by Peter Israel
Above all, she insisted he was still alive. And that I knew it and was helping him cover it up.
“I’m going to get the son of a bitch,” she hurled at me, “if it’s the last thing I do. You tell him that for me. I’m going to make him wish he never fucked Kitty Goldmark. And that goes for you too, Mac Bastard. I’m going to put you out of business. As of now, you are ruined. You’re going to get disbarred, and by the time I’m done suing you, I’m going to take you for every last penny.”
I endured her venom in troubled silence. There was little else to do, and though the Thompson account describes such moments with greater skill and detail than I am capable of, suffice it that I too was subjected to the rageful passion of the woman, her wide-mouthed grimace, the shrill reverberations of her voice, her accusing, clawlike hands.
Eventually, whether through his efforts or because she had exhausted herself, Lanceman induced her to leave. She was tearful by then, her face buried in a handkerchief, which sight, however, failed to move me to much sympathy. If the purpose of her visit had been to intimidate me, she had failed. She was, among other things, too late for that.
Roy Lanceman subsequently called to apologize. I commented to him that I failed to understand what he had expected the meeting to accomplish. He said words to the effect that his client had insisted on it.
I cannot also help speculate as to why he agreed to represent her in the first place and why, apparently, he continues to do so. The only answer that comes to mind is that we lawyers have to take our business where we find it.
MEMORANDUM TO FILE (THOMPSON)
CONFIDENTIAL
FROM: DMC
I dictate these notes in random form for inclusion in a file which, if it must remain open, yet has little more for me to add to it.
As of this writing, the final disposition or whereabouts of Stark Thompson III remains unresolved. I will return to this point.
His account and ancillary documents were finally wrested from my control by subpoena in the matter of The People vs. Katherine Goldmark Thompson. At one point, much to my discomfort, it appeared that I would be called to testify concerning their authenticity, but I was saved from that ordeal, ironically enough, by Roy Lanceman himself. After a prolonged, pre-trial battle over the question of their admissibility as evidence, Lanceman won, the documents were kept out of the trial and returned to me, for inclusion in this file.
I followed the courtroom proceedings with considerable interest. Indeed it would have been difficult not to, given the intensive media coverage. I thought Lanceman’s line of defense probably the only one realistically open to him: that Stark Thompson, not the defendant, had killed Thorne because Thorne had threatened to expose his financial dealings, and that if the defendant had helped him, however unwillingly, it was because she’d loved him and wanted to marry him. Despite his eloquence, however, Lanceman had trouble dealing with some of the evidence, and the prosecuting attorney succeeded, over Lanceman’s constant objections, in demonstrating how important a role the defendant had played not only in her husband’s financial affairs but in Thorne’s as well.
In this connection, obviously, the testimony against her of her brother, Theodore R. Goldmark, was devastating.
(Clearly Goldmark’s testimony grew out of his own plea bargaining, for the sentence he received for his own crimes—two years, I believe—was surprisingly light.)
I must confess to a certain, however grudging, admiration for the way Ms. Goldmark conducted herself throughout. Gone was the shrewish creature who’d ranted and raved in my office, as well as in the pages of Stark Thompson’s account. In her place was this handsome and poised woman whom I saw many times on television, entering and leaving the courthouse, ever calm, even gracious, before the jackals of the media. Apparently she gave the same impression inside the court, never flustering under close questioning and maintaining her composure—no mean feat, one would assume—even when her brother took the stand.
I admit, rather to my surprise, that I found her pretty.
Some of this impression, I imagine, must have been shared by the jury. There was no other basis, in my opinion, for them to have brought in a verdict, disregarding the judge’s charges, of manslaughter in the first degree. Of course, as any lawyer knows, the quickest way to lose money is to bet on what any jury will decide.
She is now serving her time. I know this because I hear from her occasionally by mail. She continues to threaten me. She is still going to sue, to have me disbarred. She is absolutely convinced I know where he is, and she demands that I now tell her.
I have never answered.
I must conclude, however irrelevantly, with some conjecture as to what happened to my client on that night of October 26th-27th, 1987. I do so not without pain, for I was fond of the young man, having known him virtually since his birth and having been, despite our occasional differences, a good and longtime friend of his late father.
Even though an old man and an attorney, neither of whom should be shocked by much that happens in this world, I continue to be dismayed by Tommy’s account, parts of which I have referred to again from time to time. Most of it I am inclined to believe. Somehow, through some moral failure of his own, aggravated by the actions and failures to act of those around him, and swept, I am sure, by the trends and tendencies of this period of our history, as well as—most of all!—by his total infatuation with this formidable woman, he participated in the worst of crimes. More even than his own role in the murder of Robert Thorne, I was overwhelmed by the slaughter of Corcoran Stark, whom I myself knew slightly, and still more, though I am neither psychologist nor literary critic, by the almost casual and remorseless way he described it. Certainly he deserved the highest penalty for his crimes as much as his wife did.
Returning to the night of October 26th-27th, I am compelled to say, however reluctantly and late in the day, that I am now inclined toward Ms. Goldmark’s belief. This is not at all, I add, because she has so steadfastly maintained it. Certain unanswered questions to the contrary, I indeed thought—or wanted to think—that Tommy, after he had been unable to bring himself to kill her that Sunday night, had experienced such terrible despair and hopelessness that he in fact took his own life, either deliberately or accidentally. In the continued absence of any physical evidence (such as his body, which, I had been assured, must one day float to the surface if it did go into the river that night), I thought this solution best fit the warped psychology of a man who still craved vengeance even though, by his own account, he had failed miserably to achieve it.
I now believe I was wrong. I also believe that Tommy used me.
Not long ago, I was visited, by appointment, by a man mentioned several times in the Thompson account, one Crandall Fly Jr., who identified himself as the Trustee of the Stark-Thompson Family Funds. Mr. Fly, a most personable man and a prominent architect, asked my discreet help in sorting out a highly confidential matter. In substance, it appeared to him, and had just been confirmed by independent audit, that there was a cash shortfall in the Funds accounts amounting to just over five million dollars, which dated back to Stark Thompson’s brief tenure as Trustee. Although they had managed to track other transactions of his during the period in question, this one remained an enigma. Could I shed any light on the subject for him?
In fact I could not. There was no such item in the list of assets I had drawn up, and, I regretfully informed Mr. Fly, in the best of circumstances, and even assuming the obligation could be proven, Stark Thompson’s Estate would never be able to make good on it.
Mr. Fly did not seem overly concerned by this news. We chatted a few moments, inevitably about the mystery surrounding Tommy’s disappearance, and then he left. I have not heard again from him. I doubt that I will.
Five million dollars, however.
A reasonable stake for a man on the run.
But whom am I to tell it to?
The police? But they have already closed their books on the Thompson case.
<
br /> The Stark-Thompson Family Council? To judge from Fly’s attitude, as well as the Thompson account, they will scarcely miss the money.
Mary Laura, Starkie, and their mother (who, recently remarried, has at last ceased pestering me for child-support payments)? But what good would it do them?
And, lastly, Kitty Goldmark? But what good, finally, would it do her?
My God, though, Tommy …
In truth—a sad realization—I have no one to tell it to. Yet it weighs heavy. Therefore I confide it to this file.
MEMORANDUM TO FILE (THOMPSON)
CONFIDENTIAL
FROM: AE, SECRETARY TO DMC
SUBJECT: ATTACHED LETTER
I have asked Mr. Rogers what to do with the attached letter, addressed to Mr. Coombs and received from Katherine Goldmark shortly after Mr. Coombs passed away. Upon Mr. Rogers’ instructions I am adding it to the confidential Thompson file, pending the disposal of Mr. Coombs’ personal papers.
Dear Macaroon,
Here’s the irony of it. I have the proof. The proof of what I’ve been saying all along, and you’ve been so busy denying—at least you used to be—is sitting beside me as I write. It is a picture postcard, Mac. On the one side is a photo of a curving beach, with palm trees, on the island of Tobago. On the other is his message. It says: “Hi Kitten.” That’s all. Just “Hi Kitten.” His handwriting, his sense of comedy, but true to himself he didn’t have the guts to sign it.
Now I wonder who it was, if not you, who gave him my address?
So, you’ll ask if you ever ask, where’s the irony in it? The irony is this. I have no one now to do anything about it. My high and mighty lawyer, the shyster Lanceman, has fired me. And you, if I had to guess, toss my correspondence into the circular file, unopened. (Unless you forward it on to him?) So who should I show it to? The warden?
Besides, what’s to do?
The days are cold and long here, Mac Bastard. The nights colder and longer. Not cold inside my room. Cold inside me. Days, weeks, months, a long, cold blur. But I promise you this much. I’ll never forget any of you.
Not you.
Not Tommy.
Not even my darling brother.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1989 by Peter Freeborn
Cover design by Mimi Bark
ISBN: 978-1-4532-9408-6
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