by David Linzee
“Okay. Look, I got to be going.” Reyes opened the door of the truck and climbed in.
She was almost dizzy with the rush of hope. She wanted to grab him by the collar and make him swear to call the cops. But she managed to thank him and step back as the truck reversed out of the drive.
Part III
Monday, May 24
Chapter 14
On Monday morning, Peter Lombardo entered the office of Medical Public Relations by the back door, which meant that he did not pass the reception desk, and had no warning. He just walked into his office and found the Associate Deputy Vice Chancellor for Public Relations sitting in his visitor’s chair.
Peter had not seen Roger Merck since his job interview eight weeks before. He’d learned enough of the office routines to know that when Roger wanted to see one of his medical writers, he summoned him to the main campus of Adams University, to his office just down the hall from the chancellor’s. Roger liked being close to the chancellor.
In fact, that was how the conversation began. After rising to give Peter a smile and handshake, Roger said, “I was up early to have breakfast with the chancellor. At his house.” Roger turned around and spread his coattails. Long white hairs made a spiral pattern on the seat of his black trousers. “They’re from Mavis, the chancellor’s Persian cat. I shouldn’t have sat on the sofa.” He chuckled.
Peter did too. “So … uh, you want me to take a lint roller to your butt or what, boss?”
Roger swung around quickly, to show an embarrassed face. Peter winced inwardly. He was still struggling to find the right tone for this place. People were nice, they liked a joke, but the crudeness and raucousness of his previous workplace, the newsroom of the Springfield Journal-Register, wouldn’t fly here. Trying to recover, he politely invited Roger to resume his seat, and went around the desk to drop into his own chair.
Roger slowly, mournfully shook his head. “This is a hell of a thing, isn’t it?”
Peter nodded back. He had no idea what his boss was talking about. Obviously some bad news had broken over the weekend. As a PR man, he was supposed to know about it. Unfortunately, he had spent the weekend trying to forget all about his job.
“Have you gotten a lot of calls?”
Peter covertly glanced at his phone. The light was blinking, meaning he had messages, but he didn’t know how many. What to say? “Um … yes.”
“Have you returned any yet?”
Each answer was a step into the fog, possibly toward a cliff edge. “No.”
“Good. Forward them all to me. I’ll handle all Stromberg-Brand media queries personally.”
So whatever had happened was connected to Sturm und Drang. No surprise there, she was the newsiest doc on his beat. He hoped he wouldn’t have to talk to her.
“What I’d like you to do, Pete, is get to work right away on the obit. I don’t suppose you have a draft on file?”
The obit. Holy mackerel. Sturm und Drang was dead. He strove to feel a pang but couldn’t. He had never met her or even talked to her on the phone, but she sent him stinging emails whenever she was unhappy with her media coverage. He pulled himself together to reply to the question. “No, we don’t prepare obits on people until they turn fifty.”
“And she was only forty-eight,” said Roger, nodding sadly. “Who’d expect her to die? Let alone be murdered.”
Murdered.
Nothing since he had left the Journal-Register newsroom had thrilled Peter as much as that word. Questions filled his mind—none of which he could ask Roger. He couldn’t wait to get on the phone to reporters. Adjusting his glasses on his nose, he said, “Uh, Roger, I wouldn’t mind returning those calls myself.”
“Thanks, Pete. I’m not looking forward to it. But the chancellor was firm on that point. As you can imagine, it’s very delicate, now that the local media have chosen to focus on the scandalous aspects.”
Scandalous aspects.
Peter could hardly sit still. He said, “Any tips on how I should deal with the scandalous aspects in the obit?”
“Ignore them,” said Roger, getting to his feet. “Do our standard obit. Call around for some quotes, play up her scientific and teaching accomplishments, get a draft to me by noon if possible. I’ll leave you to it.”
Before the door even closed behind him, Peter had swung to his computer and flicked the power switch. The prospect of another boring Monday, which had weighed upon him since he woke up, was forgotten.
Chapter 15
In their last conversation before his arrest, Don had ridiculed Renata for feeling guilty if she did not practice her singing for three hours a day. Because of his troubles, yesterday had been one of the few days in her life when she had not sung for even three minutes. And this morning she was missing the vocal warm-ups before rehearsal to catch Dick Samuelson before he went to court. She felt guilty for neglecting her profession. Considering the crisis Don was in, she also felt guilty about being so selfish as to feel guilty for neglecting her profession.
She entered the Peter J. Calvocoressi Administration Building and climbed the steps to the corporate counsel’s office. Dick Samuelson looked up from his computer screen and frowned in a puzzled way at the suit on a hanger she was carrying.
“For Don to wear in court,” she said. “Is that all right? I didn’t want him appearing in an orange jumpsuit or whatever.”
“People are arraigned in all manner of get-ups, but I suppose it can’t hurt. Just drape it over the chair back.”
The charcoal pinstripe was his favorite suit. Last night she had spent a long time weighing the pros and cons: it would give him confidence today, but would he ever want to wear it again in his life? Either way, he wouldn’t want it draped over a chair. She hung it from the door handle.
“You’ll need the deed to the house for bail. Is this it?” Never having owned real estate, she wasn’t sure she had found the right paper.
“Renata, I’ll do my best, but don’t get your hopes up. Judges are reluctant to grant bail in a case like this, especially if they think the defendant is a flight risk. Don being a foreigner—”
“He’s an American citizen. Do you want me to get his passport?”
“No, that’s okay.” He glanced at his watch. “I better head for the courthouse. I’ll call you.”
“When?”
“Depends on the docket.”
She left him shoving papers into his briefcase. She wondered where his normal smugness was when she really needed it. Checking her watch, she crossed the Emerson Electric Picnic Lawn, still glittering with dew, and entered the Jane B. Pritchard Theatre by the stage door. The corridors were empty, because rehearsal was scheduled to begin in five minutes and everyone else was on stage. Ordinarily Renata would have been too, but she was trying to avoid being consoled and asked a lot of questions about Don. So she leaned against the corridor wall and waited. Precisely on time, she pushed through the heavy door to the dimness of the Charles MacNamara III Auditorium.
The plan didn’t work. She was halfway up the aisle when she heard an urgent whisper of “There’s Renata!” By the time she climbed up to the Ruth Baxter Irwin Mainstage, the whole cast was gathered round, taking her hands, hugging her, saying how terrible it was, asking how she was bearing up, offering to lend her a car or take her to lunch. Looking over shoulders, Renata uneasily watched Bernhard von Schussnigg, the director, a paunchy, gray-headed figure in black, pacing the aisle. He had a filthy temper at the best of times. If they didn’t get on with rehearsal soon, he would make everyone pay for it the rest of the day.
She tried to get across the stage to take her position, but here were more people coming up to manhandle her. In the lead was Amy Song, the Endeavor-Rent-a-Car Endowed Artist and star of the show. She had actually bestirred herself to come up early from her dressing room and assume the expression she had worn as Suzuki, when she condoled with Madama Butterfly at the San Francisco Opera last fall.
Renata hurried through the brave smiles and hand-clasping and sho
ulder-petting. As she finally made her way downstage to stand on the piece of tape that marked her position, she thought, This is all awfully wet. How opera singers do love an emotional binge, especially when it breaks the tedium of rehearsal. But the asperity of her thoughts was only to help keep her equilibrium, for there was an undeniable lump in her throat. Mustn’t burst into tears. That would bring everyone round for more shoulder-pats and the director would get very cross indeed.
The way Renata saw it, she was a gloomy, irritable person who pretty much deserved the lonely life she led. It escaped her notice that in a theater, gloom and irritability were not her leading characteristics. She had a love for music that she didn’t have for anything or anybody else, and it transformed her into an enthusiastic, patient, tolerant person. A trouper. Whatever it would take to make an opera score live, she would do. In fact, the middle rungs of the opera world rang with praise of Renata Radleigh’s dedication and generosity, though it never reached her ears. Perhaps that was just as well, because the conversations generally ended with some variant of, Poor Renata, she’s a better musician than X, and so much nicer, but she never got the breaks, and now it’s too late.
The stage managers were rushing around, urging the others to their places. Ray the super loped to his place next to her.
“I’m not much for hugs, Renata, but I’m sorry for your trouble, too.”
“That’s all right, Ray. Seems a bit much, doesn’t it? I’m not the one in jail.”
“It’s harder to feel sorry for your brother.”
She turned to him, but he avoided her eye. She said, “He’s innocent, you know.”
“Of course you say that. You’re his sister. But I saw the husband on TV.”
“Bert Stromberg-Brand gave an interview?” This was the first she had heard of it. Last evening she had obeyed Congreve’s orders and ignored the telephone. In the interests of a night’s sleep, she had avoided the television and computer, too.
“The poor guy laid out the whole story. What your brother did was sleazy.”
“Sleazy isn’t the same as guilty.”
Not the most ringing defense, but it was the best she could do. She wondered if most of the St. Louis television audience sympathized with Bert and agreed with Ray.
“He should never have gotten mixed up with that Stromberg-Brand woman,” Ray said.
“What do you know about her?”
“Nothing, except she had way too much money.”
She shook her head; Ray had some very reactionary ideas. “For a woman?”
“For a doctor.”
“Quiet everyone!” bellowed the stage manager, as Bernhard von Schussnigg walked down the aisle.
Chapter 16
It was mid-morning at the Office of Medical Public Relations, and Peter Lombardo was gazing out the window. He had nothing else to do.
His day had gotten off to such a fast start. He had written up a list of people who he knew would feel that they ought to be quoted in the Stromberg-Brand obit and put in calls or dispatched emails to all of them. Then he had written up the rest of the obit, which had taken about fifteen minutes, because it was mostly a matter of cutting and pasting paragraphs from the many press releases he had churned out about Sturm und Drang’s triumphs. Now he could only sit and wait for return calls. It could be a long wait. Docs were busy people.
Meanwhile, the view: the roof of the Amygdala building, the helipad atop Granger Hospital, and the glass and concrete towers of various medical school buildings and luxury condos. In the gaps between he could see the green of Forest Park.
In his early days here it had excited him to have an office of his own with a window. At the Springfield Journal-Register, he had sat at one desk in a long row. He had to hear his neighbors’ phone conversations. People walking by would snatch bits of his lunch. Others would interrupt his writing to tell a joke or let slip a bit of salacious gossip from the State Capitol. Periodically somebody watching the TV in one corner, always tuned to CNN, would shout that something big was happening and they would all rush over to watch and kibitz.
God, the paper had been wonderful.
Peter swung his chair around, breathed on his glasses and wiped them off with the broad end of his tie, and faced the computer screen. Reading what he had written was like chewing Styrofoam pellets. At the paper he had written stories that were like Reuben sandwiches.
His phone rang.
“Mr. Lombardo, this is Dr. Patel returning your call.”
Anisha Patel MD, assistant professor of molecular microbiology. She was very junior in the department, and he hadn’t spoken to her before. Her name had made him expect an accent, but she sounded as middle American as he did.
“Thanks for calling back, doctor. It’s about the obit for Dr. Stromberg-Brand, of course.”
“Yes. I should let you know that I’m going to record this conversation.”
“Um … why?”
“In case you misquote me.”
“That’s not necessary, Dr. Patel.”
“Reporters have told me that in the past, and then they’ve misquoted me.”
“I’m not a reporter. When the article is finished, I’ll send your part to you for your okay. Public Relations never sends out a piece until all quotes are approved.”
“Oh. You mean I can make sure it’s what I said.”
“Or you can change it. Whatever you want is what I’ll run.”
“Oh. That’s good. What about the rest?”
“Sorry?”
“Do I get to approve the whole article?”
“You mean, change other people’s quotes?”
“Well, or recommend they be dropped, if in my opinion they’re inappropriate?”
“I think you would have to take up that with Roger.”
“Who?”
Medical profs were notoriously unimpressed with the satraps and pooh-bahs of the main campus. “Roger Merck, Associate Deputy Vice Chancellor for Public Relations. I’m working directly for him on this.”
“Who else are you asking for quotes about Helen?”
The list was lying on his desk, and there was no reason not to read it to Dr. Patel. But this conversation had been hard on his self-esteem. He dug in his heels.
“I’m afraid not, Doctor. That’s something else you would have to clear with the vice chancellor.”
He heard a sigh of impatience that ought to have intimidated him, but alas, only gratified him. “Mr. Lombardo, all I’m asking is that you tell me one thing. Have you called Dr. Chase?”
Peter hadn’t. In fact, he couldn’t place the name. “No.”
“All right then.”
The rest of the conversation went well. Dr. Patel became quite affable and gave him a nice, sincere-sounding quote about what an inspiring mentor Sturm und Drang had been.
After hanging up, Peter pushed off with his feet and spun around in his chair a few times, cackling to himself. Nothing he had done in the past month had exhilarated him like that phone call. It had been like being back at the paper, fencing with a source at City Hall. If he really was back at the paper, his next act would be to contact the person he had been told not to talk to.
Peter could not resist.
He consulted his directory: Ransome P. Chase MD, associate professor of molecular microbiology. Now that was interesting. Chase was on his beat, but no one had ever mentioned his name. Turning to the computer, he rattled off his standard query, asking Dr. Chase for a quote about his late colleague Dr. Stromberg-Brand, and sent it off.
Only as he turned back to his desk did he notice that he hadn’t hesitated before clicking “send.” The cover-your-ass instincts of an Adams University underling, which should have warned him that he was about to create a permanent record of his insubordination toward a faculty member, had failed to kick in. Oh well, too late now.
The computer gave its incoming-mail beep. Dr. Chase must have been at his computer, too, because his reply popped up on the screen:
Yes, I have a quote for you:
“Ding Dong! The Witch is dead. Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch!
Ding Dong! The Wicked Witch is dead.”
Peter stared at the screen for a long time. Then he pressed “print” and ran down the hall to the office printer, to grab the message before anyone else saw it.
Chapter 17
If an opera fan who couldn’t wait for opening night had happened to wander into the Charles MacNamara III Auditorium this morning, he would have been puzzled by what he saw on the Ruth Baxter Mainstage. He would have been able to figure out that the twenty-odd people standing around in their street clothes, mostly T-shirts and jeans, were opera singers. Their tendency to barrel-chestedness would give them away. The puzzling part was the set.
Act III of Carmen takes place on the border between Spain and France in the Pyrenees Mountains in the mid-nineteenth century. There was nothing to suggest that here, except perhaps, for a jagged line of orange neon across the back of the stage that could have been a mountain range, and an electric simulation of a campfire burning stage right. Most of the stage was taken up by vertical rows of oversize video screens, showing recent news footage of illegal immigrants rushing the Texas and Arizona borders and being apprehended by helicopters and SUVs of the U.S. Border Patrol. Upstage left was a red-velvet banquette and more neon squiggles, this time suggesting a Las Vegas casino. The dominant fixture was an oversize slot machine.
The curious opera fan would have gazed upon all this in bewilderment, until, with a smile of comprehension, he exclaimed, Of course. It’s a Eurotrash production!
When SLO’s two productions for the season were announced, the New York Times had commented that Philip Congreve was making bold, risky choices. Congreve had ordered this quote placed on the cover of the season brochure—and had chosen the music director as scapegoat if the season turned out to be a disaster. Such was the rumor around SLO, anyway. The world premiere of Catch-22 would bring prestige to the company. But like most new operas, it was glum and tuneless and would play to half-empty houses. Congreve had paired it with the world’s most popular opera to put bottoms on seats. So far so good, but then he got to thinking about the critics who flew in from New York to review the season, and how they wouldn’t even bother to write about Carmen, which they had seen countless times. So he had hired Bernhard von Schussnigg to jolt the old warhorse back to life. Von Schussnigg was internationally notorious for his radical productions. He was able to discover an anti-American message latent in practically any opera. His Rigoletto set in the locker room of the Pittsburg Steelers had electrified the Aix en Provence festival. His Pelléas et Mélisande set aboard a Polaris submarine had incited a riot at Innsbruck. With his Carmen set in present-day Mexico, he was going to tell Americans what he thought of their immigration policy.