by Stuart Woods
“That’s the downside,” Wolf agreed.
“Well, it surprises me a little, what I think about that.”
“What do you think?”
“I think I don’t much give a shit if you did whack ’em out.”
Wolf turned to him in surprise. “You don’t care if I’m a triple murderer?”
“I’ll admit, it’s not much of a character reference, but I think that if you did do it, you either had an overwhelmingly good reason, or else it was some sort of temporary aberration. I guess I could live with either of those.”
“You have a forgiving nature, Hal.”
“Not really. But you’ve been my friend almost as long as you’ve been my client, and I need somebody around who can take a first set from me the way you just did. Keeps me on my toes.”
“Thanks, Harold.”
“And since you’re my friend, I’m going to give you the best advice I can muster.”
“Go right ahead.”
“Get a lawyer right this minute and start working on getting yourself out of this mess. I know a couple of hotshots.”
“That’s good advice, Hal, but no. I’m going to finish this movie first.”
“You may be digging your own grave, pal.”
“I may already have dug it,” Wolf replied.
CHAPTER
9
The four of them sat in Wolf’s screening room and watched the cut and scored print of L.A. Days. Jane got up periodically and changed the reels on the big 35mm projectors, and Wolf took an occasional note. The work had taken ten days—longer than Wolf had intended, but less time than ever before, and he was pleased. In the process, he and Jane had learned to work together. They had edited four minutes of the film on their first day, and three times that on their last.
Hal, who had never seen any of the film, had laughed aloud throughout. “Jesus,” he said, “it’s fucking wonderful. It’s Jack’s best work.”
Wolf and Jane exchanged an amused glance. “I’m glad you like it, Hal,” Wolf said.
“I’ll take it to Centurion tomorrow,” Hal said.
“Hang on, we’re not ready yet. I’ve got some notes for Dave and Jane.” Wolf held up a pad. “Ready, Dave?”
“Ready,” Dave replied, producing his own pad.
“In scene sixteen I’d like you to wait a couple of seconds before the strings come in—just at the point where she lifts her wineglass.”
“Good idea,” Dave said. “I can do that and trim without rerecording. What else?”
Wolf consulted his notes. “That’s it.”
“That’s it?” the astonished composer asked.
“The score is unimprovable,” Wolf said with satisfaction. “And brilliant, besides.”
“Jesus, thank you, Wolf,” Dave said. “I’ve never had an experience like this on a film. Maybe we ought to work this way all the time.”
“God forbid,” Jane said. “Now, what have you got for me?”
Wolf consulted the stopwatch in his hand. “I want you to take four minutes out of the film without fucking up Dave’s score. We haven’t got time to rerecord.”
“Four minutes?” she wailed.
“Centurion would ask for it anyway, and they’d be right. It moves just a hair too slowly, and four minutes will trim it to an hour and forty-five minutes exactly. The distributors and exhibitors will love us for it—they can turn over the house every two hours on the hour—I bet we’ll pick up an extra fifty screens on first release.”
“Okay,” Jane said resignedly. “When do we start?”
“You can start now,” he said. “I’ve got to be somewhere.”
“By myself?” Jane erupted.
“You can do it,” Wolf said, squeezing her hand. He didn’t let it go. “You know this movie as well as Jack or I do by now, and you’ve got great instincts.”
“By myself,” she muttered.
“When you’re finished, hand-carry the print to the lab and stand over them until you’ve got an answer print you can live with.” He turned to Hal. “Then you can take it to Centurion. And don’t leave without their signed acceptance.”
When the others had gone, Wolf sat in his study and stared at the telephone. Last chance, he thought. Tell Hal to raise all the money he can, then get in the airplane and head for Mexico—no, Central America, maybe even Brazil—someplace with no extradition treaty. Finally he heaved a deep, fearful sigh and picked up the phone.
“The Eagle Practice,” a woman’s voice answered.
“I’d like to speak to Mr. Eagle,” Wolf said.
“Whom may I say is calling?”
“A friend of Mark Shea. I believe he’s expecting my call.”
There was a moment’s pause and a deep, rich voice drawled, “This is Ed Eagle.” The tones were the pure, oddly accentless speech of the American Indian, almost regardless of tribe.
“Mr. Eagle, I believe Mark Shea called you about me.”
“He did,” Eagle replied laconically. “Who are you?”
“I would prefer not to give you my name until we can meet and see if we can establish a client-attorney relationship,” Wolf said.
“Well, sounds like you’re a lawyer,” Eagle said. “When do you want to come by here?”
“I don’t think it’s wise for me to come to your office at the moment. Could we meet somewhere else privately? After office hours?”
“Why don’t you come out to the house this evening? Say, about seven?”
Wolf looked at his watch: a little before five, and L.A. was an hour earlier. “I’m not in Santa Fe at the moment,” he said. “I don’t think I could make it there much before eleven.” He didn’t want to reach the city until after dark.
“That’ll be all right,” Eagle replied. “I’m usually up late. You know where I live?”
“No.”
“You know Tesuque?” He pronounced it Teh-SOO-kee.
“Yes.”
“Drive past the Tesuque Market, and take your first right. I’m about four miles up the road in the hills. You’ll see the sign on your left.”
“I’ll get there earlier if I can.”
“See you this evening, then, Mr. Willett.”
“Goodbye, Mr. Eagle.” Wolf had already hung up before he realized that Ed Eagle had known his name.
CHAPTER
10
Wolf landed at Santa Fe Airport half an hour after the field closed. Once in the Porsche he became downright paranoid, working his way to the north side of town by back roads and side streets, nearly fainting when a police car pulled up beside him at a traffic light, then ignored him.
He turned right after the Tesuque Market, as instructed, and farther up the mountain found the sign, which turned out to be a life-size bronze sculpture of an eagle, its wings spread wide, a writhing rattlesnake gripped in its claws. The drive climbed for another half mile until the road leveled out at a broad, graveled area before a sizable adobe residence. As Wolf stopped the car, floodlights illuminated the front of the house. He climbed the front steps, but before he could ring the bell, the large carved door made a clicking sound and swung open.
“In here!” a deep voice called from Wolf’s right. He closed the door and walked down the wide central hallway. A round table sat at its center, a big arrangement of desert flowers upon it, and doors opened to the left and right of it.
“Come in,” the voice called, and Wolf turned right into a large study, lit only by a fire in the wide hearth. Ed Eagle rose from one of a pair of huge wing chairs arranged before the fireplace. He was slender, dressed in faded jeans, a chambray shirt, and expensive boots—lizard. He extended a hand. “May I call you Wolf?” He towered over his guest.
Wolf allowed his hand to be enveloped. “Sure.” The guy must be six-five or six-six, he thought.
“I’m Ed. I’m six-foot-seven, plus another couple of inches for the boots. Everybody always wonders.” He waved Wolf to the other chair, smiling a little. “I expect you can use a drink. I’m havin
g a very nice single-malt Scotch whisky.”
“I’ll have the American equivalent,” Wolf said, sinking gratefully into the comfortable leather chair.
“One Wild Turkey coming up. Rocks?”
“Please. Nothing else.”
Eagle went to a serious bar tucked into a corner and came back with the drink, handed it to Wolf, and sat down. “Good flight?”
“Very nice.”
“Sun at your back. The light must have been marvelous this evening.”
“It was. How did you know I flew in?”
“You came from L.A. You own an airplane—a Bonanza, I believe.”
“A B-36.”
“Ah, the turbocharged version. I’ve got a Malibu Mirage out at Capitol Aviation.”
“How did you know I was in L.A.?”
“When a man runs, he usually goes someplace he knows.”
“Why do you think I was running?”
“Why do you need a criminal lawyer?”
“I’m not sure I do.”
“Sure, you’re sure. Let’s not tap-dance, Wolf; it’s tiring.” He took a sip of his whisky and waited. “Well,” he said finally, “why don’t you tell me about it? And you may consider this conversation privileged.”
“I hardly know where to start.”
“At the beginning, please.”
“I don’t really know where the beginning is,” Wolf said, sagging into his chair. He didn’t, Christ knew. At the beginning of his life? When he met Jack? When he met Julia?
“Start the night of the killings.”
“I have no memory of that night; none whatever.”
“Is that what you’re going to say to a jury?”
“You’ve already decided to put me on the stand?” Wolf asked, incredulous.
“I don’t defend against murder charges unless my client will testify. I reckon it’s more in his interests for him to lie to a jury, if he feels he has to, than to refuse to talk to them. In my experience, juries think that’s kind of stand-offish.”
“I see.”
“You will, as we get further along with this. And you’ll agree. What’s the first thing you remember after the killings?”
Wolf started with waking up that morning, told Eagle about the dog, about the flight to the Grand Canyon, about the newspaper, about the day missing from his life.
Eagle listened in silence, sipping his Scotch, nodding encour-agement now and then. When Wolf had finished, he was quiet for a time. “Tell me something,” he said at last. “How well did you know your wife?”
Wolf laughed ruefully. “Not as well as I thought I did.”
“I read the Times piece; did you know about any of that?”
“None of it. I met Julia in a casting session. We were married four months later. Apparently everything she told me about herself was a lie.”
“Well, you probably had no reason to doubt her. Most people believe what they’re told, if it’s at all credible, until they have some reason to think they’re being lied to. I take it she was credible.”
Wolf nodded. “She was. Julia always seemed such an open person. I never caught her in a lie—not even a little one. If anything, she seemed obsessive about not lying. I remember once, some people asked us to dinner—some people she didn’t like much—and she could have said ‘We already have plans,’ that sort of thing, but she said to the woman—I was sitting right there by the phone—‘I think it would be a waste of time for both of us, don’t you?’ And she said it kindly, sympathetically, as if she were doing the people a favor. When she hung up she saw me looking at her, and she said, ’Life is too short to tell anything but the truth.’”
“An admirable attitude,” Eagle said. “One adopted by every con man worth his weight in suckers: get to be known for telling the truth, and the lies will go down like honey.”
“Maybe so, but I never found Julia to be anything but an admirable woman. She was good-natured, considerate, do anything for a friend, do anything for me.” Wolf rubbed his temples. “I feel terrible that, since I read the Times piece, I haven’t let myself think about her for more than a few seconds, and when I do, I don’t seem to feel much.”
“The first stage of grief is denial.”
“But I don’t feel any grief,” Wolf said, shaking his head. “I just feel numb—dead at the center. Since the day after I learned about the shootings, I’ve been cutting a film—completely wrapped up in it—and feeling a lot of affection for a woman I hardly knew a couple of weeks ago. I think I must be insane, or something.”
“That’s always a possibility,” Eagle said. “And it’s not necessarily an inconvenient one.”
“You think I should plead insanity?”
“I think you should see a shrink; then we can talk about it. Were you ever a patient of Mark Shea?”
“Yes, Julia and I both were—me, for a couple of years.”
“Good, that’ll shorten the process; we’ll have an eminent psychiatrist who knows your background and can testify to your state of mind over a long period; Julia’s, too. That could be invaluable.”
“What’s this going to cost me, Ed?”
“A quarter of a million dollars, if we go to trial, and that’s up front. I’ll take a mortgage on something, if you’ve got an unencumbered asset.”
“What about appeals?”
“I’ve never had to appeal a capital case, so if it comes to that, it’s on the house.”
“What’s your opinion of my chances so far? Could I beat a murder charge?”
“Wolf, this is Santa Fe, and everything is done a little differently here. We’re playing by Santa Fe Rules, and that dictates that the first thing I should do is to see if I can work my way through the system to keep you from even being charged. Then we won’t have to beat it. If I can manage that, it’ll only cost you a hundred thousand. I’ll want that tomorrow.”
“Okay, but you didn’t answer my question.”
Eagle shrugged. “She was in bed with two other men,” he said. “That’s a hell of a motive. Looks like you were in the house, too—that’s plenty of opportunity. As for means—well, it was your shotgun, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, one of a pair of Purdeys. What about the unwritten law?”
“The unwritten law doesn’t exist…” he managed a small smile, “except in the minds of a jury—and at least some of them would think that two lovers, present and active, would draw a thick line under the unwritten law.”
“So I’d have at least a chance, you think?”
“Well, let me put it this way,” Ed Eagle said. “If it’s me against the State of New Mexico, it’ll be a fair fight.”
CHAPTER
11
Wolf woke in a pleasant guest room of Ed Eagle’s house. He found his watch—just after seven a.m.—and struggled through a shave and a shower. Feeling better, he found his way downstairs.
Ed Eagle was reading the Wall Street Journal, surrounded by the debris of a finished breakfast and a stack of other newspapers. He looked up. “Morning,” he said. “You feeling better?”
“Rested,” Wolf replied.
“I hope you didn’t mind staying over, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to go back to your house just yet.”
“I understand. It hadn’t occurred to me that I’d have to sleep somewhere in Santa Fe. I didn’t want to expose Mark Shea, and I couldn’t have gone to a hotel.”
“Exactly.” An Indian woman came into the room and waited expectantly. “How about some breakfast?” Eagle asked. “Anything you’d like.”
“Bacon and eggs, orange juice, toast, and coffee, please.”
Eagle nodded at the woman, and she disappeared into the kitchen. When the eggs came, Eagle put down his newspaper. “Eat hearty,” he said. “At nine o’clock we find out whether you’re going to be arrested.”
“How do we do that?”
“We visit the district attorney.”
Wolf had trouble swallowing the first bite of his breakfast.
“Something I need to ask you,” Eagle said. “Didn’t think of it last night, and I don’t want you to be offended.”
“Shoot.”
“Did you and your wife ever go to bed with anybody else? Together, I mean.”
Wolf nodded. “We had a couple of threesomes. Julia always arranged it.”
“With another man or another woman?”
“Always with another woman, although I think Julia was angling for two men.”
“How did you feel about that idea?”
“Uncomfortable.”
“Would it have made you wildly jealous?”
“I’m not a jealous person.”
Eagle nodded. “So you wouldn’t have exploded on finding Julia in bed with Jack?”
“I don’t explode much. Anyway, I think that if I had found Julia and Jack and this other guy, whoever he was, in bed together, I would have thought it was bad manners on Julia’s part, but I wouldn’t have reacted by using a shotgun on the three of them.” He managed a short laugh. “Certainly not one of my Purdeys.”
Eagle laughed, too. “I appreciate your delicacy; I hope the D.A. will, as well. One more thing, and I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important.”
“Shoot.”
“On the occasion of your pair of threesomes, were the third partners different?”
“No, it was the same woman both times.”
“Who was she?”
“Her name is Monica Collins.”
“That rings a bell, but I can’t place her,” Eagle said.
“She lives in Santa Fe; divorced from a big-time independent movie producer named Franklin J. Collins.”
“I’ve got her now: blond, fortyish, Beverly Hills dental work.”
“That’s Monica.”
“Tell me about her.”
“We knew them a little as a couple in L.A., had dinner once at their house. It was shortly after that when the divorce happened. Story was, Monica got their Santa Fe house and a few million—opinions vary on that—and Frank got the L.A. property and the debts.”
