The Gold Coast (94 page)

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Authors: Nelson DeMille

BOOK: The Gold Coast
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“Sir?”
“Get a one percent binder, now. Today. And I want to go to contract in a week with twenty percent down.”
“A week? But—”
“I’ll fax you a contract this afternoon. You get this guy in high gear, Mr. Weber. If there are any problems, get back to me pronto.”
“Yes, sir.’’ He asked, “Are you looking to buy any other property out east?”
“What do you have east of Montauk Point?”
“Ocean.”
“How much?”
“It’s free, Mr. Sutter.”
“I’ll take it.’’ I hung up.
Madonn
’, when the shit happens, it happens. Well, I thought, I broke even today. Not bad for a man who’s only in his mid-forties.
• • •
I took the train home that evening and met Susan at McGlade’s for dinner, as we’d planned that morning. I explained the deal to her and said, “I tried to call you to get your approval.’’ Which was more than Frank Bellarosa did when he bought Alhambra without mentioning it to his wife.
Susan didn’t seem to care about the sale. But you never know with women. To paraphrase what Churchill said about the Germans, “Women are either at your feet or at your throat.”
Anyway, I had my calculator out and I was doing some number-crunching over my third gin and tonic. “So, we pay the IRS, we pay Melzer, we pay the real estate commission, we satisfy the existing mortgage, we damned sure put money aside for the capital gains tax since we’re not buying another house, and we add in the ten thousand for the furniture and about three thousand for rent, and deduct the taxes on that as though it were income to play it safe . . . then, let’s see, we factor in some out-of-pocket expenses. . . .”
Susan was yawning. The rich are bored by money talk.
I scratched some figures on my place mat. “Well, I think we cleared ninety-three bucks.’’ I thought a moment, then said, “A potential half-million-dollar asset wiped out.’’ I looked at Susan, “What does the government do with all my money?”
“Can we order dinner?”
“I can’t afford it. I’ll drink.’’ I played around with the numbers again, but I still couldn’t afford solid food, so I ordered another gin and tonic.
Susan said, “Oh, by the way, are you figuring in the twenty thousand dollars you owe me?”
I looked up at her. “Excuse me, Mrs. Sutter, this is a joint liability.”
“Well, I know that, John. But it wasn’t my fault.”
Understand, please, this woman needs twenty thousand dollars like I need to move another stable across the property. I cleared my throat, the way Messrs. Melzer and Weber had done. “Why are you bringing that up?”
“My attorneys want to know—”
“Your
father
.”
“Well . . . I don’t really care about the money. But it’s not a good habit to get into. I mean, mingling assets.”
“We mingle
my
assets. Look, Susan, rest assured I have no claim on your property, even if we do occasionally mingle assets. You have a very tight marriage contract. I’m a lawyer. Trust me.”
“I do, John, but . . . I don’t actually need to have the money, but I do need a sort of promissory note. That’s what my . . . lawyers said.”
“All right.’’ I scribbled an IOU for $20,000 on the place mat, signed and dated it, and pushed it across the table. “It’s legal. Just ignore the part about lunch, dinner, and cocktails, steaks and chops.”
“You needn’t be so touchy. You’re a lawyer. You understand—”
“I understand that I’ve given your father free legal services for nearly two decades. I understand that I paid half the cost for the moving of your stable—”
“Your horse is in there, too.”
“I don’t want the stupid horse. I’m going to have him turned into glue.”
“That’s an awful thing to say. And by the way, you bought the boat in your name only.”
“The check had my name only on it, lady.”
“All right, then . . . I don’t like to bring this up, but you’ve never had to make a mortgage or rent payment since we’ve been married.”
“And what did
you
do to get that house except to get born with a silver spoon up your ass?”
“Please don’t be crude, John. Look, I don’t like to talk about money. Let’s drop it. Please?”
“No, no, no. Let us not drop it. Let us have our very first and very overdue fight about money.”
“Please lower your voice.”
I may or may not have lowered my voice, but the jukebox came on, and so everyone who was listening to us had to listen to Frank Sinatra singing “My Way.’’ Great song. I think the guy at the end of the bar played it for me. I gave him a thumbs-up.
Susan said, “This is very ugly. I’m not used to this.”
I addressed Lady Stanhope. “I’m sorry I lost my temper. You’re quite right, of course. Please put that IOU in your bag and I will repay the loan as soon as I can. I’ll need a few days.”
She seemed embarrassed now. “Forget it. Really.’’ She ripped up the IOU. “I don’t understand any of this.”
“Then, in the future, keep my business and our business to yourself, and do not discuss any of it with your father. I strongly suggest you get a personal attorney who has nothing to do with your father or your trustees. I will deal with that attorney in any future matters.’’
Including matrimonial
. “And please keep in mind that, for better or worse, I am your husband.”
She was really quite red now, and I could see she was vacillating between my feet and my throat. She finally said, “All right, John.’’ She picked up the menu and I couldn’t see her face.
I told you about the red hair, and I knew she was still wavering between her good breeding and her bad genes. I suppose, as a purely precautionary move, I should have put the steak knives out of her reach, but that might be overreacting. I was still pretty hot myself, of course, and I had to get one last zinger in. I said, “I didn’t appreciate your father calling you the other night to see if you were all right. Does he think I beat you?”
She glanced up from the menu. “Of course not. That was silly of him.’’ She added, “He’s really quite angry with you.”
“Why? Because I stuck him with the dinner bill?”
“John . . . what you said was a bit strong. But . . . he asked me to tell you that he would accept an apology from you.”
I clapped my hands. “What a magnificent man! What a beautiful human being!’’ I wiped a tear from my eye.
The song had ended, and we had our audience back.
Susan leaned across the table and said to me, “You’ve changed. Do you know that?”
“And how about you, Susan?”
She shrugged and went back to the menu, then looked up again. “John, if you apologized, it would make things so much less tense. For all of us. Even if you don’t mean it. Do it for me. Please.”
There was a time, of course, not so long ago, when I would have. But that time had passed, and it was not likely to come again. I replied, “I will not say something I don’t mean. I will not crawl for you, or for anyone. My only regret in that episode is that I should have grabbed his tie and yanked his face into his cheesecake.”
“You’re really angry, aren’t you?”
“No, anger is transient. I hate the bastard.”
“John! He’s my father.”
“Don’t bet on that.”
So, I had dinner alone. But I figured I should get used to it. Someday my quick wit is going to get me into trouble. Actually, I guess it did.

 

 

Thirty-one
We went back to the Plaza Hotel. Bellarosa gave Vinnie and Lenny the night off, and Frank and I ordered dinner in the suite.
As we ate at the table in the dining area, we made small talk, mostly about vegetables and real estate. I sliced my steak, and as I did so, I wondered what new and exciting course my life would take if I plunged my steak knife into Bellarosa’s heart.
I think he was reading my thoughts because he said, “You know, Counselor, you’re probably thinking that your life is getting fucked up and you think I fucked it up for you. Wrong. You fucked yourself up and you did it before you ever laid eyes on me.”
“Maybe. But you’re not part of the solution.”
“Sure I am. I helped you get rid of all the bullshit in your life. So now you got to go on.”
“Thank you.”
“Yeah. You think I’m some kind of dumb greaseball. Wrong again.”
I was getting a little annoyed with this guy now. I said, “Stupid people think you’re stupid. I know better.”
He smiled. “Yeah. It’s an old Italian trick. Claudius did it to save his life before he became emperor. There’s a guy in my business up in the Bronx—you know the guy—he’s been acting simpleminded for ten years because the Feds are on his case. You know? But Ferragamo is stupid and he thinks I’m stupid, so I surprise him every time, but he’s too stupid to get it.’’ He laughed.
We went back to our steaks and didn’t speak until coffee, then he asked me, “You ever play dumb?”
“Sometimes.”
“Like, I mean, you
know
something, but you don’t let on you know. You hold on to it until the right time. You don’t go off hot and get yourself hurt. You wait.”
I replied, “Sometimes I
never
let on. Sometimes I just let the other guy go crazy wondering if I know.”
He nodded appreciatively. “Yeah. Like what, for instance? Give me a for instance.”
We looked at each other across the table, and I replied, “Like the bullshit with the IRS, Frank. You told Melzer to go to his friends in the IRS and see if they could find something on me, and they did. Then you turn me on to Melzer, who fixes things for me, and I owe you a favor. You’re a real pal.”
He played around with his dessert and didn’t reply.
I asked, “But what if I hadn’t come to you with the problem?”
He shrugged.
“Then,’’ I said, “you’d find another problem for me. Or maybe I’d need another kind of favor from you, like the variance for the stables. I’m not sure that was a coincidence or a setup, but apparently you have my wife’s ear, so you can get to me through her.”
The man obviously knew there was trouble between Susan and me, and if he had a conscience at all, it was a guilty one. In fact, he actually looked uncomfortable. I mean, beyond class differences and political differences, and ethnic and racial tensions, and all the other problems that people have with one another in society, the most primitive and elemental cause of violence, murder, and mayhem is sexual possessiveness. To put it more simply, people get angry when other people are fucking or trying to fuck their mate. Anyway, Bellarosa must have been feeling a little uneasy or he wouldn’t have prodded me into the subject to see my reaction. He looked at me, waiting to see, I think, if I was actually going to broach the subject of him and Susan. But since it was he who was feeling a little uneasy, not me, I decided to leave him hanging awhile longer.
Without a word, I stood and went to the sideboard on which were a few dozen telephone messages, one of which was from Susan advising me that she’d changed her telephone number. I suppose the media were getting to her, not to mention our friends and relatives. I threw the message with the new phone number in the wastebasket and left the suite.
Down in the lobby, I was accosted by none other than Jenny Alvarez, the lady in red, except that she was not wearing red that evening. “Hello, Mr. Sutter,’’ she said.
She was, in fact, wearing a black silk dress, sort of an evening dress, I guess, as if she’d just come from dinner. She really looked good, and I wanted to ask her if we’d spent the night together, but it seemed like a silly question, so I just replied, “Hello.”
“Can I buy you a drink?’’ she asked.
“I don’t drink.”
“Coffee?”
“I’m in a bit of a hurry.”
She seemed hurt, and I began to believe we really had spent the night together. I’m a lot of things, but a cad isn’t one of them, so I accepted the offer of a drink, and we went into the Oak Bar and got a table. She ordered a scotch and soda, and I made it two. She said, “I saw the statements you made to the newspapers this morning.”
“I didn’t know TV journalists read the papers. Or read at all.”
“Don’t be a snot.”
“Okay.”
“Anyway, I’d like to do an interview with you.”
“I don’t think so.”
“It won’t take long. We can do it right here in the Plaza, live for the eleven-o’clock news.”
“I’d be dead for the morning news.”
She laughed as though this were a joke. This was not a joke. She said, “Could you get Mr. Bellarosa to join you?”
“I think not.”
“Maybe we could tape an in-depth interview and run it on our nightly news show at eleven-thirty. That’s a national show. That would give you both an opportunity to present your side of the case.”

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