Timothy's Game

by Lawrence Sanders

  “Since when have you been religious?”

  “I believe in God,” he protests. “He looks a lot like my drill instructor at Parris Island. A mean sonofabitch who kept kicking our ass and telling us it was for our own good. Like my pa walloping me with his belt and telling me it hurt him more than it did me. God always has a catch. Maybe not right away, but sooner or later. You pay for your pleasure in this world, kiddo.”

  “I’m willing,” Samantha says. “Fly now, pay later.”

  Ten minutes later they’re in bed together.

  Both would be shocked if someone had suggested anything admirable in their allegiance to each other. Not only their sexual fidelity but their constancy for more years than most of their acquaintances have been married. Each is a half-filled glass, needing the other for topping off. Alone, each is half-empty.

  But no such dreary soul-searching for them; all they know, or want to know, is sweat and rut: a gorgeous game of shouted oaths and wailing cries. And in slick slide and fevered grasp they are oblivious to all else. Not even aware that the TV screen has gone blank after the closing rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

  Three

  A MIDSUMMER HEAT WAVE has Manhattan by the throat. The air is humid, so supersaturated that one drinks rather than breathes it. Clothing clings, feet swell, hair uncurls, and even paper money feels greasy, as if all those engraved presidents are sweating.

  Cone shuffles slowly down to Cedar Street, carrying his cap and jacket. He tries to keep to the shady side of streets, but there’s no escape. It is the kind of day, as Sydney Smith said, that makes you want to take off your skin and walk around in your bones.

  David Dempster Associates, Inc., is located in a building of stainless steel and tinted glass. The lobby is blessedly chilled by air conditioning turned down so low that sides of beef might be hung on the walls without fear of spoilage. Cone just stands there for almost five minutes until his blood stops bubbling. Then he consults the lobby directory and takes a high-speed elevator to the twenty-seventh floor, donning his jacket en route.

  The anteroom is small: desk, typewriter on a stand, file cabinet, wastebasket, and a plump, hennaed secretary reading a copy of Elle. She looks up as Cone enters and gives him a saucy smile. “Hot enough for you?” she asks.

  “It’s not the heat,” he says solemnly, “it’s the humidity.” And having completed the New York catechism, he gets down to business. “Timothy Cone from Haldering and Company to see Mr. Dempster. I have an appointment.”

  “Sure,” she says blithely. “I’ll tell him you’re here.”

  She pops through an inner door and is out again in a moment. “This way, please, Mr. Cone. Would you like to leave your cap out here?”

  “Nah,” he says. “Someone might steal it.”

  “I doubt that,” she says. “Very much.”

  David Dempster’s office is large, but only in comparison to the reception room. Actually, it’s a modest chamber, skimpily furnished: executive-type desk with leatherbound accessories and two telephones, swivel chair and two armchairs, steel file cabinet and small bookcase. And that’s about it. The only wall decoration is a large color photograph of a golden retriever, with an award and blue ribbon affixed to the frame.

  The man standing smiling behind the desk is tall and stalwart. He’s wearing a vested glen plaid tropical worsted, and the suit is snug across shoulders and chest. Cone figures that if he doesn’t pump iron, he does something equally disgusting—like exercise regularly. His handshake is a bonecrusher, as if he’s ready to arm wrestle right then and there.

  But he’s affable enough: gets his visitor seated in one of the armchairs, holds a gold Dunhill to light Cone’s Camel and his own Benson & Hedges (filtered). He asks, with a boomy laugh, if it’s hot enough for Cone, and the Wall Street dick gives the proper reply. They’re like lodge brothers exchanging the secret code.

  They settle back, sucking greedily on their cigarettes and regarding each other with cautious ease.

  “Teresa informed me you were up to see her,” Dempster says. “She was quite embarrassed that she continued to address you as Mr. Timothy.”

  “That’s okay. She said it wasn’t important, and it’s not.”

  “What did you think of her?” the other man asks suddenly. “Tell me, what was your initial impression?”

  Cone shrugs. “She’s different.”

  Dempster smiles; more fangs than teeth. “Teresa is her own woman. Many people, meeting her for the first time, are put off by her manner. But I assure you, she is not as simple-minded as she might appear. When it is necessary, she can be quite practical and quick-witted. She has handled the tragedy of Jack’s death remarkably well.”

  “He didn’t die,” Cone can’t resist saying, “he passed over.”

  Dempster becomes serious. “Yes, well, that’s what she believes—sincerely believes. And it does no harm to anyone, does it?”

  “Not a bit. I asked if her husband had any enemies, and she said no. Now I’ll ask you the same thing.”

  “So have all the police and reporters,” Dempster says ruefully. “You must realize, Mr. Cone, that my sister-in-law was not totally aware of her husband’s business activities. Or even what Jack did for a living. Not that he ever attempted to conceal anything from her, but she simply wasn’t all that interested. She had her sons, her homes, her bonsai, and she was content. As for your question to me: Did Jack have any enemies? Of course he did. He was a ruthless and, at times I fear, a brutal CEO. He built an enormous conglomerate from a small machine shop in Quincy, Massachusetts. You don’t do that without making enemies along the way. But no one, to my knowledge, hated him enough to murder him. That is what I have told the police, and it is the truth as I know it.”

  “Mr. Dempster, I’m not involved in the homicide investigation. I’m supposed to be looking into all the industrial accidents Dempster-Torrey has had lately. You know about those?”

  “Vaguely. Jack mentioned them one night at dinner.”

  “Any idea of who might be pulling that stuff?”

  “Discharged or disgruntled employees would be my guess.”

  Then they are silent. Cone lights another cigarette, but this time David Dempster takes a handsome silver-banded brier from his desk drawer and fills it from a silken pouch. He tamps the tobacco down slowly with a blunt forefinger. Then he lights the pipe carefully, using a wax match from a tiny box. He sits back, puffing contentedly.

  Lord of the manor, Cone thinks. With a picture of his favorite hound on the wall.

  Dempster has a big face, long and craggy. Big nose, big teeth, and biggest of all, a mustache trimmed in a guardsman’s style. It spreads squarely from cheek to cheek, brown with reddish glints. And he has a thick head of hair in the same hues, so bountiful that it makes Cone’s spiky crew cut look like a cactus. Dempster’s only small feature are his eyes; they’re dark aggies.

  “What kind of a man was your brother?” Cone asks.

  “You know, you’re the first investigator who’s asked me that. Odd, isn’t it? You’d think that would be the first thing the police would want to know. Well, Jack was an enormously driven man. With tremendous energy. And enough ambition for ten. Not for money or power, you understand. He had enough of both to last him two lifetimes. But Jack was a builder. He wanted Dempster-Torrey to become the biggest, richest international business entity in the world. He was intensely competitive. I think business was really a game to him. He played squash, golf, poker, and was a devil at three-cushion billiards. And he always played to win. He couldn’t endure losing.”

  “Did he ever cut any corners to make sure he won?”

  Dempster laughs, flashing the fangs again. “Of course he did! But he rarely got caught. And when he did, he would admit it, grin, and people would forgive him. Because he had so much charm. He was the most charming man I’ve ever known. And I’m not saying that just because he was my brother.”

  “And his opponents in business deals—did
they forgive him when he cut corners?”

  “That I doubt. I told you he made enemies. But of course I can’t speak firsthand. I never had any business dealings with Jack. We went our separate ways.”

  “What kind of business are you in, Mr. Dempster?”

  “You didn’t know?” the other man says, surprised. “Corporate public relations. Not a great number of clients because I prefer to keep this a one-man operation. I am not an empire builder the way Jack was. None of my clients are what you might call giants of industry, but they stick with me and pay their bills promptly. That’s all I ask.”

  “What sort of things do you do?” Cone asks. “Turn out press releases? Plant photos and bios of clients? Sit in on planning sessions for new products?”

  “Ah,” Dempster says, relighting his pipe, “I see you know the business. Yes, I do all that, but I suppose my most important function is keeping my clients’ names out of the newspapers after they’ve pulled some exceptionally stupid stunt or gotten fouled up in their personal lives.”

  “Yeah,” Cone says, “there’s a lot of that going around these days. How well did you and your brother get along?”

  Dempster sets his pipe down carefully. “We weren’t as close as we might have been, I suppose. We had such a small family. Our parents are dead, and our few aunts, uncles, and cousins are all out in South Dakota. We should have been closer. And now Jack is gone. I’d say our relationship was cordial but cool. We didn’t socialize much. An occasional dinner when he could make it; he was an extremely busy man. And I’d spend a weekend up at their summer place now and then.”

  “You ever do any public relations for Dempster-Torrey?”

  “No, and I never made a pitch for that account. I didn’t want anyone accusing Jack of nepotism. And besides, Dempster-Torrey has a very effective in-house PR department. So it was better all around if I stayed away from my brother’s business.”

  “Uh-huh,” Cone says. “Well, you promised to cooperate, and you have. Thanks for your time.”

  “If there’s anything else I can do to help, don’t hesitate to give me a call.”

  “I’ll do that. Nice dog you’ve got there.”

  Dempster turns to stare at the picture on the wall. “Had,” he says in a stony voice. “He was hit and killed last year by a drunken driver who came over the curb while I was walking King along Central Park South.”

  “Jesus,” Cone says, “that’s tough.”

  “I dragged the guy out of his car,” David Dempster goes on, “and kicked the shit out of the bastard.”

  Again that bonecrushing handshake, and Cone gets out of there. He goes down to the icy lobby, takes off his jacket, and steps out into the steam bath. The heat is a slap in the face, and he starts slogging back to John Street wondering if he’ll survive in the office where Haldering & Co. air conditioners, all antique window units, wheeze and clank, fighting a losing battle against the simmer.

  He has an hour to kill before his appointment with Simon Trale, Chief Financial Officer of Dempster-Torrey, and he knows there are things he should be doing: checking with Davenport on the homicide investigation; goosing Sid Apicella to get skinny on the balance sheet of David Dempster Associates, Inc.; gathering evidence to back up his grand theory on who’s responsible for the campaign of sabotage.

  He starts by reviewing his recent conversation with David Dempster. Timothy knows very well that he himself is a mess of prejudices. For instance, he’ll never believe a man who wears a pinkie ring, never lend money to anyone who claims to have finished reading Silas Marner, never letch after a woman who, on a bright day, wears sunglasses pushed up in her hair.

  Silly bigotries, he acknowledges, and he’s got a lot of them. And the morning meeting with David Dempster has added a few more. The orotund voice and precise diction. The fanged smile with all the warmth of a wolf snarl. The showy way he loaded his pipe, as if he was filling a chalice with sacramental wine. Wearing a vest on the hottest day of the year and then festooning it with a heavy gold chain from which a Phi Beta Kappa key dangled.

  All minor affectations, Cone admits, but revealing. The man comes perilously close to being a poof, or acting like one. Whatever he is, Cone suspects, there is not much to him. Beneath that confident, almost magisterial manner is a guy running scared. Prick him and he’ll deflate like a punctured bladder of hot air.

  Except … Except … In David Dempster’s final words, regarding the drunken driver who killed his dog, he said in tones of uncontrolled savagery, “I kicked the shit out of the bastard.” That shocked Cone, not because of the act or the words describing it, but that it was so out of character for someone he had tagged as a wimp, and a pompous wimp at that.

  It’s a puzzlement, and Timothy decides to put David Dempster on hold, not that the guy is obviously a wrongo, but only because no one else questioned up to now has given off such confusing vibes. Like all detectives, Cone tends to pigeonhole people. And when he can’t assign them to neat slots, his anxiety quotient rises.

  The interview with Simon Trale is held in the offices of Dempster-Torrey on Wall Street. Trale elects to meet Cone in the boardroom, a cavernous chamber with a conference table long enough to sleep Paul Bunyan. It is surrounded by twenty black leather armchairs, precisely spaced. On the table in front of each chair is a water carafe, glass, pad of yellow legal paper, ballpoint pen, and ashtray—all embossed with the corporate insignia.

  “I brought you in here,” Trale says in a high-pitched voice, “because it was swept electronically about an hour ago. The debuggers won’t get to my office until this afternoon, so I thought it would be safer if we talked in here.”

  “Yeah,” Cone says, “that makes sense.”

  He wonders if they’re going to sit at opposite ends of that stretched slab of polished walnut and shout at each other. But Trale pulls out two adjoining chairs along one side, and that’s where they park themselves.

  The CFO is a short guy. In fact, Cone figures that if he was a few inches shorter he’d qualify as a midget. Usually a man so diminutive will buy his clothes in the boys’ section of a department store, but Trale’s duds are too well tailored for that. He’s wearing a dark blue pinstripe with unpadded shoulders and side vents. His shirt is sparkling white, and he sports a paisley bow tie. Small gold cuff links. A wide gold wedding band. A gold Rolex. Black tasseled loafers on his tiny feet.

  He’s got a full head of snowy white hair neatly trimmed. The white hair is understandable because Timothy guesses that Simon Trale is pushing seventy, if he’s not already on the downslope. But his movements are sure, and that reedy voice has no quaver.

  “Mind if I smoke?” Cone asks.

  “Go right ahead,” Trale says. “The doc limits me to one cigar a day, but it tastes all the better for that.”

  “When do you smoke it—at night after dinner?”

  “No,” Trale says, smiling. “First thing in the morning. It gets the juices flowing.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, how old are you?”

  “I don’t mind. I’ll be seventy-three next year.”

  “I should look as good next year as you do right now,” Cone says admiringly. “No aches or pains?”

  “The usual,” the little man says, shrugging. “But I still got my own teeth, thank God. I use reading glasses, but my hearing is A-Okay.”

  “How come you’re still working?” Cone asks curiously. “Doesn’t Dempster-Torrey have a mandatory retirement at sixty-five?”

  “Sure we do. But Jack Dempster pushed a waiver through the Board of Directors allowing me to stay on. You know why he did that?”

  “Because you’re such a hotshot financial officer?”

  “No,” Trale says, laughing. “There’s a hundred younger men who could do my job. But my wife died nine years ago, and all my kids have married and moved away. I don’t play golf, and I’ve got no hobbies. Dempster-Torrey has been my whole life. Jack knew that, knew how lost I’d be without an office to come to and problem
s to solve. So he kept me on, bless him.”

  “Very kind of him,” Cone says, looking down at the cigarette in his stained fingers. “But that doesn’t sound like the John J. Dempster I’ve been hearing about.”

  “Oh, you’ll hear a lot of bad things about him,” Trale says cheerfully. “And most of them will be true. I’m not going to tell you he was a saint; he wasn’t. But do you know anyone who is?”

  “I heard he was ruthless and brutal in his business dealings.”

  The CFO frowns. “Ruthless and brutal? Well … maybe. But when you’re wheeling and dealing on the scale that Dempster was, you can’t afford to play pattycake. He was hard when he had to be hard.”

  “So he made enemies along the way?”

  “Sure he did. The police asked me to make out a list. I told them it wouldn’t be a list, it would be a book!”

  He smiles at the recollection. He has the complexion of a healthy baby, and his mild blue eyes look out at the world with wonder and amusement. Small pink ears are set flat to his skull, and his lips are so red they might be rouged. It is a doll’s head, finely molded porcelain, with every detail from black lashes to dimpled chin painted just so.

  “How long have you been with Dempster-Torrey, Mr. Trale?”

  “From the beginning. I was the bookkeeper with the Torrey Machine Works up in Quincy, Massachusetts, when John Dempster came to work for us as sales manager. Within a year he had doubled our revenues. And a year after that he married Teresa Torrey and was made vice president.”

  “Oh-ho,” Cone says, lighting another Camel. “He married the boss’s daughter, did he?”

  “He did. But he’d have been made vice president even if he hadn’t. Sanford Torrey knew what a wizard he had in J.J. Also, Sanford and his wife were worried about their daughter. She had plenty of beaux, but they didn’t stay around long. Have you met Teresa?”

  “Yeah, I met her.”

  “And what do you think?”

  “Off the wall.”

  “Yes,” Trale says sorrowfully, “that’s what other young men thought—but John Dempster saw something in her. She’s really a dear, loving woman, Mr. Cone. When my wife was ill, she couldn’t do enough for us. I’ll be eternally grateful. John saw that side of her—the warm affection, the innocent openness. Yes, he married the boss’s daughter, but there was more to it than that. I may be a foolish old romantic, but I’ve always thought that he loved her and married her for the qualities he knew he himself lacked: sympathy, sweet naiveté, absolute honesty.”