VC01 - Privileged Lives

by Edward Stewart

  “Have you filled any other prescriptions for this woman?” Cardozo asked.

  “We’ve been selling her insulin for twelve years,” the druggist said. “She’s a diabetic.”

  Back at the precinct, Cardozo pulled the records on the Devens case.

  The bottles of insulin found in the brown bag had had their labels, including the lot numbers, removed. The contents had had to be analyzed before they could be positively identified as insulin. There had been no fingerprints on the bottles.

  There was no mention in any of the fives of Faith Banks’s being diabetic.

  Because nobody asked, Cardozo thought. Nobody thought of asking if anyone in the house had a legitimate supply of insulin.

  But we must have asked, he thought. You don’t not ask a thing like that.

  Cardozo puzzled, drinking coffee after coffee, till he was getting a high-pitched note inside his ears like a cricket playing a violin.

  We must have asked and Banks must have lied.

  He felt his way further.

  The insulin bottles in the brown bag had been stripped of identifying marks. But the Alstetter bottle had been traceable straight to Banks. How come?

  What came to him was that the first bottles had been part of a careful frame aimed at convincing the police; the fourth insulin bottle had been a careless embellishment, executed long after the Vanderwalks’ professional investigator had gone home, aimed at convincing an amateur magazine sleuth named Dina Alstetter.

  Cardozo lifted the phone and dialed Judge Tom Levin’s number.

  Cardozo followed Judge Levin into the sitting room of his Brooklyn Heights town house. There was a fresh bottle of Johnnie Walker black label on the sideboard, glasses and ice waiting.

  The judge handed him a glass.

  The transcript was sitting on the table, a brown binder with the label already beginning to peel off. People of the State of New York v. William Scott Devens.

  Cardozo took a seat in the corduroy easy chair, his eyes bent to the transcript. He sipped Scotch and made notes on a small lined pad.

  After page 73, when the defense was moving to introduce a medical report into evidence, there was a blank page.

  Cardozo turned to the next page. It, too, was blank. He riffled quickly through the remainder of the transcript. All blank.

  “Tom,” he said, “would you take a look at this?”

  Tom Levin took the transcript and stood turning pages. “This is downright interesting,” he muttered.

  “Why would anyone steal pages from a sealed record?”

  “Because sealing a record is bullshit. Every day of the week people like me get into sealed records, and whoever wanted this record sealed was making sure people like you didn’t read it.”

  Cardozo read the newspaper articles on Babe Devens.

  According to the Post, she had returned to her life of luxury among the rich and famous of New York. The News said her five-bedroom town house on Sutton Place was assessed at 4.2 million dollars. Her neighbors included two U.N. ambassadors, the world’s leading operatic tenor, a movie star, and a cousin of the queen of England. People magazine said that before her coma she and her husband had thrown parties for some of the biggest names in society and show business. Any day now she would return to her rightful place as queen of the glitterati.

  The guests in the photographs of Scottie and Babe Devens’s last party looked to Cardozo like a bunch of rouged-up clowns, living in a world that rained diamonds and tinsel and cocaine.

  He couldn’t picture her in that society. Didn’t want to.

  He pushed the buzzer of number 18 Sutton Place, a gray slate town house with French château turrets. A stiff-necked butler let him in.

  “Would you care to wait in the sitting room, sir?”

  “That’s all right, Wheelock. Here I am.”

  Cardozo turned. Babe Devens was wheeling herself out of the elevator, hair honey blond and eyes sky blue, and his heart gave a little jump of pleasure. Her blue silk afternoon dress shimmered faintly. Smiling, she stretched out her hand. “You’re very kind to come.”

  He took the hand, held it, and said “Hello,” and when she looked at him strangely he realized he’d forgotten to let go.

  “Do you think it’s too warm for iced tea on the terrace?”

  “The terrace is fine by me,” he said.

  He followed her through a room that looked as though someone had robbed a museum to furnish it. The thought came to him that if he accidentally knocked an objet off a table he’d be busting two hundred thousand dollars. He felt clumsy and intimidated, and he made up for it by adopting a careful swagger.

  She used her chair smoothly, her movements strong and practiced and precise. He opened the terrace door for her, and she wheeled her chair to a little wicker patio table.

  A row of boxwood bushes and small dogwoods just beyond the flagstones afforded a token sort of privacy, marking the space off from the rest of the park. Beyond the hedge a tree-fringed lawn stretched almost to the river.

  Cardozo sat and Babe rang a small silver bell.

  He raised his eyes up to where lingering summer sunlight caught the roofs of the city. Wouldn’t this be the life, he thought.

  A uniformed maid appeared.

  “Mrs. Wheelock, we’ll have our iced tea here.”

  The maid returned, bringing a carved-glass pitcher beaded with condensation and two tall glasses packed with ice cubes and fresh mint sprigs.

  Babe poured, her arms braceleted and bare but in the sunlight downed with light blond hair.

  “Help yourself to sugar or NutraSweet.”

  The edge of Cardozo’s sleeve brushed her hand and her hand stayed there on the table as though nothing at all had happened.

  “You don’t have to keep your jacket on,” she said.

  He hesitated. “I’m wearing a gun. Your neighbors might think it was funny, you sitting here with a man with a gun.”

  “They think it’s pretty funny my sitting here at all. If they don’t like your gun they can call the cops.”

  He laughed and felt warm and happy inside. He took his jacket off, put it over the back of his chair, and hoped to hell there was no ring around his collar.

  “It’s pretty here,” he said.

  “I love this place. It has water, sky, trees. You wouldn’t think there’s nature in the city, but there is.” She took a swallow of tea. “You should know this—I’m not going hide it. It’s so good, it’s so nice just to talk to you.”

  He looked at her, and the hair on the back of his neck came alive as though the lightest finger he’d ever felt had passed over it. “It’s nice for me too,” he said.

  “You’re the only one who doesn’t treat me as though I’m permanently damaged.”

  He sensed strength in her, not the willed force of sinew, but something gentler, surer, like a flower coming through rock. “You’re not damaged at all.”

  She looked at him and he sensed gratitude. The shadows of the row-houses were crossing the lawn, stretching toward the river wall.

  He took out his notebook. “Down to business, okay? A judge let me see the record of the second trial. Ted Morgenstern pleaded your husband innocent.”

  “I thought Scottie pleaded guilty to a lesser charge.”

  “He started out pleading innocent. This time the syringe wasn’t allowed in evidence. Which didn’t leave the state many cards to play. The state called four witnesses. The doctor. Your housekeeper, Mrs. Banks. Your daughter. And Billi von Kleist.”

  Her eyes came up, surprised. “Billi testified against Scottie?”

  “Not exactly against him. He said you left the party drunk, you left with your husband, it was two in the morning, he offered to go home with you, your husband said no thanks. The doctor said you were injected with a near-lethal dose of insulin sometime between midnight and four o’clock that morning. Cordelia said she saw your husband coming out of the bedroom at three in the morning. Mrs. Banks said Cordelia woke her up
at three fifteen. So far it’s the same case the state presented in trial one—minus the syringe. Then Morgenstern takes over. He moves to put in evidence a psychiatric report on your daughter.”

  Babe wrinkled her brow.

  “The psychiatrist’s name was Dr. Flora Vogelsang. Do you know her?”

  “I’ve never heard of her,” Babe said.

  Cardozo’s glance flicked up at her. “Vogelsang’s still practicing. Has an office over on Madison Avenue. It looks like she examined your daughter, prepared a report for the defense, and came to court to back it up with her testimony.”

  “What did the report say?”

  “I don’t know. The trial record’s missing from that point on. Someone substituted two hundred blank pages. No way of knowing if the report was accepted into evidence, how Vogelsang testified; no record of the tender of a plea bargain.”

  Babe’s eyes were intelligent and questioning. “Why would those pages have been taken?”

  “Someone’s covering their—their behind. But you don’t have to be Albert Einstein to put it together. Your daughter was the eyewitness against your husband. Morgenstern couldn’t defend his client, so he did the next best thing—he attacked the witness. Bringing in the psychiatrist means he attacked her sanity. The upshot was, the state couldn’t use her. So what do you do. No eyewitness, no syringe, no case. You buy the plea bargain.”

  When he had laid it all out he could feel the almost physical touch of her attention.

  “I can’t believe Scottie would let his lawyer … He loved Cordelia, she was a daughter to him.”

  “He was saving his skin.”

  “Wouldn’t the jurors remember what was said?”

  “They didn’t hear it. The judge would have cleared the courtroom. Morgenstern would have questioned Cordelia and pulverized her, the state would have seen it was hopeless and accepted the plea bargain, the jury would have been sent home.”

  “Cordelia’s changed. I’m sure it has to do with that trial.” Babe Devens sat looking at Cardozo, her face anxious now and determined. “I wish I knew what that psychiatrist’s report said.”

  “I’d like to know too.” Cardozo stood up and slipped back into his jacket. The seersucker cloth was still warm from hanging in the sun. “By the way—do you happen to know if Faith Banks had any health problems while she was working for you?”

  “None that I know of,” Babe Devens said. “Why?”

  “That insulin you gave me was hers. She’s a diabetic.”

  The twilight was already dusky gray. Sunset was near. The darkening leaves hung quivering on the trees and shrubs and night was coming down very gently.

  “I never knew that,” Babe Devens said.

  “It’s not the kind of thing you’d necessarily notice. She just wouldn’t eat sweets or drink alcohol.”

  “That’s true—we offered her champagne and she wouldn’t touch it.”

  “The insulin in the brown bag could have been hers. I hate to admit it, but your ex-husband could have been framed. Which isn’t necessarily good news. Did you change the locks on the house?”

  Babe’s glance came up at him watchfully. “If someone still wanted to kill me, they’ve had plenty of opportunity.”

  “I’m not saying it’s likely. I’m saying be a little extra careful, stay alert.”

  She nodded. “I had the locks changed.”

  “Don’t give away too many keys.”

  “I haven’t. I won’t.”

  “And if anything starts worrying you, or if there’s anything you need—”

  “You’re being extraordinarily kind, and I appreciate it. But I don’t want a guard, if that’s what you’re offering.”

  “Or any other way I can help.”

  She shook her head. “I’ve imposed on you enough.”

  “No you haven’t.”

  She smiled.

  “Okay,” he said. “Stay in touch. Or I’ll be worrying.”

  “Don’t worry about me. Please.”

  He glanced over his shoulder. “Does that gate go to the street?”

  “Slam it hard. It locks itself.”

  After a moment he turned and crossed the lawn, passing under the leafy trees, and then he was lost to sight.

  Babe Devens’s head hummed with wondering. She had seen Vince Cardozo fewer than a half-dozen times, but already she felt something she couldn’t put into words. She thought of his dark eyes, his look of weariness, of taking life sadly. She thought of his offer of protection and for some reason it made her feel a little safer.

  The iron gate clanged. A pulsation seemed to pass through the darkness. She sat there a long time, wondering things about Vince Cardozo and staring at the space where he had vanished.

  33

  JUDGE FRANCIS DAVENPORT HELD his head back, a look of brooding fierceness coming from thick gray brows and black eyes. “Counsel, I hope you have your arguments a little better prepared tomorrow than you did today. This court will stand in recess till ten o’clock.”

  The silver-handled gavel came slamming down. The judge squinted into the court and said, “Babe, come in, won’t you?”

  Babe thanked the clerk who helped her wheel her chair into the judge’s chambers.

  “Aren’t you looking splendid,” the judge said. Out of his robes he was a thickset man, heavy-jawed, with silver hair and a patrician accent. “What an absolutely great surprise.”

  She angled her head up, offering her cheek to his lips. “Uncle Frank, I need help.”

  She could see a wave of guardedness hit the judge. He was obviously afraid she’d come to ask about Scottie’s trial.

  “You know, Babe, I was at your baptism at Saint Bartholomew’s. I’ve always regarded myself as your ex officio godfather.”

  Her family’s money had put Francis Davenport on the bench and kept him there: he was in no position to decline to perform a favor. All he could do was tactfully dissuade her from asking.

  “I happen to care about you very dearly,” he said.

  “I know that, Uncle Frank, and I’m grateful.”

  The judge heaved a short sigh filled with resignation. “What kind of help do you need?”

  “You have police department contacts, don’t you?”

  “I have a few friends among the force.”

  “What can you find out about a lieutenant detective of homicide named Vincent Cardozo?”

  The judge pushed his lips together. “Probably a little.”

  “He’s a native New Yorker, as native as you, Babe. Grew up on Charlton Street, in Greenwich Village.”

  Judge Davenport was sitting by the unlit fire in Babe’s drawing room, consulting a small leather-bound notebook.

  “His father was a Portuguese Jewish immigrant who came to this country as a steam press operator. By the time of his death Baruch Cardozo was a senior administrator in the post office.”

  “Baruch,” Babe said, savoring the strangeness of the name. “That’s a Hebrew word. What does it mean?”

  “Sorry, Hebrew isn’t one of my languages. They called him Barry for short. Lieutenant Cardozo’s mother was an Italo-American, native born, a lay teacher at Saint Anthony’s school, where Vince had his primary education. Vince was an only child. He’s nominally Roman Catholic. His father observed High Holy Days at the Village Temple till his death and was given a Jewish burial.”

  Warm summer twilight floated through the windows.

  Judge Davenport turned a page of his notebook. “Vince was very popular with his schoolmates. Spoke back to the teachers, was not popular with the sisters. Ran with the neighborhood gangs. Had a few scrapes with the police when he was a teenager. No felonies of course. Went to Fordham University, political science, graduated cum laude. Graduate work at John Jay College of Criminal Justice—he still has twelve credits to go for his degree—entered the Police Academy, joined the force, worked his way up from patrolman to lieutenant detective in homicide. He’s highly thought of; his clearance rate is one of the hig
hest.”

  “What’s his private life?”

  The judge was staring at Babe with a curiosity bordering on disapproval. Clearly the web of connection between her and this homicide cop was eluding him.

  “Vincent Cardozo’s private life is quiet. Thirteen years ago he married Rose Romano.”

  Babe pulled herself upright, spine straight, her back not touching the wheelchair.

  “Rose was a schoolteacher, like Vince’s mother. He and his bride moved into a small apartment on Broome Street, not far from where Vince grew up. A year later they had a daughter, their only child, Teresa. Teresa goes to grade school at Saint Agnes, highly intelligent.”

  “Are Vince and Rose Romano happy?” Babe asked. She felt remote from the man they were discussing and the life that surrounded him. Her sense of him was sketchy, unfinished; she felt a need to give him definition.

  “From all reports, they were extremely happy.”

  The past tense caught her. “Are they separated?”

  A silence flowed by and Judge Davenport gave her a glance with a trace of warning.

  “Five years ago on Christmas Eve Rose Cardozo discovered that the tape deck they were giving Teresa was defective. She went to Crazy Eddie’s in the Village to replace it. She never came home. Christmas Day a patrolman found her in the basement of a high rise being constructed on West Street. She’d been assaulted and stabbed seventy-three times with a sharp instrument.”

  The words caught Babe with physical force. “His wife was murdered?”

  Judge Davenport drew in a deep breath and nodded grimly.

  “Did they find the killer?”

  “Never.”

  A knot twisted in Babe’s stomach. He’s living with that, she thought. He’s faced that and he’s gone on.

  When the judge had gone, Babe took the elevator upstairs. She wheeled to her dressing room and reached resolutely for her crutches.

  “Oh Billi,” Babe sighed, staring out at the city sliding past the limousine windows. “Sometimes I think too much has changed. I wonder if I don’t need a thousand years’ more sleep.”