I was close to urinating in my pants, but instead I quietly bit the tip of my tongue, as hard as I could stand it.
"I would like to know what is being covered up, Mr. Wy-eth! I would like Jay Rainey to tell us! He knows the land. He grew up on it. It's eighty-six acres, Mr. Wy-eth. Not so big. But we could spend a very long time and lots of money trying to find out. The snow will be gone soon, maybe tomorrow. We want to know what we are dealing with here. Underground gasoline tanks? Buried herbicide? I know that the potato farmers used arsenic for many years and that many of the old barns still have bags and bags of it. It could be many things. Water moves under the ground. Sideways, up and down. I am worried about planting vines and in three years the roots find some kind of poison. The vines die, maybe. Or, worse than that, we find herbicide in our wine, we find trace elements. We use Roundup, this is very good stuff, breaks down to water. We like that. But other farmers in the past used very bad stuff. You can get terrible things in the wine. You have to tear out vines, Mr. Wy-eth! A terrible thing. Expensive, and very painful. So we are careful. We are thorough."
"Yes."
"It looks to me like the bulldozer was trying to add some soil over about a two-acre area, okay? The till depth to establish the vines is twenty-four inches, in your measurements. This is standard out there and is well known. Deeper than potatoes. I suspect, yes, that he was trying to be sure our tillers did not hit anything. You see, when the ground freezes and thaws, things come up. But if you add soil on top of them, they might stay hidden longer. We want to know what the problem is, Mr. Wy-eth. We want to take care of the problem in such a way that it doesn't attract the interest of the local residents. The environmental officials, okay? I have heard that when the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation gets involved, the delays are usually measured in years. Years! I am sure you understand that we do not want the publicity of our arrival in any way damaged by bad news, Mr. Wy-eth."
"I'll have to talk to my client."
"Yes. You see, we have to get moving on the construction of our vineyard. We have financing lined up, we have a planting schedule, we are about to build the first two barns. We have to get the land ready. The vines get planted in May, but there's a lot to do before that. The land has to be tilled and raked, graded and fertilized, thousands of posts put in. For the variety we wish to grow, we have a two-week window to plant the vines, so that the roots go deep enough to take the summer heat— otherwise we wait another year, Mr. Wy-eth. So we need Mr. Rainey's help soon, very soon."
"I will talk with him."
"We would like him to take us to the place on the land and tell us just what exactly we may find under the soil. I want him to point to a spot in the ground and say dig here and you will find whatever it is that he is hiding from me. We do not want to plant vines and then find out we have to tear them out."
"That's reasonable." I bit my roll, but it might as well have been my fist.
"We know a lot about Mr. Rainey already, we know he grew up there. I have tried to call him, I have been goddamn fucking polite."
I didn't doubt this.
"I would like an answer in one day, please."
"I'll see what I can do."
"Yes," he said. "Or you will see what we can do." He pulled something from his breast pocket. "Here," he said. "I believe this is yours."
He handed me the same old business card I'd given the cop the night before.
"That is yours, no?"
Yes. The lettering, so neat and formal, the name and address, my name, my title, all my old phone numbers, four of them and e-mail, all the signifiers of a former life. The sight of the card made me sick. I'd handed it to the policeman late the night before, a hundred miles away, and here it was again? How? Marceno, like any good businessman, might already have an understanding with the local police department, may even have asked them to keep an eye out for trespassers, and when called and told about the interaction, had one of his minions drive out to retrieve the card.
"I have something else for you, Mr. Wy-eth."
"Yes?"
He looked at Miss Allana. She reached down to her feet— slowly, keeping her back straight and legs crossed— and retrieved a large purse, from which she pulled a legal-size manila envelope. Marceno took the envelope, opened it, and slid out two documents. Even across the table I could tell it was a lawsuit.
"Please deliver this to Jay Rainey." He handed me one of the documents. "And this copy— this copy is for you."
I skipped my eyes over the first page. I was named as a defendant.
"Wait—"
"If he gives us a good answer, we will tear it up."
"Listen, I'm not—"
"You were Mr. Rainey's legal representation in his deal with Voodoo LLC."
"But I'm not involved in—"
"And according to the local police, you accompanied Mr. Rainey out to the land last night. Trespassing, I should add."
Marceno stood, as did Miss Allana, and they left without further word. He was going to take her to a hotel or apartment and spend some time with her beautiful sea-creature mouth and I was going to spend some time with a lawsuit. A great steaming plate of tandori chicken landed in front of me, but I slid it aside and lifted the first page of the document. There it was, Jay and I both named as defendants, allegations of fraud, misconduct, misrepresentation, and whatever else they could dream up, the amount being sought nothing less than ten million dollars. Some junior associate at a third-string law firm had pumped out the language. It's easy; you get an old suit, change the names and addresses, doctor up the wording. It was just a bluff, a device meant to get one's attention. Yes, meant to make the acid creep up your throat, meant to remind you that mistakes are costly and dread very cheap indeed. But even such trumped-up attacks have a way of quietly sucking the sauce out of people; they are expensive to win and disastrous to lose, they become part of your psychic history, they snap your life onto a grid of legal filings and motions and court calendars. But worse than that, I feared the unknown connection between Herschel, his frozen eyes lifted to a dark heaven, and Marceno's orderly wrath. Old black farmhands with sixty years' experience don't end up on bulldozers in the middle of a snowstorm without their socks on.
* * *
Was the next part luck? Not quite. Mostly a guess as I stood out on the street, wind against my cheeks, angry with Jay and a little scared, the lawsuit rolled thick as a magazine and jammed in my pocket. It was, after all, a Thursday night in February, and Jay had circled all the Thursday night games on the girls' basketball schedule I'd found in his car the night before. Plus, he'd said that very afternoon that he had an important appointment in the evening. No, it wasn't much of a deduction, but still it took me a while. I flagged down a cab near the Plaza Hotel. The school was only twenty blocks away, and I knew it well, for it was one that Timothy might have gone to when he'd gotten older.
The school's gym stood around the corner from its main entrance and I could hear the cheers roaring out of the high, lighted windows. I stepped past the guard without making eye contact, walked down a corridor of pewter trophies, many of them fifty or eighty years old, and into a small, old-time gym. It was packed with parents. They looked tired and quite prosperous, many of them clearly on the way home from the office, dragging briefcases, caught in the whirling time-squeeze of parenthood and work. These were people with jobs and marriages and lunches scheduled months into the future; I used to be one of them and I hunched a bit, as much out of shame as from the worry I might see someone I knew. You never can tell whom you're going to run into in these places and it was quite possible I'd encounter fathers or mothers of Timothy's old friends, or even people who knew Wilson Doan. This thought nearly made me turn around, and I was glad to be dressed in a suit, as if that might protect me from something.
The home team was losing by nine points. I found a seat in the bleachers. Time was running out— eight minutes left in the fourth quarter. The girls on the court were sweaty a
nd red-faced and excited; most of them had breasts or the beginning of breasts and they fussed with their hair and uniforms, but by the standards of the world, they were children. I scanned the crowd for Jay, and after a minute spotted him on the far side of the gym, in the section reserved for rooters from the other school. He sat on the top bleacher next to the wall, bent over.
Something in me recoiled. Perhaps it was the avid lean of Jay's big body. He was peering intently through a small pair of binoculars, but not, it seemed, following the game. The ball was passing back and forth in front of him, the girls shrieking, the coach hollering directions. But the binoculars didn't move. Then he put them down and opened a small notebook. He scrawled a few sentences, presumably in the same slanting block letters he'd written on the back of the slip of stationery, closed his eyes, and then wrote a little more. I was watching an act of worship. He folded the notebook into his breast pocket and lifted the binoculars again.
I considered going over to Jay, but realized I might learn more if I watched him from across the court. Maybe he knew one of the girls on the court. Maybe he was a sexual predator stalking one of them. Maybe Allison would be interested to know. The game progressed. The gym was warm and I loosened my coat. The visiting team looked like it would win by about a dozen points. The coach hollered, the crowd cheered. One of the home-team girls fouled out.
"Substitution," called the announcer, a nasally teenage boy in a coat and tie. "Coming in, number five, Sally Cowles."
A girl stepped forward from the scorer's table and ran onto the court to a smattering of polite applause. She was tallish and leggy and a little awkward in her baggy jersey and shorts, but she took her position on the floor quickly. Cowles, Sally Cowles. This had to be the daughter of the Englishman we'd met that morning, no? I had not seen the photo on Cowles's desk well enough to make the match. She looked about fourteen, still very much a girl, breasts not yet developed, her body more up and down than curving. But her large eyes and well-formed face promised beauty. I glanced back at Jay. Now his binoculars followed the action of the game, the action of the girl, I should say, and on the occasion when play stopped at the end of the court near him, when Sally Cowles stood just thirty feet or so from him, her face sweaty and eyes alert, knees bent and waiting for the referee to whistle play to begin, Jay Rainey lowered his binoculars and stared at her.
I glanced from one to the other, trying to understand their connection, but then someone behind me was calling my name. I turned fearfully, and there was Dan Tuthill five bleacher rows up, good old Dan Tuthill, looking a little grayer, and a lot heavier, firing me a big wave. He said something to his wife next to him, then began stepping down the bleachers, his enormous stomach tented in a green sport short.
"Jeez, Bill, you look great!" he said when he reached me, breathing like the wealthy fat man he was. "I told Mindy, I think that's got to be Bill Wyeth, can't believe it, just great to see you."
We shook hands with the old conspiratorial intimacy. "You here to see your daughter?" I asked.
"Yeah, she made a layup in the second quarter. Total luck it went in. You?"
"I'm here, well, to meet a client."
He nodded, perhaps impressed. "Anyone I know?"
"Probably not."
He knew I wouldn't tell him.
"How's it going at the firm?" I asked him.
"Ah, don't ask." His face sagged in pain. I'd always liked this about Dan; his emotions were right there for you to see, up or down. "I mean, I'll tell you, but Christ! Nobody knows where the power is anymore. All the young guys are pissed off at the old guys for sucking up all the bonus money. I qualify as an old guy now. The really old guys are nervous. They fired two lawyers last week and two more quit. It's a fucking nightmare, Bill. The executive committee is a snake pit."
"I thought you were on that committee now," I said, glancing to see that Jay was still in his seat.
"I used to be." He shrugged at the unstoppable flow of time. "Listen, it's good to see you, Bill. See that you're out there, in circulation." He gave me a little affectionate slug in the arm. "You look good, you look trim. Been working out?"
I laughed. "I eat mostly steak."
"I've heard about that diet, I should try it. All protein or something…. You know, Bill, I'm still sorry about— all that stuff that happened…"
"Yeah," I said.
"Did you land anywhere, pardon the expression?"
"I landed hard, Dan. Let's put it that way."
"But it looks like you've got a little work?" he asked gently.
"I could always use more."
He stared at me, wheels clicking in his head. I remembered the look. Dan liked deals, he liked speed, he liked action. "We should have lunch." His voice was thoughtful. "We could talk about some things, you know?"
"Name the time, guy."
He pulled an electronic device out of his pocket. "I always say I better not drop this thing…" He pushed a button, studied the tiny screen. "Day after tomorrow? One? Harvard Club?"
"You got it."
"I'm really glad to see you. Frankly, there's a lot going on— I can't discuss it here, but we'll kick it around, okay?" He shook my hand as if it was he who needed me, and returned to his wife. I didn't know what to make of the interaction except that it had been surprisingly pleasant and confirmed that you should always keep a decent suit around. I could still fit in. In fact, the parents around me didn't give me a second look at all; I was just another fortyish guy in a tie. It felt good, it felt possible.
Then I turned back to look for Jay. He was gone.
But perhaps I could follow him. I bounced down the bleacher steps, making my apologies, and hurried out to the street, hoping to see his large frame ahead of me. I took a chance and walked east toward Lexington Avenue, past the lighted windows of other people's lives.
That was when I felt a hand slide into my armpit.
A hoarse voice: "Easy."
Two tall, well-dressed white guys walked on either side of me.
"Take the wallet," I said. "Just leave me the ID, okay?"
"Relax."
"I don't care about the credit cards, just—"
"Hey, re-lax."
They were hustling me toward a double-parked limo. A third man jumped out and opened the back doors.
"Look, I talked with Marceno earlier! I have the lawsuit in my pocket right here, I understand the situation, I know he's serious."
One of the men shrugged at the other. "Not a clue."
A taxi went by, not stopping. They hustled me inside the limo, sat on either side of me. The seat was soft and I sank backward comfortably. Both men sank down next to me as well.
The one on my right said, "Let's go," and the car started to move.
"H.J. said he'd call when."
We were cruising downtown. "Who is H.J.?" I asked.
"He's the gentleman who keeps us in his admirable employ."
The accent was Irish, I guessed. "Hey guys, come on."
"Just taking orders."
"I think you got the wrong man."
The man on my right whispered something under his breath, and instead of shooting me in the head, right there in the car, a mess for someone to clean up, he leaned forward and turned on the television in the console in front of us. It was CNN and we watched a terse summary of the situation in the Middle East.
"They got it wrong, Denny," announced the man on my left. "They left out the part about who really owns the bloody oil."
"My cousin from over here was in the second Gulf War, you know."
"Guys, come on," I tried again. "This is the wrong—"
"He kill anybody? Any wee action with the ragheads?"
"He killed forty-one, by his count," said the one named Denny. "Also he shot at some Iraqi trucks, blew them to shite with a grenade launcher."
"Look, you guys aren't looking for me, you're probably looking for—"
"There's a fellow in Queens who sells those things."
"Get o
ut."
"Swear to it. Eight thousand dollars."
The man on my left nodded. "We could go there now, after we deal with Andrew Wyeth here."
"Bill Wyeth, not Andrew Wyeth."
"He's the great painter, the artist, right?"
"Yes, American archetypes, Maine, all that. Bit of the stony coast and the sea."
The Havana Room Page 19