Book of Nathan
Page 8
“Damnit, Maurice!” I swore.
“The fun’s just starting,” Doc predicted. “Know anything about the brain’s vomit center?”
“This isn’t the time, Doc,” I growled.
“Once the center clicks into gear, it’s stays on. At least for a while. You might want to pull over.”
I navigated my Buick on to the shoulder of the tree-lined road. Maurice scrambled out of the car just as my cell phone went off.
“Yigal?” I asked, trying to decipher the voice coming through the static.
“Just calling about last night. Wanted to make sure Twyla is all right. And the rest of you too.”
“We’re fine. What about the blood test? Did you hear from your cousin?”
“Binyamin just called me.”
“And?”
“He knows whose blood is on the medallion.”
“Whose blood is it? Zeusenoerdorf’s?”
“No. Not my client.”
I wasn’t in the mood to play twenty questions—not with Maurice continuing to heave into a neatly trimmed hedge and Doc deciding to play mechanic with the engine of my already-distressed Buick. “Then whose, Yigal!”
“Juan Perez. That’s whose blood it is.”
“Who’s Juan Perez?”
“The dead man the police found in Kissimmee.”
I drew a long breath. “Yigal, help me out here.”
“My cousin Binyamin was working on the medallion. That’s when another blood sample showed up at the lab.”
“And the second sample belonged to Juan Perez?” I interjected just to be sure I was traveling in the same direction as Yigal.
“Yes. An accident victim. Real bad accident. Needed a DNA test to prove it was Perez, and the lab asked Binyamin to do the analysis.”
“So Benny Yomin happened to be working on the Quia Vita medallion and noticed that the blood sample matched the one taken from Perez?” I wanted absolute confirmation.
“Yes. That’s what Binyamin said.”
I tried to understand what Yigal was telling me. I was close to certain the medallion was the same silver disk Zeus had seen the night Kurios died. But what was the connection to a dead man named Perez? “Yigal, where did they find Perez’s body?”
“Near Lake Tohopekaliga in Kissimmee. The car he was driving caught fire. He was inside.”
I took a wild stab. “A blue car?”
“Yes. That’s what my connections said.”
“Paint!” I said, my excitement mounting. By sheer luck, we might have just discovered who was behind the wheel of the sedan that had forced the white van off the road. “Is there any paint left on the outside of the car?”
“Yes there is,” replied Yigal. “Not all of it burned off. Saw pictures. One door still had paint. Blue paint.”
“Listen to me.” I wanted the lawyer’s full attention if that were possible. “Is there a way you could get one of your connections to scrape some that paint off the door?”
“I can try. I know a few people in Kissimmee.”
“A few chips of paint,” I cut in. “See if you can make that happen.”
“I can do that,” Yigal said, then picked up an old refrain. “But we owe Binyamin his money. Thirteen hundred dollars.”
“Yeah, I remember,” I said. “I’m good for it.” At least I thought I was, thanks to my questionable decision to give insider information to Arthur Silverstein. “Let’s get back to Juan Perez. If you can deliver paint samples from Perez’s car, I’ll try to find somebody who can tell us if the paint matches the chips we scraped off the underpass piling where Kurios was killed.”
“Morty Margolis can do that.”
“What?”
“He’s my partner’s brother-in-law. Does that kind of lab work for the FBI.”
Astounding, I thought. For all his weirdness, Yigal Rosenblatt did have important connections. “Let me get this straight. This guy, Margolis—he could tell us if the two paint samples came from the same van?”
Yigal paused. I could feel him about to lay an egg that could mean nothing but trouble. “Yes, he could. But I would have to talk to him. Face-to-face would probably work.”
“Face-to-face,” I mumbled and then gritted my teeth. “And where does Morty do business?”
“Weehawken.”
“Weehawken? Like Weehawken, New Jersey?”
“That’s where he works.”
“So. You want to come all the way from Florida to New Jersey just to talk to Margolis?”
Pause. “That would be good. I don’t mind driving. Cheaper than flying. At Gafstein and Rosenblatt, we keep expenses down.”
I knew Yigal had a two-word ulterior motive for making the trip: Twyla Tharp. Even so, I decided not to bury the suggestion. “If you get paint off Juan Perez’s car, then we’ll talk.”
I ended the phone call about the same time Doc closed the hood of my Century. “Besides a filthy air filter, looks like a tip-in problem,” he said. I was only half paying attention, partly because I have little interest in cars, but mostly because I was still sorting through what I had just heard from Yigal. The possibility that Juan Perez could be connected to the Benjamin Kurios murder, not to mention the two Hispanics who bombed the Continental terminal, made my Buick’s engine malfunction seem insignificant.
“You got a 3.1 liter engine in this thing,” Doc went on. “Time for a new vacuum hose elbow for your PCV system. I gave it a temporary fix, but you’re going to be bucking and stalling again in no time, unless you get this thing to a mechanic.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Want to know how I figured out what was wrong?”
It was pointless to say “not really” because nothing was going to stop Doc. He held up a rag. “You use this to wipe your windshield?”
“Yeah.”
“From the looks of it, it gets a workout.”
“When the temperature hits forty degrees or so, fog builds up inside the windshield. The damn defroster doesn’t do what it’s supposed to.”
“There you go,” said Doc with a smile. “It’s all about knowing what clues to look for and figuring out what they mean. A Buick Century with a defroster problem and an engine that idles rough or stalls usually add up to a faulty vacuum hose.”
Doc didn’t explain how a history professor knew more about cars than General Motors. He was an enigma and it was best to leave it at that. My malfunctioning defroster did remind me, though, that Doc had an incredible ability to problem solve—except when it came to extricating himself from his own self-made troubles. While I had long admired Doc’s logic, I had no idea I’d be using it as a life preserver in the days ahead.
A few minutes later, we were on the road again. My Buick purred its way to the front of an iron gate that blocked the main drive leading to the interior of the investment banker’s spread. I pressed a red button on a squawk box attached to one of the two impressive stone columns that loomed like sentinels on either side of the drive. A raspy voice leaked through the speaker, and after I delivered the right answers, the gate swung open and I navigated my Buick into a mini-Versailles. The Silverstein grounds were enclosed by a perfectly trimmed six-foot hedge and a lethal-looking electric fence. Doug Kool would tell me later that Silverstein had purchased enough electronic surveillance devices to monitor nearly every inch of the sprawling estate. For added protection, he employed a squad of security personnel to patrol the place.
En route to the main house, there was nothing but spectacular scenery. Every tree, shrub, and blade of grass appeared to be in top-notch shape. If the flora scored high, Silverstein’s home was off the charts. We circled around a colossal fountain and parked in front of a tier of steps that could have been the walk-up to the Lincoln Memorial. The four-story mansion was by far the most imposing private residence I had ever seen. Doc pulled himself from the Buick, took a long look at the building, and blew out a whistle. My sentiments exactly. Even the bedraggled Maurice Tyson was obviously impressed.
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We were greeted at the door by Arthur Silverstein’s aide-de-camp who introduced himself as Abraham Arcontius. Thanks to an earlier phone conversation with Doug, I recognized the man the second he came into view. He had a long, narrow nose and his ears were so freakishly big they resembled feelers. According to Doug, Arcontius’s physical appearance was as strange as his personality.
“You’re Bullock?” Arcontius asked.
“I am.”
Arcontius leered at Doc and Maurice. “We weren’t told you’d be bringing company.”
“Mr. Silverstein wants information about the Benjamin Kurios murder investigation,” I explained. “I brought along my—associates to help spell out some of the details.” The exaggeration seemed to suit Maurice just fine, a dose of importance making him beam.
“Come this way.” Arcontius didn’t walk, he slithered.
Doug called Arcontius “a composite guy—part chief of staff, part appointment secretary, and part butler.” There were, he told me, those who claimed Arcontius pulled Arthur Silverstein’s strings while others said he was an indentured servant who had given many years of his life trying to please his master without ever succeeding. My own take was that he was just plain nasty all the way from the tip of his balding head to his polished oxfords.
“Mr. Bullock is here to see you,” Arcontius announced as we entered a two-story chamber with as much warmth as the New York Public Library reading room. The walls were all dark wood but barely visible behind shelves and shelves of books. A monstrously large desk in one corner of the room ruled over the other lesser pieces of furniture. Behind the desk hung a larger-than-life oil painting of a young blonde woman wearing a red dress and a smile more forced than genuine. The lady in the portrait was not as well endowed as Twyla and was perfectly groomed and dressed. But there were startling similarities—high cheekbones, the shape of the mouth and, particularly, the eyes.
A short man wearing a dark suit and striped bow tie stood as we walked into the room.
“Ah, yes.” Arthur Silverstein held a cigar in one stubby hand and greeted me with the other. “Welcome, Mr. Bullock.”
I shook hands with a five-foot-five-inch man who resembled a shrunken Winston Churchill.
Arcontius jerked his head toward Maurice and Doc. “These two accompanied Mr. Bullock—unexpectedly.”
I introduced the two men by name.
“I see. Abraham, would you show Mr. Bullock’s companions to the sitting room?” It was clearly an order couched as a question. The banker turned to me. “Would you be interested in a short tour of my home, Mr. Bullock?”
Without waiting for a response, Silverstein led me to the grand foyer. We began ambling through corridors that would have made a Ritz-Carlton proud.
“I understand you had a narrow escape yesterday.” Silverstein said as we walked.
“Very narrow.”
Silverstein had a low, strong voice that didn’t match his diminutive size. He sounded more like a billionaire than he looked. “I’ve often thought about how vulnerable we are to chance—to circumstances and events that we don’t control. When fate treats us badly, it’s sad indeed. But of course, there are times when our own reckless behavior puts us at risk. When that happens and the consequences are unpleasant, well, we have no one or nothing to blame other than ourselves.”
I was trying to sort out whether Silverstein was being philosophical or sending me a warning, when the billionaire motioned to an array of paintings displayed on the corridor wall.
“Do you enjoy art?” he asked.
“National Geographic covers. French postcards. That sort of thing.”
Silverstein found no humor in the comment. He stopped in front of a picture that gave star billing to two men—one lying naked on a pile of logs and a second standing over him holding a knife.
“Are you familiar with this work?” Arthur asked. “It’s quite well known.”
“Afraid not.”
“It’s a Marc Chagall. Called The Sacrifice of Isaac. Do you know the story?”
I pleaded ignorance.
“It’s from the Bible—Book of Genesis. God decides to test Abraham’s allegiance by telling him to sacrifice his son, Isaac. This is the scene on Mount Moriah where Abraham agreed to go along with God’s wishes.”
“Why?” I asked and silently answered my own question. Because the father was a religious fanatic.
“Abraham was committed to carrying out God’s will without question—in other words, he proved himself worthy of God’s trust. Consequently, he became the father of all of us. Jew. Christian. Muslim. We’re all Abraham’s children.”
Abraham wasn’t the kind of man I wanted anywhere near my family tree. “Asking someone to sacrifice his child seems a little extreme, doesn’t it?”
“There are times when a personal sacrifice must be made for the greater good. No matter how difficult that sacrifice might be.”
While I tried to fathom what he had just said, Silverstein resumed the tour. “The white-haired gentleman you brought with you,” Silverstein asked. “Is he the same Professor Waters who once taught at Rutgers?”
I nodded. Silverstein pulled the cigar from his mouth and grimaced. Doc’s testicle-squashing misfortune had a predictable cause-and-effect impact on all men regardless of their income.
“As I recall, he’s as brilliant as he is misguided,” Silverstein noted. “No matter what shape or form it comes in, I respect intelligence. Always have.”
“When it comes to figuring things out, there’s no one smarter than the professor.”
“Good. That’s a quality that should prove quite helpful, shouldn’t it?”
We continued our stroll past more art and artifacts. There was no further mention of what was hanging on the walls or perched on pedestals. Instead, Silverstein shifted his attention to the business of the moment.
“So, tell me about Miklos Zeusenoerdorf.”
I cannot recall one other occasion where someone other than me pronounced Zeus’s name correctly.
“He says he’s innocent—claims he didn’t kill Benjamin Kurios.”
“I see.” Silverstein thought a few seconds before continuing. “And what’s your opinion? Is he innocent?”
“Could be that he’s just a poor slob with a low IQ who stumbled into something that wasn’t his doing.”
Silverstein shook his head. “Public opinion doesn’t seem to line up with that possibility. Quite the contrary. Most seem to think Mr. Zeusenoerdorf is, indeed, a cold-blooded killer.”
I glanced at the short man. “And what about you?”
Silverstein smiled. “I never accept probability as certainty. That’s why I’m interested in assisting you, Mr. Bullock.”
“Assisting me?”
“You and your—team—have a connection to Mr. Zeusenoerdorf that no one else seems to have. I’m anxious to learn what you already know and what else you’re able to find out about Kurios’s death.”
Silverstein stopped, put his cigar-free hand into his suit jacket pocket, and pulled out a letter-sized envelope.
“This is to retain your services as a—let’s call you a private investigator. I have two ten thousand dollar checks in here that I want you to have. The first is made payable to your men’s shelter, which I understand can accept tax-deductible donations. The second is made out to you—consider it an advance.”
“But—”
“For other reasonable expenses, just let Mr. Arcontius know and we’ll reimburse you over and above your retainer.”
This didn’t smell right. It was the kind of thing that ended up as a page-one story in the New Brunswick News Tribune laced with words like “under-the-table payoffs” and “indictment.”
Silverstein read my anxiety. “Don’t worry, Mr. Bullock. I’ve gone through all the necessary channels to make sure this is legitimate. One of my legal staff contacted your board chairman and verified that your employment contract doesn’t exclude you from working on the side.”
“What did you find out when you visited Mr. Zeusenoerdorf in Orlando?”
I fed Silverstein just some of what happened in Florida, including news about the Quia Vita medallion discovery. But I didn’t mention what Zeus claimed were Kurios’s last words—Father Nathan. And I left out cousin Binyamin’s report that the blood on the silver medallion belonged to a dead man named Juan Perez. Time and trust—not a few thousand dollars—was what it would take to buy full disclosure.
“How much do you know about my involvement with Benjamin Kurios?” asked Silverstein.
Why did I think this was more of a bear trap than a simple question? I picked my words carefully. “From what I’ve read and what a few people have told me, you were a major donor to his religious movement.”
“More of an investor in Benjamin than his movement,” Silverstein amended. “And I am sure you know my reputation when it comes to making prudent investments.”
Next to Warren Buffett, there was no one who could throw the Wall Street dice better than Arthur Silverstein. The tycoon was best known for being a hedge fund genius, but in recent years he’d become what Fortune called a “natural resource speculator.” He had untold landholdings around the world—especially in Latin America, where he owned mineral and oil rights in Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela, and Brazil.
“Each time I spend money on an opportunity, I look for—make that expect—a return on that investment. My financial involvement with Benjamin was no different from other commitments I’ve made. His untimely death meant I ended up with less of a payoff than I anticipated. That displeases me.”