The Jezebel Remedy

by Martin Clark

  “Thanks,” M.J. said. “Maybe I can recoup enough from selling the squirrel suit to pay my legal fees.”

  —

  “Today is June sixth, 2011, and this is a called meeting of Stone and Stone, LLC,” Joe droned, as serious and grave and ponderous as ever, as if he were a corporate titan on a podium, addressing hundreds of stockholders in a magnificent Manhattan ballroom.

  “Joe,” Lisa snapped, “can we just get to it? Why do you always do this?” Despite her earnest efforts to be tolerant and understanding of her husband’s quirks, the whole Robert’s Rules, dog-and-pony show was simply too much. Joe had appeared at her door after lunch and announced there’d be a “firm meeting” in his office, five o’clock sharp. Moments later, Betty had delivered a typewritten notice confirming the place and time.

  “There’s a correct way and a half-assed way,” Joe said, and the calm, satisfied reply made matters worse. The firm’s three thick files were stacked in the center of his desk, the files tabbed and organized, every paper and resolution in its place, twenty years’ worth of boondoggle.

  “There’s a normal way and an anal-retentive way,” she replied.

  “New business,” he said, ignoring her swipe. “Mr. Pichler phoned this morning while you were in court. They’ve received the nondisclosure forms we signed. He wants to discuss Lettie’s medicine. I didn’t take the call. Betty told him we’d be in touch soon.”

  “Okay. Why didn’t you simply tell me?”

  “I think we’re at a point where we really need to stop and think. We need to either punt this and forget it or jump in whole hog.”

  “I agree,” she said, nodding.

  “If we jump in whole hog, it could be dangerous. It could also ruin us and the firm financially.”

  “I suppose,” Lisa answered. “Do you think they’d really come after us?”

  “From what I’ve seen, yes. In some form or fashion, yes, I believe they’ll attempt to punish us if we cause them any problems. Maybe attack us legally, maybe otherwise. In fact, the more I’ve thought about it and the more we’ve learned, it wouldn’t surprise me if Benecorp had a hand in Jane Rousch’s disappearance. Remember the mysterious rental-car lady? Maybe she and her companion ended up dead and their car carefully abandoned in a parking deck because they were a direct connection to Lettie. They’d be a hellacious loose thread for Seth Garrison.”

  “True.”

  “Of course,” Joe added, “I realize you’re convinced that Lettie’s alive. I’m not forgetting that possibility. Still nothing from the chat room?”

  “Nothing. And I’ve sent tons of messages. I haven’t told you, and it’s a long shot, but I’ve checked by her trailer too. Several times, without any luck. But I know what I saw.”

  “I’m not trying to be a prick about it,” Joe said. “I’m not saying you’re wrong. Everything’s on the table. We have to keep an open mind. If we pursue every alternative, then nothing can surprise us. I’m positive there was someone in your car who sounded like Lettie and claimed to be Lettie. No doubt. I believe you.”

  “So what do you think we ought to do?” Lisa asked. She was sitting across the desk from him. She was wearing her tanzanite ring and began rotating it around her middle finger. The blue stone scraped on each side as it turned. “I’ve thought and thought, and I’m not sure of our options. We could finesse, well, counterfeit trust or foundation documents, but I’m certain there’s no chance you’d go along with that plan. We can hire a private detective to hunt for Lettie, assuming she’s alive, and I really believe she is, but she could be anywhere. We don’t have the first clue or lead. You could look in Topeka or next door in Chatham. It’s frustrating as hell.”

  “I won’t be a crook just because they are,” Joe replied. He swiveled and took a walnut from a bowl he kept on the credenza. He cracked the nut in his palm, picked out the husk and dropped it into the trash can, then ate the meat straight from his hand. “As for a detective, you’re right, where the hell would he search?”

  “We don’t have any leverage.” She sighed. “Sooner or later, our ruse is going to end and they’ll discover they already own the formula and we were posturing about Lettie’s trust having a claim.”

  “Yep,” Joe said. He rubbed his palms together over the trash can.

  “I’ve considered trying to push this farther up the ladder.” She quit spinning her ring. “What do we lose if we refuse to speak to Pichler, drop the iron curtain and tell him we want to talk to Garrison personally? Pichler’s an apparatchik. He might not even understand the big picture, and he damn sure isn’t in a position to make any kind of agreement or compromise with us.”

  “I’m with you,” Joe said. “I’ve had the same thought. Certainly Garrison won’t admit squat, but it’ll buy us a few weeks, rattle their cage and maybe give us a small read on what he’s up to. Who knows—maybe Lettie surfaces for good in the meantime.”

  “If he actually agrees to talk to us, that in itself confirms a lot.”

  “Along with the demand to hear from Seth Garrison, we also need to prod them a bit,” Joe suggested. “Add some black pepper and habanero to their diet.”

  “How?”

  “First, we let them know we’re willing to file suit. A civil action to recover the Wound Velvet.” He leaned forward, pressed his flat hands together under his chin, finger matching finger. A fleck of walnut husk was stuck on his wrist. “I’m realistic enough to know it’s an uphill fight, but it’ll make the point we’re serious and here to stay.”

  “I’ve done the same math, Joe. What do we plead? Fraud?”

  “Exactly.” Joe broke his hands apart but stayed close to the desk’s edge.

  “Mutual mistake of fact?” Lisa added.

  “Correct,” he said.

  Lisa was briefly quiet. “We’re the two lawyers,” she mused, “and Neal’s the village idiot. I’d say it’ll be heavy lifting for us.”

  “No doubt.” Joe frowned, shifted in his chair. “But thanks to you, I friggin’ asked him if he knew of any other assets, any estate holdings he wasn’t revealing. He lied. He told us he didn’t know any more than we did, yet there’s no doubt he’d already been contacted by Benecorp and was their boy then. He’d probably struck a deal long before he claimed to us he was a babe in the woods.” Joe took a breath, exhaled deliberately. He rubbed his neck. “For the record, I’m sorry I screwed this up, but who the heck knew? I was trying to be fair. I had no earthly idea Petty Lettie VanSandt had suddenly become Marie Curie. If I’d kept what she gave me, we’d be in the catbird seat right now.”

  “I don’t blame you, Joe,” Lisa said. “I agreed with your decision a hundred percent. You handed over a bunch of stray animals, a dilapidated trailer and a few thousand dollars. Attempted to do right by Lettie and her son. My asking was rote and routine, basic lawyering, nothing special. We were both in the dark.” She twisted the TV ring a full rotation. “And hey, listen, I saw Lettie and talked to her and none of this estate bullshit is going to matter. She still owns the VV 108, simple as that. Neal transferred a big fat zero to Benecorp.”

  “Well, we’ve never mentioned it, and you’ve been generous not to remind me I might’ve pissed away a potential fortune, but…I thought I should apologize. I wish I could go back. I wouldn’t make the same mistake again.”

  “Totally not your fault. No need to explain. We’ve all done things we’d like to take back.”

  “So, yeah, we allege fraud,” he said. “If Neal claims he didn’t know about the Wound Velvet when we did the deal, then it’s mutual mistake of a material fact, and we ask to void my renouncement.”

  “Garrison will paint us as greedy, gold-digging lawyers trying to scrounge a buck from Lettie’s simpleton son, and even if we win, what’ll we get? We can’t pinpoint what we’re after. They’ll hand over the formula for granny’s lye soap or Kaboom shower cleaner, pure junk or complete garbage that doesn’t work, and a year later they’ll announce they’ve discovered the Fountain of
Youth.”

  “I understand it’s not an easy case. But I think we should pressure them, put the option of a suit on the table, at least let them know we aren’t simply planning to roll over in light of what we’ve discovered. We tell Pichler we want to speak to Garrison, and that we’re planning to file suit for fraud. If they stonewall, we drop the fraud claim on them.”

  “All right,” Lisa said, didn’t hesitate. “I’m a hundred percent committed.”

  “So I’ll make a motion that we adopt the course of action we’ve discussed and dedicate all necessary firm resources. Do I have a second?”

  “Damn it, Joe, you’re such a twerp sometimes.”

  “A second?” he repeated.

  “Yes, Joe, I second your motion.”

  “All in favor,” he intoned, “say ‘aye.’ ”

  “What if I vote no?” she asked. “Just to aggravate you?”

  “Then the motion would fail,” he said, “and we’d forget about it.”

  “Aye,” she said.

  “Aye,” he said, raising his hand to emphasize the vote. “I’ll have Betty type the minutes.”

  “You do that, Warren Buffett.”

  “Another piece of new business,” Joe added. “I think we need outside counsel. Our own lawyers. You and I might have to testify. In fact, if this thing goes the distance, we absolutely will have to testify.”

  “Technically, Joe, only you’ll need a lawyer. I don’t have any claim to Lettie’s estate. At best—or maybe I should say at worst—I’m only a witness. But yeah, I agree. If this escalates, we’ll probably need a battalion of lawyers. Who’d you have in mind?”

  “First, I say we see if Robert Williams will help us,” Joe suggested.

  “Huh. I love Robert and he’s a great lawyer, but it’s only him. His brother’s not there any longer. He’s solo. Don’t we need lots of associates and clerks and warm bodies in the trenches?”

  “I said first. Nobody can look around corners better than Robert. I’ve never seen him ambushed or surprised or blindsided. He’s a swami like that. Savvy and smart. It’d be like having Nostradamus on our side.”

  “Fair enough. Good choice. Robert’s a class act too. He’ll be easy to work with. Even better, he’s about the only man I know who can wear a double-breasted suit and not come off as Sky Masterson.” She grinned at Joe.

  “Next, what if we retain your party buddy Brett Brooks? I’m not a fan, personally, but he’s got a powerhouse firm behind him and every judge in Virginia takes him seriously.”

  “No,” Lisa blurted, the grin instantly gone. “Uh, no.”

  “Why?” Joe asked. “That was pretty knee-jerk.”

  “Because…well, Phil Anderson’s a better lawyer and has a larger group of associates. Former state bar president, smooth operator in court, carries a big stick, never flinches.” Lisa raked her hair forward, covered more of her neck. She shifted in the chair and pulled her skirt’s hem closer to her knees.

  “I thought about Phil,” Joe said. “He’s top-notch and fearless.”

  “And you won’t make pissy cracks about him or demand to be present at every meeting or refer to him as my ‘party buddy.’ ” She took another pass at her hair.

  Joe laughed. “Me? Make ‘pissy cracks’? You must be thinking of a different Joe Stone, the guy with the goatee, my evil, parallel-universe twin.”

  “Nope.”

  He tapped his foot, diddled with a thick brown rubber band, stared out the window. The phone rang and he ignored it. “Phil Anderson, huh?” he said when the phone finished and went to voice mail.

  “It doesn’t have to be Phil. But seriously, we don’t need any degree of complication, no matter how great a lawyer Brett Brooks is.”

  “Okay. I’m sold. Robert and Phil Anderson it is.” Joe stood up, leaned against his credenza and put his hands in his pockets. “Here’s another idea. Tell me what you think. We’ve basically gone as far as we can in terms of an investigation. How about we bring the cops into the loop? Specifically, Toliver Jackson. I think it’s time.”

  “Did he ever track down the e-mail from the library? To make certain it’s legit and not Dr. Downs’s vindictive handiwork?”

  “He said he would. He also said it’d be a pain in the ass, so I haven’t badgered him. But I’ll follow up. I mean, given what’s happened so far, I don’t have much doubt Lettie sent it.”

  “If he could find just one tiny dirty link to Benecorp. Maybe he could run down the origin of the Jane Rousch money order, where it was bought. Or interview the dog guy, Don Beverly—somehow that’s bound to be a part of this. Or, I don’t know, think of something we haven’t.”

  “I’m still a big fan of checking the hospital records,” Joe said. “It can’t be coincidence the rental car was so close by. But like you said, that won’t be simple, either.”

  “Yeah, I’d definitely keep the records idea on the back burner for now. But we have a solid start for Toliver, enough that it should raise a red flag and get him interested.”

  “Do we tell him we think Lettie might be alive?” Joe asked. “About your leprechaun visitor?”

  “Why not? I think we need to tell him everything. By all means, let’s get her on the cops’ radar so they’ll be looking for her. Hell, as volatile as she is, maybe she’ll get arrested somewhere. We’ll see if he can locate any prints on her cardboard too. It’s still in your desk in the Ziploc bag, right?”

  “Yes. I’ll give it to him.” Joe smiled. “The absolute best would be Toliver interviewing Seth Garrison. I’d pay money to see that extravaganza.”

  “I’d bet on Toliver,” Lisa said. “He’d take out his little notebook and drop a few Toliverisms on the king of Benecorp. ‘Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit’ is still my favorite.”

  “I’d vote for ‘the dingleberry vortex.’ As in ‘you keep lyin’ to me, you gonna find yourself deep in the dingleberry vortex.’ ” Joe mimicked the officer’s speech. “It’s simultaneously kind of childish and Fahrenheit 451.”

  “I’m guessing none of the criminals have any idea what he means. I’m not even sure I do. But it’s been a signature line for years.”

  “So we’re agreed on everything?” Joe asked. “We have a plan?”

  “We do. Yes.”

  They voted again, two ayes.

  “And if there is no further business, then I move we stand adjourned,” Joe said, not a jot of fun or irony in the statement.

  On the way back to her office, Lisa stopped in the hallway, stalled underneath the high ceiling and four-piece crown molding, and a banished recollection slipped loose, the memory of the warm Bahamian ocean, how she’d flitted to the beach and kicked off her shoes and started wading until the waves bobbed against her legs, her slacks soaked. She recalled the sand eroding with each pull of the tide, wallowing out holes around her feet and ankles, sinking her deeper and deeper into the bottom. Her mind allowed the image to mutate, and she imagined the ocean changing from blue to pale gray, and as far as she could see, the surface turned level and placid and the water transformed into hard concrete, and she was captured there, unable to move, locked in place from the thighs down, encased. She shook her head, cleared her thoughts and started walking again, and she muttered Brett’s name and made a finger pistol, pointed an index finger at her temple, fired with her thumb. “Pow,” she said.

  The Saturday following the Stone and Stone stockholders’ meeting, Lisa was at the kitchen counter working on a favorite strawberry cake. Earlier, Joe had fixed them breakfast. He’d fried ham in the black skillet and cut the first honeydew melon of the summer—mushmelons, he called them—scraped away the center seeds and pared the rind from the fruit and then sliced the wet, green strips into fat chunks. She’d saved a bite of the salty ham and a piece of the honeydew and nibbled on them between cracking eggs and measuring flour and reading the recipe off a stained index card, written in her great-aunt’s cursive, ruler-trained hand. She could see her lilies and snapdragons at the
corner of the patio, giddy spreads of pink, orange, yellow and white atop yeomen green stems. Even though they’d agreed the Primland trip would be their anniversary present to each other, Joe had mail-ordered a Tiffany necklace and given it to her last night, a sterling silver key on a delicate chain—the key to his heart, he’d said, kind of silly and kind of sincere—and when she leaned over the recipe card, the key would swing forward and hang in the air. She’d surprised him with a custom-stitched saddle blanket, a bold “S” embroidered on each side, and she could tell he was happy to have it.

  Almost every Saturday, Joe loaded Brownie into the farm truck and hauled trash and recyclables to the dump, the dog ecstatic in the truck bed, riding with stuffed garbage bags and large tubs of magazines and empty plastic containers. Joe carried the last bag to the truck and filled his travel mug with coffee and kissed her cheek. She was looking forward to some time alone in the house, baking and piddling, a foot-loose morning, but a few minutes later he returned to the kitchen and told her he couldn’t find Brownie. The dog had been there for breakfast. He’d eaten, ambled outside and climbed into the sturdy house—shingled, insulated, and now with an orthopedic pad—Joe had built for him when he was a pup.

  “He’s not in his box, and I’ve looked all over the yard and the barn.”

  “Huh,” she said. She was dressed in shorts and flip-flops, her hair gathered away from her face. She’d started beating batter for the cake, and she tipped the KitchenAid mixer back from its silver metal bowl. “Did you check the basement?” Pink batter coated the blades, and dollops dripped into the bowl. “Maybe he used the pet door.”

  “Yeah, the basement, the barn, under the vehicles. Everywhere. He’s gone. Pancho and Lefty are in the hayloft. I even cranked the engine so he could hear me. Blew the horn. Yelled.”

  “Yeah, I heard the horn. Was he okay at breakfast?”

  “He was stiff and slow, but no more than usual. I gave him his pills in a ball of cheese. He wanted to go out, and he went straight to his box. I saw him while I was cutting the mushmelon, right before you came down. He was just lying there in his house.”