Flinch Factor, The

by Michael Kahn

  I stood. “Your Honor, we call Kenneth Rubenstein.”

  There was a murmur in the crowd. Rubenstein gave his attorney a baffled look and stood. He glanced at me, eyes wary, as he walked to the witness box.

  The clerk swore him in and he took his seat and gazed at me.

  “Mr. Rubenstein, you are the owner and president of Ruby Productions, correct?”

  He gave me a sardonic smile. “I am indeed, Miss Gold.”

  “You’ve heard testimony today regarding Corundum Construction Company, correct?”

  “I have.”

  “Ruby is Corundum, correct?”

  He tried to chuckle. “Ruby is Ruby. Corundum is Corundum.”

  “What is corundum?”

  “You mean the company or the mineral?”

  “Start with the mineral.”

  “A form of aluminum oxide.”

  “You never took a course in geology, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “You know what corundum is because you are a crossword puzzle fan, correct?”

  “I know what corundum is, and I am a crossword puzzle fan. I don’t know that the two are connected.”

  “Actually, you are more than just a fan. You compete in national crossword puzzle tournaments, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “You have actually won a tournament or two, haven’t you?”

  “Four to be precise.”

  “At your deposition, when I mentioned corundum, you told me about a sapphire, correct?”

  “I did. Sapphire is a corundum.”

  “But you only mentioned sapphire.”

  “I believe so.”

  “Back to my earlier question. Ruby is corundum, correct?”

  “Back to my earlier answer. Ruby is ruby, corundum is corundum.”

  “Let’s go back to crosswords. Please look over at the monitor, sir.”

  He did.

  “You are looking at Plaintiffs’ Exhibit Twenty-One. It is the upper left quadrant of the New York Times crossword puzzle from three years ago on Friday, April seventeen.”

  He studied the monitor. “If you say so.”

  “I understand that the Friday puzzles in the Times are some of the hardest to solve.”

  “That they are.”

  “Can you solve them?”

  He smiled. “Absolutely.”

  “Every time?”

  “Every time.”

  “Even in a crowded courtroom?”

  He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “Try me.”

  “I have the clues here, sir. My co-counsel has the answers. Let’s see if you are good as you claim.”

  He gave me an amused look. “Fire away.”

  “Can I play, too?” the judge asked.

  There was laughter in the gallery.

  I smiled at the judge. “Certainly, Your Honor. But I warn you: Mr. Rubenstein claims to be quite good. Let’s start with one across, gentlemen. Eight letters. The clue is: Painter of The Snake Charmer.”

  “Rousseau,” Rubenstein said.

  “Whoa.” The judge stared at the puzzle on the screen. “Is that right?”

  I turned. “Jacki?”

  She pushed a key on the computer and up on the monitor screen the letters R-O-U-S-S-E-A-U filled up the top row.

  “Well done,” I said. “Directly below that word is number four across. This one is also eight letters. The clue is: Sunblock.”

  “Coppertone,” Judge Flinch called out.

  “Too many letters,” I said.

  “Banana Boat,” Judge Flinch said.

  “Still too many letters, Your Honor. Mr. Rubenstein?”

  He gave me a cocky grin. “Umbrella.”

  “Umbrella?” Judge Flinch said.

  Rubenstein pantomimed opening an umbrella. “It blocks out the sun.”

  The impatience in his voice was evident.

  “Jacki?” I said.

  The second row filled up with the letters U-M-B-R-E-L-L-A.

  “Below that is ten across,” I said. “The clue is: Director abode.”

  “Boardroom,” Rubenstein snapped.

  Jackie pressed the key and the letters B-O-A-R-D-R-O-O-M filled the row.

  “And below that. Fourteen across. Eight letters. The clue is: Tishri holy day.”

  “Whose holy day?” Judge Flinch asked.

  “Tishri,” I said, and then spelled it.

  I turned to Rubenstein, who’d figured out what I was doing.

  “The answer?” I asked.

  He gazed at the screen and finally shrugged. “Yom Kippur.”

  Jacki hit the key and the letters filled the screen.

  “Let’s double-check our answers,” I said. “One down is just four letters, and we already have all four filled in: R-U-B-Y. Guess what the clue is, Mr. Rubenstein?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “The clue,” I said, “is: Corundum. The answer is Ruby.”

  A murmur in the gallery.

  “At least in the world of crossword puzzles, Mr. Rubenstein, can we agree that ruby is corundum.”

  Another shrug. “In the world of crossword puzzles, yes.”

  “As a champion crossword puzzle solver, you already knew that ruby is corundum.”

  “I knew sapphire and ruby are both corundum. Sapphire is the more common form.”

  “Can we also agree that the lawyer for Ruby Productions is the lawyer for Corundum Construction Company?”

  His smile disappeared. “I’m not following you.”

  I turned to the court reporter. “Would you please read back the question to the witness.

  She did.

  “Which lawyer are you talking about?” he said.

  “I ask the questions, sir. Let’s make this easier. Take a look at the document on the monitor. That is Plaintiffs’ Exhibit Thirty. It’s a copy of a release agreement prepared by an attorney for Corundum Construction Company.”

  “Never seen that document before.”

  “We’re going to zoom in on that little number in the lower left corner. That’s a document identification number. Law firms use them.”

  “I’m supposed to know what that number means?”

  “Let’s look at Plaintiffs’’ Exhibit Thirty-One. That’s a demand letter from your attorney, Mr. Crane, to me. Correct?”

  “Appears to be.”

  “Let’s zoom in on that document ID number. You see it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you see it’s in the same format?”

  “But a different number.”

  “That’s correct, Mr. Rubenstein. But the same format and typeface. And if we need to, we will put on the witness stand someone from Mr. Crane’s law firm who can show us how to identify the attorney who created those two documents. But perhaps you can save us that trouble, Mr. Rubenstein. Did Mr. Crane create the release agreement for Corundum Construction Company marked as Exhibit Thirty?”

  “I was not at that law firm at the time the document was created, so I do not have personal knowledge of who created it. I assume you don’t want me to speculate, right?”

  “That is correct, Mr. Rubenstein. So let’s just cut to the chase. Did you instruct Mr. Crane to prepare the Corundum release agreement?”

  “Objection,” Crane said. “Attorney-client privilege. I instruct the witness not to answer.”

  “Hate to do it,” the judge said to me, “but I got to sustain that one. Let’s move on.”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  I turned toward Rubenstein, who had crossed his arms over his chest and was staring at me guardedly.

  Here we go, I said to myself.

  I looked back at Crane. Our eyes met. After a m
oment, he lowered his.

  I turned back to the judge. “Your Honor, may I approach the witness?”

  “You certainly may.”

  I moved from the podium toward Rubenstein, stopping when we were separated by just an arm’s length. I needed our interaction to seem as intimate as possible. We studied one another.

  In a softer voice, I said, “You knew Nick Moran, correct?”

  “Not personally.”

  “Earlier this year he renovated the kitchen in your home?”

  “He did.”

  “And the guest bathroom.”

  “Yes.”

  “That was his line of work. He did home renovations.”

  “So he claimed.”

  “The same line of work as Corundum Construction?”

  “Seems similar, at least from what other witnesses have said about Corundum. I don’t think he built pools, though.”

  “You’ve heard the testimony about Corundum Construction today.”

  “I certainly have.”

  “Have you heard any testimony that would link Corundum to Mr. Moran’s death.”

  He smiled. “I certainly have not.”

  “Based on what you’ve heard today, Mr. Rubenstein, did Mr. Moran die because of what he knew about Corundum Construction?”

  “Based on what I’ve heard, the answer to that is no.”

  “Leaving aside that testimony, Mr. Rubenstein, based on what you personally know, do you believe that Mr. Moran died because of what he knew about Corundum Construction?”

  “Nope.”

  “What do you understand to be the cause of his death?”

  “A drug overdose in Forest Park.”

  “What do you base that on?”

  “That’s what it said in the newspaper.” He gave me a smug grin. “Sounded to me like he was a closet fag who got his rocks off with strange men in the park.”

  “Is that based on what you read in the newspaper?”

  “I can put two and two together.”

  “Explain.”

  He chuckled. “Not rocket science, Counsel. The man is found in his pickup truck on that infamous lane in the park.”

  “You referred to him as a ‘closet fag.’ Did you base the closet part on what you read in the newspaper?”

  “Again, I put two and two together.”

  “Explain.”

  “The man worked on my house. I didn’t meet him personally, but I understand that he didn’t seem like a queer. Thus, a closet fag.”

  “He actually seemed more like a ladies man, didn’t he?”

  He shrugged. “Just goes to show, eh?”

  “To show what?”

  “You never know.”

  “I was at his funeral,” I said. “A lot of the women there were surprised.”

  He forced a laugh. “Like I said, it just goes to show.”

  There was a manic edge in his voice.

  “Were you mad at him?” I asked.

  “Was I what?”

  “Were you mad at him?”

  He stared at me, the vein in his temple pulsing. “Why would I be mad at him?”

  “Were you?”

  He seemed to think it over.

  “I was not crazy about him.”

  “Were you jealous?”

  He forced a laugh. “Jealous? Of what?”

  I paused, letting his response hang out there. “You are many things, sir. Correct?”

  He frowned. “Pardon?”

  “You are a successful real estate developer, correct?”

  “I am.”

  “And you are also an accomplished triathlete, correct?”

  He smiled. “I am.”

  “And a crossword puzzle champ, and a father, and a husband, correct?”

  He was staring at me. “I am.”

  “You are many things, sir, but you are not a cold-blooded murderer, correct?”

  “Pardon?”

  “You are not a cold-blooded murderer, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  I paused again.

  “In your business, sir,” I said, “would it be fair to say that you set high standards for yourself?”

  He leaned back, puzzled. “Could you repeat that?”

  “Do you set high standards for yourself?”

  “Yes.”

  “In everything you do, right?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “What about the people who work for you? Do you set high standards for them, too?”

  “You better believe it.”

  “I do believe it, sir.” I gave him what I hoped would seem an admiring smile. “Do the people who work for you always live up to your standards?”

  He shook his head. “Nope.”

  “Do they sometimes bungle your instructions, fail to properly execute the tasks you’ve given them?”

  “That happens.”

  “That’s what happened that night, didn’t it.”

  “What night?”

  “The night Nick Moran died.”

  “What are trying to say?”

  I moved one step closer and lowered my voice. “He wasn’t supposed to die, was he?”

  “Supposed to die? You think I know the answer to that?”

  “I do. He wasn’t supposed to die, was he?”

  “What kind of question is that?”

  “They screwed up, didn’t they?”

  “Why would you ask me that?”

  In a softer voice, I said, “You know why I’m asking.”

  His eyes darted around the courtroom. Eventually, they returned to mine, and then he looked down.

  “I am asking you on behalf of his sister Susannah. I’m asking you on behalf of the others who knew him. And I’m asking because I don’t think you’re a murderer, Mr. Rubenstein.”

  I gazed at him, waiting until he raised his eyes to mine.

  “Mr. Rubenstein, let me ask you again. Nick Moran wasn’t supposed to die that night, was he? There was no intent to kill the man. This wasn’t a premeditated murder. Your people failed you.”

  He was staring at me, a pained look in his eyes.

  I said, “This is your chance to make that clear.”

  We stared into one another’s eyes for what seemed an eternity.

  “It’s all going to come out anyway,” I said. “Why wait? This is your moment. Tell me. More important, tell his sister. Help her understand her loss. Please.”

  He bowed his head and exhaled slowly.

  In a quite voice, barely above a whisper, he said, “He wasn’t supposed to die.”

  Chapter Fifty-four

  The ensuing media blizzard eclipsed all of the publicity Ken Rubenstein had chased for years through triathlons, crossword puzzle tournaments, and flashy residential real estate developments. Sound bites of his testimony made CNN and Fox News that night. The homicide charges landed the next day. Rubenstein’s perp walk was the lead story on all four local TV stations, made the front page of the Post-Dispatch, and ran in the hourly news cycle on CNN for twenty-four hours. A week later, the issuance of nineteen federal indictments arising out of the corruption-of-public-officials scheme put him on the front page of the New York Times, and got him featured in an interactive chart on the Wall Street Journal’s’ website which, if you clicked on it, generated a graphic showing him as a spider at the center of an elaborate web of venal public officials.

  That press eruption had been preceded by a long moment of silence in the courtroom after Rubenstein’s answer to my last question. Even Judge Flinch was speechless. I finally turned to the judge and told him that I had no further questions. Flinch twirled his mustache, frowned, and adjourned the hearing.

  I had further questions, of course. Plenty. But I didn�
��t want to ask them in front of a TV audience. Barbara Weiss deserved some modicum of privacy. Moreover, I knew that better qualified questioners were seated in the courtroom gallery, including Bertie Tomaso, who ushered Ken Rubenstein out of the courthouse two hours later in handcuffs.

  Over a marathon police interview that began that evening and ended just before dawn, Rubenstein admitted what I had assumed, namely, that Nick Moran’s death was an accident. According to his statement, the plan had been to incapacitate him, shoot him up with heroin, put him back in his pickup, park it along Gay Way, unzip his fly, pull out his penis, and call the cops. The motive was the oldest and pettiest one of all: jealous rage. Rubenstein’s goal had been to humiliate the man who’d had the nerve to romance his wife—and to teach his wife a lesson, too.

  Armed with a packet of Ketamine power, Gene Chase had met Nick for a drink, ostensibly to discuss some kitchen renovation work that Corundum Construction might be able to send his way. Whatever actually went wrong—too much Ketamine, too much heroin, or too much in combination—the resulting death had repercussions that eventually eliminated the two Rubenstein underlings who had participated in the scheme. Professionals handled their deaths, however. Rubenstein had seen what could go wrong when you relied on amateurs. Of course, so had the professionals, who made sure that all arrangements were conducted through double-blind communications. Thus Bertie was still trying to track down Gene Chase’s killers and still trying to confirm that Rudy Hickman was in fact dead, since he had not been heard from since his disappearance.

  Although Rob Crane had known nothing about Nick Moran, he knew too much about the rest. Whatever slim chance he had to avoid indictment ended with the performance of Abraham Lincoln Johnson. Honest Abe convened his own press conference on the courthouse steps after court adjourned. Standing before the cameras, he announced exactly what he had been prepared to testify to in court, namely, that Rob Crane had sought him out, arranged a meeting in a private room at his club, and suggested during that meeting that Johnson could parlay a vote in favor of the Brittany Woods TIF into a terrific deal on a backyard swimming pool and deck. Crane had, alas, misread the flamboyant used-car salesman. Honest Abe had been so outraged that he had threatened to go public right then and there. It took days of groveling for Crane to get him to agree to keep quiet—but only after promising that there would be no further tampering with the Cloverdale City Counsel. Johnson’s discovery of Crane’s breach of that promise made him willing—indeed, eager—to bear witness.