The Arraignment

by Steve Martini

  She has a point.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  It is late June and from all accounts the cops are no closer to finding out who shot Nick than they were two months ago. The double murder has all the signs of an investigation going nowhere.

  I pull into the parking lot on Harbor Boulevard and find an empty visitor’s space. Zane Tresler’s county office is located on the top floor of the Hall of Administration, a Spanish art deco tower facing the bay.

  I clear security on the ground floor and take the elevator up to the executive suites. At the far end of the marble corridor is a set of double doors, translucent etched glass framed in mahogany, the name ZANE TRESLER stenciled in gold letters across the glass. Tresler represents District 5, and Adam was right, he is now chairman of the board.

  I jerk the heavy door open and walk in. Reception is its own museum. A floor-to-ceiling display case is situated in the center of the room like a pillar of ice. Inside are artifacts of an earlier civilization. If I had to guess, I would say Central or South American. They contain pieces of ancient pottery arrayed on shelves around a large stone tablet, covered in white plaster with figures etched into it. The printed card next to it reads:

  SIXTH CENTURY MAYAN STELA

  This magnificently preserved Mayan tablet, covered in limestone plaster and etched with hieroglyphs, is an ancient document and form of written expression used by Mayan scribes to record important events or religious ceremonies. The stela presented here was discovered in 1932 near the ruins of Tulúm on the Caribbean coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. It is believed to have been transported from an even earlier site somewhere in Central Southern Mexico.

  My appointment with Tresler is for ten. I am a couple of minutes early. I step around the display case and hand my card to the young woman sitting behind the counter.

  She picks up the phone and sends my name back, listens for a second, then hangs up.

  “Someone will be out to get you in a moment,” she says.

  I turn to check the display on this side, behind me. Here there are pieces of pottery, dishes and a jug, some with hairline cracks probably dating back to the time of Moses. The card typed in neat print next to them says: TOLTEC: TENTH CENTURY. I’m wrong. Before I can read further, I am paged from behind.

  “Mr. Madriani?”

  When I turn, a young man is standing in front of me.

  “Hi. I’m Arnie Mack, one of Supervisor Tresler’s A.A.s.” He shakes my hand under a guileless grin.

  “The man has quite a display,” I tell him.

  “Yeah. One of the supervisor’s passions. He’s really into archeology and history. He’s working to fund a museum for the area.”

  “Yes. I’d heard that.”

  “If you follow me, I’ll take you back.” He leads me past reception, a guarded door that leads to the inner sanctum.

  We arrive at another centered set of double translucent doors, each etched with gold lettering across them.

  ZANE TRESLER

  CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS

  When the kid opens the door, there is a kind of musty odor. It’s a familiar smell that seems to linger in government buildings dating to the depression, the WPA of the 1930s. I have often equated this damp scent with the smell of power.

  He takes a few tentative steps into the cavernous office. “Excuse me, sir.”

  “What?”

  “Your ten o’clock is here.”

  “Well, let him in.”

  “He’s here.”

  Seated behind a desk twenty feet away is a bald figure, wrinkles climbing up his pale forehead, ending only as they begin to traverse the crown of his head. This seems aimed at me, like a well-polished bullet, as Tresler’s attention is focused down on a prodigious pile of papers centered on the leather blotter in front of him, the only items on top of an otherwise clean desk.

  He seems to possess the attentive powers of a mystic, as he neither moves nor looks up, as our shoes click and shuffle against the hard marble on our way to his desk.

  Slight of build, Tresler is not what you would expect of someone possessing an estate in the billions and holding the reigns to a political dynasty, even if it’s just a local one. He is wearing a short-sleeved rayon white shirt, buttoned right up to the throat, with one of those string ties that were popular in the fifties, this one sporting a sizable piece of blue-green turquoise in a silver setting just below his Adam’s apple. If I didn’t know better, I might expect him to get out the banjo and guitar any second. His nose is almost touching the papers as he reads.

  The kid looks at me, not sure whether he should go or not. “Sir.”

  “Get out,” says Tresler. “Get the hell outta here. Can’t you see I’m reading?”

  “Your ten o’clock, sir.”

  “I know. I heard you. You think I’m deaf?”

  “Yessir.” The kid figures I’m on my own. He heads for the door, ice-skating across the marble on leather soles.

  “Have a seat. I’ll be done here in a minute.” Tresler still hasn’t looked at me.

  I sit in one of the leather armchairs in front of his desk, cross one leg over the other, and watch him. This goes on for a long enough period that I might wonder if he hasn’t passed out, except that his nose is still suspended over the pile of papers. Every minute or so, one hand will come up from behind the desk, off his lap to flip a page over onto the finished stack.

  After a couple of minutes of this, I clear my throat.

  “What are you here for? Ramiriz send you over here to kiss my ass?”

  The Ramiriz he is talking about I assume is Bernardo, the presiding judge of the county’s superior court.

  “Actually no. I’m here on my own.”

  He finally looks up at me, a quizzical stare, then he reaches over and picks up a single sheet of paper. I can see through it, lines typed on the other side.

  “Says here you’re with the county bar,” says Tresler. “Court budget.” He pushes his glasses back up toward the bridge of his nose and takes a long hard look at me.

  I am guessing he is in his late sixties, maybe seventy. Ordinarily you would give the benefit to someone his age and assume that irritability overtook him about the same time as flatulence—and probably for the same reasons. In Tresler’s case, I suspect he came out of the womb this way.

  “What do you want?” he says.

  “Adam Tolt set up the appointment,” I tell him. “He did me the favor. That may be the reason for the confusion on your calendar.”

  “Ahh. You’re a friend of Adam’s?” he says.

  “We know each other.”

  “How is Adam?” He puts his schedule back down on the desk, off to the side.

  “When I saw him yesterday he was fine.”

  “That’s good. Glad to hear it.” Tolt’s name seems to have the same soothing effect as a mild laxative.

  “You got a card?” he says.

  The kid was too frightened to hand him the one he had, so I get another from my pocket and hand it to him.

  He examines this. “Mad-re-ani.”

  “Mah-dree-ahnee,” I say.

  “You say Tolt sent you?”

  “No. He made the appointment. He didn’t send me. Adam and I are acquaintances,” I tell him. “He was kind enough to schedule the appointment since I didn’t know you.”

  “I see. Worked on some cases with him, have you? Adam’s a good lawyer.” He takes his glasses off and squints at me now, so that I sense he can no longer see me. He feels around until he opens the center drawer of his desk, pulls out a small polishing cloth, and goes to work on each lens, exhaling a little warm breath on them as he works.

  “Represented me on a couple of matters,” he says.

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “Oh, yeah. It’s been a few years,” he says. “Back in the sixties. Some property issues.”

  “As you say, he’s a good lawyer.”

  He puts the glasses back on, so he can focus again. The cl
oth disappears into the center drawer, everything in its place.

  “So if it isn’t the court budget, what is it you need to see me about?”

  “I’m looking for information on some appointments you made to the County Arts Commission some time ago?”

  “People I appointed?” he says. “Why? One of them do something wrong?”

  “One of them was killed,” I tell him.

  “When was this?”

  “Two months ago. I think you probably read about it in the papers. His name was Gerald Metz. He was shot and killed out in front of the federal courthouse, along with his lawyer.”

  He looks at me, makes a face. “I remember seeing the headlines. But the name doesn’t ring any bells. I don’t think I know him.”

  “You appointed him.”

  “I appoint a lot of people to a lot of things. Doesn’t mean I know ’em. You have questions about this, you can get the information from my staff,” he says. “You go out the door there and find my secretary, give her your name, and she’ll get whatever information we have.”

  “You say you don’t remember the name Gerald Metz?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “I have two other names. Can I ask you if you know either of them?”

  “Listen, I’m busy,” he says.

  “What I need to know is, if you didn’t know them personally, were they recommended for appointment by someone else? And if so, who?”

  “Why would you want to know that? Who did you say you worked for? Are you a reporter?” Fangs start to come out.

  “No, sir. I’m a lawyer. I had a friend who was also killed. He was the attorney who was killed.”

  He nods soberly. “I remember the shooting. Saw it in the papers. A terrible thing.”

  “The client’s name was Gerald Metz.”

  “Emm.”

  “You didn’t know that one of the men who was shot in that incident was someone you had appointed to the arts commission?”

  “No.” He shakes his head. “No one told me that. I knew Mrs. Rush was on the commission,” he says. “I take it her husband was your friend.”

  “You know Dana?”

  “No. I can’t say I ever met her. But I knew the husband.”

  “How did you know Nick?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Met him somewhere. An event, a fund-raiser. We’d met a few times. He seemed like a nice enough guy. What was the client’s name again?”

  “Gerald Metz.”

  He thinks about this, shakes his head slowly. “No. I don’t think I know that name. I’m not saying I didn’t appoint him. I just don’t remember the name.”

  “So you wouldn’t know offhand why you might have appointed Mr. Metz to the commission?”

  “I’m sure he was qualified. But offhand I can’t say.”

  “Would there be documents anywhere that might show whether there were recommendations made by others to your office regarding these appointments?”

  “Could be,” he says. I get the sense that the answer to this might depend on what I want to use these records for.

  “Can you tell me how Dana Rush, Nick’s wife, got appointed?”

  “Oh, that’s easy,” he says. “Her husband asked me to appoint her.”

  “Nick?”

  “I assume that’s the only husband she had.”

  “Then you must have known Nick pretty well?”

  “As I said, over the years we’d met a few times. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a lot of work to do.”

  “Where can I get the records for these appointments?”

  “Talk to my staff,” he says. Tresler is back to his pile of papers, trying to get rid of me.

  “Can I ask you about one more name?”

  “Who is it?” Now he’s getting short.

  “The name is Nathan Fittipaldi.”

  He thinks about this for a second, searches his memory quickly, then shakes his head. “Never heard of him.”

  “You appointed him to the commission as well.”

  “Like I say, I appoint a lot of people. If you have questions, talk to my staff,” he says. “Now, get out.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  It has taken Harry less than two days to run down Tresler’s list of campaign contributors. As expected, Adam Tolt shows up everywhere.

  “The man’s on everybody’s list of givers,” says Harry. Harry is sprawled in one of my client chairs, scanning the computer printouts as he summarizes his discoveries.

  “Congress, half the state legislature, city council. Tolt gave to both candidates for governor the last time around. You’d think that would piss somebody off,” he says. “Apparently not. The guy’s name and address must come preprinted on everybody’s Rolodex when they buy ’em. Remind me never to get involved in giving money,” says Harry.

  For some reason I don’t think this is going to be a problem.

  “Tolt gave to all five supervisors,” he says. “No favorites. Two hundred and fifty dollars each. The max for individuals. He gave the same amount to Tresler.” Harry figures we can use this as a benchmark to judge the others. “He’s got a lot of money, but he gives in small amounts.”

  It is one of the urban myths, that high rollers by definition give large amounts. Even wealthy ones usually confine it to a few hundred dollars per candidate. They just spread it around more.

  “Metz and Fittipaldi both show up,” says Harry. “But again small. Metz gave a hundred. Fittipaldi a hundred and a half. What’s interesting is they only gave to Tresler. My guess is they had a goal in mind.”

  “Appointment to the commission,” I say.

  Harry nods. “And while I don’t like to disappoint you, Dana doesn’t show up at all.”

  It seems she wasn’t lying. Dana is nonpolitical, at least when it comes to politics.

  “But there is a bell ringer,” says Harry. “Guess who shows up as a major donor?”

  “Nick.”

  “How did you know that?”

  “Call it a hunch,” I tell him. Tresler knew him. A politician with three hundred thousand constituents in his district isn’t likely to remember your first name unless you fall in one of two categories: You have clout or you’ve done something for him recently.

  “How much?” I ask.

  “Maybe you’d like to guess that too? Pick a number.”

  “A thousand?” I say.

  “Try ten,” he says.

  This sits me up in my chair. No wonder Tresler knew his name.

  “And to get around the giving limits,” says Harry, “he set up a PAC. Citizens for County Government.”

  Harry is talking about a political action committee, people with a common interest pooling their money for effect.

  “They gave in five-thousand-dollar increments over two years. All of it to Tresler. Nick shows up as the treasurer. He gave to the individual max, two hundred and fifty dollars each year.”

  “Let me see that.” Harry hands me the computer printout. I scan down the list. I don’t have to go far to find the PAC. The donors are listed in the order of the amount given, large contributors at the top.

  Harry can tell by my look that this is not something I had expected.

  There are twenty names on Nick’s PAC, a separate list for each year, but the names are pretty much the same. Some of them are out of county. Two are out of state.

  “Did you ever know him to get involved?” asks Harry.

  “Nick didn’t have a high interest in civics,” I tell him.

  “That’s what I thought. But I checked it anyway. He didn’t give to anybody else. I looked for local, state, and federal, under donor names. Not a single hit for Nick, except on Tresler. So what do you think he was after?”

  I shake my head. Not a clue.

  “We can assume,” says Harry, “that this would be a lock, ten thousand, to put his wife on this commission. But you’d have to admit it’s a bit of an overkill. Especially for a guy who’s missing house payments.”

&
nbsp; I settle back in my chair, still studying the list of names underneath Nick’s.

  “There was no hint from Tresler when you talked to him, right?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe you should go back and ask him.”

  “He’d just tell me what every politician tells anybody who asks. ‘I’m above all that. I never look.’ He’d act surprised and tell me that Nick must have been a follower of his philosophy—senile belligerence,” I tell him. “That’s if I got through the front door. By now Tresler probably has my name on the list under ‘cranks and the demented’ with security in the lobby. Still he didn’t try to hide the fact that he knew Nick.”

  “It’s good to know that at least Nick’s money bought him a little recognition, even if it was posthumous,” says Harry. “We’re no better off now than we were before.”

  The phone on my desk rings.

  “Except now we have more questions.” Harry finishes the thought as I answer the call.

  “Hello.”

  “I don’t know any other lawyers answer their own phone.” I recognize the raspy voice on the other end. “Joyce here,” she says. “I bet you thought I died and went to hell.”

  She tells me she and Benny checked out the neighborhood, the drug dealer’s house last night. “But not to worry,” she says. “Benny had his gun. Double-barrel shotgun, both of them loaded. We had to make sure of the address,” she says.

  “You didn’t trust me?”

  “We’re professionals,” she says. “Like to do it right.”

  I can see her up on the porch with one of those flashlights that takes a battery the size of a bread box, with a notepad writing down the names off the mailbox, while Benny sat in the car at the curb with his blunderbuss, ready to blow the shit out of the front of the place if anybody walked out the door. There are at least three felonies here that I can count. It’s the problem with Joyce. I know mobsters with more discretion.

  “What did you find out?”