Guardian Angel

by Sara Paretsky

  It was a rehearsed speech, delivered quickly and without warmth because of the coldness of the audience. Michael bowed slightly, first in the direction of our box, then to Or’. The two seated themselves. Michael tuned his cello, then looked at Or’. At her nod they began to play.

  Max was right. The concerto bore no resemblance to the atonal cacophony of Or’s chamber music. The composer had returned to the folk music of Jewish Eastern Europe to find her themes. The music, forgotten for five decades, came to life in fits and starts as cello and oboe made tentative passes at each other. For a few poignant minutes they seemed to find each other in a measured antiphon. The harmony shattered abruptly as antiphon turned to antagonism. The instruments fought so fiercely that I could feel sweat on my temples. They built to a frantic climax and broke off. Even this nonmusical audience could hold its breath when they paused at that peak. Then the cello chased the oboe from terror to peace, but a horrible peace, for it was the repose of death. I gripped Lotty’s hand, not making any pretense of dashing away my tears. Neither of us could join in the applause.

  Michael and Or’ bowed briefly and disappeared from the stage. Although the clapping continued for some minutes, with more enthusiasm than had greeted the Don Quixote Variations, the response lacked the vital spark that would have shown they’d got the point. The musicians didn’t return, but sent out the children’s choir for the set that concluded the concert.

  Like Lotty, Max had been shaken by his son’s recital. I offered to get the car at once, but they felt they had to stay for the reception.

  “Since it’s in Theresz’s honor, it would look strange if Max wasn’t there, especially as Michael is his son,” Lotty said. “If you want to leave, though, Vic, we can take a cab home.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “I’ll keep an eye out for you—you give me a signal when you’re ready to go.”

  “But you might see Dick again—could you stand the excitement?” Lotty strove to steady herself with sarcasm.

  I kissed her cheek. “I’ll manage.”

  That was the last I saw of her for some time. The minute the concert ended a crush of people poured into the stairwells. When Max, Lotty, and I finally struggled into the upper foyer, we were immediately separated by the throng. Instead of fighting my way through the mob to rejoin them I went to the balustrade and tried following their progress. It was hopeless: Max tops Lotty’s five feet by only a few inches. I lost sight of them within seconds of their reaching the main floor.

  During the second half, caterers had set up shop in the lobby. Four tables, formed into an enormous rectangle, were covered with staggering amounts of food: shrimp molded into mountains, giant bowls of strawberries, cakes, rolls, salads, platters of raw oysters. The shorter sides of the rectangle held hot dishes. From my perch I couldn’t make out the contents very clearly, but thought egg rolls and chicken livers jostled next to fried mushrooms and crab cakes. In the middle of the two long sides, white-capped men poised carving knives over giant haunches of beef and ham.

  People were stampeding to get at the spread before it vanished. I noticed Teri’s bronze breastplate in the first surge toward the shrimp mountain. She was riding in Dick’s wake as he snatched shrimps with the frenzy of a man who feared his just share would be lost if he didn’t grab it fast. While stuffing shrimp into his mouth he talked earnestly to two other men in evening garb, who were plunging into the oysters. As they slowly moved toward the roast beef in the middle they punctuated their conversation by stabbing at olives, crab cakes, endives, whatever lay in their path. Teri bobbed behind, apparently talking to a woman in a blue gown whose surface was tightly covered with seed pearls.

  “I feel like Pharaoh watching the locusts descend,” a familiar voice said behind me.

  I turned to see Freeman Carter—Crawford, Mead’s token criminal lawyer. I grinned and laid a hand on the superfine broadcloth of his jacket. Our relationship went back to those days when I used to bob along behind Dick myself at the firm’s social functions. Freeman was the only partner who ever talked to the womenfolk without showing what a big favor he was doing us, so I’d started turning to him for my own legal needs those times the system looked like mangling me.

  “What are you doing here?” I demanded. “I wasn’t expecting to see anyone I know.”

  “Love of music.” Freeman smiled sardonically. “What about you? You’re the last person I’d look for at a hundred-and-fifty-buck function.”

  “Love of music,” I mimicked solemnly. “The cellist is the son of a friend—I’m sorry to say I’m freeloading, not supporting the cause.”

  “Well, Crawford, Mead seems to have adopted Chicago Settlement as a pet. All partners were encouraged to buy five tickets each. I thought it would be collegial of me to join in—make it my last gesture of goodwill to the firm.”

  My brows went up reflexively. “You’re leaving? Since when? What will you do?”

  Freeman looked cautiously over his shoulder. “I haven’t told them yet, so keep it to yourself, but it’s time I went into practice on my own. Criminal law has never been important at Crawford—for years I’ve known I should cut the ties—but there are so many perks in a big firm that I just coasted along. Now the firm is growing so fast and so far away from the work I think is important, it just seems to be time to go. I’ll notify you officially—notify all my clients—when I’m actually on my own.”

  A few clumps of people stood around talking, not wishing to head into the melee below. Freeman kept looking at them to make sure he couldn’t be overheard and finally changed the subject abruptly.

  “My daughter’s here someplace, along with her boyfriend. I don’t know if I’ll ever see them again.”

  “Yeah, I was wondering the same about the couple I came with. They’re not very tall—I’ll never find them if I head into the scrimmage.

  “I wondered what brought Dick here. I’d have put refugees down near the bottom of the list of people he’d shell out for, kind of near women with AIDS. But if the firm is pushing Chicago Settlement I suppose he’s out in front leading the cheers.”

  Freeman smiled. “I’m not going to comment on that one, Warshawski. He and I are still partners, after all.”

  “He’s not the one bringing in the business you don’t like, is he?”

  “Don’t sound so hopeful. Dick’s done a lot to revitalize Crawford, Mead.” He held up a hand. “I know you hate the kind of law he practices. I know you love driving a beater and sneering at his German sports cars—”

  “I no longer drive a beater,” I said with dignity. “I have an ’89 Trans Am whose body still gleams despite my having to keep it on the street instead of in a six-car garage in Oak Brook.”

  “Believe it or not, there are days when Dick wonders if he made a mistake—if you’re doing things the right way, not him.”

  “I know you haven’t been drinking, because I can’t smell it on your breath—so it must be something you put up your nose.”

  Freeman smiled. “It doesn’t happen often, but the guy did think enough about you to marry you once.”

  “Don’t get all sentimental on me, Freeman. Or are you thinking there are days when I wonder if he’s doing it right, ’stead of me? How many women are partners at Crawford now? Three, isn’t it, out of a roster of ninety-eight? There are days when I wish I made Dick’s money, but there’s never a time when I wish I’d put myself through what a woman has to do to make it in your kind of firm.”

  Freeman gave a placatory smile and tucked my hand under his arm. “I didn’t come here to alienate my feistiest client. Come on, Saint Joan. I’ll clear a path to the bar for you and get you a glass of champagne.”

  In the few minutes we’d been talking the shrimp mountains had disappeared and most of the strawberries were gone. The haunches of beef seemed to be holding their own. I scanned the crowd as we strolled downstairs but couldn’t make out Lotty or Max. Teri’s bronze dress had disappeared too.

  I tried staying
close to Freeman, but as we hit the ground floor this proved impossible. Someone cutting between us got my arm separated from his. After that I followed the close-cut gold hairs along his neck for a few twistings through the mob, but a woman in pink satin with trailing butterfly wings needed a yard’s clearance and I lost him.

  I moved with the eddies for a bit. The noise was intense, echoing off the marble pillars and floor. The sound filled my head with a white roaring. It became impossible to concentrate on any outside goal, such as looking for Lotty; all my energy had to go to protecting my brain from the swells of noise. No one could possibly carry on a conversation in this lion’s den—they all must be shouting simply for the pleasure of adding to the uproar.

  At one point the jostling moved me close to the food tables. The men behind the haunches stood expressionless in their little island, only their hands moving as they sliced and served. The shrimp had vanished, as had all the hot food. All that was left besides the meat—now close to the bone—was the picked-over salads.

  I dove back into the tide and began fighting my way across the current to the theater. Some fancy elbow-work brought me to the columns separating the aisle doors from the foyer. The crowd thinned there; people who were trying to talk could get their heads close enough together to hear one another. Michael and Or’ were huddled with five or six serious-looking people. I moved past without speaking in case these were major donors, and escaped into the body of the theater.

  Dick was standing immediately inside the door on my right, talking to a man of sixty or so. Even though I knew he was here, seeing him so close made my heart skip a beat. Not romantic enthusiasm, just a jolt—kind of like losing your footing on a glassy floor. Dick seemed jolted too—he broke off a smooth phrase mid-word and gaped at me.

  “Hi, Dick,” I said weakly. “I never knew you were a cello enthusiast.”

  “What are you doing here?” he demanded.

  “I’ve been hired to sweep the theater. I have to take what work I can get these days.”

  The sixtyish man looked at me with blank impatience. He didn’t care who I was or what I did as long as I got out of there fast. He was also oblivious of the children’s choir: free from the responsibility of looking angelic they were chasing each other through the seats, shrieking wildly, throwing rolls and bits of cake at each other.

  “Yes, well, I’m in the middle of something, so why don’t you start work on the far side.” Dick wasn’t above a little humor as long as it wasn’t at his own expense.

  “Are you wheeling and dealing?” I tried to infuse my voice with humble admiration. “Maybe I could watch you and get a few pointers, move up to toilet scrubbing or something.”

  A flush rose in Dick’s closely shaven cheeks. On the verge of spitting out a curt insult, he turned it into a bark of laughter. “It’s been what—thirteen years? fourteen?—and you still know the shortest distance from your mouth to my goat.”

  He grabbed my shoulder and moved me toward his partner. “This is Victoria Warshawski. She and I made a big mistake in law school by thinking we were in love. Teri’s and my kids are all going to have to work for five years before I’ll let them think about marriage. Vic, Peter Felitti, chairman of Amalgamated Portage.”

  Felitti held out a reluctant hand—because I was his daughter’s predecessor? Or because he didn’t want me interrupting high-level finance? “I don’t remember the details of your settlement. You been paying ever since for your sins, Yarborough?”

  I squeezed Felitti’s fingers with enough force to make him wince. “Not at all. It was my alimony that bought Dick his stake in Crawford, Mead. Now that he’s launched on his own, though, I’m trying to get the court to let me off the hook.”

  Dick made a face. “Must you, Vic? I’ll be happy to swear all over town that you never asked for a dime. She’s a lawyer,” he added to Felitti, “but works as a detective.”

  Turning back to me, he said plaintively, “Are you happy now? Can Pete and I finish our conversation?”

  I was extricating myself—from Dick’s arm as well as the conversation—with what grace I could when Teri came in, the woman in beaded blue satin close on her heels.

  “There you are,” the woman in blue said gaily. “Harmon Lessner wants to talk with you two especially. You can’t sneak off and do business now.”

  Teri eyed me narrowly, trying to decide if I was a business encounter or a sexual competitor. Champagne had added a rosy glow beneath her foundation, but late as it was her makeup was still perfect: the eyeshadow on the lids where it belonged instead of meandering around her face; her lipstick, a subdued bronze that was an understated version of her dress, fresh and glossy. Her chestnut hair, pulled into a complicated knot, looked as though she had just left her hairdresser’s. No frizz, no stray strands creeping down her neck, marred the effect.

  By this time of night, without looking in a mirror, I knew that my lipstick had vanished and that such styling as I had given my short curls was long gone. I wanted to think I had the more interesting personality, but Dick wasn’t interested in women with personality. I felt like telling Teri not to worry, that she had looks and they would win the day for her, but I sketched a wave at the four of them and moved on to the far door without speaking.

  When I finally found Lotty it was past midnight. She was alone, shivering in a corner of the outer lobby, her arms hugging her.

  “Where’s Max?” I said sharply, pulling her close to me. “You need to get home, get to bed. I’ll find him and go get the car.”

  “He left with Or’ and Michael. They’re staying with him, you know. I’m all right, Vic, really. It’s merely that the concert stirred up old memories. They started to haunt me while I waited. I’ll walk with you to the car. The fresh air will do me good.”

  “Are you and Max having a fight?” I hadn’t meant to ask, and the words came out abruptly.

  Lotty made a face. “Max thinks I’m behaving badly about Carol. And maybe I am.”

  I shepherded her through the revolving door. “What about her?”

  “You didn’t know? She’s quitting. It’s not that I mind that. Well, of course I mind it—we’ve worked together for eight years. I feel bereft, but I wouldn’t try to stop her moving on, trying new opportunities. But it’s why she’s quitting. It drives me mad that she lets that family of hers run her life—and now—and Max says I have no empathy! I ask you!”

  During the drive home she spoke determinedly about the concert, and what pungent remarks Theresz would have made over the collection of nonmusical parvenus who had flocked to her memorial concert. It was only when I dropped her at her door that she let me get the conversation back to Carol.

  “What is she doing? You don’t know? She’s going to stay home and nurse some damned cousin of that morbid mother of hers. He’s got AIDS and Carol feels it her duty to look after him.”

  She slammed the door with a snap and swirled through her front door. I felt the chill fingers of depression creep into my shoulders. Poor Carol. Poor Lotty. And poor me: I didn’t want to be caught between them. I waited until the lights came on in Lotty’s living room and put the Trans Am back into gear.

  4

  Rye on Eggs

  I slept badly that night. The thought of Lotty, shivering in the dark over her dead family, brought back the nightmares of my mother’s final illness. I would approach Gabriella’s bed through the maze of tubes and oxygen that shrouded her only to see Lotty’s face propped against the pillows. She stared at me blankly, then turned away. I felt wrapped in gauze, unable to move or speak. When the doorbell rang, forcing me back to consciousness, it was a relief to wake up.

  I had been crying in my sleep. The tears glued my lids together and I moved unsteadily to the door as the buzzer shrilled again. It was the upper bell, the one right on my door, not in the outer lobby. I couldn’t see clearly enough to make out the person on the other side of the peephole.

  “Who is it?” I called hoarsely through the edge of the do
or.

  I put my ear against the jamb. At first all I could make out was senseless gabbling, but finally I realized it was Mr. Contreras.

  I undid the bolts and opened the door a crack. “Just a minute,” I croaked. “I need to put on some clothes.”

  “Sorry to wake you, doll, I mean it’s nine-thirty and all and usually you’re up and about by now, but you must’ve got in late and of course I turned in early, being done in by getting Her Highness through—”

  I slammed the door on him and stomped off to the bathroom. I took my time in the shower. If something had gone seriously wrong with Peppy he would have come right out with it. This was doubtless by way of a minor emergency: one of the pups wasn’t nursing or she’d rejected the old man’s offering of ham and eggs.

  Before going down I made myself a cup of strong coffee and swallowed it in great scalding gulps. It didn’t make me feel rested and refreshed, but at least I could navigate the stairs.

  Mr. Contreras bounded out as I rang his bell. “Oh, there you are. I was beginning to think you’d gone back to bed and I didn’t want to bother you none. I thought being as how you was out with the doc last night it wouldn’t be such a late evening, but you must’ve run into someone else you knew.”

  His incessant burrowing into my love life sometimes brought me to the screaming point. Lack of sleep moved me to irritability faster than usual.

  “Just once, as a noble experiment, could you pretend my private life is private? Tell me how Peppy is and why you had to come wake me up.”

  He threw up placatory hands. “No need to get your tail in a knot, doll. I know you got a private life. That’s why I waited till nine-thirty. But I wanted to make sure I had a chance to talk to you before you took off for the day, that’s all. Don’t be so shirty.”