“We’ll get started in a few minutes.”
“Cutie,” Ruby mumbled, then cleared her throat and pretended to cough.
Rossum straightened his tie. “I keep thinking I know you from somewhere, but I can’t place it.”
Deborah’s heart leapt to her throat. “I don’t know how. I don’t know a lot of important people like you.”
“Well, then. Back to work.” He strode toward the dais, stopping to shake hands with the suits seated near the front row.
A moment later, Deborah’s phone chirped again. Louie? Rossum again, letting her know he was free after the meeting if she wanted to get a drink. She glanced up at the dais to find him staring fixedly at her. Shoot. He was going to make her too nervous to read. At least the testimony was tucked in her bag, safe and reviewed a dozen times.
“Relax, honey.” Ruby patted her hand. “It’s all going to be fine. Eventually.”
* * *
Claudine settled into a seat near the back. Maybe a few dozen people had turned out for the hearing, probably because of the news piece, but the room was far from full. Deborah kept glancing at her phone, then sticking out her lip in exasperation. Judging from Commissioner Rossum’s fixed stare from the dais, Claudine would be willing to bet he was texting her. Ruby fanned herself with the agenda.
Toward the front was the developer’s team. Couldn’t be anyone else. Likely it was a PR person or two and a lawyer. There was a good chance the developer wouldn’t even show up tonight. Why should he—or, thinking of Ellie—she? His well paid team—from the cut of clothes and quality of shoes, that much was evident—would take care of business. They spoke the same language as the commissioners.
If the developer were Ellie, she’d be there all right. She’d never miss a front row seat to potential victory. Claudine just had to hope that the Boosters’ appeal to social responsibility with a touch of emotion tossed in would be more powerful.
People trickled in, and all of the commissioners’ seats at the dais were occupied. The chair, an older woman with a long history in local politics, sat in the middle, with the four other commissioners, each representing a different area in the county, beside her.
A couple slipped into the room. Claudine could see only the backs of their heads. The woman was tall and dressed in pearls and a meticulous dove-gray wrap dress that would flatter either a businesswoman or a lady-who-lunched. She lit on a chair at the opposite end of Claudine’s row. Claudine leaned forward to catch her profile. Ellie Whiteby. Claudine drew a quick breath. Ellie Whiteby was here. That sealed it.
The man—her husband, probably—was equally crisply dressed. He seemed to be holding—could it be?—a book of crossword puzzles.
The chair rapped her gavel on the table. “I will now call the meeting to order.”
“Bobby, don’t run over my skirt,” a woman said.
Gilda? Claudine cursed under her breath.
Her father was right behind Gilda. He should be at home, in bed, so soon after his operation. Bobby pushed Hank’s wheelchair into the hearing room, and Gilda followed, gripping her walker, but still managing a seductive sway to her hips. Father Vincent, fully tricked out in long black priest’s attire, took up the rear.
Claudine half rose from her seat to tell her father to go home, then lowered herself when she met his disapproving stare. Serve the family by serving the job, it seemed to say, and at the moment this was the job. She hesitated, then turned her attention to the front of the room. Maybe, she convinced herself, just maybe they’d come simply to watch. Maybe they were here to support her, and they’d be quiet. At least they’d left the Rizzio kids at the Villa.
“Holy Mother of Christ.” Father Vincent’s voice boomed through the room. “Could you walk any slower?”
The whole crowd turned to watch the foursome make their way to the handicapped seating area at the front. Smiling, Gilda looked right, then left as she traversed the room. If it weren’t for the firm grip on her walker, she’d probably be waving. Claudine had to admit that her hair looked fabulous—nightclub-ready. Father Vincent’s robes still emitted a hint of incense, along with the stench of the cigarillos he smoked. Bobby’s cap was low over his forehead as he pushed Hank’s wheelchair.
Her father. His face looked shrunken and colorless, but his eyes held that steely determination. He breathed shallowly. Her heart flooded with concern—and warmth that he’d come to support her.
“If everyone is settled,” the chair said, “We’ll get started.”
14
During the meeting’s business drudge—the approval of the minutes, a budget modification, a mind-numbing proposal by the county attorney on proposed tax law changes—Claudine’s attention ping-ponged from Eleanor Millhouse and her husband, to her father, to the crisp-suited team. The hearing had all the ingredients for a fine explosion: fuel, air, and a spark. If only they could be kept separate.
Rain drummed on the windows as the meeting slogged on. At last, the firehouse came up. Claudine sat up straighter. This was it.
“The county calls Deborah Granzer to the stand,” the chair said.
Deborah, dropping her phone into her purse after an exasperated glance at its screen, grabbed her folder. Ruby patted her arm. Commissioner Rossum’s head swiveled to follow her. Deborah had only three minutes for her statement. She and Ruby had practiced over the past week, she knew, but Claudine hadn’t heard it yet.
Deborah took the lectern and smiled. One thing Claudine could say about Deborah was that she was engaging. She might spend most of her time cleaning house, but when she was on the stand, no one could look away. She radiated sincerity.
Claudine stole another glance toward Ellie and her husband. With a calm smile, Ellie watched Deborah. Her husband scratched through a puzzle, barely pausing.
Deborah looked down at her prepared testimony. Her smile morphed into shock. Claudine held her breath. Something wasn’t right. Deborah glanced up at the audience, then back to her papers before pushing them away.
“Thank you for the opportunity to support selling the old firehouse. Over the past few months, I’ve gotten to know some young people who turned to the firehouse for shelter. They’d been split apart in foster families, but after their mother’s death, they wanted to be together. I think it’s all right to talk about it now.” Her voice was gentle, honest. Persuasive. But she wasn’t reading. She was winging it, Claudine was sure. “Just like how the firehouse was used in the past to save people’s lives, even as it sits abandoned it continues to do good.”
Claudine noticed the public relations team listening attentively. One of them made a few notes in a legal pad. Ruby, sitting, behind them, seemed mystified.
“A group of us—”
A very small group, Claudine added silently.
“—called the Booster Club hope to buy the old firehouse in the warehouse district and renovate it as a family shelter. The firehouse is structurally sound, and its layout is already largely suitable. We have a donor willing to pay for the building, and we’ve collected a solid sum toward renovations. Right now, there’s nowhere in Carsonville a homeless family can stay together.” She swallowed. “Say you’re a mom and you lose your job. You can’t afford to pay the rent. You don’t know anyone in town with a house big enough to take you in. Well, right now in Carsonville, you’re on the street.” Rain thrummed on the hearing room’s windows. Thunder rumbled like a growling mastiff. “Worse, say you’re kids, and both your parents are gone. In that case, at least there’s foster care. But most families can’t take in more than two kids, so you get split up. You’ve already lost your parents. Now you lose each other.”
Deborah glanced toward the lectern. “I had a bunch of statistics about how families who stay together are healthier and more successful, but I must have grabbed the wrong papers. So I guess that’s all I have to say. But please, commissioners, vote to grant us the firehouse. It’s the first step toward doing something important for Carsonville’s families—especially th
e children.”
The audience was silent. Someone may have sniffed. Lightning flashed outside.
“Do the commissioners have any questions?” the chair asked.
A bald man whose campaign materials boasted “Carsonville Cares for Calvin” said, “Say we sold you the firehouse. Say you managed to fix it up for families. How would you get the money to operate it? Shelters are expensive to run.”
Claudine knew Deborah had prepared this answer. “Should the sale go through, the Booster Club will incorporate as a nonprofit and raise funds throughout the year.”
This was, in fact, how the Villa ran. The criminal community pitched in two percent of its earnings, and Art Weinstein invested the proceeds. Any of the tithers who retired and were willing to abide by the Villa’s no-crime rule were eligible for an open spot.
“The fact that we can raise enough money to buy and renovate the firehouse in the first place shows we’re more than capable of funding its operations,” Deborah finished. “We’d contract with the county, of course.”
Ned Rossum leaned toward the microphone. He beamed over the audience as if expecting applause. The few dozen people present looked on dully. “I’d also like to congratulate you on such a worthy mission. That’s remarkable.” Again a pause, and again no reaction from the crowd. “There are many ways to help families, though, and one way is to provide jobs, not services. We want to offer a hand up, not a handout.”
Isn’t that original, Claudine thought. A regular Shakespeare, he is.
“You mean we should put the children to work?” Deborah asked, her face all innocence. “I thought that was against the law.”
Gilda tittered, as did a few people in the audience.
“No, I mean we give the parents jobs, then they can afford the rent.”
Deborah looked perplexed. “How do you give a dead mom a job?”
Bobby guffawed from his seat between Gilda and Hank.
“Never mind,” the chair said. “Any other questions from the dais? No?”
Not bad, Claudine thought. From her seat, she couldn’t see the audience’s faces, but the shushed attention they paid Deborah spoke volumes. When she stepped down, Ruby clapped, and so did the crowd from Villa Saint Nicholas, with Gilda stamping her walker on the ground. Deborah lowered herself in her seat, and Ruby turned to her asking something. Deborah shrugged her shoulders and handed her the testimony, which Ruby held at arm’s length until she slipped on her reading glasses.
“Next we have Marcus Pickering from Pickering and Pickering public relations.”
A suited man with the bearing of a game show host took the stand. “Thank you, Madame Chair, and thank you to the representative of the Booster Club, who expressed so eloquently the group’s deep care for Carsonville’s families and youth. We at Pickering and Pickering speak for our client as well as ourselves when we say that we share your concern. After all, children are our city’s future.” He smiled.
Claudine knew a con man when she saw one, and Mr. PR had flimflam coursing through his veins.
“That’s why we’re doing something vital for the community as well. Our client has already purchased parcels of land surrounding the firehouse with the goal of creating a riverside district offering vital public services.”
Ruby’s hand shot up, but the PR man studiously looked away. With a calm flick of his wrist, he turned on a projector. “Would someone darken the lights, please?”
The next few minutes were spent on slides showing a glass and steel building with marble floors and lush landscaping. The “vital public services” appeared to include a salon, penthouse condos, and a cocktail bar with stiletto-clad women drinking from martini glasses. The last slide, a marvel of architectural beauty, morphed into a shot of the firehouse as it stood now, with boarded-up windows and ferns growing from its brick walls.
“I think you’ll agree that the high-rise complex, including Carsonville’s new spa, the Shangri-La Too, is a vast improvement over an aging and unsafe firehouse.” The PR man’s smile turned to a sigh. “Sadly, the children who lived at the firehouse seem to have abandoned it. Or perhaps they’ve been picked up and sent to juvenile detention or—we can only hope—foster homes.”
Damn it. Could that have been why someone tried to break into the firehouse—to get the kids to leave? They hadn’t thought moving them to Villa Saint Nicholas would hurt their case. More importantly, how had they discovered that the kids already lived there?
“Of course, we were concerned for the children’s safety,” the man continued. “Right away we tracked down their foster care files to see if we could find relatives who might care for them.” He paused for dramatic effect. “The children’s mother, Wanda Rizzio, had died in jail. She was a criminal, I’m sorry to say. Insurance fraud. She bilked law-abiding business owners out of tens of thousands of dollars.”
Claudine shifted in her seat in a combination of anger and disappointment. She wanted to smack that smirk right off the PR man’s face. She knew that every cent of Wanda’s earnings had gone toward keeping her family healthy. When she died, her bank account was nearly empty.
“Do the commissioners have any questions?” the chair asked.
As before, the bald commissioner was the first to raise his hand. “Do you already have funding lined up for the project?”
“Thank you, commissioner, for that insightful question. Why, yes, we do. The developer is investing her own funds. We’re not relying on outside funding at this point. Purchases against the businesses will fund half of the project.”
Rossum glanced at a note card. “Is it true that this project will provide nearly fifty jobs for Carsonville residents?”
Claudine rolled her eyes. How did this man stay in office? He had “business patsy” written all over him. Handy how he already knew the job count.
“Thank you, commissioner. You’ve put your finger on one of this project’s greatest benefits. It’s an economic engine. Yes, besides the hundreds who will participate in building it, the complex will employ janitors, security people, beauticians, and more. Those people will take their paychecks into Carsonville to buy groceries and other goods, which will, in turn, help businesses throughout the city.”
A few more smarmy questions like this bandied between Mr. PR and the commissioners. Claudine felt sick. Ellie was going to win. There was no stopping her. And the children would be left without a home.
The chair pulled the microphone forward. “Do we have any questions from the audience?”
“Yes.” The deep voice came from near the front. Father Vincent. He took the microphone beside the dais. His black robes swished as he moved.
“Your name, please.”
“Father Vincent Samboni, Madame Chair.”
Claudine’s family hadn’t been much for going to church, and she’d never experienced Father Vincent at the pulpit. Seeing him now, stately in his crisp collar, she practically heard the organ music.
“Commissioners. Fellow citizens of Carsonville. In this room tonight, we have the opportunity to do something good. Something moral. It our chance to be merciful and care for our flock, just as the Lord cares for us.”
There was no soothing organ music, no altar brimming with flowers, but the audience seemed more alert. Even the rain calmed to a gentle patter. Claudine began to relax just a little. Given his bearing, she wasn’t sure why Father Vincent wasn’t Pope, or at least a cardinal.
The priest’s voice reverberated through the hearing room. “Tonight, I heard a poor woman denounced because she had strayed from the path of the Lord. Her children’s bond was deemed unimportant. We don’t know their mother’s circumstance. We don’t know the choices she faced. We don’t know the goodness she contained within herself.” He lowered his voice a touch for dramatic effect. “We don’t know the grace God bequeathed her.”
Perhaps he was laying it on just a bit thick, Claudine thought. The audience, though, sat enraptured.
“Let me remind you that in this world,
there’s book law and there’s God’s law. Those who profit while others suffer will face their judgment at the final reckoning. But tonight we have the opportunity to be merciful.” He paused once again. “A city’s goodness is not in its pocketbook but in its mercy. It is by giving to others that we become a true community. By giving the firehouse to the community to protect those of us less fortunate, you are truly doing God’s work. Bless you.” He stepped down, and moving with the dignity of a papal cortege, retook his seat.
The commissioners’ expressions were unreadable. Eleanor Millhouse’s face was equally placid. Claudine could only hope Father Vincent had swayed just enough votes their way.
One of the commissioners who had been quiet so far, a plump brunette, asked, “So you’re saying it’s okay to break the law? Is that what I hear?”
“Or maybe it’s better to pass laws that line your pockets?” Gilda shouted.
Claudine cringed.
The PR man cut in. “I’d like to make an announcement.”
“Yes. Please proceed to the microphone.”
“The father’s words were very moving. On behalf of our client, we would like to present a check for $25,000 toward a new family shelter built elsewhere. With the Booster Club’s obvious resourcefulness, they’ll quickly find the perfect location.”
Anger burned slow and steady through Claudine’s bloodstream. They—Ellie—had this planned, just in case.
“That’s quite generous,” the chair said. Ned Rossum leaned back, the worry erased from his forehead. “If there aren’t any other comments, we’ll vote.”
“They called Wanda Rizzio a criminal. Well, I’ll tell you who the baddie is. It’s them.” Gilda, near tears, stood at her walker. Deborah knelt at Gilda’s side and placed a hand on her arm.
The Booster Club Page 13