Elias In Love

by Grace Burrowes

  “You’re not having anything to drink?” Derek asked.

  “Had my two cups for the day.” Rather than gag down the insult to the palate that was decaf, Max switched to water thereafter.

  “You’re not human,” Derek said, sipping at something that left foam on his upper lip. He licked it off and set down his cup. “Bonnie will have that coffee pot plugged in and perking by lunchtime if she knows what’s good for her. Speaking of perking, I did you a favor.”

  Derek Hendershot never did anybody any favors, though committing adultery had certainly allowed the former Mrs. Hendershot to depart for Scottish climes with her head held high.

  “I don’t ask for favors, Derek, and generally don’t want them or reciprocate them when they come my way.”

  “That’s what I mean about not being human, or maybe you were playing with your slide rule when the common sense was handed out. Business runs on favors. I know this because business is in my blood.”

  Nepotism was in his blood. Absent his father’s influence, Derek would have little education and less revenue. Daddy Hender-bucks had taken a dim of view Derek fishing off the company dock, though, and Derek had been cut loose to stand on his own two Johnson-and-Murphy shod feet when the marriage had fallen apart.

  “So what’s this favor?” Max asked. “A first-rate single-serve coffee maker for the office might restore you to Bonnie’s good graces.”

  Derek sneered, but with latte foam on his lip, the effect was comical. “Girl needs to get laid, not that I’m in the pity—”

  “Bonnie is an adult, not a girl, and you don’t talk that way about a co-worker in my hearing. I’m in a hurry, so listen up. I could well be moving my office. I’ll know by next week, and the chances are, I’ll turn in a 90-day notice at the end of the month. Plan accordingly, but plan quietly unless you want people to speculate that you’re closing up shop.”

  The office lease was in Max’s name, and had gone month-to-month at the first of the year. If the deal went through with Elias Brodie, a much larger space would be needed to serve as project headquarters.

  Though no space Max chose would be large enough to include an office for Derek Hendershot.

  “Remind me again why I do you favors,” Derek said. “Your timing sucks, Max. I’m barely getting started as a solo, and you pull this shit? Are your boys in Baltimore ditching you?”

  “No, as a matter of fact, and nothing’s final yet. If this deal goes down, it could go down quickly, and you deserve notice.”

  “Notice,” Derek said, draining his cup. “Notice that you’re bailing on a guy who’s made your life a lot easier in the past few months. Paid half of everything, no questions; put up with the legal assistant from hell, no complaints. I’m sorry for your troubles, man, but maybe now you’ll see why favors are a good thing. I’ve pretty much guaranteed that Violet Hughes woman won’t be a thorn in your side ever again.”

  Of all the grand pronouncements Derek might have made, that one hadn’t been on the list of pronouncements Max might have predicted.

  “Violet Hughes merely exercises her rights as a citizen.” She did so at the worst possible times and places, hogging the mike at zoning hearings, rattling off facts and figures that by no means represented the whole land use debate fairly.

  But Violet played by the rules, and Derek… Derek merely played.

  “Violet Hughes would keep this valley sweating behind a team of stinking draft horses,” Derek replied. “That’s what you said after she trashed your last project at the public hearing stage. You’re not the only person who feels that way.”

  Violet Hughes was a problem, of course. Max could and would buy the Hedstrom property, and then came the first major hurdle on the path to developing it: The land had to be rezoned to permit subdivision into residential lots. The risk of buying land speculatively was that the rezoning request could be denied, or take years to resolve.

  Expensive, frustrating years while other developers went forward with their projects.

  “Land use is always subject to debate,” Max said, “and I have to get back to work. What favor have you done me?”

  Derek crumpled up his coffee cup and lobbed it toward the trash receptacle. He missed, and the cup bounced to the floor.

  Max waited a moment for Derek to get up and tend to the mess—the business owner hadn’t been born who wasn’t aware of the risks of a slip-and-fall hazard, even trash on the floor—but Derek stayed in his seat and waved to the barista on duty.

  “I’ll have another double sweet, double whip, large, babe.”

  Her smile should have had Derek backing slowly out the door. “Got it, Mr. Hendershot.”

  “I’m outside counsel for Brethren Amalgamated Insurance,” Derek said, getting out his phone. “So happens I met with my clients last week. We came up with list.”

  Insurance companies were not among Max’s favorite institutions. Many of them were in the something for nothing business—pay them exorbitant premiums for years on end, and when a claim was filed, they dithered around, denied coverage, or jerked the policy on a technicality.

  “Did you check your list twice?”

  “Yes, we did,” Derek said. “If you were more of a businessman, you’d know that every prudent organization is always looking to keep itself in a lucrative posture. In a place like Damson Valley, for an insurance company, that means dumping high risk properties and keeping the low risk properties.”

  “I still think you should get Bonnie a new coffeemaker,” Max said. “The single-serve version so nobody has to make a fresh pot.”

  “Fine. Don’t listen to me, but when good luck comes your way, remember who sent it to you,” Derek said.

  Elias Brodie’s late uncle was on the list of people sending good fortune Max’s way—Max hoped—along with Ned Hirschman and a very few others.

  “I’d rather earn my luck, Derek. You might give that approach a try yourself.”

  “Too much like hard work,” Derek said. “I’d rather work smart.”

  The barrista suffered a coughing fit. Max winked at her, picked up Derek’s discarded coffee cup, and tossed it in the trash. He was half-way across the street when his phone rang, the bank’s main number beaming up at him from the screen.

  * * *

  “That went reasonably well,” Dunstan said.

  Elias walked along beside him, the morning sunshine and damned chirping birds adding insult to injury.

  “I didn’t resort to fisticuffs when you referred to my title, Dunstan, but that doesn’t mean I’ve put the option entirely aside.” The meeting had gone civilly, cordially even, on Mr. Hirschman’s part. It had not gone well.

  “Hirschman is a banker,” Dunstan said, in the same tones he might have referred to a Scotsman who rooted for an English football team. “They are the most risk-averse species on the face of the earth, when it comes to their own interests, though it’s not as if he’d be lending you his personal money.”

  “He’s concerned with personal influence and with personal money,” Elias said, stepping over a large crack in the sidewalk. “With the much greater money to be made on a hundred home mortgages rather than one farm mortgage. He’s also concerned with his position, with the promotion he’ll likely earn if the development is financed through his bank, and the mortgages are added to his portfolio too.”

  Why hadn’t Elias seen this coming? Why had he assumed a small town bank would be interested in holding a relatively low risk note for a large farm? Low risk meant low return, in which few banks were interested anymore.

  “He asked the right questions about lending to you,” Dunstan said. “Turn right, if you’re still intent on filing a police report.”

  “He was probably sniffing about in hopes of lending to my not-for-profit clients,” Elias said, following the uneven sidewalk down another tree-lined street. “The clients I’m neglecting while I’m dodging kamikaze mosquitos in the jungles of Maryland.”

  “What sort of clients, Elias?”
>
  What followed was an oddly comforting business discussion. Dunstan’s law practice was general, though he and Jane each specialized somewhat. Divorces and wills made up a portion of the practice, but so did incorporations, contracts, and civil disputes.

  “I had no idea you were even involved in such goings on,” Dunstan said as they approached the police station. “Do you enjoy it?”

  Interesting question, which nobody had asked Elias previously. “I enjoy when clients listen to me. They usually pay me exorbitant sums in exchange for what is mostly commonsense advice, then ignore the lot of it, and retain me again a year later to tell them why matters haven’t improved.”

  Dunstan held the door to the police station. “Sounds a lot like being a lawyer. At least you’re trying to build something up. We’re often involved in tearing something down—a family, an estate, a business relationship. The criminal defense work is something of an exception, but I always feel as if a social worker on the case ten years previous to my involvement might have spared society and the client a lot of bother.”

  The police station had at one time apparently been a train station. The building was long and narrow with ornate plasterwork. After stating their business to a uniformed officer at the front window, Dunstan and Elias were ushered through a door with a coded lock, and then past a bullpen.

  “They might have made that ticket area a bit homier,” Elias said. “A potted palm or two, maybe a fern. The glass barriers are a bit off-putting.”

  “It’s bullet proof glass, Elias.”

  The officer escorting them gave Elias a tolerant look.

  The bullpen itself reminded Elias of a corner pub. Work progressed with a hum and bustle, the officers yelled to each other across desks and three-quarter height dividers, a copying machine of venerable size thumped out paper over in one corner.

  Elias was unused to seeing guns on display even among law enforcement professionals, while Dunstan was not only at home in this environment, he was apparently welcome.

  “Cromarty,” said their escort, “next time you need to file a stolen property report, send Ms. De Luca with the client. She’s good for morale, when we don’t have to deal with her in court.”

  “She’s good for my morale too,” Dunstan said, “especially when she has a go at one of your rookies. Sergeant Detwiler, this is my cousin, Elias Brodie. He owns the Hedstrom farm, from which we believe livestock having substantial value has been taken.”

  Detwiler was a well-fed, graying specimen who nonetheless looked capable of handling himself well in dark alleys and dim bars. His smile was merry, his eyes watchful.

  “You want forms, we got forms,” Detwiler said, cracking a wad of gum. “What we don’t got is a damned pen that works. MacHugh, lend me a pen!”

  A pen came sailing through the air, which Detwiler caught with his left hand. “In here, gentlemen,” he said, gesturing to a small conference room. “Make yourself at home and we’ll get you squared away in no time.”

  The room was small, windowless, and devoid of decoration. “Do they interrogate suspects here?” Elias asked.

  “Very likely,” Dunstan said, taking a chair, “and probably play hearts at lunch time.”

  The form was simple to fill out, in part because Elias knew very little about the crime. Detwiler slid into a seat opposite Elias and glanced over the finished product.

  “Frederick Mitchell,” Detwiler muttered. “Name rings a bell. That could mean MacHugh dated his sister—MacHugh dates anybody who doesn’t have pending solicitation charges—or it might mean my kid’s third grade teacher was a Mitchell. Fred goddamned Mitchell. Wait here a minute.”

  “Uncle Donald would like him,” Elias said, when Detwiler had left the room.

  “I respect him,” Dunstan said. “His job isn’t easy, nor is it particularly safe or well paid.”

  Being a farmer was less safe. Elias had come across that statistic in his internet travels at some point. The frustration that had followed him from the meeting with the bank resurged, along with a sense of futility.

  “They aren’t likely to find my livestock, are they?”

  “In all honesty, no. The trail is cold, and livestock are easily moved across state lines.”

  Now, Dunstan chose to be honest, now when Elias might have tolerated a ray of optimism in an otherwise rotten morning.

  “Have you ever had to tell Jane you’ve failed her?” Too late, Elias realized that the plain, claustrophobic little room bore the quality of a confessional. Sound lay dead between these walls, and the only light was artificial. The day outside might turn to a raging storm, and in this interrogation room, nobody would know.

  “Violet knew better than you what you were up against at the bank,” Dunstan said. “I doubt she expected you to walk out with a mortgage closing on your schedule. Why not let the castle crumble to ruins?”

  The notion was unthinkable and seductive, both. Elias rose from his chair—the legs of which had been uneven—but the room afforded nowhere to pace.

  “Even if I halted work now, I’d owe a fortune in broken contracts, materials on order, permits, wages earned. Jeannie has uprooted her life and Henry’s to manage the business in my absence. The only sensible path is forward.”

  “Forward, into enormous debt,” Dunstan said. “What would you tell your clients, Elias? Would you tell them to cut their losses, regroup, and choose the farm over the castle, or to liquidate the farm, and along with it, ruin the hopes of the only woman who’s caught your eye in years?”

  “Are you trying to get your face rearranged, Dunstan?”

  Dunstan was spared a reply by Detwiler’s return. “I am not losing my marbles, contrary to Mrs. Detwiler’s second worst fears. Fred Mitchell is wanted for non-support. Kid was born last summer, mama was in non-support court within 90 days, and our boy Freddy is racking up arrears. He failed to appear three times, and a bench warrant has been issued. Father of the year, he is not.”

  “Any priors?” Dunstan asked.

  “DUI, a few years ago, a little too much weed, for which he was given probation. If you own the Hedstrom property, Mr. Brodie, you might want to take a close look around. Never know what might be growing on the back forty.”

  “The back forty acres,” Dunstan translated. “Mr. Mitchell might have traded his alpacas for a crop of marijuana.”

  “My alpacas,” Elias said, incredulity warring with indignation. “You’re implying he might have grown an illegal crop on my land?”

  “I wish I could talk like you guys,” Detwiler said. “Mrs. Detwiler is always reading those books with the headless guys in a kilt on the cover. Don’t go near ‘em myself—my virgin eyes, you know?”

  Detwiler wiggled his eyebrows, while Elias wanted to punch a hole in the wall. “Now I’m growing contraband somewhere on an 800-acre farm, which property I cannot mortgage even for pocket change. Perhaps I’ll turn to a life of crime.”

  “I don’t recommend it,” Detwiler said as Dunstan stashed a copy of the police report into his brief case. “Decriminalization, you know. Takes all the fun and half the profit out of the business. Getting so an honest criminal can barely make a living.”

  Elias could not tell if this lament was in earnest or in jest. “Thank you for your time, officer, and your business advice.”

  Detwiler offered a brisk handshake. “Protecting and serving, that’s me. Cromarty, say hi to the missus. We’ll keep an eye out for Mr. Mitchell. FTA on a non-support for a baby less than a year old… guy is a goddamned dopehead sissy.”

  On that professional summation, Elias shouldered his backpack and followed Dunstan past the locked door, the bullet-proof glass, and out into the mid-day sun. Thank god for good sunglasses, and a slight breeze.

  Chapter Twelve

  * * *

  “What does it do to somebody, to work in environment like that?” Elias asked as he and Dunstan resumed their progress down the crooked, cracked sidewalk. “Interrogation chambers, combination locks on the
doors, cameras in every corner, bullets a constant threat?” How much more gratifying, to stack a hay wagon under the blazing sun, than to endure the conditions the officers accepted as normal.

  “They train for it, and those that can’t take the stress often move on,” Dunstan said. “The courthouse has many of the same security features, but you’re the poor sod who’s rebuilding an entire castle. Stone walls six feet thick are bullet proof, parapets give you the same advantage as surveillance cameras, a portcullis and drawbridge function as effectively as a combination lock.”

  “Remind me again why Zeb sent you to law school?”

  “Because I enjoy analytical thinking, and I wanted to do good while doing well.”

  Modest ambitions, and honorable. Elias still wanted to hit something. “What’s your point, Dunstan? I must somehow tell Violet that I’ve failed her, that the conservation easement is likely the only means of keeping the farm out of Maitland’s hands. That approach will take cash flow miracles and a whisky auction to make workable.”

  “You can’t auction the whisky,” Dunstan said, coming to a halt on the sidewalk. “Every Cromarty on the face of the earth, every Brodie, would pillory you for auctioning that whisky. The ghost of William Wallace would haunt you, and Jane would be properly cheesed off too.”

  And in Dunstan’s world, Jane’s disfavor settled all bets. How enviable, to live such a simple, happy life.

  “I have promised Violet I will not fail her. I have assets, I simply lack cash. It’s a common business problem.”

  Dunstan studied him for a moment, something about the angle of the sun, or the shade dappling his features, creating a resemblance to Elias’s late father.

  “You’re daft, you know that?” Dunstan said. “You’re still carrying your father’s rucksack.”

  “It’s the only thing I have of his that he made himself.”

  “Are those his sunglasses perched on your handsome beak?”