The Gate House

by Nelson DeMille

  I responded, “I know that. But this guy is young. He’s not his father.” I added, “I think he’s a hothead.” I didn’t tell him that I’d said a few things that made Anthony very angry, hoping he’d make an actual, quotable threat. And neither did I tell Detective Nastasi that I’d had a minor meltdown and slashed a painting in Anthony Bellarosa’s office—that was irrelevant except to Anthony, who would have a shit fit when he discovered it. I did tell Nastasi, however, “The threat may or may not be real, but it was made, so that in itself could be considered harassment and threatening under the law.”

  “Right. I got that, Counselor.” He added, “Let’s see what he says when I talk to him.”

  “All right. So, what’s next?”

  Detective Nastasi hit the print button and said, “You read this and sign it.” As the pages printed out, he further informed us, “This will be part of the case report. We take threats seriously, and we will follow up with the party named. Meanwhile, I advise you both to avoid all contact with this man.”

  “Goes without saying.”

  “Right. But I have to say it.” He added, “I’d advise you also to take some normal precautions, but I’ll leave that to you to decide what kind of precautions.” He looked at us and said, “After I speak to him, I’ll get back to you and advise you further.”

  I asked, “When will you speak to him?”

  “Very soon.”

  My statement was hot out of the printer, and Detective Nastasi handed it to me and said, “Look it over, then if everything is in order, I’d like you to sign it.”

  I scanned the pages, then took my pen and signed where my name was printed.

  Detective Nastasi gave each of us his card and said, “Call me if you think of anything else, or if you see him around, or if you see anything that arouses your suspicion.” He added, “Or call 9-1-1.”

  I nodded and asked him, “Do you intend to put him under surveillance?”

  He replied, “I’ll take that up with my supervisors after we speak to Bellarosa.”

  That seemed to be about it for now, so Detective Nastasi walked us back through the squad room and up the stairs and into the big reception room. I said to him, “Thank you for your time and your attention to this matter.”

  He didn’t reply to that, but said to us, “If you intend to leave the area for any reason, please let us know.” Then he assured us, “You did the right thing by coming in.”

  We shook hands, and Susan and I left the station house and walked toward the car. I said to her, “We did do the right thing, and this is going to be all right.”

  She asked me, “Can we change the subject now?”

  “Sure. What would you like to talk about?”

  “Anything.”

  We got in the car and I headed home. We drove in silence awhile, then Susan said, “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Do you care about me, or my money?”

  “Your money.”

  She pointed out, “But you were worried about me even before you proposed to me.”

  Did I propose? Anyway, I replied, “I’ve always cared about you, Susan, even when I wanted to break your neck.”

  “That’s very sweet.” She thought a moment, then said, “This is all my fault.”

  I assured her, “It is. But it’s our problem.”

  She thought about that, then said, “I didn’t know he threatened you.”

  I didn’t respond.

  She asked me, “What did you say to him that made him say that to you?”

  I told him that his father was going to abandon his whole family for Susan Sutter, and it felt good saying it.

  “John? What did you say to him?”

  “I just turned down his job offer without showing the proper respect.”

  “That hardly warrants the kind of threat he made.”

  I changed the subject and said, “I think we should take a vacation right after Ethel’s funeral.”

  “I’ll think about it.” She said, “Meanwhile, it’s a beautiful day, and I need a break, so why don’t we drive out to the Hamptons for the day?”

  If she meant a mental health break, we’d be gone a few months, but I replied, “Good idea. We’ll stop and get our bathing suits.”

  “There’s that beach in Southampton where we don’t need bathing suits.”

  “Okay.” I made a course correction, and within ten minutes we were on the Long Island Expressway heading east to the Hamptons for a skinny-dip in the ocean.

  I had once owned a summer house in East Hampton, and so had my parents, and the Sutter family would spend as much of the summer as possible out east. When my children were young, and when I was still on speaking terms with my parents, those had been magical, barefoot summers, filled with awe and wonder for the kids, and with peace and love for Susan and me.

  I had sold the house because of my tax problems, and I hadn’t been back to the Hamptons in the last decade, so I was looking forward to spending the day out east, and not thinking about this morning, or tomorrow.

  Susan said, “This will be like old times.”

  “Even better.”

  “And the best is yet to come.”

  “It is.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  There are no officially sanctioned nude beaches in the Hamptons, but we found the secluded ocean beach in Southampton that was unofficially clothes-optional.

  I parked the car in the small windswept lot and we got out. The beach was nearly deserted on this Monday in early June, but there were two couples in the water, and when the surf ran out, we confirmed that they were skinny-dippers.

  Susan and I ran down to the wide, white-sand beach, shucked our clothes, and dove in the chilly water. Susan exclaimed, “Holy shit.”

  It was a bit cool, but we stayed in for about half an hour, and before hypothermia set in, we ran back to the beach. As we pulled on our clothes over our wet bodies, Susan said, “I remember the first time we did this together, when we were dating.” She reminded me, “I’d never done this before, and I thought you were crazy.”

  “Crazy in love.” In fact, there were a lot of things that Susan Stanhope hadn’t done before she met me, and maybe I was attracted to that sheltered rich girl who was gamely going along with my silly antics. I was trying to impress her, of course, and she was trying to show me she was just like everyone else. Eventually we both started being ourselves, and it was a relief to discover that we still liked each other.

  We jogged back to the car and drove into the formerly quaint, now boutiquified village of Southampton, and had a late lunch at one of our old haunts, a pub called the Drivers Seat. At Susan’s strong suggestion, I ordered a grilled chicken salad and sparkling water, but when I got up to go to the men’s room, I changed it to a bacon cheeseburger with fries and a beer. Susan apparently remembered this trick, and when she went to the ladies’ room, she reinstated the original order. A good friend once said to me, “Never date or remarry your ex-wife.” Now I get it.

  After our salads, we took a walk along Job’s Lane, which, according to a marker, was laid out in 1664, and was now filled with trendy shops, restaurants, and adventurous settlers from Manhattan Island.

  Susan said, “Let’s buy you some clothes.”

  “I have some clothes.”

  “Come on, John. Just a few shirts.”

  So we stopped in a few shops and bought a few dress shirts, and a few sports shirts, a few ties, and a few jeans, and a few other things I didn’t know I needed. She bought a few things for herself as well.

  We decided to stay overnight, so we also bought workout clothes and bathing suits, and Susan called Gurney’s Inn, out near Montauk Point, which has spa facilities, and she booked a room with an ocean view. We then drove east, through the remaining villages of the Hamptons, including East Hampton, where we’d once had our summer house, and I asked her, “Do you want to drive past our old house?”

  She shook her head and replied,
“Too sad.” She reminded me, “The children really loved that house, and loved being here.” Then she brightened and said, “Let’s buy it back.”

  I replied, “You can’t buy back all your old houses.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, money, for one thing.”

  She informed me, “I don’t want to sound crass, John, but someday I’ll inherit my share of a hundred million dollars.”

  That was the first time I’d ever heard what the Stanhopes were actually worth, and I almost drove off the road. I mean, the Stanhope fortune, when it was mentioned at all, was always preceded by the adjectives “diminished” or “dwindling,” which made me feel sorry for William and Charlotte. Not really, but I always pegged their net worth at about ten or maybe twenty million, so this number came as a surprise. Now I was really in love. Just kidding.

  Anyway, I knew that Edward and Carolyn, the only grandchildren, would be in William’s will, and then there was Susan’s brother, Peter, the Lotus Eater, and, of course, Charlotte, if she survived William. Charlotte, however, was not a Stanhope, so in the world of old money, the bulk of the Stanhope estate would bypass her—who, in any case, had her own family money—and through some clever tax and estate planning, and complicated trusts, most of the Stanhope fortune would pass to William’s lineal descendents. That was how William got it from Augustus, and how Augustus got it from Cyrus.

  So some quick math would reveal that Susan Stanhope should pop a bottle of champagne at William’s funeral.

  Unless, of course, she married me, so I reminded her, “Your share may be closer to zero.”

  She had no reply to that, but I could tell reality was setting in.

  We continued on, past the villages and through a stretch of desolate dunes. Farther on was the Montauk Point Lighthouse, on the easternmost tip of Long Island. The last time I’d seen the lighthouse, it was from the water, ten years ago, when I’d rounded the point on my sail to Hilton Head, and I’ve wondered about a million times what would have happened if I’d actually stopped there and seen her.

  I still don’t think either of us would have been ready for a reconciliation, but if we’d spoken, I don’t believe I would have stayed away ten years. But who knows?

  Before we reached the point, Gurney’s Inn came up on the ocean side of the road, and I pulled in and parked at reception.

  We checked into the ocean-view room, then we changed into our newly purchased workout clothes and spent a few hours using the spa and exercise facilities.

  Susan had scheduled a beauty treatment of some sort, so I took the opportunity to go back to our room, and I called the general number of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Manhattan.

  After a bit of a bureaucratic runaround, I got someone in the Organized Crime Task Force, and said to him, “My name is John Sutter, and I am looking for Special Agent Felix Mancuso.”

  “And what is this in reference to, sir?”

  I replied, “He handled a case that I was involved in ten years ago. I would like to speak to him about a new development, if he’s there, please.”

  “And he’ll know what this is about?”

  “He will.”

  “All right. I can’t confirm that he’s here, sir, but if you leave your contact information, I will have him, or someone, get back to you.”

  “Fine.” I gave him the number of Gurney’s Inn, which I said would be good until morning, then I gave him the number of the guest cottage as my home phone.

  He asked, “Is there a cell number we can reach you at?”

  I replied, “I don’t have a cell phone.”

  He didn’t respond for a second, and I thought I’d committed some sort of criminal offense, so I explained, “I’ve just transferred here from London.” I added, “I’ll have one soon.”

  “All right, so someone can leave you a message at these numbers?”

  “Correct.” I added, “Please tell Special Agent Mancuso that it’s important.”

  “Will do.”

  I hung up and went back to the spa for our scheduled couples’ massage.

  Susan had booked a masseuse for herself, a tiny East Asian lady, and a masseur for me, who may have once been convicted of torture.

  As we were lying side by side on the tables, Susan said to me, “I went to the business office and e-mailed the children and my parents to update them on Ethel’s condition, and told them they should think about getting here soon.”

  “Did you tell your parents our good news?”

  “No, and in my e-mail to the children, I told them not to say anything to anyone until you made the announcement.”

  “Right.” I hoped when I told Mom and Dad the good news, they’d drop dead before they disinherited their daughter. A hundred million? Maybe I should have been nicer to them. Or maybe I should call Sally Da-da and work out a deal.

  Actually, I used to know people on the Gold Coast and here in the Hamptons who were worth hundreds of millions, so that number didn’t completely stun me. What stunned me was that William, who always acted as though he was a paycheck away from being homeless, actually had that kind of money. This really annoyed me. I mean, that cheap, tightwad bastard . . . but maybe Susan had the number wrong. It wouldn’t be the first time. Actually, I thought, it could be more.

  Susan asked, “What are you thinking about?”

  “Oh . . . I’m thinking about getting your oiled-up body back to the room.”

  The masseuse tittered, and the masseur chuckled, and Susan said, “John.”

  We finished our massages in silence, then took our oiled-up bodies back to our room. The message light wasn’t on, and we made love, napped, then dressed and went down to the cocktail lounge and watched the ocean and the darkening sky.

  We had a dinner reservation at the hotel, and we got to the restaurant late and tipsy as the last of the sun faded from the sky.

  Susan looked at me across the candlelit table and said, “I never thought I’d see you again sitting across from me in a restaurant.”

  I took her hand and said, “We have many good years ahead of us.”

  “I know we do.”

  Her cell phone rang, and she looked at it, and said to me, “I don’t need to take it.”

  She shut off the phone and slipped it back into her purse.

  I wasn’t sure if I should ask who’d called—it could be her parents, or our children responding to her e-mail, or Elizabeth with some bad news. Or it could be a man. And if she wanted me to know who it was, she’d have told me.

  However, she seemed suddenly less cheerful, so I did ask, “Who was that?”

  She replied, “Nassau County Police Department.”

  I said, “Play the message.”

  “Later.”

  “Now.”

  She retrieved her cell phone, turned it on and punched in her password, then handed it to me.

  I put the phone to my ear and heard, “Hello, Mrs. Sutter, this is Detective Nastasi, Nassau County PD. I just want you to know that I called on the subject tonight, at his home, and his wife informed me that he was out of town for an unspecified period of time. Call me back at your convenience.” He added, “Please pass this on to Mr. Sutter.”

  I hit the replay button and handed her the phone. As she listened, I thought about Anthony Bellarosa being out of town. That didn’t comport with him needing to stay close to home for John Gotti’s imminent death and funeral. Maybe, though, Uncle Sal had jumped the gun—pardon the pun—and Anthony was somewhere out there in the ocean, feeding the fishes as they say. Wouldn’t that be nice? But if not, then Anthony’s sudden disappearance was more worrisome than it was comforting.

  Susan shut off her phone again and put it back in her purse.

  I said, “We’ll call him tomorrow.”

  She changed the subject and said, “I want you to order from the spa menu.”

  “Why? What did I do wrong?”

  She informed me, “You are what you eat.”

  “Well,
then, I need to change my name to Prime Rib.”

  “I recommend the steamed halibut.”

  “I had fish oil for breakfast.”

  “I want you around for a long time.”

  “Well, it’s going to seem like a long time if I have to eat that crap.”

  “Go ahead, then, order your steak, and kill yourself.”

  “Thank you.”

  The waitress came and we ordered.

  The halibut wasn’t that bad with a bottle of local chardonnay.

  When we got back to the room, I saw that the message light still wasn’t lit.

  I didn’t need to speak to Felix Mancuso, but if there was one person in law enforcement who understood this case—not only the facts and the history, but also the human element of what had happened ten years ago—it was this man, who’d not only tried to save my soul from a great evil, but who also had been troubled by his colleagues acting as pimps for don Bellarosa.

  Well, for all I knew, Mancuso was retired, transferred, or dead, but if he wasn’t any of those things, then I knew I’d hear from him.

  Susan and I went out on the balcony and looked at the ocean. On the distant horizon I could see the lights of great ocean liners and cargo ships, and overhead, aircraft were beginning their descent into Kennedy Airport, or climbing out on their way to Europe, or the world.

  Susan asked me, “Do you think you want to sail again?”

  I replied, “Well, what good is a yacht club without a yacht?”

  She smiled, then said, seriously, “I never want you to sail alone again.”

  I hadn’t been completely alone, but I understood what she meant and replied, “I won’t sail without you.”

  She stayed quiet awhile, and we listened to the surf washing against the shore, and I stared, transfixed by the night sky and the black ocean.

  She asked me, “How was it?”

  I continued to look out into the dark, starry night, and replied, “Lonely.” I thought a moment, then said, “It’s easy to imagine out there, at night, that you are the last man left alive on earth.”

  “It sounds awful.”

  “Sometimes. But most of the time I felt . . . as though it was just me and God. I mean, you can go a little crazy out there, but it’s not necessarily a bad kind of crazy.” I added, “You have a lot of time to think, and you get to know yourself.”