The Big Killing

by Annette Meyers

  The sky overhead grew threatening as she walked down Wall Street, congested with people despite the weather. Originally built as a wall in the seventeenth century to defend the then Dutch city against the English, by the turn of the twentieth century the street had transmogrified into the financial district of the country. Over the last fifteen years, the financial district, now known as the Street, had become a mix of old and new: here where Wetzon walked, stolid, concrete buildings were aged and stained with soot and the streets were dark, narrow caverns; and down by the East River, on the southernmost tip of Manhattan Island the buildings were all giant towers of marble and glass.

  Wetzon was always amazed by the otherworld atmosphere in lower Manhattan. Everywhere, office workers mingled with executives and messengers, salesmen, traders, arbitrageurs. There were very few tourists with cameras in this section of the City. The denizens scurried about the cramped, grimy streets, dwarfed by the sheer mass of structure, real and symbolic.

  Perhaps that was why so many of the companies had moved to Water Street and The Battery area, drawn to open space and light. But that light brought discovery with it. The dark old buildings had kept many secrets, and the crooked little streets invoked a sense of mystery. The bright light was almost like an invitation for the SEC to take a look.

  Wetzon turned down Broad Street, which in the Dutch days had been a canal. She loved the historical aura of this section of New York. Because of her business she always found herself rushing down for a meeting or an interview and then rushing back to midtown. One day she would walk the streets with a guidebook like a tourist.

  It started to rain. She opened her umbrella and turned into the short, narrow warren of Beaver Street. These old streets were dark in normal daylight because even not-too-tall buildings blocked out light. The street was barely the width of a limousine, having been designed for carts and carriages, with slivers of sidewalks added later, and hardly space for more than one person at a time. And when everyone carried umbrellas, as now, it became an obstacle course.

  Wetzon was trying to negotiate her way around a fat, bearded man devouring a slice of pizza, oblivious to the rain, when she collided with a woman in a shiny red, wet-look raincoat carrying a huge red-and-white striped umbrella.

  “Good lord, it’s Wetzon! Why aren’t you in your office dialing for dollars?”

  Wetzon had been so rapt in thought that she had not recognized Laura Lee Day, a petite woman about Wetzon’s age, who held a black violin case in her arm as if she were holding a baby. Laura Lee’s brown hair was also in a wet-look and stood up, short and spiky, with blonde tips, but neat. Two years ago Wetzon had recruited her from Merrill and placed her at Oppenheimer.

  A refugee from Mississippi, who still spoke with a thick southern drawl when it suited her, Laura Lee Day had come to New York to study violin at Juilliard, but her daddy felt she should either get married or have a serious career, so after a few months he had stopped paying for lessons. She’d gone to work for Merrill as a stockbroker, just to earn money for her music studies. Four years later she had become one of the top producers on Wall Street. She had a beautiful apartment right across the street from Juilliard and paid for her own violin lessons with one of the best teachers in the world.

  “Laura Lee Day, as I live and breathe,” Wetzon responded in a southern accent. Her words came back at her: as I live and breathe. Why were all her words death words lately?

  “Wetzon, now, Wetzon,” Laura Lee scolded gently. “I know what you’re doin’ to yourself and you’re to stop, y’hear?” She stepped into the street to let someone pass. “Shut your baby umbrella and come under mine.”

  “Laura Lee, I’m a mess,” Wetzon confessed, folding her umbrella and ducking under the huge red-and-white one. “I’ve been a mess since—”

  “Not another word, Wetzon, darlin’. Y’know, I was thinking about you today. Let’s move on off the sidewalk. We are causing a perfectly frightful traffic jam.”

  Tiny, ancient Beaver Street, where the Cotton Exchange had once been headquartered, almost gave one a feeling of optical illusion. The buildings rising high above it seemed to tilt in, like trees, over the people far below. A car crept slowly toward them, forcing them back onto the sidewalk.

  Wetzon looked at her watch. “I’m late,” she said, without her usual obsession to be on time for appointments.

  “Where are you off to?” Wetzon held Laura Lee’s umbrella arm and they walked toward Broadway.

  “I have an appointment at Sixty-one Broadway.”

  “Where to after that?”

  “The Vista Bar at five o’clock.”

  “Good. After you finish at Sixty-one Broadway, you come right on over to my office and pick me up.” Laura Lee was ebullient, even on a dull day, and she was bubbling with energy today.

  “What are you up to, Laura Lee? Where are we going?”

  “Century Twenty-one is having a big sale on silk lingerie.”

  “Laura Lee,” Wetzon laughed, “you’re crazy. I don’t wear silk lingerie.” They stopped on the corner of Beaver and Broadway.

  “Well then, darlin’, it’s time you did,” Laura Lee said emphatically. “It’ll do wonders for your self-image.” She chortled. “And your sex life. See you.”

  What sex life? Wetzon thought, watching Laura Lee’s cheery red figure sashay off in the direction of the World Financial Center.

  32

  Sixty-one Broadway was one of those wonderful old art deco buildings. The main doors were inlaid with geometric designs in brass on bronze, like the Frank Lloyd Wright stained glass windows that were in the Metropolitan Museum. The lobby had obviously been recently restored, all the brass polished to a high shine, the trim and borders sharply defined. She waited for the elevator in the lobby. There was not much traffic in and out at this time of day. When the elevator doors opened, a girl in a sedate denim dress started off, then, seeing Wetzon, sidled away, eyes and head down. Buffie. It was Buffie. Wetzon went after her, cornering her near the newsstand.

  “Buffie. What are you doing here?”

  Buffie looked at her insolently, tossing her hair, which was in a ponytail today. “It has nothing to do with you.”

  “Did you find Barry’s material? Are you coming from Mildred Gleason’s office?”

  Buffie shook her head stubbornly. Her mouth was a thin hard line.

  “You fool. Two people have been murdered.” The girl’s greedy stupidity infuriated Wetzon. “Let the police handle it. I hope you told them yesterday about the ‘insurance’ and Barry’s writing?”

  “Leave me alone,” Buffie said, pushing Wetzon away. “It’s none of your business.”

  Shocked by Buffie’s violent reaction, Wetzon stumbled against the magazines and dropped her briefcase. When she looked up, Buffie was gone. She wasn’t behaving at all like the Buffie from yesterday. No weakness, no tears. Nothing fragile about her.

  “I’m sorry,” Wetzon said to the newsdealer, an old man with white hair and faded eyes, whose bulbous nose was liberally decorated with broken blue veins. She picked up her briefcase.

  “Takes all kinds these days,” the newsdealer said in a faint brogue.

  She got on the elevator, so deep in thought that she forgot to press the fifth-floor button, and the elevator stopped to pick someone up on ten. Oh, well, she would stay on for the ride up, and she waited impatiently for the elevator to pick up others on the remaining floors. The elevator, too, was a work of art, bronze and brass, fine geometric lines, a sense of history and pride revealed in the fact that it had been cared for so well for all these years. It said, “old money,” and, “you can depend on us.” Sure, Wetzon thought. Then, You’re getting cynical, old girl.

  The reception area of M. Gleason & Co. also had that look of trust-me about it. Wood paneling, English antique furniture, mahogany and walnut, dark wood, and an oriental rug on the floor. The receptionist, an attractive older woman with a lot of white hair rolled in a traditional chignon, greeted Wetzon war
mly but professionally. “Good afternoon. May I help you?”

  “I have a two-thirty appointment with Mildred Gleason.”

  “Your name?” She had a large agenda book open on her desk.

  “Leslie Wetzon.”

  “Oh, yes.” She checked off Wetzon’s name in her book. “I’ll take your coat for you, and if you’ll just have a seat for a moment, I’ll let Ms. Gleason’s assistant know you’re waiting.” As the woman rose, her phone rang.

  “That’s all right,” Wetzon said. “I’ll do it. Is that the closet?” She pointed to a closed door near the entrance.

  The woman nodded. “Mildred Gleason and Company, good afternoon,” she said into the phone.

  The closet gave off a faint floral scent. Wetzon hung her Burberry next to a black leather trench coat and settled into a large chintz-covered wing chair. The woman’s touch, she thought chauvinistically, but she didn’t care. The world of investment banking was like one great private men’s club, a fraternity that grudgingly permitted some women to enter, but only because, in these times, they couldn’t keep them out physically. But psychologically and in reality, women were and would always be on the outside. Everything about the industry, down to the decor, was male-oriented. She mentally congratulated Mildred for being her own person.

  The receptionist seemed to be having trouble getting through to Mildred Gleason’s assistant. She dialed several times and let it ring. Finally she said, “I can’t seem to locate Ms. Bancroft, Ms. Gleason’s assistant, so I’m going to ring Ms. Gleason.... Oh, Ms. Gleason ... yes. I can’t seem to get through to Bobbie ... oh, she is ... Ms. Wetzon is here to see you ... yes ... all right.” She put down the phone and smiled at Wetzon, standing. “If you’ll come this way.” She opened the door, revealing a wide, well-lit hallway carpeted in rich, plush gray. “Down this hall, make a right at the end, and walk straight back. Ms. Gleason’s office is at the far end of that corridor.” She stood aside and let Wetzon through. The door closed behind her with a soft click.

  How different this was from Jake Donahue’s. The walls were lined with old prints, Currier and Ives type of prints. Maybe even the real thing. After all, Mildred Gleason’s father had been a major rainmaker on the Street back in the forties. Wetzon walked slowly, looking into the offices that opened off the corridor. The fairly spacious offices held one or sometimes two brokers. All the doors were open, and the market activity came in a quiet flurry, not in an uproar as at Jake’s. All very professional. People talked in moderation, and even the phones rang with muted brrrs.

  She turned right and walked down another pleasant space, more Currier and Ives prints, doors opening off the hall. The quiet buzz of voices followed her. The door at the end of the hall was half-open, and Wetzon paused. She heard angry voices. Women’s voices.

  “You are not going to pay anything. I won’t let you. Don’t you know she’s lying? It’s obvious she doesn’t have it.”

  “You won’t let me? Hold on here. Aren’t you forgetting who you are? Who I am?” The deep, rasping voice was Mildred Gleason’s.

  There was a long moment when no one spoke. “I could never do that. You never let me forget—not for a minute.” Something, a book perhaps, slammed on a hard surface. “Oh, God, my head is killing me.”

  “Bobbie dear, please don’t be angry.” Gleason’s voice was pleading. “You know it only makes the pain worse. This has been such a mess. And I have—we have—so much at stake.” There was another long pause. “You mean so much to me.”

  The other voice responded, “Sometimes you have a strange way of showing—”

  The voices quieted into murmurs.

  Wetzon felt a pang of guilt at eavesdropping. It was a peculiar conversation for two women to have, unless they were having a relationship. Actually, she had never considered Mildred Gleason as sexual even though she had been married to Jake Donahue, who had a reputation as a womanizer. She knocked on the door.

  “Come in, come in.” Mildred Gleason rose and came out from behind her desk, hand outstretched. She wore a tailored black wool gabardine skirt, a rose silk shirt, and a wide black alligator belt with a large gold buckle. “I’m so grateful you were able to come. Here, please sit on the sofa....”

  Wetzon entered a room full of antiques. A beautiful old partners’ desk stood in front of the windows and a very large oriental rug lay on the floor. The jacket to the black gabardine skirt lay oddly out of place on top of the desk, as if Mildred had just taken it off. The window blinds were angled down, leaving the room in dim light.

  The other woman was sitting in the far corner, in a wing chair similar to the one in the reception room. She wore an outfit of deep olive green and did not get up. Wetzon was barely able to see ropes of pearls of varying lengths over a full bosom. It was difficult to tell the woman’s age because she wore dark glasses and a patterned silk turban that picked up the green in her dress and completely covered her hair. Ignoring Wetzon, she gave a soft moan and pressed a long, thin hand on the side of her head.

  “This is my assistant, Roberta Bancroft. She suffers terribly from migraine.” Gleason gave the word the English pronunciation, meegraine. “I hope you don’t mind if she stays while we talk. I have no secrets from Bobbie.” Mildred smiled fondly at her assistant, who moaned again. “That’s why we’ve drawn the blinds. The light is agony for her. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all,” Wetzon said. She looked at Roberta sympathetically, careful not to stare. There was something ... about her... “Have we met before, Ms. Bancroft?”

  “I don’t believe so,” Roberta responded in a low voice. “Forgive me, it is painful for me to speak.” She did not offer her hand.

  Wetzon seated herself on the sofa, and Mildred sat slightly to the right in a Chippendale side chair. On the butler’s tray coffee table was a silver trivet holding a crystal pitcher of what looked like lemon slices floating in water. Nearby were a small, silver ice bucket and some handsome crystal goblets, probably all Waterford.

  “I keep a pitcher here all the time,” Mildred said, gesturing toward the water. “It’s so much better for me than coffee. I get too wired on coffee. Will you have some? It’s just water, good old New York City tap water.”

  “Yes, I’d like that. This is a beautiful room, Mildred.”

  “Thank you. It’s my sanctuary, isn’t it, Bobbie?” Despite her air of poise, Mildred’s hands trembled as she raised the crystal pitcher, and a little water splashed over the side of the goblet. Her eyes were sunken and red-rimmed. “Oh, my, I’m just not myself today,” she continued wearily, mopping up the spill with a linen napkin. She looked drained, white and tense, though, in a strange way, not as bad as she had looked when Wetzon first met her in Harry’s. Her nose had seemed thicker then, her chin less defined. Now her face seemed fuller and younger.

  Of course, Wetzon realized, wondering if she was gawking, Mildred must have had a face lift. Wetzon leaned her briefcase on the floor against the sofa and took a sip of lemon water. It was good.

  Roberta shifted her position several times, crossing and recrossing slim ankles, not speaking, sending out waves of impatience. Mildred Gleason, watching her anxiously, stood up, the gold bracelets on her narrow wrists clinking. Her fingers played with the heavy gold chain around her neck. Two small, dark perspiration spots stained the underarms of the rose silk blouse. She closed the door to the hallway and leaned against it as if to catch her breath. A Bunker Ramo on her desk burbled and bleeped like a stew pot. Wetzon hadn’t seen one of those machines in a long time. Most of the firms had switched to Quotrons. She had good legs, Wetzon thought, her mind drifting.

  “I ... ah ... Barry ...” Mildred began. The phone rang. She whirled and picked it up. “No calls ... didn’t I say no interruptions? ... Oh ... why am I being bothered, Bobbie?” Bobbie didn’t answer. Mildred looked, as she spoke, more and more disordered, standing there leaning over her tremendous desk, her hair on end, her makeup smeared, the perspiration stains on her beautiful blo
use. She lit a cigarette, still bent over the desk. “Who? Oh ... I’ll have to call him back ... what was the name? ... Tell him four-thirty will be fine. Now, no interruptions/’ She hung up. “I’m sorry about this ... uh, these last two days.... My God, where was I?” She straightened up as she spoke. Ashes dotted her dark skirt.

  “Barry.”

  “Yes. Barry. That was the police, you know. A detective named Silvestri wants to see me at four-thirty today.” Wetzon had the distinct feeling that Mildred was speaking to Bobbie even though she was looking directly at her.

  “You? Why?” Wetzon asked.

  “Don’t you know? You must know....”

  “Of course she knows.” Bobbie’s voice was dipped in scorn. She didn’t move.

  “I’m sorry. You’re confusing me. I don’t know why you wanted to see me. Perhaps if you could tell me what this is all about?” Mildred’s nervousness was contagious. Wetzon found Bobbie, in spite of her migraine, sitting stonelike with her dark glasses and her arms folded, intimidating.

  “I heard it,” Mildred Gleason said distractedly. “I heard him being murdered and I couldn’t do anything. I knew they would trace it. I’ve been expecting them. Oh, God, it was horrible. I heard him being murdered.”

  In the corner, Bobbie made a coarse noise that was a cross between a cough and a laugh.

  “You ... Barry? Barry was calling you when he was murdered? Why?” Wetzon was baffled. What did it mean? One thing it meant for sure: if Mildred had heard Barry being killed over the phone, she had not murdered him.

  Mildred strew more ashes with a quick, restless gesture of her hand. “He was working for me. We were working on something, a deal, on the side....”

  “I told you not to trust him. He was a lying scumbag.” Bobbie made no effort to hide her contempt. “He double-crossed us.”

  Mildred lit another cigarette from the remaining tip of her butt, then stubbed the first out convulsively. She shot an angry look at Bobbie. “It was a secret.” She drew closer to Wetzon. “You’ve got to help me, Leslie. May I call you Leslie?” She sat on the arm of the sofa, not waiting for an answer. “I know you can, and I’m desperate. I’ll make it worth your while. I’m a very wealthy woman, you know ... and I’m very good to my friends.”