by John Verdon
She held Gurney’s gaze for what seemed like a long time before clearing her throat, turning to Hardwick, and speaking in a changed voice: crisper, lighter. “Okay. We have a deal. Ask Bincher to send me the letter of agreement.”
“Will do,” said Hardwick with a quick, serious nod that barely concealed his elation.
She looked at Gurney suspiciously. “Why are you staring at me like that?”
“I’m impressed with the way you make decisions.”
“I make them as soon as my gut and brain agree. What’s the next item on our list?”
“You said earlier that I didn’t know a damn thing about Carl. Educate me.”
“Where shall I start?”
“With whatever seems important. For example, was Carl involved in anything that might have led to his murder?”
She flashed a quick, bitter smile. “It’s no surprise he was murdered. The only surprise was that it didn’t happen sooner. The cause of his death was his life. Carl was ambitious. Crazy with ambition. Sick with ambition. He inherited that gene from his father, a disgusting reptile who’d have swallowed the world whole if he could have.”
“When you say Carl was ‘sick,’ what do you mean?”
“His ambition was destroying him. More, bigger, better. More, more, more. And the how didn’t matter. To get what he wanted, he was dealing with people you wouldn’t want to be in the same room with. You play with rattlesnakes …” She paused, her eyes bright with anger. “It’s so damn absurd that I’m locked up in this zoo. I’m the one who warned him to back away from the predators. I’m the one who told him he was in over his head, that he was going to get himself murdered. Well, he paid no attention to me, and he got himself murdered. And I’m the one convicted for it.” She gave Gurney a look that seemed to say, Is life a fucked-up joke or what?
“You have any idea who shot him?”
“Well, that’s another little irony. The guy without whose approval nothing happens in upstate New York—in other words, the snake who either ordered the hit on Carl or at least okayed it—that snake was in our house on three occasions. I could’ve popped him on any one of those occasions. In fact, I came very close to it the third time. You know what? If I’d done it then, when I had the urge, Carl wouldn’t be dead now, and I wouldn’t be sitting here. You get the picture? I was convicted for a murder I didn’t commit—because of a murder I should have committed but didn’t.”
“What’s his name?”
“Who?”
“The snake you should have killed.”
“Donny Angel. Also known as the Greek. Also known as Adonis Angelidis. Three times I had a chance to take him out. Three times I let it go by.”
This narrative direction, Gurney noted, had illuminated another piece of Kay Spalter. Inside the smart, striking, fine-boned creature, there was something very icy.
“Back up for a minute,” said Gurney, wanting a clearer sense of the world the Spalters lived in. “Tell me more about Carl’s business.”
“I can only tell you what I know. Tip of the iceberg.”
Over the next half hour Kay covered not only Carl’s business and its strange corporate structure, but his strange family as well.
His father, Joe Spalter, had inherited a real estate holding company from his father. Spalter Realty ended up owning a huge chunk of upstate New York’s inventory of rental properties, including half the apartment houses in Long Falls—all of this by the time that Joe, close to death, transferred the company to his two sons, Carl and Jonah.
Carl took after Joe, had his ambition and money-hunger, squared. Jonah took after his mother, Mary, an aggressive pursuer of many hopeless causes. Jonah was a utopian dreamer, a charismatic New Age spiritualist. As Kay put it, “Carl wanted to own the world, and Jonah wanted to save it.”
The way their father saw it, Carl had what it took to “go all the way”—to be the richest man in America, or maybe the world. The problem was, Carl was as uncontrolled as he was ruthless. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to get what he wanted. As a child he’d once set fire to a neighbor’s dog as a distraction so he could steal a video game. And that wasn’t a one-time instance of craziness. Things like that happened regularly.
Joe, as ruthless as he was himself, saw this trait as a potential problem—not that he cared about setting fire to dogs or about stealing. It was the lack of prudence, the lack of an appropriate risk-reward calculus, that bothered him. His ultimate solution was to bind Carl and Jonah together in the family business. Jonah was supposed to be a moderating influence, a source of the caution that Carl lacked.
The vehicle for this supposedly beneficial combining of their personalities was an unbreakable legal agreement that they both signed when Joe handed the corporation over to them. All of its provisions were designed to ensure that no business could be done, no decisions taken, and no changes made to the corporation without Carl and Jonah’s joint approval.
But Joe’s fantasy of merging the opposite inclinations of his sons into a single force for success was never realized. All that came of it was conflict, the stagnation of Spalter Realty, and an ever-growing animosity between the brothers. It pushed Carl in the direction of politics as an alternate route to power and money, with backdoor help from organized crime, while it pushed Jonah in the direction of religion and the establishment of his grand venture, the Cyberspace Cathedral, with backdoor help from his mother, whom Joe had left exceedingly well-off. The mother at whose funeral Carl was fatally wounded.
When Kay finally concluded her recounting of the Spalter family saga, Gurney was the first to speak. “So Carl’s Anticrime Party and his ‘Scum of the Earth’ speeches about smashing organized crime in New York were nothing but—”
She finished his thought. “A lie, a disguise. For a politician secretly in bed with the mob, what better cover could you have than an image as the state’s most aggressive crime fighter?”
Gurney nodded, trying to let the twisty soap opera narrative sink in. “So your theory is that Carl eventually had some kind of falling-out with this Angel character? And that’s the reason he was killed?”
“Angel was always the most dangerous player in the room. Carl wouldn’t have been the first or even the tenth of Angel’s business associates to end up dead. There’s a saying in certain circles that the Greek only puts two offers on the negotiating table: ‘Do it my way. Or I blow your fucking head off.’ I’d bet anything that there was something Carl refused to do Donny’s way. And he did end up getting his head blown off, didn’t he?”
Gurney didn’t answer. He was trying to figure out who the hell this brutally unsentimental woman really was.
“By the way,” she added, “you ought to look at some pictures of Carl taken before this thing happened.”
“Why?”
“So you understand what he had going for him. Carl was made for politics. Sold his soul to the devil—with a smile made in heaven.”
“How come you didn’t leave him when things got ugly?”
“Because I’m a shallow little gold digger, addicted to power and money.”
“Is that true?”
Her answer was a brilliant, enigmatic smile. “You have any more questions?”
Gurney thought about it. “Yeah. What the hell is the Cyberspace Cathedral?”
“Just another God-free religion. Type the words into a search engine, you’ll find out more than you ever wanted to know. Anything else?”
“Did Carl or Jonah have any kids?”
“Not Jonah. Too busy being spiritual. Carl has one daughter, from his first marriage. A demented slut.” Kay’s voice sounded as flatly factual as if she’d been describing the girl as “a college student.”
Gurney blinked at the disconnect. “You want to tell me more about that?”
She looked like she was about to, then shook her head. “Better that you look into it yourself. I’m not objective on that subject.”
After a few more questions and answers and after a
rranging a time for a follow-up phone call, Hardwick and Gurney stood to leave. Hardwick made a point of looking again at Kay’s bruised cheek. “You sure you’re all right? I know someone here. She could keep an eye on you, maybe separate you from the general population for a while.”
“I told you, I’ve got it covered.”
“Sure you’re not putting too many eggs in Crystal’s basket?”
“Crystal’s got a big, tough basket. And my nickname helps. Did I mention that? Here in the zoo it’s a term of great respect.”
“What nickname?”
She bared her teeth in a quick, chilly smile. “The Black Widow.”
Chapter 10
The Demented Slut
Once they’d put the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility behind them and were heading for the Tappan Zee Bridge, Gurney brought up the subject that was eating at him. “I get the impression you know some significant things about this case that you haven’t told me.”
Hardwick gunned the engine and veered around a slow-moving minivan with an expression of disgust. “Obviously this asshole has no place to get to and doesn’t care when he arrives. Be nice to have a bulldozer, push him into a ditch.”
Gurney waited.
Hardwick eventually responded to his question. “You’ve got the outline, ace—key points, main actors. What more do you want?”
Gurney thought about this, thought about the tone. “You seem more like yourself than you did earlier this morning.”
“Fuck’s that supposed to mean?”
“You figure it out. Remember I can still walk away from this, which I will do if I don’t get the feeling that I know everything you know about the Spalter murder case. I’m not playing front man just to get that woman to sign on with your lawyer. What did she say his name was?”
“Take it easy. No sweat. His name is Lex Bincher. You’ll meet him.”
“See, Jack, that’s the problem.”
“What problem?”
“You’re assuming things.”
“Assuming what things?”
“Assuming that I’m on board.”
Hardwick fixed a concentrated frown on the empty road ahead of them. The tic was back. “You’re not?”
“Maybe I am, maybe I’m not. The point is, I’ll let you know.”
“Right. Good.”
A silence fell between them that lasted until they were across the Hudson and speeding west on I-287. Gurney had spent the time reflecting on what it was that had him so upset, and had come to the conclusion that the problem wasn’t Hardwick. It was his own dishonesty.
In fact, he was on board. There were aspects of the case—beyond the appalling photograph of Carl Spalter—that had him intrigued. But he was pretending to be undecided. And the pretense had more to do with Madeleine than with Hardwick. He was pretending—and letting on to her—that this was a rational process he was conducting according to some objective criteria when, truth be told, it wasn’t anything like that. His involvement was no more a matter of rational choice than the idea that he might choose to be, or not to be, affected by gravity.
The truth was that a complex murder case attracted his attention and curiosity like nothing else on earth. He could make up reasons for it. He could say it was all about justice. About rectifying an imbalance in the scheme of things. About standing up for those who had been struck down. About a quest for truth.
But there were other times when he considered it nothing but high-stakes puzzle-solving, an obsessive-compulsive drive to fit all the loose pieces together. An intellectual game, a contest of mind and will. A playing field on which he could excel.
And then there was Madeleine’s dark suggestion: the possibility that he was somehow attracted by the terrible risk itself, that some self-hating part of his psyche kept drawing him blindly into the orbit of death.
His mind rejected that possibility even as his heart was chilled by it.
But ultimately he had no faith in anything he thought or said about the why of his profession. They were just ideas he had about it, labels he was sometimes comfortable with.
Did any of the labels capture the essence of the gravitational pull?
He couldn’t say.
The bottom line was this:
Rationalize and temporize as he might, he could no more walk away from a challenge like the Spalter case than an alcoholic could walk away from a martini after the first sip.
Suddenly exhausted, he closed his eyes.
When he finally opened them, he caught a glimpse of the Pepacton Reservoir dead ahead. Meaning they’d passed through Cat Hollow and were back in Delaware County, less than twenty minutes from Walnut Crossing. The water in the reservoir was depressingly low, the result of a dry summer, the kind of summer likely to produce a drab autumn.
His mind returned to the meeting at Bedford Hills.
He looked over at Hardwick, who appeared to be lost in his own unpleasant thoughts.
“So tell me, Jack, what do you know about Carl Spalter’s ‘demented slut’ daughter?”
“You obviously skimmed past that page in the trial transcript—where she testified to hearing Kay on the phone with someone the day before Carl got hit, saying that everything was arranged and that in twenty-four hours her problems would be over. The lovely young lady’s name is Alyssa. Think positive thoughts about her. Her demented sluttiness could be the key that springs our client.”
Hardwick was doing sixty-five on a winding stretch of road where the posted limit was forty-five. Gurney checked his seat belt. “You want to tell me why?”
“Alyssa is nineteen, movie-star gorgeous, and pure poison. I’ve been told she has the words ‘No Limits’ tattooed in a special place.” Hardwick’s expression exploded into a manic grin that faded as quickly as it appeared. “She’s also a heroin addict.”
“How does this help Kay?”
“Be patient. Seems Carl was very generous with little Alyssa. He spoiled her rotten, maybe worse than rotten—as long as he was alive. But his will was another matter. Maybe he had a moment of insight into what his junkie daughter could do with a few million bucks at her disposal. So his will provided that everything would go to Kay. And he hadn’t changed the will at the time of the shooting—maybe because he hadn’t made up his mind about the divorce, or just hadn’t gotten around to it—a point the prosecutor kept highlighting as Kay’s main motive for the murder.”
Gurney nodded. “And after the shooting, he wasn’t capable of changing it.”
“Right. But there’s another side to that. Once Kay was convicted, it meant she couldn’t inherit a cent—because the law prevents a beneficiary from receiving the assets of a deceased person whose death the beneficiary has facilitated. The assets that would have gone to the guilty party are distributed instead to the next of kin—in this instance, Alyssa Spalter.”
“She got Carl’s money?”
“Not quite. These things move slowly at best, and the appeal will stop any actual distribution until there’s a final resolution.”
Gurney was starting to feel impatient. “So how is Miss ‘No Limits’ the key to the case?”
“She obviously had a powerful motive to see that Kay was found guilty. You might even say she also had a powerful motive for committing the murder herself, so long as Kay was blamed for it.”
“So what? The case file doesn’t mention any evidence that would connect her to the shooting. Did I miss something?”
“Not a thing.”
“So where are you going with this?”
Hardwick’s grin widened. Wherever he was going, he was obviously getting a kick out of the ride. Gurney glanced at the speedometer needle and saw that it was now hovering around seventy. They were heading downhill past the west end of the reservoir, approaching the tight curve at Barney’s Kayak Rentals. Gurney’s jaw tightened. Old muscle cars had plenty of horsepower, but the handling in fast turns could be unforgiving.
“Where am I going with this?” Hardwick’s eyes were g
leaming with delight. “Well, let me ask you a question. Would you say there might be a slight conflict-of-interest issue … a slight due-process issue … a slight tainted-investigation issue … if a potential suspect in a murder case was fucking the chief investigating officer?”
“What—Klemper? And Alyssa Spalter?”
“Mick the Dick and the Demented Slut herself.”
“Jesus. You have proof of that?”
For a moment, the grin grew bigger and brighter than ever. “You know, Davey boy, I think that’s one of those little things you can help us with.”
Chapter 11
The Little Birds
Gurney said nothing. And he continued to say nothing for the next seventeen minutes, which is how long it took them to drive from the reservoir to Walnut Crossing, and then up the winding dirt and gravel road from the county route to his pond, pasture, and farmhouse.
Sitting next to the house in the roughly idling GTO, he knew he had to say something, and he wanted it to be unambiguous. “Jack, I have the feeling we’re on two different paths with this project of yours.”
Hardwick looked as if there were something sour in his mouth. “How so?”
“You keep pushing me toward the tainted-investigation issues, the due-process defects, et cetera.”
“That’s what appeals are all about.”
“I understand that. I’ll get there. But I can’t start there.”
“But if Mick Klemper—”
“I know, Jack, I know. If you can show that the CIO ignored an avenue of investigation because—”
“Because he was fucking a potential suspect, we could get the conviction reversed on that alone. Bingo! What’s wrong with that?”
“There’s nothing wrong with that. My problem is how I’m supposed to get from here to there.”
“A smart first step would be to have a chat with the breathtaking Alyssa, get a sense of who we’re dealing with, the pressure points that could turn her our way, the angles that—”
“You see, that’s exactly what I mean by two different paths.”