Robert led the lawyer through the bedroom door and Pilgrim sized her up. A tall, freckled, coffee-skinned woman with her hair pulled back and tied with a bow, glasses, frumpy suit, and flats. Be nicer-looking if she made an effort, he thought.
“Nice to meet you,” he said. “You come well recommended. This here’s my daughter.”
Corella sat at the end of the bed, dressed in black, down to the socks and shoes, her hair short like a man’s. His other daughter, Cynthia, was the pretty one, but she wasn’t Lorene’s child. Cynthia lived with her mother far away-St. Louis, the last anybody heard.
Corella would never move away. She was Daddy’s little princess, homely like him.
Marguerite extended her hand. “Pleasure.”
“Obliged,” Corella said.
Pilgrim shooed both Robert and his daughter from the room. Robert went quick, Corella less so. Clingy, that was the word he wanted. But bitter. He waited for the door to close.
“I got the feeling,” he said, “way your voice sounded over the phone-”
“You were right, there are problems.” Marguerite removed a thin stack of papers from her briefcase, copies of documents she’d discovered at the County Recorder. “With the Excelsior property.”
She explained what she’d found. Six months earlier, the IRS had filed tax liens for over $300,000 in back taxes against a Raymont Williams-who came with a generous assortment of aliases. Soon after that, Lorene, who worked at a local credit union, recorded the first of three powers-of-attorney, forging Pilgrim’s signature and getting a notary at the credit union to validate it. Then, acting as Pilgrim’s surrogate under the power-of-attorney, she took out a loan for $120,000, same amount as the oldest of the tax liens, securing it with the Excelsior property.
But no release of lien was ever recorded. Apparently, when Lorene realized how easily she could phony up a loan, she got the fever. The IRS could wait for its money. Two more loans followed for increasingly shameless sums from hard-money lenders. The house was now leveraged to the hilt, the total indebtedness over $600,000, and that was just principal. Worse, though Lorene had made a token effort to cover her tracks, keep up with the payments, she’d already slipped into default.
“Expects me to come to the rescue,” Pilgrim guessed.
“It’s that or lose the house to foreclosure,” Marguerite said.
“All that happen in just six months?” Pilgrim chided himself for not seeing it sooner. Hadn’t even known about this Raymont fool till recent. Why hadn’t Corella told him? She went to see her mother from time to time-not often, they didn’t get on, but often enough. Daddy’s homely, clingy, bitter little princess was playing both sides. But she’d pay. Everyone would pay.
Marguerite said, “You’ve got a very strong case against the notary, pretty strong against the lenders, though the last two are a step above loan sharks. I don’t know what Lorene told them-”
“Woman can charm a stump.”
“But they’ll want their money. They’ll know they can’t go against Lorene or this Raymont individual for recovery. And they could say they had a right to rely on the notary and turn on her, but her pockets most likely aren’t that deep either. So they’ll come after you. And my guess is they won’t be nice about it.”
“How you figure?”
“It’ll suit their purposes to stick with Lorene and her story, at least for a while. She’ll say she had your full authority to do what she did and now you’re just reneging out of jealousy. It’s not an argument that’ll carry the day, not in the end, but the whole thing could get so drawn out and ugly they could grind you down, force a settlement that still leaves you holding a pretty sizable bag.”
“Maybe I’ll just walk away from the house.”
“If you’re okay with that, why not do it now? Save yourself my legal fees.”
Pilgrim cackled. “You don’t want my money?”
“Not as much as some other people do, apparently.”
Pilgrim blinked his eyes. He could feel the water building up. “And this Raymont Williams, this phony preacher, he walks away clean.”
“I call it the Deadbeat Write-off. Meanwhile, for you, this could all get very expensive, particularly in addition to the other work you mentioned.”
Pilgrim glowered, trying to shush her. He figured Corella had an ear pressed up to the door, trying to hear his business.
“Expensive is lying here doing nothing. I can’t move. Don’t mean I can’t fight.”
That night Pilgrim dreamed he had his body back. He and Lorene were in the throes, the way it used to be-give some, not too much, take a little away, then give it back till she’s arching her spine and making that sound that made everything right. Damn near the only good he’d done his whole sorry life, pleasure that woman-that and turn himself into a quadriplegic piggy bank.
But no sooner did she make that gratified cry in his dream than the whole thing changed. He heard another sound, a low fierce hum, then the deafening broadside slam of the semi ramming his pickup, the fierce growl of the diesel inches from his bleeding face through the shattered glass of his window, the scream of air brakes and metal against metal, then the odd, hissing silence after. His head bobbing atop his twisted spine, body hanging limp in the shoulder harness. The smell of gas and smoldering rubber and that tick-tick-tick from the truck’s radiator that he mistook for dripping blood.
Raymont Williams, dressed in pleated slacks and a cashmere V-neck, Italian loafers, and silk socks, heard the doorbell ring and glanced down from a second story window. A fluffy little white fella, baggy suit, small hat, stood on the porch. Something wrong with this picture, he thought. White people in the neighborhood didn’t come to visit.
Raymont lifted the window: “Yeah?”
The man backed up, gripping his hat so it wouldn’t fall off as he tilted his head back to see who was talking. “Reverend Raymont Williams?”
No collar, Raymont thought, touching his throat. “You’re who?”
“Name’s William Montgomery. I live down the block. I received some of your mail. By mistake. The names, I guess.” He tugged on the brim of his puny hat. “Kind of similar in a backwards sort of way.”
“Shove it through the slot.”
The man winced. “There’s a bit of a snafu.” He looked at the wad of mail in his hand, like it might catch fire. “One of the letters is certified, I signed by mistake. I don’t know, I didn’t look carefully, I just…” He scrunched up his face. “I called the post office. I have to get your signature, too, next to mine, then take the receipt down to the main office on Evans. It’s a hassle, I realize-”
“That don’t make sense.”
“They were very specific. I’m truly sorry, Reverend.”
The hairs on Raymont’s neck stood up. You mocking me? “Hold on.” He closed the window, walked down the carpeted stairs to the entry. The crystal prisms on the chandelier refracted the sunshine streaming through the fanlight. In the dining room a bouquet of lilies and irises exploded from a crystal vase on the Hepplewhite side table. Lorene had this mania for Waterford lately, in addition to a number of other decorating obsessions. Out of control. They’d need to talk on that.
He flipped open the mail slot from inside. “Okay, slip it through.”
The little man obliged. Raymont took the bundle of paper, at which point the voice through the mail slot said, “Reverend Raymont Williams, a.k.a. Raymont Williams, a.k.a. Raymond White, a.k.a. Montel Dickson-you’ve been served with a summons and a complaint in accordance with state law and local rules of the California Superior Court. You must appear on the specified date or a default judgment may be filed against you. If you have any questions, you can call the number that appears on the summons.”