In for a Ruble

by David Duffy

  “So you know her?”

  “Sure. There’re a handful who’re pretty damned good at what they do, as much as we hate to say so. She’s one. Smart, tough, opinionated. Her approach is all or nothing, takes no prisoners. She works on big corporate deals—mergers, acquisitions, restructurings. Every transaction is either going to remake the entire landscape of corporate America or end capitalism as we know it, depending on which side is paying her. She charges a fortune—six, seven, eight hundred bucks an hour. Like a big-time lawyer. That’s another reason we can’t stand flacks—jealousy.” He laughed.

  “Anything I should watch out for?”

  “Get ready for a fight if you disagree. And she and truth—I’d say they’re more acquaintances than friends.”

  I was a block from the Bleecker Street subway station when I passed Ballato’s, a timeless old-school Italian restaurant. I was still running early, and the smoked salmon sandwich had ceased to satisfy, so I enjoyed a plate of fried calamari and a fortifying vodka before resuming my journey uptown to meet one of capitalism’s soldiers of fortune.

  * * *

  Third Avenue was busy at the end of the workday. Traffic crawled between the lights. Lines queued for the commuter buses to the Bronx and Queens. People walked quickly, hurrying home to their families, eager to get out of the cold. I didn’t feel part of it. My workday wasn’t over and I had no one to go home to. I’d held myself to a single drink at Ballato’s. Maybe, if I was lucky, one of Julia Leitz’s all-important deals would blow, she’d stand me up, and I could retreat to another saloon.

  Something had been tugging at me in the empty restaurant, something I was overlooking, but I couldn’t grab hold of it. Perhaps only that a day spent with a crushed Marianna Leitz, a terminally ill Jenny, and a hamstrung Stern left me unsettled. Never mind Andras’s and Irina’s bank accounts. I was delving into all kinds of problems that weren’t mine and couldn’t do a damned thing about. Except make them worse if I discovered one of the Leitzes had conspired to undercut their brother. Julia Leitz didn’t promise to break the mold.

  It had taken a minute to peg the guy following me when I came out of Ballato’s. I’d all but forgotten about the gray Camry until I crossed Houston and saw a balding man sitting in the big window of a pool hall on the far side, looking out. He held a folded tan overcoat in his lap. He probably thought the dim light of the billiard parlor provided the perfect cover. He hadn’t counted on the streetlight directly above his head. I couldn’t be sure he was the same guy who’d been in Bedford, but I wasn’t about to bet against it. His face and clothes said he was American. Nothing about him, starting with competence, said he was working for Nosferatu. Still, he had to be working for someone.

  I kept walking, down the stairs of the Bleecker Street station. He followed a minute later. When the train came, I got on, and he did as well, the car behind mine. At Fourteenth Street, I waited until the doors started to close and hopped off. He wasn’t fast enough. I was tempted to wave as he passed. I climbed back to the street and caught a cab uptown. I’m not sure why I bothered—except old habits die hard.

  Julia Leitz’s building was one of dozens of similar Third Avenue structures, mediocre, knockoff international-style skyscrapers, all equally forgettable. I didn’t bother to look for Tan Coat. He would know my destination or not. I showed my driver’s license to the lobby guard and took the elevator to the sixteenth floor. Maroon letters announced THE LEITZ GROUP in flowing script. The receptionist had gone home, but a harried-looking young man answered when I buzzed and led me through the halls and cubicle clusters to a corner office with two secretaries’ desks outside. The place was still busy with the sounds of keyboards, phones, TVs, printers, and voices. The staff was young—twenties and thirties. Unlike her brother’s shop, these kids were fully dressed, some even wore skirts and ties. Most had the same harassed look as the man who’d let me in.

  I waited at a respectful distance while the kid stuck his head in his boss’s door. He recoiled as Julia Leitz’s twang blew out. They could have heard her back in Queens.

  “SHIT! I DON’T HAVE FUCKING TIME FOR THIS. WE’RE ALREADY GOING ALL FUCKING NIGHT. I TOLD HIM TO CALL. WHY DIDN’T HE FUCKING CALL, GODDAMMIT? WHY DIDN’T HE CALL?”

  I stepped around the young man into the office. He shouldn’t have to answer for my sins.

  “He didn’t call because he forgot,” I said quietly. “He apologizes. No harm done, at least not to him. If this is not a good time, he can come back later—or perhaps tomorrow. I’ll tell your brother you were busy.”

  Julia Leitz sat behind a table-desk strewn with papers. A flat screen held down one corner, three more behind her head. The furniture, prints, carpeting, and curtains were all decorator neutral, without personality, conveying nothing. The woman behind the desk was plump, but not overly so, and dressed in a white blouse open at the neck. She was neither attractive nor not. Bags under her eyes indicated she lived the lifestyle she espoused. She took a big swallow from a glass next to a Diet Pepsi can. I don’t know whether the mention of her brother changed her mood or temperamental outbursts ran in the family, but she seemed to cool as I stood there.

  “That’s okay,” she said, standing. “It’s been a long day. Going to be a long night. Sit down. Later won’t be any better.”

  She came around her desk and took an upholstered chair. She wore a black skirt beneath the white blouse and black shoes without heels. I sat in a matching chair across a glass coffee table.

  “I won’t waste your time,” I said. “I’m here on your brother’s behalf. I want to know about some people—perhaps a man and woman, stating they were lawyers—who might have come to see you a few weeks ago.”

  “Who else have you spoken with?” Her tone was aggressive, she was on the attack. For no reason that I could see.

  “Your sister and brother-in-law. And Jenny. I’m seeing Thomas tomorrow.”

  “Don’t believe anything they tell you.”

  One more manifestation of Leitz family closeness. Remembering my reporter-friend’s admonition, I passed on the opportunity to disagree. But I did ask, “Why not?”

  “Thomas hates me. Hates Sebastian too. He’s jealous. Always has been. He doesn’t make a dime, and he spends like a drunken sailor. Probably spends on drunken sailors. Anyone who’s successful, anyone with a real job, who does something important, we’re a target.” She leaned back and crossed her arms, resting her case.

  I wanted to ask if she believed teaching was unimportant, but I said, “And Marianna?”

  She waved a hand dismissively. “You’ve seen her, you know.”

  Sympathy, it appeared, was something else Julia Leitz was only distantly acquainted with.

  “You did get a visit? A man and a woman? Lawyers?”

  “Yes. About a month ago. I’ve got a card here somewhere.” She went to her desk and dove into the papers.

  “SHEILA! HERE NOW!”

  A thirty-something woman appeared at the door.

  Julia said, “Those lawyers that came here last month, right in the middle of the Asco deal, remember? No notice. Not anything we were working on, something about Sebastian…”

  “I remember.”

  “They left a card.”

  “Got it,” the woman said.

  She disappeared and came back thirty seconds later. She handed a card to Julia who passed it over to me. Same one I’d received from Marianna.

  “Need anything else?” Julia said. “I’ve got calls…”

  “Yes, I do,” I said. “Just a few minutes. Can you describe them?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What did they look like? What did they say?”

  “Oh. Ordinary. Lawyers. They asked questions about Sebastian. Some kind of background check. Related to the network deal. I told them what they wanted to know. I was in a hurry. Asco was a huge transaction, biggest merger ever in the human resources software space. A game-changer, but not a marquee business, hard to get attention.
We landed the front page of the Journal.”

  She leaned back once more, basking.

  Marianna, drunk, emotionally devastated, tells them nothing. Julia, one could argue the more sophisticated, at least professionally, pays no attention, buys the cover story because they look the part, they’re familiar in her world, and spills the beans—to the extent she had beans to spill.

  “What was that—what they wanted to know?”

  “Is this really important? They were checking him out. He’s trying to buy two TV networks. No one’s ever done that before. Due diligence is part of the process. Just came at an inconvenient time, like I said.”

  “What did they want to know?” I pressed, trying to break through her need to bring everything back to herself.

  “They asked questions about our family, our parents, where we came from, that kind of thing.”

  “They ask about the layout of your brother’s trading floor?”

  “I don’t remember. I don’t think so. Why?”

  “It didn’t occur to you, this was all information they could’ve gotten elsewhere—or why they needed to know?”

  “What are you implying?”

  “I’m trying to get a fix on these people. I’m not sure they were who they claimed to be.”

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN? DO YOU THINK I’M NAÏVE?”

  “I’m just asking questions.”

  “The law firm was legit. I checked the Web site. Called the office.”

  “Talk to anyone?”

  Pause. Realization dawning. “Yes.”

  “A receptionist and a recording?”

  “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU SUGGESTING?”

  “You were conned, I’m afraid.”

  “BULLSHIT. I checked the Web site. Here.” She went to her desk, typed on the keyboard, and swiveled the flat screen toward me. “Look.”

  “It’s a Web site, all right, hosted somewhere in Eastern Europe.”

  “HOW THE HELL DO YOU KNOW THAT?”

  “I get paid to know. You describe your brother’s office to them?”

  “NO! I told you. Why would I do that?”

  “Because they asked.”

  Her face turned bright red. The decibels jumped. “GET OUT! I’m calling Sebastian right now.”

  “Call ahead.”

  I sat still while she played the bluff as long as she could, all the way through ten digits of the phone number, before she replaced the receiver. She moved papers around the desk, struggling to keep her temper under control. I’d stepped over the line, a couple of lines—I probably shouldn’t have stopped for the vodka—but I didn’t care. Three head cases and a death sentence in one day was too much.

  “What do you want?” she said.

  “Have you lent your brother Thomas money?”

  “What’s that have to do with anything?”

  “He spends like a drunken sailor. Your words, not mine. Have you lent him any money?”

  “No.”

  “How about your husband? Would he?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Would you know?”

  “YES, GODDAMMIT, OF COURSE I WOULD KNOW. WHY WOULDN’T I KNOW?”

  She shoved more papers. She looked at all four flat screens and clicked her computer mouse. “I’ve got eighty-five new e-mails…”

  Once again, the subject of Walter Coryell hit a nervous nerve. This time, with his wife. It might have been her confrontational attitude, it might have been because she was married to the guy, but this time I didn’t back off.

  “Did the people who came to see you talk to your husband?”

  She stopped shoving papers and thought for a moment. The first time she’d taken time to think since I arrived. “Walter’s very busy. He’s got his own company—highly successful. He’s out of town right now. He travels a lot on business.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question.”

  “I don’t know. I doubt it.”

  “But you don’t know for sure.”

  “Is this really important?”

  “Why didn’t you attend your brother’s wedding?”

  “What?”

  “Why didn’t you and your husband attend your brother’s wedding?”

  “What’s that have to do with this?”

  “Just a question.”

  “I have work to do.” She grabbed her computer mouse and shoved it across the desk. The phone rang.

  “That’s your conference call,” Sheila said through the door.

  Julia Leitz reached for the phone and stopped and looked at me. I waited while it rang.

  “I have to take this call.”

  “Saved by the bell.”

  “What the hell does that mean? I have to take this call.”

  I stood. “I’m sure the whole damned deal depends on it.”

  * * *

  Third Avenue was quieter now. The cold air felt good. I was annoyed with myself. Julia Leitz got under my skin. The whole family pissed me off. I felt sympathy for Jonathan Stern, not necessarily a sympathetic guy. How did levelheaded, smiling Jenny Leitz put up with this lot? How would she manage when her illness really took hold? I would have locked them all in a single Lubyanka cell and thrown away the key.

  I looked around for Tan Coat, but he was nowhere in sight. Maybe he hadn’t guessed my destination—or was learning better technique. I flipped a mental coin. Heads—find a quiet tavern. Tails—skip the tavern, go home, eat a Spartan dinner, and go to bed. Plenty to look into in the morning. In my mind’s eye, the coin landed on the sidewalk, rolled along a crease in the concrete and disappeared into a sewer drain. On par with the rest of the day.

  Bar and dinner could wait. I walked to Grand Central, rode the Lexington Avenue Express between Fourteenth and Fifty-ninth Streets a few times to give Tan Coat a chance to show himself. When he didn’t, I switched at Fifty-ninth to the N to Queens. The first stop across the river put me at Queensboro Plaza. I walked a few minutes to the block of Twenty-second Street between Fortieth and Forty-first avenues, the headquarters of YouGoHere.com, Walter Coryell’s company.

  CHAPTER 15

  An empty commercial block in an empty commercial neighborhood. Five-story brick and concrete buildings on one side held warehouses, electricians, cabinet makers, a lighting manufacturer, and more than a few empty spaces for rent. The single- and double-height structures opposite were home to an auto repair shop, a refrigeration company, a metal fabricator, and one small apartment conversion, if the satellite TV dishes outside three of six windows were any indication. No delis, restaurants, or bars, unless you counted the “gentlemen’s club” near the subway offering the opportunity of meet one of Tiger Woods’s mistresses up close and personal. Hardly a service industry neighborhood. Definitely not a successful dot-com neighborhood.

  Number 40-28 stood midblock and won the contest for most peeling paint and FOR RENT signs. Roman numerals on the concrete cornice broadcast the date of construction as MDCCCVII—a few years after the classical era. The door was steel with a small, reinforced glass window. Empty tiled vestibule behind. An intercom by the door had a dozen buzzers with yellowed signs. The only one ending in “.com” was YOUGOHERE. I pushed it and got no response. I pushed again with the same result. The elevator at the far end of the vestibule opened, and a middle-aged black guy with a graying mustache pushed open the front door.

  “Hey,” I said, “I’m looking for the guy at YouGoHere, supposed to meet him at seven thirty.” I guessed at the time.

  “Good luck to you, man. Ain’t never seen that dude. Go on up and take a look, that’s what you want.”

  I thanked him as he walked into the night.

  A slow elevator with a worn-out cab deposited me on the third floor at the head of a short cinderblock corridor with four steel doors. Three had signs. None said YouGoHere. The unlabeled door was sandwiched between the elevator and a space labeled GROARK CUSTOM FRAMERS. I knocked. No answer. I tried the other three with the same result. My watch said 7:55. The hell with
it.

  Back downstairs, I crossed the street to see if there were lights in any of the windows. None. A wasted trip, but hadn’t I expected that?

  I remembered a first-rate Italian restaurant, another old-style New York institution, a half-dozen blocks away. I’d been taken there a few years before and thought more than once about returning. The tug of a vodka martini and a good Bolognese sauce was setting up another mental coin toss when headlights turned into the block. Instinct pushed me into a dark doorway. The lights swept the parked cars, and motion caught my eye—a head ducking, a moment too late, behind the windshield of a Chevy sedan. Could have been a trick of the lights, but I stepped farther back into the darkness. No way Tan Coat could have followed me here—and certainly not in a car. A black Cadillac Escalade rolled to a stop outside number 12. The driver kept the engine running. Nobody got out. I didn’t move.

  Five minutes passed. Then another five.

  My muscles started to ache mildly, but waiting is an acquired skill, one I’d learned, along with every other Russian, as a kid. No more movement from the car down the block.

  A flash of fire in the SUV as the driver struck a match. The flame illuminated a blood-drained face as it lit a cigarette held by misshapen teeth.

  The spectral driver drawing on the smoke was Nosferatu.

  * * *

  The music was coming from my apartment. Only two to the floor, one at each end of the hall, the elevator in the middle. My door was ajar. Loretta Lynn, I was pretty sure, backed by steel guitar, bass and drums, floated in my direction. She was singing about being true to her man while he’s gone—if he doesn’t overdo it. I like Loretta—but I don’t own any of her records. No question, though, she was on my stereo. My first thought was that I’d been followed, but Loretta didn’t seem Nosferatu’s style.

  Almost ten o’clock. Nosferatu had smoked his cigarette, then two more. He’d made two calls on his cell phone. I didn’t move a muscle the entire time. No one else came down the block, vehicle or pedestrian. The guy in the other car, if there was a guy in the other car, stayed out of sight. After the third smoke, Nosferatu climbed out and went into the building using a key to open the front door. I watched the windows on the third floor. No light came on. Coryell could have drawn curtains or shades. Nosferatu could be doing his work in the dark. He could be visiting someone else altogether. Still no movement at the car down the block. Ever so slowly, I got out my phone and tapped Coryell’s number, not sure what I’d say if anyone answered. No one did. After a handful of rings I got a recording.