The Patriots' Club

51

The fire door opened and a young African American woman showed her face. “You Mr. Thomas?”

“Yes.” Bolden hugged the wall next to the employee entrance of the Peninsula Hotel. A slim cornice one story up deflected the snow from his head and onto the toes of his shoes. In his dark overcoat, blue blazer, and flannel trousers, he could be the night manager waiting for his shift to begin, or a boyfriend wondering why his girl was always late.

“I’m Catherine. Come with me.” Without waiting for his acknowledgment, she turned and led the way inside.

Bolden followed at her heel. She was dressed in hotelier’s garb-black blazer, gray skirt cut below the knees, and a pressed white blouse. She walked quickly, never checking to see if he was keeping up. At the staff elevator, she pressed the call button and assumed her professional hostess’s stance. Hands folded at the waist. Head slightly bowed. But her eyes were anything but welcoming.

“I’ve put you in four twenty-one. It’s a junior suite,” she said as the elevator arrived and the two stepped inside. “Darius says to call if you need something else. Anything. He made me say it like that.”

Her name was Catherine Fell, and her official title was assistant front-office manager. Bolden had met her once over lunch at Schrafft’s. As a favor to her brother, Darius, he’d used the company’s pull to help Catherine get a job at the hotel. Darius Fell was his one great failure at the Boys Club, and not incidentally, the man who’d beaten him in a scant twenty moves at last weekend’s chess tournament. Chess, however, was one of Darius’s secondary endeavors. What captured the lion’s share of his formidable mental powers was crime. Drugs, guns, numbers: Harlem’s holy trinity. Darius Fell was a major player in the Macoutes street gang, the American offshoot of the feared Haitian secret police, the Tonton Macoutes. Un homme d’importance, according to the gang’s bloody hierarchy.

When they arrived at the room, she handed him a key. “You’re registered as Mr. Flanagan.”

“Thanks,” said Bolden, attempting a smile. “Don’t worry. I won’t take anything from the minibar.”

But Catherine Fell was immune. Her brother was bad news, and so were his friends. “Be out by nine P.M. Housekeeping performs a second room check. I don’t want them to ask any questions.”

The suite was as opulent as you had every right to expect for twelve hundred dollars a night. There wasn’t a square inch that wasn’t decorated, laden, or stuffed with elegant accoutrements. The quilted king-size bed, the claw-footed desk, the Egyptian divan, the chiffon curtains: All were done in warm golden tones of vast wealth.

Bolden grabbed an orange from the fruit basket and sat on the bed. He picked up the phone, then set it back in its cradle. He could not risk making a call that might be traced. Still, he couldn’t drive her from his mind. He turned on the TV. All three networks were showing the video of him shooting Sol Weiss. He closed his eyes, wanting to doze, but sleep wouldn’t come. He imagined Jenny asleep in his arms, her face the color of alabaster. Wake up, he wanted to tell her. We’ll start the day over. This never happened. But she didn’t move.

A sharp knock at the door startled him. He stood immediately. He had dozed, after all. The bedside clock read 6:05. “Yeah,” he called. “Coming. Who is it?”

“Martin Kravitz,” came the muted reply. “Prell.”

Bolden peered through the peephole. Marty Kravitz stood in the hall, briefcase in hand. He studied him for a few seconds, checking for a tip-off that he’d alerted the police or brought a second. Pressing his cheek to either side of the hole, he trained his eye down the corridor. Miles of golden carpeting stared back.

He opened the door. Turning swiftly, he made as if to return to the sitting room, showing Kravitz his back. “Come on in,” he said.

“How goes it, Jake?” asked Kravitz. “Not bad digs. If you’ve got to keep a safe house, this will do nicely.”

Bolden waited for the two-tone thud of the door closing properly. He let Kravitz catch up, then spun quickly and slugged the investigator in the stomach. Breath hissed out of him like a punctured tire. “I’m not Jake,” he said, shoving him against the wall, bracing a forearm under the man’s chin, raising it high so that he could look him in the eye. “Recognize me?”

Kravitz nodded, his eyes bulging. “Bolden.”

“Nice to meet you, too. Listen up. I’ll tell you this once, and only once: I didn’t kill Sol Weiss. The tape you saw was altered by… well, all you need to know is that it was altered. Got me so far?”

“Yeah,” croaked Kravitz.

“The way I see things, you have two choices: Come in, have a seat, and tell me what you’ve learned about Mickey Schiff, or struggle. If you put up a fight, I promise it’ll go badly for you.”

Kravitz raised a hand in surrender. “Okay,” he gasped. “Just relax. It’s all good. All good.”

Bolden released his pressure and stepped back. Kravitz stumbled down the hall and collapsed on a divan. In his late forties, he was short with sloped shoulders and a runner’s wiry physique. His hair was curly and black. He had a long, bony nose and a weak chin, but his brown eyes were formidable. After a moment, he gathered his breath. “You’re in some deep kimchee, my friend.”

“You can say that again.”

Kravitz held his stomach, grimacing. “Here I was thinking I was doing scut work for HW’s next CEO. Oh well.”

Bolden sat down on the edge of the bed. “What did you find?”

“First, you tell me something. What makes you so interested in Schiff?”

“I have my reasons. Take my advice: You don’t want to know them. Let’s just say that Schiff’s a dirtbag.”

“If you’re trying to prey on my conscience, you can forget it. I checked it at the door when I started at Prell. We’re not in the good-fairy business.”

“I’m getting sick and tired of people telling me they don’t care what’s right and wrong,” said Bolden. “You want to know what my reasons are. Okay. Here’s one of them: Last night some men kidnapped me off the street and decided to ask me some very interesting questions while I was standing on the girder of a high-rise seventy stories above the ground. I had no idea what they were talking about, but it didn’t matter. They weren’t in the good-fairy business either. One of them had a tattoo on his chest that I’m pretty sure identifies him as working for the Scanlon Corporation. I did some checking and found that Mickey Schiff worked for a company that bought Scanlon twenty years ago. That good enough for you?”

“Marginal. I’d have added that he was standing right next to you when Sol Weiss got shot. I saw the tape, by the way. I take it you believe Schiff was involved with your dismissal from the firm. The coincidences are piling up. I’ll grant you that. Looks like you took out the wrong man.”

“I didn’t shoot Sol.”

“So you told me.” Kravitz sat back, crossing one leg over another. “At least I know why you filed a police report for felonious assault at the Thirty-fourth Precinct last night.”

The two men looked at each other. “Someone’s trying to kill me,” Bolden said finally.

“That’s a good reason,” said Kravitz. He nodded to the entryway. “My briefcase. There’s some material you may find interesting.”

“Does this mean you’re going to let me know what you found on Schiff?”

“May I?”

Bolden stood and retrieved the briefcase, setting it down between them. Kravitz opened it, and methodically withdrew one folder after the next, setting each on the table beside him. “All right then, first things first,” he said. “Diana Chambers.” He picked up a folder and opened the cover. “No record of her at any hospital. She isn’t at home either. Or, if she is, she’s not answering her phone or door. Easy ruse: send over takeout. There’s been no police report filed, either. Not in the five boroughs, at least, and you said the crime took place in Manhattan.”

“Downtown.”

“Yeah. Anyway, not a peep about big bad Bolden beating her to a pulp. No record at all of someone by her name pressing charges against you.”

“But Mickey Schiff said she’d filed a complaint. He had detectives waiting to take me to the station.”

“He was lying,” said Kravitz matter-of-factly. “We had better luck with Schiff. Didn’t know he was a marine.”

“Yeah, Mickey’s our own Chesty Puller,” said Bolden.

“I’d watch invoking the name of a legend to describe Mr. Schiff.” Kravitz settled a folder on his lap. “Lieutenant Colonel Schiff served in supply. A procurement officer. Outstanding record. Numerous medals, commendations. All in all, a fine career. After leaving the military, he joined the firm of Defense Associates.”

Bolden nodded, feeling a gear lock into place.

“Schiff lasted at said company for all of nine months, then jumped ship to HW.”

“Defense Associates went bankrupt,” said Bolden.

“Nothing fishy there. Just a few lousy investments. Paid too much for Fanning Firearms and couldn’t turn it around despite Mr. Schiff’s best efforts. That’s that.”

“What happened next?”

Suddenly, Kravitz went mute. One by one, he slipped the folders back into his briefcase.

“We’re not done here,” said Bolden.

“Speak for yourself.” Kravitz buckled his briefcase and stood. “The way I see it, Tom, you’ve taken advantage of me enough as it is.”

Bolden remained seated. “Did you expect me to stop you? Go ahead, if you want. But I’ll leave it to you to explain to Allen Prell that you used the firm’s resources on behalf of a suspected murderer without doing any double-checking. You said it yourself. You thought you were helping the next CEO of HW. Guess you screwed up. Right now, your ass is on the line as much as mine. You help me, and you’re helping yourself. If I get caught, sooner or later it’s going to come out that we met. I don’t think Prell likes to be caught in bed with a murderer any more than HW.” Bolden shrugged. “Your call.”

Kravitz walked past Bolden to the door. “Good luck, Tom.” He opened it and stepped outside.

Bolden let him go. He wasn’t about to beg. What was the point? Kravitz had confirmed what he knew. Schiff had been involved with Defense Associates. He opened a bottle of water and drank greedily from it.

The knock on the door startled him. He looked through the peephole, then opened the door. “You’re back?”

Martin Kravitz swept past him into the bedroom. “I’m not quite the cynical bastard you think I am. If you’d killed Sol Weiss, you’d never have allowed me to leave. Therefore, I’m left with the conclusion that you are innocent, and that someone at your firm is helping to frame you. Given the information I discovered this afternoon about Mickey Schiff, I believe I can help you get out of this mess.”

Bolden nodded. “Glad to hear it. Have a seat.”

Kravitz sat down, and once again, unpacked his briefcase. He sighed, slapping his hands on his knees. “And so… Lieutenant Colonel Schiff’s last project as a procurement officer was overseeing bidding to equip the Marine Corps with a new generation of side arm. Following his recommendation, the Marine Corps signed a seventy-million-dollar contract with Fanning Firearms for the purchase of nine-millimeter automatic pistols.”

“Interesting.”

“Not as interesting as Mr. Schiff’s purchase of a $1.2-million home in McClean, Virginia, a few months after his retirement from the military. This was 1984, I remind you, when a million-dollar home bought you something more than a tract house with marble flooring and a toilet that irrigates your asshole. The place was located next door to the Kennedy estate, Hickory Hill.”

“Sounds like a good neighborhood.”

“Schiff’s maximum pay grade was ‘0-10.’ With nineteen years in, Lieutenant Colonel Schiff earned a maximum of fifty-two hundred dollars a month.”

“Did he have a trust?” asked Bolden, playing the devil’s advocate. “Parents leave him any money?”

“No to both questions. The highest balance his account at the credit union ever saw was twenty-two thousand. Respectable, but hardly sufficient to make a three-hundred-twenty-thousand-dollar down payment on the home.”

“Three hundred twenty thousand? That’s not bad for a career military officer.” Bolden looked squarely at Kravitz. “You’re saying that Schiff steered the contract to Defense Associates and got the house and a job as his reward.”

“I’m saying no such thing. I have no proof of any wrongdoing, Tom. What I offer you is conjecture based on the information I was able to gather. But,” he added a moment later, “a reasonable man might make that assumption.”

Kravitz paused and took a breath. When he next spoke, his voice was softer, pitched high with a tangible fear. “Are you currently doing any business with Jefferson Partners?”

“Yes, I’m handling the purchase of a consumer data company. Trendrite. Heard of it?”

“Oh yes, most definitely.” Kravitz dropped his eyes to the floor. “Earlier you mentioned Scanlon Corporation. Back in the late seventies, Scanlon was split into two divisions. One concentrated on surveillance software systems designed to gather information from consumers. I believe it’s called ‘data mining’ now. They started a company called Guardian Microsystems in Albany, New York.”

“I’ve never heard of it.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t have. Before your time. What you should know is that the company changed its name a few years back. Now they call themselves Trendrite.”

“You said they split into two divisions?”

“The other is their training side. Contractors. Officially, they’ve ceased to exist, but unofficially…” Kravitz shrugged.

Before Bolden could question him further, he delved into his briefcase and came out with a buff envelope. “I almost forgot. You asked for the background check we performed on you. Here it is. Interesting about your name. Do you know of any reason why your mother changed it?”