Misfortune

by Nancy Geary

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “Will he pay us back?” Mary Lou’s voice was high-pitched but soft.

  Frances shook her head.

  “Why not? The jury found him guilty.”

  Frances took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Yes.” The words felt like rubber cement on the roof of her mouth. “The jury did find that Mr. Avery stole your money. Unfortunately, though, the judge didn’t want to send the defendant to jail. He didn’t even order Avery to give you back your money.”

  Both Mary Lou and Roger had expressions on their faces that Frances couldn’t read. Did they not understand or, like her, were they shocked by the unfairness of what had just transpired?

  “Judges in state court have discretion over how to punish defendants. We talked about that before the trial ever began. Judge Cohen apparently felt that a fine and a period of probation was sufficient punishment. I can’t lie to you. It’s a terrible outcome. I thought, given how well the trial went, that we would get a better result. I don’t know why this happened.”

  “What did the judge mean by a year suspended?” Mr. Horton had been listening closely to the precise words of Judge Cohen.

  “With a suspended sentence, if Avery does anything to violate the conditions of his probation, his sentence, in effect, becomes ‘unsuspended’ and he goes to jail for a year. But since there are no special conditions of probation, he simply has to report to his probation officer and stay out of trouble—not socialize with known felons, not commit a felony himself, all things that will be pretty easy for Avery to do.” Frances looked at the Hortons, realizing that her explanation was futile. The Hortons wanted their money back, and they wanted Avery punished. They had gotten neither, and there was nothing more that Frances could do. “Judge Cohen recommended that you file a civil lawsuit. That’s something you may want to consider.”

  “But we haven’t any money to pay for a lawyer. As it is, we’re just managing on our Social Security and the bit that I earn at the Candy Kitchen. If Roger’s arthritis were better, perhaps—”

  “You might be able to find someone who’d be willing to represent you on a contingent fee, meaning that you’d only have to pay your lawyer when you had a recovery. The criminal conviction will make the civil suit very easy. I can get you some recommendations for good civil lawyers.” Nausea washed over Frances as she spoke. Assuming a contingent fee lawyer could recover most of the money from Avery, it would still end up costing the Hortons one-third, more than $150,000, fifteen times what Avery’s theft cost him.

  “How long will that take?” Roger Horton said.

  “I don’t know.” Frances couldn’t bring herself to tell them that it could be years before they saw any money. The civil docket was jammed. Even if the Hortons got a quick judgment against Avery, they would still have to attach assets, force a sale. They could lose additional time if they got bogged down in an appeal. The morass was too hard to explain. “I’m sorry. I truly am. I wish the outcome had been different.” Frances turned away, not wanting the Hortons to see the tears that welled in her eyes. They had counted on her to help them and she had failed. Blaming it on the system was a feeble justification for her inability to deliver a favorable result.

  Frances cleared her throat. “Let me see what I can find out for you about contingent fee lawyers. There’s also the possibility that I can get you some money from the Victims Assistance Program. It’s an organization that generally compensates only victims of violent crime, but maybe there can be an accommodation in your case. Why don’t we talk tomorrow.” To steady her nerves, she focused on gathering up her papers.

  “What time tomorrow will you know?” Roger Horton asked.

  “As early as possible. I’ll call you at home. I promise.” Frances stuffed her file back into her briefcase and walked quickly out of the courtroom.

  Frances wished there were a back entrance to her office, a way to avoid the crowd of colleagues eager to express condolences, inquire about details, and otherwise involve themselves in the death of her stepmother. An early arrival at the office of District Attorney Malcolm Morris would have provided the opportunity to slip in unnoticed, but by ten o’clock the rumor mill had worked its wonders. Now the litany of sympathetic phrases showered forth.

  “Thank you. I appreciate your support,” she mumbled to a group of assistant district attorneys gathered in the hall as she walked briskly past. She rounded the corner, leaving the group behind, and turned into the office of Special Agent Robert Burke.

  “Hey, Meaty,” Frances said as she entered the small, windowless room.

  Meaty sat at a metal desk, the newspaper spread out in front of him. A jelly doughnut, as well as a partially eaten cream one covered in powdered sugar, lay within arm’s reach on a piece of waxed paper. In one hand Meaty held a paper cup of coffee. He took a sip and looked up. Frances could hear him swallow.

  “Have you seen the ME’s report?” she asked.

  “Only a preliminary.”

  “And?”

  “Have a seat.” Meaty indicated a vinyl armchair across from him.

  Frances cleared a stack of papers off the cushion, added it to similar piles on the floor, and settled herself facing Meaty.

  “Want some?” Meaty gestured toward the jelly doughnut.

  “No thanks.”

  Meaty licked the ends of his thick fingers, then picked up a pair of half-glasses and positioned them on his nose. From the top drawer of his desk he removed a single sheet of paper and scanned the page, mumbling aloud. “Caucasian female, age fifty-one, height five feet nine inches, weight one hundred nineteen pounds. No lacerations or abrasions. No signs of any injury or trauma. Probable cause of death is acute cardiac arrhythmia. Here we go…” He paused, then continued in a loud, clear voice. “Toxicology screen evidenced approximately eight hundred milligrams of Dexedrine and traces of phenelzine. That’s what got me thinking.”

  Frances knew that Meaty had considerable medical expertise in part from years on the job, in part because his wife had been an emergency room nurse for three decades. She waited for him to translate.

  “Dexedrine is an amphetamine. It’s most common nonprescription use is as an appetite suppressant. It’s the key ingredient in a lot of diet pills.”

  Clio always had been thin. She appeared to have tremendous control over what she ate and discipline in the regularity of her exercise. “Clio had nothing to lose,” Frances thought out loud.

  “The amount in her system was about ten times the recommended dosage for weight loss.”

  “What was the other drug you mentioned?” Frances asked.

  “Nardil’s the brand name for phenelzine. It’s what’s called a monoamine oxidase inhibitor, a class of drugs prescribed for certain kinds of mental illness, serious anxiety or panic disorders, social phobias, especially hypochondria.”

  “What kind of anxiety disorders?”

  “Well, there’s all kinds. Agoraphobia, where a person is afraid of crowds, obsessive-compulsive disorder, where a person does things over and over, checking the locks on doors, that sort of thing, to ward off perceived dangers. Phenelzine’s also used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder and, as I said, hypochondria, a debilitating fear of serious disease. There’s dozens of these anxiety disorder classifications. The shrinks are all over human behavior, labeling and prescribing.“

  “I had no idea,” Frances said. She suspected there was a lot about Clio that she didn’t know.

  “As the ME tells it,” Meaty continued, “monoamine oxidase inhibitors like phenelzine are dangerous, really dangerous. You can’t mix them with anything. No narcotics or alcohol, especially red wine. There’s also a lot of dietary restrictions—no cheese, no pickled herring, no marmot, not that anyone eats that anyway. Presumably a shrink of some sort prescribed it, given the small level, which is consistent with a range for therapeutic use. We’ll find out. She must have used a pharmacy in Southampton. There can’t be that many, and it’s a pretty unusual
drug.” Meaty paused for a moment and rubbed his neck. “I have to think that Clio would have been told over and over again about the prohibitions, the things she could and couldn’t do if she was taking phenelzine. The manufacturer’s warning labels are serious, too. Any doctor, any pharmacist, would have made sure she understood exactly what she was getting into.”

  “But she might not have asked her doctor about interaction with diet pills. Looking at her, you would have no reason to think she took them. Her doctor might not have thought to mention it.”

  “Perhaps,” he said, although Frances could tell by the look on his face that he found such a scenario implausible. “The amphetamines alone could have killed her, made her heart race so fast and so irregularly that it gave out. In combination with phenelzine, death was certain, probably very fast.” Meaty removed his glasses and ran his fingers through his thick, graying hair. Frances knew what was coming next. “The medical examiner’s report isn’t final, I understand that, but I think we’re looking at a homicide. The ME does, too, given the mix. The combination of drugs was too potent, too lethal, to have been ingested by accident. It’s either a homicide…” He paused and looked at Frances. “Or a suicide.”

  “Clio doesn’t strike me as the type.”

  “You would know almost as well as anyone.” Meaty rested his elbows on his desk and leaned toward her. “I happen to agree. The scene doesn’t fit a suicide. A healthy woman finishes a tennis game at roughly ten-thirty, then kills herself in a toilet stall shortly thereafter. No note, no nothing.”

  Frances nodded in agreement. Clio had been far too private a person to have wanted such a spectacle for her death.

  “I’ve advised Malcolm to treat this as a homicide.”

  “Is he going to?”

  “Yeah. He’s having a press conference at eleven.”

  Frances glanced at her watch. Malcolm’s public announcement, designed to make the noontime news, was less than half an hour away.

  “Has he assigned the case yet?”

  “I’ll be heading up the investigative end. Perry Cogswell is the ADA.”

  Frances sat back in her chair, folded her hands in her lap, and sighed. Of the more than thirty assistant district attorneys in Malcolm’s office, Perry Cogswell was the one Frances most despised. He had been hired less than three years earlier, but his ambition and sycophancy had propelled a meteoric rise to chief of the Violent Crimes Unit. He never tired of boasting to her that violent crime—homicides, rapes, assaults—was the stuff of real prosecutors, not the paper trails she pursued. “Where’s the excitement in reviewing canceled checks and bank statements?” he had said on more than one occasion.

  “I’m sorry,” Meaty said. “I wish it were otherwise. I truly do.”

  “I know,” Frances replied, even as she felt a pang of betrayal.

  “You know I’ll fill you in on everything I can.”

  “Yeah.” She tried to force a smile.

  Frances looked intently at his round face, sunken eyes, and dimpled cheeks. His retirement from state government was only a year away. With a second pension to supplement his federal one, he could look forward to a comfortable old age with his wife and their granddaughter. Meaty was pragmatic. Frances knew he wasn’t about to jeopardize his plans for her. Any information he gave her would have to be done quietly.

  “Is any Crime Scene information back yet?” Frances asked.

  Meaty had consumed his jelly doughnut in the brief interlude of silence. He wiped his hands on the waxed paper. “Some stuff was gathered, but I doubt any tests have been run. Saturday this didn’t look like a murder, and isn’t Sunday the day of rest?” Meaty smiled. “I was surprised the ME’s preliminary report was back this morning.” He looked up expectantly, opened his mouth again as if to speak, but said nothing.

  “What does Malcolm know?”

  “He called me on Saturday night, and I gave him a brief overview, although there wasn’t much to report. The ME sent him a copy of this report yesterday. Last night I advised him to open a homicide case. Otherwise, I don’t know who he’s talked to.”

  Frances’s own conversation with Malcolm the evening of Clio’s death was still fresh in her mind, but she decided not to discuss it. Not now. The thought unsettled her. Although she didn’t keep secrets from Meaty, their relationship was no doubt headed for change. “Can I get copies of all the witness statements?”

  “I knew you’d ask.” Meaty removed a yellow envelope sealed with a metal clasp from his desk drawer and handed it to her. “Here’s everything we’ve got. Copies of all the statements and information taken by Detective Kelly and his team, the paramedics’ report, even my notes from July Fourth.”

  “Thanks,” she said, knowing that they both knew he shouldn’t be giving her the information.

  Meaty smiled again. “Hang in there, kiddo.”

  Frances returned to her office quickly, shut the door behind her, and leaned back against the wall for balance. She scanned the familiar sight: a metal desk with two folders that she had left out on Friday; a leather pencil holder stuffed with pens, scissors, pencils, and a curled Crazy Straw that Meaty had given her for her birthday the year before; a stack of legal pads; a single photograph of Felonious and Miss Demeanor in a maple frame; and a mahogany placard she had received for her work on the federal-state joint task force on public corruption. Against one wall, a metal bookcase overflowed with legal treatises on various components of criminal law, several versions of the Prosecutor’s Handbook, notebooks on sentencing, and a directory of resource agencies for victims of crime. Her files were stacked against the opposite wall. The file cabinet she had requisitioned nearly five years ago had yet to arrive.

  Although her office was exactly as she had left it Friday, and virtually every other night before that, it felt different today, as if she had stumbled upon a largely forgotten scene from her past with which she needed to become reacquainted. The partial disarray, the papers that evidenced hours of investigation, research, and trial preparation, seemed foreign. Frances walked around her desk, fingering the papers, the wrinkled files, the drawer pulls. Then she dropped Meaty’s envelope on her desk, collapsed into her chair, and hugged her knees to her chest.

  She remembered the last time she’d seen Clio alive: an opening at the Devlin Gallery. Clio had come alone. In front of a charcoal drawing of a dead bird, they’d spoken briefly, exchanging praise for all that Blair and Jake had done to build their business. It had been an awkward conversation filled with pregnant pauses and forced smiles. Eager to escape the second-rate art crowd, Clio had finally excused herself. Frances had followed her out and watched her climb into a black limousine. The capped chauffeur had shut the door behind her.

  That had been nearly three months earlier, a literal lifetime ago. Now Frances was left to wonder who in the world hated Clio enough to actually kill her.

  The pungent smell of bottled air freshener filled the press room for the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office. As Frances moved through the crowd, trying to find free space, her eyes burned with aerosol fragrance. She could feel a bead of sweat run between her breasts and down her belly. Her gabardine skirt clung with moisture to her thighs. She settled in a corner by the window and crossed her arms in front of her to prevent them from touching any of the people standing just inches away.

  Malcolm Morris’s media staff certainly had done their advance work. The room was packed with reporters, television and radio crews, and area law enforcement, many in uniform. Malcolm stood at a wooden podium, reviewing his prepared remarks as the crowd settled. He looked handsome in a double-breasted suit, a crisp white shirt, and a red tie anchored with a gold clip that caught the light. Frances watched his lips purse and his forehead wrinkle, then relax. He appeared to be practicing appropriate looks of gravity. Then he raised his head, focused his eyes directly into a camera for the ABC affiliate station, and began to speak.

  “As you already know, Clio Henshaw Pratt, a fifty-one-year-old resid
ent of Southampton and the wife of financier Richard Pratt, was found dead at a private tennis club over the weekend. Based on evidence gathered by this office in coordination with local police, it is now apparent that Mrs. Pratt’s death was, in fact, a homicide. I cannot discuss details of this investigation, but I can say that everything possible is being done, and will be done, to apprehend and prosecute this vicious killer. My personal condolences are extended to the Pratt family.”

  Cameras flashed. Frances heard a blur of “Mr. Morris!” as reporters jockeyed to be recognized.

  “I will do my best to answer questions.” He flashed a smile.

  Malcolm was in his element. He loved the publicity, the excitement of feeling in control of information. This time, though, it was her family, her father’s loss, that was providing Malcolm’s momentum. Frances hoped that her father wouldn’t watch the noontime news.

  “Who’s in charge of the investigation?” asked an attractive woman in a bright blue suit.

  “Special Agent Robert Burke and Assistant District Attorney Perry Cogswell.”

  Frances looked around for Meaty and noticed him standing off to Malcolm’s left. Perry stood beside him. At the mention of his name, Perry stepped forward and raised his hand over his head. This case was Perry’s dream, a chance to probe the details of her father’s life and business, of her stepmother’s friends and social world, amid the spectacle of media attention. How many times had Perry chastised Frances for being born rich, given her his unsolicited opinion that she could never be a great prosecutor because she was alien to the run-of-the-mill Suffolk County jury? “Private schools, summers in Southampton, who are you trying to fool with your rustic existence on Orient Point?” Perry had said with a sarcastic laugh at the Saint Patrick’s Day office party last year. She had wanted to hit him.