As Dog Is My Witness (18 page)

“What kind of cases?” I asked.

“Mob cases,” he answered.

Driving home, I had to admit there was something
awfully strange about this story. If Justin Fowler
hadn’t
shot Michael Huston, he’d done a remarkably good job of framing
himself.

Nothing was adding up, and I was used to that. This
kind of thing didn’t happen to Elvis Cole or Spenser—they always
knew who the bad guys were, who needed to be protected, and what
kind of firearm was best suited to dropping an elephant in its
tracks (whenever they’re talking about a gun used by a bad guy,
it’s one that’s “best suited to stopping an elephant in its
tracks”). I, on the other hand, knew exactly what kind of firearm
had been used in this crime, and it was especially well suited to
dropping Great Emancipators in their tracks while they were
watching light comedies called “Our American Cousin.” That wasn’t
much help, really.

It had been a fast-paced morning, so I figured I’d
have some time to do screenplay revision before the kids got home,
if I started right in. Normally, I can’t write an original word of
fiction before three in the afternoon, but rewriting is another
story. You’ve already done the heavy lifting, and don’t need to
make up as much, so it’s actually possible for me to get some work
done before the hour my creative muse usually gets up from her
traditional eighteen-hour nap.

So naturally, I called Cynthia Opdyke, whom Karen
Huston had listed among the best friends she and Michael had in the
world, at least since they were married. In previous conversations
with their friends (including Pearl, the roommate who had
introduced the two), I had been given such glowing reviews of the
Huston marriage I was beginning to feel my own was a summer stock
production of “Carousel” starring Wink Martindale.

This next interview proved no exception. “They were
the perfect couple,” Cynthia said after I’d explained my tenuous
connection to the matter. “You know, Mr. Tucker, you hear about
marriages like theirs, but you never really
see
one. I saw
one.”

“So no chance that Michael was seeing someone
else?”

By now, having asked this question three or four
times, I knew enough to pull the receiver from my ear. The laugh
was just as loud as the others had been. “No!” she screamed. “You
don’t know the level of devotion that man had, Mr. Tucker. He
wouldn’t have cheated on Karen if J. Lo, Halle Berry, and Britney
Spears had offered him a foursome.”

“Well, how about Karen?”

“Mr. Tucker,” she said with a patronizing tone, “the
man sent her flowers on a Tuesday,
for no reason.
He cooked
dinner for her and did the laundry. He took her to Paris for her
thirtieth birthday. The man loaded and unloaded the dishwasher
without being asked.
Do you know another husband like
that?”

Actually, I knew one other man like that, minus the
Paris trip. When Abby turned thirty, I believe I took her out to
dinner at a Cajun place we used to frequent, then to a production
of Medea at the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick. She tells
me it was a fine production. I remember it only as a refreshing
nap.

If Michael wasn’t cheating, I figured, he was
probably involved in some kind of financial trouble. So my next
call was to his lawyer, who, I expected, would point me in the
right direction.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Tucker,” said John Markowitz. “I
don’t know what I can tell you. Michael Huston didn’t have a will
for a logical reason, although I didn’t agree with it. He knew that
by New Jersey law, in the absence of a will, his entire estate
would go to his next of kin, Karen. He wanted his wife to have
whatever he left behind, and knew it would happen automatically, so
he never saw the need for a will.”

“Was there any indication of financial trouble?
Gambling? Loans?
Anything
?”

“Nothing,” Markowitz said. “As far as I know,
everything was completely normal, and the Hustons were actually
doing quite nicely.”
Well
, that wasn’t any help. “But
Michael never really trusted me with
all
his records. He
always wanted a good deal of his money to be his own, in places he
wouldn’t tell me about. I really have no idea how much money he had
in total.” And that was even less help.

So far this morning, I was batting zero-for-two, so I
figured I couldn’t do worse with the bail bondsman, Terrance McShea
of Carteret. He, on the other hand, saw true potential for me to
get even less information than I had from the others.

“Look, if the person who puts up the bond wants to be
anonymous, I keep them anonymous,” he said once I mentioned the
magic name of Justin Fowler. “They don’t want their name mentioned,
I don’t mention their name.” He seemed out to prove that redundancy
could be, um, redundant.

“Well, without names, can you tell me what collateral
was put up for the two hundred grand?” I asked.

“Nothing. The bond was in cash.”

“So someone put up two hundred thousand dollars in
cash, then paid you a fee to post bond in court?”

“That’s exactly right,” McShea said. “And you thought
you wouldn’t catch on.”

“Why would someone do that?” I asked.

With a tone meant to convey heavy sarcasm, McShea
said, “I guess they wanted to be
anonymous.
” Thanks for the
help, McShea.

The phone calls hadn’t done me any good, so it was
clearly time to attack the screenplay. This project was, I reminded
myself, what I’d wanted for years. Time to prove I deserved it.

Unfortunately, I’d barely gotten through the emails
that had accumulated since I left, and was just about to open the
“Minivan” computer file, when the doorbell rang. I usually get
either Jehovah’s Witnesses or the UPS guy at this time of day, so
when I rose to answer the door, I was hoping for a brown truck
outside the window.

But there was nothing but a big black SUV in the
driveway. Maybe Howard and the Steins had let some trendy friends
know they were in town, but had neglected to tell them this
particular day was being devoted to a visit to the Edison
Historical Site in West Orange, which is actually a very cool
place. I was willing to bet Dylan would be so bored he’d jump out a
second story window. Nonetheless, the company obviously didn’t know
their friends weren’t home right now.

I was also very disappointed not to find Jehovah’s
Witnesses on the doorstep, because when I opened the door and
started to say, “They’re not home,” I was greeted instead by Big,
Bigger, and Biggest.

“Mr. Shapiro wants to see you,” Big said, grinning
broadly and looking down on me.

B
ig was smiling not because
he was so happy to see me, I decided. He was smiling because he
enjoyed this part of his job.

“I really can’t leave right now,” I said.

“Yes, you can,” said Bigger. He wasn’t grinning, and
that was worse.

“My kids will be home in an hour and a half,” I told
Big. “Do you think you can have me back by then?” Okay, so I was
essentially begging for a ray of hope.

“Don’t worry,” Big said. Easy for him to say.

As I got my coat, walked out, and locked the door
behind me, Warren looked at me sadly, as if he knew we wouldn’t be
taking any future walks together. There wasn’t even anywhere to
run—I was going without so much as a whimper.

“Get in,” said Bigger, opening the back door of the
SUV. I got in. What did you think I was going to do? If I were Jack
Reacher, the exmilitary cop/one-man wrecking crew, I probably would
have shot each of them twelve or thirteen times, and then had sex
with a female police officer. Alas, Jack was elsewhere that
day.

Biggest drove. As we were pulling out of the
driveway, Howard and company drove up in my Saturn, and waited
until we were out to pull into my driveway. Howard even waved as
Biggest drove us away. I made a mental note to inform my wife, if I
ever saw her again, of what a doofus her brother was.

The drive wasn’t long. Of course, the windows were
tinted, which is supposedly illegal in New Jersey, but no one
cares. I could still see out, and they were making no effort to
keep me from seeing the route. Don’t they usually put blindfolds on
you, or something, so you won’t be able to testify? Of course, I’d
seen all three of their faces. They weren’t expecting me to
testify.

The SUV pulled up to a gate in Millburn, a Union
County town for people who think they should be residents of Morris
County. Millburn isn’t quite as ritzy as its neighbor, Short Hills
(which is actually in Essex County, truth be told), but then, it’s
been said some sections of Heaven aren’t quite as ritzy as Short
Hills. The gate opened, although no gatetender was visible.

The house was quite impressive—a huge Victorian,
tasteful in every way but ostentatious in size. Biggest pulled the
car up to the entrance, and Big motioned for me to get out. Much as
I didn’t want to go inside the house, staying in the car seemed a
worse option, so I complied—as if I had a choice.

Bigger opened the front door without knocking and led
me into the entrance hall, then through a large living room with a
roaring fireplace and toward a very impressive solid wood door.
Here, he knocked.

“Come,” came a voice. Bigger opened the door and made
sure I walked in ahead of him.

The room, of course, was enormous. And though I
expected something darker and more Brando-like, this man wasn’t
even sitting in a swivel chair, behind his desk, so he could spin
and suddenly reveal himself to be the double-dealing superior
officer I had thought I could trust.

Instead, Hyman Shapiro was standing in the center of
the room, walking toward me with a hand extended, and smiling. He
was pushing eighty, but his gait was brisk and he was trim and
seemingly quite fit. I found myself taking his hand, disarmed by
the fact that he didn’t -seem to be getting ready to kill me.

“Mr. Tucker,” he said with the slightest trace of an
accent we second-generation types associate mostly with our
grandparents. Yiddish will die out as a living language soon, and
it’ll be a shame. Shapiro’s Eastern European roots were showing in
his voice. “I’m Hyman Shapiro. Thank you for coming on such short
notice.”

I decided to see what the parameters were. “It’s not
that I mind a slight case of abduction now and then,” I said, “but
I have tickets to the theatre, to a play I’ve been looking forward
to seeing. And I get, well, kind of unreasonable about things like
that.”

He chuckled with appreciation. “Cary Grant,” he said.
“
North by Northwest.
Very good. Come. Sit down.”

So I sat down. In front of the desk were several very
nice armchairs, which reminded me of the Oval Office set for “West
Wing.” There was a table between them with a coffee urn and a tray
of baked goods. Shapiro wasn’t only a big-time gangster—he could
obviously cater. We sat there so Shapiro could show what a regular
guy he was. In the presence of this slim little man, it was
difficult to believe he was reputed to cause all sorts of mayhem
and bloodshed.

“Bagel?” He gestured to the tray. “We get the best,
Sonny Amster’s, from right here in town.” Sonny’s bagels are
legendary, but my stomach wasn’t really in the mood for anything
except abject terror. I shook my head. “Your loss,” he said, taking
a bagel and placing half of one, dry, on a plate.

“Why am I here, Mr. Shapiro?”

“That’s good. To the point. I like that,” Shapiro
said. He was doing his very best to be charming. “I suppose you’ve
heard of me.”

“To tell you the truth, until the Three Stooges
showed up on my doorstep, I thought you were a myth,” I said.

Shapiro took a bite of bagel (salt) and nodded,
chewing. “Better that way,” he said when he could. “People don’t
come looking for a myth, and my reputation is a lot more
intimidating than the real thing.”