it’s like he’s about to start conducting a symphony. “I’m not convinced,” he tells his friend, a younger fellow in a pale blue sweater and glasses. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I liked Ezra as a person. You have to like him. You understand what I mean? He was a beautiful human being. But when it comes to his take on life, the whole Exodus thing, well, what can I say? He was wrong. Just. Plain. Wrong.”

  “You say that. But what I’d like to know is, how do you argue with archaeology?” his friend counters. “It’s right there in the ground. The science is real. He had the facts. You don’t believe in facts, Maury?”

  “It’s more than facts,” Maury says. He takes a second—or maybe a third—hunk of challah, puts a spoonful of honey on it and stuffs the concoction into his mouth. “It’s drama. It’s literature. It’s sequence. Things need to happen a certain way.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” his friend says.

  “Okay, listen. If there’s no Exodus, there’s no wandering in the desert, right? If there’s no wandering in the desert, there’s no coming to Mount Sinai.”

  “So?”

  “So, Sinai counts. God needs to speak to Moses from on high. That’s how God works. And Moses needs a sacred place to go. It’s the Ten Commandments, for crying out loud.” Triumphant, he shoots his finger into the air.

  “Now you’re assuming there was a real Moses. I wouldn’t be so bold.”

  “No,” Maury says. “I’m not assuming. Not at all. My point is that, even if he didn’t exist, we’d have to invent him.”

  “Also Mount Sinai.”

  “A sacred place, yes.”

  “Because?”

  Maury shakes his head, exasperated. “Tell me, where would you want this great event to happen? In a parking lot?”

  His friend sets down his empty paper cup on the table, then picks it up again and drops it conscientiously into a nearby receptacle. “You know something? None of the goyim I work with at the office believe in the immaculate conception. Not one. They’re smart. They know better. But they still call themselves Christians. So what’s the problem, Maury? Why can’t you do the same with our own little fairy tale?”

  Saturday comes, and soon after sunrise it’s warm and smoggy. From our ninth-floor window a police helicopter is making loud, lazy, menacing circles directly overhead. It’s close, too close, too loud and too fast, and suddenly something shoves me through a tiny peephole and I’m in Vietnam. The fluttering noise from the engine stops my heart. I can’t think, or even if I can, each black thought I have slams obliquely into the next. Men are falling all around me and I’m terrified, a pinball machine, all lit up, out of control. I blink three times in a row; my whole body shakes. They’re firing mortars at us from the next ridge. Get down, down, get the fuck down! Then, just like that, it’s over. I glance around the kitchen, embarrassed, lean my damp hands flat against the cool marble countertop. Wait. Wait. Don’t move a muscle. Not until the world decides at last to relent. It will happen. What was normal before will be normal again. The coffee is brewing. The clock on the wall is ticking. I see Loretta at the end of the hall, still standing in her nightclothes, doing slow-motion calisthenics. I take a long, deep, anguished breath. There.

  Half an hour later, I pick up the phone, call Omar, tell him I’ve got a lunch date with Malloy, tell him he can relax, kick back for the rest of the weekend. I figure this news will make him happy. I’m wrong. Even though he doesn’t relish walking around with a gun in his pants, it’s easy money so far, meaning he hasn’t had to do anything physical besides watch me jimmy my way into a building.

  “You sure you’ll be okay?”

  “Absolutely. I’ll call you next week.”

  “You want the gun back?”

  “No, it’s fine. You keep it. But don’t use it.”

  I take Highland all the way up to Hollywood Boulevard, turn right and try, without success, to find a parking spot on Cherokee. You used to be able to, but no more. I circle the block. Still nothing. Now, if you want to park anywhere decent you need a valet, that’s all there is to it, some energetic young man in a white shirt and black vest who’ll gladly hide your car, God only knows where. Not that it matters, old sport. You just put it all on the Shir Emet tab. That’s how they do things in this modern age.

  At a quarter past one, I meet Bill Malloy at Musso & Frank. It’s a classic chophouse I haven’t been back to since my earliest days in the detection business, but I’m very glad he suggested it. Brings back some bittersweet memories. I can still see the client from one of those cases, a fancy dresser named Aldo something. He ran a couple of Cadillac dealerships in Pasadena and Glendale. A sincere man really, soft hands and big watery eyes. The most sincere car salesman I ever met. Wanted me to spy on his wife. She was disappearing at odd hours, and he was scared to death she might be cheating on him. Turned out she wasn’t. She was just coming to Musso’s in the afternoon and sitting all alone at the bar. She was ordering gin martinis, one after another. I watched her. She always drank quietly and deliberately. Very ladylike. Maybe she was looking for oblivion. Or maybe it was worse than that. Maybe she wanted to die. But there was nobody else. Only Aldo, and she couldn’t bear to be around him. When I finally told him that, you know what he did? He cried.

  Musso’s has been around since 1919. It’s got cushy leather booths and obsequious waiters who stroll around in red uniforms and bow ties. They carry towels on their forearms to mop up any mess you make, and they still serve things like goulash with butter noodles. How can you lose?

  Malloy orders spaghetti and meatballs, and I go for the steak and fries. Once the waiter has disappeared, he sips his ice water for a moment. “Thanks for th
e tip about Jonah Siegel,” he says. “I guess I owe you one. We probably should have had him on our radar earlier, but you know, it didn’t seem like murder. Not at first.”

  “Forget it,” I say. “We’re in this together.”

  “Yeah, well, we haven’t found him yet, but we will.”

  “Any idea where he went?”

  “He bought a train ticket to Martinez, it looks like, and he’s from the Bay Area originally. Also, he doesn’t know how to drive, so somebody must have picked him up at the station.”

  “Parents?”

  Malloy nods. “That’s the theory. His parents still live there in San Rafael, but they swear they haven’t seen him in months. I think they’re lying. My guess is he’s in the neighborhood. We’ve got the locals watching the house. Also mom and dad. Something will break.”

  Our salads arrive. And suddenly, there’s a plate of great sourdough bread and a ramekin of butter on our white linen tablecloth. I feel loved. The waiter removes some plates that were there originally and replaces them with other plates. I don’t know why they do this, but still, it’s touching.

  “Oh, yeah, and you’ll never guess what we found inside his apartment.”

  “Don’t keep me in suspense,” I say.

  “There was a crowbar in the bottom drawer of his dresser,” he says, tucking into his salad. “Blood all over it.”

  “No kidding.”

  Now that he’s gotten past the apology, he seems in a better mood. “We’re still checking that out, but it looks like the blood is consistent with Dr. Ewing’s.” He takes a small slice of bread and covers it gently with butter. “You really should try this bread, Amos.”

  “I think I will.”

  He hands me the plate and I choose a nice crusty end piece. “Oh, and by the way, you need to be a whole lot more careful the next time you break into someone’s house.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Amos, have you lost every single one of your marbles? You knew damn well we’d dust the place. Your prints were everywhere. On the light switch. On the crowbar. On the kitchen counter. Also, we came across another person’s—” he pulls out a slip of paper from his jacket, puts on his reading glasses. “You wouldn’t happen to know a fellow named Omar Jesus Villasenor?”

  I hold up my hands. Now it’s my turn to act contrite. “Okay, okay, you win. We went in. We looked around, but we didn’t take anything, I swear. And Omar’s my partner in crime. I only brought him along to protect me. He’s had a rough life, Bill. Please leave him alone.”

  Malloy sighs. “We know all about Mr. Omar,” he says. Now there’s a small grin on his face. “Didn’t he used to be a wrestler?”

  We’re sipping coffee and pondering the dessert menu when Malloy admits that he’s been stymied in getting an autopsy of the rabbi. “The family is refusing,” he says. “They don’t care how he died. They just want to move on.”

  “But don’t you have compelling evidence? The fact that his doctor was also murdered? And now with the crowbar in Jonah Siegel’s apartment? You think a judge is going to just ignore that?”

  “We don’t have the definitive testing work done yet. But even if we did, that just connects him with Dr. Ewing. It still doesn’t really place him at Canter’s. We have no good witnesses.”

  “Joey Marcus? Couldn’t he identify him?”

  “We talked with Marcus. Even showed him lots of pictures. He said he didn’t pay much attention. Said all those yeshiva kids look alike to him. Actually, he said he reminded him of Trotsky. Fat lot of good that does.”

  “So you’re nowhere, then.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say nowhere. Not exactly. We’ve made some progress.”

  “In what way?”

  “Well, Dora Ewing came out of Stanford with some pretty heavy debt, which isn’t so peculiar. Doctors make good money, of course; I don’t feel so sorry for them. Still, it can take a long time—years—to work off that kinda nut.” He leans forward and his voice drops almost to a whisper. “But here’s the thing. Ever since last August she’s been paying it down in a great big hurry. I had some accounting people look at her checkbook, and guess what? It didn’t make sense. What goes in? You know, it’s always supposed to equal what goes out. Not with this lady. At first they were all scratching their heads.”

  “Huh! So maybe she was moonlighting somewhere.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Who knows? Doctors do all kinds of things on the side. Did you check out what kinds of prescriptions she was writing?”

  He rolls his eyes. “Forget about it. You don’t go to Stanford to become a drug dealer.”

  “Okay. Okay, then maybe some folks were paying her cash under the table. Maybe that’s why there was no file on the rabbi.”

  “You’ve got a very lively imagination, Amos. I’ll give you that. But the facts turn out to be ever so much plainer.”

  “What facts, for instance?”

  “For instance, when you subtract the food and the trash and the electric bill from everything else you have to pay for in life, what’s left?”

  “I dunno, rent?”

  “Precisely. And she seemed to be living rent-free at her apartment down on Doheny. I mean, we’re talking zero.”

  “Really. Loretta and I looked at places on Doheny once upon a time. Too rich for our blood, even then. Probably even more now.”

  “Ain’t that the truth.”

  “A doctor who lives rent-free. Now how’s that happen?”

  He lowers his knife and fork. “It happens when your landlord’s name is Howard Rothbart, that’s how it happens.”

  We skip dessert, and Bill grabs the check as he gets up to leave. “This one’s on me, Amos. Call it a down payment on the crowbar.”

  “Thanks,” I say. “And I’ll keep on telling you whatever I come up with, Bill. You know that.”

  “Yeah,” he says, and turns to go. “I’m counting on it. Oh, I almost forgot to mention. We couldn’t touch the rabbi, but we did do an autopsy on Dr. Ewing.”

  “Why? I thought our guy, Jonah, busted her with a crowbar.”

  “Someone did do that, yes.”

  “So what else is there to learn?”

  “We did it because we could, if you really want to know. Because the judge okayed it. And I’m glad we did. Sure, we knew all along how she died, we just didn’t have any idea she was pregnant.”

  Chapter 12

  I’M IN MY HONDA and headed west on Melrose. The sun is shining. The beautiful people are wandering around hand in hand. They’re wearing sunglasses and tight jeans and they’re all tanned, and they all seem to know where they’re going. Everyone but me. Me, my head is spinning. Crazy ideas are caroming around like bats in a cave. Part of me feels betrayed. Another part feels stupid, mortified. Maybe Malloy was right all along. Maybe I’m just too damn rusty. Maybe this isn’t an old man’s game. I should have known Howie Rothbart had a bigger part in this than he let on. Still, he hired me. Why would he do that? What was he thinking?

  I take a left at Crescent Heights and make my way slowly to Wilshire. From there, it’s just a short hop to the towering opulence of Westwood. It’s Saturday. Of course he might not be working. He might be out fooling around on the golf course or holding some meeting at the temple. He might even be saying his weekly prayers, but my gut tells me no. Not Howie. Howie Rothbart will be working on a Saturday afternoon. And he won’t be expecting me either, which is fine; I like it like that.

  His law office is way up on the twelfth floor. A big, glassy, postmodern space with lavender-tinted windows and spectacular views. As you step out of the elevator, a silent serenity wafts over you. It’s like you’re walking on the surface of the moon. There is no apparent gravity here, no pain, no restraint. On a clear day, you can probably see all the way to Catalina.

  “Is Mr. Rothbart in?” I ask his secretary as she peers up from her computer screen. It’s a big office with several vacant desks. She’s young and athletic-looking, not much more th
an twenty-five. Her blond hair falls past her shoulders, and every few seconds she feels compelled to touch it or brush it out of her eyes. There are three other desks, but she’s the only one on duty, and something tells me she’d much rather be hiking around Griffith Park with her boyfriend.

  “Yes, he is. Did you have an appointment?”

  “No. No appointment. But just tell him Amos Parisman is here. He’ll want to talk with me.”

  “Regarding?”

  Then all at once I see him ten feet away, pacing around his office through the thick pale glass. “Never mind,” I say. “You don’t have to page him. This won’t take long.” I push past her and head straight for Howie’s door.

  “Wait. You can’t just—”

  But I’m already turning the handle, opening the door. “Hey, Howie? Got a minute?”

  “I’m so sorry, Mr. Rothbart,” says blondie, right behind me. “He just sailed on by me before I could—”

  “It’s okay, Gwendolyn. We’re old friends. Come in, Amos. Please, have yourself a seat.” He closes the door and settles down behind his desk. Like any good attorney, he’s used to thinking on his feet. Nothing in his expression shows surprise. “Funny, I was hoping I’d see you, actually,” he says. He directs me to the chair opposite his desk. “Do you have any good news? Have we caught our killer?”

  “These things take time, Howie. You know how it is. In general, the law moves like a glacier.”

  “Well, that’s certainly how we lawyers make money, isn’t it?” he replies, smiling. “Slow everything down. Crank out those billable hours.” He drums his fingertips lightly on the desk. “Still, the Board is paying you for something, right? And that can’t go on forever. So tell me, what do we know?”