The Big Law (1998)

by Chuck Logan

  Thinking.

  Caren. Coming here. Today. Into his new world of diapers, cleaning, cooking and folding baby clothes. Not to mention…

  Nina, who watched him from a framed photo on the bedside table with her smiling Pict princess smile and her freckles like Scotch-Irish war paint under a fur cap. Camouflage fatigues, a flak vest and a pistol belt strapped around her waist. Black camouflage oak leaves fastened on her collar. Major Mom.

  Broker grimaced and said to his wife's picture, "I said I'd give her a good listen. Okay?"

  Then.

  Keith, you idiot. Domestic assault. There's that new law. They'll take your gun away, son—they'll put you out to pasture answering phones and force you out of the job.

  Serves you right for being smart enough, or dumb enough, to steal my wife.

  Ex-wife, Broker reminded himself.

  Sonofabitch hit her, she said.

  Some buttons still lit up.

  It took him half an hour to get Kit back to sleep. Then he pulled on his Sorel boots and a jacket and stepped out on the front deck. Unseen, Superior heaved and splashed behind a curtain of fog. Lots of things were up and moving out there in the fog. Like Caren. And if she was coming, Keith wouldn't be far behind.

  12

  Tom abandoned Ida to the mysteries of the curling iron in her steamy bathroom and went home to clean up. Grumbling at the cold, he kicked his VW along Shepard Road, skirting the Mississippi River bluffs. Dawn spiked the eastern horizon, bitter as flint roses.

  Disheveled, his hair uncombed, he tramped up from his parking garage and waited as a load of scrubbed office worker ants unloaded from the elevator. He rode up to the fourteenth floor, walked to his door, stooped, picked up the morning paper, turned the key and went in.

  As he tossed the newspaper on the table, a large manila envelope slid out. The business card was fastened by a squeeze-clasp: THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION. SPECIAL AGENT LORN GARRISON.

  He grabbed the envelope, tore it open and pulled out an eight-by-ten glossy photograph of himself and Caren Angland talking over a horizontal Christmas tree at Hansen's Tree Farm.

  Oh boy.

  His hand went to his phone. Heard the interrupted tone. Message. He tapped in the code for his voice mail. Caren Angland's voice, tight, shaking: "Take some precautions. Keith knows that we met and he's acting very…crazy. He hit me. Call me immediately." She left a number.

  Tom punched in the number and Caren answered on the first ring. "Mrs. Angland? It's Tom James. I just got your message. Are you all right?"

  "No. Where are you?"

  "My place at Kellogg Square, downtown."

  "Go someplace where there are other people, don't stay alone," she cautioned.

  "What's going on?" A cold shiver wrinkled his scalp.

  "If you want a story, I've got one. But I can't talk on the phone. Where will you be in two hours?" She sounded mad. Mad was good.

  Tom's blood pressure climbed a red inch up the roots of his hair. "At the paper."

  "I'll pick you up, out front. Don't tell anyone you've talked to me. Two hours exactly." She hung up.

  He'd barely replaced the receiver in the cradle when three emphatic raps sounded on the door. Caveman knuckles. Angland? Jesus. Could be. Tom stood rooted to the carpet, paralyzed by stage fright. "Who is it?" he croaked.

  "Lorn Garrison, FBI." Southern inflection twanged like a thrown knife.

  Oh boy. Sweating, giddy, Tom turned the knob, opened.

  Lorn Garrison filled the doorway. He had pale blue eyes, a long pouchy face and a tobacco smile under a brown felt hat from a departed era.

  A big guy with a badge and a gun, like Angland; six two, solid, with a white starched shirt riveted to his barrel chest. He wore a heavy olive drab trench coat over a houndstooth sports jacket, a burgundy tie, dark slacks and glossy black wing tips. Fifty plus and fit.

  He extended a calloused, manicured right hand. "Lorn Garrison, good morning Tom, glad to meet you." Garrison wagged Tom in his big hand. "Can I come in?"

  "Ah, sure. Can I see a badge?"

  Garrison flipped open his coat. A badge and ID card were clipped on his belt, along with the patterned grip of a holstered automatic pistol back there. "I'll skip the fore-play," said Garrison. He nodded at the glossy photo. "If you're smart, you'll share some information."

  "You were following me?" Tom flushed, gulped the words.

  The agent stifled a smile. His practiced eye toured Tom's grim efficiency apartment. The chairs and table were cheap seconds from a Futon factory. Unpaid bills cascaded off the desk next to his cheap computer. Garbage wasn't emptied. Flies buzzed.

  Tom took a deep breath and ran his hand through his frizzed hair. With more precision, he said, "You were following her."

  "And we have no idea why she'd reach out to someone like you. Enlighten us."

  "She didn't approach me, I went looking for her," Tom insisted.

  "Sure, Tom. We all got to protect our sources. So what'd she say?" Garrison loomed over him.

  "Let me see your badge and ID again," demanded Tom.

  Garrison placed his broad hand, palm out, on Tom's chest and plopped him back and down onto the couch. "Listen carefully. We checked. You're on probation. You're one fuckup from being tossed out of your job. How you got on to this, I have no idea. But here we are. Now, you can be stupid, in which case you'll be subpoenaed to appear before a federal grand jury, or you can be smart."

  Tom uncluttered his mind of sticky impediments and conceits like the First Amendment, confidentiality, fairness, ethics and the public's right to know. He cleared his throat. "What happens if I'm smart?"

  Garrison's eyes were as sympathetic as an empty patch of prairie sky. "You maybe get some attention, you know, get to be the hot shit reporter you've dreamed of being your whole ordinary, messy little life." He thumped his knuckle on the picture on the table. "So what'daya say."

  You get some attention.

  Jackpot cherries. All lined up. He didn't even hesitate. "I just talked to her on the phone, when you knocked on the door. She's scared. She wants to meet. She says she has a story."

  "Good." said Garrison. He patted Tom on the shoulder. It was patronizing. Tom didn't care. He smelled a deal.

  Garrison smiled. "How'd you like exclusive rights to a story that would get you out of the doghouse."

  Tom sat up straighter. His chest puffed up. "Try me," he said.

  "Can you swim, Tom?" asked Garrison.

  "Sure," said Tom.

  "I hope so, because the water's about to get real deep."

  "Go on," said Tom.

  "Two days ago the federal building emptied out because of a bomb scare. That package was addressed to me, personally. What do you think happened?"

  Tom shook his head. "The bomb squad called it a hoax. There's a rumor about a tongue being in the box the bomb came in. But nobody can confirm that."

  "Not rumor, fact. A male human tongue. They ran tests on it at the lab in Quantico. The return address was the home of a key undercover informant who disappeared three days before the bomb hoax."

  "Why was it addressed to you?"

  "To send me a message. I brought the snitch into town to do a special job. We're assuming his forwarding address is the bottom of the Mississippi."

  "This is St. Paul. Not New Orleans," Tom thought out loud.

  "Same river, except up here it freezes over," said Garrison.

  Tom asked dryly, "What was he working on?"

  Garrison smiled. "Revealing the identity of a dirty St. Paul cop who's helping certain people set up a narcotics distribution network in Minnesota."

  "Angland," Tom said. By Tom James.

  "Don't jump to conclusions, we need proof," warned Garrison, "not talk, not allegations—evidence. Now I know," Garrison paused, "it's a privileged relationship. The sinner and the priest, the dying man and the doctor. The pissed-off wife and the reporter. The problem with pissed-off wives is pissed-off husbands can throw their te
stimony out of court because of this thing called spousal immunity."

  "What's your point?"

  Garrison shrugged. "You go off half cocked and print something you could prejudice an investigation," cautioned Garrison. "But if you help us get the whole thing, you can have the story from the inside. Right now, we're curious what his wife knows and if she's willing to talk to us."

  Tom asked, "These certain people—are they local drug dealers?"

  "No. They're serious organized crime. International."

  "So this is dangerous," said Tom. He stood up straight, like brave.

  "Very. You still interested?" Garrison watched with dubious eyes.

  "Absolutely. Is there any other press on to this?"

  "Nope," said Garrison. "Just you."

  "Keep it like that and you have a deal," said Tom. He extended his hand. Garrison shook it.

  "Look," said Tom, "I don't mean to be rude, but I haven't cleaned up yet and I have to get to work."

  Garrison worried the inside of his cheek with his tongue. He tossed two more business cards on the table. "I'm always in touch with that number," he said. "I can get back to you in ten minutes any time day or night. Let us know the second you connect with her."

  "I understand," said Tom.

  "Do you?" speculated Garrison. "There's some real nasty people mixed up in this. If Caren Angland knows something and is willing to talk, she doesn't want to be on the street. You might impress that on her."

  "I hear you." Like a hole card, he held his knowledge of Caren's alleged beating by her husband close to his chest.

  "I sure hope so," said Lorn Garrison.

  Tom took his time. Leisurely, he slow danced in the shower with The Dream Story that could whisk him to the Pulitzer mezzanine where the suits were all tailored and the elevators were marked Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, or the New York Times.

  Tom understood that, beneath their trappings of arrogance, law enforcement and journalism were privileged systems of barter and gossip. To catch a big story or a big crook, somebody had to squeal on someone.

  So who tipped him.

  Maybe some disgruntled cop who'd worked with Angland. A black cop, maybe, angered by Angland's outrageous remarks. Maybe Garrison himself, grabbing at straws.

  His doughy image in the steamed mirror was an argument for a haircut, for exercise. He saw himself, ten pounds lighter, with a razor cut. He removed his glasses. Contacts maybe. Yeah.

  The problem was how to control the story. The Minneapolis Star Tribune, unlike the anorexic St. Paul paper, would throw money and bodies at something like this. The TV stations would hold high carnival.

  Twenty minutes later, Tom floated into the newsroom, more buoyant than he'd been in years. He smiled so broadly at Ida Rain she barely contained a blush. He sat down at his desk. Barb Luct wasn't in yet. Magnanimously, Tom slipped two twenties from his Mystic Lake winnings into her bottom drawer.

  13

  Outside, another dark, snowless Scandinavian day tapped on the sixth-floor newsroom windows and invited suicides to jump. Inside, Tom struggled to keep from grinning. Call Rush Limbaugh and spread the word. Another overforty, not-quite-dead white male was getting a second wind.

  He imagined Caren Angland in a black dress. A tight black dress. With blond hair and wet red lipstick. A Raymond Chandler fantasy. Very much in trouble. Coming to him.

  In real life, Tom had to read his e-mail. Sometimes he read Ida's e-mail. Figuring out passwords was a little game he played.

  First message. From Ida Rain, being fussy and vertical on the job. Much different from horizontal Ida. Real earthshaking stuff. Re: yesterday's school lunch program story, which you missed. I never got anyone out to cover it so make a call and do it on the phone.

  Another great assignment. Out to lunch by Tom James, staff writer. He disliked his name. Tom and James. Like two first names, as if he didn't have a proper last name. His middle name was Shelle, no help there. He'd changed his byline to his initials, T.S. James, for a while.

  His colleagues started calling him "Tough Shit James," so he tried Thomas, but it sounded stuffy. Tommy came off weak.

  So he was back to Tom.

  He checked his wristwatch again. She'd be out front in about half an hour. His briefcase was ready to go. Pads. Pens, tape recorder, and cell phone all charged up.

  Look busy. No distractions, then, just get up and make his move. The only reason to be in the office was in case she called with a change. Ida's back was to him, perfect as a page out of Vanity Fair; herringbone belted jacket over black slacks. She'd kill him if she knew. God. The FBI. International crime ring.

  Keep busy. He drummed his fingers on his desk and turned to his keyboard. His cursor pecked through the files and selected the one titled Names. He scrolled through notes and pages, revisiting old lists of outlaws. His eyes strained the words for textures. The power of the sounds we call each other.

  Take Jesse James…if his name had been Tom, he'd probably have been a bank clerk. But Jesse—see, it all changed.

  William Bonney.

  Ma Barker.

  Clyde Barrow.

  John Dillinger.

  Cole Younger.

  Pretty Boy Floyd.

  Those people knew from childhood they would lead dangerous lives. Just the sound of their names was like hearing a dare and a taunt.

  And what about Charles Starkweather. No office job kissing politically correct ass for that bad boy. That name had big wrists and big shoulders and was plain scary as an ax handle stained with blood and left out on the frozen prairie.

  Starkweather would cut Ida Rain in half and throw

  the top away. Tom paused. He conjured the image of Caren Angland's top on Ida's bottom. Ouch.

  After outlaws came monsters. He put the name Donner at the head of this list: a place, a family, a particularly evocative American moment. He'd never met anyone named Donner. Just as he'd never met anyone named Hitler.

  But Bundy was a common enough name.

  The monsters didn't have the statuesque phonetics of the outlaws. Ted Bundy sounded normal. Dillinger sounded like bare knuckles.

  Charles Manson.

  The monsters did not answer to their names. Their directions came from a chat room on the moon.

  He'd studied his lists of names until he created one for a fictional hero and alter ego: Danny Storey; gambler, lover. Private eye. He whispered it out loud. The sound fit magically in between the outlaws and the monsters. It sounded decisive. A good name for today. That's when the shadow blocked the overhead fluorescent light, fell across the screen, and a violent kick jarred his chair.

  14

  A sour blast of whiskey breath announced Keith Angland, who bristled over Tom, big as the FBI man, Garrison. But no smooth manner, no manicure. Angland was dressed in dirty blue jeans, scuffed running shoes and a thick charcoal wool sweater under a long dark wool overcoat. His cheeks were flushed and gritty with bronze stubble. Uncombed hair. Wraparound sunglasses hid his eyes, doubling his menace in the December gloom.

  A photo dropped from Angland's hand into Tom's lap. Jesus. More Tom and Caren among the Christmas trees. Tom experienced the disturbing sensation that his spine had turned to ice and was going to slide out his bottom. But this was his ground and Angland was the invader. He struggled up from his chair, licked dry lips, pushed his glasses up on his nose and challenged in a cracked voice:

  "Are you being investigated by the FBI?" In his peripheral vision, Tom caught general motion—reporters' heads jerking up like alerted deer.

  Angland's lips curled in contempt. He sneered and heaved Tom into his computer, a chair clattered over. "Stay away from my wife, you fucking hamster."

  Shocked stares crisscrossed on them from all over the office.

  Ida Rain was quick, out of her chair, moving to con front Angland. But Molly Korne was quicker, appearing out of nowhere. She placed her knuckles where her hips should be if she had hips and announced, "You can't come in here a
nd treat my reporters like this."

  Angland held out his left arm like a bar and firmly moved the women aside.

  God. Everybody was watching them. Him. So Tom stepped protectively in front of Ida and Molly and blurted, "Leave them alone."

  Standoff. Time for dozens of reporters and editors to engrave Angland's demeanor on their memory and for the slow ones to be informed by the fast ones as to his identity. Angland jerked a thumb toward the lobby. "Outside," he ordered.