Killer, Come Hither

by Louis Begley

  X

  The telephone rang the next morning just as I settled down to work. I looked at the identification window on the receiver, saw the Jones & Whetstone number, and pressed TALK. A no-nonsense female voice inquired whether she was speaking to me. Reassured by me that such was the case, it said, Please hold for Mr. Lathrop. In a moment, I heard his patrician accents.

  Oh Jack, he said, you may not remember me but I’m one of your poor uncle Harry’s oldest and best friends. The name is Lathrop, Simon Lathrop. Harry was one year ahead of me at college and law school, and we’d been together ever since at Jones. I had the pleasure of attending the book party Harry gave in honor of your first book, and you were kind enough to inscribe it for me. Jennie—that’s my wife—and I are heartbroken over what happened, and you would have heard from me sooner if I hadn’t been in rehab at Burke until ten days ago. Would you by any chance be free to lunch with me today?

  I assured him that I knew perfectly who he was and remembered meeting him, and was free, whereupon he asked me to meet him at his club. It was the club to which Harry had also belonged, and I had lunched and dined with him there frequently.

  Simon, as he asked me to call him when we shook hands, met me in a small room on the ground floor behind the hall porter’s desk, and suggested we take the elevator to the dining room.

  It’s these wretched things, he said, waving one of his two Canadian crutches. They make climbing stairs pure hell.

  Having offered me his condolences again as soon as we sat down at table, and expressed his shock and sorrow, he explained that he had been away from the office since the week before the party for my second book. The artificial hip that he had received five years earlier had started to disintegrate, causing a great deal of trouble. He had tried to postpone the procedure to replace it so as not to miss the celebration, but it turned out there was no flexibility in his surgeon’s schedule. It had to be then or two weeks after Christmas, and he had been unable to wait that long. The discomfort was too intense.

  He had jogged my memory.

  I remember now, I told him. Harry mentioned the operation. Apropos of your not being there, something that struck me then, and seems more significant now in retrospect given everything that has happened, is that only one J & W partner attended that party. Quite a few had come to the one for my first book.

  Really, Simon observed, that is very odd.

  At the time I thought that the guest list had been trimmed because the publishing house was the host, I told him. Now I’m not so sure.

  Really, he said once again, and went on to relate that the operation to replace the malfunctioning artificial joint turned out to be a much bigger deal than he had expected, and the rehabilitation surprisingly difficult, considering his physical condition before the operation, which, except for the hip, had been quite good. Harry visited him at the hospital twice and said nothing about having problems at the firm. Then, during one of the subsequent visits at the rehabilitation center in Westchester, Harry astonished him by announcing that he had decided to retire, in large measure because he would no longer be doing Brown work.

  When I tried to talk him out of it, Simon continued, one of the arguments I used was that difficulties with a client can sometimes be smoothed over, particularly if the client is a fellow like Brown, who makes up his own mind, with whom one has been on terms of personal friendship. You can have a long talk and find your way out of the difficulty. But he made it so clear that he wasn’t interested in a reconciliation, and that he was in fact delighted to end a relationship that had become an albatross, that I began to think that I was coming through as naïve. He said he was grateful that it was over. Otherwise, he would have never made up his mind to stop working, not until the retirement plan forced him out, and he’d come to realize that getting out was what he’d been yearning to do. He’d be able to read, to go back to his piano, to travel, and to play Cupid. And that is, of course, where you come in, dear fellow.

  Simon paused and looked at me as though he expected me to offer a specific rejoinder. Not understanding what he was driving at, I said nothing.

  Come, come. Simon chuckled. It’s not that hard to guess what he meant. I agree it was an out-of-character thing for Harry to say. I had to chuckle then too, because my wife, Jennie, and I tried to play Cupid with him once or twice—not before the Inca came on the stage, because way back then he was always involved with one glamorous lady or another—but after the calamity, when he was at first so grief-stricken and later so lonely. I pleaded with him to let us introduce him to some really wonderful women, but all to no avail. And there at Burke, at the rehab, he told me he was going to make sure that you and a certain young lady he thought the world of would get together. He went so far as to say that he looked forward to playing grandfather as the sequel to playing Cupid.

  It was my turn to laugh.

  I’m beginning to think I know whom Harry had in mind, I replied. If I’m right, the arrow didn’t miss the target.

  Kerry? he asked.

  I nodded.

  He’d be so happy, Simon said, one wishes one could believe he knows it. That is one of the reasons why I find his having committed suicide—less than two weeks after I last saw him—so utterly strange. If it hadn’t happened one would have said it was the last thing he’d do. There is another troubling element. I’ve been told by a partner who works for me on some of my matters that the reason for Harry’s withdrawal from the firm, and apparently also for having been asked to stop working on Brown matters, is that he was suffering from dementia. That is something I really can’t accept. I had long and far-ranging conversations with him during the period of my convalescence. We talked about the past, about current firm issues, about politics, and even about our investments—about life and death, if you like—and there isn’t an iota of doubt in my mind that Harry’s intellectual acuity and emotional balance were unimpaired. His intelligence was as always absolutely of the highest order!

  I nodded again, and told him that I had spoken to his doctor, who at his recommendation had become also my doctor. He told me conclusively that Harry had had his annual physical examination two weeks before Christmas, and he could confirm that he was in excellent health. There were no neurological problems, and certainly no symptoms of anything like dementia.

  Incredible, Mr. Lathrop said. Have you any explanation for what happened?

  None for what happened at the firm, I answered. Will Hobson told me when I saw him upon returning from Brazil that Harry showed symptoms of dementia, which had been detected by Abner Brown, and gave that as the reason for Harry’s being removed at Brown’s request from work on Brown matters, as well as for having been asked by him, Hobson, to take early retirement. The dementia part of the story would seem to be an invention.

  A rotten lie, Mr. Lathrop interjected.

  I don’t object to that word, I said, in fact I’ll adopt it. Neither you, nor Harry’s doctor, nor other people close to Harry who were in contact with him shortly before he died believe any such thing. I don’t know why Mr. Hobson chose to lie to me and spread the lie in the firm.

  I can perhaps think of a reason, Mr. Lathrop replied.

  I’d like to hear it.

  And the suicide, how do you explain it?

  I found myself liking and trusting this fine old man, and remembered that Harry had indeed spoken of him as his best friend. All the same, I took the instant decision not to tell him I was convinced that he had been murdered, or that I had what I and Kerry and Scott all thought was conclusive proof that a crime had been committed. My reluctance was akin to not wanting too many cooks in the kitchen. I didn’t know yet how I was going to find the Voice, or how I was going to kill him, and having this grand old lawyer begin to think that he was somehow part of the team, and perhaps had to take responsibility for what I would do, could only complicate the task.

  So, feeling somewhat ashamed of myself, and hoping I didn’t show it, I said that I had not come to terms either wi
th the fact of the suicide itself or the manner in which it had been done. But could he tell me, I asked, the reason he had thought of for Mr. Hobson’s actions?

  It’s a strange business, he told me, law firm jealousies. Jones & Whetstone is one of the few remaining great law firms that still adhere to the lockstep system of compensation for partners. Are you familiar with that concept?

  I nodded.

  Well, then you know that how many billable hours you rack up or how much business you bring in isn’t reflected in your compensation. It’s all based on seniority, unless, of course, a partner really screws up, which, I’m happy to say, hasn’t happened more than a few times in the firm’s history. In that case, the management committee may cut his or her compensation for a year or two, sometimes as a prelude to a forced departure. I’m telling you all this to set the stage. Harry and Will Hobson were taken into the firm in the same year. Therefore, their earnings as partners have been identical. However, even though Will is an excellent lawyer, with a tough analytic mind, the difference in productivity and contributions to the firm has been huge—and glaring. Will has made his contribution to the firm, and it’s not negligible, as a competent, no, in fact a remarkably effective bureaucrat. From the beginning, he has been on every committee, he has been the moving force behind every so-called strategic-planning initiative, and on and on and on. Stuff that Harry and I have always basically considered a waste of time. What he has never had, however, is the one thing that makes the firm live, which is the ability to attract and hold clients. I don’t believe that Will has ever had one significant client of his own. He has only worked on matters brought to the firm by other partners, those who have their own clients, and among those Harry has always stood out. To put it simply, clients had been always drawn to Harry as though to a magnet, and he had always done brilliant work for them, all the while leaving the firm’s administrative bureaucratic tasks to the likes of Hobson. I am of the opinion that Hobson has never been able to forgive Harry for that, or for Harry’s generosity in bringing him, Hobson, into Brown matters. Because there they were in the real world, where Harry was number one, and Hobson, the firm leader, was figuratively speaking carrying his briefcase. And don’t think for a moment that the contrast between those two or between their relative value to the firm was lost on the older partners! Or, I would guess, on Abner Brown!

  How extraordinary! I said.

  Poor Harry meant well, and he had such good character that I don’t think he allowed himself to be aware of Will’s resentment. Or Will’s pent-up ambition. What I’m driving at, as you’ve probably figured out, is that it is not impossible that Will placed a banana peel in exactly the right place for Harry to slip on in the Brown relationship. Or that he seized on something Harry had done or said and made sure that it enraged Abner Brown. Obviously, I can’t tell you what Hobson has done, but I have no doubt that he had a hand in engineering Harry’s fall. Having done that, he would have wanted him out of the firm, and I suspect that Harry was so disgusted by what he saw had been done that he couldn’t wait to get out the door. Then Hobson spread this vicious rumor to cover up his tracks.

  How horrible, I said, to trip Harry up if that is what he did. But why the lie? Why the rumor?

  Because if it had been said that Harry was leaving because Brown no longer wanted him to work on his matters, that he’d rather have Hobson on them, partners would have protested and pleaded with Harry to stay. His value to the firm was so great. More dangerous yet, they might have wanted to know just what he had done that was wrong. But if they were told, Look, fellows, he’s losing his mind, or He’s already as good as lost it, don’t embarrass him by talking to him about it, just let him go in peace…Well, that’s another ball game.

  I see, I said, struck by the similarities in Simon’s and Scott’s analyses.

  Yes, and it’s my fault, Simon continued, or rather the fault of my goddamn hip. If I had been at the office instead of the hospital, Harry would have talked to me and I would have taken steps—I have a certain weight in the firm—to undo the harm with Brown, but the chances of that initiative’s success would have been less than fifty percent, and certainly to put an end to the nonsense of quitting the firm over whatever Brown and Hobson had cooked up. And there would have been no slander campaign, no lies about dementia.

  I wish, indeed, you had been there. You’ve given me a great deal to think about, and a great deal to regret.

  We’ll stay in touch, he told me. Jennie and I would like to have you and Kerry over to dinner. By the way, don’t you worry about Kerry’s standing or future at the firm. Since Harry treated her like a daughter you may assume that Hobson hates her, but her reputation at J & W is solid gold and, just in case, she has me to cover her back. I’ve had this bum hip, but otherwise I’m in fine shape, and I’ll be at the firm for a good while still, perhaps longer than Hobson. I have no problem with your telling her that.

  —

  I thought a great deal during the weekend with Kerry and Scott about the conversation with Simon Lathrop, my gratitude growing for the explanation he’d advanced for the role that office dynamics might have played in the catastrophe that overcame Harry. I thought it would be of great value in the confrontation with Abner Brown that appeared to be the necessary next step. But I was more than ever convinced that I had been right not to draw him into my plans, and I continued to think that the decision to withhold from Kerry and Scott knowledge of the discovery I had made in the Gospel according to Saint Matthew was sound. It was necessary, however, to put those sheets bearing Harry’s message in a safe place that Brown’s minions would not discover in case my mission failed and the Voice or another of Brown’s thugs killed me. That was an absolute necessity. I had another wish, which may appear frivolous to a reader who is not a writer. It was to finish my third book. I thought that if I worked hard, and with total concentration, I could have a publishable draft in my agent’s hands within three weeks. In four weeks, therefore, I would seek out Abner Brown in his Houston lair. Just how I would get him to receive me I hadn’t figured out yet. It occurred to me that I might seek Simon Lathrop’s advice.

  The three-week pause would be useful as well in ways that had nothing to do with literature. Scott’s forensic team would be arriving in Sag Harbor the following weekend. They would scour the house, and would use their wiles to borrow—Scott’s expression—Harry’s clothes and the hemp rope for examination in the Langley laboratory. The work on relating the Voice to the database was still in progress, Scott’s linguist friends having confirmed that almost certainly the Voice was a Bosniak Serb. Most probably one of the swine involved in the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia. A number of subjects fitting that description were known to be active in gangs whose operations had been detected in the U.S. A narrowing-down process had been started, designed to determine who among them was known or suspected to be actually present in the country, and if possible his connections. There’s no use looking for the address, Scott laughed. They’re one hundred percent illegal, moving in the underground, which may include luxurious hotel suites and safe houses, inhabited by drug dealers, money launderers, and hit men.

  A remark Scott let fall fascinated me. If we find some connection between Brown and money laundering it may develop into a connection to terrorist organizations. Even the beginning of that sort of proof, and the agency and the FBI will be after him with everything they’ve got. And, believe me, they won’t let go.

  That proof, I now realized, might well be lodged on the sheets of legal pad paper tucked away in my safe.

  XI

  I finished book number three on time. It was a disguised retelling of my love affair with Felicity and her ditching me after I’d gone to war, which at the time I’d considered callous and cruel. As I wrote my novel, my point of view changed and became fairer. I came to understand that she had been opposed to the war and considered it foolish, and that for her I was not some chevalier sans peur et sans reproche responding to the call of his suzerain
but a self-important jerk who’d never stopped to consider her point of view or the future we had hoped to have together. I didn’t agree with her assessment of my attitude, but there it was. It couldn’t be swept aside. Harry would have understood my new book better than anybody. That was too bad. There I was in his apartment, working in the study he had furnished for me with such care, and I would never again knock on the library door, hear his voice tell me to come in, and hand him my manuscript as he half rose from his favorite leather club chair to greet me. Kerry knew no more about Felicity than that such a woman had existed in my life, and I didn’t think I had the time, if I was going to keep to my schedule, to tell her enough to prepare her to accept the new book. If my agent and my editor thought it was publishable, she would read it later. When the time came. This was not the moment when I should trouble her. But I did email the manuscript to Scott. He called me two days later and said he’d stayed up both nights reading it. He thought it was the best thing I’d done, even better than my war book. I thanked him profusely and sincerely, but wished he’d skipped the comparison. Authors, I was discovering, are like parents: they resent having their progeny compared and ranked. All the same, Scott’s praise gave me the encouragement I needed. I printed my text and sent it to my agent, and realized I was now free to turn my attention to the Voice. The plan to ask Simon Lathrop how he thought I should go about getting to see Abner Brown still seemed good. Kerry and I had been to dinner with him and his wife, and I had no doubt about his friendship or willingness to help.