A Handy Death Read online

  “I promise not to charge more than the Mets can afford,” Ross said piously. Across the desk Sharon bit back a smile. Ross became serious. “All right, Charley, what’s the story on Dupaul?”

  “He’s in this jam—damn it, Hank! Haven’t you been listening for the last half hour?”

  “I don’t mean that. I mean, why your sudden interest in him now? Eight years ago you people didn’t want to touch him. You didn’t want to pay for a decent lawyer for him. Now, if you’ll pardon the modesty, you want the best. Or at least the most expensive.”

  Quirt hesitated a moment.

  “Well, hell, Hank—the boy’s only twenty-six. I’ve kept track of him in prison. He keeps in shape, he works out regularly, or as regularly as you can up there since the troubles last year. And he pitches every time he gets a chance in one of the prison games …”

  Ross frowned at the telephone in utter disbelief.

  “Charley, are you trying to tell me you’re interested in getting this fellow out from whatever charges he’s up against—murder, riot instigation, or whatnot—because your team needs more strength in the bull pen? What happened to that gum-chewing, All-American-image spiel a minute ago?”

  “God damn it, Hank, that’s not what I said! You don’t understand—”

  “I don’t and that’s a fact,” Ross said candidly. “When the boy represented a large investment for you, and before he was even tried, you dropped him like a hot potato. Now that he’s a second-offender with a murder charge against him and a good possibility of having been involved in a riot that indirectly may have resulted in the deaths of three men, you want to pull all the stops and save him. As you say, I don’t understand.”

  “Look,” Quirt said. “It’s simply—well, eight years ago I wasn’t in a position to try to help the boy—”

  “Eight years ago you were vice-president of the Mets, and today you’re still vice-president of the Mets,” Ross said. “What happened? Or were you promoted since I talked with you last?”

  Quirt paused a moment and then spoke, but now his voice was no longer apologetic. Now it was cold and hard.

  “What the hell is this, anyway? A God-damned inquisition? Who’s hiring who around here? Look, Hank, do you want this case or not? There are other criminal lawyers in town, you know!”

  Ross imitated the other’s tone of moments before.

  “Whoa, Charley! Of course I want this case. Any time Louie Gorman makes big talk in the papers, I love to put pinholes in his balloons. And I have a feeling the money won’t be bad, either.”

  “Well, I was beginning to wonder! All right, then, stop wasting your time and mine and get on the job. Billy will be brought down from Attica within the next few days for arraignment. If you’d like to interview him up at Attica Prison before then—over the weekend, say—I have some pull with the authorities—”

  “I don’t need pull to interview a client, Charley. You know that.”

  “Sure, only I thought if I could help—”

  “I’ll handle it my way, Charley.”

  “What? All right, you stiff-necked bastard, I was only trying to help,” Quirt said, slightly offended. “All right, get moving. Let me know how things are going, and if I can be of help in any way.”

  “I will,” Ross promised. “Anything else?”

  “That’s it. Goodbye, Hank. And good luck.”

  “Right, Charley,” Ross said. He put the telephone back in its cradle with a thoughtful look.

  Sharon said, “Do you want this transcribed right away?”

  “No,” Ross said slowly. “Just put the notebook aside for the time being. Date it, initial it, and let me initial it as well, and then get another one to work from. Don’t tear out any sheets, even blank ones.”

  He tented his fingers and swung his chair around, staring from the high window out over the island of Manhattan. A plane was taking off at a sharp angle from LaGuardia Field, leaving behind dissipating vapor trails. Hank Ross watched it disappear into a cloud bank. He spoke over his shoulder.

  “What did you think?”

  Sharon understood. She said, “Of Mr. Quirt’s reasons for wanting to help this man Dupaul?”

  Ross swung his chair back to face the girl. “That’s right.”

  “Well,” Sharon said, “it does seem strange, as you pointed out, that when Billy Dupaul represented a large investment on their part, they made no attempt to help him, but now that he doesn’t represent anything to them, they suddenly seem so anxious to get him out of trouble.”

  “He doesn’t represent anything to them that we know of,” Ross said.

  “Still,” Sharon said, “other than simple goodheartedness, what other reason could Mr. Quirt have? I’m sure it wasn’t for the baseball left in the man, because if he’s a second-offender, even getting out of the murder charge won’t affect his remaining in prison on his present sentence.”

  “Though Charley said he kept track of the man in prison,” Ross said, and frowned. “What was even more puzzling, though, was when he said that eight years ago he couldn’t do anything to help Dupaul, and now he can. I wonder what happened to change the picture?”

  “Just a change of heart?”

  Ross shrugged.

  “Maybe. Anway, we’ll worry about that later. Right now we’ve got a job to do. Let me know when Steve gets back from Court. I’ve got a real job for him. I want a complete abstract of the entire Dupaul court transcripts. Both trials—the one that sent him up for assault and battery—the Neeley case—as well as the one that made him a second-offender.”

  Sharon nodded, her fingers relaying the information to her desk pad with lightning pothooks.

  “I’ll also want as much background material on Billy Dupaul as possible, but Steve can have Mike Gunnerson’s office work on that.”

  Sharon nodded and added the instruction to her pad.

  Ross grinned and rose from his chair.

  “And here’s the catch,” he said. “I want it by Monday, which gives him exactly two and a half days. On second thought, let Molly give him the good news; I hate to see a grown man cry. And besides, you and I are going out for lunch.” His smile broadened. “It’s been a long time since I’ve taken anybody to a meal except a trout.”

  CHAPTER

  2

  Jeannot, maître d’ of the Sign of the Dove at sixty-fifth and Third Avenue, smiled happily at Ross and Sharon as he ushered them to a corner table. He flicked his hand majestically, waving aside the waiter who had appeared, making it quite evident that he considered it an honor to handle the requirements of these favored customers himself.

  “It has been a long time, M’sieu Ross!” Jeannot’s heavy French accent did not obscure his meaning as he chided Ross for his extended absence. “And Miss McCloud! And we have had your favorite dish every day this week, too.” He raised his head dramatically, daring Ross to challenge his statement. “Trout!”

  Ross laughed.

  “Not today, Jeannot. I’ve eaten enough trout the past two weeks to last me a lifetime. Or, anyway, for at least several months. The next mistake I make in court, the District Attorney’s office will have to scale me instead of skinning me.”

  He saw the hurt look that crossed Jeannot’s plump, handsome face and hurried to explain that he had not been unfaithful to his favorite restaurant.

  “Not in New York, Jeannot. In Maine. Over a campfire.”

  “Ah!” Jeannot understood and was satisfied. He raised a finger in the direction of the bar; the waiting bartender had been expecting it. He instantly began to prepare a very cold, extra-dry martini for Sharon; in the refrigerator beneath the bar he had, for Mr. Ross, a particularly chilled bottle of Cerveza Schneider, Argentinian beer, and the world’s best.

  “But I haven’t,” Sharon said calmly. She laid aside her menu and smiled at Jeannot. “So I will.”

  The maître d’ was puzzled. “Ma’am’selle?”

  “I haven’t been eating trout over a campfire in Maine,” Sharon e
xplained, “so I’ll have it here.”

  “Much better,” Jeannot assured her, and smiled. “And for M’sieu Ross, in that case, a thick steak, très succulent, with pommes de terre hash brown and two salads of the house, n’est-ce pas?”

  He beamed at the two of them, never doubting for a moment that his selection had been both accurate and gastronomically wise, motioned imperiously to a waiter to hustle the waiting drinks from the bar, and strode away, shoulders back and mustache alert, prepared to do battle in the kitchen for these special patrons, if need be.

  Ross accepted his beer from the waiter and raised the chilled glass.

  “Here’s luck. It’s good to be back in civilization—if you want to call it that—again.”

  “It’s good to see you back,” Sharon said, and smiled at him over the rim of her martini. “You’ve spoiled me, taking me on so many business trips. Now I feel left out of things when I’m not invited along on a nonbusiness trip, like camping.”

  “You could have done the cooking,” Ross admitted. “I might still like trout. Except that without you in the office, there wouldn’t be any business left to come back to. Steve’s a good boy and one day he’ll be a fine lawyer, but he couldn’t run the office. Any more than I could.” He smiled and raised his glass. “Here’s to the indispensable Miss Sharon McCloud—”

  There was a slight tap on his shoulder. Ross looked up to find himself facing a rather excessively thin man, whose lined cheeks were clearly the result of excesses rather than age. At one time he might have been handsome, but he appeared as if he had aged faster than usual. He was wearing clothes more suitable for a person much younger than himself, and he could have used a shave. Ross looked at the man without expression, masking his irritation with the interruption.

  “Yes?”

  “Mr. Ross?” The question was clearly redundant, nor did the tall, thin man make the slightest effort to hide the fact.

  “Yes, I’m Mr. Ross.”

  “Press.”

  The folder in the man’s hand appeared for an instant and then disappeared into an inner pocket of the flashy sports jacket before Ross had a chance to properly examine it or even to verify its authenticity. Sharon looked at the man curiously and then brought her eyes down to Ross’s face. Ross frowned up at the tall man.

  “How did you know I was here?”

  “I was at your office,” the man said easily. “Your telephone operator said you’d just left for lunch. I asked her where, but she denied knowing. That’s probably your idea of a good telephone-receptionist—”

  Ross said evenly, “It is.”

  “—but in any event, when I came down the elevator I saw you and your young lady crossing the street, and I simply followed.”

  “I see. Well, I appreciate the Press, of course, but I’m sorry. At the moment I’m about to have my lunch.”

  “I hate to disturb you,” the man said smoothly, “but your paragon of a telephone operator also said she didn’t know if you’d be returning after lunch, and it was important that I see you.”

  “I’ll be back in the office after lunch,” Ross said, his dislike for the thin man growing by the minute, “but I’m afraid I have a rather busy schedule today …”

  It was clearly a rejection, but the thin man didn’t seem to notice.

  “Too busy to find out why you’d be better off talking to me before taking on the Dupaul case?” The skeletal face broke into a smile that looked like a rictus. The teeth were huge blocks of white, out of proportion to the sunken cheeks and narrow jaw. He winked broadly at Ross and started to turn away. “I’ll be looking for you in your office in an hour or so. Don’t rush your lunch on my account.”

  “Hold it! Could I see that press card again?”

  The thin man almost sneered.

  “Of course. Be my guest.”

  He reached into his inner jacket pocket and brought out the folder, opening it and placing it face upward on the table before Ross. The lawyer picked it up and studied it carefully; his eyes came up, matching the photograph behind the shiny plastic with the gaunt face smiling down at him so sardonically. The blocks of teeth were bared in a grin.

  “Satisfied?”

  “Your name is Jerry Coughlin?”

  “That’s what it says, doesn’t it?”

  “A stringer in sports for the Daily Mirror?”

  “Among other papers,” Coughlin said calmly. “We can’t all work for U.P.I. or be staffers on the Times, you know. Everybody can’t make like Hildy Johnson in The Front Page.”

  He reached out. Pencil-like fingers removed the folder from Ross’s hand and tucked the press card away in a pocket again. Coughlin looked down at Ross with a faint smile on his face.

  “See the story in the Mirror this morning?”

  “I read the Times.”

  “Tough on you,” Coughlin said. “I dug out the story on that prison break try at Attica yesterday. The Mirror carried it.” His eyes held those of Ross for a moment. “Good reading.”

  Something cued Ross to his next line. “Under your own by-line?”

  For a moment the composure of the thin man faltered. Coughlin frowned blackly.

  “It should have been, but it wasn’t. But I’ve got a lovely by-lined story that’ll be in the next edition you might be interested in. It’ll be out on the streets pretty soon.” He turned away again. “I’ll be waiting in your office an hour from now.”

  Ross stared thoughtfully after the narrow shoulders in the loud sports jacket as they edged their way past waiters and tables to reach the street and disappear beyond the visual limits afforded by the curtained, latticed windows. He turned back to Sharon, raising his glass slowly, staring into the golden contents as if to find some answer there.

  “The trouble with practicing criminal law—” he began slowly.

  “What about it?” Sharon asked.

  “It’s some of the people you have to associate with,” Ross said, and finished his beer in one swallow.

  The emaciated Jerry Coughlin shook his head decisively as Sharon seated herself at her desk in Ross’s office, opened a new stenographic notebook, and reached for a sharpened pencil.

  “No dice,” Coughlin said firmly.

  “What?”

  “I mean, alone,” Coughlin said emphatically.

  “There is no ‘alone’ in this law office,” Ross said quietly. “Miss McCloud is my confidential secretary, and in this office that word means just what it says. She sits in on all my conferences.”

  “But not on mine.”

  Ross shrugged. “Sorry.”

  Coughlin didn’t argue. Instead he raised his narrow shoulders in lack of interest and stood up.

  “I came here to do you a favor, Ross. Either we do it my way or we don’t do it at all.”

  Ross studied the bean pole of a man towering across the desk from him, watching him almost indolently. Several seconds passed before Ross came to a decision. He nodded to Sharon; she understood, closed her book, rose and left the room. Coughlin crossed the room and closed the door firmly behind her. He came back and sat down. There was no trace of expression on his face, no hint of triumph. Ross shook his head.

  “You realize, of course, that I could have a tape recorder turned on this minute—” And a pity he hadn’t, he thought, with at least ten casette recorders in the various offices. “—or the room itself could be bugged, and my secretary could be in another room taking down everything you say.”

  “I know,” Coughlin said calmly. “I also know that tape-recorder evidence stands far less chance in a courtroom than do personal witnesses.” He leaned across the desk, getting right to the point. “Ross, let’s not fight. We’re on the same side of the fence. Like I told you, I’m here to do you a favor. I covered that riot at Attica Prison yesterday. I was at the baseball game when the trouble started.”

  “Doing what? The paper assigned you?”

  “I don’t get assignments, or anyway, damned few. I work on my own. If I dig up some
thing hot, I peddle it.”

  “And what made you think something hot would happen at Attica Prison yesterday? Of all days?”

  “I didn’t, particularly. But they’ve got a prison league and, believe it or not, there’s a certain amount of interest in prison sports. Ex-cons, maybe, figuring it’s their alma mater. Or family, maybe, of guys on the teams—lets them know that if Daddy’s hustling out in left field, at least he isn’t in the freezer. Anyway, I cover prison sports as a stringer, sometimes sell a couple of paragraphs to the local papers, sometimes sell a couple of lines in one of the big-time rags—”

  “So?”

  “So I saw what happened—exactly what happened.”

  “And exactly what did happen?”

  “Well,” Coughlin said, “I’ve seen Billy Dupaul pitch a lot of ball games over the years. He’s good. Big-league stuff, like he was when he first came up as a bonus baby. Maybe even better; stronger, more mature. But this time he throws four balls, one right on top of the other. And the cons in the stands don’t care greatly for the umpire’s calls, so they stage a slight riot.”

  He shook his head with an indication of sadness at the vicissitudes of baseball, but his eyes were alert and bright, watching Ross sardonically.

  Ross returned the look evenly. “So?”

  “It was a setup,” Coughlin said flatly. “It was a plant.”

  “Why?” Ross asked mildly. “I’ve seen the best pitchers in the business throw four balls in a row.”

  “Sure—facing Willy Mays or Hank Aaron, maybe,” Coughlin said, nodding. “But Billy Dupaul was facing a clown named Ryan, doing a ten-to-twenty for safecracking. A safe’s about the only thing can’t run away from Ryan. He’s slower than glacier ice. Dupaul and Millard—he was back of the plate—those two can play catch a couple of times while Ryan is getting the bat off his shoulder. Dupaul can throw it past Ryan ten out of ten, but in this game—after a perfect warm-up—he throws four straight balls. I ask you!”

  Coughlin paused for a moment for effect and then went on.

  “And then what do you think just happened to happen?” The thin man opened his eyes wide for effect. “Surprise, surprise! A Donnybrook out on the field and the guards come from all over the joint—they’re still pretty much on edge at Attica, you know; a guy sneezes in the yard and he’s apt to get shot if he reaches for a handkerchief—and while everyone’s milling around on the athletic field, over on the far side of the joint two cons are making tracks for the open spaces!”