Sudden Mischief

chapter thirty

WE DIDN'T GET to sleep until very late that night and got up far too early in the morning. Susan was very late, so she left Pearl with me for further spoiling. I fed Pearl and walked her and now she was in the office with me looking out my window and barking at things on Berkeley Street. I was drinking coffee and sharing an oatmeal scone with Pearl and trying to feel perkier when Quirk came in. Pearl abandoned me at once and hustled over. Quirk bent down low enough for Pearl to give him a lap, and scratched her behind the right ear for a moment before he straightened up.

"You got custody this week?" he said.

"It's take your dog to work day," I said. "You want some coffee?"

"Of course."

I got a cup from the storage cabinet and handed it to him and pointed at the Mr. Coffee machine on the side table.

"There's milk in the little refrigerator," I said.

Quirk poured some coffee, and added milk and sugar. Pearl paid close attention. There was a canister of dog biscuits beside the coffee maker. Quirk took one out and gave it to Pearl. Then he came and sat in one of my conference chairs. Pearl sat on the floor beside him and put her head on his thigh.

"Why you," Quirk said to Pearl, "why not my old lady?"

Pearl wagged her tail.

"Going through Sterling's address file, we came across the name Richard Gavin," Quirk said.

I nodded.

"When we talked the other night in Sterling's office," Quirk said to me, "you mentioned a guy named Gavin who kept popping up in whatever it is you think you're doing."

"Investigating," I said. "I'm investigating."

"Sure you are," Quirk said. "Gavin has popped up again."

"And you stopped by on your way to work to share?" I said.

"Spirit of cooperation," Quirk said. "Maybe you can learn by example."

He drank some coffee.

"Good coffee," he said. "You remember the name of the stiff in Sterling's office?"

"Cony Brown," I said.

"Right. You remember he was tried for assault in Massachusetts."

"Yeah, dismissed because the plaintiff got frightened."

"Uh huh. You want to guess who his lawyer was?"

"Richard Gavin."

Quirk pointed his forefinger. "Bingo," he said.

"Richard gets around." I was thinking out loud. "He warns me away from Carla Quagliozzi, who is Sterling's ex-wife. Number 3, I think, who is the president of a charity, of which Gavin is a board member, which was part of Galapalooza which Sterling produced. Gavin's name is in Sterling's address file…"

"To which you of course have no legal access," Quirk said.

"Right. And a guy who answers Gavin's description is calling on some of the other charities in Galapalooza asking how much money they made from the event."

"Is he now?" Quirk said. "You got any idea why?"

"No. All I know is that nobody made a dime, except Civil Streets."

"How much did they get?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe they didn't get anything either. They won't talk to me."

"I'll bet I can get them to talk to me," Quirk said.

"You have a winning way about you, Captain."

"Yeah. You want to make a wager what I'll find out?"

"If you get past the cooked books?"

"I got people can get past those," Quirk said.

"I'll bet they made a bundle."

"No bet," Quirk said.

We sat quiet for a time drinking coffee, both of us thinking.

"Here's what I know," I said to Quirk.

"See, spirit of concentration is working already."

"He talks a good game, and he puts up a nice front, and he won't admit it, but financially, Sterling is in the crapper. He's got alimony and child support. He can't pay his bills. He's apparently run out of people to borrow from. Even his sister won't lend him money."

I held up a last small corner of my oatmeal scone.

Pearl left Quirk and came over and I gave it to her. She ate it with a lot more enthusiasm than its size deserved.

"It's a mess," Quirk said. "But there's ways to get out of it. People get out of it all the time."

"Sure," I said. "The right kind of people. They change the way they manage their money. Restructure for debt relief until they get back on their feet. They might even get a better job, or pick up a night job. But Sterling's old man was a self-made success, and Sterling went to Harvard and played football and was in Hasty Pudding, and drives a Lexus and rents himself a corner office and thinks all those things are important."

"So he doesn't do the only thing that makes any sense," Quirk said. "He does something stupid."

"He does something stupid," I said. "And now he's involved with people like Cony Brown."

Quirk nodded. We both drank coffee again. Pearl lingered near my desk, in case I might eat another scone. Quirk got up and went to the side table and poured himself more coffee. He put in a careful measure of milk and two sugars. He took another dog biscuit from the canister and came over and gave it to Pearl and went back and sat down. Pearl ate the biscuit and resumed her scone watch.

"And," Quirk said, "there was Galapalooza, grossing all that dough."

"Ah yes," I said.

"So where's Gavin fit?" Quirk said.

"Don't know yet."

"And what is Gavin's connection to Carla Quagliozzi?"

"Don't know yet."

"And if you had been married to a guy and could call yourself Carla Sterling, why would you go with Quagliozzi?"

"Might be pride in heritage," I said.

"Yeah, that's probably it," Quirk said.

"Or it might tell you how she felt about Sterling."

"And what the hell has all this got to do with the Ronan lawsuit?"

"I don't know," I said. "Got a guess?"

"Maybe nothing," Quirk said. "Maybe it's got nothing to do with it."