Ehrengraf for the Defense (10 page)

But how was one to deal with a nasty madman?
A helpless, pathetic madman?

Ehrengraf, who was fond of poetry, sought his
memory for an illuminating phrase. Thoughts of madmen recalled
Christopher Smart, an eighteenth-century poet who was periodically
confined to Bedlam where he wrote a long poem that was largely
comprehensible only to himself and God.

Quoting Smart, Ehrengraf said, “‘Let Ross,
house of Ross, rejoice with Obadiah, and the rankle-dankle fish
with hands.’”

Terence Reginald Mayhew nodded. “Now that,”
he said, “is the first sensible thing you’ve said since you walked
in here.”

* * *

A dozen days later, while Martin Ehrengraf
was enjoying a sonnet of Thomas Hood’s, his telephone rang. He took
it up, said hello, and heard himself called an unconscionable
swine.

“Ah,” he said. “Mr. Mayhew.”

“You are a man with no heart. I’m a poor
housebound cripple, Mr. Ehrengraf—”

“Indeed.”

“—and you’ve taken my life away. Do you have
any notion what I had to go through to make this phone call?”

“I have a fair idea.”

“Do you have any idea what I’ve been going
through?”

“A fair idea of that as well,” Ehrengraf
said. “Here’s a pretty coincidence. Just as you called, I was
reading this poem of Thomas Hood’s—do you know him?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“A sonnet called
Silence
. I’ll just
read you the sestet:

“
But in green ruins, in the desolate
walls,

Of antique palaces, where Man hath been,

Though the dun fox or wild hyena calls,

And owls that flit continually between,

Shriek to the echo, and the low winds moan—

There the true silence is, self-conscious and
alone.

“Don’t you think that’s marvelously evocative
of what you’ve been going through, Mr. Mayhew?”

“You’re a terrible man.”

“Indeed. And you should never forget it.”

“I won’t.”

“It could all happen again. In fact, it could
happen over and over.”

“What do I have to do?”

“You have to leave my client strictly
alone.”

“I was having so much
fun
.”

“Don’t whine, Mr. Mayhew. You can’t play your
nasty little tricks on Mr. Crowe. But there’s a whole world of
other victims out there just waiting for your attentions.”

“You mean—”

“I’m sure I’ve said nothing that wouldn’t
have occurred to you in good time, sir. On the other hand, you
never know what some other victim might do. He might even find his
way to my office, and you know full well what the consequences of
that would be. Indeed, you know that you
can’t
know. So
perhaps what you ought to do is grow up, Mr. Mayhew, and wrap the
tattered scraps of your life around your wretched body, and make
the best of it.”

“I don’t—”

“Think of Thomas Hood, sir. Think of the true
silence.”

“I can’t—”

“Think of Ross, house of Ross, and the
rankle-dankle fish with hands.”

“I’m not—”

“And think of Mr. Crowe while you’re at it. I
suggest you call him, sir. Apologize to him. Assure him that his
troubles are over.”

“I don’t want to call him.”

“Make the call,” Ehrengraf said, his voice
smooth as steel. “Or your troubles, Mr. Mayhew, are just
beginning.”

* * *

“The most remarkable thing,” Ethan Crowe
said. “I had a call from that troll Mayhew. At first I didn’t
believe it was he. I didn’t recognize his voice. He sounded so
frightened, so unsure of himself.”

“Indeed.”

“He assured me I’d have no further trouble
from him. No more limousines or taxis, no more flowers, none of his
idiotic little pranks. He apologized profusely for all the trouble
he’d caused me in the past and assured me it would never happen
again. It’s hard to know whether to take the word of a madman, but
I think he meant what he said.”

“I’m certain he did.”

They were once again in Martin Ehrengraf’s
office, and as usual the lawyer’s desk was as cluttered as his
person was immaculate. He was wearing the navy suit again, as it
happened, but he had left the light-blue vest at home. His tie bore
a half-inch diagonal stripe of royal blue flanked by two narrower
stripes, one of gold and the other of a rather bright green, all on
a navy field. Crowe was wearing a three-piece suit, expensive and
beautifully tailored but in a rather morose shade of brown.
Ehrengraf had decided charitably to regard the man as color blind
and let it go at that.

“What did you do, Ehrengraf?”

The little lawyer looked off into the middle
distance. “I suppose I can tell you,” he said after a moment’s
reflection. “I took his life away from him.”

“That’s what I thought you would do. Take his
life, I mean. But he was certainly alive when I spoke to him.”

“You misunderstand me. Mr. Crowe, your
antagonist was a housebound cripple who had adjusted to his mean
little life of isolation. He had an income sufficient to his meager
needs. And I went around his house shutting things down.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I speak metaphorically, of course. Well,
there’s no reason I can’t tell you what I did in plain English.
First of all, I went to the post office. I filled out a
change-of-address card, signed it in his name, and filed it. From
that moment on, all his mail was efficiently forwarded to the
General Delivery window in Greeley, Colorado, where it’s to be held
until called for, which may take rather a long time.”

“Good heavens.”

“I notified the electric company that Mr.
Mayhew had vacated the premises and ordered them to cut off service
forthwith. I told the telephone company the same thing, so when he
picked up the phone to complain about the lights being out I’m
afraid he had a hard time getting a dial tone. I sent a notarized
letter to the landlord—over Mr. Mayhew’s signature, of
course—announcing that he was moving and demanding that his lease
be canceled. I got in touch with his cleaning woman and informed
her that her services would no longer be required. I could go on,
Mr. Crowe, but I believe you get the idea. I took his life away and
shut it down and he didn’t like it.”

“Good grief.”

“His only remaining contact with the world
was what he saw through his windows, and that was nothing
attractive. Nevertheless, I was going to have his windows painted
black from the outside—I was in the process of making final
arrangements. A chap was going to suspend a scaffold as if to wash
the windows but he would have painted them instead. I saw it as a
neat coup de grace, but Mayhew made that last touch unnecessary
throwing in the sponge. That’s a mixed metaphor, from coup de grace
to throwing in the sponge, but I hope you’ll pardon it.”

“You did to him what he’d done to me. Hoist
him on his own petard.”

“Let’s say I hoisted him on a similar petard.
He plagued you by introducing an infinity of unwanted elements into
your life. But I reduced his life to the four rooms he lived in and
even threatened his ability to retain those very rooms. That drove
the lesson home to him in a way I doubt he’ll ever forget.”

“Simple and brilliant,” Crowe said. “I wish
I’d thought of it.”

“I’m glad you didn’t.”

“Why?”

“Because you’d have saved yourself fifty
thousand dollars.”

Crowe gasped. ‘‘Fifty thousand—”

“Dollars. My fee.”

“But that’s an outrage. All you did was write
some letters and make some phone calls.”

“All I did, sir, was everything you asked me
to do. I saved you from answering to a murder charge.”

“I wouldn’t have murdered him.”

“Nonsense,” Ehrengraf snapped. “You
tried
to murder him. You thought engaging me would have
precisely that effect. Had I wrung the wretch’s neck you’d pay my
fee without a whimper, but because I accomplished the desired
result with style and grace instead of brute force you now resist
paying me. It would be an immense act of folly, Mr. Crowe, if you
were to do anything other than pay my fee in full at once.”

‘You don’t think the amount is out of
line?”

“I don’t keep my fees in a line, Mr. Crowe.”
Ehrengraf’s hand went to the knot of his tie. It was the official
necktie of the Caedmon Society of Oxford University. Ehrengraf had
not attended Oxford and did not belong to the Caedmon Society any
more than he belonged to the International Society for the
Preservation of Wild Mustangs and Burros, but it was a tie he
habitually wore on celebratory occasions. “I set my fees according
to an intuitive process,” he went on, “and they are never
negotiable. Fifty thousand dollars, sir. Not a penny more, not a
penny less. Ah, Mr. Crowe, Mr. Crowe—do you know why Mayhew chose
to torment you?”

“I suppose he feels I’ve harmed him.”

“And have you?”

“No, but—”

“Supposition is blunder’s handmaiden, Mr.
Crowe. Mayhew made your life miserable because he hated you. I
don’t know why he hated you. I don’t believe Mayhew himself knows
why he hated you. I think he selected you at random. He needed
someone to hate and you were convenient. Ah, Mr. Crowe—” Ehrengraf
smiled with his lips “—consider how much damage was done to you by
an insane cripple with no actual reason to do you harm. And then
consider, sir, how much more harm could be done you by someone
infinitely more ruthless and resourceful than Terence Reginald
Mayhew, someone who is neither a lunatic nor a cripple, someone who
is supplied with fifty thousand excellent reasons to wish you
ill.”

Crowe stared. “That’s a threat,” he said
slowly.

“I fear you’ve confused a threat and a
caution, Mr. Crowe, though I warrant the distinction’s a thin one.
Are you fond of poetry, sir?”

“No.”

“I’m not surprised. It’s no criticism, sir.
Some people have poetry in their souls and others do not. It’s
predetermined, I suspect, like color blindness. I could recommend
Thomas Hood, sir, or Christopher Smart, but would you read them? Or
profit by them? Fifty thousand dollars, Mr. Crowe, and a check will
do nicely.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“Certainly not.”

“And I won’t be intimidated.”

“Indeed you won’t,” Ehrengraf agreed. “But do
you recall our initial interview, Mr. Crowe? I submit that you
would do well to act
as if
—as if you were afraid of me, as
if you were intimidated.”

Ethan Crowe sat quite still for several
seconds. A variety of expressions played over his generally
unexpressive face. At length he drew a checkbook from the breast
pocket of his morosely brown jacket and uncapped a silver fountain
pen.

“Payable to?”

“Martin H. Ehrengraf.”

The pen scratched away. Then, idly, “What’s
the H. stand for?”

“Herod.”

“The store in England?”

“The king,” said Ehrengraf. “The king in the
Bible.”

The End

“
Play me songs with flatted thirds:

Puppets dance from bloody strings.

Music mourns dead birds.

Breath is sweet in broken things.”

—
William Telliford

William Telliford gave his head a tentative
scratch, in part because it itched, in part out of puzzlement. It
itched because he had been unable to wash his lank brown hair
during the four days he’d thus far spent in jail. He was puzzled
because this dapper man before him was proposing to get him out of
jail.

“I don’t understand,” he said. “The court
appointed an attorney for me. A younger man, I think he said his
name was Trabner. You’re not associated with him or anything, are
you?”

“Certainly not.”

“Your name is—”

“Martin Ehrengraf.”

“Well, I appreciate your coming to see me,
Mr. Ehrengraf, but I’ve already got a lawyer, this Mr. Trabner,
and—”

“Are you satisfied with Mr. Trabner?”

Telliford lowered his eyes, focusing his gaze
upon the little lawyer’s shoes, a pair of highly polished black
wing tips. “I suppose he’s all right,” he said slowly.

“But?”

“But he doesn’t believe I’m innocent. I mean
he seems to take it for granted I’m guilty and the best thing I can
do is plead guilty to manslaughter or something. He’s talking in
terms of making some kind of deal with the district attorney, like
it’s a foregone conclusion that I have to go to prison and the only
question is how long.”

“Then you’ve answered my question,” Ehrengraf
said, a smile flickering on his thin lips. “You’re unsatisfied with
your lawyer. The court has appointed him. It remains for you to
disappoint him, as it were, and to engage me in his stead. You have
the right to do this, you know.”

“But I don’t have the money. Trabner was
going to defend me for free, which is about as much as I can
afford. I don’t know what kind of fees you charge for something
like this but I’ll bet they’re substantial. That suit of yours
didn’t come from the Salvation Army.”

Ehrengraf beamed. His suit, charcoal gray
flannel with a nipped-in waist, had been made for him by a most
exclusive tailor. His shirt was pink, with a button-down collar.
His vest was a Tattersall check, red and black on a cream
background, and his tie showed half-inch stripes of red and
charcoal gray. “My fees are on the high side,” he allowed. “To
undertake your defense I would ordinarily set a fee of eighty
thousand dollars.”

“Eighty dollars would strain my budget,”
William Telliford said. “Eighty thousand, well, it might take me
ten years to earn that much.”

“But I propose to defend free of charge,
sir.”

William Telliford stared, not least because
he could not recall the last time anyone had thought to call him
sir. He was, it must be said, a rather unprepossessing young man,
much given to slouching and sprawling. His jeans needed patching at
the knees. His plaid flannel shirt needed washing and ironing. His
chukka boots needed soles and heels, and his socks needed
replacement altogether.