Bad Business E-Book

Robert B Parker

• Herausgeber: No Exit Press
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Serie: A Spenser Novel
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Seitenzahl: 290

Beschreibung

A cheating husband and a wayward wife provide Spenser with an unconventional and dangerous surveillance job When Marlene Cowley hires Spenser to see if her husband, Trent, is cheating on her, he encounters more than he bargained for: Not only does he find a two-timing husband, but a second investigator as well, hired by the husband to look after his wife. As a result of their joint efforts, Spenser soon finds himself investigating both individual depravity and corporate corruption. It seems the folks in the Cowley's circle have become enamoured of radio talk-show host Darrin O'Mara, whose views on Courtly Love are clouding some already fuzzy minds with the notion of cross-connubial relationships. O'Mara's brand of sex therapy is unconventional at best, unlawful-and deadly-at worst. Then a murder at Kinergy, where Trent Cowley is CFO, sends Spenser in yet another direction. Apparently, the unfettered pursuit of profit has a price.

Leseprobe

A SPENSER NOVEL

A cheating husband and a wayward wife provide Spenser with an unconventional and dangerous surveillance job.

When Marlene Cowley hires Spenser to see if her husband, Trent, is cheating on her, he encounters more than he bargained for: not only does he find a two-timing husband, but a second investigator as well, hired by the husband to look after his wife. As a result of their joint efforts, Spenser soon finds himself investigating both individual depravity and corporate corruption.

It seems the folks in the Cowley’s circle have become enamoured of radio talk-show host Darrin O’Mara, whose views on Courtly Love are clouding some already fuzzy minds with the notion of cross-connubial relationships. O’Mara’s brand of sex therapy is unconventional at best, unlawful – and deadly – at worst. Then a murder at Kinergy, where Trent Cowley is CFO, sends Spenser in yet another direction. Apparently, the unfettered pursuit of profit has a price.

Robert B. Parker (1932–2010) has long been acknowledged as the dean of American crime fiction. His novels featuring the wisecracking, street-smart Boston private-eye Spenser earned him a devoted following and reams of critical acclaim, typified by R.W.B. Lewis’ comment, ‘We are witnessing one of the great series in the history of the American detective story’ (The NewYork Times Book Review).

Born and raised inMassachusetts, Parker attended Colby College in Maine, served with the Army in Korea, and then completed a Ph.D. in English at Boston University. He married his wife Joan in 1956; they raised two sons, David and Daniel. Together the Parkers founded Pearl Productions, a Boston-based independent film company named after their short-haired pointer, Pearl, who has also been featured in many of Parker’s novels.

Robert B. Parker died in 2010 at the age of 77.

CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR ROBERT B. PARKER

‘Parker writes old-time, stripped-to-the-bone, hard-boiled school of Chandler…His novels are funny, smart and highly entertaining…There’s no writer I’d rather take on an aeroplane’ – Sunday Telegraph

‘Parker packs more meaning into a whispered ‘yeah’ than most writers can pack into a page’ – Sunday Times

‘Why Robert Parker’s not better known in Britain is a mystery. His best series featuring Boston-based PI Spenser is a triumph of style and substance’ – Daily Mirror

‘Robert B. Parker is one of the greats of the American hard-boiled genre’ – Guardian

‘Nobody does it better than Parker…’ – Sunday Times

‘Parker’s sentences flow with as much wit, grace and assurance as ever, and Stone is a complex and consistently interesting new protagonist’ – Newsday

‘If Robert B. Parker doesn’t blow it, in the new series he set up in Night Passage and continues with Trouble in Paradise, he could go places and take the kind of risks that wouldn’t be seemly in his popular Spenser stories’ – Marilyn Stasio, New York Times

THE SPENSER NOVELS

Sixkill

Double Deuce

Painted Ladies

Pastime

The Professional

Stardust

Rough Weather

Playmates

Now & Then

Crimson Joy

Dream Girl (aka Hundred-Dollar Baby)

Pale Kings and Princes

School Days

Taming a Sea-Horse

Cold Service

A Catskill Eagle

Bad Business

Valediction

Back Story

The Widening Gyre

Widow’s Walk

Ceremony

Potshot

A Savage Place

Hugger Mugger

Early Autumn

Hush Money

Looking for Rachel Wallace

Sudden Mischief

The Judas Goat

Small Vices

Promised Land

Chance

Mortal Stakes

Thin Air

God Save the Child

Walking Shadow

The Godwulf Manuscript

Paper Doll

THE JESSE STONE NOVELS

Split Image

Stone Cold

Night and Day

Death in Paradise

Stranger in Paradise

Trouble in Paradise

High Profile

Night Passage

Sea Change

THE SUNNY RANDALL NOVELS

Spare Change

Shrink Rap

Blue Screen

Perish Twice

Melancholy Baby

Family Honor

ALSO BY ROBERT B. PARKER

Brimstone

Poodle Springs

Resolution

(and Raymond Chandler)

Appaloosa

Love and Glory

Double Play

Wilderness

Gunman’s Rhapsody

Three Weeks in Spring

All Our Yesterdays

(with Joan Parker)

A Year at the Races

Training with Weights

(with Joan Parker)

(with John R. Marsh)

Perchance to Dream

Available from No Exit Press

Joan:good business

1

Do you do divorce work?’ the woman said.

‘I do,’ I said.

‘Are you any good?’

‘I am,’ I said.

‘I don’t want likelihood,’ she said. ‘Or guesswork. I need evidence that will stand up in court.’

‘That’s not up to me,’ I said. ‘That’s up to the evidence.’

She sat quietly in my client chair and thought about that.

‘You’re telling me you won’t manufacture it,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘You won’t have to,’ she said. ‘The sonovabitch can’t keep his dick in his pants for a full day.’

‘Must make dining out a little awkward,’ I said.

She ignored me. I was used to it. Mostly I amused myself.

‘I always have trouble convincing people that any man would cheat on a woman like me. I mean, look at me.’

‘Unbelievable,’ I said.

‘My attorneys tell me you are too expensive,’ she said. ‘But that you are probably worth it.’

‘The same could be remarked of Susan Silverman.’

She frowned.

‘Who the hell is Susan Silverman?’ she said.

‘Girl of my dreams.’

She frowned again. Then she said, ‘Oh, I see. You’re being cute.’

‘It’s my nature,’ I said.

‘Well, it’s not mine,’ she said. ‘Do you want the job?’

‘Sure.’

‘My attorneys will want a strict accounting of what you spend,’ she said.

‘I’ll bet they will,’ I said.

She was good-looking in kind of an old-fashioned way. Sort of womanly. Before personal trainers, and StairMasters. Like the women in Life Magazine when we were all much younger. Like she would look good in a small-waisted white polka-dot dress, and a huge straw hat with a white polka-dot band. In fact, of course, she was wearing a beige pantsuit and big pearls. Her reddish blond hair was long and thoroughly sprayed, and framed her face like the halo in a mediaeval religious painting. Her mouth was kind of thin and her eyes were small. I imagined cheating on her.

‘I’m represented by Frampton and Keyes,’ she said. ‘Do you know the firm?’

‘I don’t.’

‘You’ll do all further business through them. The managing partner is Randy Frampton.’

‘Why didn’t you let them hire me?’ I said.

‘I don’t let other people make judgments for me. I wanted to look you in the eye.’

I nodded.

‘Do you have pictures of your husband?’ I said. ‘Names of suspected paramours? Addresses? That sort of thing?’

‘You can get all that from Randy.’

‘And a retainer?’

‘Randy will take care of that as well.’

‘Good for Randy,’ I said. ‘Will he tell me your name, too?’

‘I’d rather keep that confidential for now,’ she said. ‘This is a very sensitive situation.’

I smiled.

‘Ma’am,’ I said. ‘How long do you think it will take me to find out your name once I know who your husband is?’

‘I…’

I smiled my sunny good-natured smile at her. I could melt polar ice caps with my sunny good-natured smile. She was no match for it.

‘Marlene,’ she said. ‘Marlene Rowley. My husband is Trenton Rowley.’

‘How do you do,’ I said. ‘My name is Spenser.’

‘Of course I know your name,’ she said. ‘How do you think I got here?’

‘I thought you looked up handsome in the phone book,’ I said. ‘And my picture was there.’

She smiled for the first time that morning.

‘Well,’ she said. ‘Maybe you are a little bit handsome in a rough sort of way.’

‘Tough,’ I said. ‘But sensitive.’

‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘Will you speak with Randy?’

‘Right away,’ I said.

2

Frampton and Keyes had offices on the second floor of a two-story building in downtown Beverly. It was one of those block-long brick buildings built before the Second World War when most of the bigger towns were discrete entities rather than suburbs of Boston. There was less open space than you found in the big Boston firms. More small offices, but no partitioned cubbies. In the small reception area was a four-foot-long model of a clipper ship. There were paintings of ships on the walls. The magazines on the small reading table were devoted to golf and sailing.

At the reception desk was a young woman with a big chest and a small sweater, who probably wasn’t devoted to golf and sailing. She smiled at me happily as I came in. I suspected that she smiled at most men happily.

‘My name is Spenser,’ I said. ‘To see Randy Frampton.’

‘Concerning?’ she said.

‘I’m trying to establish if that’s his first name or a descriptive adjective,’ I said.

She looked at me and frowned for a minute and then smiled widely.

‘That is most definitely his first name, Mr Spenser. Is there anything else you need to see Mr Frampton about?’

‘Tell him Marlene Rowley sent me,’ I said.

‘Yes sir,’ she said and smiled at me and her eyes were lively.

Randy Frampton, the managing partner, had a corner office. Randy was not very tall. His weight was disproportionate to his height. He had gray hair that needed cutting. His dark blue suit needed pressing and wasn’t much better than the one I owned. His tie was yellow silk, and he wore a white broadcloth shirt with one collar point slightly askew. I couldn’t see because he was behind his desk, but I suspected that his shoes weren’t shined.

‘So she decided to hire you,’ Frampton said.

‘Who wouldn’t?’ I said.

Frampton sighed a little.

‘Marlene is sometimes erratic,’ he said. ‘Did she instruct you that everything goes through this firm?’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘But I’m not sure she meant it.’

Frampton smiled pleasantly.

‘That sounds like Marlene,’ he said. ‘But I mean it. You and I need to be on the same page.’

‘She was pretty clear that you took care of paying me,’ I said.

‘You’ll submit your expenses, carefully kept, weekly, and we’ll pay them weekly. When the investigation is complete, you’ll submit your final bill. Shall we discuss rates?’

I told him my rates. He shook his head.

‘I’m sorry, but that’s out of line.’

‘Sure,’ I said.

‘We’ll need to negotiate that a little.’

‘Nope,’ I said.

‘You won’t negotiate?’

‘Nope.’

‘Then I’m afraid we can’t do business,’ Frampton said.

‘Okay,’ I said, and stood up. ‘You want to tell Marlene, or shall I?’

‘That’s it?’ Frampton said. ‘No discussion? Nothing?’

‘Marlene doesn’t look like she’ll be fun to work for,’ I said.

‘You require fun?’

‘Fun or money,’ I said.

Frampton sat back in his chair and swiveled away from me and looked out his window.

‘You know you’ve got me over a barrel,’ he said.

‘I do.’

‘You know I don’t want to tell Marlene that we wouldn’t hire you.’

‘I know,’ I said.

‘Will you require a contract?’

‘Handshake’s fine,’ I said.

‘That’s foolish,’ he said. ‘You should have a contract.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I just wanted to see your reaction.’

Frampton looked at me thoughtfully.

‘You are a little different,’ he said. ‘Aren’t you?’

All the answers to that question seemed dumb, so I didn’t give one.

‘We’ll draft a contract and you can run it past your attorney,’ Frampton said.

‘Okay.’

‘Are you prepared to begin now?’ Frampton said.

‘Sure.’

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘What do you know?’

‘Marlene wants me to catch her husband cheating on her.’

‘Anything else?’

‘Nope.’

‘What would you like from me?’

‘Her husband’s name; his address, home and business; a couple of different pictures of him; description of his car, plate number. And maybe your reaction to her suspicions.’

He reached into a file drawer and took out a big manila envelope and tossed it on his desk in front of me.

‘Pictures,’ he said. ‘Of Trenton Rowley. He’s forty-seven years old. He and Marlene live here, in Manchester. The address is in the envelope. So is his business address. He has several cars, I don’t know what kind. I don’t have the plate numbers. His business is off Totten Pond Road in Waltham. Company named Kinergy, got their own building.’

‘Kinergy?’ I said.

Frampton shrugged.

‘I have no idea what it means,’ he said.

‘What do they do?’

‘Energy trading of some kind,’ Frampton said.

‘That doesn’t mean they run a power plant,’ I said.

‘No, no. They’re traders – brokers. They buy power here and sell it there.’

‘Gee,’ I said. ‘Just like the legislature.’

Frampton smiled a little.

‘Kinergy,’ he said, ‘is an enormously successful company.’

‘And what does he do there?’

‘He’s the chief financial officer.’

‘Mr Rowley is wealthy?’

‘Yes. And he has a lot of clout.’

‘Yikes,’ I said. ‘Do you folks represent him as well?’

‘Oh God no. Obviously we couldn’t represent both sides in a divorce, but, even if we could. No, no. The company does business with Cone, Oakes, and Baldwin. I would assume they might represent him as well.’

‘What about the last part of my question?’

‘What do I think?’

I nodded.

‘Trent Rowley has, for a long time, gotten everything he wanted. He has always given Marlene everything she wanted.’

‘So do you think he’s cheating on her?’

‘I don’t know. I think he would if he wanted to.’

‘Marlene have any evidence?’

‘I don’t know. She says she knows he’s cheating. But she adds nothing of substance to the accusation.’

‘Does she have much of substance?’

‘In this case?’

‘In any case,’ I said.

Frampton shook his head slowly.

‘Marlene is a client,’ he said. ‘It is unbecoming an attorney to discuss his clients’ personal quirks.’

‘Heavens,’ I said. ‘Integrity?’

‘One finds it in the most unlikely places,’ Frampton said. ‘Even, now and then, in law firms.’

‘I’m heartened,’ I said.

3

I took Rita Fiore to dinner at the Federalist. Rita was the chief criminal litigator at Cone, Oakes. But I had known her since she was an ADA in Norfolk County, and, in a healthy platonic fashion, we liked each other.

‘How’s your love life?’ I said after we’d each gotten a martini.

‘Busy,’ she said. ‘But, same old question – why are there so many more horses’ asses than there are horses?’

‘Still looking for Mr Right?’

‘Always. I thought I had him last year. Chief of police on the North Shore.’

‘But?’

‘But he had an ex-wife.’

‘And?’

‘And he wouldn’t let go.’

‘Oh well,’ I said.

‘Yeah. That may become the Fiore family motto.’

‘And the previous Mr Right?’ I said. ‘Number, what was it, five?’

‘Divorce is final.’ She grinned at me. ‘I cleaned his clock too.’

‘I’d have expected no less,’ I said. ‘What do you know about Trent Rowley?’

‘He’s the CFO at Kinergy. Whom we represent.’

‘Tell me about him?’

‘Discussing a client is considered unethical.’

I nodded. The waiter brought menus. We read them and ordered.

‘May I bring you another cocktail?’ he said.

Rita smiled up at him.

‘Oh, please,’ she said.

‘You, sir?’

‘He’ll have one too,’ Rita said.

‘Very good.’

The waiter picked up the menus and smiled at Rita and left.

‘Our waiter is hot for you,’ I said.

‘Wow,’ Rita said. ‘A straight waiter.’

‘Maybe he’s Mr Right,’ I said.

‘Can’t be. For one thing a waiter can’t swathe me in luxury. And secondly, if they’re hot for me that proves they’re Mr Wrong.’

‘Maybe you should stop getting married and just sleep with people.’

‘I’m doing that too,’ Rita said. ‘Except you.’

‘My loss,’ I said. ‘What about Trent Rowley?’

‘What about client confidentiality?’

‘What about several martinis and dinner?’ I said.

The waiter came with our second martinis. Rita sipped hers happily.

‘You think you can bribe me,’ she said, ‘with a few martinis and some Chilean sea bass?’

‘I do,’ I said.

Our salads arrived. Rita picked up a scrap of Boston lettuce in her fingers and nibbled on it. Susan was the only other person I knew who could eat with her fingers and look elegant.

‘Why do you want to know about him?’ Rita said. ‘Why not just catch him in the act? Tell the little woman, collect your fee, and stand by to testify at the divorce proceedings.’

‘Excuse to have dinner with you, Toots.’

‘Like you need an excuse.’

‘I like to have an idea of what I’m dealing with. It was time for us to have dinner again. It seemed a nice synergy.’

‘You are a bear for knowing things,’ Rita said.

‘Knowledge is power,’ I said.

Rita drank some more of her martini. Her big greenish eyes softened a little. They always did when she drank. She had thick red hair and great legs, and was smarter than Bill Gates.

‘We have a whole department servicing Kinergy,’ Rita said. ‘I talked to the lead guy, Tom Clark. He says that there isn’t anything to know about Rowley outside of business hours. Rowley starts early, works late, and, as far as Tom knows, has no other life.’

‘Doesn’t sound like Mr Right to me,’ I said.

‘Apparently Mrs Rowley doesn’t think so either.’

I shrugged.

‘Maybe she wants out,’ I said. ‘But she wants to take half of everything with her.’

‘Can’t blame a girl for trying,’ Rita said. ‘In my last divorce, I didn’t, of course, settle for half.’

‘Marlene may be less experienced,’ I said.

‘Marlene?’

‘Someone named Rita is making fun of a name like Marlene?’

‘I don’t get the chance that often,’ Rita said.

The salad plates disappeared. The entrees came. The waiter took a bottle of sauvignon blanc from the ice bucket and poured a little for Rita to sample. She said it was drinkable and he poured some out for each of us.

‘So he’s a big success,’ I said.

‘Oh, you bet. Kinergy is a huge profit machine.’

‘Just from brokering energy?’

‘Sure,’ Rita said. ‘You are running short of electrical power in your grid, they can acquire some from another source, reroute it to you, and charge you a fortune. Like the power shortfall in California, couple years ago.’

‘Is it that simple?’

‘At bottom a lot of businesses are simple. You know. American Airlines picks you up in Boston and flies you to LA. That’s the service. The complicated part comes in how to do it profitably.’

‘Can they manipulate the market?’

‘Probably.’

‘Do they?’

‘Probably. Tom sees very little evil in a client,’ Rita said, ‘and speaks less.’

‘Does he gossip?’

‘Not to me,’ Rita said. ‘Not about clients. He swears there is nothing to gossip about with Rowley.’

‘You believe him?’

‘Tom’s a company guy. And he wants to be managing partner. The firm says jump and he says ‘how high?’ ’

‘Which means if Rowley says jump…’

‘ ‘How high,’ ’ Rita said. ‘Can we talk about sex again?’

‘We’d be fools not to,’ I said.

4

At 6 a.m., drinking a large coffee to help my heart get started, I drove out the Mass Pike and south on 128 to Waltham. The Kinergy Building was just off Route 128. It was innovatively ugly: five different kinds of brick facings, intermingled with black glass and textured concrete, sporting a multilevel profile. It looked like Darth Vader’s country home.

Near the front entrance were parking spots labeled CEO, COO, CFO. I parked in the visitors slot and waited to see if I could get a live look at Trent Rowley when he came to work. I was there in place, on the alert, at 6:10. I was just in time. At 6:15 a silver BMW sports car pulled into the CFO parking space and Rowley got out.

He looked just like his picture: strong jaw, dark wavy hair worn longish. He had on small round glasses with thin gold frames. He was crisp and clean and pressed and tailored in a tan summer suit, a blue shirt with a pin collar, and a pale blue tie. He almost certainly smelled of expensive cologne. He walked very briskly into the still empty building, proud of being the earliest bird.

What kind of affair can a guy have when he shows up for work at6:15 in the morning?

I hung around until everyone else came to work, without seeing anyone who looked like they might be having an affair with Rowley. Though it was, admittedly, hard to be sure. Then I wrote down the plate number on the BMW. That done, I still had some energy left over, so I drove back to Boston and went to the gym.

At four in the afternoon, sound of muscle and pure of mind, with a tall can of Budweiser to replenish my electrolytes, I drove back to Kinergy and waited for Rowley to come out. By the time he did it was nearly eight o’clock. I was thinking deeply about a sub sandwich and another beer. I followed him north on Route 128, to Route 2, and in Route 2 to Cambridge. We went along the river to the Hyatt Hotel, where Rowley turned off and drove into the parking garage, behind the hotel.

I left my car and twenty bucks with the doorman, and was in the lobby hanging around near the elevators when Rowley came in. He was carrying a small overnight bag, and paying me no attention as he headed to the elevator. The Hyatt has one of those twenty-story Portman lobbies, where you reach your floor by a glass-enclosed elevator, and each room door opens out onto an interior balcony overlooking the lobby. He went to the seventh floor and got out and walked to his left, halfway down the balcony, and knocked on a door. The door opened and in he went. I looked at my watch. It was ten minutes of nine, and Rowley’s evening was just starting. It made me feel old.

I took the elevator to the seventh floor, and walked down to the twelfth door to the left, which was where Rowley had knocked. It was room number 717. I wrote it down and went back downstairs and took a seat in the lobby near the elevators, across from a little guy with a big nose. He was wearing a tan windbreaker and reading the paper. He was seriously engaged with his newspaper. Now and then as he read he’d smile or frown or shake his head. I on the other hand was seriously engaged in looking at the people who came and went into and out of the elevator. In my first hour I saw three women who passed muster, one of whom was a rare sighting. She earned nine on a scale where Susan was ten. I could hear the piano in the cocktail lounge. By 11:15 the foot traffic had thinned at the elevator. I had turned to thinking about my all-fathers-and-sons baseball team. The little guy with the big nose had finally given up on the newspaper and appeared to be whistling silently. Songs unheard are sweeter far. I had gotten as far as Dick Sisler at first when the door to room 717 opened and Trent Rowley came out with a woman. The woman was carrying a large purse with a shoulder strap. They walked to the elevator and came down. She looked good getting off the elevator. Short blond hair brushed back. Good body, maybe a little heavy in the legs, but nothing to disqualify her. Her eyes were made up and her lipstick looked fresh. Despite that, I thought there was some sort of postcoital blur in her expression. It might not stand up in court, but it was an expression I’d seen elsewhere. I wasn’t wrong. They walked past us toward the corridor that led to the parking garage. I got up as soon as they passed and hot-footed it down to get my car from the doorman. The little guy with the nose was right behind me. We looked at each other while the doorman got our car keys.

‘You’re following her,’ I said.

He grinned.

‘And you’re following him.’

I grinned.

‘And now we’ll switch,’ I said.

He nodded.

‘You’ll follow her home, and I’ll follow him home. And then we’ll know who’s who.’

‘Might be easier,’ I said, ‘to pool information.’

‘Nope,’ the little guy said, ‘got to be done right.’

The little guy took a business card out of his shirt pocket.

‘But maybe we can talk later.’ He handed me the card. ‘Save you from chasing down my registration.’

I took his card and gave him one of mine and we both got in our cars as Rowley pulled out of the parking garage. The little guy gave me a thumbs-up gesture and pulled out behind Rowley and drove off after him. I did the same with the woman.

5

The little guy’s name was Elmer O’Neill, and his card said he conducted discreet inquiries. Me too. He arrived at my office the next morning right after I did.

‘You got any coffee?’ he said.

‘I’m about to make some,’ I said.

‘Good.’

He sat in one of my client chairs with his legs crossed, while I measured the coffee into the filter basket and the water into the reservoir and turned on the coffeemaker.

‘Your name’s Spenser,’ he said.

‘Yep.’

‘You know mine.’

‘I do.’

The coffeemaker gurgled encouragingly. I put out two coffee mugs and two spoons, and some sugar, and a small carton of half-and-half. Elmer looked around my office.

‘You must be doing okay,’ he said.

‘Because my office is so elegant?’ I said.

‘Naw. The place is a dump. But the location – must cost you some rent.’

‘Dump seems harsh,’ I said.

Elmer made a gesture with his hand as if he were shooing a fly.

‘It’s why I’m in Arlington,’ he said. ‘Costs a lot less and I can still get in town quick when I need to.’

The coffee was done. I poured it out.

‘You find out my client’s name yet?’ I said.

‘He lives in Manchester,’ Elmer said. ‘And after we talk I can check his plates at the registry.’

I nodded.

‘His name is Trenton Rowley,’ I said. ‘He’s the CFO of a company in Waltham called Kinergy.’

Elmer nodded as if that meant something to him. He set his coffee cup on the edge of my desk, took out a small notebook, and wrote it down.

‘Who’s the woman?’ I said.

‘Ellen Eisen,’ he said. ‘Husband works the same place.’

‘Kinergy?’

‘Un-huh.’

‘And they live in the new Ritz condos off Tremont Street.’

‘And you were going to check her plates at the registry if I didn’t tell you.’

‘Might anyway,’ I said.

‘Shit,’ Elmer said. ‘You don’t trust me?’

‘He hire you?’ I said.

‘Yep. Rowley’s wife hire you?’

‘Un-huh.’

Elmer leaned back a little in his chair so that the front legs cleared the floor. He rocked the chair slightly with his toes.

‘Well,’ he said. ‘We know they’re fucking.’

‘We know they spent time together in a hotel room,’ I said.

‘Oh hell,’ Elmer said. ‘A purist.’

‘Didn’t you say everything had to be done right?’

‘That’s because I didn’t know if I could trust you.’

‘How unkind,’ I said. ‘My client will want something more solid than the shared hotel room. She plans to “get-everything-he-has-the-philandering-bastard.”’

‘My guy just wants to know is she cheating on him,’ Elmer said.

‘His name is Eisen?’

‘Yeah, sure.’

‘Sometimes women keep their, ah, premarital name,’ I said.

‘Ain’t that horseshit,’ Elmer said. ‘Guy’s name is Bernard Eisen. He’s COO at, whatsitsname, Kinergy.’

‘Small world,’ I said.

‘So,’ he said. ‘I guess we should tell the clients.’

‘I’d like to let themselves dig a deeper hole,’ I said.

He drank a little more coffee.

‘That’s ’cause your client wants more than mine does.’

‘True,’ I said. ‘But if you tell yours then I probably won’t be able to get what my client wants.’

‘But my client will settle for what I know now.’

‘An ethical dilemma,’ I said.

Elmer frowned a little.

‘Don’t run into many of them anymore,’ he said. ‘You got more coffee?’

I poured him another cup. He added a lot of sugar and half-and-half, stirred it slowly.

‘There’s another little thing,’ he said.

‘Well,’ I said. ‘Two cups of coffee ought to buy me something.’

He grinned.

‘Somebody seems to be tailing Mrs Rowley, too.’

6

Susan and I were sitting on a stone pier at the beach in Kennebunkport, looking at the ocean and eating lunch out of a wicker basket.

‘So,’ she said, ‘if I understand it. You are, on behalf of Mrs Rowley, trailing Mr Rowley, who is having a clandestine affair with Mrs Eisen, who is being followed by Elmer O’Neill on behalf of Mr Eisen.’

‘Exactly,’ I said.

Susan had a lobster club sandwich, which she ate by taking the two slices of bread apart and eating the various components of the sandwich separately, slowly, and in very small bites.

‘And after their rendezvous, for purposes of identification, you trailed Mrs Eisen home…’

‘To the new Ritz.’

She ate a piece of bacon from the sandwich. I had a pastrami on light rye, which I ate in the conventional manner.

‘And Mr O’Neill trailed Mr Rowley home.’

‘Yes.’

‘And encountered someone conducting surveillance on Mrs Rowley.’

‘Yes.’

‘How hideous,’ Susan said.

‘Hideous?’

‘A gaggle of private detectives,’ she said. ‘You assume that Mr Rowley is also trying to catch Mrs Rowley?’

‘I do,’ I said.

Susan ate a part of a lettuce leaf. A fishing boat chugged in toward the river past us, a boy at the wheel. A man stood next to him. We watched as they passed.

‘A veritable circle jerk,’ Susan said.

‘Wow,’ I said, ‘you shrinks have a technical language all your own, don’t you?’

‘Bet your ass,’ Susan said. ‘Do you know the identity of the third snoop?’

‘No. Elmer didn’t get the plate numbers.’

I ate my half-sour pickle and looked at the dark water moving against the great granite blocks below us.

Susan said, ‘None of this changes what you were hired to do, of course.’

‘Of course.’

‘Do what you were hired to do, collect your pay, and move on.’

‘Yep.’

The movement of the immediate water sort of dragged me outward toward a bigger and bigger seascape until I felt the near eternal presence of the ocean far past the horizon.

‘But you won’t,’ Susan said.

‘I won’t?’

‘Nope.’

We had a couple of bottles of Riesling. I poured us some wine.

‘A jug of wine, some plastic cups, and thou,’ I said.

‘You will have to know if Mr Rowley hired someone to follow Mrs Rowley and if so, why.’

‘I will?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why is that?’ I said.

‘Because of how you are. When you pick something up, you can’t put it down until you know it entirely,’ Susan said. ‘Your imagination simply won’t let go of it, and, whether you want to or not, you’ll be turning it every which way to see what it’s made of.’

‘Do you have a diagnosis?’

‘It’s what in my profession we call characterological.’

‘Which means you haven’t an explanation.’

‘Basically yes,’ Susan said. ‘It’s simply how you are.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘Because you know me so well?’

She smiled. ‘Yes.’

‘And…?’ I said.

She smiled wider.

‘Because that’s how I am too.’

‘Makes you good at what you do,’ I said.

‘Makes both of us good,’ Susan said. ‘We are hounds for the truth.’

‘Woof,’ I said.

We sat with our shoulders touching and our backs to the land, and ate our lunch, and drank our wine, and felt the pull of the ocean’s implacable kinesis.

‘Should we walk back to the White Barn and have a nap?’ I said. ‘And afterwards a swim in the pool, and cocktails, and dinner?’

‘Is ‘nap’ a euphemism for something more active?’ Susan said.

‘The two are not mutually exclusive,’ I said.

‘No,’ Susan. ‘But its important that they don’t coincide.’

Which they didn’t.

7

Here’s the deal,’ I said to Elmer. ‘You stay with Ellen Eisen, and let me know if she meets my guy, and I’ll see what I can find out about who’s watching Mrs Rowley.’

‘Whadda you care who’s watching Mrs Rowley?’

‘It’s characterological,’ I said.

‘Sure it is,’ Elmer said. ‘I’ll buy in if I get something out of it.’

‘I’ll owe you,’ I said.

‘If finding out gets you any money,’ Elmer said, ‘half of it’s mine.’

‘You bet,’ I said.

‘Can I trust you?’ Elmer said.

‘You bet,’ I said.

He looked at me for a time without saying anything. His little dark eyes were slightly oval, as if, maybe, a long way back, one of the O’Neills had been Asian. Finally he nodded to himself slowly.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Your word is good.’

‘How do you know that?’ I said.

‘I know,’ Elmer said. ‘I’ll keep in touch.’

He got up and went toward the door. He walked with a little swagger. He would have walked with a big swagger had he been larger. Pearl the Wonder Dog II stood up on the office sofa and stared at Elmer as he walked past. She didn’t bristle, but she didn’t wag her tail either.

‘Fucking dog don’t like me,’ he said.

‘She’s just cautious,’ I said. ‘She hasn’t been with us very long.’

‘He some kinda Doberman?’

‘She’s a German shorthaired pointer,’ I said.

‘Same thing,’ Elmer said.

I walked over and sat on the couch beside Pearl, and she stretched up her neck to give me a lap.

‘Now’s your chance,’ I said. ‘Make a break for it.’

After Elmer made his escape, Pearl and I sat on the couch for a while until I was sure Elmer hadn’t hurt her feelings. Then I took her to Susan’s house. Susan was seeing patients on the first floor. Pearl ran up the stairs to the second floor where Susan lived. When I opened the door she raced into Susan’s bedroom, jumped on the bed, clamped onto one of the pillows, and subdued it ferociously. Her self-esteem seemed intact. I gave her a cookie, made sure there was water, left a note on the front hall table for Susan, and went to Manchester.

8