by Chris Knopf
Veckstrom was still well-dressed in a white shirt, club tie and raw silk sport coat. His face had a scrubbed and close-shaven look. No blemishes, no hairs sticking out of the wrong places. Not hard to interpret the psychology there. It said: I might have chosen to be a cop because the profession interests me, but don’t think I’m one of them. I live on a higher plane, and there’s no room here for you.
“They never found the punks who killed your father. Hardly tried, is how I heard it. No point. Hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys in those days. Piss you off, did it?”
I pointed my finger at him.
“Come on, Veckstrom. You gotta do better than that. The trauma of a murdered father, his killers gone free, instilling in the young man antisocial tendencies. Manifest in a variety of ways—affiliations with lowlifes, violent and self-destructive behaviors, a wicked bad temper and a pronounced disinterest in regular church attendance.”
“You forgot the repressed lust for revenge. Unfocused, free-floating and easily attached to any person who might represent, symbolically, the unpunished killers. Big guys with big mouths. Nasty arrogant buggers. Swaggering around threatening old men and pretty girls.”
“Criminals,” I said, warming to the topic. “People who’d proven in the past they were also willing and able to break a few social conventions.”
“Very good.”
“Only I didn’t know that about Patrick and his boys at the time. I thought they were just a bunch of drunken builders coming off a hard winter, just like we were. Maybe not with the same style, but the same idea.”
Veckstrom looked like he’d lost track, but tried not to show it.
“You know Patrick Getty had done time,” I said. “You’d have to know that.”
“Of course,” he said, recovering. “Exactly my point.”
“Right. So you know where.”
“Yeah. Hungerford. Medium security. Should have been harder time, in my opinion, but that’s your typical prosecution. Rather cut a deal than deal with the paperwork.”
“Hungerford. Really.”
“Yeah. Pussy time,” he said.
“Pussy prosecutors. Piss you off, don’t they?” I asked him. “Makes you just want to kill somebody, doesn’t it?”
He smiled a humorless smile and waved the bartender over to order his own cup of coffee. I knew the tactic. Buying time.
“Doesn’t it make you wonder,” I asked, “why an ex-con like Getty isn’t getting looked at? Why am I a better pick than a known felon? Prosecution just going the easy route? More fun to bag an ex-corporate man, better story for papers? Come on, you’re the learned one. No theories?”
“Getty’s prints weren’t all over that stapler.”
“That’s because it didn’t belong to him. It belonged to me. I can show you where I used it to install insulation. Forensics can match the staples. Shoot a few into a barrel of water.”
“Your prints and nobody else’s,” he almost growled at me.
“On the handle? I heard about clear prints on the chrome. What about the orange handle? If you’d spent more time getting your hands dirty you’d know which end of a hammer stapler you swing.”
A breath of doubt tried to gain purchase on his expression, but he held tough.
“The physical evidence is as good as it gets,” he said. “Don’t start putting your hopes there. Never works.”
“I don’t have hopes,” I said. “Gave them up a while ago.”
“Smart decision.”
I stood up and put enough money on the bar to cover both our coffees.
“You’re right. They get in the way. A hope is like an assumption, a theoretical construct. A paradigm. You get too loyal to any of those things and your IQ falls about fifty points,” I said before leaving him there and getting back into the Grand Prix.
I was glad to be close to home. I wanted to pick up Eddie so I could run a few things by him in the car on the way over to Jackie Swaitkowski’s. That always helped me work through my assumptions. Even my theories. And despite what I’d said to Veckstrom, maybe a hope or two.
——
I was irritated to find Jackie with another client. I was forced to pace around the sidewalk and occupy myself looking at artwork and tchotchkes in the shop windows that lined Montauk Highway. Worse for Eddie was succumbing to a leash, but I had to keep a grip on him in case he ran into a Lhasa apso out to prove something.
I tried to interest him in a flock of collectible hunting decoys but only insulted his intelligence. We were both happy to hear Jackie call to us from her second-story window.
“Some people actually make appointments,” she said as we walked up her staircase.
“I’ve tried that. Not as sure as just showing up.”
“You think it’s made all better by bringing the dog?”
“No, but he does.”
I was gratified to see her new office space filling up on schedule. I had to shovel a stack of papers off the couch so Eddie and I would both have room to sit.
“Before you get too comfortable, tell me why you’re here,” she said, dropping into one of the opposing chairs.
“I’m supposed to be communicative and here I am communicating and what do I get?”
“Oh, please.”
“I just had a cup of coffee with Lionel Veckstrom.”
She sat up a little in her chair.
“You didn’t tell him anything did you? Or provoke him?”
“He did all the telling and provoking. I just bought the coffee.”
“So what did he tell you?” she asked.
“Something I should have asked about a long time ago, and didn’t. Like a dope.”
“So tell me.”
“You need to take a trip with me.”
“That’s what he told you?”
“I always love your company, Jackie, but this time I really need it or they won’t let me leave the Island.”
“That’s a cinch. Where’re we going?”
“I’ll tell you on the way. How’s tomorrow?”
She leaned forward so quickly she almost propelled herself out of her chair.
“Oh, no. Not this time. You have to talk to me. Or no trip.”
This is the problem with being communicative. People actually expect you to tell them things.
“We need to go visit another one of your clients. One who didn’t do as well as I’m hoping to in court.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Roy Battiston. Hungerford Correctional Facility. All the more reason to have you there, assuming he still likes you.”
She ran her fingers up into her disorderly ball of hair and shook her head.
“If he does, that’s good, though I don’t like him. I do like you, Sam, God knows why, but I’m not even going to discuss this with you until you tell me what you’re thinking.”
So I told her what I’d learned about Jeff Milhouser’s unsuccessful gambit with the Town funds, though I spared her the means I used to get the information. I’d maybe save that for the ride when we were moving too fast for her to jump out of the car.
“That’s fascinating, Sam, but I still don’t know what the hell it has to do with your case.”
“East End Savings and Loan. The bank where Milhouser tried the fiddle. Something Amanda told me a long time ago.”
“They were bought up by Harbor Trust,” said Jackie. “Moved into their building there on Main Street.”
“See? Everybody knows this but me.”
“Roy was the manager?”
“Not at that point, but he was there, working his way up. Opening accounts, building relationships, loaning money.”
Jackie fell back and pulled up her legs like she was riding the chair sidesaddle.
“What makes you think Roy will talk to us? Assuming I even agree to do this.”
“He’ll talk if we want him to.”
She knew what I meant. Roy was in prison for defrauding Amanda. But he could be in there for a lot
worse. Jackie and I were the only two people in the world who knew that. Worse for Roy, we could also prove it.
“I can get a message to him,” said Jackie, halfheartedly.
“No, no. Surprise visit. Can’t have him forewarned. For that matter, same goes for Veckstrom and Ross, or Edith Madison. None of them can know.”
“That’ll be a neat trick.”
“You got to meet me part way on this, Jackie. It’s got to be done like this. You can do it.”
“I still have to get the prison people to cooperate.” I scoffed.
“You’ve done harder things than that.” She looked at me quietly for a few moments, then shook her head.
“If I’d known what it would be like having you as the guy who saved my life, I’d have jumped right in front of that explosion.”
Eddie stood up and stretched when he saw me make moves toward leaving. He put his head in her lap so she could say goodbye. I just patted her shoulder.
“Bring a sweater. It can still be cool in Upstate New York.”
“Unbelievable.”
——
There was enough time left in the day to make one more stop. I peeled off Montauk Highway and took Cobb and Wickapogue Roads southwest toward the estate section of Southampton. The weather was still lousy, casting a drab shadowless light on the giant naked frames of a half dozen mansions going up on what used to be a small farm specializing in flowering bushes. If it weren’t for the staggering size of the houses, it would look like any other suburban development. That and what you couldn’t see from the road, that they were all paid for with cash, just a slice off last year’s bonus. A field filled with the ripening blooms of Wall Street, seeded by a relentless wind out of the west.
Burton’s place was even bigger, but it was harder to tell, snuggled inside the sweeping boughs of ancient sycamore and copper beech. Assuming you could get past the gate.
“You don’t like me to say this, but you really should call ahead,” Isabella squawked at me over the intercom.
“I’d need a cell phone for that. Can’t afford it.”
“People living in huts in the rain forest have cell phones. You just don’t like to call anybody.”
“So, is he there?”
“No, I’m trying to tell you. He’s at the club for the Wednesday cocktail hour. You can’t go there.”
She was certainly right about that. Besides the lack of portfolio or pedigree, I’d never be seen at a cocktail hour. Not when there were so many more hours available for drinking cocktails.
I drove into the Village to use the last lonely pay phone in Southampton. People coming in and out of the restrooms looked at me like the curiosity I was. At least on the other end was a cell phone. Burton’s.
“Yes, they have these every Wednesday,” said Burton. “First I’ve been to this year. Trying to get my money’s worth.”
“That’d take a lot of cocktails.”
“Why don’t you join me. As my guest.”
I looked down at the khakis and blue Oxford-cloth shirt I’d worn to the Southampton Chronicle. They were both well worn around the edges, but likely no worse than Burton’s.
“I think I’m actually suitably dressed,” I told him. “I just need a jacket at the door. A medium long. Something with gold buttons, but no embroidery unless they have the Acquillo crest.”
“I’ll check with the staff.”
Back at the Grand Prix I realized I had another impediment. Eddie, who always came as he was.
“Talk about a lack of pedigree,” I said to him on the way over there.
Burton probably could have cleared the way for Eddie to come inside, but having me as a guest was enough blemish on Burton’s good standing. So I left Eddie in the car with the windows open where he was just as happy spread out across the huge back seat.
A thin, nicely groomed guy in a traditional suit greeted me at the front desk with a blue blazer draped over his arm. I thought about introducing him to Lionel Veckstrom. They could compare haberdashers.
“Mr. Lewis has retired to the billiards room,” he said to me.
“That’s where I want to retire. Only I’m more into eight-ball.”
“All we have is a pair of pool tables. Billiards sounds more sophisticated,” the guy explained with commendable honesty.
They weren’t just pool tables. More like massive empire furniture made of carved mahogany and topped with almost silken green felt.
I was glad to see Burton was alone.
“I wonder why I’d want to play with you after that last demonstration,” he said, twisting the tip of his cue into a cube of green chalk.
“Everybody gets a lucky game.”
“I suppose I’ll have to let you break.”
I dropped a pair of solids but did little to scatter the pack. So I took care of that with my second shot. I never liked picking balls out of a crowd, even if it meant losing my turn.
“No word from the grand jury, I suppose,” he said, leaning down for his first shot at a duck in the corner. The cue ball came back nicely, putting him in good position to sink two more before rushing the third with ill effect.
“Not yet. Probably dotting i’s and crossing t’s,” I said.
“I’ve had several lively meetings with Ms. Swaitkowski. I think she’s doing all she can before we get the indictment. It’s hard to mount a defense when you don’t know the particulars of the prosecution.”
“It’s liable to be particularly imaginative,” I said, sinking number three and number four, each in a side pocket, after which I told him about my conversation with Lionel Veckstrom.
“Imaginative indeed,” said Burton when I was finished. “But tricky to make work in a courtroom. Subjective argument can always be neutralized by subjective argument, with the advantage going to the defense who only has to establish reasonable doubt. If I were them, I’d emphasize the tangible evidence. Murder weapons and footprints at the scene.”
“The murder weapon was mine and I was at the scene. That doesn’t mean I killed him.”
“That’s where the prosecution portrays your character.”
“I thought that was a subjective argument,” I said, feeling genuinely at sea.
I thoroughly muffed my next shot.
“Combined with the physical evidence, enough to tip the scales,” said Burton, reassuming control of the table.
I watched him clean up his share of the balls using his gentle, precise touch. Every ball dropping on its last roll. I waited until I had the next game in the rack before I brought it up.
“So Hayden told you about our fun at the 7-Eleven.”
“He did,” said Burton, giving nothing away by his inflection.
“I thought he would. Get out ahead of it.”
Burton’s break dropped a solid and a stripe. He tried for another solid and missed.
“I’m getting older, Sam. A little constancy would be welcome at this point. Something you ought to consider yourself. Since you’re older than me.”
“How much are you willing to pay for constancy?” I asked him.
“How much are you?”
I’d heard a similar question, phrased a different way, at a party in New Canaan back when I was married to Abby. The interrogator was a woman at least ten years younger than me. She was married to a tall twitchy scarecrow of a guy who was in the process of making a half billion dollars in the technology infrastructure. Oblivious as I usually am about these things, her proposition was pretty clear. I told her I was all set, but thanks anyway. That’s when she asked me if it was worth the cost of my life.
I let two more rounds go by before attempting to answer Burton’s question.
“I’m sorry I asked you that, Burt. It’s none of my business.”
He stood up straight and chalked his cue.
“I’m not sorry,” he said. “Tell me your answer first.”
It felt like candor was more important than usual.
“I don’t know.”’
; He leaned over and sighted down the pool cue.
“Exactly,” he said.
I let him play for a while, then said, “Of course, I have a little less to lose than you do.”
“How do you value the human heart? By the net worth of the owner?”
“I love debating with lawyers.”
“Not a debate. An inquiry into an important subject.”
“I meant it when I said it’s none of my business. I’m just trying to look after you. You’ve certainly done enough of that for me.”
“I didn’t know,” he said.
“Didn’t know what?”
“You said to Hayden, ‘don’t think he doesn’t know,’ which is what compelled him to confess to me.”
“You’d have gotten there.”
“Maybe. Did you know it’s possible to be a successful legal writer and a cheap hustler? Or a mechanical engineer and a prizefighter. Dual personas within a single person is not uncommon.”
“We’ve known a few of those.”
Burton stood holding his pool cue out at an angle from his body like a lance.
“I want to give this one a try,” he said quietly, “not in spite of the confusion in his mind, because of it. Now that I know it’s there. Thanks to you.”
I nodded and tried to look happy about it.
“You’re a good man, Burton,” a truthful thing that was easy for me to say. “Just watch your back.”
“That’s a task I’d rather delegate to you. Since you’ll be doing it anyway,” he said, before winning the game, and the next two after that.
Vulnerability wasn’t a quality I ever associated with him, but that’s what it sounded like, on more than one level. I liked thinking of him as invincible, by temperament and circumstance. I hadn’t been the easiest friend. Yet Burton never showed anything but unflinching faith and generosity. Which is maybe why I was such a pain in the ass. I knew I’d never be able to reciprocate.
Probably all he ever wanted was what I gave him that night. The right to do something stupid with your eyes open, without condemnation. And the reassurance that no matter how stupid the thing you did, you didn’t have to do it alone.
TWENTY-TWO
JACKIE ALWAYS LOOKED reluctant to climb into the Grand Prix for anything longer than a trip into Southampton Village. Not that we had another option. Her Toyota pickup was half the age and twice the wreck, with oversized tires and amped-up shocks that made the thing ride like a slab of granite.