Acts of Malice

by Perri O'shaughnessy

  Her hand scrabbled in the change bin. She was out of quarters, and sixty bucks down. The man next to her gave her a sideways glance and then looked hurriedly away, and she felt the intense humiliation of the loser with an empty purse. No one must see that there wasn’t a single quarter left in her change bucket. She picked it up and, remembering that ‘‘slot machines’’ was an anagram for ‘‘cash lost in ’em,’’ ditched the bucket between a couple of Genie’s Treasure slots a few rows away.

  As she slunk out, she happened to look over toward the escalators leading toward the Race and Sports Book area on the second floor. Mrs. Geiger and another lady were gliding up toward it, talking animatedly, with the same bewitched expression on their faces that she had felt on her own face coming in.

  And it was Mrs. Geiger in the waiting room on Monday morning, her purse in her lap and her bird-like darting eyes bright with anticipation, when Nina came in.

  ‘‘The check came in on Saturday,’’ Sandy explained. ‘‘And you said to let her know right away.’’

  ‘‘Great! I’ll be right with you, Mrs. Geiger.’’

  She grabbed her messages and went into her office. Ginger and Tony wanted to talk to her. Jim had called. So had three other clients, two opposing counsels, and an insurance adjustor in a pear tree. She resigned herself to that kind of day.

  Sandy escorted Mrs. Geiger in and laid some papers on the desk along with the insurance company’s check in the amount of two hundred and forty thousand dollars and no cents.

  Nina explained the paperwork point by point while Mrs. Geiger sat and listened, her bright-eyed expression never changing.

  When Nina said, ‘‘Do you have any questions?’’

  She piped up, ‘‘I have to pay sixty thousand dollars for my legal fee to you? That’s a lot, hon.’’

  ‘‘It’s right here in the contract between us, if you’ll recall. My fee is twenty-five percent of the gross recovery.’’

  ‘‘That’s a lot. Considering there was no trial.’’

  ‘‘It is a lot. But if you had lost your case, which was definitely a possibility, I would have recovered nothing. Partly the fee is a reflection of the fact that I was right there with you taking the risk, Mrs. Geiger.’’

  ‘‘Just like on Friday night.’’

  ‘‘I beg your pardon?’’

  ‘‘There we were at Harrah’s, taking the risk together. I saw you down on the main floor as I was going up. You win anything, hon?’’

  ‘‘Well, I don’t think—’’

  ‘‘Me neither. But my sister and I, we had a whale of a time. We won the first race. Too bad about the rest of them.’’ Mrs. Geiger sighed. ‘‘Well, all right, hon. You take your fee. And this other eighteen thousand I’m not getting?’’

  ‘‘Medical bills you haven’t paid yet, costs of deposition, your doctors’ reports, filing fees.’’

  ‘‘That’s a lot, too.’’

  ‘‘It’s a good recovery,’’ Nina said. ‘‘You seemed quite satisfied with it before.’’

  ‘‘Oh, I am, hon. It’s enough to buy a little house in my sister’s neighborhood and buy some stock. I’ll be all right. In a couple years I’ll be getting sosh-security and I’ll be just fine.’’

  ‘‘How’s it going with Mr. Geiger?’’ Nina asked.

  ‘‘Oh, he hauled his tired old carcass back to Oklahoma, hon.’’

  ‘‘I’m sorry to hear that. Really. I hoped it was a temporary problem.’’

  ‘‘He was the problem. Skinflint. Didn’t know how to have a good time. Thirty-one years sitting in his dad-blamed fishing boat. Bored me silly. My sister and me, we’re going to get out there now and raise hell.’’

  ‘‘So—I take it you still want a divorce?’’

  ‘‘ASAP. Just point me where to sign.’’

  Nina took some more notes so that she could prepare the petition for dissolution. At length, Mrs. Geiger hopped up to leave. ‘‘You take care, now, hon,’’ she said. She folded up her check thoughtfully and stashed it in her wallet. With a wink, she was gone.

  Nina got on the phone and sprayed extinguisher on a few minor wildfires while Sandy tapped on the keyboard outside. Due to the new hot-milk whipper Nina had purchased at the Raley’s when she finally made it there on Sunday afternoon, the coffee tasted superb. Botelho crooned in the background. The fig in the corner seemed to be enjoying the new fertilizer she was putting on it.

  A semblance of calm and control reigned over the office. Mrs. Geiger had her check, and Nina had her own big fee to fatten up the skeletal bank account and pay off some recent heavy bills. Maybe the geologist and Ginger could convince Judge Flaherty at the prelim that Jim shouldn’t be bound over for trial. Maybe she would buy one of those Apple G3 laptops like Ginger had. One might almost imagine, at this moment, that practicing law could be satisfying, even enjoyable.

  From her office she watched a uniformed cop walk into the outer office. ‘‘Mrs. Reilly here?’’ he asked Sandy.

  ‘‘What’s it about, Vern?’’ Sandy said.

  ‘‘A delivery. Papers from Mr. Hallowell. Additional discovery in the Strong case.’’

  ‘‘Well, what are you waiting for? Hand it over.’’

  ‘‘You have to sign for it, Sandy,’’ he said.

  ‘‘I know that. Here.’’ A manila envelope passed from hand to hand. Sandy’s chair screeched faintly in relief as she left it. There came the sound of jingling from silver bracelets. Her face loomed in the doorway, the envelope flapping in her hand. She brought it to Nina’s desk and turned to go.

  ‘‘And how do you know Vern?’’ Nina said as she picked it up.

  ‘‘Vern?’’

  ‘‘The policeman who just came in.’’

  ‘‘He’s my other next-door neighbor,’’ said Sandy.

  Nina tore the envelope open, removed the cover letter, and looked at the interview summary that Collier was providing to her under the Rules of Court requiring that he share his evidence with her.

  Somebody named Gene Malavoy. Something about Jim firing him. Something about an argument between Jim and his father.

  Something that smelled like more fresh, steaming trouble.

  ‘‘Tell me about Gene Malavoy, Jim.’’

  ‘‘He was a night host at the lodge. We had to let him go.’’

  ‘‘Why?’’

  ‘‘I suspected he was doing drugs in the bathroom on his breaks. He’s a complete loser. He’s a good-looking kid and the customers like him, that’s why he lasted as long as he did. What’s this about?’’ She had caught Jim at a busy time at the lodge. He looked impatient, even angry to see her. Sun poured through the windows onto the down- and polyester-filled jackets of the skiers crowding the tables.

  ‘‘He’s given a statement to the D.A.’s office claiming that you fired him wrongfully.’’

  ‘‘Figures. To be expected. Look, I’m very busy.’’

  ‘‘There’s more. Somebody else, a girl named Gina Beloit, told Mr. Hallowell that you and your father had a fight about it, and that your father wanted to replace you with Alex as the lodge manager.’’

  ‘‘See? I know Gina. She quit the other day. They’re getting their whole backstabbing game together. She said that?’’

  ‘‘She’s resisting giving a sworn statement. The phone call is probably inadmissible as hearsay, but I still need to check with you on it.’’

  ‘‘Both of them, big losers.’’ He caught her response to that line and he dropped the angry expression. ‘‘When am I supposed to have had this argument?’’

  ‘‘Two days before Alex died.’’

  ‘‘So what would it mean, if my father did want to replace me?’’

  ‘‘Well, it might be inferred from that that you had a motive to harm Alex.’’

  ‘‘But we’re going to prove it was an accident!’’

  ‘‘No, Jim,’’ Nina said. ‘‘We can’t prove that at this point. We do have people working on proving it. I have to check on t
hings like this with you as they come up.’’

  ‘‘Well, it never happened,’’ Jim said, his face set. ‘‘It’s a plot against me by the staff. My father let them get completely out of control, and they don’t like my efforts to shape them up. And they want to think I killed my brother. They want me out.’’

  ‘‘The summary says that during this alleged conversation Gina heard your father say, ‘Marianne won’t like it.’ In reference to your firing Malavoy.’’

  Jim said, ‘‘She’s an accomplished liar. Good detail. Because, see, Marianne knows him from somewhere. He’s French. She got him the job. Gina would know that.’’

  ‘‘Really.’’ Nina made a mental note to confirm that.

  She had flashed to the Dalbello boots outside Marianne’s door in Zephyr Cove—Malavoy’s? ‘‘His name isn’t French,’’ she went on, puzzled.

  ‘‘Yeah, it is. Gene. Spelled ‘Jean.’ You know, like ‘Zhaungh,’ ’’ Jim said. ‘‘He tells everybody it’s the American spelling, because he’s embarrassed at having a girl’s name. That reminds me. I forgot to tell you this. Forgot it myself, until now. Gene gave Alex a black eye. I saw it on the mountain, the day he died. Alex said Malavoy jumped him.’’

  ‘‘Why would he do that?’’

  ‘‘You’ve got me. Alex didn’t have a clue. He didn’t even report it. I mean, I’m the one who fired the kid.’’

  This brought up another point in Gina Beloit’s statement. According to that statement, Jim had bragged about telling Gene Malavoy that Alex was the one who had made the decision to fire him. If true, it would explain perfectly why Malavoy would attack Alex the day before his death. It gave Malavoy a grudge against Alex, maybe even a motive to kill him. But would Jim admit he’d done something so malicious? He was denying that there had even been a conversation.

  How to approach this?

  ‘‘Are you positive you’re not mistaken? Are you sure there was no conversation about Malavoy with your father?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘No! I’m telling you, there wasn’t!’’

  She gave up, but she didn’t believe him.

  ‘‘How long have you been the manager at the lodge?’’ she asked instead.

  ‘‘What difference does it make?’’

  ‘‘How long?’’ Nina said, resisting the pressure to slack off.

  ‘‘Three months!’’

  ‘‘And what did you do before that?’’

  ‘‘Operations manager outside.’’

  ‘‘And Alex was working—where?’’

  ‘‘At the lodge. He’d been doing it for years. We did a switch. I wanted to be in the lodge. He didn’t mind.’’

  ‘‘Your father must have had a lot of trust in you, to put you into that job.’’

  ‘‘Trust? I don’t know if that’s the word. But I’m trying. Alex was too soft with the staff and I’m handling that problem. And I better get back to it. I’m trying to keep everything together until my father gets back. There’s another mess happening too. It’s Marianne.’’

  ‘‘What about her?’’

  ‘‘It’s the stock shares. She’s got one third of the company now. She’s hinting around at selling out if I’m not nice to her. She knows my father and I can’t afford to buy her out right away. She could blow the company wide open. We’d have to go public. It wouldn’t be the Strong family operation anymore.’’

  ‘‘So be nice to her.’’

  ‘‘You don’t get it,’’ Jim said. ‘‘You don’t get what being nice to her means. I’m not going to fuck her for money. Or marry her. She’s a cobra.’’

  ‘‘I didn’t mean that!’’ Nina said, shocked.

  ‘‘Oh, let’s drop it,’’ Jim said. He was getting more and more agitated.

  ‘‘Sure. I’m sorry to have interrupted you, but it was important to tell you about this and get your reaction.’’

  ‘‘What’s happening, huh? I get up this morning thinking, it’s all right, I’m gonna be okay, we’re getting a geologist and this whole thing will blow by next week in court. Then you show up with your questions. Do you know how hard it is for me to keep going with all this? And nobody to help me? They’ve all let me down. Alex and Heidi and my father. They don’t care about me or the resort.’’

  ‘‘Your father cares about both you and the business, I’m sure, Jim,’’ Nina said, trying to calm him down.

  ‘‘Then where is he? Let me tell you where he is. He’s off grieving over Alex while I go to hell. You know why he’s not here? He can’t stand to look at me!’’ Jim was shouting. He looked around him, at the shocked face of the cashier nearby.

  ‘‘Whaddaya think you’re looking at?’’ he demanded, and she looked down nervously. Nina was kicking herself for trying to talk to him at work. He had warned her before to call him at home because he didn’t trust his reactions. She ought to know by now that he was impulsive.

  ‘‘I’m sorry, Jim,’’ she said. ‘‘We should have met at my office.’’

  ‘‘It’s true about my father. He called me and told me to take some time off when he gets back. I think he’s going to kick me out of the only thing I’ve got left.’’

  ‘‘I’ll talk to him.’’

  ‘‘You will? Change his mind?’’

  ‘‘I’ll talk to him. Go back to work. Sorry I disturbed you.’’

  ‘‘It’s okay. Sometimes it feels as though everyone is against me but you—’’

  ‘‘I know.’’

  ‘‘I just want things back to normal. I want to do my job and be left alone. It’ll be over soon. Right?’’

  ‘‘Good-bye, Jim.’’

  14

  JIM STRONG’S ARREST had been reported at great length in the Tahoe Mirror. The San Francisco papers and all the suburban dailies had by now picked up the story and resurrected old photographs of Jim and Alex on the slopes together. Nina found one photo, printed in color by the San Jose paper, particularly poignant. It featured all four of them, Alex and Marianne, Jim and Heidi, all smiles, arms around each other, frozen images of health, happiness, and family fealty.

  Fortunately, the explosive forensics findings either hadn’t found their way into the insatiable maw of the reporting machine, or the papers were taking a cautious course and waiting for the prelim, which would be public and hard news.

  Anyway, another story shared billing with Jim’s case in Tahoe that fall—the weather report. Not since the ghastly winter of 1846, when the snows began in October and continued until April, had so much snow been predicted in the Sierra. Every night, the people in town turned on their TVs to watch the weather lady cheerfully predict another wave of storms.

  All day trucks lumbered along the streets with loads of wood, propane, and extra supplies for the grocery stores. Matt had all his tow trucks, now comprising a small fleet, tuned up and ready to go, with extra drivers ready on call. The bears were rumored to be coming into town at night to forage, and the ski resorts were pausing in their money-counting to wonder if they were in for too much of a good thing, and the traffic would come to a screeching halt, buried under the weight of all that snow.

  A quiet frenzy of preparation gripped everyone, including Nina and Bob. They had stacked several cords of wood under the porch now, all they could stuff under there. The dial on the propane tank along the side of the house registered full.

  The question was not if there would be a power outage, but when. The frontier culture had always underlain the modern town, and the locals returned to it almost gladly.

  The town had become so beautiful in this new season, not dirty around the edges as it would be in the spring, but glorious and fresh, like an extended Christmas. Or was it being in love that gave her this buoyant energy, that made the world glorious and let her carry her loads lightly?

  Collier came over for dinner every couple of nights. She fixed something simple like spaghetti and the three of them sacked out in front of the fireplace on the rug and played board games. Collier taught Bob to play pin
ochle and Bob soon beat him.

  The Monopoly game was dusted off and, like a Rorschach blot, brought out their core personalities—Bob, headstrong and erratic, buying indiscriminately and sometimes having to sell for ready cash; Collier, the slow and steady empire builder, cautious and implacable; and Nina, propertyless except for the hotels on Park Place and Broadway that she always managed to erect, all her hopes resting on the red plastic traps on the board that sometimes caught the other two.

  Nina thought—hoped, prayed—that they liked each other. Bob was struggling with it, she could see that, and she felt the familiar guilt at putting him through another change.

  And on those same evenings, after Bob had gone to bed, at first they would go out for an hour, drive to the top of Ski Run Boulevard or Kingsbury Grade, and park the car like teenagers. But that was intolerable, cold and uncomfortable, and what if a cop on patrol shined in his flashlight and rousted them?

  So they started driving straight to Collier’s and took their single hour on his bed with its black sheets and gray comforter. Then Nina would jump up and throw on her coat and drive the four miles home along Pioneer Trail alone, in complete disarray, worrying about leaving Bob alone at night, worrying about hitting a tree on the lonely icy road and having to go to the hospital with no underwear on, worrying about the files waiting for her attention on her own bed, worrying because it was all getting too complicated too fast.

  But not worrying enough to slow down. They were riding a tsunami. Nothing could slow them down.