Freeze Frame (21 page)

The apparatus Sean described had been
removed, but as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I noticed a tube
in his right arm.

"Manny?" I reached down and touched his arm
through the covers.

His eyes opened, at first staring blankly at
the ceiling, then locking on my face. I thought I detected a
smile.

"Manny? Do you hear me?"

He nodded. "Yes...weak."

"We know about the DVD...why you were
beaten." Another nod.

"Can you move?"

Looking down, I could see his left arm move
beneath the cover.

I removed my scarf and coat and set them on
the chair between the bed and window. “It's lucky you're alive.
There’s going to be a policeman guarding you tonight."

"Policeman?"

"The people who did this to you, we want to
make sure they can't hurt you again.

"I brought this." I reached over and took the
pistol out of my coat pocket. I held it out. Manny smiled as he
recognized the weapon.

The room suddenly grew darker and I looked up
to see the silhouette of a large person standing at the door. A
nurse making the rounds. I brought the pistol down quickly and,
lifting Manny’s head, shoved it under the pillow. I hoped she
hadn’t seen the gun.

She hadn’t. The nurse walked to the foot of
Manny’s bed and reached for the chart.

That's when she noticed me. "I'm sorry,
you'll have to leave. The patient's condition is still
critical."

"But I'm an old friend." I stayed in the
shadows.

"Doctor's orders." She turned toward the
light switch. "I'll see you out."

I couldn’t chance letting the nurse see my
face. I grabbed my coat and scarf and, head down, started for the
door.

"Don't trouble yourself." I brushed past the
woman. In the hallway, I walked quickly to the elevator.

Not until the doors closed and the elevator
headed for the main floor did I remember the pistol, still buried
beneath Manny’s pillow.

85

8:01 p.m.

Staring down from the darkened third floor
office, the bright Adams & Benson lobby reminded me of a
bustling beehive.

With the season's biggest football game an
hour away, two teams were buzzing around, making last minute
preparations. The ESPN-TV crew frantically checked cables, lighting
and microphones for the remote telecast at halftime. The other
team, A & B hourly employees on overtime, flew around hanging
brightly colored team pennants all over the lobby, checking on
refreshments and fine-tuning sound equipment that would broadcast
the game to every corner of the lobby. The workers had to maneuver
around a few early celebrants who had crashed the party prior to
the official eight-thirty opening and stood chatting and
drinking.

With everyone focused on the evening’s
preparations, sneaking up to the third floor had been the
proverbial piece of cake. I had been caught on video of course;
there were security cameras all over. But unless a reason popped up
to replay the discs, say a burglary somewhere in the building,
their contents would never be reviewed.

Bleachers had been erected to face giant
forty-foot screens installed at either end of the lobby. To my
right, the north end was covered in green and white New York Jets
pennants and banners; the south end decked out in the familiar red
and gold of the San Francisco Forty-Niners.

The receptionist's desk had been removed from
the center of the lobby and replaced with a round platform about
three feet high. Atop that sat a canvas-covered shape the length,
width and height of a small vehicle. Lines ran from the canvas
shroud to the ceiling. At the right moment during halftime, the
canvas would be lifted, introducing the new Ampere to the people
here, and to a national television audience at home. Two beefy
security men stood on either side of the platform, making sure
party guests didn’t help themselves to a preview.

Besides the giant screens at each end, at
least twenty smaller monitors had been positioned about the lobby.
There were a half dozen portable bars, and a number of stands with
colorful signs boasting they served pizza, hot dogs and Italian
sausage sandwiches.

Tonight, tonight...won’t be just any
night...

Stephen Sondheim's lyrics blending with
Leonard Bernstein’s melody poured through my mind like water from a
faucet I couldn't shut off. I’d spent untold afternoons at the
piano absorbed in the score of West Side Story, despite the fact it
had been popular two decades before I was born.

Tonight would not be just any night. It
couldn't be. Tonight had to be the night the madness stopped.

A knot of nervousness tied itself in the pit
of my stomach, accompanied by a pounding in my temples. Not a
headache. Not now. I rubbed the sides of my head.

My watch read eight-o-seven. I pictured Joe
Washington on his way to Henry Ford Hospital. He’d split
immediately after the game, but it was better than nothing. By then
this nightmare would be over...one way or another.

Tonight, tonight...

86

10:16 p.m.

"How long you figure this thing’ll take to
work?" Kaminski took a sip from his coffee mug.

He and Higgins sat in an unmarked Taurus in
the Adams & Benson lot. The game played on the radio; the Jets
up fourteen to seven with minutes to go in the half.

"Damned if I know,” Higgins shrugged. "This
subliminal crap is new to me, too."

They had found a parking spot fifty feet from
the side entrance. With all other doors locked, they had a clear
view of everyone coming and going.

"It better be one of those six," Kaminski
said. "With two hundred people inside, we sure as hell can't follow
everyone.”

That, Higgins thought, is the biggest hole in
the whole damn plan. Instead of saying so, he stared out the car
window at a brightly lit ore freighter sliding past the city on its
way south.

10:43 p.m.

I had forgotten about the football game until
a roar from the lobby caused me to look at the giant screen on my
left in time to see a Jets player doing his version of the hula in
the end zone. The numbers on the screen told the score: twenty-one
to seven, New York.

Big deal. Since the opening kickoff my
attention had been focused on the crowd. Thankfully, every one of
our six suspects was there. Joe Adams arrived first, followed
shortly by Ken Cunningham. Forgive me, but I still couldn’t imagine
Ken Cunningham or Sid Goldman as suspects.

The others arrived soon after Cunningham. Sid
appeared with his wife Mavis, followed by C. J. Rathmore, and
Jonathon Goff, A & B's vice president of media. Baron Nichols
came last, fashionably late at the end of the first quarter.

Looking down from the darkened office, I
spotted Will Parkins and two guys from research in the Jets
bleachers, still high-fiving after the New York touchdown.

I found Sid and Mavis Goldman in the
Forty-Niners bleachers, Sid dressed in a well-worn Forty-Niners
jacket. I remembered he had spent time at BBDO in San
Francisco.

To one side of the bleachers, Paul Chapman
stood by himself, taking in the scene. Ginny Stankowski, Glo-Jo
Johnson, M. J. Curtis and a woman I didn't recognize stood beside
one of the refreshment stands.

It seemed like a hundred years since we had
all been together and I couldn't believe how much I missed the
whole group.

In the center of the lobby, a few men wearing
black jackets with the ESPN logo on the back began moving around a
group of agency and AVC brass, testing lights and camera positions.
In minutes the world would have its first look at the Ampere.

Next to the shroud-covered platform, I saw
Ken Cunningham, Joe Adams and C. J. Rathmore with two American
Vehicle VIPs: William Kesler and Malcolm Sears, AVC's Board
Chairman and President. Carter told me Ken Cunningham would present
a brief history of the development of the Ampere, then toss the
ball to AVC Board Chairman Kesler for the actual introduction. On
Kesler's cue, the canvas would lift, and the Ampere unveiled to the
world.

The Ampere commercial with its subliminal and
hopefully not-so-subliminal messages would follow.

87

11:01 p.m.

Toting the small black bag, the white-haired
man had no trouble entering Henry Ford Hospital long after visiting
hours. Most of the staff members he passed took him for a doctor on
the way to his rounds.

Once on the fourth floor he encountered a
predicament: a tall black man, no doubt a policeman, sitting just
inside Rodriguez’s room. Bacalla had noticed him in time to walk
past and enter an empty room two doors away. He would wait to see
how dedicated a sentry the policeman turned out to be. If he left
to have a cigarette or visit the cafeteria on the first floor,
Bacalla would strike. On the other hand, should the waiting become
too tiresome, he would walk into the room posing as Rodriguez’s
physician and deliver the fatal injection while the policeman
watched.

Either way the man in bed would die.

***

The Ampere introduction went smoothly.

I had a perfect view from the darkened
office. As scripted, Cunningham spoke first and turned the
microphone over to Bill Kesler.

Kesler hadn’t uttered two sentences when it
became painfully clear why Ken had been chosen to deliver the major
portion of the program. Kesler was dull as dust. Mercifully, his
verbal meandering lasted only moments. Then the canvas lifted
toward the four-story ceiling, and the Ampere made its debut before
an applauding Adams & Benson audience and millions watching at
home.

The Ampere commercial followed and received a
predictably enthusiastic reception in the lobby, since this marked
the first time most A & B staffers had seen it. The spot then
began running continuously on three monitors designated for that
purpose.

I watched as people crowded around the
monitors for a second and third viewing. To my delight, every
person on our list drifted over for another look at one time or
another.

If the plan took a dive, it wouldn't be
because no one had been exposed to the subliminal message.

88

11:37 p.m.

The Jets broke the game open with three quick
touchdowns in the third quarter, and the majority of people below
me turned their attention to talking, eating and drinking.

Most of the American Vehicle Corporation
brass left as the third quarter ended but Adams and Cunningham
remained, mingling with employees.

I kept my eye on Joe Adams. There had been
something unusual all evening: he hadn’t consumed a drop of liquor.
I watched intently each time he approached one of the bars. The
bartender poured from a bottle of Vernor’s Ginger Ale, never once
reaching for whiskey. Even after the clients left, Adams nursed
ginger ale straight up. By this time on most occasions he would
have been poured into his car and driven home.

I decided to relay my observation to Sean and
Garry, and punched the numbers to Sean’s cell phone.

He answered on the first ring. "Yeah?"

"I've noticed something strange about Joe
Adams. Is Garry there?"

"No." I could detect a smile in his voice.
"He's down at the river taking a leak. He’s been drinking coffee
all night and it’s his third trip. What's up?"

I explained my suspicions.

"I'll tell Kaminski. Keep your eye on
Adams."

I did, and with the fourth quarter half over,
Adams made a move. He began shaking hands, working his way toward
the door. I phoned Sean again.

"Yeah?"

"Joe Adams is leaving. He’ll be out the door
in minutes."

"Got it. We're on him."

89

12:24 a.m.

It seemed an eternity since Joe Adams left
and I hadn't heard from Sean or Garry.

With the outcome of the game decided long
ago, the party below had begun breaking up. But five of the
suspects still lingered in the lobby.

Tall, curly-haired Jonathon Goff stood in the
center of a group of his media buyers enthralled with his every
word. Agency parties made great opportunities for brownnosing the
boss.

Ken Cunningham chatted with Tom Kuhn, A &
B’s Vice President of Research in front of one of the monitors
displaying the Ampere commercial. I longed to go down and talk with
Ken. He had been like an uncle while I was growing up, and he would
know how to help.

The sound of the phone pierced my thoughts. I
grabbed the receiver.

"Sean?"

"Darcy, listen to me. I'm in the back seat of
Kaminski's car, under arrest. Cops are all around and I don't know
how long I can talk."

"Did you find Adams?"

"We found him. He drove directly to his
secretary's house in Grosse Pointe. She met him at the door dressed
in a flimsy negligee. They're having an affair."

"What did Kaminski do?"

"What the hell do you think? He put me in the
back seat of his car and called his office. He's standing outside
right now."

"But Sean..."

"Kaminski just noticed me talking on the
phone. He's coming for me. Run for it, Darcy or they'll get
you..."

Kaminski's voice came on. "Darcy? Stay where
you are, I'll be right there."

I slammed down the phone. My first thought:
don’t panic.

Down in the lobby, I saw Ken Cunningham and
Tom Kuhn shake hands. As Kuhn went out the glass doors, Cunningham
headed for a metal door fifty feet away that led to the basement of
the building.

I had to talk with Ken, to explain what was
happening. He'd know what to do.

I ran out into the hall to the elevator. Once
on the ground floor, I kept to the outside wall of the lobby,
walking quickly, trying to avoid the few stragglers left. I
shielded the side of my face with one hand, probably unnecessarily.
By this time most guests were too busy saying goodbyes and too far
into their cups to notice me.