Steve punched in 411, and asked for the listing. The operator said, “Certainly,” he heard the click and the recording began. Oh hell, the worst of these recording information services, where the hell was a pencil?
He dug in his pockets, pulled out a whole bunch of junk, and finally, an old ballpoint pen. He tried it on an old envelope. It worked.
By that time the recording had already given the phone number and instructed him to stay on the line if he needed further assistance.
An operator clicked on. “Yes?”
“The phone number for the Taylor Detective Agency.”
“We just gave you that number.”
“I missed it.”
“All right.”
There was a click, and the recording began again.
He got it that time. He broke the connection, got a dial tone and dialed the number.
A female voice answered. “Taylor Detective Agency.”
“Mark Taylor, please.”
“Who’s calling, please?”
“Steve Winslow.”
“One moment please.”
There was a click, and Steve was on hold. He hated that. At least there was no recorded music. Another click, and Mark Taylor’s slightly Brooklyn twang said, “Steve, hi. Good to hear from you. Where you been keeping yourself?”
“It’s a long story. Listen, Mark. I got some work for you.”
“Oh yeah? What kind of work?”
“A murder case.”
“No shit. I thought Wilson and Doyle fixed it so you’d never work again.”
“I got lucky. Now look. A man was found murdered in a Miss Sheila Benton’s apartment this afternoon.”
“Yeah. What about it?”
“You heard about it?”
“Can’t say that I have.”
“Well, you will. It happens to be the biggest thing going.”
“Oh yeah? And why is that?”
“Because Sheila Benton happens to be Maxwell Baxter’s niece.”
Taylor whistled. “You mean to say you got a piece of that action?”
“That’s right.”
“Who’s the client?”
“Sheila Benton. ”
Taylor whistled again. “How the hell’d you get involved?”
“That can keep. The thing is, I need information, and I need it fast. The police haven’t identified the body yet. When they do, I want you to go to work on him.”
“How strong?”
“As strong as you can. I want to know everything the police know, and some things they don’t know. Get men started. Work round the clock, if you have to.”
“That’s gonna run into a lot of money.”
“Don’t worry. I got a huge retainer.”
Steve hung up the phone. He walked over to a townhouse, sat on the front steps and opened the file folder. Inside, as Baxter had said, was a copy of the provisions of the trust. Steve sat on the steps and read it through.
It was simple and straightforward. Sheila’s entire fortune was in trust until she reached the age of thirty-five. Maxwell Baxter was designated sole trustee. In the event of his death, the power of trustee reverted to the bank, which was to administer the trust under guidelines specifically laid out in the document, which included the amount of money Sheila could receive each month. The only provision under which she could receive more was in the event of a medical emergency, or if she wished to attend school.
The morals clause was there too, just as Baxter had said: “… be convicted of any crime, or engage in any illegal, immoral or unethical act which should, in the estimation of the trustee, bring disrepute upon the family name, the entire trust is forfeit, and…”
Steve skimmed through the rest of the document and found the passage he was looking for: ‘This trust is held inviolate. No lien of any kind upon the said Sheila Benton shall be payable from or shall in any way reduce the amount of this trust. No judgment in any court of law against the said Sheila Benton shall be payable from this trust or shall in any way reduce the amount of this trust. Any debts incurred by the said Sheila Benton are hers and hers alone, and have no bearing upon this trust, nor shall any creditor of Sheila Benton have any legal recourse…”
It went on in that manner for another page and a half Steve read it through three times, looking for a loophole. In the end he was forced to admit that Baxter was right There was no way he was going to get a dime.
Wouldn’t you know it? He was hurting for cash right now. He checked in his pockets. Thirty-six bucks. Nothing in the bank. And the rent coming due.
Shit! Not only that, but he was late for work.
Steve drove a cab. This was another carryover from his acting days, just like his long hair and his answering service. Out-of-work actors waited tables or drove cabs. Steve had never had the temperament to wait tables, so as an out-of-work actor he’d driven a cab. And then, as an out-of-work lawyer, he’d driven a cab.
And he was due to drive one now.
With a sigh, Steve shoved the document back in the folder, got up and went back to the phone. He fished in his pocket, dug out another quarter and dropped it in. It rang three times, then a voice answered.
“Hello.”
“Hello, Marty. It’s Steve. Listen, can you drive for me tonight?”
“Sorry, pal. I got a date.”
“Listen, Marty, it’s important.”
Marty chuckled. “So’s the date.”
The phone clicked dead.
Steve sighed and hung up the receiver. He picked it up again, dug out another quarter and dialed.
“Hello?” growled the voice of the dispatcher.
“Hello, Charlie. It’s Steve. Listen. I can’t drive tonight.”
“Why not?”
“I’m sick.”
“So get a replacement.”
“I tried. No one’s free.”
“Then you gotta drive.”
“I’m sick.”
“Yeah. I’m sick too. Look. Show up or get a replacement. You don’t show up, you’re fired.”
The phone clicked dead.
Steve hung up the phone. Shit What was it he had? Thirty-six bucks? The cabbie job was his lifeline, the thing standing between him and eventual eviction. If there were any chance, any faint hope of getting a retainer… but he’d read the trust, and he knew enough law to know what it meant.
He couldn’t afford to lose his job.
Which is why Steve Winslow, attorney for Sheila Benton in a premeditated-murder case, spent the first night of his employment driving a cab.
17
Mark Taylor was seated at his desk talking on the phone when Steve Winslow walked in. It was three in the morning, and Taylor looked it-stubble on his cheeks, and circles under his eyes. Steve, who had slept late and shaved late, looked better, if you discounted his clothes.
The stubble on Taylor’s cheeks was red, and matched the curly red hair that framed his chubby face. Taylor was a man who had spent his twenties resisting the onslaught of fat, and now in his thirties had given up. Half a sandwich from the all-night deli lay unwrapped on his desk. Next to it was the inevitable cup of coffee, which, after years of being black was now laced with cream and sugar.
Mark Taylor had been Steve’s roommate their freshman year at Yale. Steve had gone on to major in drama. Mark had majored in economics, but that had been out of the necessity of majoring in something. To Taylor, Yale had meant just one thing: football. At six foot, two hundred twenty pounds, all muscle, Taylor had been an exceptional linebacker with not unrealistic professional aspirations. A knee injury that wouldn’t heal right his senior year shattered the dream. He emerged from Yale with a “gentleman’s C” in a subject that held little interest for him, and with limited prospects.
His salvation had been his beef, which landed him a job with a Manhattan detective agency run by the father of one of his former teammates. Taylor liked it fine, picked it up fast and within five years was running his own agency.
When Steve, who’d kept in touch, had gone to work for Wilson and Doyle, he’d promised to try to throw some work Taylor’s way. Only Steve hadn’t lasted long enough to do it.