Guardian Angel

by Sara Paretsky

  I felt my cheeks redden. “Sure. Yes, unless you’ve changed your mind.”

  “Well, let’s just leave things here before we say so much we don’t want to get together again. I can’t think fast enough to do a discussion like this on the phone.” He hesitated, then said, “Will you promise to call me if someone tries to hurt you? Run you over, climb through your window, whatever? Would that be a violation of your principles?”

  I agreed amiably enough, but my fists were still clenched when I hung up the phone. I should have known better than to get in bed with a policeman. Every day for the last two weeks I’d been acting before I thought. And every day it had gotten me into trouble.

  The phone rang again as I was heading into the bathroom to get ready for bed. I was tempted to let it go—it was after eleven, after all. But maybe it was Rawlings wanting to smooth things out. I picked up the bedroom extension on the fifth ring. It was Murray Ryerson. By the noise in the background, he was calling from a party in full swing.

  “You drunk, Murray? It’s way past a respectable time to call anyone.”

  “You getting old, Warshawski? I thought your night just got going about now.”

  I made a face into the phone. “Yes, I’m getting old. Now that you know that, is your investigative reporter’s mind at ease?”

  “Not really, Vic.” He was shouting to be heard over the music. I held the receiver a few inches from my ear.

  “How come you go falling into the Sanitary Canal without telling me about it? One of my gofers just came sidling up to me with the news at the bar here. Of course, he thought I must already know, since everybody believes you and I are pals. You made me look bad.”

  “Come on, Murray, you told me the last time I saw you that what I was doing wasn’t news. Don’t you come playing that ‘all pals together’ tune on your violin. I won’t stand for it.” I was so angry, I snapped a pencil I’d been fiddling with in two.

  “You can’t pick and choose what’s news, Warshawski. An old lady losing her dogs because she’s senile and they’re a nuisance—that just isn’t interesting. And neither is a drunk deadbeat falling into the canal. But when you go in, people want to know about it.”

  “Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, Ryerson.” I slammed the phone down as hard as I could.

  I was panting with rage, my fragile calm from my trip to Atlanta completely shattered. What was with these guys, trying to run me around? I dug a basketball from the back of my hall closet and started bouncing it up and down, with an evil disregard for the family trying to sleep below, hoping to pound away some of my fury.

  I’d been dribbling for about five minutes when the phone rang again. It was either Murray, hoping to bludgeon me into giving him a story, or my downstairs neighbor, Mrs. Lee. I hastily stuffed the ball back in the closet before picking up the receiver.

  “Vic?” It was Dick’s light baritone. “I know it’s late, but I’ve been trying to get through for two hours.”

  I sat down hard on the piano bench, surprise knocking the rage out of me. “And that gives you the right to call at eleven-fifteen?” Just because I’d stopped feeling angry didn’t mean Dick got a free ride.

  “You and I need to talk. I left two messages with your answering service today.”

  I realized I hadn’t checked with my service since returning from Atlanta. “This is really sudden, Dick, so I don’t have a response ready. Does Teri know?”

  “Please don’t clown around right now, Vic. I’m not in the humor for it.”

  “Well, that’s kind of why we split up to begin with, wasn’t it,” I said reasonably. “Because I didn’t care enough about the stuff you were in the humor for.”

  “Look. You’ve been sticking your nose into my business for the last two weeks. I think I’ve been pretty tolerant about it on the whole, but you’re really asking for trouble now. And strange as it may seem to you, I don’t want to see you in major trouble.”

  I made a face at the mouthpiece. “Funny you should say that, Richard. I just had that identical thought about you recently. I’ll trade you—you tell me what major trouble you think I’m headed for and then I’ll tell you about yours.”

  He sighed ostentatiously. “I might have known better than to try to do you a good turn.”

  “You should have known better than to think calling up to lay down the law would sound like a good turn to me,” I corrected.

  “I’d like you to come to my office tomorrow. I’m free around ten.”

  “Which means I’d kick my heels in your waiting room until eleven or twelve. No, thanks. I’ve got a very tight day scheduled. Why don’t you stop here on your way into the Loop? It’s just a hop, skip, and jump off the Eisenhower to Belmont.”

  He didn’t like it, mostly because he wasn’t controlling the program. He tried to make me come downtown to the Enterprise Club, the favorite embalming center for Chicago’s top lawyers and bankers. I wanted to start my day in the neighborhood, at the Bank of Lake View. He finally consented to meet me at the Belmont Diner, but it had to be seven o’clock: his important meetings started at eight-thirty. Since Dick knows early mornings and I aren’t on speaking terms, it enabled him to salvage a small triumph from the conversation.

  Before going to bed I checked in with my answering service. Sure enough, there were two messages from Dick, both stressing the urgency of my calling him immediately. Detective Finchley had phoned, as had Luke Edwards and Sergeant Rawlings. I was glad I’d missed Luke. I wasn’t in the humor for a long, lugubrious account of the Trans Am’s woes. I unplugged the phone and went to bed.

  39

  Postmarital Upset

  My dreams were tormented by images of my mother. She appeared at the gym where I was playing basketball. I dropped the ball and ran from the court to her side, but just as I held out a hand to her, she turned her back on me and walked away. I felt myself crying in my sleep as I followed her down Halsted, begging her to turn and look at me. Behind me the Buddha was saying in Gabriella’s heavily accented English, “You’re on your own now, Victoria.”

  When the alarm woke me at six, it was a welcome release from the trap of dreams. My eyes were gummy with the tears I’d shed in the night. I felt so sorry for myself that I hiccuped back another crying bout as I brushed my teeth.

  “What’s wrong with you?” I said derisively to the face in the mirror. “Feel deprived over losing Dick Yarborough’s love?”

  I turned the cold water on in the shower and held my head under it. The shock cleaned my eyelids and cleared my head. I did a complete workout in the living room, including a full set of weight exercises. At the end my arms and legs were trembling, but I felt purged of my nightmare.

  I dressed with a care that made me feel a little annoyed with myself, in a soft gold top with a charcoal pantsuit. I didn’t think I wanted to show off for Dick, at least not in a sexual way. I just wanted to seem cool and prosperous. Big earrings and a chunky necklace added a touch of modernity. The jacket was cut full enough to hide my shoulder holster.

  It had been almost four days since I’d gone into the drink. I was beginning to feel nervous about the peace my pals were leaving me in. No threatening calls, no firebombs through the window. That wasn’t all due to the watchful eye of Conrad’s minions. I couldn’t help thinking they were saving up for some huge, ugly surprise.

  I studied the street carefully from my living room window before leaving. It was hard to tell from this angle whether anyone was staking me out from the cars out front, but the Subaru that had dogged me last week wasn’t there. No one shot at me when I came out. Always a welcome beginning to the day.

  I took a long way around to the Belmont Diner, in keeping with the first rule for terrorist targets: vary your route. Although it was a few minutes after seven when I got to the diner, Dick hadn’t arrived yet. In my eagerness to remember the rules for terrorism I’d forgotten those for power breakfasting: make the other person wait.

  Barbara and Helen greeted me e
nthusiastically. Business was heavy, but they managed to give me the details of what had happened to my tail after I left Friday.

  “Honey, you should have been here,” Barbara called over her shoulder, depositing a short stack and fried eggs at the table behind me. “Helen here practically undressed the poor slob, sobbing all over his trouser legs how sorry she was about the tea. And then—well, I’ll tell you in a minute.… You want your usual, don’t you, Jack? And how ’bout you, Chuck—two over easy, hon? And hash browns?” She whisked back to the kitchen.

  Helen, who’d been unloading an armful of food in the corner, called over, “The high point was Marge. She came out from the kitchen to see what the commotion was and dropped a can of hot grease along the hallway. The poor slob’s backup had come tearing in. When the first guy yelled you’d gone out the rear, the second one went ass-over-tea-cup through the grease.” She roared with laughter.

  Barbara reappeared with a fresh pot of coffee and poured out a cup for me. “It was great, Vic. God, I wish I’d brought my camera. It took ’em about an hour to get out of here and all the time we’re boo-hoo-hooing like we’re the Three Stooges and can’t help ourselves.… What are you having today, hon?”

  “I’m waiting for someone before I order. You guys are great. I wish I’d stayed for the show. If I had a fortune, I’d split it among the lot of you.”

  Most of the crowd this time of day were regulars, people from the neighborhood who’d been coming in for years on their way to work. They obviously had heard the story already—they kept cutting in with embellishments. At my comment a couple of them gave catcalls. “Easy to promise when you know you’ll die broke, Vic.” “You oughtta give it up and turn your business over to these girls here—they’re the pros.”

  The uproar suddenly trailed off. I looked over my shoulder and saw Dick come in. His pearl-gray summer worsted had the glow of wealth to it. The faint hauteur with which he viewed the chipped Formica tables stirred a ripple of resentment. The men in work clothes and shabby jackets busied themselves with their food. When Dick saw me and sketched a wave, a low murmur went through the crowd.

  “Who’s the talent?” Barbara whispered, refilling my coffee cup. “You land him and you’ve got that fortune all right. And don’t think I’ll forget your sweet talk.”

  When Dick sat down she flicked her rag in front of him. “Okay if he joins you, Vic?”

  I felt a bit embarrassed—I hadn’t asked Dick here in the hopes he’d be actively insulted. “He’s my guest, Barbara. Dick Yarborough, Barbara Flannery. Dick used to be married to me, but that was in another country.”

  Barbara pursed her mouth in a wise “O,” which indicated understanding that we had confidential business. “Need a menu, Dick?”

  Dick lifted frosty eyebrows. The Enterprise Club waiters murmured “Mr. Yarborough” at him deferentially.

  “Do you have fresh fruit?”

  Barbara rolled her eyes, but held back her favorite retort. “Honeydew, cantaloupe, and strawberries.”

  “Strawberries. With yogurt. And granola. Skim milk with the granola.”

  “Fruit, nuts and flakes, lean,” Barbara muttered. “Yours, Vic?”

  Dick’s ostentatious good health made me feel as perverse as everything else about him did. “Corned beef hash and a poached egg. And fries.”

  Barbara winked at me and took off.

  “You ever hear of cholesterol, Vic?” Dick inspected his plastic water glass as if it were an unknown life form.

  “That what you wanted to talk to me about so urgently? You know you’ve seen plastic before—it’s what we used to drink out of when we lived together down on Ellis.”

  He had the grace to look a little ashamed. He drank some water, fiddled with his cuff links, and looked around.

  “It’s probably good for me to come to a place like this now and then.”

  “Yeah. Kind of like going to the zoo. You can feel superior to the creatures in cages even while you’re sorry for them.”

  Barbara swept out with his food before he could snap anything really clever back at me. He poked cautiously through the strawberries, picked out four or five that apparently didn’t meet his standards, and spooned some yogurt onto the rest. It was because of guys like him moving into the neighborhood that the diner had started carrying things like yogurt and granola. When I first arrived four years ago, you couldn’t get such arty food.

  “So what’d you want to talk about, Dick? I know your time’s valuable.”

  He swallowed a mouthful of berries. “You went out to see Jason Felitti on Friday.”

  “Thank you for sharing that information with me.”

  He frowned, but plowed ahead. “I’d like to know why you felt you had to bother him.”

  Barbara brought my food. I cut into the egg and stirred the yolk up with the hash. The fries were golden-brown and crisp; I ate a few and then turned to the hash. I thought Dick was eyeing the fries a little enviously.

  “I know you’re on the Diamond Head board, Dick. I have a feeling that you handled the legal work involved when Jason bought the company. After all, he’s your father-in-law’s brother, and even in Oak Brook I expect families stick together.” I was studying his face as I spoke, but he’d been through too many high-stakes poker games to show any surprise at my knowledge.

  I sketched out the story of Mitch Kruger and of Milt Chamfers’s refusal to talk to me. “So I just hoped I could persuade Jason to get Chamfers to meet with me. Your daddy-in-law been complaining to you?”

  Dick gave a tight little smile. “Vic, believe it or not, despite all the ragging you do every time you see me, I don’t wish you ill. I even wish you well, as long as you don’t start disrupting my family or my professional life.”

  He swallowed some coffee and made a face. “But Peter Felitti is connected to some very powerful people in this city. He’s annoyed that you’ve been harassing Jason. I gather you even tried breaking into the plant the other night. Peter could put pressure on the cops to hound you every time you try to conduct an investigation. He could even see that you lost your license. I’m just talking to you as a friend. Believe it or not, I’d hate to see you go through that kind of misery.”

  “Of course, if you really cared about my happiness you could persuade Peter not to do all those mean things—he is your father-in-law, after all.” I finished the hash, savoring the richness of the egg yolk. “But I’ve got a few worries about you, Dick. Something ugly’s going on over at Diamond Head. Something involving Paragon Steel and some of the retired machinists and who knows what-all else.”

  I waved a hand to show the scope of ugliness I had in mind. “I don’t want to see you up before the SEC or the bar’s disciplinary committee or something for signing on to unethical activities. Maybe coercing people into giving money to your favorite charities in exchange for special legal favors.”

  Off and on since leaving my office last night I’d been wondering about Eddie Mohr and Chicago Settlement. It had occurred to me that the Felittis might have Dick’s firm muscle people for contributions in exchange for high-priced legal work. That seemed like a relatively flimsy idea, but I watched Dick’s face expectantly to see if I was closing in on anything.

  He put his spoon back into the granola and gave me a grim little smile. “Those are very heavy accusations, Vic. I can see why you didn’t want to meet at my office. It would be hard for you to retract those remarks if I had a witness to them.”

  “You’ve been practicing law in a mighty strange place lately if you bring in witnesses to this kind of conversation. By the way, you notice I’m not asking you how you know I was down at Diamond Head last week. That’s because your daddy-in-law Peter must have told you. I already know the manager is working hand-in-glove with the goons who are using the plant as a front for stolen goods. So that must mean Peter knows about that stuff too.”

  Dick’s face turned pale with anger, so much that his eyes blazed like sapphires against his skin. “There are s
lander laws in this state, and they’re specifically designed to stop people like you from uttering garbage like that. A front for stolen goods? You can’t offer me one shred of proof of that. You’re flailing around because you got caught with your pants down the other night.”

  “Dick, I saw seven men loading spools of Paragon wire onto trucks in the middle of the night.”

  He snorted. “And so it must be theft.”

  “They tried to kill me.”

  “They’d caught you breaking and entering.”

  By now I really was flailing around. “Chamfers told them who I was. They were tipped off, and they were waiting for me. Anyway, they get tons more wire from Paragon than they use in production. What do you think they’re doing with it when the plant is shut down? Sending it to the Salvation Army?”

  “If—and I mean if—some employees are stealing from the company, do you think Peter would condone it?” He gave a pitying smile. “Despite all your bravado, I can’t help thinking you’re a teeny bit jealous of Teri. Her life must look pretty good to you sometimes. So you’re trying to get at her through her father.”

  “Me? Jealous of Teri? Jealous of someone who has to go to Neiman-Marcus just to have something to do with her day?” My voice rose a register to a falsetto. “Jesus, Dick! Get a grip on yourself. What do you think I’ve been doing for the last decade: lying in wait until our paths crossed by total accident so I could take a bead on your wife?”

  He flushed and frowned. “Be that as it may, I’m warning you for your own good to back away from Diamond Head. Certainly to stop throwing around outrageous accusations like theft. Words like that won’t let you down any more lightly if this thing comes to a major confrontation. Peter was most upset when he heard it was you who’d gone into the canal. In fact, it was a major embarrassment to him, given your connection to me. Thank God he was able to persuade the papers not to print anything about it—”

  “You weren’t born stupid, Dick.” I cut him off, my own eyes blazing. “Use your goddamn head. I just finished telling you I can link goons at Diamond Head to the plant manager. And you’ve just connected Peter Felitti to the plant manager and the goons. Which side do you want to be on when all this comes out? Not even Peter Felitti can suppress it forever. Besides, I know a guy at the Herald-Star who’s itching to run a piece on what I was doing at Diamond Head Friday night.”