Corrupt Practices (27 page)

“Instruct not to answer,” Frantz finally says.

Lovely leans toward me. A strand of her hair tickles my cheek. “Who is this person?” she whispers.

I ignore her, keeping my eyes, my entire reserve of energy, directed toward the witness. “Mr. McCarthy, you’ve heard . . .” I fight to keep my voice clear and level. “You’ve heard the name Quiana Gottschalk, haven’t you?”

McCarthy’s body rolls up into itself like a pill bug under attack, while his face softens and bloats.

“Objection,” Frantz says. “You just asked that. Confidential.”

“You’re wrong about that. Before, I asked the witness whether Quiana Gottschalk was an elder of the Assembly. Now I asked him if he’s heard the name. That’s not remotely confidential.”

Frantz considers this. “You can answer that one.”

“I will not answer that one,” McCarthy says, making no effort to hide his displeasure with his lawyer.

Frantz unsuccessfully tries to mask his own irritation. No one talks to him that way, not even his most important clients. “Well, in light of my client’s refusal to answer, I object.”

“Mr. McCarthy, didn’t you once tell me that belief in secrets is a superstition? Did you actually believe that you could keep Quiana Gottschalk a secret?”

His eyes cloud over in rage.

“Objection,” Frantz says.

“Mr. McCarthy, who was the First Apostate?”

“I don’t . . . I mean, I won’t . . .”

“Does that mean that you don’t know or that you won’t respond?”

He doesn’t answer.

“Move on to another question, counsel,” Frantz says, nervously riffling the pages of his legal pad.

“You know, I think I’ll do that, Mr. Frantz. Mr. McCarthy, do you . . . um, do you know . . . Strike that.” I grip the edge of the table. “Mr. McCarthy, has the Sanctified Assembly ever practiced what’s called Ascending Sodality?”

He goes slack-jawed. Frantz turns to Weir, who shakes his head in confusion.

“The First Apostate rejected the practice of Ascending Sodality, am I right?”

“Vile mythology!” Aware that he’s said too much, he clamps his mouth shut. Frantz and Weir whisper to each other, evidently too befuddled to object.

“Answer the question,” I say.

McCarthy glowers at me with molten rage, but also with a kind of awe. He starts buffing his sunglasses with his expensive silk tie, an action that lasts much longer than necessary and becomes ever more compulsive as the seconds pass. In the process, he looks up at the ceiling, his irises rolling up into the sockets. It’s as if I’m looking at a cardboard cutout of a face and the artist didn’t bother to draw in the eyes.

“I insist on an answer,” I say.

“We’re done!” he bellows, bolting up out of his chair. He spins toward the door, bumping hard into the crates behind him. He staggers past Frantz and Weir like a drunkard. The videographer tries to warn him, but he rips the microphone cord clipped to his tie clean out of the sound system and hurries out of the room. Weir belatedly follows.

“Let’s pack up,” I say to Lovely, who’s having a hard time stifling a grin. “This deposition is over.”

“He’ll be back shortly and we’ll finish this travesty,” Frantz says.

“McCarthy’s not coming back,” I say.

Five minutes later Nick Weir returns, looking shaken and disheveled. I imagine him pursuing McCarthy all the way down Melrose, pleading with him to come back. The arrogant son of a bitch had no clue what he was getting into when his boss brought the Assembly in as a client.

Deanna comes into the room. “Are you guys done?”

“Absolutely,” I say.

Frantz looks at Weir, who nods in confirmation.

She addresses Frantz. “Then pack up and get the hell out of my store.” She points her finger at Weir. “And take
that
with you.”

Weir starts to respond, but Frantz silences him with a wave of his hand. Without saying another word, they gather up their things and walk out.

“What happened?” Deanna says.

Lovely starts to answer, hours of pent-up adrenaline bursting out. “Parker asked McCarthy about—”

“I asked about the Assembly’s religious beliefs. I guess I got a little too sarcastic. McCarthy got his nose out of joint and bailed.”

Lovely gives me an odd look, but stays quiet.

“So you might have another go-round,” Deanna says. “Although I doubt Frantz will agree to come back here. And I’ve lost his wife as a customer, for sure, though the look on his face was worth it. Priceless. I’ll be out front if you need anything.”

When she leaves, Lovely and I check our e-mails. We both have urgent messages from Jonathan Borzo asking us to call him right away. Lovely punches in his number. I can hear Jonathan over her speaker, talking fast, but I can’t make out what he’s saying.

She places her hand over the microphone. “They want us to come out to the Valley. Alan Markowitz refuses to meet with them. He’ll only talk to you.” Markowitz is the man whose identity Rich allegedly stole to forge a passport and rent the Silver Lake apartment. A few days ago, I assigned Jonathan and Kathleen the task of interviewing him, a way to make up for leaving them out of the McCarthy deposition. It obviously hasn’t worked out.

“I’m whipped,” I say. “Can’t we go back another day?”

She shakes her head and mouths the word,
please
. Like a generous favored sibling, she always wants me to pay more attention to Kathleen and Jonathan.

“Fine. Tell them to wait and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

When she ends the call, an unbearable awkwardness separates us, a malicious gift from Lou Frantz and Nick Weir. With a formality that might have made sense a few months ago but that now sounds absurd, I say, “I’m very grateful for your assistance today.”

Meeting my contrived reserve with forced joviality, she says, “Hey, I’d love to hear what Markowitz has to say, so how about we ride out to the Valley together?” and without a second’s hesitation I reply that we’ll take my car.

We travel the 405 at an LA crawl. Unasked questions and unspoken words hang in the air like invisible cosmic matter, cold and dark. My body aches. Not until we reach the Mulholland Drive exit does Lovely say in a quavering voice, “It’s all true, you know. What . . . what Nick said about him and me and . . .”

“You don’t owe me—”

“Parker, I want to owe you an explanation. I want to so much.”

I don’t speak, only remove my right hand from the steering wheel and take hers.

“You have to know something about me,” she says. “I—”

“Please don’t.” It’s not only that I don’t want to know about her sexual history. It’s that if someone shares their secrets with you, they expect you to reveal yours in return, and I won’t do that. “Just tell me it’s over between him and you.”

“It really never was.”

“Then let’s not talk about it anymore.”

We drive in silence for a while. Finally, she asks about
Keanu
Gottschalk and the First Apostate and Ascending Sodality. I don’t tell her that the name is
Quiana
. I say that I heard the words whispered years ago when my mother joined the Assembly, but I don’t know what they mean. I don’t think she believes me, but for once she doesn’t push back.

It takes a full hour to reach North Hollywood in the east San Fernando Valley. The area isn’t geographically close to the real Hollywood, although it’s only a few miles away from the Burbank-based studios—Disney, Warner Bros., and Universal. The neighborhood near the studios has become chic in recent years, but Alan Thomas Markowitz’s used car dealership is on the border of a barrio.

I pull up to Lankershim Preowned Automobiles, an asphalt slab jammed with low-end used cars and a showroom/garage no bigger than a double storefront. Jonathan and Kathleen wait on the sidewalk near the entrance. She’s carrying a briefcase and wearing a threadbare polyester black pantsuit and black blouse obviously intended to conceal her plumpness. Unfortunately, the outfit is more appropriate for a funeral than a witness interview. Jonathan is dressed in a plaid sport coat and tan slacks too large for his wiry frame. His necktie hangs almost to his crotch, and there are gaps in his red goatee where he over-trimmed it. No wonder Markowitz insists on speaking with a grownup.

“We’re sorry we dragged you out here,” Jonathan says. “Markowitz will only talk to a real lawyer. He’s really suspicious.”

“It’s the lot of a young lawyer to be disrespected, Mr. Borzo.”

“So, how did it go?” Kathleen asks.

“Weird,” Lovely says. She gives them a recap of the deposition, leaving out Weir’s slur against her.

We go inside the dealership, dark and gloomy despite the glass walls and the bright afternoon sun. The place smells of floral deodorizer and automotive grease. The room is bigger than it seemed from the outside, large enough to house a long front counter, desks for five or six salespeople, and a private office in the back. A door at the far end of the room leads into the garage, where the sounds of air ratchets and blowtorches contend with Led Zeppelin blaring over the speaker system.

A middle-aged woman with bleached hair and pasty skin greets Jonathan and Kathleen. “Welcome back, kids.” She turns to me. “You must be the boss.”

“I’m their law professor. Parker Stern. I understand that Mr. Markowitz would be willing to meet with me about a case we’re handling.”

“OK, Parker. I’ll tell Alan you’re here.” She picks up the phone and identifies me as the young people’s boss.

“Head on back,” she says. “There’s all kinds of crap lying around on the floor. Don’t trip.”

We navigate back to the private office like a ragtag platoon. I knock and open the door to a tiny room that can’t possibly accommodate all four of us.

“Lovely and Jonathan, why don’t you wait outside.”

“Gotcha,” Jonathan says. Lovely grins. To her credit, Kathleen acts like this decision was the logical one.

Markowitz sits at his desk typing on a computer keypad. I expected him to resemble a character out of a David Mamet play—profane, hard driving, a scavenger. Instead, his drooping eyes, jowly face, receding chin, and salt-and-pepper toupee make him seem mild. He’s a sports fan—baseball memorabilia, trophies, and athletic photographs adorn his shelves and walls. We sit down in uncomfortable vinyl client chairs, and I tell him why we’re here. He told the FBI that he doesn’t know anything about Rich’s alleged identity theft, and I don’t expect him to say anything new or different now. Still, we have to find out what he knows just to button up our investigation.

“I’m not sure why I should help you,” he says. “Your client stole my identity.”

“Richard Baxter isn’t my client,” I say. “Richard Baxter is dead. My client is his father, an elderly man who’s been unfairly sued by the Church of the Sanctified Assembly for millions of dollars.”

“The Assembly consists of a bunch of anti-Semites. I abhor their pro-Palestinian propaganda. Ask me anything you want.”

“We won’t take up much of your time,” I say.

“I have hours to kill. In this economy, you’d think the public would want to buy used vehicles, but business is the pits. So fire away.”

“Did you know Richard Baxter?”

“I did not.”

“Do you know how anyone could have gotten your name and social security number?”

“As I told the FBI, your guess is as good as mine.” He shrugs and holds his arms out as he talks. “My wife rented a safe deposit box at a new bank. I opened up an online stock trading account. Someone dug through my garbage and found a document I should have shredded. An unscrupulous psychic read my mind.”

There’s a deafening burst of what sounds like artillery fire—a pneumatic drill. I flinch and Kathleen covers her ears. Markowitz acts as though he doesn’t hear a thing.

“What about a former employee?” I shout over the din.

“The Feds asked me that, too. I gave them some names. But people come and go. Selling used cars on commission isn’t easy, especially with the economy in the toilet the way it is. I’ve had so many sales people here over the past five years that . . .” His weary eyes sag a bit more. He looks as tired as I feel.

I ask a few more questions—or more accurately, pose the same question in several different ways—and get nowhere. “Is there anything you want to ask, Kathleen?” I say, expecting her to say no.

“I . . . I do have a question,” she says. “I was wondering whether . . . you know, if you ever met this woman. I have a picture of her.” She reaches into her briefcase and takes out a sheet of paper, which she hands to Markowitz. In my haste to finish up with Markowitz, I forgot to ask about the Outsider. Good catch, Kathleen.

“You won’t be able to see her face,” Kathleen says. “But there’s this tattoo on her left ankle you might recognize, maybe.”

I expect Markowitz to respond with the perfunctory “I don’t know this woman” until he raises his brow so forcefully that it looks like his hairpiece might slip backward. He stands and turns his back on us. On tiptoes, he lifts a photograph off a metal hook and then comes around to our side of the desk and sets the photo down in front of us. “Our company team—the Seminoles. We were the East Valley slow-pitch softball champs two years ago. Sandy was our short fielder.” He points to a woman sitting cross-legged in the front row wearing a green softball jersey with the yellow letters
Lankershim Pre-Owned
appliquéd across the front. “Sandra Casey. Worked for me until a little over a year ago.”