The latter I would leave to Ormes — with the resources of the police department behind her, she could tap into the paper trail that we all generate as we go through life. As for the Paris family and Hugh’s relations with it, two names immediately came to mind, Aaron Gold and Katherine Paris. Then I drew a blank. Finally, a third name did occur to me. Grant Hancock. I turned the name over in my mind and mentally wrote beside it, “last resort.” Then I poured another drink.
The law office of Grayson, Graves and Miller, Aaron Gold’s firm, occupied the top three floors of the tallest building in town. A carpeted, wood-paneled elevator whisked me up to the twentieth floor and deposited me in a reception room the size of my entire apartment and considerably better furnished. A middle-aged woman sat behind a semi-circular desk, beneath a Rothko, manipulating the most elaborate phone console I had ever seen. Wading through the carpet, and between the heavy chairs and couches scattered around the room, I approached her and asked for Aaron. She took my measure with a glance and invited me to wait.
Instead, I walked over to a huge globe of the world and spun it. She cleared her throat censoriously and I drifted to the window. The window faced south to the foothills and beyond, where behind rustic stone walls and elaborate electronic alarm systems, the firm’s rich clients kept the twentieth century at bay.
Grayson, Graves and Miller was just another weapon in their armory. The receptionist called my name and directed me through the door beside her desk and down the hall. I went through the door and found myself looking down a seemingly endless, blue- carpeted corridor lined with closed doors. I heard a lot of frantic voices coming from behind those doors. The refrigerated air blew uncomfortably as I made my way down the hall looking for Gold’s office. This, it occurred to me, was my idea of hell. Just then, a door opened and Gold stepped out and came toward me. The stride was a touch less athletic today, I noticed, and the stomach muscles sagged a bit beneath his elegantly tailored shirt. He was tired around the mouth and eyes and his shaggy hair looked recently slept on.
As we stepped into his office, he instructed his secretary that we were not to be disturbed. On his desk was yesterday’s paper turned to the story of Hugh’s death. I sat down on a comer of the desk while Aaron stood irresolutely before me.
“I was going to call you,” he said.
“I’ve saved you the trouble.” I lifted a corner of the newspaper. “Hugh told me he was in danger of being murdered. I didn’t believe him.”
Gold said nothing.
“He even told me who the murderer would be, his grandfather, Robert Paris. A client of your firm.”
Gold shook his head.
“That can’t be true,” he said, unconvincingly.
“Then what were you going to call me about?”
Gold wandered over to the liquor cabinet and poured himself some scotch. He held the bottle at me. I shook my head.
“You got Hugh’s letters from someone,” I continued, “presumably the recipient. If Robert Paris is involved in Hugh’s death and you’re protecting him, you’re already an accessory.”
“Don’t lecture me about my legal status,” Aaron snapped. “I just want to talk.”
“I’m listening.”
“Judge Paris’s account is managed by the two most senior partners in the firm,” he began, “but there’s enough so that some of it trickles down to the associates. I’ve done my share of work on that account and I’d heard of Hugh Paris, knew he was the judge’s grandson. I’d heard he was bad news,” Aaron shrugged. “I really didn’t give it much thought.”
He sipped his drink.
“Still,” he continued, “when you told me he was in jail, I thought that was important enough to mention to one of the partners on the judge’s account. I thought we might want to do something for him.”
You did, I thought, but said nothing.
“I got the third-degree,” Aaron said. “The two partners questioned me for more than an hour. When they were satisfied I wasn’t holding back anything they explained to me that Hugh had made threats against the judge’s life. I was shown the letters and asked to report back to them anything else that I might learn from you of Hugh’s activities.”
“And did you?”
“Of course I did,” he replied, emptying his glass. “The partners had me convinced that Hugh was dangerous. They told me that he was a drug addict, that his father was crazy. There were disturbing reports from private investigators who’d been hired to keep an eye on him in New York. I not only believed Hugh was a threat to his grandfather but also to you.”
I shook my head. “You never met him.” Aaron wasn’t listening.
“But the more they confided in me,” he said, “the stranger it seemed that the judge would go to such lengths and to such expense to keep track of Hugh. It seemed completely out of proportion to any possible threat Hugh may have posed to Robert Paris.”
“And now Hugh is dead.”
“Yes.” He rose from the couch and went back to the liquor cabinet, pouring another drink. “Three days ago I had a meeting with the partners on the Paris account. They asked me a lot of questions about you — questions that contained information they could have got only by having had you followed.”
“What kind of questions?”
“They wanted to know the nature of your relationship with Hugh.”
“And did you tell them?”
“No, but I think they already knew.”
We looked at each other.
“Three days ago,” I said, “and the next day we had lunch and you tried to talk me out of seeing Hugh. And that night he was killed.”
“I swear I had nothing to do with that,” he said.
“But your client — the judge did.”
“I don’t think it’s that simple,” Aaron said. “I’ve been doing some research. Something’s going on that goes back a long time and involves a lot of people.”
“You’re talking in riddles.”
“I can’t speak more clearly — yet.” He looked at me. “I’m going to stay here,” his gesture encompassed the entire firm, “until I find out. But I don’t want to see you. It’s not safe for either of us.”
“This is no time to split up,” I said.
“They’re watching you, Henry. But they’re not worried about my loyalties. You’re my diversion.”
“Why are you doing this, Aaron?”
“I won’t be an instrument of crime,” he said. “I either have to clear my client of this murder or urge him to turn himself in. That’s my obligation.”
“Then our interests are different,” I said, “because I want justice for my friend.”
He nodded. “I’ll be in touch, Henry. Wait for my call.”
“You have to give me something, Aaron. Something to go on.”
“All right,” he said. “Robert Paris inherited his wife’s estate after she was killed in a car accident. She had a will but she died intestate.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“If you can make sense of it,” he said, “you’ll know who killed Hugh Paris.”
I heard the tremor in his voice and I was frightened for both of us.
I was sitting on the patio of the student union at the university having left Gold’s office an hour earlier. I had come to find Katherine Paris. I stared out across the empty expanse of grass and pavement. Misty light hung from the branches of the trees. A white-jacketed busboy cleared away my breakfast dishes.
School had not yet started for the undergraduates so there was none of their noise and traffic to shatter the stillness. I was thinking about Hugh. The same money that raised this school was responsible for his death. The money was everything and nothing, something that overwhelmed him and which, perhaps, could only be contained by the institution. It had not done Hugh any good, but was merely the background noise against which he played out his unhappiness.
I got up and walked across the plaza to the bookstore. It was a two-story beige box with a red tile roof, a far cry from the excesses of the Old Quad. But then, as the campus moved away from the Old Quad the architecture became purely utilitarian as conspicuous displays of wealth, whether personal or institutional, went out of style. I entered the store and stopped one of the blue-frocked salesclerks, asking where the poetry books were shelved. I was directed to the back wall of the second floor. The poetry books covered a dozen long shelves and it took me a minute to figure out that they were arranged alphabetically.