Leader of the Pack (Andy Carpenter)

by David Rosenfelt

  In a courtroom, even under tremendous pressure, I can think on my feet and verbally and strategically react to anything that might happen. But in this case, talking about taking a dog to visit an old fat man, I freeze up like a Fudgsicle.

  “Sure. Happy to do it,” I say. In terms of level of truthfulness, that statement would rank with something like, “Damn, I’m going to be traveling to Saturn that day to go giraffe hunting.”

  “Great. I’ll set it up.”

  “You’re going to meet with Nicky Fats? And you’re taking a dog?”

  The speaker is Eddie “Hike” Lynch, the lawyer who works with me when we have a case to work on, which means we don’t work together very often. He comes into the office pretty much daily to use the computer. Hike is cheap; he wouldn’t buy his own computer if the store threw in the antidote to a deadly poison he had just taken.

  Hike also takes pessimism to a new level, so I’m not surprised that he sees my upcoming therapy session as a disaster about to happen.

  “It’ll be a half hour, and I’ll be out of there,” I say.

  “Really? What if you piss him off?”

  “I won’t piss him off.”

  “Come on,” he says. “You piss everybody off. You’re a really annoying person.”

  “Thanks, Hike.”

  “And speaking of pissing, what if your dog pisses on the floor?”

  “Don’t call her my dog, OK? Her name is Tara.”

  “What does that mean? She’s not your dog?’

  “She’s my partner, and she’s a trained therapist.”

  “Sorry. What if your trained therapist pisses on the floor?”

  “There is no chance of that,” I say.

  “Oh yeah? If I was alone in a room with Nicky Fats, I’d piss on the floor.”

  My assistant, Edna, is not in because it is Tuesday. When we are not working on a case, Edna takes seven-day weekends. Tuesdays consistently fall within that window.

  Her absence has left me with only Hike to talk to, which clearly is unacceptable, so I head for home. Laurie is not there; she’s teaching her criminology class at William Paterson College. But Tara is, and she and I need to talk.

  I grab the leash, which sends her barreling toward the door. We take the same walk through Eastside Park that we take every day, but as always she treats it like it’s the first time she’s been in this wonderful aromatic world.

  “Tara, we’re going to see this guy named Nicky; he’s pretty old and probably still pretty fat. He’s got a bit of a temper, so we want to be careful how we treat him.”

  She’s not really paying attention, looking off toward a nearby tree. “You want to look for squirrels, or listen to me? Anyway, just be yourself, but follow my lead. Just do what I do, OK? For instance, don’t lick him unless I do, and I definitely won’t. Wagging your tail is fine.”

  Tara doesn’t intimidate easily. I know that for a fact; we’ve argued over biscuit issues a number of times over the years, and the next time I win will be the first. She’s either not worried about meeting Nicky Fats, or she’s putting up a front. I suspect it’s the former.

  I may be worrying too much, and at the same time underestimating Tara’s therapeutic powers. By the time she’s done with this fearsome Mafia figure, he’ll probably be a sensitive, poetry-reading, yoga-loving, introspective, mushy guy.

  From pictures I’ve seen, he’s got the mushy part down already.

  Somehow, Nicky Fats manages to be simultaneously fat and frail. He doesn’t seem quite as obese as the older pictures had made him appear, but I would still put him in the two-eighty-to-three-hundred-pound range.

  But he’s also gotten very old, which I suppose is an accomplishment for someone in his profession. He seems weak, and his face is drawn and almost thin, a weird contrast to the rest of his body.

  So far the visit has been not as awful as I expected. Nicky lives in Carmine’s house, which is on a nice piece of property just outside of Elizabeth, New Jersey. Two men greeted Tara and me at the door, but as security guards go, they were pretty lax.

  I’ve been frisked by mob guys in the past in such a way that my private parts were made to feel open to the public. With these guys, I could have been carrying a bazooka, and I doubt they would have noticed.

  They motioned me into a room at the rear of the house, which turned out to be a den. There was a large-screen TV, and Nicky was sitting in an armchair watching ESPN. Watching might be the wrong word; Nicky appeared to be paying no attention to it at all.

  Nicky seemed to be expecting our visit, or at least he didn’t show any surprise. All he said was, “The dog is here. What time is it?”

  I introduced myself as Andy Carpenter, though I was tempted to say I was Hike Lynch, in case anything happened that would cause Nicky to order some kind of retribution. He didn’t respond to that, or to my mentioning that Joey suggested I stop by, or to anything else I said.

  But he sure as hell liked Tara. She went right up to him and he started petting her, occasionally laughing a weird laugh as he did so. This has now gone on for almost forty-five minutes, though it feels like next week will be two years since we got here. When one is with Nicky Fats, time goes in slow motion.

  Nicky seems intermittently lucid, snapping back and forth from clear statements to borderline gibberish. But one constant is his petting and focus on Tara; she has got this therapy thing down really well.

  Suddenly, Nicky looks up at me and says, “Who are you?”

  I’ve mentioned my name a couple of times already, but decide that I don’t need to point that out. “I’m Andy Carpenter. Joey suggested I come visit.”

  “Good boy, that Joey.”

  I nod vigorously. Nicky Fats is the kind of guy that makes you want to nod vigorously. I’ll keep doing it until he says something like, “Stop nodding vigorously, asshole.”

  “Yes, definitely a good boy, that Joey,” I say, since it seemed to fit in with the nodding vigorously approach.

  “He coming here today?” Nicky asks.

  Now, I know that Nicky has been in contact with Joey in prison, so it’s not like it’s been kept a secret from him the last six years. But if he’s forgotten about it, I’m not going to be the one to rebreak the news to him. “No, he’s not coming today,” I say.

  I swear, I can see his eyes, and behind that his mind, start to clear. “He’s locked up,” Nicky says.

  I nod, less vigorously this time. “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

  “Who are you? How do you know Joey?”

  “My name is Andy Carpenter. I am Joey’s lawyer.”

  “You lost the case?”

  This time a slight nod and an involuntary cringe. “I lost the case.”

  “My fault,” he says. “My fault.”

  I assume he’s using the wrong pronoun, and instead of “your” fault, is saying “my” fault. I decide to be gracious and defensive at the same time. “It’s nobody’s fault.”

  “We shoulda hit the bastard ourselves, as soon as it happened,” Nicky says. “I shoulda told Carmine. We should have been the ones to do it. My fault.”

  On second thought, maybe he’s got the pronoun right. But whatever he’s saying, it’s so strange that I can’t let it go. “What are you talking about? As soon as what happened?”

  “The prick couldn’t be trusted, you know? He was dirty; he had no honor. We shoulda hit him months before.”

  “Are you talking about Solarno? Richard Solarno? The guy they said Joey murdered?”

  Nicky nods and seems to be getting agitated. “I knew the prick couldn’t be trusted. I shoulda told Carmine.”

  “Solarno? Is that what you’re saying? Why would you have to trust him? How did you even know him?”

  Then something else seems to click in the relic that is his mind, and he stares straight at me with very cold eyes. “Get out of here. Take the dog.”

  One more vigorous nod and Tara and I are out the door. I’m not sure, but I think she is nodding as well.
Vigorously.

  No one will ever have to put out an “All Points Bulletin” for Pete Stanton. The Paterson police lieutenant is always in one of two places; either he is on the job, or he is at Charlie’s, the greatest sports bar in America.

  Part of what I am saying is hearsay. Except for when his path crosses with mine on a case or at trial, I don’t actually see him on the job. But he is a star in the department, and seems to be involved in a large number of investigations and arrests. He also knows virtually everything about any case the department is dealing with, whether he is assigned to it or not. So I’m assuming he works long hours.

  But when it comes to Charlie’s, I am an eyewitness. Pete, Vince Sanders, and I have a regular table at Charlie’s. I’m not there every night, nor is Vince, but Pete’s presence is a rock-solid guarantee. I think he handcuffs himself to the table.

  Laurie is the only other person allowed at the table, but for some reason she doesn’t come by more than a couple of times a month. I’m not sure why; it’s possible she doesn’t care for the belching.

  Pete’s probably the only true sports fan among the three of us. Vince and I bet on the games, and therefore have a manufactured interest. Pete doesn’t gamble, which in my view makes him a communist, but he will eagerly watch any sport on television.

  Tonight is a perfect example. Because the four or five hundred ESPN channels each have to devour twenty-four hours of sports, they show games like Troy at Middle Tennessee State, which is on tonight.

  I’m taking Middle Tennessee plus five points, while Vince has Troy. If I wasn’t betting the game, I wouldn’t watch it if you strapped me to the chair. But not only is Pete interested in it, he’s spouting facts about the key players on each team.

  At the half, Troy is ahead by two touchdowns. I don’t mind that I’m losing; what bothers me is that Vince is winning. Vince is a terrible loser; he complains, makes excuses, and can’t let it go. He’s also a terrible winner; he brags, gloats, and is generally obnoxious. And tie games bring out the worst in him.

  “How could you possibly bet Middle Tennessee?” he asks. “Northern Tennessee I could understand. Southern Tennessee I get. But Middle Tennessee? They play chess and jacks in the middle of Tennessee, not football.”

  “You’re an idiot,” I point out.

  “So you’re down two touchdowns to an idiot?” he asks, a question for which there is no good retort, because it contains the truth.

  “Currently I am, yes.”

  Satisfied with his rhetorical victory, Vince looks around the room, his customary frown on his face. “This place is turning into foo-foo land.”

  There was a time, early in our relationship, when I would have said, “What do you mean, Vince?” That time has now passed; he’s going to tell me anyway, no doubt in a negative rant, so there’s no reason to pretend I’m interested.

  “Just sitting here, I can see eleven beer bottles on tables.”

  “So?”

  “Of those, nine are light beers, and of those, eight are foreign.”

  “I repeat … so?”

  “So if they don’t like this country, and they don’t want to be fat, why don’t they go to some health spa in Paris, sip wheat germ, and let me drink real American beer and watch football?”

  There’s no answer to that, and no reason at all to continue to talk to Vince, so I turn my attention to Pete. He hasn’t said much during the first half, which is typical for him. For one thing, he’s intent on watching the game. For another, it’s hard to chitchat when one has a beer bottle in one’s mouth.

  For Pete, a beer bottle is like a pacifier. When he’s complaining, or talking too much, you just stick one in his mouth and he starts happily sucking on it.

  “What’s new in the world of crime?” I ask.

  “Why, you looking for some scumbags to represent?”

  They’ve been verbally mistreating me like this for a long time, and I’ve suddenly had enough. “OK, listen, both of you. You are either going to talk to me in a civil, friendly, respectful manner, or you are going to buy your own beer and burgers.” Since I am wealthy, and they’re not, I am always getting stuck with the check.

  “How’s it going, my man?” Vince says to me, not missing a beat. “You’re looking good today. You lose some weight?”

  “Why would he need to lose weight?” Pete says. “The man is ripped. It’s no wonder Laurie is nuts about him.”

  This is even worse than the abuse. “That’s enough,” I say. “Now you’re making me nauseous.”

  “Whatever you say, asshole,” Vince says.

  “I’ve fished bodies better than yours out of the river,” Pete chimes in.

  Back to normal.

  “So I heard you were making the prison rounds yesterday,” Pete says. “How’s killer Joey doing?”

  Pete was the arresting officer in the Desimone case, and his testimony at trial was credible and convincing. He never had any doubt about Joey’s guilt, as he has told me on numerous occasions.

  “How much do you know about Richard Solarno?” I ask.

  “He’s dead.”

  “Besides that.”

  “Read the trial transcript.”

  “I have, many times. I’m talking about beyond what came out at trial. How carefully did you check into him?”

  He’s quickly suspicious. “Why?”

  “Because I’m buying the beer.”

  He shrugs his defeat. “Not that much. There wasn’t much point; he wasn’t the target. His wife was.”

  “According to your theory.”

  “Right. I’ve got to stop basing my theories on the facts and the evidence. I should use your approach and have my theories delivered to me from fantasyland.”

  “Any chance Solarno was involved in something illegal?”

  “Like what?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Sounds like you’re really getting somewhere.”

  “Just answer my question,” I say.

  “Yeah; he was into something illegal. He was a Russian spy. He also killed Kennedy and kidnapped Lindbergh’s kid. Who’s putting this bullshit into your head?”

  “Nicky Fats.”

  Vince considers it time to jump in. “You talked to Nicky Fats? I hear he sits in a room all day planning to assassinate President Eisenhower.”

  “What the hell were you doing talking to Nicky Fats?” Pete asks. “Is he your next innocent client?”

  “He’s a misunderstood soul,” I say. “But he had some interesting things to say about Richard Solarno.”

  Now Pete sneers openly. “Yeah? Why didn’t he say them when Joey was going down?”

  “Now that is a damn good question.”

  Nicky Fats forgot Carpenter’s visit within ten minutes after he left. His short-term memory was unpredictable. Some things stuck with him for days, or even months, while others were wiped clean almost instantly. Were Carpenter and his dog to come back, Nicky would think they were visiting for the first time.

  The deterioration of his mind had taken place slowly, and his family and friends had been just as slow to notice it. Of course, Nicky had never been surrounded by the most sensitive of people, nor those who were the most tolerant of weakness.

  It was up to Nicky’s brother, Carmine, to provide for his care. Carmine was the youngest of three brothers, seven years younger than Nicky, who in turn was born three years after Vincent Desimone. Vincent seemed destined to lead the family, but his ascent was thwarted by a bullet that spread his brain matter over much of downtown Bayonne, New Jersey.

  Of the remaining, unsplattered brains among the siblings, Carmine’s was significantly superior to Nicky’s. Since Nicky was far more prone to, and adept at, violence, the roles they adopted were the obvious ones. Carmine would be in charge, and Nicky would be his trusted enforcer.

  Nothing much changed for many years, and the family ruled with only occasional challenges that they thwarted easily and ruthlessly. They’ve also been comparatively su
ccessful in fending off law enforcement. While other “families” have been infiltrated and had their top people taken down by the feds, the Desimone family has survived relatively intact.

  To this day Carmine is said to be on top of his game, but instead of having Nicky as his enforcer, he has taken on the role of Nicky’s caretaker.

  Not that it’s taken a lot of work. Nicky has been mostly content to sit in his room, watching television and movies on DVDs. He’s not adept at working the remote control, but that hasn’t been a big problem, because he doesn’t really seem to care what he’s watching.

  Lately Nicky has asked to go out more, even mentioning old friends that he wants to see. The fact that some of them have been dead for twenty years either is lost to his failed memory, or not enough to deter him from wanting to reconnect and hash over old times.

  Carmine’s primary custodian for Nicky is Tommy Iurato. Iurato is somewhat overqualified for the assignment; he’s been a top-level soldier in the family for years.

  Iurato had given the OK to allow Carpenter and the dog to visit with Nicky. He figured that it would be uneventful, and might shut the complaining Nicky up for a while.

  The other, more important reason was that it would serve as a test, to see how Nicky would handle himself when in contact with the outside world.

  “Did you enjoy the visit?” Iurato asked when he brought in Nicky’s dinner. It was the same dinner every night, spaghetti and meatballs, chocolate pudding, and a carafe of red wine.

  “What?”

  “When you saw the lawyer and the dog. How was that?”

  “What the hell you talking about?” Nicky asked. He absolutely had no clue about having had a visit of any kind.

  “Never mind. I thought someone was here today. Maybe I was wrong.”

  “Not only are you wrong, but you’re stupid,” Nicky said.

  Iurato not only knew that Carpenter and the dog had been there, he knew every word that was said. He had seen it through the hidden cameras in the room, and heard it through the hidden microphones. Nicky was under constant surveillance.