by Ray Merritt
A number of those around me fervently wish me to leave this stage now. Tremaine communicates only through her advisers and her consort. She is rapt in emotion with her Abelard and she claims it’s all for the love of art. Kati has tired of me too, but for a different reason. I would not give her what she wants. At least she is honest about it. Luc is champing for his chance in the sun. I would have thought he was smart enough to stay on the dark side. And there are others too close, too despicable, to mention in this letter. What some of them may not know is that I have been marked and measured by the mortician, so fate or I might just save them the effort.
When I started my journey, I had no prevision of where it might end. I know now at least my love will last beyond the grave, especially for Dorothy and Leo. That will not be buried with me.
I am not an innocent. I sometimes wish I had more Frodo than Holden in me, more Tom than Huck, more Woodman than Wizard. There is little I can do about it now.
So please proceed with caution as you attend to my affairs.
Obviously, much of this is intended for limited ears only—you, Charlotte, those who have to know, and those few you know I would trust.
I have made provision for all those I love. Viggie and Tereza are provided for in my Will. Argos has just passed away and I will soon join him on endless walks in Elysium. I’m counting on him to use his charm to get me in.
As for my earthly possessions not otherwise allocated in my Will, I request my executor to give Leo my clothes and jewelry, such that he may want, and Dorothy all my diaries as soon as possible after I die, along with any of the books, furnishings, and other things she desires. Whatever remains is for Tereza. My car is to go to Viggie. He understands why. Both have been loving, faithful, and loyal—attributes not dispensed easily to someone as insensitive and petulant as I can be.
Maude and I planned a large family, but fate frustrated us. After the miracle of Dorothy, Leo, and the twins, we lost the twins, and then Maude passed.
All that’s left of the Baums now is Dorothy and Leo and I would not barter them for immortality. I feel confident that they will honor and perpetuate the good that I have done. I expect great things from Dorothy. And for Leo, my wounded lion, I pray for inner peace and great happiness. His heart is bigger than mine could ever be.
Dorothy knows how much I love her and Leo senses my love for him. They have made me very proud. And Dorothy, I need to say to you over and over that I am sorry. Your pain was the lifetime mortgage I took out to maintain our love. I will spend eternity paying it back.
There are many powers in the world for good and for evil. Many are greater than I am. Against some I have not yet been measured. My tests are coming. The road goes ever on.
Perhaps I have said enough. The hour of departure may soon be upon me and we must go our separate ways.
Namárië.
L. Benjamin Baum
Tereza Toboso
Marco Viggiano
12
I returned to the conference room. Before I took my seat, I leaned over and cranked the chair up a notch. I’m not sure if it was an act of independence or petulance. It was an old trick often employed by an insecure host. Lower the level of your guests’ seats. It was thought to put them at a subtle disadvantage, permitting the host to loom larger. I smiled as I cranked it up, then slowly took my seat.
“It seems there is more to Ben Baum than I’d imagined,” I uttered, somewhat inanely. Those were just word-fillers, for I was at a loss to say anything more meaningful.
Barr mercifully took over.
“I am sure you have not had time to consider the full potential import of the letter . . . for Ben’s estate, Ben’s heirs, the Firm, Ozone, and ultimately the Baum legacy. If Ben’s death appears likely to be neither natural nor accidental, then we have to determine what course of action to take. If he killed himself, we would have to examine his mental capacity to determine whether or not to probate his current Will. If it reasonably appears possible that he might have died at the hands of others, then we must consider notifying the authorities. The permutations and the consequences are myriad.”
Dan Finn picked up on that and reframed the issues in the vernacular.
“If we’re convinced that Ben killed himself, we’ll have a hard time keeping the lid on it. While suicide does not necessarily imply incapacity, it and other factors may give rise to a Will contest. If his wife was directly or indirectly involved, she will likely lose her inheritance, her prenuptial perks, and her place on the foundation’s board.”
I had forgotten that Tremaine was the chairman of the Baum Foundation, which I inferred was a major beneficiary under the Will.
“If his lady friend Ms. Krkavec did it,” Dan continued, “she’ll be frozen out. In either case, the press will have a frenzy. If someone at Ozone ordered it, all hell will break loose.”
He paused, perhaps for effect, then resumed.
“If Luc Grogaman or one of his minions appears to be implicated, then it isn’t so much a Will issue as a client issue. The Firm would have to assess the potential conflicts. We have to be careful not to jump to conclusions. A mistaken or premature accusation would clearly damage our reputation and likely cost us our largest client. Grogaman would fire us in a nanosecond. To sweep any of this under attorney-client privilege, however, could prove even more damaging—perhaps fatal—to the Firm’s reputation. Its viability.”
This was heady stuff.
I was processing the information as quickly as possible. I watched Evan grimace at Finn’s words. He was potentially the big loser here. Charlotte looked very uncomfortable. I presumed that she was the first one to read the letter, not expecting it to be anything unusual. In doing so, she’d let the genie out and Evan couldn’t put it back.
Barr reclaimed the stage.
“It is for all these possibilities that we need your help, Tuck. After much discussion, we have concluded that we need to retain special counsel—not so much to advise us, but to discreetly ferret out additional information to aid us in making a more informed judgment. After considering many candidates, we decided on you as our first choice. You bring an invaluable knowledge of the deceased and his family, Ozone, and the Firm. You have the shortest learning curve.”
“What exactly are you proposing?” I asked, with a bit more resolve in my voice.
Gordon Brady, I gathered, was assigned to deal with that for he responded to my inquiry without prompting.
“Here’s our proposal. You would be engaged as special Firm counsel, compensated at the rate of $200,000 per month. We would assign two associates to you full time for the duration of this project. We would expect you and your team to operate in an off-premises space. We suggest you use Mr. Baum’s downtown apartment. We would make his secretary and driver exclusively available to assist in your efforts. You would pay them as well as the associates and we would reimburse you for those costs and all other out-of-pocket expenses. This undertaking would last three months at the longest. We feel we cannot delay filing Ben’s Will any longer than that. We fully understand that you may make little or no progress, but it seems a valuable and perhaps necessary undertaking for us to have someone look deeply—and discreetly—into this. We will, of course, hold you harmless, whatever transpires.”
He took a deep breath.
“Tuck, we could really use you on this.”
His presentation was over.
I accepted the engagement. I did not dare ask for deliberation time. I was afraid my rational self would talk me out of it.
This assignment was too tantalizing to turn down.
13
I did not know Ben as well as I thought I did. Although I was very immersed in his business, I rarely spent time with him alone. That was Evan’s place and he guarded it tenaciously.
Ben’s public persona cast him as a larger-than-life figure. He was physically imposing, his silver-highlighted hair setting off a seemingly muscular physique. Yet he was not known to engage in any activ
e sport—other than his legendary sex life.
In business, he was thought to be hard-wired, verging on ruthless. Yet to those of us who worked with him, he was effective, often calculating but never callous. What made him special as a client was that he truly appreciated his lawyers’ efforts and never complained about the bill.
Uncommon traits.
And he was not only about business. His generosity made him quite well known to the public. Working through his favorite charity, UNICEF, he supported the rescue of countless children from genocide and provided funding for food and medicine to children in need.
Above all, he was always dominant. No matter what arena he played in, his presence was pervasive. Somehow he usurped all the oxygen in any room he entered.
His Precatory Letter, at least on first reading, indicated that there was much more humanity than hubris to the man; more brain than bravado; more angst than arrogance. Precatory Letters, often referred to as Letters of Wishes, are not that uncommon. As nonbinding writings normally directed to one’s executor, they often contain desires as to how the executor might exercise his or her discretionary powers, most often indicating which heir should get what watch, ring, or family heirloom. Once in a while, they are used to express the deceased’s feelings or explain his actions to those left behind.
Wills, most people are surprised to learn, are quite accessible to the public. Anyone can obtain a copy of a person’s Will from the Surrogate’s Court once it is probated.
Precatory Letters, however, remain private.
Obviously, Ben did not want his inner feelings made public. They would be prime fodder for inquiring authorities, not to mention media gossipmongers. This more private form of testamentary desires suited him well.
I had quickly bid my good-byes and bolted from the conference room as the meeting ended. I did not want to speculate on the letter before I’d had a chance to absorb it in private.
I dialed Charlotte from the car and was put right through.
“Hi. What a turn of events! I’ve never read anything like that. Can’t talk right now . . . in the car, but can you messenger out to my home a copy of Ben’s Will? Oh, and also copies of his previous Will and his prenup agreement. They may help me put the prec letter into some context.”
“Of course,” she responded. “I’ll check with Reed and Evan but I’m sure it won’t be a problem. Oh, just heard. Drew Benson and Frank Dixon are the associates who have been assigned to you for the duration. Drew works in my department. I know her very well. She’s a major talent. Don’t be put off by her mannerisms. She’s a bit of a yenta, but there’s a lot of substance behind her veneer. Frank I don’t know. He’s in the corporate securities department. Supposed to be a real comer and very well liked by the associates. What I understand is that they will take leaves of absence and work exclusively with you, using Ben’s townhouse as their offices. This weekend Ben’s secretary is supervising the move of his personal files from his office at Ozone. Word of caution: Be careful, Tuck. Everyone here is drum-tight.”
“Thanks, Charlotte, and thanks for the warning. I’ll be in touch as soon as I’ve read the papers and digested the letter.”
I clicked off.
Tight? More like fright. The stakes for the Firm were very high. You could not miss the tension that radiated between Charlotte and Evan. I imagined that Evan was not happy about her sharing the letter with the power partners in the Firm. All this would undoubtedly entangle partners’ alliances, forge new ones, and result in the lopping off of a few heads. And history tells us that they kill the messenger first.
Poor Charlotte.
Traffic slowed to a crawl. The Long Island Expressway is like that. No particular rhyme or reason for the patterns. For once, it did not bother me. I could relax. I smiled at the letter’s constant allusions to children’s literature. I did not realize Ben was so into that. Beneath the letter’s florid and obscure prose, I suspect, lay a very serious message.
This was no matter for mirth.
Accusations of murder and suggestions of suicide never are.
Like Ben, I too am drawn to the pleasures of children’s classics. Even before the kids were born, I found comfort in Lewis Carroll, J. R. R. Tolkien, and L. Frank Baum. Saint-Exupéry and E. B. White were not far behind. The best tonic for legal and corporate miasmas is the occasional retreat into fantasy.
Ben must also have found it in kid-lit.
I could not suppress my glee when I saw the hobbit hieroglyphics. Tolkien created several languages for his middle-earth, an imaginary place in the earth’s history. Runes are the letters he invented for one of them. As soon as I settled in for the night, I’d translate them. Tolkien’s runes had always fascinated me.
Back to the matter at hand.
Would Tremaine or Kati commit or commission the unthinkable? Could Luc stab his mentor, like Brutus did? Who else was there? And how would they have done it? And what or who was Belladonna?
Could Ben have induced his own demise? Perhaps he did not want to endure the pain of a lingering death. It could have caused him to lose his senses. That’s a separate issue.
Here was a man who lived life fully. He took care of himself and his friends. He may have been a bit eccentric, but he seemed to be cognizant of his mistakes and appeared to have set out to correct them.
He was not perfect, but he was a perfect example of being human.
My guess was that he loved life too much to quit it. Few people kill themselves by throwing themselves off the pinnacle of success. He was certainly more cultivated, perhaps more destructive, indeed madder, yet a lot more sane, than the average person.
I was jumping to my own conclusions—a fatal flaw for any lawyer. Wall Street Woolly’s rule number one: Let the facts guide you, not the reverse.
I had been out of practice too long. If I were to do this assignment justice, I’d better reboot quickly.
I’d have to recognize that there was now a fresh element in my life. I had seized the Firm’s offer without hesitation—and without negotiation—in large part, I suspect, to crowd out my grief.
Even I was getting tired of it.
The reality was that Alice and the kids were long gone. It was time I had the fortitude to declare it. Maybe taking this assignment was that declaration. Perhaps I had a personal duende, as Ben would have put it, who has other ideas for me. That was one of the references I did not get in Ben’s letter. At the house that night, after Nip went down, I deciphered the hobbit runes and Googled duende. Seems duende is a mysterious power that one can’t quite explain, often seductive and potentially destructive. I suspect it is like a psychic kick in the butt. Maybe that’s exactly what I needed.
Tomorrow I start, I told myself.
I had Ms. Toboso, Ben’s secretary—Terry as she preferred to be called—contact the two associates to have them at the West Village townhouse at one the next day and arrange for Ben’s driver to pick me up at eleven so I could speak to Terry and set up shop before they arrived. I had quickly prepared folders for the associates containing copies of Ben’s Will, the prenup and the Precatory Letter, along with a copy of Ozone’s last annual report, although I presumed they had already immersed themselves in all the Ozone information they could get their hands on.
I had developed a plan of sorts.
We would use as our pretext that we were working as a team to help the Firm prepare the filings necessary to probate Ben’s Will and to effectuate his testamentary wishes. That would give us an excuse to speak to those I wanted debriefed, while hopefully keeping their hackles down.
I decided to interview Luc Grogaman and Dorothy and her partner, Eloise, personally. I would have Drew, the estate associate, cover Tremaine and Kati, if she could be located, and Abelard, Tremaine’s assistant. Frank could run down the corporate side, which included Luc Grogaman’s key operatives. Also, he could deal with the forensic and police matters that were needed and work with the London office to get a copy of the police file and see if we
could exhume the body if they hadn’t done an autopsy.
I would also cover Evan. He wouldn’t suffer questioning by an associate.
The chauffeur arrived precisely at eleven the next day. Nip and I had driven in early in the morning.
I was waiting outside my apartment when a gray Mercedes SUV pulled up. The driver, whom I correctly assumed was Marco Viggiano, quickly exited and opened the car door for me.
He was hard to size up on first encounter. Physically, he fit the mold—black-haired, muscular, with a chiseled dark face that was highlighted by frown lines. His eyes were deep-socketed and devoid of agenda. His physique suggested that he was more than a car jockey.
Instinctively I liked him, although my attempt at idle chatter evoked only monosyllabic rejoinders. He seemed to neither require nor expect conversation. The only breach of that was when I commented on the dog hairs in the back of the car. Seems he was very fond of Argos, Ben’s recently deceased golden retriever.
After a long crawl in traffic, we finally pulled in front of a townhouse in the West Village, distinguished from the others by its yellow brick stairs, which led up to a green wooden door, domed at the top and with a brass knob in the middle. I smiled. I suspected it was fashioned after Tolkien’s drawing of Bilbo’s hobbit house.
Viggiano pointed to the buzzer and returned to the car, quickly pulling away.
I was greeted by Tereza Toboso, an affable, robust woman who appeared to be in her sixties. I remembered her—Ben’s personal assistant and the gatekeeper to his kingdom. She promptly reintroduced herself and again directed me to call her Terry as she offered me coffee and homemade muffins.
I did not refuse and I let her keep talking.
Seems she had been in Ben’s employ for a long time. She knew him in high school, where she was the secretary of their school’s literary society, at the same time that Ben served as president. After graduation, she joined Ben in his fledgling electronics company—never to leave. Later, when the company moved its headquarters to New York, she eventually settled in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, although she confided she spent most of the week in the townhouse.