The Ambitious Card

by John Gaspard

She was naked. Of course she was. Why wouldn’t she be? Standing in the center of the room. Completely naked. I should have seen it coming.

  “Oh my,” was all that came out of my mouth.

  She was stunning, of course, I expected that, but I had not anticipated the tattoos. She had a lot of tattoos, starting on her shoulders and moving, in varying patterns and illustrations, all the way down to her ankles. They meshed perfectly with the curves of her body, seeming to be a part of her, as natural as her skin. One design in particular—a half-moon, directly beneath her left breast—was exceptionally captivating, almost eclipsing the breast itself.

  “What’s this all about?” I finally said.

  “I don’t like to sleep alone,” she said, sounding almost shy. I mean, for a naked person.

  “And yet you insist on banishing strangers from the house.”

  “What?”

  She was, admittedly, not my best comedy audience. I took a different tack. “Thanks, but I don’t think so.”

  “You don’t find me attractive?”

  “On the contrary. Just the opposite.”

  “And you’re not married.”

  “Yes, I’m not married.”

  “Do you have a girlfriend?”

  “Sort of,” I hedged.

  “You do? Or don’t?” My hedging confused her. To be honest, I was a little confused myself.

  “I have someone I’m interested in.”

  “So that means you can’t sleep with me?”

  “In my world, yes.”

  She shook her head and nearly giggled, holding one hand up to her mouth. “You’re weird.”

  “Hello, pot. Kettle’s waiting for you in the lobby.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind.”

  She turned and headed toward the bed, completely unselfconscious. She pulled the covers off. “I’m going to go to sleep.”

  “Then I’ll be on my way,” I said, moving toward the hall.

  “No, no, no, no,” she said plaintively. “Can’t you stay until I fall asleep? I’ll fall asleep faster if you stay.”

  I stood in the doorway for a long moment while she climbed into bed and got herself all comfortable and arranged. She smiled at me and gestured toward a high-back chair near the bed. Realizing there was no other gracious way out of the house, I made my way across the room and settled into the chair.

  “Tell me a story,” she said, as she reached over and flipped the switch on the table lamp, returning the room to darkness. The only light in the room came from the streetlight out the window. In the dim light I could barely see her as she laid her head on the pillow and closed her eyes.

  “I don’t know any stories,” I said.

  “Then do something magical.”

  “I can’t work magic in the dark.”

  “Oh, I bet you could.” This was followed by a wicked little laugh. “Come on. It will help me sleep.”

  “So, you want to fall asleep?” I said. “Let me see. I’m sure there’s something in my act that fits that bill.” I thought for a few moments and then an idea came to me. “Okay, here’s one. My friend Nathan does this trick all the time. He’s a kid’s magician.”

  “I love kid’s magicians,” she said softly.

  “I want you to pick a number between one and nine.”

  “Twelve,” she answered quickly, and then giggled.

  “Pick a number between one and nine and don’t tell me what it is.”

  There was a long moment while she thought this through. “Got it,” she said finally.

  “Okay, take that number and multiply it by nine.”

  “Multiply it by nine?” Another pause. “Okay, I got it.”

  “Okay, now whatever that answer is, add those two digits together.”

  “Together?”

  “Yes. Like, if you had 27, you’d add two and seven together.”

  “Oh. Got it.”

  “Now, whatever that total is, subtract five from it.”

  Her voice was very quiet. “I’m subtracting five.”

  “Now it gets fun.”

  “It’s fun already.”

  “Okay, it gets more fun. Take the number you got when you subtracted five.”

  “Okay.”

  “And find the corresponding letter of the alphabet. Like, if you had one, that would be ‘A,” if you had two, that would be ‘B.”

  “Okay.” Another pause. I could see her lips moving silently in the light from the street lamp. “I’ve got the letter.”

  “Okay, now think of a country that starts with that letter.”

  There was a long silence and then she finally said, very softly, “I’ve got one.”

  “Now take the second letter in the name of that country and think of an animal whose name starts with that letter.”

  “Okay.” Her voice was sounding very far away.

  “Now think about the color of that animal.”

  “I’ve got the color.” Her voice was just above a whisper.

  “Using my magical powers, I can tell you that the country you were thinking of was Denmark.”

  “Yes. It was. It was Denmark.” I could actually hear the smile in her voice.

  “And the animal you were thinking of was an elephant.”

  “It was an elephant. A big elephant.”

  “And the color you were thinking of was—”

  I stopped in mid-sentence, silently cursing myself. This is a very standard trick that always played out the same way. And I had stupidly forgotten the nearly inevitable outcome. The country was always Denmark. The animal was always elephant. And the color was always—

  “And your color was…gray.”

  I waited for a reaction from Nova, and after what seemed like a very long time, she gave me one. The only sound in the house was her steady breathing. She had fallen asleep.

  I sat for what felt like a long time in the dark, still room, enjoying the quiet, with only the sound of Nova’s breathing breaking the silence. I had no immediate desire to get up. I had nowhere I needed to be, it had been a long, strange day, and the chair was more comfortable than it had first appeared.

  I reviewed the events of the day, re-ran conversations through my head and tried, as best I could, to sort things out. In the end, answers eluded me.

  My reverie was broken by a slight chirp from my iPhone, signaling the delivery of a text message. I glanced over at Nova, hoping that the soft sound had not awoken her, and was glad to see in the faint light that her eyes were still closed. I flipped off the ringer to forestall any future beeps, chirps, or actual ringing.

  I didn’t recognize the phone number from which the text had been issued. The text read, simply, “Did u get the drunk girl home ok? M.”

  I ran the initial M through my mind quickly and then it hit me. Megan. Texting me. At night. Would wonders never cease?

  I texted back, making as little noise as possible so as not to rouse Nova. “Yes. Safe and sound.”

  Moments later a response came. “Fun talking 2 u 2day.”

  I hit the keys quickly and quietly, recognizing that the abbreviations Megan was employing might speed things up and yet opting against them. “Me too. Good time.”

  Her response was almost instantaneous. “Again sometime?”

  I thought about the correct response for a long moment, weighing content and word choice. I settled on: “Absolutely. Maybe lunch?” I hit send and although I can’t be certain, I may not have actually taken a breath until the response came.

  “Sounds Gr8. Later in the week?”

  I cheered silently and almost got up to dance around the chair, but then thought better of it. I didn’t have enough material to get Nova back to sleep. Instead, I carefully typed and sent my reply. “Yes.”

  A reply came back through the ether with remarkable speed. “Talk later. Sleep well. Gnight. M.”

  I typed my response. “Good night.”

  I held the phone for a long time, happily scrolling back and forth
through the text exchange. Then I shut the phone’s screen off and set it in my lap, closing my eyes for what I thought would be a short rest before getting up, leaving the house, getting into my car and driving home.

  When I opened my eyes, sunlight was streaming in through the bedroom windows and my iPhone was vibrating insistently against my leg.

  Chapter 11

  I looked down at the screen on my vibrating phone. It was Deirdre, although at some point in the past I had set the Caller ID so that it read, “Ex-Wife (Probably Pissed).” I looked around the room. Nova’s bed was empty and the sun was clearly up. I considered my options for a long moment, and then pressed the answer icon.

  “Good morning.”

  “Where the hell are you?”

  “I’m fine, thanks, how are you?”

  “Eli, I don’t have time to play around,” she said, the level of agitation in her voice at a peak I hadn’t experienced recently. “I’ve been calling you since 6:30 this morning, the police are looking for you at your apartment, your uncle has no idea where you are, and Fred is about to issue an APB, listing you as a fugitive from justice.”

  If I had been groggy twenty seconds ago, I was now fully awake. “Why? What? What’s going on?”

  “What’s going on is that Dr. Maurice Bitterman is dead.”

  For a split second I considered correcting her pronunciation of his first name and wisely thought better of it. “Dead? How dead?”

  “What do you mean, how dead? Completely dead.”

  Now it was my turn to be agitated. “I meant, how did he die?”

  “We can talk all about that when you get down here. Your options are to come in on your own or Fred will send uniformed officers to bring you in.” She paused, her tone warming just a bit. “Personally, I would recommend the former.”

  “I’ll be right there,” I said and she broke the connection. I sat in the chair for a few more seconds. The house was completely still and quiet, with the exception of an odd hum coming from the floor below.

  I stood up, feeling a bit rubbery in my legs, and headed toward the door and down the stairs.

  The odd hum turned out to be Nova, who was seated in what looked to be a very uncomfortable yoga position in the center of the living room floor. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was open in the shape of an O. All of her hair had been pulled up into a tousled bun atop her head.

  She was wearing more clothes than the last time I had seen her, but not by much. She stopped humming when she heard me come down the stairs but didn’t open her eyes.

  “Hey, sleepyhead, you’re finally up. Want to go out to breakfast? Or I could make something. I’m a vegan but I make a mean poached egg.”

  There was an odd domesticity in her tone that I found surprisingly inviting. “Um, no thanks. Some other time. I’ve got to head out.”

  “That’s cool,” she said, her eyes still closed. “Maybe next time. Thanks again for the ride. And everything.”

  “No problem,” I said, turning to the front door and flipping the deadbolt. “Do you want to get up and lock this after I go?”

  She tilted her head quizzically to one side, but still didn’t open her eyes. “Why?”

  “No reason,” I said. “No reason at all.”

  The room was once again filled with humming by the time I closed the door behind me.

  As I approached my car I was surprised to see that absolutely none of the snow that had been so feverishly predicted by the weathermen had materialized.

  Franny had been right yet again.

  Fifteen minutes later I found myself seated in the sunny, glass-walled conference room in Deirdre’s workplace. Deirdre and Homicide Detective Fred Hutton were in a deep, hushed conversation just outside the room. He stood a head taller than her and yet his current posture somehow gave the impression that she was standing over him, whacking him with a ruler.

  They reached some sort of impasse and Deirdre marched into the conference room, setting a small stack of file folders on her side of the large, deeply polished table that took up the lion’s share of the room.

  “I feel like I’m spending way too much time trying to keep you out of jail lately,” she grumbled as she flipped open one of the folders, took out her reading glasses, and quickly scanned the first document.

  “Do you feel that I should be in jail?” I asked cautiously.

  “No, I don’t,” she said flatly. “Which is why I’m working so hard to keep you out.”

  “So Dr. Bitterman is dead and somehow you…or, more to the point, Homicide Detective Fred Hutton thinks I’m involved?”

  “In a word, yes.”

  “And what has led him to that conclusion?”

  “We’ll get to that in a minute. I’d rather keep you two apart for as long as I reasonably can.” She continued to page through her documents, almost as if I weren’t in the room.

  “Did the transcript of my interrogation come back?” I finally asked.

  “Yes, Eli, it did,” she answered without looking up.

  “And he read it?”

  “Yes he did.”

  “The part at the end? Where I sang the song?”

  “The entire thing.”

  “Anybody else read it?”

  She sighed deeply and looked up at me, peering over the top of her reading glasses. “Eli, everybody read it. In fact, the MP3 of you singing nearly crashed the server, it got e-mailed around so much.”

  “Oh.” I sat silently while she finished the report.

  She set the papers down, sat back, and took off her glasses. She glanced over at the glass wall behind me and gave her head an almost imperceptible nod.

  A moment later, Homicide Detective Fred Hutton entered, followed by his partner, Miles Wright, carrying a manila folder. They both sat on Deirdre’s side of the table, looking at me coolly. Homicide Detective Fred Hutton looked particularly icy.

  “I want to open by saying that this is all preliminary,” she said. “Eli, as I’m sure I’ve said to you many times in the past, the office of the District Attorney works closely with the Minneapolis Police Department on major crimes. We have the responsibility and authority to direct the police on investigative issues and we make recommendations on charging decisions, because after all, we will be responsible for prosecuting those charges. You are here for questioning today because you are directly linked to the deaths of Walter Graboski, also known as Grey, and now to the death of Dr. Maurice Bitterman.”

  “How am I linked? Can you define ‘directly?’”

  “I’ll get to that in a moment,” she said. “Here’s what we know so far. At around four-thirty this morning, Dr. Bitterman was found dead by his personal trainer, who apparently was in the habit of arriving at that hour for Dr. Bitterman’s exercise regimen.

  “He found the doctor unconscious in his bed. Paramedics were dispatched and pronounced him dead at the scene. The Medical Examiner’s initial ruling is death by poisoning, but as I said, this is all preliminary.”

  “Poisoning?” I repeated.

  “Yes, we believe so.”

  “But what about everyone else at the reception? There were at least a hundred people there, all eating. Even I—” I stopped in mid-sentence, realizing that I had, in fact, not eaten anything at the reception. I decided to hold onto that tidbit for the time being.

  “There have been no other reports of illness or death resulting from food or drink ingested at that reception. I will say, though, that since there was no official guest list, we’re having no small amount of trouble locating all of the other attendees.”

  I looked from her to Homicide Detective Fred Hutton, who was burning holes through me with his stare. “But if there was a mass poisoning of a hundred people, you would have heard something by now,” I offered.

  “We agree. And in fact, we believe that Dr. Bitterman wasn’t poisoned via the food, but was in fact poisoned while he slept.” She let that sink in. “What do you know about sleep apnea?”

  “Not
a lot. I know that Bitterman suffered from it.”

  Homicide Detective Fred Hutton raised one eyebrow at this statement and sat up a little straighter in his chair. Deidre made a point of not looking at him.

  “And how did you come by that information?” she asked.

  “He told me. Yesterday. At the reception.”

  She considered this, then put on her glasses and skimmed the notes. “Dr. Bitterman regularly used a device called a CPAP machine, which stands for Continuous Positive Airway Pressure. The device was in operation last night. As I understand it, the patient straps a mask to his face, covering his nose and mouth. This mask is connected by a small hose to the machine, which administers a continuous, pre-determined level of air pressure into the patient’s mouth and nose while he sleeps. This air pressure, in theory, prevents the patient’s airways from constricting while asleep, which is the primary cause of sleep apnea.”

  She looked up at me, again peering over the top of her glasses. “It’s also effective at controlling snoring, in case you’re interested. Unless you’ve outgrown that.” She returned to her notes.

  “One of the features of the CPAP machine that Dr. Bitterman owned is a small, removable water storage reservoir, which holds about a cup of water. When the machine is operational, a heating element under the reservoir warms the water, which moisturizes the air being blown at the patient’s face.”

  “Like a miniature humidifier,” I offered.

  I regretted making this comment as soon as it came out of my mouth. Homicide Detective Fred Hutton had continued to stare at me, but now glanced down and made a brief note on his pad. I decided it would be best if I didn’t offer any further comments on the operation of the CPAP machine or sleep apnea in general.

  “Yes, like a miniature humidifier,” she repeated. “We believe at some point a capsule containing poison…we suspect cyanide…was introduced into the reservoir. When the machine was turned on, the poison was released into Dr. Bitterman via his respiratory system. Death would have occurred very soon after he fell asleep.”

  “Cyanide?” I said. “Where would someone get cyanide?”