His heart stopped as she said it, and he went back to the living room to look at the number. He thought about it for a long time, and didn't say anything about it at dinner. It was a local number, and Chandler was obviously back for more money. Bernie was thinking of ignoring the message when the phone rang at ten o'clock that night and he had a premonition as he picked it up. And he was right. It was Chandler Scott.
“Hi there.” There was the same aura of false cheer about him as before and Bernie was not impressed.
“I thought I made myself clear last time.” There was no hospitality in his voice.
“Just passing through town, my friend.”
“Don't let us stop you.”
Chandler laughed as though Bernie had said something very, very funny.
“How's Liz?” He didn't want to tell him what had happened. It was none of his goddamn business.
“Fine.”
“How's my kid?”
“She's not your child. She's mine now.” It was the wrong thing to say and Bernie could hear him bridle.
“That's not how I remember it.”
“Really? How's your memory on the ten thousand dollars?” Bernie's voice sounded hard, but Chandler sounded slimy.
“My memory's okay, but my investments didn't turn out so hot.”
“Sorry to hear it.” Then he was back for more money.
“Me too. I thought maybe we'd have another little talk, you know, about my kid.” Bernie's jaw went taut beneath his beard and he remembered his promise to Liz. He wanted to get rid of the guy once and for all, and not have him come back once a year. In fact, it had been a year and a half since they'd given him the money.
“I thought I told you last time that it was a one-shot deal, Scott.”
“Maybe so, my friend, maybe so.” Something in his voice made Bernie want to smash his face in. “But maybe we'll have to play this one one more time.”
“I don't think so.”
“Are you telling me the pot's run out?” Bernie hated the way he talked. He sounded like exactly what he was. A two-bit con man.
“I'm telling you I'm not playing this game with you again. Got that, buddy?”
“Then how about a little visit with my daughter?” He played a cool hand of poker.
“She's not interested.”
“She will be if I take you to court. How old is she now? Seven? Eight?” He wasn't sure.
“What difference does it make?” She was nine, and he didn't even know that.
“Why don't you ask Liz how she feels about it?”
It was blackmail in the purest sense and Bernie was sick of him. He wanted him to know there was no game to play with Liz now. “Liz doesn't feel anything about it, Scott. She died in July.” There was a long, long silence.
“Sorry to hear that.” For a moment he sounded sober.
“Does that end our conversation?” He was suddenly glad he'd told him. Maybe the bastard would go away now, but he had sorely misjudged him.
“Not quite. The kid didn't die, did she? What did Liz die of anyway?”
“Cancer.”
“That's too bad. Anyway, she's still my kid, with or without Liz, and I imagine you'd just as soon see me get lost. And for a price, I will be happy to do that.”
“For how long? Another year? Nah, it's not worth it to me, Scott. This time I'm not buying.”
“Too bad. I guess I'll just have to go to court and get me some visitation.”
Bernie remembered his promise to Liz and decided to bluff him anyway. “You do that, Scott. Do anything you want. I'm not interested.”
“I'll get lost for another ten thousand. Tell you what, I'll make you a deal. How about eight?”
Bernie's skin crawled just thinking about him. “Go screw yourself.” And with that, he hung up. He would have liked to kick the guy in the guts. But three days later Chandler did it to him instead. A notice arrived in the mail, through a lawyer on Market Street, that Chandler Scott, father of one Jane Scott, ex-husband of Elizabeth O'Reilly Scott Fine, was requesting visitation with his daughter. Bernie's hands trembled when he read the letter. He was ordered to appear in court on November seventeenth, fortunately without the child. But his heart pounded as he read the words, and he dialed Bill Grossman's office.
“What do I do now?” Bernie sounded desperate. Grossman had taken the call immediately. He remembered Bernie's first call on the subject.
“You go to court, it looks like.”
“Does he have any rights?”
“Did you ever adopt the child?”
His heart sank at the question. There was always something happening, the baby, Liz getting sick, the last nine months, then their adjustment…. “No … I haven't…. Dammit, I meant to, but there was no reason. Once I bought him off, I figured we'd seen the last of him for a while.”
“You bought him off?” The lawyer sounded worried.
“Yeah. I paid him ten thousand bucks to get lost a year and a half ago.” It had actually been twenty months. He remembered it perfectly, it was right before Liz had had the baby.
“Can he prove it?”
“No, I remembered what you said about it being against the law.” Grossman had said it was considered like buying black-market babies. You could not buy or sell a child to anyone, and in effect, Chandler Scott had sold Jane to Bernie for ten thousand dollars. “I paid him in cash, in an envelope.”
“So much for that.” Grossman sounded pensive. “The problem is, when you do that kind of thing, they always come back for more sooner or later. Is that what he wants now?”
“That's how this whole thing started. He called me up a few nights ago and asked for another ten thousand to get lost again. In fact, he offered me a cut rate, for eight.”
“Christ.” Grossman sounded annoyed. “He sounds charming.”
“I thought when I told him my wife had died that he'd lose interest. I figured if he thought he was only dealing with me, he'd realize that I wasn't going to take any crap from him.”
Grossman was strangely quiet at the other end. “I didn't realize that your wife had passed away in the meantime. I'm sorry to hear that.”
“It was in July.” Bernie's voice was very quiet, thinking of Liz, and the promise that she had insisted on, that he would keep Jane away from Chandler Scott at all costs. Maybe he should have paid him the ten thousand dollars after all. Maybe it was foolish to call his bluff.
“Did she leave a will regarding the child?” They had talked about it but she had nothing to leave anyone except the things that Bernie had bought her, and she was leaving everything to him and the children.
“No. She really had no estate.”
“But what about the guardianship of the child? Did she leave that to you?”
“Of course.” Bernie sounded almost offended. Who else would she leave her children to?
“Did she put it in writing?”
“No, she didn't.”
Bill Grossman sighed silently at the other end. Bernie had just gotten himself a major problem. “The law is on his side, you know, now that your wife is gone. He is the child's natural father.” Bernie almost shuddered.
“Are you serious?” Bernie's blood ran cold.
“I am.”
“The guy's a crook, a con man, an ex-con, in fact. He probably just got out of jail again.”
“That doesn't make any difference. California feels that natural fathers have rights, no matter what else they are. Even ax murderers have a right to see their children.”
“Now what?”
“They may grant him temporary visitation, pending a hearing.” He didn't tell him that he could lose custody completely. “Has he ever had a relationship with the child?”
“Never. She doesn't know he's alive, and from what my wife said, the last time he saw her she was a year old. He doesn't have a leg to stand on, Bill.”
“Yes, he does. Don't kid yourself. He's the child's natural father…. What kind of marital history did they have?”