Two Time

SIXTEEN

AMANDA CALLED UP to me when I was just about to muscle a four-by-eight sheet of half-inch plywood up onto the rafters of the addition. All I could do was grunt back until the thing was laid down and tacked in place.

“Shouldn’t you get some help?” she yelled.

“And miss all the exercise?”

“Sometimes doing everything yourself isn’t manly, it’s pigheaded.”

The sun was almost directly overhead, so despite her sunglasses she had to shield her eyes when looking up. She wore a pair of denim shorts, a T-shirt and sneakers.

“So come on up and help.”

“Me? I’m not a carpenter.”

“Hands and back is all you need.”

She was right. There’s no simple way to handle a four-by-eight sheet of anything by yourself, especially plywood, especially suspended on ladders and scaffolding. Having her help made it possible to lay up one full side of subroof, from eave to ridge. The effort cost her a few splinters, while demonstrating the superior exercise value of genuine labor over the simulated health-club variety. As compensation I fed her beer from my dwindling stock of Burton’s fancy imports and let her back-nail the subroof with a power nailer.

“So, does this mean the end of the hammer?” she asked.

“Gone the way of Peter, Paul and Mary.”

“It’s fun.”

“Just don’t aim it at anything unless you intend to shoot.”

We worked until the daylight started to draw long hard shadows across the grass and the sun threatened the horizon with another evening of fireworks. I think she would have kept going despite her exhaustion—asserting her own version of manly pigheadedness—but quickly took my suggestion that we advance the construction schedule to the drinks-on-the-lawn phase.

We took what I guess you’d call an enhanced shower together in the outdoor stall. The experience was comparable to the other night, even stone sober in the full, though fading sunlight. I lent her a flannel shirt and pair of sweatpants to spare her the journey overland to retrieve clean clothes. I let her make a meal, enduring commentary on my kitchen organization, so we could eat something with our drinks out in the Adirondacks, which I’d bleached back to new, covered with cushions and dragged to the edge of the breakwater.

Amanda waited until the plates were empty and we were on our second round to broach the subject.

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want,” she said.

Of course there were any number of subjects that leaped to mind that I didn’t want to talk about, though asking her which she meant might have been more perilous than just saying, “I don’t mind.”

I braced myself and said, “I don’t mind.”

“So how is he? Joe Sullivan.”

“Awake, but not exactly alert. And like Markham said, doesn’t remember a thing past the night before when he ate a hundred pounds of pasta at La Maricanto. He woke up thinking he’d just had a wicked case of food poisoning. It’s a good thing they got him full of sedatives. Soon as he realizes somebody tried to whack him there’ll be hell to pay”

“If he discovers who.”

“I’ve got a pretty good idea who, and unless he’s forgotten the last few weeks, he will, too. Proving it’ll be the problem, particularly for Sullivan, being sworn to uphold the law and all.”

“He’ll want to skip the due process part.”

“Though he won’t, no matter what. His cop head is hardwired. One of the things I like about him.”

“You never said you liked anything about him.”

This was exactly the kind of thing I was hoping we weren’t going to talk about. But it could have been worse.

“He cares what happens to the people he’s paid to look after. That’s good enough for me. How’re the hands?”

“Sore, but happy. So what are you going to do about it?”

“Band-Aids?”

“Joe Sullivan.”

“Consult your lawyer.”

“My lawyer?”

“Burton Lewis.”

“I’m sure there’s a connection.”

“Everything connects to Burton one way or the other.”

“And we’re doing this when?”

“As soon as you decide if you want to change your clothes or go as you are.”

“As if.”

“When you’re ready,” I said, working my way deeper into the chair so I could catch the last act of the sunset, when the crimson orb dips below the line of hills over on the North Shore and shoots a fan of pink and lavender light back up into the sky. “I’ll be waiting.”

—

I first met Burton Lewis when he hauled me up into the cockpit of his forty-foot sailboat, moored in the middle of the congested harbor off Marblehead, Massachusetts. He’d just thrashed the entire New England racing fleet in a boat with the hailing port of New York City NY, written across the transom. Whatever regional animosity this might have engendered, none was directed toward Burton, whose awkward good nature and unflagging civility made all forms of rancor seem ridiculous. In fact, Abby’s family, who would have achieved a heroic shallowness were it not for the depth of their self-importance, fairly fell over one another to offer him obsequious congratulations. Which was maybe why, as the last guy to clamor over the coaming, and the only one announcing his yacht club allegiance as Yankee Stadium, I hit it off with the lanky young billionaire.

At the time Burton had a criminal law practice run out of a storefront in the Alphabet District on the Lower East Side. Like other very rich people who were rich through inheritance, he could have easily devoted his life to philanthropic ventures with little notice, but instead found a way to put time in at a law firm his grandfather had founded that specialized in corporate tax law, which under his subsequent management had became one of the largest practices in the world.

“You get bored defending indigents day in and day out,” he’d tell me. “A. person needs a little something different once in a while to stimulate the mind, stir the juices. Dashing off Schedule M-3s, petitioning for changes in capital structure, tasty audit-driven litigation and compliance hearings, that sort of thing.”

Burton’s house was built on a foundation that had supported the two previous Lewis mansions, built by his grandfather and father respectively. When Burton downsized from forty-six to twenty-four rooms he retained the original footprint, so the building tended to flow across the grounds in a disorienting sprawl that made you grateful for the people assigned to guide your way.

Amanda and I drew Isabella, a Cuban refugee and Burton’s chief of staff, who’d been on the job since her husband dropped dead while serving subpoenas on behalf of Burton’s criminal practice. Burton had only meant to help her over the initial stages of her loss, but somehow she’d managed to co-opt enough responsibility to make herself indispensable. Or at least provide that illusion.

“Be careful when you go into the room,” she told us. “He’s painting.”

The room was a long rectangle lined on three walls with tall arch-top mahogany doors. The floor was tiled with glossy red ceramic squares and the ceiling rose up into a series of vaulted domes, which Burton was in the act of painting a brilliant white. He stood on a rolling scaffold and was leaning backwards in what looked like a painfully contorted position.

“Missed a spot,” I called up.

“And to think what Michelangelo had to contend with.”

“Had a tough client.”

“Not an issue here. All I battle is sniffing from Isabella.”

“Doesn’t like white?”

“What is it with you men and scaffolding,” said Amanda.

“I think old Mick did it all from a recumbent position,” said Burton, wiping a glob of paint off his forehead.

“We should probably let you work,” Amanda said.

“Not offering to help?” I asked her.

“Not unless it involves a power nailer.”

“Stay put,” Burton called down. “I’ll order up refreshment.”

Before climbing down from the scaffold Burton called Isabella on his cell phone to ask for drinks and a side of soap and water. Then he led us out one of the big doors to a slate patio furnished in wrought iron and shaded by an enormous dark green market umbrella under which were suspended tiny electric globes. As we waited for a staffer to bring refreshments, Burton dragged a garden hose out from behind a Japanese andromeda to do some preliminary rinsing. The night air was soft, but cooled by a breeze coming from the ocean, which you could hear as a low rumble washing around the neighboring estate on the shoreline side of Gin Lane, and through the privet hedge at the distant edge of the yard.

I’d lost track of Burton for a few years after I’d screwed up my job and left Abby who’d been our common link. If you asked her, she’d say Burton belonged to her, declaring the supremacy of social parity, never noticing he actually preferred me to the empty-headed gentility that often gathered on his lawn to sip Campari and play one-upsmanship with each other. He was younger than me, now maybe forty-five or forty-six, but looked like a well-preserved older version of himself. Perpetually tan, his faced was creased and gaunt, offsetting a full head of light brown hair that fell in a French curve across his forehead.

Over the first round of drinks Amanda endured a thorough examination of the current and prospective fortunes of the New York Yankees, which led to general agreement on the inevitable four-game sweep of the World Series. Back when I had a job I’d often duck out of the office to meet Burton down in the Bronx where we’d take our chances on general admission or patronize one of the resident scalpers with whom Burton had an ongoing business relationship. It was fun, but I admit I liked basketball season better in his private box at Madison Square Garden, which looked a little like the inside of his law offices on Wall Street, complete with a full bar and a happy Romanian kid named Mihail who always made me name my drink, even though it was always the same thing.

It took a little longer to catch him up with the Eldridge thing, but at least Amanda was able to join in. I told him about Joyce Whithers and her connections to Appolonia. And about Agent Ig, with his ominous cautions and impenetrable intimations. Burton started nodding when we got to the part about Joe Sullivan and my conversation with Ross Semple, a friend of Burton’s from a time years ago when they’d squared off over the case of a young black kid some people thought was getting railroaded by the Southampton DA. It all ended with the kid free, the community becalmed and only the media expressing disappointment over the expeditious resolution of the case. Burton himself managed to direct all the credit to Ross Semple, who accepted it, I always thought, as part of the deal.

“The Chief called me in the City to ask about Mr. Fleming. I told him I’d learn what I could as far as background, but any Federals investigating a car bombing were likely tied to Homeland Security and that means the proverbial black hole. I know a few folks who have access, but when it comes to that territory, one doesn’t even ask.”

“I wasn’t thinking you should, Burt. I was only looking for an opinion. What do you thinks going on?”

“Haven’t a clue. Anyone care for a snack? I seem to have missed dinner.”

People who worked for Burton had to get used to his indifference to conventions of time and space. You were as likely to find him reading in Battery Park in the early afternoon as you were having him show up at your apartment at three in the morning to consult on a case.

“I’ve got a list of Jonathan’s clients, along with some notes on three we’re calling the hostiles. Ivor Fleming and Joyce Whithers, along with his brother Butch Ellington, who’s in a somewhat separate category. Anything you or your hundred-thousand-person investigative staff can tell me about these people would be deeply appreciated.”

Burton sat back in his chair and crossed his legs, resting his drink on his knee.

“Does this mean I don’t have to browbeat you into accepting my help?” he asked.

I’d inherited a keen sense of reciprocity from my father. You borrow a guy’s tools, you lend him yours without hesitation. You help frame a garage, you get the same help when you build the addition off the back. This unspoken contract among working people sustained both a sense of community and self-reliance, because it was unspoken. Nobody made a big deal about it. Though it only worked if the quid pro quo was reasonably proportionate, an impossibility when you traded favors with Burton Lewis.

But I was on a program of self-improvement. I knew it would give Burton pleasure to help out, that he’d be slightly pained if I didn’t let him. Allowing him the chance to express his generosity for nothing in return was in this case the less selfish thing to do.

“Only if you come up with something good,” I said tossing the manila envelope toward his lap. “There’re plenty of rich lawyers where you came from.”

He snatched it midair and disgorged the contents.

“Since you’re making it competitive.”

He looked over the client list and notes, straining slightly to read without his glasses.

“I knew Walter Whithers, speaking of competition. An excellent attorney from a very wealthy family. More inclined to general corporate governance, not much in the tax game. Sat on several boards. We did his taxes. Died of a heart attack in his mid-forties. At least that was the family’s story. Undoubtedly true, though eyebrows were raised.”

“How come?”

“Walter was a bit of a gambler. High stakes poker, very high, with friends and associates, and even an occasional trip to the casinos, I was told. Didn’t know him very well personally.”

“So he blew a bunch of money and offed himself? And Joyce made it look like a heart attack. Would explain why she’s so pissed at him.”

“It would, except it’s highly unlikely. Walter was actually quite an accomplished gambler. Consistently won more than he lost. You can do that with poker, some make their living at it. It’s probably not too great a breach of ethics to tell you his tax returns always expressed a general northerly direction in his financial circumstances. Joyce came into the marriage with her own plethora of trusts and investment instruments. I wouldn’t know the particulars, but a dramatic shortfall would be noticed.”

“Maybe all the excitement got to him.”

“It’s possible. He was a very reserved person.”

At that point I lost his attention to a half-wheel of Brie and a small pile of hand-sliced baguette. Amanda and I helped him wipe it out over another round of drinks. I started to sink deeper into the lush padding that softened the ornate iron recliner, feeling the sea breeze gently stir the satin summer air, now inky black and flecked with the random twinkle of lightning bugs.

“So no thoughts on Ivor Fleming,” I asked him.

“As I said, no chance of any inside information if he’s connected to a car bombing. But I can speculate, Governor Ridge’s proscriptions notwithstanding,” he said while surveying a plate of assorted fruits and crudités that suddenly appeared from out of the night as if the woman with the tray had been poised on the lawn for his cue. Probably sensed the disappearance of the last slice of cheese.

“Option one,” said Burton. “The investigators know Fleming is their man, and are merely crossing every imaginable T and dotting every I in constructing a bombproof case, if you will, essentially eliminating Fleming’s ability to mount a successful defense. Which is their modus operandi. Once they indict, they win, virtually every time. With no statute of limitations, and a steady, albeit constrained, flow of public financing, time is on their side. Peaches, anyone?”

“That’s what you think?”

“Just a possibility. It’s also possible Fleming’s appearance on the client list was just a bit of bad luck for Fleming, drawing the kind of scrutiny that could yield a banquet of unrelated but delectable prosecutorial fodder. So, the Federals, and now the State it appears, could be focused entirely on these collateral opportunities, preparing to move ahead with or without a resolution of the Eldridge matter.”

“Or the Sullivan matter, for that matter,” I said.

“This is merely speculation.”

“But it’s possible they’d be satisfied with a racketeering conviction and to hell with the murder.”

“You try the case you can win. It isn’t always the one you want.”

“It’s not what I want. I could give a crap about Fleming’s rackets.”

Burton rummaged around for one more peach, which he took some care in selecting.

“I don’t suppose you’d listen if I suggested you leave well enough alone,” he said.

“I would, Burt, honest to God I would. I never wanted any part of this thing. I was only trying to have a drink with Jackie Swaitkowski. Sullivan never should have asked me. As soon as he revisits the planet I’m telling him. That’s what I really want. His goddamned fault anyway.”

“With a knife in the gut and a smack on the head for his trouble,” said Burton.

“I’d have smacked him myself if I’d known where this was going. Take a page from Joyce Whithers.”

“You know how it is with people like Ivor Fleming. Once the die is cast, the threat perceived, it’s on to the death. Lacking the subtlety for a less self-destructive course, they never know how to stop.”

“I know.”

I was talking to Burton, but I was watching Amanda. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Not surprising for a girl who led with her looks and knew how to keep herself to herself. Who only let you see the part of her she wanted seen and nothing more. Hunkered down within a reinforced bunker built of intelligence and effortless deceit, as much to conceal an essential goodness as to advance the cause of self-preservation. It might have been because she grew up without a father, alert and aware but unsure of where it was all going. Or the natural accumulation of experience that comes early to girls men admire, but fear to approach. In fact, she’d been knocked around pretty hard most of her forty years, though it didn’t show unless you knew where to look. Maybe I saw it more than most, since I could never stop looking.

“So you won’t be coming to Butch’s Council Rock on the Giant Finger,” she said.

“Wouldn’t miss that. Art lover like me.”

“Butch Ellington,” she said to Burton, “he wants me to let him assemble a giant sculpture in one of the WB buildings. I told him I’d think about it.”

“Do you want a lengthy speech on exposure to regulatory sanctions, property damage and the finer points of joint and several liability?” Burton asked her.

“Not particularly.”

“Then say no.”

“Attitudes like that are what calls for a Giant Finger,” I told him.

“Then tell Mr. Ellington he’s made his point, obviating the need for further implementation.”

Amanda laughed a light little laugh.

“What if Michelangelo had to contend with you two,” she said.

Isabella picked that moment to roll a tray out on the patio filled with serving bowls, vodka, bread and wine. I knew what Burton was doing. He wanted company and was asking us to stay. Further evidence that anyone can be lonely. Or that everyone is lonely in one way or another. He tolerated, or maybe even enjoyed, the eager flock of sycophants that usually fluttered about. But a man like Burton would starve on a steady diet of that. For some reason he hadn’t found a partner he could stick with. Or more likely, one he could trust. But all in all he was a happy man. Like Amanda, content to live within a containment field of his own design, occasionally foraying out to the territories to refresh his sensibilities and re-establish affiliations, before returning gratefully to the worn enclosure of his mind—safe, free and secure.