Grave Designs (5 page)

Chapter Five

Benny and I walked down Monroe Street to Dearborn. The sun was to our backs, and there was a cool breeze coming off the lake. The last of the commuters brushed past us hurrying toward the train stations, squinting into the setting sun. We turned north on Dearborn and walked by the First National Plaza. The outdoor café on the Plaza was filled with young couples sipping wine coolers. In the shadows of the Plaza the Chagall mosaic looked like a giant slab of moldy cream cheese, splotched with pastel greens and blues.

“When are you going to marry me, Rachel?”

“Benny, don't start that again. You know my mother wants me to marry a nice Jewish doctor.”

“Hey, I'm a juris doctor. What's that? Chopped liver?”

Benny Goldberg was an anomaly at Abbott & Windsor, a chubby Jew among tall, athletic Wasps. Unlike the typical Abbott & Windsor lawyer, whose language complied with the television networks' code of decency, Benny's profanity was astonishing, apparently inspired by his chronic bowel disorders.

Benny also had a first name that sounded like a first name and a last name that sounded like a last name. This, too, put him in the minority at Abbott & Windsor, where most of the lawyers had interchangeable first and last names. The firm's letterhead included Sterling Grant, Hamilton Frederick, Ishmael Richardson, Porter Edwards, Hayden James, Baker Scott, Townsend Ward, and—until recently—Graham Marshall. And centered at the top of the letterhead, the long-dead founding partners: Kendall Abbott and Evans Windsor.

Benny had been with Abbott & Windsor since he graduated near the top of his class at Columbia Law School six years ago. His longevity at the firm was due to a Mexican standoff between the firm's need for Benny's brain and the firm's discomfort with everything that housed, fed, and transported that brain. Up until Graham Marshall's death, the equilibrium had started shifting in the firm's favor as Benny began approaching partnership age. Under ordinary circumstances Benny had no future at Abbott & Windsor beyond his thirtieth birthday. An Ishmael Richardson or a Townsend Ward would shudder at the prospect of introducing Benny to a client as “my partner, Ben Goldberg.”

But Marshall's death had shifted the odds. Benny now knew more about
In re Bottles & Cans
than anyone else at the firm, with the possible exception of Marshall's two aides-de-camp, Kent Charles and Calvin Pemberton. At least until some other senior associate could get up to speed in that litigation—a lawsuit which brought more than $6,000,000 a year in fees to the firm—Benny's position was secure.

“I don't have any illusions,” Benny said as we crossed Madison Street. “Someone like Richardson would rather be proctoscoped with an electric cattle prod than have me as a partner. Believe me, they'll figure out some way to make sure my shoes aren't shined.”

The shoeshine was another Abbott & Windsor tradition. Twice a week Harold (the shoeshine “boy”) made his rounds of the partners' offices, providing one of the perks of partnership. Each spring, during a secret meeting, the partners selected the new partners from among the ranks of the seventh-year associates. Harold would be notified later that evening. Word of the meeting usually leaked by nine o'clock the next morning, and all seventh-year associates would begin the nervous vigil known as “waiting for Harold.” If you were up for partnership that year, the appearance of Harold at your office door, smiling and asking whether you needed a shine, was the Abbott & Windsor equivalent of divine grace. During my last year at Abbott & Windsor, one high-strung senior tax associate cracked up after Harold, eyes averted, passed his office. Three associates had to wrestle him away from the window he was trying to break with his briefcase.

“I wouldn't worry about that, Benny,” I said. “You wear Hush Puppies, anyway.”

“Shit, I'm not worried, Rachel,” Benny said. “My résumé is on the street, anyway. I think I may even get an offer from DePaul. They really liked that law review article I wrote for them last year.”

By the time we got to the elevator of my building I had decided I wanted to tell Benny about my assignment from Ishmael Richardson and my trip to the cemetery. I knew I wasn't supposed to tell anyone, but I needed someone to talk to about it—and that someone wasn't Ishmael Richardson. Anyway, I swore Benny to secrecy and briefly filled him in during the ride up to my floor.

I unlocked the door and we walked through the tiny reception area to my office. Mary had already gone home. Benny plopped down on the couch while I leafed through the phone messages on my desk. Nothing important. I looked out the window down on the Daley Plaza, where the rust-brown Picasso sculpture stood, huge and isolated. It looked less like a work of art than a bizarre spoof on Soviet technology: an early Russian attempt to mass-produce IUDs, eventually abandoned due to impracticalities of size.

“So,” I said, turning back to Benny, “your turn. What's your scoop on Marshall?”

“Did you read the obituaries?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Did they mention where he died?”

“In the office.”

“Yep. Well, Lou Cohen is a resident over at Northwestern Memorial. The cardiac emergency unit. We grew up together. Next-door neighbors.” Benny had grown up in South Orange, New Jersey.

“Okay. So?”

“He saw the obituary too. And it didn't jibe with what he knows about Abbott and Windsor.”

“What didn't jibe?” I asked.

Benny was grinning. “Lou didn't think that partners at Abbott and Windsor come to work in skindiving suits.”

“What are you talking about, Goldberg?” I asked.

“You heard me.”

“Are you telling me Marshall was wearing a rubber suit when they brought him to the hospital?”

“You got it, Rachel. And judging from the evidence, he wasn't working on a brief when he died.”

“Oh?”

“Nope. He was getting laid. Getting his goddamn ashes hauled in an orange rubber suit.”

“You've got to be kidding me, Benny.” We were both laughing. “Marshall in a rubber suit? My God, that's like…like Charles Bronson in fishnets and spike heels.”

Benny nodded his head. “It's the truth. Lou saw the obituary and then he went back to check the ambulance log. They didn't pick him up at the office. They got him over at Shore Drive Tower.”

“From whom?” I asked.

“Someone named Reynolds. C. Reynolds.”

I jotted it down on a yellow legal pad.

“Rachel, this stuff is confidential. Lou swore me to secrecy.”

“No promises, Benny.”

“Screw you. Anyway, I thought you might find it interesting.”

“Do you know this Reynolds's first name?” I asked.

“Nope. Probably some chick.”

“First name starts with a
C,
huh?”

“That's what he said.”

I picked up the telephone directory and flipped to the listings for Reynolds. There was a listing for Reynolds, C, at Shore Drive Tower. I jotted down the number.

“Think she had a pet named Canaan?” Benny asked, running his fingers through his curly black hair. He stood up, walked over to my bookshelf, and picked up the dictionary. “It means Promised Land, I think.” He sat back down with the dictionary open on his lap. “Here it is. Let's see. Canaan. ‘The fourth son of Ham and the grandson of Noah.' What kind of name is Ham for a nice Jewish boy?”

“Read on,” I said.

“Okay. Here we go: ‘In biblical times, the part of Palestine between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea; the Promised Land.' Some name for a mutt, huh?”

“Keep reading,” I said.

“That's it.”

“No. There should be one more definition.”

“Not here,” said Benny, handing me the dictionary.

I read the definitions slowly. “Wait a minute.” I reached into my briefcase and pulled out my notes.

“What are you talking about?” asked Benny.

“I checked the definitions over at Abbott and Windsor. Marshall's dictionary. I even wrote them down.”

“So?”

“There was a third definition in Marshall's dictionary. Listen.” I read from my notes: “‘A village in Massachusetts, founded in 1679 by Reverend Winthrop Marvell and disbanded in 1698.'”

“Big deal,” said Benny. “Different dictionary, different definitions.”

“Same word, though.”

“Maybe you copied the wrong definition, Rachel.”

“I don't think so.” I frowned. “I'll check it tomorrow. I'm supposed to drop by the firm around noon.”

“Read me that definition again,” said Benny.

I read it to him.

“Canaan, Massachusetts?” said Benny. “Never heard of it. I knew a couple of preppies from
New
Canaan, Connecticut. Real douche bags. But I never heard of a Canaan.” Benny walked to the window. “It's a weird name for a pet.”

“You still hungry?” I asked.

“Still hungry? I'm starving. Let's get out of here. I'm ready to put on the feed bag.”

I put my notes into my briefcase, turned out the lights, and locked up. We flagged a cab and headed up to the Oxford Pub for a hamburger and beer.

Once we placed our orders, I went over to the pay phone and called C. Reynolds at Shore Drive Tower. She answered on the third ring, sounding pleasant but a little distracted. I introduced myself, vaguely explained my relationship to Graham Marshall and Abbott & Windsor, and asked if I could have thirty minutes of her time tomorrow morning to ask a few questions.

She hesitated, I persisted, and finally she agreed. “Suit yourself, lady,” she said. “Drop by around ten tomorrow morning. I can give you fifteen minutes.”

Chapter Six

On my way down to Shore Drive Tower Tuesday morning I stopped at a bookstore on Michigan Avenue. I found an atlas in the travel section and studied the maps of New England. There were Canaans all over the East—in Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, and New York. There was even a Canaan in Mississippi. But no Canaan in Massachusetts. I wandered over to the history section and skimmed the indexes of several books on Colonial America. No mention of Canaan, Massachusetts. I checked every dictionary in the bookstore. No reference to Canaan, Massachusetts.

I walked across Grant Park toward Shore Drive Tower, squinting in the bright morning sun. A couple was playing tennis on the center court. The woman, her back to me, was built like Harmon Killibrew, and she swung her racket, two-fisted, as if it were a Louisville Slugger. Her opponent chased her wild shots with the stiff-legged gait of middle age. Leaning against a lamppost, I watched them play for a few minutes. A pigeon strutted past, its head bobbing.

About thirty yards away, a fat Park District employee methodically stabbed paper cups and other litter with a steel pole and deposited his catch in a black plastic bag. I watched the tennis couple volley until she hit a shot off the handle into the next court, and then I walked on to Shore Drive Tower.

The guard inside called C. Reynolds on the house phone, spoke briefly, and then buzzed me in. I took the mirrored elevator to the eighteenth floor and stepped off into the carpeted hallway. The elevator door slid closed behind me with a muffled sigh. I rang the bell to Apartment 18B.

She opened the door and I introduced myself. We shook hands. She was beautiful—gorgeous—in a Midwest cheerleader sort of way. Pug nose, freckles, pouty lips, perfect white teeth. Her blue eyes were still puffy from sleep, and her blond hair was partially covered by a red and white bandanna. She was in her mid-twenties.

“Well, come on in, Miss Gold,” she said, smiling stiffly. “Make yourself at home.”

She was wearing an old blue terry-cloth robe that was at least two sizes too big. Her bare feet showed below the bottom of the robe. We walked through the small foyer into her living room.

“I'm gonna get some coffee,” she said. “Want some?”

“Sure. Thanks.”

“How do you take it?”

“Black. And you can call me Rachel.”

She stared at me, and her face relaxed just a little. “Okay. And I'm Cindi. With an
i
at the end.”

She left me in the living room and walked into the modern white kitchen. A butcher-block countertop bar separated the two rooms. The living room was bright and cheerful. There were two healthy Boston ferns hanging in front of the large picture window and a pair of areca palms flanking a cream-colored couch. The off-white walls were decorated with chrome-framed prints of art exhibits.

“This is a lovely place,” I said, looking out the window at the scalloped beaches along the Gold Coast.

I sat down on the love seat opposite the couch and scanned the magazines spread out on the glass and chrome coffee table. She had eclectic tastes. There was a
New Republic,
a
Vogue,
a
Penthouse,
a
Newsweek,
a
Daedelus,
a
New Yorker,
an
American Scholar,
and a
Harvard Law Review.

“Here you go.” She came in carrying two steaming mugs and handed me one.

“Thanks.”

She sat down on the couch, took a sip from her mug, and rested it on the table. Leaning back, she shoved her hands into the deep pockets of her robe.

“Did you work with Graham?” she asked.

“For a while.”

“Bottles and Cans?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. How did you know?”

“Graham specialized in litigation.” She shrugged and reached for her mug. “I know many litigators.” She took another sip of coffee and settled back with the mug on her lap. “Sometimes they talk to me about their cases, and occasionally I listen.” She turned her head toward the window.

“He was here the night he died?”

She turned back and stared at me. “Is that a question?”

I shrugged. “Only partly. The hospital records indicate he was picked up here.”

She turned again toward the window. “Well, that's true. He was here. I called the ambulance.”

“I take it your relationship with him was…uh…professional,” I said.

“That's correct,” she said. Her large eyes were a deep blue, almost violet.

“Did he ever talk about his personal life?”

“Not much,” she said. “That's why I told you I didn't think I'd be much help.”

“Would you mind if I asked you some questions anyway? We're trying to wrap up a few loose ends.”

Cindi sighed. “Sure. Go ahead.” She lifted her long slender legs and rested them on the table. “Tell me, are you still with Abbott and Windsor?”

“Only as far as this matter is concerned. I left the firm a few years back.”

“How come?”

“Hard to say,” I said. “It seemed like the right thing to do.”

“What do you mean?”

“There were a lot of little things.”

“Like what?”

“The clients. All those big corporations fighting over money.” I shrugged. “It seemed kind of trivial. So I decided to go into practice on my own.”

“Sounds very noble. And not very true,” she said, smiling. She had dimples.

I smiled too. “You're right, I guess.” I took a sip of coffee. “Mostly, I was just bored. Do you know the saying, You're either on the bus or off the bus?”

“Sure.”

“Well, around my fourth year at Abbott and Windsor I realized I was off the bus. Some people like it that way—sitting by the side of the road, joking about all the bozos on the buses that go rumbling by.” I sighed. “But it's not a good way to live. You end up playing to an audience of one: yourself. It gets depressing real quick. Well, when I realized I was off the bus”—I shrugged—“I decided to find another one.”

“Did you?” Cindi asked.

“I think so. I have a nice practice—interesting work, decent clients, and I don't have to put up with the usual BS from senior partners. It's not quite a bus, yet. More like a sub-compact.”

Cindi smiled. “Any regrets?”

“Some. Everything's a tradeoff.” I worked on my coffee. “Sometimes I wish I had some young associate to do the legal research. But I like being on my own. Particularly when I'm in a case up against a firm like Abbott and Windsor.”

She nodded her head, smiling. “Good for you.” She took another sip of coffee and then frowned. “So, why are you here?”

“Abbott and Windsor is handling Marshall's estate. They've retained me to clear up a few things. For one, how long did you know Marshall?”

” About two years.”

“How many times did you two…er…see each other?”

She thought for a moment. “Approximately twice a month for the last six months or so. Alternate Wednesdays. Before that, maybe once a month.”

“What kind of things did you talk about?”

She smiled. “Well, other than the particular logistics for the evening's events, just the usual stuff. The weather, the Bears, the news. He sometimes would talk about one of his lawsuits in a vague way—a deposition, an appellate argument, some motion pending in
In re Bottles and Cans.”

“Did he ever mention something called Canaan?”

“Canaan?” She frowned in thought. “No, not that I remember.”

“A pet?”

“No.”

“Have you ever had a pet named Canaan?”

She shook her head. “I've never heard of Canaan.”

“Anything else that you remember talking about? Anything at all?” I asked.

“No, I don't think so.” She paused. “When we first met he used to ask me about the pageant. I don't know why he kept harping on it.”

“What pageant?”

She blushed. “The beauty pageant. Ms. United States.”

“I don't understand.”

“I was in it, Rachel. Back in 1985. Back before I met Graham. You're talking to the third runner-up.”

“No kidding.”

“Yep. I was Ms. Illinois, 1985.” She grinned.

“Congratulations.”

“It seems like another lifetime.”

“You enter many pageants?”

“Not anymore.” She finished her coffee. “I started my glorious career at six months. I was named cutest baby in Peoria. You know, one of those baby-picture contests the newspapers sponsor. Bare tush and a big toothless grin.”

“Great.”

Cindi stood up. “I'm gonna grab some yogurt and fruit. You hungry?”

“No, thanks.”

She paused, and then smiled. “Let me give you something to look at.” She walked into the bedroom and returned with a well-worn scrapbook, which she set on the coffee table. Her name was engraved in gold leaf on the cover: Cynthia Ann Reynolds. She leaned over and opened it to the first page.

“Feast your eyes,” she said, pointing to the first page. “I'll be right back.”

I leaned forward to look at the faded newspaper clipping from the
Peoria
News.
BABY CYNTHIA—THIS YEAR'S CUTEST TYKE read the headline over the photograph of a smiling baby lying on her stomach, wearing nothing but a ribbon around her neck. Next to the clipping someone had hand-printed the following: “3/12/63—P.N.—Cynthia has won her first contest! Only the beginning for my cute little princess!”

Cindi returned carrying a cup of plain yogurt and an apple. She took a large bite out of the apple as she sat back down on the couch, tucking a leg under her. She smoothed her robe over her lap.

“My mother,” Cindi explained, pointing to the writing. “The last of the great pageant mothers. She totally planned my career. Tap-dancing lessons at five, for the talent competitions. Dermatologists, dance classes, charm school, music lessons, modeling class—you name it. Bedtime stories about pageants to come.” Cindi shook her head. “We were a real pair of clichés, my mother and I. She kept this scrapbook, filling it with newspaper clippings. When she died last year, I brought it back with me.”

“She must have been proud.”

“Sure. I was the beautiful princess she never could be.” There was a trace of bitterness in her voice. “Classic textbook case, right? Klutzy fathers make jocks out of their sons. Homely mothers make their daughters beauty queens.”

“My mother wanted me to be the wife of a nice Jewish doctor,” I said. “Still does. And my father wants me to learn how to cook a tzimmes like his mother.”

I flipped slowly through the scrapbook. Little Miss Peoria—five years old in a short dress, patent leather shoes, and a sunbonnet. Camp Wallawalla Queen for a Day. Homecoming Queen, Peoria High School. And then the big time. Miss Southern Illinois, Miss Corn-belt, Miss Heartland, University of Illinois Homecoming Queen, and then Ms. Illinois. News clippings for each, and hand-printed notes by her mother, loaded with exclamation marks—“We did it! My princess was wonderful! The judges loved her!”

“This is impressive,” I said. “Did you really tap-dance for the talent part?”

“Sure. When I was little it was perfectly adorable. And once I reached puberty the male judges loved it. Lots of jiggling.”

I turned to the last page. Ms. United States. The headline read: NEW MS. UNITED STATES CROWNED; MISS ILLINOIS THIRD RUNNER-UP. In the picture Cindi was hugging the newly crowned queen. The defeat had been hard on her mother. No notes, no exclamation marks. Just the essentials: “7/28/85 C.H.T.—Third Runner-up.”

“What does C.H.T. mean?”

“Chicago Herald Tribune.
That's where the article's from. The July twenty-eighth edition of the
Herald Tribune.”

“That's my birthday.” I read the article. “Third runner-up. That's not bad.”

“I was lucky it wasn't fourth runner-up after the way I screwed up.”

“What happened?”

“I made it to the finals. Then came the part where each of us was asked one question. The idea is to see who has grace under pressure, or some baloney like that. Which is ridiculous, anyway, since you give the same answer no matter what you're asked.”

“I don't follow.”

“You plan your answer ahead of time. Something really patriotic and tear-jerking.”

“Did you?”

“Sure. Mine was the social-worker-in-the-cancer-ward-of-a-children's-hospital shtick. Then, no matter what I would be asked, that was the answer. If they asked me what my future plans were, I'd say I wanted to be a social worker in the blah, blah, blah. If they asked me what I'd do to make this country better, I'd say I'd train social workers and put them in blah, blah, blah. If they asked me what I'd do during my reign as Ms. United States, I'd say I'd spend my days visiting the cancer wards of children's hospitals, blah, blah, blah. Get the idea? Total bullshit delivered in a trembling voice.”

“Okay,” I said, smiling. “So what happened?”

“Well, the emcee called my name and I walked over to the microphone. He said a few cutesy things and then he held up the card and read the questions. ‘Cynthia,' he said, ‘if an alien from outer space landed in the center of your hometown and asked to see the one thing that typified the spirit of Peoria, what would you show him?' The question was a cinch. And I had the answer ready. You know, I'd take the alien to the cancer ward in the children's hospital, blah, blah, blah. But I didn't say anything at first.” She frowned, crinkling her nose. “It was weird. Have you ever been talking with someone and suddenly become aware of your own voice? Like you've stepped out of yourself and you're watching yourself talk, and your voice sounds odd, and the words stop making any sense? Or maybe someone is talking to you and you suddenly are noticing the hairs sticking out of his nose or the perspiration on his upper lip, or you even begin to watch yourself standing there listening to him?”