by Paul Levine
“H.T., chill out.”
His eyes lit up. “That’s just what your client’s tortuous misconduct caused to occur. The terminal chilling-out of a dedicated citizen, a man who put civic duty above financial reward, a man who spent his all-too-brief life fighting the robber barons and the well-connected. A man who walked through the valley of greed and gluttony, cupidity and corruption, and sought the straight-and-narrow path.
“Save it for the jury, H.T.”
“A man cannot indiscriminately let flow a river of demon rum to his guest,” H.T. continued, impervious, “then abdicate his responsibility. No, he must be made to pay, and pay till it hurts.”
Nicky Florio’s olive complexion was beginning to color. He drummed his well-manicured nails on the tabletop. His black hair was slicked straight back, his dark eyes blazing at H.T. Patterson. Florio wore a jet-black suit, a white-on-white shirt, and one of those expensive Italian silk ties that looks like a bouquet of flowers and costs more than most small appliances. He leaned toward me and whispered, “Do I have to listen to this shit? Jesus, let’s get it over with. I got a business to run.”
I calmed him with a hand on his shoulder and turned to my opponent. “H.T., you’re wasting a lot of valuable time and paper. I’d swear you were getting paid by the word instead of your usual forty percent.”
“Blasphemer! I have promised a percentage of my fee to the Everglades Society, so that Mr. Tupton’s grand works can continue after his untimely passing.”
“How thoughtful. I don’t suppose the group is returning the favor by helping you with the lawsuit, is it? And what percentage are you contributing, Henry Thackery? A tiny morsel, a single digit, no doubt? It’ll be good for a tax deduction and a mention of your generosity in the newspapers, probably at the time we’re picking a jury.”
“Counselor, you vex me.”
“Good. We’re even.”
I yawned and decided to keep quiet. Maybe if I ignored Patterson’s diversions, he’d get back on track. I stretched my legs, locked my hands behind my neck, and cracked my knuckles.
Something touched my left leg.
At first I thought that Nicky, seated to my left, had bumped into me under the table. He hadn’t. I glanced at Gina, sitting directly across from me. She wore a sleeveless red leather mini-dress. Too hot for Miami in the summer, but it covered so little, maybe it didn’t matter. A gold zipper ran diagonally from the hem to the neck. It was unzipped to the middle of her breasts.
Something touched my leg again and moved upward.
Gina’s foot.
Unless you were watching, you wouldn’t notice her slipping slightly lower into her chair as her foot inched upward along my leg. A small smile played at her lips.
Risk.
Danger.
Fun.
They were all the same to her. Sex was enhanced if she was bouncing on the deck of a pitching boat during a gale. Preferably with a man who was not her spouse. She drove too fast, drank too much, partied too long. She liked men who risked their bodies and their bankrolls. She skied on slopes too steep and dived in waters too deep. She jumped off bridges attached to a bungee cord and told me it was her second-favorite sport. And now, with her husband two feet away, her toes crept toward my crotch.
“Just how much did you serve Mr. Tupton to drink?” Patterson asked.
“I didn’t serve him anything,” Nicky replied. “We have servants for that.”
“Servants!” Patterson sang out. “As it is written in Matthew, ‘The dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.’”
I knew where he was going. This wasn’t a lawsuit but a class war.
“How convenient you have servants,” Patterson continued sarcastically. “Pity they’re not slaves.”
“Objection!” I yelled. “Move to stri-eeek!”
The ball of Gina’s foot had found a part of me that was totally unconcerned with the rules of evidence. Patterson was looking at me, puzzled for once.
“That is, move to stroke, ah-chem, strike the provocative and inflamed, I mean…inflammatory comment of counsel.”
I felt my face redden. Nicky Florio shot me a sideways look that seemed to ask whether I was competent. At the moment, I was not.
“You intended to get Mr. Tupton intoxicated, did you not?” Patterson asked.
“No,” Florio answered flatly.
“Did you ask him to come to the party without his wife?”
“No, that was his choice.”
“Isn’t it true you provided him with female companionship?”
“There were single women at the party, if that’s what you mean.”
Patterson thumbed through his notes. “Do you know a Ms. Amber Lane and a Ms. Marcia Middleton?”
Gina’s foot had miraculously withdrawn from my crotch.
“The ladies work for me. They take reservation deposits on new condos at Rolling Hills Estates.”
I knew the place. Located on a former marsh about six feet above sea level, the only hills were made of swampy landfill, and the estates were town houses crammed sixteen to the acre.
“Were the ladies wearing those very skimpy bikinis,” Patterson asked with obvious distaste, “the ones designed by Satan himself, the ones called—”
“Tongas,” Gina piped up, with a lascivious grin.
“Hush!” I told her.
From across the table, Gina winked at me.
“It was a pool party,” Nicky Florio said. “All the women were in appropriate attire. As I recall, a few were sunbathing topless near the seawall.”
“No!” thundered Patterson. “You violated Coral Gables ordinances, to say nothing of the law of the Lord. As Peter observed, ‘Thou shalt abstain from fleshly lusts—’”
“C’mon, H.T.,” I implored. “Keep to the point.”
“And was it the job of Ms. Lane and Ms. Middleton to spend the day entertaining Mr. Tupton?”
“All the employees are encouraged to socialize,” Florio said.
“Socialize,” Patterson repeated, as if the word turned his stomach. “Did that include playing”—again he consulted his notes—“pool tag? Where the person who’s ‘it’ must tag the next person, regardless of sex, exactly where he or she has been tagged.”
“There were games going on in the pool,” Florio said. “Nobody seemed to be complaining, and I didn’t keep track of what everyone was doing.”
“Just as you didn’t keep track of how much Mr. Tupton drank.”
“Look, fellow. There were a hundred people at my house. I’m not a nursemaid. I’m a businessman. These were all consenting adults, if you know what I mean. If somebody slips into the cabana with someone not his wife, it’s no business of mine. If a guy chooses to get sloshed, that’s his prerogative. During a party, I’m working. I’ve got to entertain county commissioners, tribal leaders, sugar growers, zoning lawyers, subcontractors, plus the usual Ocean Club crowd. I’m sorry about Peter Tupton. I really am. But he drank himself into a stupor and wandered into the wine cellar. It’s his own damn fault, and that’s all there is to it.”
Not a bad speech. We could clean it up a little, make it seem not so harsh, a little more sympathetic to the deceased, then use it at trial. With enough rehearsal, it would seem appropriately spontaneous.
Patterson pretended not to have heard a word. He had taken mental notes, I knew, sizing up the opposition, figuring just what kind of witness he had to deal with, and then he went back to work. “Now concerning your business, you lease several thousand acres in the Everglades from the Micanopy tribe, do you not?”
“Yeah, it’s a matter of public record.”
“And you run the Micanopy bingo games, correct?”
“Right. My associate handles that.”
“Your associate being Rick Gondolier?”
“That’s right.”
I had seen Gondolier’s picture in the newspaper lots of times. Handsome, mid-thirties, he was usually wearing a tux, his arm around a woman in
an evening gown at one of Miami’s endless social events. Gondolier came from Las Vegas, where he had managed a couple of hotel casinos. There’d been a scandal, skimming cash, bribing local officials. Some indictments, an immunized witness who disappeared, no convictions. Gondolier made a splash when he bought into Nicky Florio’s businesses. A few major charitable contributions and membership in the right clubs brought contacts and society-page publicity. In Miami, a shady past doesn’t hamper careers. Hereabouts, the only sin is being poor.
“And what are your business relationships with Mr. Gondolier?” Patterson asked.
“Objection to the form of the question,” I said. “Vague, overbroad.”
The court reporter noted my objection, and Patterson thought about it. “I’ll rephrase. Are the two of you partners?”
“Objection, irrelevant.”
Patterson gave me his patronizing look. “If they’re partners and this pool party was a business event,” he lectured, “then Mr. Gondolier is equally liable for the negligence of Mr. Florio. Jake, didn’t you take Business Organizations in law school?”
“Twice,” I told him. I turned to Florio. “Go ahead and answer.”
“We’re not partners. All the relationships are corporate. We each own fifty percent of the stock in Micanopy Management Company. That’s the subsidiary that runs the bingo business. Gondolier’s got a minority position in the parent company, Florio Enterprises, which develops our real estate interests. He’s got an option to purchase up to half the stock. I’m the president and CEO of each company. He’s the chief operating officer of the bingo business. Anything else you want to know?”
“Was Gondolier at the party?”
“Yeah, and so was the archbishop. Want to sue him, too?”
Patterson ignored the crack. He was good at it. “Now, concerning the several thousand acres you lease from the Micanopy tribe, you and Mr. Gondolier plan to build apartments and town houses on the environmentally sensitive land, do you not?”
“So what? It’s perfectly legal. I’ve been this route before. I’ve got the best lawyers, the best consultants, the best lobbyists.”
I remembered what Gina said about her husband. Nicky likes the best of everything.
Patterson leaned over the table, closer to Nicky Florio. “You knew that Mr. Tupton’s group opposed your plans?”
“Sure, he told us. A hundred times. He told the newspapers. He wrote letters to the governor and the cabinet. His fax machine must have blown a gasket over this thing. Gondolier and I talked about it. We were searching for areas of common ground with Tupton.”
“Such as a bribe?”
Oh shit. What was this all about?
“Objection!” I sang out. “Argumentative and irrelevant.” Buying time now.
“Jake, Jake, Jake.” Patterson’s tone was condescending. “You know that objection is preserved for trial. As for the present, there’s a question pending.” Patterson turned back to Nicky. “Now, Mr. Florio, did you offer Peter Tupton a bribe to drop his opposition to your plans?”
“Don’t answer,” I instructed my client. “Time-out, H.T. I need to confer with my client.”
“Confer or coach, Jake?” Patterson stood up, smiling.
He left the room, bouncing on his toes, a satisfied look on his face. The court reporter stood, opened her purse, grabbed a pack of cigarettes, and went into the hallway. I was left with Nicky and Gina.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Tupton must have told his wife,” Nicky said.
“Told her what?”
“But there’s nothing in writing.”
“Told her what?” I repeated.
“I could say he solicited a bribe, and I turned him down. Who would know?”
“I would,” I said.
His look was razor-sharp. “Don’t start playing Boy Scout with me over a harmless little talk I had with that self-important sack of shit. I know about you. I know all about you.”
Gina cleared her throat. “If you boys are going to play, I think I’ll go take a pee. Excuse me…powder my nose.” She wriggled back into her shoes—one or two wriggles more than seemed necessary—stood up, and left the conference room.
Nicky Florio and I just sat there staring at each other. What had he meant? All about me. Professional, personal, or both? The grievance proceeding, or Gina, or a guy I once decked in a bar? I didn’t know. All right, so maybe I’m the bull in the china shop when it comes to tact and subtlety, but basically, I like to think I’m considered almost respectable by my peers. Unfortunately, there are no sophisticated electronic devices to measure character, and all of us see ourselves differently than those around us. Our reputation is created out of earshot.
I try to go through each day wreaking as little havoc as possible. I am unfailingly polite to bone-weary waitresses who deliver my potatoes fried instead of mashed. I never park in the handicapped space or toss gum wrappers on the sidewalk. I don’t shoot little furry animals or curse at telephone solicitors. I help old ladies across the street, feed stray cats, and recycle beer bottles. For the past several years, I worked the cafeteria line at a homeless shelter on Thanksgiving, scooping out the gravy to haggard men and women, thanking the powers of the universe for the cosmic luck that gave me a sound body and semi-sound mind.
In the practice of law, a sea inhabited by sharks and other carnivores, my ethics are simple. I won’t lie to a judge, steal from a client, or bribe a cop. Until recently, I wouldn’t sleep with a client’s wife, but since I knew Gina before she married Nicky, I figured I was grandfathered in, if I figured anything at all.
Other than that, I believe in drawing blood from the opposition, but not by going for the knees. Hit ’em straight on, jawbone-to-jawbone. Which is why I didn’t like the slippery scruples of Nicky Florio, who sat there glaring at me with his dark, piercing eyes.
“Okay,” I said. “Forget about my principles. I sometimes do. Think about this. Maybe Tupton was wired when you talked.”
“That’d be illegal, wouldn’t it?”
Now it was getting too close to home. “Not if it was part of a law-enforcement investigation. Or maybe he did an affidavit after the conversation or told it to the newspapers. Maybe the grand jury is looking into it.”
“Abe Socolow runs the grand jury, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah, he’s the prosecutor in charge of corruption probes.”
“He was at the party. He’s all right.”
“He’s better than all right. Abe’s tough and honest, and he could eat your canapés all night and subpoena you the next morning.”
Florio smiled. “Don’t worry. He’s on our team.”
“What does that mean?”
“He’s running for state attorney, right? I’m helping him out with his finances.”
“Look, Nicky, I’ve known Abe since he was prosecuting DUIs and I was defending shoplifters. You can’t buy him. Now, what the hell was going on between you and Tupton?”
If Nicky had to think about the answer, he was a quick study. “It was no big deal. I offered him stock in Micanopy Management Company at a special rate, that’s all.”
“A special rate?”
“Yeah, like for free.”
“You didn’t!”
“The company’s a gold mine. We’ve got the management contract for the Micanopy bingo hall. You ever see the place?”
I shook my head.
“Out on the fringe of the Glades. You could play the Super Bowl in there, and it’s a real cash machine. Gondolier does a great job. We bring in the retirees by the busload from all over. St. Pete, Naples, Lehigh Acres, Cape Coral, Sunrise Lakes, Bonita Springs. Jeez, we gotta have a cardiologist on the premises, we get a couple tickers stopping during the hundred-grand game on Saturday nights. Now we’ve got the video pull-tab games, French bingo, do-it-yourself bingo.”
“What’s it got to do with Tupton?”
“Nothing, until, as a friendly gesture, I offered him the stock, that’s
all. Plus a seat on the board. He could pick up some spare change in director’s fees.”
“This is bullshit, and you know it. You were trying to bribe him.”
“Hold on, Jake. He wasn’t a public official. There was nothing illegal about it. Okay, so I wanted some cooperation. But I never said he had to do anything for me in return. That’s not a bribe, right?”
“Right, there’s no bribe unless there’s a quid pro quo.” I haven’t hung around Doc Riggs all these years without learning something.
Florio smiled, thinking about it. I wouldn’t want him smiling at me like that. “‘Course, if he took the quid and didn’t give me the quo, I’d have killed the son of a bitch.”
“But Tupton didn’t take it, did he?”
“No, he refused.”
“So how come the son of a bitch is dead?” I asked.
Chapter 5
* * *
The Fox and the Henhouse
I AIMED THE OLD CONVERTIBLE WEST ON TAMIAMI TRAIL BUT NEVER got out of third gear. From Brickell Avenue westward, the Trail cuts a straight, if congested, path through Little Havana. Once out of the city, the road splits the Everglades heading straight toward Naples on the west coast. Eventually, it bends to the north and hits Tampa.
Tamiami, Tampa to Miami, get it?
My old beauty, a canary-yellow 1968 Olds 442, growled and groaned, anxious for wide-open spaces. But now, as the afternoon sun glared down, Charlie Riggs and I were stuck somewhere between Thirteenth and Twenty-second avenues. At least that’s what they used to be called. Thirteenth is now Luis Medina Muñoz Marin Avenue, and Twenty-second is General Máximo Gómez Boulevard. If that’s not confusing enough, Tamiami Trail is better known as Calle Ocho, since it is really Eighth Street, in case you’re counting.
Salsa music poured from open storefronts, the neighborhood a potpourri of cultural confusion. The sign above a medical clinic: VENAS VARICOSAS. A furniture store: GARANTIZAMOS LOS PRECIOS MAS BAJOS. A nightclub: EXÓTICO, ARDIENTE, ESPECTACULAR. Delivery vans blocked the right-hand lane. Shoppers and tourists and kids in souped-up Chevys crept along, engines heating up, radiators threatening to blow. Yesterday, on the TV news, one of the weather guys with the pasted-on smile tried to fry an egg on the sidewalk. He got some sizzle, but the yolk was still runny.
