Lou Mason Mystery - 02 - The Last Witness

by Joel Goldman

  She scanned the sign-in sheet, pressed a speed-dial button on her phone, and announced Mason’s arrival. Moments later, Campbell’s secretary, an attractive woman with dark hair and a lavender skirt that had been spray-painted onto her heart-shaped bottom, appeared and told him to follow her. He wanted to tell her to slow down. She ushered him into Campbell’s office with a small flourish of her hand and held his eyes as he nodded his thanks.

  Patrick Ortiz was seated in a chair on the visitors’ side of Campbell’s ornate walnut desk. Campbell stood behind his desk, the phone to his ear. He motioned to Mason to take the chair next to Ortiz and squeezed his thumb and forefinger together to indicate that the conversation would be a short one.

  Mason remained standing, smiled at Ortiz, and shook his hand. They didn’t speak. Mason had nothing to say, and Ortiz was being deferential to his boss.

  Mason looked around the office. There were law books on one wall that Mason was confident Leonard Campbell had never opened; pictures of Campbell with various local dignitaries on another; and Campbell’s framed law school diploma on a third. Mason examined it closely to be certain that Campbell’s degree wasn’t from the Columbia School of Broadcasting. He was annoyed to learn that he and Campbell had gone to the same law school, though Campbell had graduated twenty-five years earlier.

  Campbell finished his phone call, hung up the phone, and greeted Mason.

  “Good to see you, Lou!”

  He was a trim, well-kept man nearing retirement, a neat white mustache penciled in above his upper lip. He shook Mason’s hand with both of his, the left clamped over the right in a firm commitment of fellowship that Mason took as a sign that Campbell was about to screw his lights out. Claire had once warned him that the two-handed shake was the male equivalent of a woman’s air kiss, a gesture of phony intimacy and a warning to keep your hand on your wallet and a close eye on your virtue.

  “Nice to see you too.”

  “Have a seat.”

  “I don’t think I’ll be here that long.”

  Campbell gave him the toothy grin he reserved for voters. “You might change your mind after you hear what we’ve got to say.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Patrick tells me that we’ve got your client dead to rights. No sense in putting the taxpayers through an expensive trial. We’ve got a proposal for you. Let your client put this whole thing behind him, do his time, and start over while he still has something to look forward to.”

  “Patrick is too good a lawyer to have told you that you’ve got my client dead to anything. Your case sucks.”

  “Your client’s skin and blood were found under the victim’s fingernails. The victim threatened to shut his bar down, and your client responded by threatening to kill him. And, he doesn’t have an alibi.”

  “My client stopped Jack Cullan from beating the crap out of his date. The rest is trash talk. You can’t even put my client at the murder scene. The only deal you should be offering me is a dismissal and an apology in return for a promise not to sue your ass.”

  Campbell smiled again and nodded at Ortiz.

  “We can put him at the scene,” Ortiz said.

  Mason looked at Ortiz, knowing he wouldn’t bluff on something like that. It would be too easy for Mason to call him on it.

  “What have you got, Patrick?”

  “Your client’s fingerprints on Cullan’s desk in the study where the maid found his body. Still think my case sucks?”

  Mason refused to be baited. He needed to talk to Blues. “I’m obligated to convey any offer you make to my client. You’re still a long way from home on this case and we all know that.”

  Campbell chuckled. Mason wanted to sew his lips shut.

  “We’ll accept a plea to second-degree murder and we won’t make any recommendation on the sentence. Your client will probably be sentenced to twenty years to life and be paroled in seven years.”

  “That’s not much of a deal. Even with the fingerprints, second degree is the worst that he’s likely to be convicted of on your best day in court. This isn’t the kind of deal that will make anybody lose any sleep if we turn it down.”

  “This is our best and only deal. It’s on the table until the preliminary hearing. After that, we go to trial. Believe me, this deal is in everyone’s best interests.”

  “Including yours? Is that what Ed Fiora told you?”

  Campbell’s face purpled, his eyes narrowing. Ortiz jumped in before he could answer.

  “You’re way out of line!”

  “We’ll see. In the meantime, be careful you don’t step in your boss’s shit bucket.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Twenty minutes later Mason was in a visitor’s room at the county jail with Blues.

  “They found your fingerprints in Cullan’s study. On his desk.”

  Blues showed no emotion. He didn’t curse and he didn’t deny.

  “Did you hear what I said? Patrick Ortiz told me they found your fingerprints. They can put you in Cullan’s house the night he was killed.”

  “I wasn’t there.”

  “Fine. I’ll tell them that. I’m sure they’ll just throw the fingerprints out. That will take care of everything.”

  “I wasn’t there that night or ever.”

  Mason studied Blues as he spoke. There was no artifice, no subtle tics borne of a liar’s stress. There never had been with Blues. Mason couldn’t think of a single time that Blues had ever lied to him. About anything. Blues knew it would do him no good to lie now. Just as it would do Ortiz no good to lie. They couldn’t both be telling the truth.

  Mason shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe the forensics people just made a mistake. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “If that’s supposed to make me feel better, it doesn’t. I told you they want me for this. They’ve got to make it be me.”

  “I don’t buy it. I don’t care what happened between you and Harry. I don’t buy it.”

  “Doesn’t matter if it is Harry. You’ve got to go after all of them. If you don’t, I’m a dead man.”

  Mason sighed, feeling the walls close in on him as if he were the prisoner. “Campbell offered you a deal. Second degree, no recommendation on sentencing, out in seven years.”

  “No.”

  “I know. I told Campbell that was the worst that you would get in a trial. Campbell said it’s the best deal you’ll get and that it’s off the table once the preliminary hearings starts.”

  “No deals, Lou. Tell Campbell to go fuck himself. Tell him today—now. I don’t want that punk bitch to believe I’m even thinking about it.”

  Mason called Patrick Ortiz after he left the jail. “My client says he’ll take a pass on your deal.”

  “Have a nice life,” Ortiz said, and hung up.

  “Yeah,” Mason said to the dead phone. “Whatever is left of it.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  New Year’s Eve fell on a Monday. No one had tried to kill him since Blues had turned down the prosecutor’s plea bargain. Mason didn’t know whether that was just luck or whether thugs took off the week between Christmas and New Year’s.

  He sat at his desk late in the afternoon gazing out the window onto Broadway. It was a slate-gray day, the sky nearly the same color as the pavement. It was hard to tell where one ended and the other began. Black ice made of frozen slush and grime was pocketed along curbs and buildings. It hadn’t snowed in two weeks, but it hadn’t been warm enough to melt the hard-core remnants of the last storm.

  The week before, Mason took Mickey to visit Blues so they could discuss the plans for New Year’s Eve. Mason explained to Mickey that he could go by himself, but Mickey declined, telling Mason that jail was a place you should never go without someone who knew how to get you out.

  “I’ve got a terrific idea for New Year’s,” Mickey told Blues.

  Blues raised his eyebrows, doubting whether Mickey was capable of such a thought.

  “It’s a bar,” Blues said. �
��I’ve got Pete Kirby’s trio booked already. I’ve lined up extra bar and kitchen help. All you have to do is keep the booze and the food moving.”

  Mickey waved both hands in protest. “No, no, no. You’ve got it all wrong. This is an opportunity, a huge opportunity. We bill the night as a benefit for your legal defense fund. It’ll be a knockout.”

  He looked back and forth at Blues and Mason, who both shook their heads. “No fund-raiser,” Blues said.

  “Not a chance,” Mason added.

  “Okay, okay. Plan B. You guys will love this. We do a murder mystery. You know, hire actors to stage a murder. Involve the people in the bar in solving the crime. Plant clues, stuff like that. Reveal the killer at midnight. I’m telling you guys, it will be fantastic!”

  Blues had pressed his hands against the glass separating prisoners and visitors like he wanted to reach through and strangle Mickey.

  “Just say hello to the people when they come in, take their money, and don’t fuck it up.”

  Mickey overcame his anxiety of going to the jail by himself, shuttling back and forth, pleading with Blues to approve one scheme after another. Blues finally told him that if he came back again, the guards would arrest him.

  Today, Mickey called Mason a dozen times with last-minute pleas to approve one off-the-wall idea after another. Mason had said no to the first ten and hung up on the last two.

  He spent the rest of the day going over his notes for the preliminary hearing. He didn’t think Patrick Ortiz would reveal anything more about his case than was necessary to convince Judge Pistone to bind Blues over for trial. The evidence of Blues’s fingerprints at the scene would be more than enough.

  Mason had listed the witnesses he expected Ortiz to call on the dry-erase board. The maid would testify that she had found Cullan’s body. The coroner would testify to the cause of death. Beth Harrell or Pete Kirby would testify about the fight at the bar and Blues’s threat. Harry Ryman would testify about his investigation. A forensics investigator would testify about the fingerprints.

  Mason had no evidence to work with. The last two weeks had yielded nothing that changed the core facts of the case. Judge Pistone would find probable cause to believe that Blues had murdered Jack Cullan. The press would have a field day, its monstrous appetite satisfied for the moment. Leonard Campbell would smile into the cameras on the courthouse steps and boast about doing the people’s business. The image made Mason want to puke.

  The phone rang again. He let it ring twice before picking it up.

  “Listen, Mickey,” he said. “Just do it the way Blues told you. It’s not a carnival.”

  Rachel Firestone said, “What’s not a carnival? Who’s Mickey and what did Blues tell him to do? Are you planning a New Year’s Eve jailbreak? Tell me what time and I’ll get a photographer over there.”

  “Shit. I told him not to call me at work. You reporters are too clever. I knew you’d figure it out.”

  “I’ll make certain it’s front-page, above the fold. All seriousness aside, what’s going on?”

  “Mickey is running the bar while Blues is on vacation. He’s been driving me crazy all day wanting to turn it into the Circus Maximus for New Year’s. I figured it was him.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you.”

  “You didn’t. What’s on your mind?”

  “New Year’s Eve. What else? You have any plans?”

  “It’s against my religion. Besides, what happened to your girlfriend the rugby player?”

  “Fear of commitment.”

  “Hers or yours?”

  “Mine. I figured you would be the perfect date. I’m on the rebound and I don’t like guys. Who could be safer for a girl at the peak of her vulnerability?”

  “You make it sound irresistible, but I think I’ll pass. I’m not in a party mood.”

  “I haven’t told you about the party yet. You might change your mind.”

  “Okay, where’s the party?”

  “The Dream Casino. Invitation only and I’ve got one. Does your tux still fit?”

  Mason perked up. He doubted that Ed Fiora would talk to him about Cullan’s murder, but he figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. The worst Fiora could say was no. The preliminary hearing was in two days and Mason needed something. He couldn’t think of any reason not to try and get it from Fiora, except for Tony Manzerio. Mason didn’t think Fiora would whack him in the middle of his casino on New Year’s Eve in front of hundreds of witnesses.

  “I don’t own a tux, but I’ve still got my bar mitzvah suit. Will that be formal enough?”

  “Perfect. I’ll pick you up at nine o’clock.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Rachel rang Mason’s doorbell at exactly nine. He finished smoothing out the knot in his tie before he opened the door.

  “Man-O-Manishewitz!” Mason said.

  Rachel swirled into the entry hall wearing a full-length mink coat. She slipped one arm effortlessly out of her coat, letting it slide down the other into a pile on the floor, revealing an off-the-shoulder, above-the-knee, black sheath that clung to her body as if she were born with it on. Hands on her hips, she bumped to the right, then grinded to the left, the light reflecting off the diamonds and gold on her wrist, ears, and neck.

  “Am I not fabulous?”

  “Fabulous doesn’t come close. You’re going to break every heart in the place. The men will die because they can’t have you and the woman will hate you because they don’t know they’re the only ones with a chance.”

  “Trust me. The right ones will know.”

  “What? You have a secret handshake?”

  “Can’t tell you. That’s what makes it a secret.”

  “How do you afford all this glory on a reporter’s salary?”

  “I’m different.”

  “Why? Because you’re gay?”

  “No, because I’m rich. Let’s go.”

  Casinos are built on the myth that luck lies in the next roll of the dice; the optimism that prosperity is in the next card and not just around the corner; and the greed of human beings dying to spend the rent money to cash in on something for nothing. Casinos sell euphemisms by the pound. Gambling is gaming. Blackjack dealers are buddies, and losers are high rollers.

  But the house is not a home. Mason had represented a string of people who’d put their faith in hitting on sixteen and hit the skids instead. Some went home and beat their wives and kids. Some stole from their employers to cover their losses. Some went to liquor stores to buy something to make them forget, stealing it instead.

  Mason didn’t blame the casinos. They didn’t round people up at gunpoint and make them empty their pockets. The casino owners, from the entrepreneurs like Ed Fiora to the shareholders of the publicly traded companies like Galaxy, knew there was a lot of money to be made in the stuff of dreams. Winning big was the American dream writ large.

  The lobby of the Dream Casino was carpeted in deep red and gold, the walls papered in a soothing creamy shade, and the whole area lit by cascading floodlights. Above an arched entryway to the casino, images of demographically correct winners were plastered on the wall. Three couples—one white, one black, one Hispanic—were locked in ecstatic embraces as poker chips rained down on them. The casino’s slogan made the point. “Take a Chance! Make Your Dream Come True!”

  Mason and Rachel joined the crowd of people thick with fur coats and jewels. Her eyes glittered more than her diamonds, and her red hair shimmered like woven rubies. He shook his head, mourning the loss of Rachel to heterosexual men, himself in particular.

  Hidden fog machines spewed white clouds in the path of the partygoers, creating a mystical sensation as they entered the casino. They might not have been walking into a dream, but the effect was like passing into another world.

  “Can you believe this?” Rachel asked Mason once they emerged from the clouds. “It’s a hundred and fifty thousand square feet; one of the biggest casino floors outside of Vegas and Atlantic City. Look at the people!” />
  Thousands were jammed hip to elbow as far as Mason could see. Rachel may have had an invitation, but judging from the crowd, everyone else in town had one too, except for him. The crowds around the tables were so deep that the players had disappeared from view. The only open areas were in the pits, where pit bosses patrolled under the watchful eyes of the hidden cameras that ran the length and width of the casino.

  Every person who entered a casino was videotaped from the moment he or she arrived until the moment he or she left. The only places that cameras weren’t allowed were the bathrooms, and security guards checked them on a regular basis.

  Rachel said, “I’m going to check my coat and wander. I’ll meet you back here at midnight. Have fun.”

  There was a bank of slot machines to his right, each one singing out its electronic siren call. Bells and whistles begged the players for more money. Women wearing thousand-dollar designer dresses sat on stools in front of the slots, padded gloves on their right hands to avoid calluses from pulling the handle, plastic buckets in their laps to collect their winnings, whooping and hollering as the slots paid off.

  Mason plunged into the crowd. He nodded and smiled at a few familiar faces and pretended not to notice those who stared at him a little too much.

  A woman planted herself in his path, her platinum hair piled as high as her dress was cut low. The breasts of a well-endowed twenty-year-old poured out of her gown, the rest of the woman a good thirty years older. He tried to look away, but the press of other bodies around them made it impossible.

  “Got ‘em for Christmas, so might as well unwrap ‘em,” the woman told Mason as she cupped her hands under her breasts. Her speech was slurred and her stride was unsteady, her breasts the only things keeping her anchored.

  “Deck the halls.”

  “Deck this, sweetie,” she told him as she grasped his groin, laughed, and moved on to find her next grope.

  Mason wedged himself into a blackjack table long enough to win two hundred dollars, giving up the chair before it turned cold. He sliced his way through the crowd until he reached a wall of private poker rooms. Tony Manzerio, wearing the largest tuxedo ever made, stepped out of the room to Mason’s left, forcing the crowd to go around him and trapping Mason against the wall.