by Reason of Sanity

by Gene Grossman

  Myra gets a million dollars worth of publicity and another bad guy gets brought to justice. At this point, even if Snell is watching her statement, there’s no way he can figure Handelmann as the third gang member, because at this time he doesn’t even know that Blitzstien and Drago were in the gang. I love it when a good plan comes together.

  I’m a little shor t of the full price for the Grand Banks I just made an offer on, so it’s probably a good time to get my finances in order. The time sheets on the Blitzstien case have been amended to include investigation hours spent in clearing him and finding the real killer. The court shouldn’t mind those extra hours, especially when it resulted in bringing in a real bad guy. That should cover my trip to Hawaii with Myra and still leave enough left over to almost cover the boat.

  The FBI’s twenty-five grand for fingering Handelmann will finish the new boat’s purchase price. I’ll send the Blitzstien portion to his family. The Drago share of the reward will be distributed between Suzi and Jack B. They put all the information together and they deserve it.

  Now that I can give Snell an address that I’m sure Handelmann will be at for a while, his documentation package is complete. Jack B. will hand-carry it to the FBI office for me.

  I’ve got some time to pack for Haw aii. We’ll be leaving in a couple of days and I want to get ready for this romantic vacation with Myra. The room reservation has already been made there at the Pioneer Inn. I bought the plane tickets the same afternoon that Blitzstien’s not guilty verdict came in. Myra’s ticket was given to her while we were on the way to the Federal Courthouse.

  I take some time to go through the travel brochures, lining up a bunch of things for us to do during the day while we’re in Maui. This time, I want to make sure we get to take one of those evening dinner cruises. We’ll also be renting a jeep for the curvy drive over the mountain to reach Hana, a secluded place on the farthest east end of the island, and also stopping to walk through the park that has the IAO Needle, a twenty-five hundred foot tall volcanic spire. While I’m at it, I might as well reserve some scuba gear. A fellow member of the Lahaina Yacht Club has the video concession on a large tourist dive boat, so we’ll probably spend a day out there with him. I don’t think I’m the only one on the boat who’s interested in Hawaii, because this morning I see that the travel brochures on the dinette table are not in the same order that I left them in last night.

  Myra likes to play golf. Not being from a family with money and plenty of time to waste, I never got around to learning it. If I’m going to use a stick to make a small ball move around, it won’t be on a golf course with a bunch of fat old white guys, it’ll be in a pool hall, where the real men go. There’s no quiche served in poolrooms.

  When I was a kid back in Chicago I used to work at a bowling alley that hadn’t yet converted to that new automatic pin-spotting equipment, so they employed boys like us to set the pins several nights a week when the leagues were bowling. If you were a pin-spotter, you were allowed to play pool for free during the afternoon. After a while I got pretty good at it – good enough to work my way through high school by doing a little hustling in between jobs playing piano at weddings.

  After a couple of years in smoke filled rooms, you get pretty good at spotting hustlers and con artists of every kind, and that knowledge has served me quite well over the years. I had no problem spotting Handelmann and Seymour as people to avoid doing business with. Vinnie still gives me a slight problem, but Olive and Stuart have rehabilitated him nicely, so I think he’ll be okay as long as he stays away from trees.

  Special Agent Snell calls. He is not a happy camper. “Sharp, are you crazy? We checked out the addresses you gave us on those remaining three gang members. One of them is the County Morgue and the other is the Van Nuys Division of the Los Angeles Police Station. Is this a joke?”

  “No joke Agent Snell. That’s where they are. Handelmann is the guy you saw getting arrested in court the other day. If you hurry, you can still catch him in Van Nuys. After tomorrow, he’ll be transferred to the County Jail downtown, to await trial. The County Morgue is where Vlad Drago and Harold Blitzstien are and if you hurry, you can still catch the bodies. After another day or so, you can have the ashes.”

  “And you expect us to give you fifty thousand dollars for turning in two dead bodies and a city jail prisoner?”

  “No, I expect you to give me fifty thousand dollars for providing you with their identities, proof of their involvement in the bank robberies and their present addresses.”

  “This sucks.”

  “Sorry Snell, but if you work things right, you can still get some good press coverage out of it. After all, if not for my work on getting Handelmann busted for insurance fraud, he would have used the one point three million dollar fraudulently obtained settlement to bail out the other gang members. You know what would happen then… they’d skip bail and turn up in some other location where banks are located on the first floor of large office buildings.

  “Your work on this case has put an end to that. You should be getting a medal of some kind and when I talk to a certain reporter I know, your name will be prominently mentioned. I’m sure she’ll be contacting you for an interview, so make sure you’re Bar Mitzvah suit is pressed. Blue looks really good on camera.”

  “Okay Sharp, you’ve got a point there. By the way, is she the one who you brought into court for the Handelmann bust?”

  “Yep, she’s the one and she owes me big time, so when I tell her about you, an interview is a certainty.”

  “When do you think you might be speaking to this reporter friend of yours?”

  “I’ll be telling her all about you at the dinner I promised to take her to. She picked a really expensive restaurant, but I can’t afford it without that reward money you’ll be sending me. The sooner you authorize that payment, the sooner I can tell her about you.”

  Snell doesn’t sound too happy about our conversation, but I have a feeling that the reward check will be coming in shortly.

  I think that the best place to entertain the reporter will be on our boat, so I’m working on a new pasta recipe.

  Myra calls to tell me that she had to change her flight plans. She has an important interview the morning of our flight to Maui, so she’s booked a later flight and will meet me on the Island, either late that night or early the next morning – and I’m not to worry about transportation because she’s arranged for a car service to bring her the twenty-seven miles from the Maui airport to Lahaina.

  That’s a disappointment, because it means we’ll be spending one less night together in my hotel room. Oh well, I guess you can never really have everything you want.

  I spend my remaining time here on the mainland laying out my island wardrobe and packing. As usual, I’ll be using a car service to take me to the airport. They send a Lincoln Town Car to pick me up and the driver usually gets here at least fifteen minutes early and calls me on his cell phone to ask if I need any assistance in bringing my luggage up to the car. This car service thing is really a class act. When you get into their vehicle, a brand new bottle of some expensive foreign water is waiting for you, and it’s personal, door-to-door service.

  A dock neighbor who’s really into computers has shown me the proper way to access my email, so I’m also packing my laptop. I’m sure the kid will want me to check in with her a couple of times each day. Stuart has offered to stay on the boat to keep an eye on her. She would probably rather stay alone, but Stuart insisted, because she’s helping him brief his cases for the law classes he’s taking. He already told me that some day soon he intends to be my law partner. I can’t wait. That’s just what I need – another person to take part of my hard earned fees.

  The phone rings and my caller ID display shows a familiar number – the Van Nuys Police Station. Thinking it’s Lieutenant Evans, I pick up the phone with a happy greeting. It’s not Evans – it’s Handelmann.

  “Hello Sharp, how’s the bail bond business?” “I don’t ow
e you any explanation or apology. You broke the rules and I nailed you. What do you want?”

  “I need a favor.”

  “And you think I’ll do it for you?”

  “Yeah, because I’ve got something to trade.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I can’t go into details, but I’ve made a deal with the Feds. They’re going to take me out of here soon.”

  That figures. He’s been flipped and will now rat out his other clients, so the feds will put him into some witness protection program. I know he’s a con man, but I’m still curious to know what he’s going to offer me for whatever favor he wants. I tell him I’m still listening.

  “I know that you’re getting a nice reward for turning me in and the favor I’d like is for you to deposit some money into my wife’s inmate account. She may have to serve a year or two before I can get her out.”

  “And why would I want to do this for you?”

  “Because I know that your ex-wife, the ballbusting broad who’s prosecuting me, is running for D.A. and my conviction on her record will look really good to the voters.”

  This guy may be a criminal, but he’s one smart cookie. If I get his drift, he’s offering to plead guilty to the charges Myra’s bringing against him because he knows he won’t have to serve the time.

  “Okay Handelmann, let’s say just for conversation’s sake that I go along with your program. What exactly do you have in mind?”

  “First, I call her up and tell her I want to make a plea. Then she comes and visits me and we both sign the plea agreement. I plead guilty to whatever she wants. After the deal is signed, you deposit the maximum one thousand to each of our three accounts. That’s it. Your squeeze gets a fast conviction and gets elected as District Attorney and we have plenty of money to spend on candy and cigarettes until I can spring us.”

  “Okay, go ahead and make the call, Handelmann. When your conviction is entered on the court’s record, I’ll deposit the two thousand to their accounts and when you’re transferred over to the Feds, I’ll make the last deposit to your account. And you’d better make it quick, because if Snell takes you out of there before the plea bargain is signed, our deal is off.”

  The deal is done. Now I wait to see Myra on the evening news, announcing that she got the confession and guilty plea. I call the reporter and give her an anonymous’ tip about the upcoming plea. I’m sure that in her report she’ll refer to me as a ‘highranking associate of the district attorney.’ Seymour will be pleased to hear that.

  Myra makes her announcement on the evening news. The timing is perfect because the next day Lieutenant Evans calls to tell me that the Feds came and took Handelmann away. He wasn’t disappointed. This means there’ll be one less prisoner to spend money on clothing, housing, feeding, and taking through the judicial system. Evans got his press coverage out of it, so he’s happy.

  Myra calls. She tells me that one of her spies at the District Attorney’s office tells her that Seymour is planning on making an announcement after work today. He’s called a news conference. She wants to know if I have any idea what’s going on, because she also has found out that I met with Seymour that morning before we went to Federal Court to bust Handelmann.

  I tell her that Seymour threatened to destroy me if I helped her campaign and that he wanted me to spy on her for him. At first, she’s a little put out that I didn’t tell her about it sooner, but when she remembers all the things I did to help her election campaign, she realizes that I have no intentions of doing anything that would hurt her.

  My suggestion is that we meet at Pollo Meshuga for an early dinner and to watch Seymour’s announcement on one of their six hanging television sets. If there’s no Hispanic team playing soccer somewhere in the world, they’ll probably let us tune one set in to the news.

  She took my suggestion, and I’m now sitting at our favorite table waiting for her to come in. After our salsa and guacamole appetizer is brought to the table, we see our friendly reporter on the steps of the Criminal Courts Building, prepping the audience for Acting District Attorney Seymour’s announce-ment.

  When he saunters down the steps to where the cameras are, I notice that his lunch date is nowhere to be seen. As usual, Seymour looks wonderful… he’s definitely dressed too good to be a district attorney. He starts out with the usual crap about how glad he is to see the press and about how his office finally got a conviction on the Drago murder. Our friendly reporter interrupts him with a question. “Excuse me Mister Seymour, but wasn’t that conviction obtained by your opponent, Myra Scot?”

  Seymour brushes off the question, but you can tell that it got to him. “Any conviction that’s obtained by any person working for me is a victory for the People.” Smooth. He turns Myra into one of his flunkies, just doing her job. We’re still waiting for the other shoe to drop. You can’t just call a press conference. You’ve got to have something to say or you lose credibility and the next time you try it, no press will show up. He doesn’t disappoint them.

  “The reason I’ve brought you here is because I’ve had a long discussion with my family, and the consensus is that I shouldn’t be in this race for District Attorney.” Audible gasps are heard in the crowd. Myra squeezes my arm.

  “Did you have anything to do with this?” I don’t answer her question with anything but a ‘who me?’ look. Seymour goes on.

  “This was a difficult decision to make, because I love the job of District Attorney and am sure that I would win the election, but I feel that I can do much more for the People if I’m in a higher office. Therefore, effective immediately, I am withdrawing my name from the list of candidates for the office of District Attorney of Los Angeles County and notifying the Board of Elections that I intend to be entering the race for Governor of the State of California.”

  One of the other reporters shouts out a question to him. “Mister Seymour, does this mean that you’ll be telling your people to support Myra Scot?”

  “Well to tell you the truth, if I was just a private citizen, I’d be glad to answer that question, but now that I’m a declared candidate for Governor, I don’t think it’s my place to comment on a local county election.”

  That was a nice way of avoiding the question. There’s no way he’d publicly support Myra, but it doesn’t make any difference now. She’s got a lock on this election and I feel that I fulfilled the promise I made to get her elected.

  Hearing this, Myra tells me something that makes me very happy.

  “Petey, I don’t know how, but I do know that you’ve had plenty to do with me getting in position to win this election, so I’ve got a special gift for you.”

  I wish she’d stop calling me that but I know that if I asked her to, that would provide her with just one more button she could press to annoy me. “I’m all ears.” Myra’s got tons of money she inherited from her grandfather. Maybe she’s finally going to spend a little on me.

  “When you get to Maui, I want you to make sure that you don’t waste the whole night getting drunk at the club on Margaritas. I want you to get to your hotel room at exactly eleven that evening, because there’s going to be a surprise on your bed waiting for you. I’m not going to tell you what it is, because I don’t want to ruin the surprise, but I can tell you that it will be warm, wet, and breathing hard.

  That’s it. My life is now complete. I’ve finished my last few years’ work and gotten Myra’s respect back. In another day or so, I’ll be in Myra on Maui.

  It feels like the time until my plane leaves tomorrow is taking about five years to pass by. I’m so preoccupied with my second honeymoon with Myra that I can’t even concentrate on a Sherlock Holmes or Nero Wolfe story. Instead, I spend the day on the other thing I lust for, the fifty-foot Grand Banks. Purcell Yachts has arranged with the owner for permission to board the boat and I’m now sitting in the main salon, dreaming of how great it’s going to be living here. I’ve already got some new furniture in mind. The thing I really like about it is that it ha
s separate levels. My master stateroom isn’t just through a door leading to the rear of the boat, like on the Californian we’re now on. The Grand Banks has a teak spiral staircase leading below to the walk-in engine rooms, guest staterooms and aft master stateroom, complete with walk-around king-sized bed, and plenty of bookcases for my mini legal library. I think I’ll also spring for one of those big flat-panel plasma television screens.

  The kid will appreciate the much larger forward stateroom area, usually reserved for the crew. It has its own private head with shower. The Saint Bernard will appreciate the engine rooms, where he can go to be alone.

  If Snell’s reward money comes in a s promised, the deal should close while I’m in Hawaii and Suzi can supervise the move, with the Asian boys doing most of the work.

  T itle to boats pass quite quickly, not like houses requiring up to ninety days of escrow. Boat ownership changes are just like automobile sales. Purcell will arrange for picking up the old Californian and bringing the Grand Banks over to our regular slip for us.

  26

  T

  he day has finally arrived. It’s early morning and I’m waiting for the car service to pick me up and take me to LAX for my flight to OGG, which is the official designation for Kahului Airport on Maui.

  The car comes early, but there’s no need for the driver to call me. I’m already up by the gate waiting for him. Stuart will be by later this morning to start his tutoring program, so I’m not worried about the kid. I sit back, drink from my bottle of expensive water and enjoy the nine-mile ride to the airport.