Plain Heathen Mischief

by Martin Clark

  “Correct. We understand you saw everything and were very supportive of the victim.”

  Joel wet his lips and twisted so he could better see her, crossed his legs. “Sure. Yes. So that’s it? You want to talk to me about Karl and Lisa?”

  “That’s it for the time being,” Howard added. “You and I may need to see each other about some unrelated matters before you leave.”

  “Okay,” Joel said.

  “You remember what happened?” she asked.

  “I do. I was there the whole time. I drove her to the hospital.”

  “Would you be willing to testify?” she asked him.

  “I guess so. If you think it would do any good.”

  “We think it would,” she said.

  “I’m assuming you know my situation, my history and so forth. Won’t that be a problem—me being on probation and having a record?”

  Lynette shook her head. “Not admissible in Montana. No one will know the difference.”

  “I’ll try to help,” he offered.

  “Good,” she said. “You mind telling me what you know?”

  “Now?”

  “Now would be great.”

  “Well . . .” Joel hesitated, decided to give Howard a needle and tweak even though he knew it would probably cost him later on. “Do you mind if we speak in private?” he asked her.

  “You mean you and me?” she asked.

  “Exactly.”

  “You don’t care, do you, Mr. Howard?” she replied in a way that let him know he’d better not.

  “You want me to leave my own office?” he asked, his disbelief obvious by the time he ended his sentence.

  “I don’t know why any of this matters one way or the other to you, Mr. Howard,” she said firmly. “And the county attorney’s office will be most grateful. I’ll let you know if I unearth anything that affects his probationary status.”

  “Hey, fine with me. Whatever I can do to be helpful. I’ll grab a cup of coffee.” He managed to rein in his voice. “But you don’t leave when you get done with lawyer Allen, okay Mr. King?” He showed them both an exaggerated smile. “I need to go over official probation business with you, Mr. King, take care of some important details.” He displayed the smile again. “And you’ll probably have to wait while I see my other appointments, which means hanging around till I can work you in.”

  “You want to talk now,” Joel suggested, “before Ms. Allen and I get started?”

  “No. No, no, no. Not at all. I’m sure lawyer Allen is busier than me.” He smiled one final time, said goodbye to Lynette Allen and left the room, made a production of pulling the door quietly closed as he crayfished from sight.

  “Why do you want to talk in private?” she inquired when Howard was gone.

  “Oh, so you enjoy his company?” Joel said.

  “He’s a little prickly and a piece of work, but I don’t know why you care if he hears what you have to say.” She made a quick gesture with her hands, flicked her palms.

  “I’m just more comfortable with him elsewhere,” he said.

  “Your call.” She repeated the gesture. “So what do you know about my case?”

  “Everything, most likely.” Joel recounted to her how Karl had hit his wife without any provocation and split the skin above her eye, and how he’d taken Lisa to the hospital despite Karl’s objections. After he finished the story, he asked her why it was important for him to testify. “It seems like a slam dunk to me,” he remarked. “He hit her, and the proof’s right there on her face.”

  “I’m sorry to say it’s not so simple. Like many domestic assault victims, she is extremely reluctant to testify. The case came to us on a compulsory report from the hospital.”

  “Why’s that?” Joel asked. “You’d think she’d want to stick it to him.”

  “The reasons vary. Sometimes it’s old-fashioned fear. Sometimes it’s self-esteem—many victims feel they deserve to be battered, that they’re to blame. Maybe it’s embarrassment, maybe it’s love, maybe it’s money, maybe it’s an effort to keep the kids in an intact home. I can cite you hundreds of reasons, but I’m afraid she’ll refuse to testify or simply lie for him. She’s already called my office.”

  “That’s a shame.”

  “So that’s why we need you,” she explained.

  “What does Karl say?” Joel asked.

  “He says she fell because you mishandled the boat and caused it to lurch suddenly as you were approaching the bank.”

  “That’s not true,” Joel said.

  There was a knock on the door, and Mrs. Heller appeared, inquired how much longer they’d need the office.

  “Until we’re finished,” Lynette said sharply. She waited for the door to close and then returned to Joel. “I know it’s not. He’s got two other dismissals on his record for basically the same offense. Both times she asked for the charges to be dropped.”

  “Well, I’ll do what’s right.”

  “Even if she begs you not to, calls and cries and pleads and tells you it’s her fault and that I’m pushing the case against her will?”

  “The truth is the truth. If you put me on the stand, I’ll tell what I know.”

  She leaned closer to him, put her elbow on the chair arm and let it hold her weight. “I don’t want you to think I’m a zealot or some kind of flamer. I’m not out to eradicate men and distaff the world, okay? I try to be even-handed. I want you to know as much going in. In fact, I have four rules. I don’t become too excited if someone is punched for cheating on her husband; I don’t really care if you get hit after spitting in a man’s face; and a fine will do if you slap your wife when she calls you a motherfucker for no reason. But you lay hands on a woman without any genuine provocation or in the middle of some everyday spat—you need to go to jail. Period.”

  “I don’t have any quarrel with that.”

  “Good. So I can count on you?”

  “Yes,” Joel said.

  “This guy’s an asshole,” she said.

  “And evidently pretty wealthy—a dentist or something.”

  “Right. And you know what you call an asshole with money?”

  “Nope.”

  “An asshole,” she said and didn’t smile, not one whit.

  “Let me know what I need to do.”

  “I will,” she said and took the load off her arm. “Dixon Kreager speaks highly of you.”

  “You know Dixon?”

  “Sure. I think the world of him.”

  “I do too,” Joel said. “Why were you talking to him?”

  “To find out what kind of witness you might be.”

  “Makes sense,” Joel said.

  “Howard, on the other hand, says you’re a con artist and a rascal. ‘Just another lying preacher’ is how he phrased it.”

  Joel considered what he should say, searched the floor with the toe of his shoe and then stared at the empty space behind Howard’s desk. “I’m sorry he feels that way,” he finally answered. “I’m not too fond of him either.”

  fourteen

  Joel’s divorce became final on November 3, a Tuesday. He got the news from Sa’ad a day later, received the call while he was watching a PBS special on Frank Lloyd Wright, and when he heard Sa’ad’s voice, he turned off the power to the cable box so the den fell completely quiet. He was in the house by himself; Sophie was at work, and Baker wouldn’t be home from school for another three hours. It was the first contact he’d had with Sa’ad since their argument at the carousel, and the sound of his voice—cool, polished and oiled—caused a bitter taste in Joel’s mouth and set him on edge.

  Sa’ad said hello, politely asked about Sophie and trout fishing and then went immediately to business. “As of yesterday, you and Martha are divorced,” was the way he put it. There was no suggestion of bad blood from the jewelry battle royal.

  Joel didn’t respond, just sat there with metallic saliva in his mouth and replayed the sentence over and over and over, dwelled on the brutal bareness of wh
at he was hearing and what it entailed. The words were stark, to the marrow, blunt and precise, a handful of syllables and a commonplace legal result that undid a precious sacrament and made strangers of two people who’d shared a bed and loved each other so fully they’d vowed only death would separate them, and even that would be temporary. Such a grand, remarkable movement of spirit had been reduced to nothing, made so trite and inert that the ordinary end came from the lips of a dishonest, silk-stocking Las Vegas lawyer who carefully pronounced every word and would have his secretary drop the final decree in the mail. And that was it, the sum total, all that was left of a marriage begun eighteen years ago as lovely and ineffable—a dab of paperwork and an attorney’s phone call. It was as if the moon had plummeted from orbit and ended up a regular old chunk of rock, merely another gray stone in a field or beside a road, indistinguishable from the thousands of others lying with it.

  “Joel?” Sa’ad said after a moment. “Are you still there?”

  “Yes.” He was crying, his nose was dripping and his throat was filling with spit and disappointment.

  “Hey, I’m sorry. I am, all kidding aside.”

  “The love of my life . . .” Joel said. He wiped his face and nose with his sleeve, stood up from the sofa.

  “Hang in there.”

  “I prayed and prayed over this, and somehow I just never believed it would happen.” He sucked back mucus that had run to his lip, sniffed three straight times before exhaling.

  “Sorry.”

  “I don’t mean to go to pieces,” Joel said. “I knew this was coming—it’s not like you didn’t warn me.”

  “And the good news is no alimony, no nastiness. Long term, you’ll be damn glad of that much.”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s always tough when it actually happens,” Sa’ad said.

  “Okay.” Joel was doing better. He dried his nose and cheeks again, used a paper napkin from the kitchen.

  “Let me know if I can do anything else.”

  “I will.”

  “I mean it. I realize we’ve had a few rough spots, Joel, but I consider you a friend.”

  “You . . .” The hypocrisy caught Joel off guard, infuriating him. He stopped crying. “What?”

  “I consider you a friend,” Sa’ad repeated. “Certainly more than just a client.”

  “How about that. How blessed can one guy be?” Joel couldn’t help but let the sarcasm fly. He balled the napkin and threw it at the trash can, missed.

  “I’m sorry. Did I say something to upset you?”

  “No.” Joel was curt.

  “I’ve tried to do my level best for you, Joel. I don’t know why you would be distressed with me. You’re ending up with a no-fault divorce, no alimony payments and basically a new life. I won’t mislead you—most of that seems to have been her decision, but it’s still an excellent outcome.”

  “I agree. No alimony—great. Thanks. You’ve treated me well professionally. ” He realized it was important to compose himself and keep his rage in check. He didn’t need Sa’ad suspicious, not with the church settlement still up in the air. “I didn’t mean to be rude. I’m just really upset.”

  “I understand.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Speaking of our professional relationship, I’m having trouble getting a handle on the Virginia suit,” Sa’ad said.

  “Oh?”

  “My associate tells me Mr. Roland wouldn’t return his calls and faxes, and when Roland finally does contact us, he claims we’ve been fired. What’s going on with that?”

  Joel had known this might happen, and he’d prepared a story, was ready with a practiced explanation. “I didn’t tell him I was firing anyone. After everything went so well, we discussed the case and decided I was safe and so was the church.” To Joel’s delight, his response was sounding spontaneous and blasé. “As badly as Christy did, there’s no way she’ll get anywhere near the full insurance amount. So I told Roland to manage things by himself. That was all there was to it, Sa’ad. I figured I’d save Edmund some money and, well, you know, uh, just sort of put an end to our connection. Given Edmund’s line of work, the fewer contacts we three have—”

  Sa’ad interrupted, nearly shouting. “You don’t need to explain any further over the telephone.”

  “Right. So I didn’t fire anyone. As far as I can determine, Christy’s case is a dud.”

  “You’re certain of that?” Sa’ad asked. “Roland’s not telling us diddly, but my associate’s under the impression he wasn’t very happy with you or your performance.”

  “He told me he was. And, you know, he seems to be a very cautious, close-to-the-vest kind of guy. Maybe he doesn’t want to raise expectations.”

  “Something’s a little odd there—you positive you don’t want me to track it down?”

  “There’s nothing to track down.” Joel hoped he sounded confident.

  “Well, I guess you’re right. Four million’s a lot of coverage. But don’t come complaining to me if things fail to go smoothly.”

  “I was there. She’ll be lucky to get four hundred dollars, much less four million.”

  “Okay. I’ll close my file and send Edmund a bill.”

  “You actually bill him, huh? I mean, you know, I thought you did, but—”

  “Why wouldn’t I? I’ll give him a reasonable discount, of course. He’s a friend and good client.”

  “I see,” Joel said.

  “And you’re satisfied everything is under control?”

  What is it going to take, Joel wondered. “Yes. I’ve got complete faith in Mr. Roland.”

  “Then I guess our business is done,” Sa’ad announced. “Our legal business,” he added.

  “It is. Thanks.”

  “Perhaps our paths will cross again someday. I’ve enjoyed representing you. And I regret things didn’t work out with your wife.”

  “Me too.” Joel clicked off the phone, didn’t say goodbye or mention their other concern.

  The leaves, almost all of them, had turned color in Virginia—reds and yellows and fire-oranges were gussying up the hardwood branches—but the weather was still mild and plenty tolerable during the day. Christy was wearing shorts, tennis shoes, socks and a long-sleeve Sweet Briar sweatshirt, walking from the guardhouse down a twist of road that led from Route 29 to the college. She had a pipe hidden in her hand and a film canister of pot in her pocket and had already taken two extreme hits as soon as she passed the scarecrow security cop in his silly hut. It was three in the afternoon, broad November daylight, and she was walking because she had to, had to get outside and smoke a little dope to keep from going mad, completely freaking bonkers.

  Despite what he’d said, Henry Clay Hanes still hadn’t come across with her money, claimed Roland and the insurance company were stalling and had made a sorry-ass counteroffer of one million, which wouldn’t be so bad if she weren’t expecting nearly four times as much. He was going to do this and that, set the case for trial and ask for summary judgment— he spelled the term for her over the phone—and tighten the screws, and sooner or later the cash would be on his desk, but it was more money than most people see in a lifetime and it wasn’t a big shock they were delaying payment, stretching things to the limit. Maybe before Christmas, he’d said, haughty and patronizing like always.

  She was also anxious about Joel, worried that he might be doubting her commitment and thinking she’d double-crossed him. She’d sent him Hanes’s bogus letter to Sa’ad describing her poor performance, had awakened with a hangover and the strange residue of a mushroom high and mailed the copy the morning after she’d gotten it, but that was eons ago and he had to be concerned, even though they’d agreed not to speak till after the checks were hers and the case closed, no matter how long it took.

  She lit the dope and sucked smoke, held down the pot until her lungs rebelled and coughed it up. She needed to give him a signal, to let him know she was still at school and hadn’t seen any dollars. Fuck it—she could
just call from a pay phone when she was in Lynchburg, use coins instead of her credit card. But, damn, what was the number at his sister’s? So . . . she’d mail him again, send a note, wear gloves, disguise her writing, drop a coded message to keep him sedated and off her ass while the check was in limbo. And who was watching, really? Like the FBI or something? Probably nobody—all this Morse code and Mission: Impossible stuff was a joke. It was a safe bet she could drive to his door naked and drunk, and it wouldn’t make any difference.

  Then there was the matter of a paper due Monday and a test the next day that would halt her weekend and keep her from riding with her new friend Kate to Charlottesville for a deluxe band party on Rugby Road. She’d met a killer guy named Gates who’d invited her to Vail over the holidays, and she’d screwed him at his friend’s apartment and he’d sent her flowers but, like always, if she wasn’t at the party with him it was anybody’s guess where he’d end up or what skank might try to sleep with him. Plus, she’d allowed him to do it without a condom, and even though it was day nine when they got together who knew about that math for sure, and then she hears that Denise who lives across the hall has herpes, caught the infernal shit from a VMI cadet.

  There was just a ton on her. It was making her hair fall out and spoiling her complexion.

  She put away the dope and sat against a tree trunk midway down the entrance road. She could hear cars and trucks traveling on the four-lane below her, but she couldn’t see them. She heard somebody blow a long, pissed-off horn, and occasionally a trucker would let off the accelerator and the engine would make a rumbling pop-pop-pop noise. The pot and the warm sun on her face gave her a small portion of relief, coated her with a soothing, low-grade comfort. She marveled at the brightness of the leaves, running her eyes from hue to hue, and after a while busied herself trying to find patches that were still green, hadn’t yet changed. They’re all dying, she dope-thought, one final, spectacular, eye-catching flameout, and next month they’ll be gone, dry and brown and useless and stuck to the dirt.