Santa Fe Rules (15 page)

“I’m making perfectly good sense.”

“But that would make you Jewish.”

“Right.”

“A
Jewish
Indian?”

“Nope. Just Jewish.”

“What are you talking about, Ed?”

Eagle reached for the brandy bottle and poured himself a generous slug. “Let me see if I can clear this up for you, Wolf. I’m not an Indian. I’m a Jew.”

“What the living
fuck
are you talking about?”

“I think I’d better start at the beginning.”

“I don’t see how that could possibly help, but go ahead.”

“Okay, I’ll start at the
very
beginning. I was born in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, New York.”

“What the hell kind of Indian is born in Brooklyn?”

“Well, there were some Mohawks, but I wasn’t one of them.”

Wolf sighed. “This isn’t making any sense, but go on.”

“My parents were Hassidim—that’s a very strictly orthodox Jewish sect.”

“I know what Hassidim are, for Christ’s sake.”

“Well, I was one—at least until I was fourteen.”

“Then you changed into an Indian?”

“No, not yet. I started to play basketball.”

“Wait a minute, I’m getting a déjà vu here. Isn’t this a Chaim Potok novel?”

“That was softball or something; I played basketball.”

“Why?”

“Because I loved doing it. It drove my parents nuts, though, because there weren’t any Hassidic kids good enough to play with me. I wanted to go to public highschool and play basketball.”

“So you went to an Indian high school?”

“There aren’t any Indian high schools in Brooklyn.”

“So, anyway, what happened then?”

“Big family crisis. I moved in with my Uncle Harry and Aunt Nellie, who had also left the Hassidim, and I went to public high school and played basketball.”

“What does all this have to do with Indians?”

“There was a Mohawk kid on the team, name of Marty. There’s this Mohawk settlement in Brooklyn—they’re all steelworkers on buildings—up high, you know?”

“I think I read something about it once.”

“Anyway, Marty and I were the best players on the team, and people got to calling us Big Chief and Little Chief. I wasn’t an Indian, of course, but nobody knew that. My name sounded Indian, and in this particular school, which had a lot of Irish and Italian kids, tough customers, it seemed like a better idea to be an Indian than to be a Hassidic Jew. So I kept my mouth shut and became an Indian. I had a prominent nose and sort of dark skin, but I never actually
claimed
to be an Indian; the other kids did that for me. Marty thought it was funny as hell, so he kept his mouth shut, too.”

“Ed, you’re drunk.”

“Sure. Well, four years of high school went pretty well; Marty and I made All-City, and the colleges started sniffing around. Marty was too short, but I got some offers—N.Y.U. wanted me—even Fordham. Then along came Arizona State, and I saw an opportunity to get out of New York for good, so I accepted.”

“Were you an Indian at Arizona State, too?”

“It was effortless. There were a bunch of Indians in the school, but I ran around with basketball players, mostly, who thought I was pretty exotic. I refused to talk about my background, and that made me mysterious, started a lot of
rumors. The consensus was, I think, that I was a Mohawk who had gotten too tall to work on high buildings.”

“So how did that get you into practicing law in Santa Fe?”

“It didn’t, exactly. I came up to Santa Fe with a girlfriend a few times when I was at Arizona State, and I liked it; the Indian thing seemed to work very well here. I got into Yale Law School, and Uncle Harry put me through. When I graduated, the best offers were in New York, but I didn’t want to go back there, so I came to Santa Fe, put out my shingle, and hung around the courthouse looking for work. The rest, as they say, is history.”

“And everybody thinks you’re an Indian?”

“Right. Remember, though, I never
said
I was an Indian.”

“What about the Indians? They buy it?”

“Seem to. I haven’t met many, really; only had one for a client. Their crimes aren’t usually big enough for my kind of help, and anyway, they can’t afford me.”

“So you’re not an Indian.”

“No, Wolf. I’m a Jew.”

There was a long silence while Wolf considered this. “Ed, what are you talking about?”

CHAPTER
22

E
d Eagle waited a week before he told the district attorney how he had known who James Grafton was. A few days passed, then Martinez called him back.

“Ed, are you trying to fuck with me, or what?”

“What are you talking about, Bob?” Eagle asked, genuinely puzzled.

“I’m talking about the Schlemmer woman.”

“What about her?”

“I sent a man to New York to interview her, Ed.” Martinez sounded thoroughly exasperated.

“Good move, Bob,” Eagle replied sarcastically. “And I’ll be willing to bet you he didn’t get any more than I did.”

“You know damn good and well he didn’t get
anything
.”

“I’m only guessing, Bob; you make it sound like I queered your man’s interview.”

“
What
interview?”

“Bob, you’re not making any sense.”

“She wasn’t there, Ed.”

“Schlemmer?”

“Right. She was paroled last week.”

“Oh. I didn’t know that. She said she was coming up for parole soon, but she didn’t say
that
soon.”

“Ed, do you swear to me you didn’t know she had been paroled?”

“I swear I didn’t. And anyway, I didn’t know you were sending a man east.”

“You’re sure.”

“Bob, I promise you. Listen, if she was paroled, she must have had an address. Didn’t they give him her address?”

“Sure they did. Turned out to be her old house, where she lived with her husband. His mother was there, said she hadn’t heard a word from Schlemmer.”

“Well, I’m sorry you had to go to all that trouble, but I really told you everything she had to say.”

“All right, then, tell me if she was in something with Grafton.”

“Bob, they were convicted at the same time; they were in different prisons. It would have been pretty tough for her to be in something with him, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t like coincidences.”

“Who does? I told you, my theory is that somehow—from Schlemmer or the papers, or something—he found out that Julia Willett was Schlemmer’s sister, operating under a new name. Grafton was just the kind of slime who would try for a blackmail score on Julia. Doesn’t that make some kind of sense?”

“Maybe.”

“Well, it’s all I’ve got to offer. If I think of something new, I’ll call you. I’m not obstructing your investigation, Bob, I really want to help. So does Wolf Willett, but he’s in the
same box you and I are in: He read about the sister in the newspaper. That was the first he knew of her, and he never heard of Grafton. That’s what he told me, and I believe him.”

“All right, Ed, we’ll leave it at that. But if you hear from the Schlemmer woman, I want to know about it, you understand?”

“Bob, I haven’t the slightest reason to think that she will ever cross my path again, but if she turns up, you’ll be the first to know, I promise.”

Martinez hung up, and Eagle sighed. That was that, and he was pleased that the district attorney had never gotten to the woman; it would have been embarrassing if he had turned up something that Eagle had missed.

His secretary stuck her head in the door. “Excuse me, Ed, but there’s a Barbara Kennerly in reception. She says you know her.”

Eagle put his face in his hands and whimpered. “Christ, Martinez is never going to believe this.” He sat back and sighed. “Send her in.”

Barbara Kennerly walked into the room wearing a Chanel suit and looking like a million dollars. “Good afternoon, Mr. Eagle,” she said.

Eagle stood up. “Good afternoon, Ms. Kennerly. Have a seat, and call me Ed, please.”

“Call me Barbara,” she said, sitting down and crossing her long, beautiful legs.

“You’re out on parole, Barbara?”

“That’s right, Ed.”

“Then I think we have a little problem, here.”

“What’s that?” she asked, looking surprised.

“It’s customary when a prisoner is released on parole for him—or her—to report regularly to a parole officer, to have a fixed address, and, most important, to remain in the jurisdiction.”

She smiled broadly, revealing perfect teeth. “Oh, that. I was unconditionally released.”

“Now, why would the State of New York do that?” Eagle asked skeptically.

“I got lucky. Shortly after your visit, a federal judge ruled that several state prisons were overcrowded and that the populations had to be reduced immediately. I was only a few months away from my parole hearing, and I was a model prisoner, so they brought it forward.”

“But why was your release unconditional?”

“Half a dozen other prisons had to release prisoners early, too, and the numbers apparently placed a heavy strain on the parole system. The parole board gave unconditional release to those it felt were unlikely to be repeat offenders. Since I had no previous record and had cooperated at my trial, I was one of them.” She spread her hands. “I’m a free woman.”

“Congratulations,” he said. “Now—”

“Why have I come to see you?” she interrupted. “Well, in all the time I was in prison, you were the only visitor I had, apart from the
Times
reporter, and I have kissed him off, refused to cooperate further on the book. The only people I knew in New York were friends and relatives of my late husband, and they would not have been pleased to see me. I wanted a new start in a new place, and you did, after all, say to call you if you could be of any help.”

Eagle laughed. “That’s right, I did say that. All right, Barbara, how can I help?”

“I need a job,” she said. “As I told you, I’ve had experience at running an office, with bookkeeping and computers; I’m smart, pretty, and I’d be an asset to any office.”

“I believe you would.”

“How about your office? You need somebody?”

Eagle shook his head. “No, we’re training somebody new right now, and she’s working out well. I’m afraid we’re fully staffed.”
I’m also afraid
, he thought,
that if you came to work here, I’d soon find myself banging you on my desk
.

“Oh,” she said, crestfallen.

“Do you have any other work experience?”

“Well, before I was married, I worked in a restaurant as a hostess.”

“I know a few restaurateurs around town,” Eagle said. “Let me make some calls.”

She rewarded him with another dazzling smile. “Thank you,” she said.

“There’s something I want to ask you first,” he said.

“Shoot.”

“When was the last time you communicated with James Grafton?”

She looked surprised. “How did you know his name? I never mentioned it, did I?”

“No. I did my homework.”

“Communicated,” she said, looking at the ceiling. “I suppose we communicated at the trial; he stared daggers at me through the whole thing.”

“Did you speak to him or write to him or send him any messages while you were both in prison?”

“Certainly not.” She snorted. “I don’t think he would have been glad to hear from me, after I testified against him, and I wanted to forget the bastard existed. To answer your original question, the last time I communicated with Jimmy was in the moment before the police burst through the door of our hotel room in Miami. I was telling him that I was going to turn myself in, and he was telling me that he’d kill me before he’d let that happen.”

“Did Grafton know Julia?”

“I think you asked me that when you visited me in Poughkeepsie. No.”

“Did he know
about
Julia?”

She looked thoughtful. “He knew she existed. Once, he saw some photographs I had of Julia and me together.”

“When Julia got married to Wolf Willett, were there pictures in the papers?”

“I saw it mentioned in some gossip column in the
New York Post
, but there was no picture. Listen, why all this sudden interest in Jimmy Grafton?” She suddenly looked alarmed. “He hasn’t turned up in Santa Fe, has he?”

“You might say that. He turned up at Wolf Willett’s house and got himself shotgunned for his trouble. He’s on a slab in Albuquerque right now, missing most of his head.”

“
What?
”

“At first they thought he was Wolf. They eventually identified him by his fingerprints.”

“My God.” She sighed, shaking her head. “This is bizarre.”

“It is.”

“Do you think he saw Julia’s picture in the papers and…” she paused for a moment. “I’ll bet he tried to blackmail her about her record.”

“That’s my best guess.”

“He’d do that. The man would stop at nothing to get money.”

“Speaking of money, the diamonds he stole from your husband were never recovered. What happened to them?”

“Jimmy got rid of them before we even left New York.”

“And what happened to the money he got for them?”

“I don’t know, but I never saw any of it. The police said he only had a few thousand dollars when we were arrested, but what he took was worth more than a million wholesale.”

“So Grafton had the money stashed somewhere?”

“He must have. He didn’t have time to spend it, and he
didn’t give it to the United Way.”

“If he was flush when he got out, why would he rush off to blackmail Julia?”

“Money didn’t last long with Jimmy; he was a big-time gambler.”

“I’m sorry to be grilling you like this, but it’ll be good practice for you. The local district attorney is very anxious to talk to you about Grafton.”

She looked alarmed. “Does he know my new name?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, that’s a relief. If I’m going to start some sort of new life here, I don’t want the local law breathing down my neck all the time. Do I have to see him?”

Eagle shook his head. “No, but I’ll have to tell him I’ve talked with you. I said I would.”