Hostile Witness Part 10

"You married him," I said accusingly.

"I thought it was charmingly masculine at the start, those subtle beads of perspiration. He is very athletic, you know. But it kept on coming. Like Niagara Falls. Finally I had him go to the doctor about it, but there was nothing to be done."

"And so Rodolpho," I said.

"For tonight, at least. Have you smelled him? He wears the most marvelous scent."

"Turn around, Victor," said Beth. I did as she ordered and, using my back as an easel, she scratched out something on a business card. "My home number's on the back," said Beth as she handed the card to Lauren.

"You should have two different cards, dear," said Lauren. "One professional, one personal. That's what I do."

"But you don't work, Lauren," I said.

"Now that I'm suddenly single, I've gone into fashion."

"Ah, yes," I said. "The dest.i.tute divorced woman, abandoned by her husband, forced to scratch out a desperate living on her own."

"Close enough," said Lauren. "Oh, here comes Rodolpho. If you'll both excuse me, you've worried him so. I need to calm him."

"You won't forget," said Beth.

"Alberto," said Lauren, again rolling the "r," her eyes widening with the excitement of it all. "Victor, now that things have changed, give me a call. I've missed you."

"I don't think so," I said.

"Oh, do, Victor. We had such fun. Ciao." And off she swept, hips forward, right arm raised, her gold runic bracelets jangling together on her arm, off to intercept the worried Rodolpho and lead him on to another gallery.

"Alberto," said Beth, rolling the "r."

"Poor old Guthrie," I said.

"Yes, Guthrie the beast. All that money," mused Beth. "That wonderful old name. Gone."

"But at least he had everything for a time."

"What about you? You were with her first. What happened?"

I shrugged. "She was slumming when she met me, looking for fun. She said she found me too serious. It was his basic insincerity that first attracted her to Guthrie. And she liked the way he hit on her all the while she was sleeping with me."

"What else are partners for?"

"Well, at least it's working out all right in the end."

We strolled through the rest of the twentieth-century wing, ending in a room dominated by the work of Marcel Duchamp. There were tiny surreal sculptures, a wall of cubist paintings, visual jokes on paper, a gla.s.s vial of 50 cc of Parisian air in a case by a window looking out over the front courtyard. In the rear of the room, in its own alcove, was a wooden door with a peephole. I looked. Through a hole in a brick wall I saw a faceless woman, lying on her back, naked in the straw, her v.a.g.i.n.a jagged as a wound. The woman was holding a lantern that illuminated the scene brightly. It was a wildly disconcerting view through that little hole and I was slightly off balance when I left the alcove and b.u.mped into Veronica. Chester Concannon was with her, still playing the beard.

Veronica was wearing a short silk dress, her head purposefully facing away from us, scanning the walls, showing off her long neck and gentle gentile profile, as I made the introductions. When I mentioned her name her head slowly turned until she stared me straight in the eye. "h.e.l.lo, Mr. Carl."

"Pleased to meet you, Veronica," said Beth with an amused voice that Veronica ignored.

"How's that landlord of yours?" I asked.

"Still a problem," she said. "So tell me, Mr. Carl, what do you think of this painting?"

She gestured to a large canvas on the wall. It was painted in different shades of red and brown and tan, a flurry of abstract shapes. I walked over to it and bent down to read the label. "Duchamp: Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2. 1912." I stood back and could just make out the figure on the stairs and track her movement downward and to the right.

"Interesting," I said.

"I had a boyfriend once who told me I looked like that," said Veronica.

I stared into her eyes for an instant and then turned back to the painting. "It's sort of abstract," I said. "Which makes it hard to tell."

"It's easier if you see me with my clothes off."

She was smiling at me, I could tell, even with my back to her. When I faced her again I smiled back and so we smiled at each other.

"Do you want to join us after the fund-raiser, Victor?" asked Chester, interrupting our smiling. "You too, Elizabeth. We're meeting at Marabella's."

"Thank you, Chester," I said. "But I should get some sleep this week, don't you think? Can I have a word, though?" I motioned him away from the two women so we could talk confidentially. "Tell me a little about your friend Chuckie Lamb," I said quietly.

"Oh, Charles is all right," he said. "He's smart as h.e.l.l, but peculiar, too. Very loyal to the councilman, very loyal to his friends, devoted to his mother. But if you catch him wrong he can be difficult to take."

"I must have caught him wrong."

"Then you're in pretty good company."

"Why wasn't he indicted with you and Jimmy?" I asked. That was the question I was really interested in. Chuckie said it was luck that kept him out of it, but federal prisons are full of guys who thought luck would keep them out of it.

"They didn't have any direct evidence about him at the time."

"I don't understand."

"Well, you see, he never met with Ruffing or talked to him on the phone. It turned out Charles had only one meeting."

"And let me guess," I said. "That meeting was with Bissonette."

"That's right. And with Bissonette unable to testify they didn't have anything about Charles they could put before the grand jury."

"Quite the convenient little coma for Chuckie," I said.

"You could say that," said Chester, slowly, like an idea was starting to form. He looked at me for a moment. "Don't get into any trouble, Victor."

I shrugged.

Then he called out to Veronica, "Look, Ronnie, we have to go. He wants us there first."

"Good-bye, Mr. Carl," said Veronica as she turned to follow Chet.

"Nice meeting you too," said Beth to her back.

I watched them go, well, actually watched her go, watched the way she shifted inside her shift, and then turned back to the Duchamp painting. I studied its lines and angles ever more closely, and found them suddenly very sensual.

"That's a sweet little girl," said Beth.

"The councilman's mistress," I said.

"Aaah," she said. "And dangerous to boot. When's that trial of yours scheduled?"

"A week from Monday."

"What are you doing to prepare?"

"I have some doc.u.ments to look at, but other than that, nothing, which is exactly what my client wants me to do."

"But that would leave the whole trial to Prescott."

"Do you think she looks like this?" I asked, still looking at the canvas, feeling an erection stir. "I'm beginning to see the resemblance."

"Have you ever thought, Victor," said Beth with an audible sigh, "that the reason Prescott gave you the hundred-and-twenty-thousand-dollar settlement in Saltz was so that you would take this case and then stay out of his way as he screwed your client? Did you ever consider that?"

That brought me away from the painting. "You're saying he bought me off?"

"I was just bringing up a possibility. I mean, of all the lawyers in all the firms in this overlawyered city, why did he pick you to step in to represent Concannon?"

"He hired me because he thinks I'm a good lawyer and a smart enough guy to stay out of his way and he's right. They gave me a fifteen-thousand-dollar retainer, they're paying me two-fifty an hour, and there has been the promise of more good things to come. Whatever he wants me to do, I'm going to do."

"You just don't get it, do you, Victor," said Beth. "They're never going to let you join their little club."

I didn't get a chance to respond because just then a flash of red shot through the window onto the wall, and then blue and then red again. There was a police car now outside in the front courtyard, and then two more, their lights all spinning. Five cops and a man in a tan raincoat stepped out of the cars and headed up the stairs to the entrance of the museum.

10.

BY THE TIME I GOT to the Great Hall, the five uniformed officers and the man in the tan raincoat were already there, surrounded by a mob of tuxedos and gowns. The man in the raincoat was an African-American. He wore thick round gla.s.ses, a navy suit, a red tie, and his shoes were black and clunky. I recognized the uniform, if not the man. He stepped right through the crowd until he reached Jimmy Moore at its center.

"What is the meaning of this?" bellowed Moore.

Two officers immediately moved to either side of Jimmy. The man in the raincoat waved a doc.u.ment and said in a weary but precise voice, "James Douglas Moore and Chester Concannon, I am here on behalf of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania with warrants for your arrests."

That brought a shocked little babble from the crowd.

One of the officers, a broad-shouldered woman, said to Moore, "Put your hands behind your back, sir." She had the voice of a gym teacher urging her girls up the hanging ropes.

"This is a travesty," shouted Moore. "I am being persecuted."

"Hands behind your back, sir," said the woman.

Concannon, who was standing at the rear of the crowd with Veronica, tried to back away but a young blond officer grabbed his arm and another officer, older, with a serious face, put a hand on Chet's shoulder. "Hands behind your back, please, Mr. Concannon," said the older officer. His serious face squeezed itself in embarra.s.sment as he brought out his handcuffs. "I'm sorry, sir, but I have to cuff you. I have orders."

"I'm Mr. Concannon's lawyer," I said after I had made my way to my client through the crowd. "By whose orders is he being cuffed?"

The officer nodded at the African-American man in the raincoat. "a.s.sistant District Attorney K. Lawrence Sloc.u.m."

Prescott cut through the crowd and took hold of Sloc.u.m's arm. "What is this about, Larry?" he said, his voice sharpened to a fine edge.

Sloc.u.m looked down at his arm until Prescott let go. "We're making an arrest."

"I'm acting as Councilman Moore's attorney. You tell me what is happening, immediately, or I'll slap a civil suit against the state and city before you leave the Parkway."

"Stay out of our way, Bill," said Sloc.u.m calmly, "until the suspects are taken into custody."

"Hands behind your back," said the woman officer as she took hold of Moore's arm, turned him to the side, and leaned him forward.

"James Moore and Chester Concannon," said Sloc.u.m as soon as the men were cuffed. "You are both under arrest for the murder of Zachariah Bissonette."

I looked at Concannon, whose head was down and whose arms were pinned behind his back. His eyes darted to and fro like minnows as the young blond officer frisked him.

"Bissonette?" I said to Concannon. "I thought he was in a coma."

"Not anymore, sir," said the officer with the embarra.s.sed, serious face. "He died at eight-o-two this evening at Pennsylvania Hospital. Too bad, too. He seemed like a nice enough guy."

"But a butcher in the field," said the young officer.

"I didn't do anything," said an angry Concannon. "I didn't do a d.a.m.n thing."

"Shut up, Chester," I said sharply. "Don't say a word to anyone. Give your name, your address, your Social Security number, and nothing else. We will get you out of jail and we will take it from there, but you keep your mouth shut."

His lips twitched, but he managed to calm himself. "What are you going to do?"

"Do you understand what I told you?"

"Yes."

"You just hang on," I said. "We'll get you out."

Flashes popped as the society photographers clicked away, thrilled at something more exciting than a spilled gla.s.s of Pinot Chardonnay to photograph on their beat. "Look this way Councilman," one shouted as Moore and Concannon were led to the museum doors, "and be sure to give us a smile." Old habits, I guess, die hard.

"Enjoy yourselves," shouted Moore to the throng of gawking swells. "Continue the festivities. My lawyer will clear up this little misunderstanding." He started to say something else, but before he could get it out he and Concannon were whisked out the doors and down the front steps to the waiting police cars. They were barely out the door when the band started up and the whirl of conversation turned gay again. No reason to let a silly little thing like a murder arrest get in the way of a party.

I followed Sloc.u.m out the doors to learn what exactly would be happening to my client. a.s.sistant District Attorney K. Lawrence Sloc.u.m stopped between two columns right outside the entrance and watched with Prescott as the suspects were led down the steps and around the fountain to the cars. He was bobbing up and down on the b.a.l.l.s of his feet.

"I'm surprised at you, Larry," said Prescott as we watched the woman officer put her hand on Moore's head and press it down so it wouldn't hit the roof as she placed him into the back seat of one of the cars. "I would have expected you to find a more public place for the arrest."

"You know how it is, Bill. The Eagles were out of town this week."