The next morning, the Thursday, Karp was preternaturally cheerful at breakfast, a sign of nervousness on a day when a verdict was in the offing. He expressed confidence. Craig had given a good charge the day before, most of the law had gone Karp’s way, but, of course, with juries … Karp refused to think about what would happen to him if they lost.
An especially warm kiss sent him on his way. Marlene dressed and went to the gun safe for her Colt. She was going to move a woman for Mattie that morning. Harry was busy with some celebrity in midtown. As she removed her pistol, she checked, as always, to see that the boxes of ammunition and the little nickel 22 were in their places, and then carefully shut and locked the safe’s door.
It was pouring outside, a heavy spring rain. She took Lucy to school and then bought a paper at a stand, holding it over her head as she dashed to her car to read it. Ariadne’s story was on the front page, in the center above the fold, with a picture of Bloom and one of a thin and tired-looking Latina woman identified as Corazon Machado.
BLOOM DENIES RAPE CHARGES IN GROWING SCANDAL
On the jump page was a supporting piece: the state attorney general, Milton Veers, had appointed a special prosecutor to look into the charges that the district attorney had been involved in a conspiracy associated with the Twenty-fifth Precinct extortion rackets. The lead editorial demanded that Bloom step down as D.A. until these allegations, and those from Mrs. Machado, were put to rest. Below the fold was the story of Seaver’s suicide. It was decorated with leaks from the brass at Police Plaza regarding the investigation of corruption in the Twenty-fifth. Marlene noted that, apparently, the corruption was widespread and involved drugs and burglaries as well as prostitution and extortion. She offered a prayer that some of it would stick to Joseph Clancy.
Marlene shifted her fugitive woman without incident, and then drove back to the Walker Street office to do some paperwork and return calls. She was just considering whether to place an ad in Cosmopolitan when the private line rang.
“It’s me,” said Karp. “Reinstatement, back pay, and two point one million. They were out for six and a half hours. I’m jelly.”
“Congratulations, baby!” said Marlene with real feeling. “Oh, good for you! Murray must be ecstatic.”
“Yeah, he’s fairly jolly. We’re in my office, drinking champagne. I have Naomi’s lipstick all over me.”
“Not on your fly, one hopes.”
Karp laughed. “Yes, a smudge or two, but let’s not get petty, Marlene. Oh, speaking of sloppy blowjobs, I seem to be back in Jack Weller’s good graces. He was effusive. The Mayor is now playing himself as a wronged victim of the evil manipulator, Sandy Bloom, and Weller is joining the chorus. Now it’s good for the firm to have made a principled stand defending a fine public servant. Can you believe this?”
“Easily. So, no more talk about leaving, huh? We’re filthy rich forever. On to Goldsboro?”
“Ah, shit, I don’t know, Marlene,” said Karp, sobering. “Since this case I have less enthusiasm for cleaning up the piles of poop left by major corporations. And between you and me, dear, Goldsboro’s hands are not entirely clean.”
“What? And B.L. is going to defend them? I’m shocked. Shocked!”
“Yeah, right. Oh, also, did you hear? Jack Keegan didn’t get his robe. They gave it to Jerome Oster.”
“Who he?”
“Nobody special-some law school professor. This will kill you, though: he’s married to Milt Veers’s sister.”
“The A.G.,” said Marlene, recalling the article in the paper. “Sandy’s covering his ass, you think?”
“Bet on it! But it’s not going to work this time. Look, fuck Bloom anyway. We want to celebrate tonight. Can you set up a sitter and we’ll pick you up in Murray’s car around seven?”
It was more than agreeable to Marlene, who could not recall when last she had spent an evening on the town that did not involve packing heavy-caliber firearms. She collected Lucy at school, noting with pleasure that she was again playing with her old friends, Janice Chen and Miranda Lanin.
Lucy was fed and sent downstairs to stay with neighbors. The only problem was what to wear; she was now swollen enough so that none of her good skirts would close. She chose a blue beaded suit with a long jacket and faked it with safety pins at the waist. At least she had a bag and shoes to match this outfit, and if anybody bitched she could shoot them with her gun.
The evening was a success. The Seligs were roaring, Karp was more relaxed and happier than Marlene had seen him in some time, thanks in part to a whole glass and a half of Dom Perignon. They went to Le Cirque. Le tout New York seemed to pass by their table, showering congratulations on Murray, on Naomi, and Karp, the man of the hour. Nor was Marlene excluded from the general approbation: an extremely famous actress approached her hesitantly in the ladies’ and gushed about how much she admired her and what a wonderful job she was doing with those poor women; it hardly diminished Marlene’s sense of well-being when she followed this with a detailed description of what her ex, the bastard, had done to her. They exchanged numbers.
In the morning Marlene was up early, having passed the evening happily enough on soda water, while Karp, the wretched sot, was still snoring. He was to be allowed to sleep in.
She roused Lucy, started the coffee, and switched on the little kitchen television set to the Today Show. The weather; an author pitching a book; a review of the breaking news. Marlene was cracking eggs into a bowl when the mention of a familiar name brought her out of the pleasant trance of domesticity. She looked up at the screen: a color photograph of Joseph Clancy in his blue uniform with medals. They cut to tape from the night before. A police radio patrol car sat at the curb on a street in Spanish Harlem, the yellow tape holding back a crowd. The passenger door of the car was open. The camera dwelt lovingly on the thick, dark stains spreading over the back of the seat.
The on-scene reporter, a studious black man, reappeared, saying, “Although there were numerous witnesses to the crime, the street was crowded because of an auto accident on the next corner, and, according to police, the stories conflict. Some witnesses said it was a tall teenager in a gang jacket. Others said it was a middle-aged man. Some said it was a thin child not more than twelve. All we know for sure is that an hour ago, someone stepped from the crowd, fired four bullets into the head of Sergeant Joe Clancy as he waited for his driver to fetch their usual coffee and donuts from the convenience store behind me. A police hero is dead, four children are without a father, and no one knows why.”
Marlene left the eggs in their bowl and walked down to her office. She consulted the Rolodex where she kept business cards, and made a call, and left a message. Then she finished scrambling eggs and making toast. She called her family to the table. Her heart was gelling in her chest. The phone rang. She dashed down to her office to pick it up.
“This is Detective Moon. You called me?”
“Yeah. This is about the mugging, the attempted murder? My friend Stupenagel?”
A pause. “Yes, well, Ms. Ciampi, see, that case’s been cleared. We believe that Paul Jackson did that. I’ve already spoken with your friend and she agrees.”
“Oh, good! That’s what I was going to say. I didn’t want to leave any loose ends. Oh, gosh, here I am bothering you with a case you already solved, and you’re probably busy with this terrible murder. Sergeant Clancy. God, I was just talking to him the other day.”
“You knew Joe Clancy?”
Marlene explained why she had been at the Two-Five, omitting, of course, the rest, and then said, “My God, three thirty-eights in the head! At least he didn’t suffer.”