The Big Law pb-2

by Chuck Logan

  John’s finger stabbed a place-name where the coast notched in south from San Francisco Bay. “How does Santa Cruz strike you?”

  Something about the name snagged in his memory.

  Something he’d read. Something exciting.

  Santa Cruz. He recalled it was the epicenter of the big quake in 1989. But that wasn’t it.

  Pondering, he acted merely curious and apprehensive.

  John smiled and said, “It’s perfect for you. A laid-back college, tourist town. With San Jose and Silicon Valley just over

  ‘the hill,’ that’s what the locals call the Coastal Mountains.”

  “Mountains and the ocean,” said Tom happily, and it was like a dream.

  “And redwood trees,” added John. “A slice of Berkeley preserved from the 1960s. Real tolerant people.”

  John placed a pile of books on Tom’s bed; they were a mix of travel manuals and locally published nonfiction about northern California. He glanced at his clipboard.

  “You’ve expressed a preference for a new name: Daniel Storey.”

  “Is it all right?” Tom asked.

  “No one in your mother’s or father’s family is named Storey, are they?”

  “No. I didn’t borrow it. I made it up. From the sound of it.”

  “Storey,” said John. “It could be a corruption of a Scotch, Irish, or English name.”

  “James is English, and my mother’s maiden name was Higgins.”

  “No problem.” John shuffled some paper in the folder and handed Tom a legal form. “Fill this out. It’s an application for a legal name change. We’ll hand carry it to a federal judge.”

  “Quick,” said Tom.

  “Absolutely. Now, is there anything else to start?”

  “Contacts,” said Tom eagerly. “And a haircut.”

  John nodded. “Get you to an optometrist tomorrow morning. For now, take it easy. Anything you need, just pick up the phone. The TV is full cable, all the movie channels plus pay per view. You understand you can’t leave the room without an escort.”

  John left and Tom inspected the room service menu. He picked up the phone and ordered grilled pork chops, baked potato, green vegetable and a salad. The refrigerator in the kitchenette was stocked with soda and water. A shopping list form stuck to the front with a magnet. Cupboards were stacked with dishes, drawers with towels and dishcloths.

  Coffeemaker. Dishwasher.

  Back at the table, he perused the map of California. What was it about Santa Cruz? He picked up the phone and heard John’s voice answer immediately.

  “John, there is something about relocating to Santa Cruz I’d like to discuss.”

  “Sure, give me about twenty minutes.”

  Tom opened a Diet Pepsi, carried it to the table on his balcony, and sat down. Below him, the voices of a family, male, female, whining child, rebounded off the brick cocoon.

  The enclosure resonated with the hive smells and sounds.

  But furtive. Out of sight.

  The unmistakable scent of fish sauce drifted up from a lower gallery. A half dozen cable television stations and radios competed. The different languages. The Witness Program had been conceived for the Italian Mafia. Now it sounded like the U.N. Tom smiled. The multiculturalism of the drug trade.

  Santa Cruz?

  John knocked. Tom got up and let him in.

  “I’m trying to remember something I read about Santa Cruz, something that made the place stick in my head. Was it ever the site of a big story? I mean, besides the big quake in 1989?” asked Tom.

  John grinned. “The UCSC mascot is the Banana Slug. Is that it? Just kidding. Does serial killers ring a bell?”

  “Wait, yeah,” said Tom. “In that book by the FBI profiler.”

  “Sure. Douglas’s book. In the early 1970s, Santa Cruz had the reputation of being the Serial killer Capital of the World.

  It’s where Ed Kemper went on his rampage-he killed six coeds, then his mother and a friend of hers. At the same time, a guy named Mullin was killing people in Santa Cruz, apparently at the direction of inner voices. Also, a hermit named Frazier came down from the hills and slaughtered a whole family, claiming to be defending the environment.”

  “Real fun place to put a college,” said Tom. Serial killer capital of the world. Where the United States government, in its wisdom, was relocating him.

  He savored the irony. Thanked John. After the marshal left, Tom turned up his collar, whipped a wet comb through his hair and viewed himself, minus his glasses, from different angles in the bathroom mirror.

  Tom had his hair cut, received an eye exam and ordered his contacts. And he took a full physical. The doctor told him his leg was mending well, he could begin light exercise. He settled into a routine. “The facility” had a small gym. He visited it two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening. Faithfully Tom began to perform Agent Terry’s road exercises.

  The red streak of scar tissue on his calf stung as he jogged on the treadmill. Liking the pain, he ran harder. In the privacy of his room, he stood naked in front of the mirror.

  His glasses were now a backup system. The marshals had fitted him with contact lenses. His hair was shorter, but it wasn’t there yet. He experimented, combing it back, turning for different angles. What would he look like with ten pounds of belly hacked off.

  He was not quite pudgy, but he was definitely doughy.

  His breathing was shallow, and he tired easily. It seemed as if his lungs and circulation only serviced the outer layer of his body. No blood or air getting deep down inside.

  His new self waited beneath that layer of flab. He began to drill through the fat. Searching for Danny Storey.

  And he practiced being more assertive, aggressive. He mimicked Robert De Niro in Taxi Driver, standing in front of the mirror, pointing, demanding:

  “You talking to me?”

  He paid attention to his diet. I will never go to McDonald’s again. He passed on the butter, the cheese, the ice cream.

  The salt. More chicken, fish, turkey, and steamed vegetables.

  Rice.

  An hour every morning and evening on the running machine. A half hour rowing. The first time he struggled through thirty push-ups in a row, he cheered out loud. Yeah, Danny, yeah.

  48

  He was Danny now. John had started using his new name.

  They were changing him too fast. He was getting ahead of himself. Requesting the movie had been a mistake.

  Danny paced his balcony, trying to shake off a creepy reaction to watching the movie Jeremiah Johnson.

  Dumb, going back into things, she said.

  Pretty dumb movie, too, mountain man horse opera, right up until the part where Jeremiah, played by a young Robert Redford-clefts, no wrinkles yet-set out to wreak bloody revenge on the Indian band that killed his family.

  Fucker running through the trees. Relentless.

  Broker’s favorite movie. Watched it over and over, Caren said.

  Out there. Him and his bug-eyed kid. Never quit.

  Calm down, Danny. Deep breath.

  He forced himself to draw the oxygen down into the bottom of his lungs. Couldn’t do it right, not all the way. But soon he would master the technique. Was going to master a lot of things. Not just the casinos. Golf. The piano.

  He sucked in deep breaths and pictured emerald California fairways, movie stars trundling past in golf carts.

  It seemed to work; he felt calmer, centered.

  Orientation was over. He’d assumed it would take months to change into Danny Storey. Not weeks. Hell, they were booking him on a flight to San Jose. He wasn’t even used to his contact lenses yet. He’d be totally dependent on his inspector in Santa Cruz.

  He shut off the light and stared into the dark, into his future. His nightly ritual began with visualizing the desolate patch of woods where his fortune was hidden in the snow-covered cistern. Sometimes he imagined animals creeping around-foxes, squirrels, even unsuspecting hunters. But hunt
ing season was over.

  After he thought about his money, he, and his right hand, conjured Ida Rain. Then, usually, he was ready to go to sleep.

  But tonight Broker’s fat kid was waiting in the dark, reaching for his money. And she stayed there, off and on, all night

  The document was called the Memorandum of Understanding. It specified the conditions of Danny’s acceptance into WITSEC. If he abided by the rules, the Marshals Service pledged to support and protect him. If he violated security, he was out on his butt.

  After he signed the agreement, John handed him a Photostat of a Michigan driver’s license with a phony address in Warren, Michigan.

  There was his new name. Daniel Storey.

  “We kept your day and month of birth but took a few years off your age. Turn it in when you apply for your California license,” said John.

  “That was fast,” said Danny, studying the picture next to his new name. In the picture he still had Tom James’s hair, mustache and glasses. That would change in California.

  “Danny, we think you’re going to be one of our more low-maintenance clients,” said John. He really was Danny now.

  His new legal name-change papers and new birth certificate had been mailed to his handler in California.

  Danny’s meager belongings lay spread out for one last inspection on the kitchen table. All the clothing had been combed through to make sure that there were no labels that originated in Minnesota. The procedure was brief because Tom only had the one bag.

  As John checked through everything again, Danny shifted from foot to foot. He tensed as the inspector perused the parka label, turned the pockets inside out. He handed the jacket to Danny and went on to another item. Danny hugged the jacket and let out a breath.

  Basic security. He could not contact anyone from his past without permission from Travis, who was his inspector in California, and then, he could only initiate supervised approved phone calls on a secure line. He could never receive calls. Mail, such as holiday cards to family, would be handled by the marshals, who would post them from a secure mail drop.

  “I won’t be sending any Christmas cards,” said Danny.

  He had to practice “unlearning” references that would identify him as someone from Minnesota, hereafter known as the “danger zone.”

  “Forget snow. Forget winter,” advised John.

  “No problem,” said Danny.

  “Forget the Twins and the Vikings.”

  “Who?”

  Danny could tell John enjoyed working with him. Or was relieved. The rare exception. The “innocent” witness.

  As with Norman and Sarah, Tom vacuumed every moment for a hint that John scented a killer in his presence. Nada.

  Referring to Norman and Sarah’s extensive notes. John went over the phony background. They used Warren, Michigan, where Tom had spent childhood summers with an aunt. They expanded it to include classes at Wayne State University in Detroit. He’d had a lifelong drinking problem and was now sober for three years. They agreed, the ruse would paper over his job history. However,

  John cautioned against attending AA meetings. “Too many questions. Too many experts on drinking behavior in those meetings. You may not fit the profile over a long period and might arouse suspicion.”

  When his checklist was completed, John extended his hand. “It’s been a pleasure, considering what’s waiting for me down the hall.”

  “Which is?”

  “Believe me, not a reporter. Good luck,” said John.

  The night before Danny was to fly to San Jose, which was one mountain range away from his new home and life, he violated his no-red-meat rule and ordered a steak, french fries, and a bottle of red wine.

  Later, he couldn’t settle on an Ida Rain fantasy. Usually he pictured her in a mask, naked. Sometimes no mask, in the light. He went back and forth. Could not decide. Then.

  What if-

  What if, when the time was right, he went back for the money and Ida. Brought her to California and, with his new wealth, turned a plastic surgeon loose on that chin.

  God, she’d be unbelievable. Gorgeous.

  The power of it nearly threw him off the bed.

  He took the last of the wine and went out to his courtyard.

  His eyes moistened with emotion, imagining how it would be, slowly removing the bandages from her face.

  How grateful she would be. How smooth her new chin would feel, sliding between his naked thighs, as her sweet auburn hair tickled his belly…

  Thank you, Danny. Thank you.

  And she’d cry, she’d be so happy and she’d raise her face to him and the hot salty tears would trickle down her perfect chin.

  49

  Late afternoon in the motel room off Highway 36. Last light leaked through the cheap venetian blinds and streaked the wall over the desk. Broker sat, eyed the telephone, sipped from a can of ginger ale, confronted the blank notebook page in front of him, fingered the message that had been waiting for him at the motel desk: Call back Ida Rain. Her work number. Put down the message. Stared at the phone again.

  He picked up a ballpoint pen, twirled it, clicked the plunger.

  Keith sat in a jail cell buried under an avalanche of lurid allegations, moral condemnation, and some solid evidence.

  The federal grand jury would indict. He would be charged.

  He refused to defend himself.

  He wanted people to think he’d killed Caren and Alex Gorski, had tried to kill James. No remorse. Defiant. Strutting. Dabbling in jailhouse tattoos.

  Wanted people to think he was crazy

  Everyone except me.

  Broker’s hand dropped to the sheet of notebook paper.

  He drew a vertical line. Near the top, he added an intersecting horizontal line. Below the first line he added another horizontal, wider, parallel to the first. Farther down the vertical, he drew the short bottom bar. On a slant.

  Bottom line.

  The bottom line on the Russian cross represented suffering.

  What do you want me to see that has to stay hidden from everybody else?

  Broker stared at the symbol on the notebook page for a long time. He finished his can of ginger ale and opened another. He reached for a cigar, rolled it lightly in his lips. The phone rang. He reached for it.

  “Broker? Dale Halme. I’m at your house.” Halme was a Cook County deputy.

  “Hi, Dale, you get in all right?”

  “Sitting right here at your kitchen table with one crumbled phone log, shows call information for the eleventh and twelfth of December. Kind of smeared up, but legible.”

  “Strawberry jam. Can you make out any calls made between ten and eleven A.M. on the twelfth?”

  “Right. Okay. Lessee, there’s one. Made at ten-thirty-three A.M. Short, less than a minute. You want the number?”

  “Yeah.” Broker copied it.

  “That all?”

  “Yep. Thanks, Dale.”

  Broker hung up and immediately entered the number. A woman answered. “Barb Luct, East Neighborhoods.”

  “Hello, this is Cook County Deputy Phil Broker. I’m down in St. Paul cleaning up some details on the Caren Angland case. You’re familiar…”

  “Yes, of course; but you want the City Desk, not Neighborhoods,” she said.

  “No, I think I’m in the right place. Did Tom James pick up his calls on this extension?”

  “He doesn’t work here anymore,” she said stiffly.

  “But this was his phone?”

  “Yes, this was his direct line.”

  “Thank you, you’ve been very helpful.”

  Broker chewed the cigar, was tempted to light it. The FBI had dug into the phone log, determined a call went from Caren’s house to the newspaper. And then they had rested on their shovels. No one took the basic step to verify whether Caren was home.

  A ghoulish configuration arose out of Caren’s death and Keith’s silence. Broker had always had a gift for timing, for seeing into people. He moved
in step with things, so when life accelerated, became tricky, or monstrous, he didn’t trip.

  Whatever came his way, he accepted it at its own speed.

  With equanimity, the world produced malignant cancer and beautiful children, like Kit.

  These qualities made him a natural for working nights in Vietnam. He’d been the best deep undercover cop in Minnesota. In his time.

  If the job was merely charging the Gates of Hell with a bucket of water, send a young dumb guy. But if you needed to penetrate all nine rings, and get down past the sulfur, to the bottom, where Judas Iscariot was buried in the lake of ice-send Broker.

  If you can’t send Broker to hell, send Keith.

  The second call came as anticlimax.

  “Broker? Yeah, J.T.I checked the phone logs with Dispatch.

  Keith signed out to his home number between ten A.M. and noon on December twelfth. And the feds never ran a tap on his home line.”

  “Thanks, J.T., and ah…”

  “Yeah, yeah; we never talked. So long, partner.” Captain Merryweather hung up.

  Broker placed the phone back on the cradle and rubbed his eyes. Then he studied the Russian cross he’d drawn on the notebook page. Remembered Keith, holding up his left hand-and now he thought: as if the wounds, the tattoo, the rings, were a shrine he kept to Caren. Broker said it out loud, “Caren didn’t call James. You did. You crazy sonofabitch, you’re… working.”

  And it got all fucked up.

  50

  Broker only had one move. He called Ida Rain.

  “Is this business or pleasure?” she asked in a wry tone.

  Broker caught her still at work.

  “If you’ve something for me, I have something for you,”

  he said, being deliberately coy. As he spoke, he wrote in the notebook, under the Russian cross-Question: Help me?

  Answer: Find James. Tongue story!

  She answered with wry ambiguity, “Gee, and we’ve only just met.”

  “You’ll love it, what I’ve got,” he predicted.

  “I will, huh? Give me a hint?”

  “An embalmer’s syringe full of hot ink, straight in your heart.”

  Instantly practical: “Where shall we meet?”