Heartbalm

by Malachi Stone

  “And from what you told me over the phone, it sounds like they should have severed these cases for trial. That could be a constitutional violation.”

  “So there’s hope?”

  “There’s always hope. Let me meticulously review the files and sniff out the reversible errors. I can always find something, believe me. It’s always there, lurking in the transcripts, waiting to be found.” I opened a desk drawer, retrieved a blank attorney representation agreement and a receipt book, and began filling in names and amounts.

  “Now as we discussed, the retainer is twenty thousand,” I said evenly, trying to sound bored. “And will you be paying that by personal check?”

  Heart averted her eyes, covered her mouth and coughed.

  Ruth said, “I am prepared to pay you five hundred dollars today, and to make whatever additional payments are appropriate as the case progresses. I prefer to receive a detailed itemization of all services performed, on a monthly basis if at all possible.” I noticed her head had stopped bobbing.

  I looked at Heart, at her figure straining that dress to capacity, her mother beside her. I imagined the two of them in bed together, with me in the middle. Nana Bobble-Head could double as Nana Chicken-Head. Heart looked at me expectantly, lips slightly parted.

  “Do you need a pen?” I said.

  “To whom shall I make the check payable?”

  “We have a stamp.”

  “I thought we were talking twenty thousand dollars,” I said to Heart as soon as her mother bobbled out the front door after having dropped off the latest copies of The Watchtower and Awake.

  Heart hesitated. “I said she made mention of twenty thousand dollars,” she began. “Mom is supported by her teacher’s retirement pension supplemented by a small disability check each month.”

  “By the way, you never made mention of any kids in your life.”

  “Are you shattered? Because you look positively shattered.”

  “Shattered doesn’t begin to describe what I’m feeling. Everybody’s got kids; I’ve got kids. But if Mom’s living on a fixed income, what’s she doing making mention of twenty grand? In this office we tend to look unkindly on anyone who takes the name of Mammon in vain.”

  “Beattie’s bond was—is, twenty thousand. It’s still posted but we can’t touch it during the pendency of the appeal.”

  “Pendency?”

  “Of course once you win her appeal, I’m sure she and Mom would be happy to consider executing a bond assignment paying the bond over to you. See how easy?” Heart smiled fetchingly.

  “Why do I have the distinct feeling I’ve been snookered? And by two lovely women yet.”

  “We’re double trouble,” Heart said.

  “In more ways than one. Tell me, Heart, have you reviewed these files yourself?”

  “Every night for months. Mom had to pay that appellate defender guy twenty-five cents a page for the copies, but I told her it was worth it. Two heads are better than one.”

  “Keep feeding me straight lines like that and I’m liable to go crazy and leap right over the desk at you.”

  She giggled. “Would you like me to prepare a withdrawal and substitution of attorneys form? And a cover letter to the current attorney indicating your intention to take over Beattie’s case?”

  “You read my mind. Also a notarized bond assignment for your mother and your sister as co-signatories. And keep close track of your hours. This firm bills thirty-five dollars per hour for paralegal time. Someday we may even manage to collect some of it.”

  “I’ll remember that at salary negotiation time.”

  “May that time never come. How does seven-fifty an hour sound, until it does?”

  “Sounds a lot like the minimum wage in the State of Illinois.”

  “A mere coincidence.”

  “You know what they say: there are no coincidences.”

  “What about eight-fifty, then? Time and a half for overtime.”

  “Twelve would be better.” A tight smile.

  “It sure in the hell would. Ten. Final offer.”

  “Eleven. Final demand.”

  “You drive a hard bargain.”

  “Now who’s feeding whom straight lines?”

  “All right, eleven. Diane will have to take in mending and washing, and we may wind up selling one or two of the kids on the black market, but we’ll manage.”

  “I’ll bring you good luck,” Heart said. “See, I already made you five bills, and on a Saturday yet.”

  “But I had to sacrifice my quality time to do it.”

  “Shall I make it up to you?”

  Before I could think of a reply we heard the familiar scrape and drag of the front door against the sill again. I really had to have that fixed, and install a door chime. Heart sprang to attention and ran out to greet the new divorce while I sat at my desk and shuffled papers, attempting to look busy and professional. Idly on a notepad I wrote the day’s date and the figure five thousand dollars in capital letters embellished with flourishing curlicues, so I wouldn’t forget.

  The socialite divorce turned out to be a redneck with an apparent aversion to comparison shopping: the average retainer in a contested divorce case in St. Clair County was more like two thousand. He sat in the right-hand client chair, legs apart, big-knuckled hands splayed on his knees, the weight of him flattening and endangering the resiliency of my beaver wedge. His name Howard was sewn into his work shirt pocket with red cursive monogram stitching. Howard Kuhn, sole proprietor of Howard’s Security Service, a burglar alarm installation company. Acting in the course of his professional expertise Howard had installed a hidden webcam in his master bedroom and thereby managed to gather irrefutable evidence of his wife in flagrante delicto with another party. Caught in the act of being themselves, as the saying goes. Confronted with Howard’s candid camera, the wife nevertheless failed to react with the requisite degree of contrition and shame he might have found appropriate. Rather, she in turn accused him of a broad range of marital shortcomings that, taken together, had driven her into the arms of one whom in bygone days we would have referred to as the co-respondent: in this case, another woman.

  While I commiserated with Howard over life’s misfortunes, my door opened and Heart presented me with a newly-prepared attorney representation agreement. Rather than leave a blank for the retainer, she had inserted the five thousand dollar figure as though it were a non-negotiable part of the printed form. Clever girl.

  Clever woman, as Diane would no doubt have corrected me.

  After Howard signed the contract and handed over the check, Heart wrote him a receipt and left us alone while she made copies. I took the opportunity to question Howard about security cameras and their concealment.

  “Had a break-in last night,” I said.

  “No shit?”

  “Tore the place all to hell. Cops think bikers did it.”

  “No.”

  “Is it expensive to install a couple cameras around?”

  Howard reared back and began his schpiel. “Your cameras are your most economical element in a good security system,” he began, “ranging anywhere from twenty on up to around ninety dollars per, depending on what you call your pixel rating.”

  “You mean I could buy a security camera from you for as low as twenty bucks?”

  “You can go to a store and buy one for less’n twenty bucks, although I’d personally recommend greater pixel density for what you got in mind. You want, I could hook it up so’s you could even view it remote on your computer at home, check the place out while you’re gone. Or keep an eye on your employees, make sure they’re not fucking the dog on you, know what I mean? Works on the same principle as one a your so-called nanny cams. Course there’s privacy considerations and all that sort of thing; we don’t get into any a that. You’re the lawyer. We’re technicians, is all we are, no more, no less.”

  I looked Howard over. Could I trust him with what I was about to suggest? I took a chance. Lowering my voice I s
aid, “What I’m really after, Howard, what I actually have in mind, is some kind of a cheap camera hidden in the can, to spy on whether my secretary is using drugs during her bathroom breaks, know what I mean?”

  Howard didn’t even hesitate. “Say no more. I’ll set her up.” A can-do kind of guy, salt of the earth American entrepreneur.

  “Heart,” I called out.

  “Yes, Mr. Galeer?”

  “I won’t be needing you any more today. Take the rest of the weekend off.”

  “Nice guy, huh?” Howard joshed. “Rest of the weekend. That’s rich.”

  As soon as Heart left the office Howard headed out to his truck and returned with a toolbox, a length of cord and something that looked like an electronic eyeball. “Where’s the little girls’ room?” he asked me. I showed him back. Opening his toolbox he took out a cordless electric drill. “We can hide it in the vanity where no one’ll ever notice,” he said. “I recommend right about here.” He pointed to one corner of the sink cabinet roughly six inches above toilet seat level. “Here’s your optimum position for aiming your hidden cam at your commode to get your maximum exposure,” he said.

  “You get much demand for this?”

  “Oh, shit. In a troubled economy, this is the kind of work keeps the doors open. And I never had an unsatisfied customer yet, know what I mean?”

  “So what will I owe you for all this?”

  “Consider it a professional courtesy,” Howard said. “Course I wouldn’t turn down a complimentary DVD or two of the hot action if you can spare me a copy for my collection. I got me a customer in the women’s apparel business; he was all worried about maybe there was shoplifting going on in the dressing rooms. He called it ‘shrinkage.’ I went ahead and installed him a coupla cams, and man oh man! Them women was in there two and three at a time, and would you believe some of them even had their tops off, goin’ at it? What the hell chance us men got, what with all a these goddamn queer women runnin’ around seducin’ our wives?” Howard stared at me open-mouthed as though I had the answer and he really wanted to know.

  “I tell you what, Howard: you give me copies of one or two of your best ones, I’ll return the favor. How’s that sound?”

  “That’ll work. What’s your email?”

  I gave it to him. “Also I’ll have to have a copy of the DVD of your wife and the, ah, other woman.”

  “Got one already made up for you; it’s out in the truck. Figgered you’d need it for evidence ‘n’at.”

  “Yeah, for evidence ‘n’at.”

  In twenty minutes he was finished. He showed me how I could click on a desktop icon innocuously labeled HSS and instantly open a full-color clear video window directly onto the bathroom. There was even a tiny microphone. While I slipped on earphones and watched, Howard returned to the rest room to test things out.

  “How’s the focus?” he asked, squatting and staring into the webcam, which gave me a clear fisheye lens view of him.

  “Perfect,” I answered, raising my voice to be heard down the hall.

  “Sound okay?”

  “Also perfect,” I yelled.

  “Okey dokey.” Howard began gathering up his tools.

  “You’re gonna like this setup,” he said after he had returned. “This one customer of mine, he put in a machine dispenses all the free Red Bull you can drink, just to start things rolling. That dope ain’t cheap. But boy, he got them office women wearing out a path to the can, every one of ‘em going and going like a cow pissing on a flat rock. He says you never seen anything like it in all your life. Spends about half his time watching. Can’t get he’s work done.”

  “Love to see that video.”

  “You got it.” Howard looked at me, head cocked.

  “What’s on your mind, Howard?”

  “You’re gonna do me right on this divorce thing, aintcha?”

  “Relax. I’m going to take good care of you.”

  “Because Arlene, she says she’s entitled to half the business and more. Like I said, she’s threatening to force me out. I’m too old to go out and find me a job, start all over again at my age.”

  “You have nothing to worry about, Howard. Leave everything in my hands.”

  Howard pumped my hand gratefully. “Thanks, Ricky. I knew I could count on you.”

  I locked the front door after Howard left. Had the police picked up Snuggle yet? As though synchronized to my thoughts, the phone rang. Caller ID said Belleville PD. It was Detective Forrest.

  “You had it figured right,” he said. “Lifted a clean set of prints off that nudie pic of your secretary on the Harley? They matched Snug’s we had on file. Stupid shit probably took the gloves off to play with himself.”

  “Damn,” I said. “How do you like that? I never even met the man.”

  “Meeting Snug is a privilege you might want to pass up. Particularly under present circumstances. We arrested his dumb ass about an hour ago. He hulked out soon’s he saw what we had in mind; took five guys to haul him into custody. He’s sitting in the lockup right now crying frame. What an asshole.”

  “Well, thanks, Detective, I’ll rest easier. Me and my family.”

  “And that secretary of yours too, I’ll bet.”

  “Yes, I’m sure Heart will rest easier, as well.”

  “Heart. Unusual name.”

  “Unusual gal.”

  “I know; I saw the picture, remember?”

  CHAPTER SIX - MEN’S TRIBUTES TO WOMEN

  Suddenly I felt alone. I wished I hadn’t dismissed Heart so early in the day. I made a mental note to stock the mini-fridge over the weekend with enough Diet Coke and Red Bull to float a battleship. Monday might prove quite entertaining. Bored, I right-clicked again on the HSS icon. It was red and shaped rather like a devil’s head. This time the screen was dark. Then I realized Howard had turned off the bathroom light when he left. There were buttons underneath the screen for video and audio capture. How about an intimate self-portrait while no one else was around? A private video study of a man with fifty-five hundred dollars as good as banked and his whole Saturday still ahead of him.

  Maybe later. Instead, I absently cruised the Internet to warm up.

  There are free sites online where the bolder among us can post amateur videos of ourselves and our loved ones, or porn videos that can be purloined from various pay sites and then passed off as our own. Alone in my private office, I searched those sites, soon discovering Webcam Show and Tell, a monster exchange of video perversion offering virtually every subcategory of human degeneracy in streaming video. How had I never happened upon it before? I figured I must be working too hard. Time to do something about that right now.

  One major selection of amateur videos featured men with women, women with women and men with men, all getting their jollies in ways that needed a rubber sheet. The descriptive and evocative title Women Peeing caught my eye. Feeling about twelve years old, I clicked on it and perused a page of snapshots and lurid titles. One featured my new client, and I’m not talking about Howard.

  The video clips had been arranged in order of popularity. Beattie’s was easy to find. At the very top, in fact. Half a million hits and counting.

  Beattie’s video bore the distinctive logo Triple R’s Triple X superimposed in the lower right-hand corner. I assume that meant it had been stolen from Russell R. Russell’s proprietary website and bootlegged by someone with no respect for property. I clicked on the little play arrow. Seeing Beattie’s lips moving, I rewound the video and scurried to slap on the earphones.

  INT. UNISEX REST ROOM. DAY.

  A skuzzy bathroom, probably an out-of-the-way rest stop or a deserted public park. BEATTIE RUSSELL enters completely nude except for glasses, black high heels and wedding ring.

  BEATTIE:

  (seductive voice)

  They say drinking lots of water

  is good for you; my old man

  makes me drink plenty of fluids.

  The camera follows BEATTIE as she strolls a
round showing herself off. We hear the click and clop of her heels echoing against the concrete walls of the john. She cups her right hand under her left breast, lifts the nipple to her mouth and sucks on it playfully, looking directly into the camera.

  BEATTIE:

  Can your wife or girlfriend do this?

  No? I didn’t think so.

  BEATTIE does the other breast in the same manner, taking the whole nipple into her mouth, smirking.

  BEATTIE:

  What else can I show you?

  Anything you want to see?

  BEATTIE feigns scandalized amusement at the imagined reply.

  BEATTIE:

  I love the way your mind works.

  Okay; I’ll show you. I do have to

  pee real bad. How’d you guess?

  SOME WOMAN enters. She quickly covers her face to conceal her identity.

  WOMAN:

  “Oh! Oh for pity’s sake! Why you—

  put some clothes on!

  Flustered, the WOMAN stalks out, muttering.

  BEATTIE:

  Hope she doesn’t turn me in.

  (doing a pretty good Boo Boo Bear)

  Mister Ranger isn’t gonna like this.

  (resuming seductive voice)

  Guess she decided she didn’t really

  need to go that bad after all. I know I do.

  Wanna see? I love having men watch me.

  BEATTIE squats over a floor drain.

  Dissolve to:

  INSERT

  CLOSE SHOT: BEATTIE SQUATTING OVER DRAIN

  BEATTIE rubs her clit with her left middle fingertip. We see her wedding ring on her fourth finger.