Firm Ambitions (20 page)

“Whatever,” he said with a dismissive gesture. “He told me to tell you that his firm did some minor work for the company—routine corporate filings and such. However, he found no authority in the files to reveal any information about the company that isn't already in the public record.”

“Which means?”

There was a ding as the elevator arrived.

He gave me a smug look. “Which means you aren't going to get the information you asked for.”

I stepped onto the elevator and turned to face Fletcher with an impassive expression. “If that's his position, fine. I have to be in criminal courts out in the county in the morning for some pretrial matters on my sister's case. Tell Harris that I'm going to ask the judge to order his firm to disclose that information.”

Fletcher gave me a puzzled look. “On what possible ground?”

None came to mind immediately. No matter. I'd have one ready by the time I presented the motion in the morning. “He can find out in court tomorrow,” I said as the elevator door slid closed.

***

On the way back to my office I swung by Kimmi Buckner's house again. She wasn't home, or at least she wasn't answering her doorbell. My business card was still wedged in the front door.

When I got back to my office, I checked my mail and my telephone messages. There were plenty of both, but none from Kimmi Buckner and none from Christine Maxwell.

Chapter Twenty-one

That peculiar reality known as Anglo-American law contains, indeed requires, certain imaginary creatures known as “legal fictions.” For example, the law of torts is built upon the behavior of a phantom known as the Reasonable Man. The Reasonable Man is always careful, always vigilant, always moderate, always sensible, always clearheaded, always prudent. Twenty-four hours a day. The Reasonable Man always stops at railroad crossings, always puts on protective eyewear, always disconnects the cord from the electrical outlet before repairing, and always makes sure he has adequate ventilation. Compared to the Reasonable Man, Ward Cleaver is Evel Knievel.

The corporation is another legal fiction. Under the law, a corporation is a person. Just like you. If you prick it it does bleed, if you tickle it it does laugh, if you poison it it does die, and if you seek confidential information from its attorneys it does invoke the attorney-client privilege, which is exactly what it did the following morning when I appeared in court to present my motion to compel Landau, Mitchell & McCray to disclose the identities of the principals of Capital Investments of Missouri, Inc.

Harris Landau was in court, along with his attorney, L. Debevoise Fletcher. Never one to walk a courtroom tightrope without a net, Fletcher had brought along an intense young associate who had no doubt spent the last hour trying to drive into Fletcher's tiny brain the applicable principles of law. Fortunately for Fletcher and unfortunately for me, the presiding judge was Roman Samuels, a gray-haired GOP stalwart who saw nothing fictional in the legal fiction. Indeed, from the stern look on his face, Judge Samuels seemed to be under the impression that this particular corporation was somehow a blood relative. I got through half of my argument before Judge Samuels ran out of patience.

“Come, come, Counsel,” he interrupted, clearly irked. “The purpose of life insurance, as its very name signifies, is to insure a life, i.e., to provide to the beneficiary a fixed sum of money in the event that the named insured should die.” He looked at my opponent. “Right?”

Deb Fletcher beamed. “Precisely, Your Honor.”

Judge Samuels glared down at me. “Why, I daresay that half the corporations in this city own key-man life insurance policies on their CEOs.” He looked over at Harris Landau, who was standing next to Fletcher. “Is that a fair statement, Harris?”

Landau pretended to contemplate that verbal softball as it floated in over the middle of the plate.
“At least
half, Your Honor.” You could almost hear the crack of the bat.

Judge Samuels looked down at me. “That's my point, young lady. The mere fact that this company chose to acquire such insurance hardly makes it a murder suspect, and certainly does not constitute a waiver of its attorney-client privilege. Your motion will be denied.”

Deb Fletcher and Harris Landau were waiting for me in the hall outside the courtroom. Fletcher was smirking in triumph. “You shouldn't bite the hand that's going to feed one of your clients,” he said to me.

I brushed by him without a word and headed toward the lobby. The elevator doors slid open just as I reached them. Fletcher was following, of course, and stepped in with me. He held the door for Landau.

“Rachel,” Landau said gently as the elevator started its descent, “please understand that there's no personal animus behind my firm's position. Unless we are specifically authorized to do so, we never disclose facts about our clients or their activities. Our position is based entirely on principle.”

I said, “In my experience, Harris, I have yet to come across a position asserted by an attorney in a courtroom that is based entirely on principle.”

***

Three hours later, I handed a filing fee and my Verified Petition to Perpetuate Testimony to the cashier in the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. As the old cliche goes, there's more than one way to skin a cat. I hoped I'd found one of them. Although there were several procedural hurdles I would have to clear, if I cleared them all I would have a federal court order requiring the law firm of Landau, Mitchell & McCray to disclose the identities of the principals of Capital Investments of Missouri, Inc.

The clerk stamped the petition and handed it to the assignment clerk, who conducted the random draw to determine which judge would be assigned to the matter. As she reached for the drawing cards, two other clerks stepped over to serve as witnesses—a procedure to ensure that the draw is truly random. She lifted the top card toward her and then glanced at one of her fellow clerks. He shook his head and looked up at me with a barely disguised look of pity. The clerk turned the card toward me. It had one word on it: MADIGAN.

“That can't be,” I said. “He's on senior status.”

She shrugged. “He still handles miscellaneous matters. I'm sorry, Miss Gold.”

Stunned, I walked outside the clerk's office and stared at the directory on the wall:

JUDGE KEVIN W. MADIGAN. . . . . Room 867

I walked over to the elevator and pushed the UP button.

Kevin Wallace “Mad Dog” Madigan embodied the dark side of Article III of the U.S. Constitution, which specifies that federal judges are appointed for life. Lifetime judicial appointments are nice in theory. The problem is, things happen during a long life. Such as senility, which had held Judge Madigan's dance card for the last several years.

But even before senility, Judge Madigan's courtroom had long been known as the Wheel of Justice—a place where the law was dispensed (or dispensed with) in a manner that suggested reliance not on legal precedents but on the entrails of pigeons. A strict constructionist one day, a radical activist the next, Mr. Rogers one morning, Freddy Krueger that afternoon, Judge Madigan might appear on the bench in any one of more than a dozen ill-fitting judicial temperaments selected from the vast walk-in closet of his psyche. As Benny had once quipped, “When E.T. calls home, Mad Dog answers.”

Judge Madigan's ancient secretary took my name, disappeared into chambers, and returned a few minutes later. She sat down at her desk without saying a word or even acknowledging my presence. With a shrug, I took a seat and pulled out my copy of
Emma
and comfortably settled in.

Forty minutes later, the judge's secretary announced that he would see me now. Inside his enormous chambers and seated behind a huge desk, Judge Madigan looked even more diminutive than he did in his courtroom. Above him hung a large framed photograph of President Lyndon Baines Johnson. His Honor was holding a yellow highlighter marker in one hand and intently reading a Spiderman comic book that was open on his desk. He looked up briefly, his eyes swimming behind thick eyeglasses, and then returned to his comic, pausing to highlight a balloon of dialogue. His bald head was sprinkled with age spots.

“Good afternoon, Your Honor, Rachel Gold, for the petitioner.”

No response. He leaned forward to highlight something in the comic book. His bony hand shook slightly.

I stood up and slid my court papers toward him across the top of his desk. The movement caught his eye. He pushed his comic book to the side and leafed through the court papers.

He looked up and squinted at me. “Who are you?” he snapped.

“Rachel Gold, Your Honor. Counsel for—”

He held up his left hand, shaking his head. “Hold your horses, girlie.” He had a high-pitched, nasal twang. “I have to adjust the volume on this damn thing.” His right hand fiddled with the knob on his hearing aid. “Say something,” he snapped. “Recite the Pledge of Allegiance.”

I got as far as and-to-the-republic before Mad Dog held up his hand. “I'm reading you loud and clear.” He frowned and held up the court papers. “What the hell is this goddam thing?”

“It's a petition to perpetuate testimony.”

“I can see that, young lady. But what the hell is it?”

I got as far as the connection to the Cayman Islands when he cut me off. “This is an outrage!”

“Yes, Your Honor,” I said uncertainly.

“What are those dickless wonders at the FBI doing about it?”

“I don't believe they're involved, yet, Your Honor.”

“Well, goddammit, get on down there and tell those idiots to drop their cocks, grab their socks, and start pounding the pavement. Jesus Christ, they're just sitting around and letting a pretty little girl like you do all their dirty work. Well, I say shit on that.” He gave me a big wink. “I'll tell you one thing, darling: this goddam petition is denied.” Using the yellow marker pen, he scrawled the word DENIED across the first page and signed his name. “There,” he said proudly, sliding it across the table toward me.

Obviously, I should have read my horoscope before venturing out of the house this morning.
Leo, avoid encounters with older men in positions of authority
. I was 0 for 2 so far today.

“Are you married, young lady?” he snapped as I turned to leave.

“No.”

He pointed the yellow marker at me. “You're not a dyke, are you?”

Incredible. “No, Judge.” I remained stationary, fearing that any sudden movement could set off one of his legendary gay-bashing tirades.

“Before long,” he snorted, “our goddam armed forces will go the way of the Romanians.” His eyes flashed behind the thick lenses. He jabbed me highlighter pen at me for emphasis. “You know about the Romanians, don't you?”

“I'm not sure I do,” I said, aiming for a soothing tone.

The tendons in his neck were taut, quivering, as if straining to keep his head from popping off. “The second lieutenants in the Romanian army had to wear lipstick and rouge. They were forced by their commanding officers to…to commit infamous crimes against nature!”

I said nothing.

He stood up, his eyes darting around the room. I waited, motionless. Eventually, he sat down. He looked puzzled. I tried a docile smile. He stared at me, confused, his eyes blinking rapidly.

“Are you married, young lady?”

“Yes, Your Honor,” I gently replied.

He nodded. “Good, good.”

His eyes seemed to lose focus. He looked down and spotted his comic book on the edge of his desk. He grabbed his yellow marker and pulled the comic book close to him. I waited a few moments and then, slowly, deliberately, backed out of the room.

Chapter Twenty-two

Benny snorted in disbelief. “The fucking Romanian army?”

“Just the second lieutenants,” I said.

“I'll tell you,” Benny said, shaking his head, “we had some spooky goddam federal judges back in Chicago, but Mad Dog is right up there with the worst.” He popped the tab on his can of beer. “Someone ought to do the right thing.”

“Which is what?” I asked with a grin.

“Haul that goofy motherfucker off to the dog pound and have him put down.”

I heard the sound of my mother's car pulling into the driveway. “My mom's home.”

“Good. Now where's the pizza?”

I checked my watch. “They have seven more minutes.”

The pizza delivery guy arrived with two minutes to spare. The tangy smell of fresh hot pizza filled the kitchen. Is there any combination of scents more mouth-watering than tomato sauce, oregano, basil, garlic, and pepperoni? Benny had brought the beer, my mother had the pantry stocked with diet soda, and I had swung by the supermarket on my way home to pick up some dog treats for Ozzie and two pints of Ben & Jerry's ice cream—Heath Bar Crunch for Benny and Cherry Garcia for me. None for my mother, who had an entire pantry of Nutrisystem “desserts.” During dinner I filled her in on the events of the day.

“So what can you do?” my mother asked when I finished.

“The Cayman Islands angle is worth pursuing,” I said. “I'll check my Rolodex tomorrow morning. This guy I used to date in law school became an investment banker at Bear Stearns. Last time we talked he was in one of their international divisions. I'll call him tomorrow.”

“Good,” my mother said.

“There's also another guy,” I said. “I ran into him back at my ten-year reunion. He was in my section first year. He's a partner in the Paris office of one of the Wall Street firms. He might have a contact down in the Cayman Islands.”

Benny turned to my mother.
“Nu
, Sarah. What have you and the judge found?”

My mother wiped her lips with a paper napkin. “Plenty,” she said. “Starting with George McGee.”

“Which one's he?” Benny asked.

“The head of the burglar alarm company?” I said.

She nodded. “Arch Alarm Systems.”

“What did you find out?” Benny asked.

My mother raised her eyebrows and slowly shook her head. “That this was a man who definitely understood home security systems.” She looked around the table with a knowing smile. “Guess what Mr. McGee was before he was president of that company?”

Benny laughed. “I love it. A burglar?”

She nodded. “Three arrests, one conviction, each time for breaking and entering.”

Benny looked at me with a delighted grin. “What a great country, eh?”

“Homes?” I asked my mother.

“Homes,” she confirmed.

“But all before he started the alarm company, right?” I asked.

“Right,” my mother said. “He was out of jail two years when he opened the company.”

“And no arrests after that?” Benny asked.

“Not a thing,” my mother said.

“How 'bout the other dude?” Benny asked. “The one who killed himself?”

“Laurence Coulter,” my mother said. “Another
mensch
. You know why he committed suicide? Because he was a real pervert.”

“Now hold on, Sarah,” Benny said with a grin. “Given present company, you shouldn't be throwing around phrases like ‘real pervert' loosely.”

“I'm not, believe me,” my mother said firmly. “The man was a big fan of child pornography. He got arrested twice. Maury found the records. The first time for taking naked photographs of two little boys. Disgusting.”

“What happened?” I asked.

My mother shook her head in displeasure. “Suspended sentence.”

“And the second time?”

“Maury read the indictment and the court file. The government said that Coulter ordered a bunch of kiddie porn through the mail and they arrested him when the stuff arrived.”

“What happened?” Benny asked.

My mother crossed her arms and frowned. “The judge threw the case out on a technicality. Maury said the judge ruled that there was an unlawful trap or something.”

Benny went over to the refrigerator and got himself another beer. “So,” he said to my mother when he returned to the kitchen table, “what's the punch line?”

“What punch line?” my mother said.

“You said Coulter killed himself because he was a pervert. How do you know that?”

“Ah, right. Maury got the police file on the suicide. There was a copy of his suicide note. In the note he said that he hated himself, that he couldn't control himself anymore. He said that as long as he lived he'd be a danger to children, so he decided to kill himself.”

“When was his second arrest?” I asked.

She checked her notes and gave me the month and the year.

I compared it to the other dates we knew. “So,” I mused as I idly drew a circle around the date on my notepad, “he was arrested about a year before he opened his own interior design company.”

“Weird, huh?” Benny said. “Seems like a brush with the law is just what these two guys needed to get their entrepreneurial juices flowing.”

After dessert, Benny cleared the table and I loaded the dishwasher while my mother went down to the basement to do the laundry. Ozzie was on the floor in the middle of the kitchen, his head resting on his paws. He watched Benny as he moved back and forth between the table and the sink. It was wonderful to have Ozzie back home.

“What are you thinking about?” Benny asked as he handed me two plates to load into the dishwasher.

I rinsed the plates under the faucet. “I'm thinking about coincidences,” I said.

“What about them?”

“About the difference between coincidence and design.”

“What kind of coincidences are you talking about?”

I slotted the plates in the dishwasher rack. “Common threads among the three companies owned by Capital Investments of Missouri,” I said.

“Such as?”

I looked at Benny. “Such as the heads of all three companies are dead.”

He squinted in thought. “True,” he said, “but three very different deaths.”

“None of natural causes.”

“Okay,” he said. “What else?”

I put the silverware into the dishwasher and straightened up. “All three men had criminal records—or at least all three had been arrested.”

Benny handed me the ice cream bowls and spoons. “Which tells you what?” he said.

“If it's a coincidence, nothing. If it isn't a coincidence, well, I'm not sure.”

Benny took another beer out of the refrigerator. “It may not even be enough to qualify as a coincidence,” he said as he opened the beer. “After all, only one of those guys actually had a criminal record.”

“True,” I conceded as I closed the dishwasher. I rinsed off my hands under the faucet and dried them on a dish towel. I filled the tea kettle with water. “But,” I told him, “there's the one that really bothers me: what's the one common thread for all three businesses?”

He frowned. “I'm drawing a blank.”

“Start with the fact that the customers for all three businesses are affluent.”

Benny mulled that one over. “Okay. And?”

I joined him at the kitchen table. “For all three businesses, an essential part of the operation requires that the main guy spend time inside the client's home. A burglar alarm company, an interior decorator, and a physical fitness guru who makes house calls. Maybe it really is just a coincidence.”

“But maybe not,” Benny said, getting more animated. “Take the burglar alarm company. Shit, what a great front for a burglar like McGee. You install the burglar alarm and case the joint at the same time. If the house is worth hitting, you already know everything you need to know about the security system.” He stopped with a frown. “But what about the other two?”

“Think about it,” I said. “Andros was a foreigner who almost got deported on drug and sodomy charges.”

“But he wasn't a burglar. Neither was the other guy.”

“But both had a weakness, right? Maybe someone could have used their weakness to get leverage over them. Or maybe they were recruited. Maybe they were just corrupt and got recruited by a real burglar.”

Benny leaned back and took a big gulp of beer. He gave me a dubious look. “You really think Andros was breaking into people's homes?”

I shrugged. “I doubt it. But maybe he was connected to those break-ins.”

“Well, it's too late to find out now,” Benny said. “Even if you're right about him, he sure ain't going to be casing any other homes.”

I smiled. “Not necessarily.”

Benny paused in mid-sip and lowered his beer with a frown. “What do you mean, ‘not necessarily'?”

“It didn't all click until tonight,” I explained. “Yesterday Ann told me that her friend Holly Embry had her home burglarized the night before. I knew I'd seen her name somewhere else. I checked my printout of the Firm Ambitions appointment calendar. Guess who happened to be a personal fitness client of Andros?”

Benny raised his eyebrows. “No shit?”

I nodded. “Mondays and Thursdays, nine a.m., at her house.”

“But I don't get it,” Benny said with a frown. “You said her house was burglarized
two
nights ago.”

“Don't you see?” I said. “Andros didn't have to be
alive
at the time of the break-in. If he was only the scouting party, if he didn't personally do the breaking and entering, then Holly Embry's burglary could have been set up
before
he died.”

“Maybe,” Benny said with a defeated shrug. “But how in the hell are you ever going to be able to prove that?”

The tea kettle started whistling. I turned off the gas and looked back at Benny. “How?” I repeated. “By doing a stakeout.”

“A what?”

I smiled sheepishly. “Just like in the movies.”

“Wait a minute, Sam Spade. Just what the fuck are you going to stake out?”

“Mound City Mini-Storage.”

“I don't get it.”

“C'mon, Benny. This isn't nuclear physics. A burglar needs a fence, right? If you steal a bunch of different items, maybe you need a bunch of different fences—one for the art, one for the silver, one for the computers. If it takes a couple days to arrange to unload all the loot, you have to stash the goods somewhere, right?” I took out three mugs. “That's where Mound City comes in,” I continued. “It sure seems the most likely candidate. Remember, we know someone was out there
after
my first visit, since they removed everything that was in there. But that was also before Holly Embry's burglary. If that storage space is where they stashed the goods they stole from Holly's house, some of them might still be there.”

“Maybe,” Benny said with a shake of his head, “but that Pakistani douche bag's never going to let you back in there.”

“I know that. The police won't help, either.” I smiled and shrugged. “Thus, a stakeout.”

My mother closed the basement door as she stepped into the kitchen. “What's this about a stakeout?”

We sat down at the kitchen table for hot tea. Ozzie came over the put his head on my lap. I scratched his head and behind his ears as I explained my idea to my mother. When I finished I said, “All I need is some high-speed film. Dad's camera equipment is still in the basement. He taught me how to use his telephoto lens.”

My mother gave me her stern mother look. “And what are you supposed to do, Miss Rambo, if someone really shows up?” she asked.

I shrugged. “Snap his picture. Watch what he does. Try to follow him when he leaves.”

My mother blew across the top of her mug to cool the tea. She shook her head at me. “You don't know what you're doing.”

“Mom, as long as I just watch, I don't need to know what I'm doing. I can get some film and start tonight. I might get lucky.”

“We,” my mother corrected me. “We.”

“Don't be silly, Mom.”

“Shah,” she said with an impatient wave of her hand. “This isn't a Hollywood movie, young lady. We'll do this together.”

I turned to Benny with an embarrassed smile. “Going on a stakeout with your mother,” I said with a roll of my eyes.

“Hold on, Sarah,” Benny said and looked at me. “You have that list of times that people entered the storage space. What are the key hours?”

“Late at night,” I said. “From around ten at night until three or four in the morning.”

“Look,” he said to my mother. “I'm a night owl anyway. As long as I'm up, I might as well keep your goofy daughter company out there.”

“You?” I said to him.

“Hey, if you're dead set on doing a revival of
The Amateur Hour
, you're going to need a Ted Mack.” He checked his watch. “Where's the camera?”

“In the basement,” I said.

He followed me down the stairs and through the passageway to the back storeroom.

“I'll take the malpractice claim,” Benny said.

“Against who?” I asked, only half listening as I poked around the shelves, looking for the telephoto lens.

“Against the architect who designed this basement,” he said.

I looked at him. “What?”

“It's a maze down here.”

“Oh.” I took down another box and looked inside. It wasn't the one with the telephoto lens. “It's an old house,” I said as I put the box back and took down another. “There were three additions. They dug a new foundation each time.” I turned to him. “I don't like the idea of my mother staying alone here tonight.”

“Didn't the police promise to send a car by the house every half hour?”