The Lasko Tangent

Twenty-Two

The hospital kept me until about 3:30, a fair amount of which I spent filling out forms, ours and theirs. No fracture, they told me cheerfully, and they had pretty much ruled out brain damage. I was delighted.

Normally I would have flagged a taxi in front. Instead, I found a pay phone in the lobby and called a cab to meet me in the rear. Ten days before I would have laughed at that but now nothing much was funny.

I waited inside until the cab showed up, then got in and routed the cabbie toward Old Town Alexandria on the George Washington Parkway, paralleling the Potomac. As near as I could make out, no one was following.

The Parkway ran abruptly into Alexandria and turned into Washington Street. The cabbie turned left and steered through cramped lanes onto Duke Street. Old Town was mostly brick townhouses, very old, with small yards stubbing the sidewalk. As Georgetown, it would never quite make it. Not enough trees and no restaurant I cared for. But it was peaceful for the most part, and not jammed with weekend tourists hell-bent on making it impossible to live in. That had its charms.

Stansbury lived on Pitt Street, named after William Pitt. The Elder. His house had a front yard, large for Old Town standards, and crammed, but neatly, with the kind of lush stuff you can grow in Washington. The house itself was brick, painted grey, with a freshly painted black door and new brass knocker. I could have picked it out without an address.

I told the cabbie to wait and went to the door. I skipped the door bell and gave the brass knocker two good raps, thinking to please him.

The door opened and Stansbury stood there, looking as clean and trim as the house. He smiled broadly. “Chris, how are you?”

“Fine, Mr. Stansbury. You certainly look well.” I shook his hand.

He waved me in with a pleased expression. I looked for signs of aging and couldn’t find any. Sixty-eight, maybe. Grey hair. Skin leathery but still almost unlined. The one price of age was in his voice, a sort of manly croak.

He steered me toward the living room. I looked around. Furniture sparse, mostly antiques, very tasteful and not too much. A lot of it I remembered from the old house.

“You’ve done a nice job with this place,” I said.

He nodded his thanks. “It’s given me something to do since Martha died. That’s when I decided to move here. Cheryl’s husband is with the State Department, you know, and they’ve just had a second boy. This is close enough to Chevy Chase to see them and far enough away not to be a bother.” And farther away from Boston, I thought, but didn’t say so.

He was taking stock of me. “You look well, Chris. Older. Old enough,” he added with a smile, “to have a drink. Gin and tonic?”

He was proud of those, I remembered. “Fine,” I said, and followed him into the kitchen. We chatted, catching up while he worked on the drinks. He made them carefully, measuring and stirring, as if sealing an act of hospitality. Then he cut the lime into slices, and squeezed them with a careful, practiced twist which feared the first betrayal of old age. It was that, oddly, that reminded me that I had missed him.

He was still peering at the drinks. “Do you ever hear from Brett?”

I shook my head. “No. How is she?”

“I don’t really know.” He glanced up sideways. “No, I suppose I do know. That’s one reason I live here instead of there.”

Brett was his favorite, I knew. I tried joking. “Vietnam is over now. I would think you’re out of things to argue about.”

He smiled fleetingly. “I tell myself that wishing for past things is the first sign of senility. But I remember that you and Brett talked, communicated.” His voice lingered on the last word. “She and Roger just play act.”

I looked down at the drink. “There were a lot of things about it that were my fault. But that’s not one of them.”

He gave me a quick, questioning glance, then touched my shoulder. “I’m sorry to bring it up,” he said in a dismissing tone. “What can I help you with?”

The chips were in a sandwich bag in my pocket. I pulled them out and spilled them on his kitchen table. They scattered with a hollow rattle. He raised an inquiring eyebrow in their direction.

“I need them analyzed.”

“With what in mind?”

“Are you familiar with chips manufactured by Yokama Electric?”

He nodded. “I worked with them at the company.”

“Can you get a hold of some Yokama chips and compare them? I need to know if these are the same.”

“I can. But I probably can’t answer until Monday. Why do you need to know?”

“I wish I could tell you, but I can’t. I’m a little out of bounds on this one.”

He made a satiric face. “Top secret?”

“Something like that. To do this, does anyone at Yokama need to know?”

“Not if that’s important.”

“It is.”

“All right then. Can you stay?”

I shifted uncomfortably. “I’d like to, but I can’t. I’m under some pressure right now.”

Concern grazed his face. “Anything I could help with?”

“You already have.”

We talked a moment longer. Then he walked me to the door and gave me a firm handshake. “I’ve missed our talks, Chris.”

So had I. “I’ll come out again.”

“Good.” He waved as I went down the pathway, then turned back to the empty, quiet house and shut the door.

I rode back to the agency, trying to think of the case. It made me face something unpleasant: that I was wishing it was someone else’s problem. Sometimes I didn’t know whether I was trying to avenge Lehman, save Martinson, or catch up to my troubles before they caught me. I went to my office-thinking of Brett, then the case-depressed.

Debbie was waiting with a message. McGuire had called a meeting the next morning. Woods, McGuire, Feiner, and me. I was pondering that when some rodent who processed travel vouchers came quivering through my door. He was wearing plaid pants and white patent leather loafers and blinked a lot, for no particular reason except maybe the glare from his shoes. He was very disturbed by my expense report for Boston and couldn’t reimburse me until I explained. Why, he wondered, had it been necessary to stay in Boston overnight? Because the blizzard had closed the airport, I countered. He started to lecture me on the difficulties of his job, which I should take more seriously. I amused myself by wondering what Martinson was up to while I performed such socially useful work. Then I explained that my witness had been run over by a car. I was sure he understood that made my job more difficult. First I had to help remove the body from Arlington Street, and then the tiresome police wanted to rehash it all. So I hadn’t been able to see the widow until the next day and, of course, I’d wanted to give her a proper mourning period. Did he want a memo explaining all this, I wondered, or would autopsy photos suffice? By this time he was green, and I felt a little sorry for him. Dealing with madmen wasn’t in his job description. He said he would think about it and backed out, looking worried.

Robinson passed him on the way in. “What happened at the hospital?”

“The doctors say I’m OK. No fracture.”

Robinson looked pleased. “That’s good.” He checked his watch. “Let’s call it quits, Chris. I’ll run you home. You’ve earned it.”

That sounded good. But I hadn’t talked to Woods yet, about Green or St. Maarten. Robinson waited while I called him. I struck out. Woods was testifying on the Hill on corporate payoffs, then giving a speech in New York. He would be back in the morning. I gave up and accepted the ride.

We walked to the garage, got in his car, and headed toward my place. “So what are you going to do about all this?” he asked.

“I’ve got a meeting tomorrow. Woods, McGuire, and Feiner. Maybe I can get someone to wake up.”

“You might try being nice to McGuire.” I looked over at him. He wasn’t joking. “You know, Chris, you’re a natural target. There’s nothing about you that asks for help. You go your own way. Your better side most people don’t see because you’re so damned private. And you’ve got no use for the little accommodations people make for each other so they don’t have to look at their lives.”

I felt touchy. “Just where is all this getting us?”

Robinson glanced over. “Just this. A requirement for liking you is for people to like themselves. If they don’t, there’s too much in you that feeds the tapeworm most people carry with them. Look at you and McGuire. You’re comfortable with yourself in a way that McGuire will never be. You’ve never scrapped for money, questioned your right to what you wanted, or worried about pleasing anyone. McGuire’s had to do all of that. And you sit there with that you-be-damned expression telling him that it hasn’t meant shit.”

I wanted to tell him what I was holding against McGuire. But I couldn’t. “Look, I never said I was inherently noble. But it’s not my fault that McGuire’s turned into silly putty and the reasons for it-whatever they are-won’t make Lehman less dead.”

“Have it your way.”

“Come off it, Jim. I’ve got a dead witness and another man missing-maybe dead too. And I can’t even find out why. I’m quite a threat to the social fabric.”

Robinson pulled up in front of my place. “Look, you’ve already half-killed yourself. Just what do you want, perfection?”

I opened the door, then leaned back. “No. Just something to halfway justify the splendid opinion I’m supposed to have of myself.”

Robinson gave a tired smile. “OK, Chris. Just take it easy with McGuire. And don’t be too disappointed the first Easter after your death.”

I was amused in spite of it all. And I wanted to talk with him. But the things on which we parted company were the reasons I couldn’t. So I smiled, slapped the hood of his car, and went into my apartment.

I mixed a martini, put on some Chopin, and sat, staring into the empty fireplace. I turned the facts around, but couldn’t quite fit Martinson and Sam Green. What thoughts I had kept evanescing. Martinson could help, if I could find him. If he were alive.

That night there was another call. No words. Just silence, to remind me they were there. I hung up. They didn’t call back.