Barely Legal

by Stuart Woods

  She batted his hand away. “Stop it, Donnie.”

  “Oh, little Miss Goody Two-shoes.” His face got crafty hard. “Anything you want to tell me?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Anything you haven’t told me yet? You’re so worried I’m going to get careless and blow the gig, I wondered if you had any of the same doubts about yourself.”

  Yvette practically cooed. “I am playing this so well, honey. He’s wrapped around my finger. You wouldn’t believe it.”

  “Anything you’re leaving out?”

  “No.”

  “How about getting picked up by the police last night?”

  Yvette’s mouth fell open. “How do you know that?”

  “I know everything. How’d you manage to let that happen?”

  “I didn’t let that happen. Someone took a shot at me.”

  “And you couldn’t get the hell out of there? You sat and waited for the cops to come?”

  “I had to. The commissioner of police was sitting there when the shooting started. Who I’d just been introduced to. I should slip out on him?”

  “It doesn’t matter what the situation. You never give your name to the police.”

  “It’s all right.”

  “Oh, yeah? Suppose they pull your record?”

  “They won’t.”

  “Why not? They’re cops.”

  “I’m Herbie’s fiancée. I’m not a suspect. I was sitting next to him when someone fired a shot.”

  “Who was it, by the way?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Who hates the guy?”

  “Beats me. Perfectly nice guy.” She shrugged. “Of course, he’s a lawyer. Lawyers make enemies.”

  14

  HERBIE CAME OUT of court feeling relieved. He hadn’t done any good, but he hadn’t done any harm, either. James Glick could take over the cross-examination and it would be as if he’d never appeared. That was okay with him. Herbie was out of ideas, and this was not a case he wished to be associated with. He would be very happy just to be a footnote.

  Herbie looked for a cab, though he did not expect to get one. He headed down Centre Street toward the subway at City Hall.

  “Herbie Fisher.”

  Herbie stopped, found himself looking into the face of a muscle-bound goon. Another steroidal specimen stood next to him.

  “Yeah?” Herbie said.

  “A friend of ours would like to have a little talk.”

  Herbie exhaled sharply. “Look. It’s late, I’m tired, I’ve had a long day. If you don’t mind, I’d just like to get home.”

  “Ah, but we do mind, Mr. Fisher.”

  Herbie looked from one to the other. “Gentlemen, it is broad daylight.”

  The goon shrugged. “So what?” He gestured to a car that had just pulled up to the curb.

  “I’m not getting in that car.”

  The goon shoved a gun in his ribs. “Oh, I think you are, Mr. Fisher. Please don’t make me hurt you. The boss won’t like it if I hurt you.”

  Herbie found himself prodded toward the car. Before he knew it, he found himself in the backseat, seated between two thugs. As the car took off, the driver half turned in his seat.

  The driver was Carlo, the hood who had accosted him in the restaurant. Herbie recognized him and his mouth fell open.

  Carlo grinned. “Don’t worry, Mr. Fisher, you’re not going to be whacked.” After a moment he added, “Yet.”

  The car pulled up in front of a dilapidated office building on Ninth Avenue in the Thirties. Carlo and another thug marched Herbie through the front door, which was open, and into an elevator in the back. The buttons in it were the type that went out of fashion in the fifties. They were metal, and thick, and stuck out a good inch.

  Carlo pushed the button marked 8. It stuck going in. Then the door closed and the elevator lurched upward with an unsettling clanking noise. Herbie had visions of being trapped in the damn thing all night.

  The door opened on the eighth floor. They marched him down the hall to a frosted-glass door with the hand-lettered sign FINANCIAL PLANNER. They opened the door and guided him inside.

  Seated at the desk was a large man with a round face and a big mustache. He looked vaguely familiar. The man got up and came around the desk. “Herbie Fisher. How nice of you to drop in.”

  “Who are you?”

  “You don’t know me? I am hurt, I am wounded, I am cut to the quick.”

  “You’ll get over it.”

  Carlo punched him in the stomach. Herbie doubled up, gasping for air.

  “Carlo, are such theatrics necessary?”

  Carlo shrugged. “Seemed like it.”

  “You were rude to my boy Carlo, Mr. Fisher. Last night, in the restaurant, if you’ll recall. Carlo does not take well to rudeness. He has a sensitive nature.”

  Carlo looked like he bit the wings off flies. Herbie said nothing.

  “You may not know me, Mr. Fisher, but I am Mario Payday, so called because every day is payday, and I am the one who gets paid. And you, Mr. Fisher, owe me ninety thousand dollars.”

  “I don’t owe you anything.”

  Mario sighed. “I must say, you are not the first person ever to feel that way. Others have been of the same opinion until they saw the error of their ways.”

  “If you will forgive me, Mr. Payday, I have heard of you, of course, but I don’t owe anybody ninety thousand dollars.”

  “You are wrong, Mr. Fisher. You owe it to me.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  It happened fast. One moment Herbie was standing in front of Mario Payday. The next he was off the ground, flailing in a bear hug. He felt hands on his legs, heard a window open, and suddenly he was a short-range missile, hurtling out into the open air. At the last moment hands closed around his ankles and jerked him upside down, and the next thing he saw was the Ninth Avenue traffic in the street far below. Coins fell from his pockets, any one of which might have killed a passing pedestrian. It occurred to him that he was being shaken. The two men holding him appeared to be playing a game to see which one of them could come the closest to letting go entirely without actually letting him fall.

  Mario Payday must have felt that way, too, because the words “Don’t drop him” filtered down.

  Herbie’s original thought, that this couldn’t be happening, had been replaced by abject fear, so he found the words reassuring. The big boss didn’t want them to drop him, therefore he wouldn’t be dropped. He was as safe as any man hanging upside down out an eighth-story window could be.

  Then suddenly they were pulling him up, and he was inside the office and back on his feet, and Mario Payday was in front of him, his expression benign and friendly and comforting. It was the most chilling thing he had ever seen.

  “Are you all right, Mr. Fisher? You look a bit pale. Do you feel faint? Would you like a drink? Carlo, pour him a drink.”

  “I don’t want a drink.”

  “Yes, you do. You’re coming to your senses. It’s always a shock when one comes to one’s senses.”

  “I don’t need a drink.”

  “Sure you do. Give you a moment to recollect.”

  Carlo shoved a glass of whiskey into Herbie’s hand.

  “Now, Mr. Fisher, do you recall the ninety thousand dollars you owe me?”

  Herbie set the glass on the desk. “The ninety thousand I paid back to Vinnie the Vig?”

  Carlo took a step toward Herbie, but Mario put up his hand. “Yes, that ninety thousand, Mr. Fisher. I’m glad you remembered.”

  “You’ll pardon me for asking, but why would an ancient debt to Vinnie the Vig, which I actually paid off, have anything to do with you?”

  Mario nodded. “That is a fair question. Do you know how you know it is a fair question? Because you are not hanging out the window for asking it. It appears your marker became collateral in a transaction between Vinnie the Vig and Benny Slick.”

  “I don’t know Benny Slick.”

 
“Maybe not, but he received this marker from Vinnie the Vig shortly before the gentleman’s untimely demise.” Mario unfolded the marker and held it in front of Herbie’s face. “Here’s the original marker. Pay to the order of Vinnie the Vig, ninety thousand dollars, signed Herbie Fisher. You can see where Vinnie the Vig crossed out his name, wrote in the name of Benny Slick, and signed it, transferring the debt to him. And here, where Benny Slick crossed out his name, wrote in mine, and signed it, transferring the debt to me.”

  “It’s a worthless marker. I already paid it back.”

  “Does it say paid anywhere, Mr. Fisher? When someone pays off a marker they either take it back or scrawl paid across it. I don’t see that here, do you?”

  Herbie groaned. In the old days he had not been careful at all about his paperwork. Not getting a receipt for a ninety-thousand-dollar payment was par for the course.

  “So, Mr. Fisher. What I want you to remember is, no matter who you think you paid back, you owe the money to me. I’m Mario Payday. I have a reputation to uphold. They don’t call me Mario Payday because I have a reputation for not getting paid. They call me Mario Payday because I have a reputation for getting paid all the time. You, Mr. Fisher, have the opportunity of helping me to build that reputation. Since you claim you were not aware of this obligation, I am going to be lenient. From the way that you’re dressed, it is perfectly clear that you should have no trouble discharging your debt. But just to show you what a nice guy I am, I will forgo the vig. But I want the rest of the debt paid in full by this time tomorrow.

  “You have twenty-four hours, Mr. Fisher.”

  15

  TOMMY TAPERELLI WAS in a very bad mood. He’d been on the phone with his mistress when his wife called him at work, resulting in the nightmare scenario he’d always envisioned of having two women on hold and being in danger of pushing the wrong flashing button and saying the wrong name, resulting in a messy and financially disastrous divorce. He couldn’t deal with it, not with the verdict hanging fire and the whole Kenworth business up in the air. His mistress would just have to get off the line. He pushed the button to tell her that, and realized by doing so he had put himself in the nightmare scenario. He hung up on whichever woman was on the line and disconnected the other one. Breathing hard, he leaned back in his desk chair and poured himself a shot of whiskey to settle his nerves.

  The phone rang.

  Taperelli tossed off the shot and scooped up the phone.

  It was Mookie. “Court’s over.”

  “They got a verdict?”

  “No, they quit for the day. I thought it was never going to end.”

  “Is the trial almost over?”

  “Fuck, no. They’re still on the same witness. You get the idea the lawyer’s just stalling till the other guy gets back.”

  “When is that?”

  “I don’t know. He said emergency appendectomy. How long does that take? Kind of a rinky-dink operation, isn’t it? I mean, an appendix ain’t worth shit.”

  “This lawyer Fisher. What’s his first name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You know how many Fishers there are in the New York phone book?”

  “You want me to count ’em?”

  Taperelli slammed down the phone and called James Glick.

  The lawyer answered on the second ring. “Hello?”

  “Mr. Glick,” Taperelli said ominously, “do you know who this is?”

  There was a pause, then, “Oh. Hi.”

  “How come you weren’t in court today?”

  “My appendix burst. I had to have surgery.”

  “So you’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Well, that depends on—”

  “That wasn’t a question, Mr. Glick. You’ll be back tomorrow. Right?”

  “Right. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “You’ll be in court, and you’ll get a verdict by tomorrow night. Or you know what? You’ll wind up right back in the hospital. What hospital you in?”

  “Oh, I gotta go, the doctor just walked in,” James Glick said, and hung up.

  Taperelli stared at the phone. James Glick hung up on him? No one hung up on Tommy Taperelli. No one. In the middle of the conversation? Without answering his question? Not only did he not know what hospital James Glick was in, he hadn’t had a chance to ask him Fisher’s first name.

  Taperelli snatched up the phone and called James Glick back.

  The call went to voice mail.

  Taperelli flung his phone across the room. It clattered against the wall.

  • • •

  JAMES GLICK HUNG UP the phone in mortal terror.

  Tommy Taperelli knew! Glick was sure of it. He hadn’t bought the appendix operation one bit. That’s why he’d asked for the name of the hospital. Thank God he’d sent the second call to voice mail. God bless caller ID.

  But if Taperelli was on to him, when did he get on to him? And how did he know? Could Herb Fisher have ratted him out? No, not possible. He had been on the Acela when he called Herb Fisher. Even if Herb had tipped him off, Taperelli couldn’t get men on the train. And Herb didn’t know he was on the train. He was just being paranoid.

  James Glick’s mind did a backflip. Wait a minute. If Tommy Taperelli wanted him in court tomorrow, Herb Fisher couldn’t have taken the plea bargain. If he had, the case would be over and there would be no court to show up in, and Herb Fisher would be hanging by his balls from the nearest construction crane.

  James Glick looked up from the sandwich he was trying to choke down in the restaurant in Union Station while he waited for the next train for Miami. Two guys who looked like torpedoes were sitting at a table across the way. They had their chairs angled so they were both facing him.

  Glick looked away, willed himself to eat his sandwich and not look back. His resolution lasted a good thirty seconds.

  One of the thugs was still looking.

  James Glick left his sandwich on the plate and called for the check.

  16

  HERBIE FISHER OWNED a very nice penthouse on Park Avenue, but the two paintings that adorned the wall of his foyer were probably worth more than the apartment itself. The Picasso and the Braque had been a gift from Eduardo Bianchi, who had left them to Herbie in his will. Eduardo had only known Herbie a short time, but had been fond of the boy, and had placed a great deal of weight in Stone Barrington’s approval. Herbie had been shocked and touched by the inheritance, and he displayed the paintings proudly. He fully intended to purchase other art objects, but never seemed to have the time.

  As he stepped from the elevator, utterly exhausted from the day in court and his encounter with Mario Payday, he found Yvette standing there clad in nothing but stiletto boots, a sheer negligee, and lingerie that to his experienced eye looked like La Perla.

  Yvette thrust a martini into his hand and loosened the ribbon at the neck of the negligee, which fluttered to the floor.

  Herbie blinked and gawked. “What the hell.”

  “Hi, honey,” Yvette said. “I was pretending I was the wife in a sitcom welcoming her husband home. Isn’t this how they do it?”

  Without giving him a chance to answer, she threw her arms around his neck, spilling the martini, and kissed him on the mouth. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her to bed, all thoughts of court and old gambling debts forgotten.

  17

  DAVID ROSS WENT home to his father’s Fifth Avenue apartment. David had a dorm room at Columbia, but his father’s apartment was more convenient, being on the East Side like the court. It was also more comfortable. The councilman’s floor-through duplex boasted several amenities not available in the dorm room, like food, for instance, and David’s own shower and sauna and big-screen TV.

  David’s father met him in the foyer, which was large enough for the average apartment’s living room. It was furnished with a couple of divans and side tables, to handle the slipover from the parties the councilman was sometimes forced to throw.

  “What do yo
u mean you didn’t take the deal?” Councilman Ross said. “I had it all worked out.”

  “You didn’t tell me.”

  “I tried to tell you, you didn’t listen.”

  “Because you didn’t listen to me. I didn’t do it. The drugs weren’t mine, and someone set me up.”

  “This is not the most brilliant defense ever thought of. Any penny ante thief ever busted with the goods says, ‘That’s not mine.’”

  “It’s not a story, Dad, it’s the truth, and I’ll find a way to prove it.”

  “Didn’t your lawyer strongly advise you against doing that?”

  “My lawyer wasn’t there.”

  “What?”

  “He was in the hospital, so he sent another guy in his place.”

  “What guy?”

  “A lawyer named Herb Fisher.”

  “How is he?”

  “I don’t think he’s very good, but he isn’t forcing me to do anything I don’t want to do,” David said, and stomped off to his room.

  “Oh, for God’s sake!”

  Councilman Ross prided himself on rarely getting upset. He was a politician’s politician, who knew which side of the bread his butter was on. No matter how sticky a situation, he always managed to come out squeaky clean. He’d earned the allegiance of the police department not by any special favors, but by always appearing to be on their side, whether he was or not.

  Arranging the plea bargain had not been difficult, just inconvenient. He hated to waste the political favor, but it had been necessary. A misdemeanor settled out of court would scarcely sully his reputation. His son in jail on a drug conviction could have been the nail in his political coffin. Underneath it all the councilman really did love his son and would do anything to save him. He just had trouble letting it show.

  The councilman went into his home office and dialed the cell number of Bill Eggers, the CEO of Woodman & Weld.

  Eggers was surprised to hear from him. “Councilman. What’s wrong?”

  “My son’s attorney didn’t show up for court.”

  “Impossible. I’d have heard about it.”

  “He sent a replacement. Can you believe that? A substitute. This is my son, for Christ’s sake.”

  “Who’d he send?”

  “Herb Fisher.”