CAPRIATI'S BLOOD (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 1) (6 page)

He walked away and I sat there to catch my breath. A couple of burly college kids were sitting on a nearby bench doing bicep curls with what looked to be 35-pound weights. Football team. During my near-death workout with Dom, I hadn’t even noticed them come in. They grinned at me. One of them gave me a thumbs-up with his free hand.

“Coach Dom’s a ball buster, ain’t he,” the kid said.

When I got to the office, Dom was popping a K-Cup into one of those single-serving coffee makers. He poured water in, shut the lid, placed a mug in the machine and hit a button. It started humming.

“Three minutes,” he said, reaching into a chest and flipping me a bottle of water. “But drink that first.”

I did. The humming had evolved into an ominous-sounding gurgling. Soon the aroma of freshly brewed … something … came from the direction of the machine.

“What the hell is that,” I said.

“Pomegranate Berry Fusion Tea.”

“That’s enough! What have you done with Coach DeRenzi?”

“Very funny. This stuff is good. With a little help.” He put a couple of heaping teaspoons of sugar in the mug and handed it to me.

“Sugar?”

“If you work out, you can enjoy life,” he said. “Artificial crap will make your dick fall off.”

I took a tentative sip. It was pretty good. I said so.

“But it feels weird drinking pomegranate whatever from a mug that has a grizzly bear snarling on it.” The Wagner College mascot is a bear.

“Machine makes great coffee and hot cocoa, too.” He went to a cabinet and opened it. There were dozens of brightly-colored K-Cups jutting out from a stainless steel stand.

“Please don’t tell me you have those little marshmallows.”

He smiled and reached behind the stand and showed me a silver flask.

“Jack Daniels,” he said. “Beats marshmallows every time.”

Dom is 20 years older than me and looked like Ichabod Crane would if Ichabod Crane could bench press a Volkswagen. He had a prominent nose, jutting jaw and a full head of black hair that probably had help from a bottle. It was cut a little long for his age, but Dom fancies himself a ladies man, and rumors abound that even with three divorces under his belt he still is. Arthritis has bent his six-foot-three-inch frame, but the his designer t-shirt looked like it might burst. And while he’s normally gentle of disposition, I’d seen him twist guys who annoyed him into pretzels. We shot the bull for a few minutes. I could hear the gym filling up behind me. The school sold memberships to alumni, and gave complimentary passes to politicians, clergy and law-enforcement types. The policy was so popular (some would say, abused) that the school was planning separate facilities for its major sports teams.

“Listen, Dom. You’ve been here since the flood. Ever come across a student named William Capriati? Went here maybe 18-20 years ago. Played football.”

“Sure, Billy Capriati. Real piece of work.”

It’s not supposed to be that easy.

“You knew him?”

“I just said I did, didn’t I. Kid was on my wrestling team.”

“I didn’t know you coached wrestling.”

“Coached a little of everything here. Baseball, tennis, golf. I filled in when the wrestling coach quit. Interim appointment, they said. Interim was two fucking years. We used to wear all sorts of hats before a lot of Federal money kicked in and the school raised salaries. Taught English Lit too.”

“A Renaissance man.”

“An alimony man.”

“What did you know about wrestling?”

“Outside the boudoir, not much. But I’m a quick learner. Read some books. Billy Cap, that’s what we called him, he was pretty sharp too. One of my better wrestlers. Football coach kept trying to recruit him, the prick. Billy was built solid, and quick as a cat. But he wanted no part of football. Said he liked his nose the way it was.”

Ellen James had told me that Capriati bragged about his college football days. He’d probably lied to impress her. Football is a religion in the Deep South.

“Damn good lookin’ kid,” Dom continued. “Always had the girls around him.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“Nah. Used them up like candy. Might have pounded a teacher or two, as well. Didn’t seem to affect his stamina any. He won a lot of matches for me. Why do you want to know about Capriati?”

“I have to find him. Do you know where he is now?”

“No clue. Never heard from him after he graduated.”

Well, it wasn’t going to be that easy.

“Most of the kids keep in touch, at least for a while,” he said. “Send me pictures of their kids. Or I see them at an alumni reunion. But Billy never did any of that.”

“Where did he live?”

“I think he was born on the Island, but I seem to remember his family moved to Jersey his senior year. Maybe junior. It’s been a while.”

“You’re doing pretty well for an old fart. I don’t know I’d remember a kid from 20 years ago. Don’t they all blur?”

“Most do, the ones who don’t keep in touch. But there’s always a couple that stick in your mind. Billy Cap anchored my wrestling team, made me look good, considering I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. He had a presence.”

DeRenzi smiled at a memory.

“He was a pistol, though. Had to get him out of some minor scrapes, bar fights, and such.” He looked at me. “He in some kind of trouble?”

“I don’t think so. It’s a paternity thing.”

Dom laughed.

“Figures. He was co-ed catnip.”

“Do you remember where his family lived before they moved?”

“I want to say Port Richmond. But maybe it was Mariners Harbor. They owned a deli or something.”

I got up to leave.

“Listen,” DeRenzi said. “Why don’t you check with the Clap? He can probably get you his file, or transcript or something. And I’m sure they have his yearbook. Be a bunch of photos from the team, and his graduation shot.”

If you had a last name that Dom could have fun with, you were in trouble. Dave Clapper was the Chief of Staff to the college president. He had been the commanding officer of the Coast Guard base in Fort Wadsworth. The VA had arranged the use of the base gym for rehabbing the wounded and we’d become friendly. He put in his papers when the college recruited him. Right after he started the new job, he green-lighted my membership in the college gym. The old boy network on Staten Island was very strong.  

“I’ll call him Monday,” I said. “By the way, what’s the name of the swim team coach?”

“Leslie Tierney.”

“Married?”

I hadn’t seen a ring.

“No, why?”

“Good looking. Great legs. Thought I might give it a shot.”

Dom gave me a look of genuine horror. It was a long moment before he spoke.

“What the fuck happened to you over there? Jesus, that goddamn war.”

He grabbed a tissue from a box on his desk and blew his nose.

“What are you talking about?”

“Where were you wounded? Never mind. I don’t wanna know.” Dom looked like he was about to cry. “Anyway, I’m sorry, Alton. Les is straight as an arrow. He and his wife have three kids, another on the way. You got no chance.”

It hit me.

“Leslie is a man?”

I started to laugh. Dom looked confused.

“What’s so damn funny?” He reached for the flask and took a swallow. “This is fucking tragic!”

“I meant the coach of the women’s team. I saw her at the pool.”

The relief on his face was palpable. He put the bourbon back behind the coffee stand.

“Oh, thank God!”

“What’s
her
name?”

“Alice Watts.” He smiled. “And she’s not married. I think she’s straight, too, although she never came on to me, which made me wonder for a while.”

“Just proves she has taste. I don’t suppose you’ve got her number?”

He swiveled in his chair and did something on his computer.

“Faculty directory,” he said. “Home numbers.” He wrote on a pad, ripped off the sheet and passed it to me. “Cell number, too. Good luck. Alice is choice. Hard worker. Not full of herself like a lot of them. She also teaches philosophy here. Somehow makes that crap interesting, I hear. Kids love her.”

He walked me to the door and clapped me on the back.

“Jumpin’ Jesus, boy, you had me worried.”

The workout had restored my appetite and after leaving Wagner I stopped at the Kings Arms diner on Forest Avenue for some bacon and eggs. Then I went home to shower and change.

I had stored furniture and boxes from my old office in my wreck of a basement and I spent most of the rest of Saturday shuttling back and forth from my house to my new office. The basement didn’t look much better afterwards and I resolved to spend more effort down there cleaning it up. Sometime. It was late afternoon and I was in the midst of rearranging my office for the fifth time – I was feng shui deprived and had no idea how to position plants in relation to the universe – when Nancy Robart called.

“What are you up to?” she asked.

“I’m earning a masters degree in botany in my office.”

She laughed.

“You poor boy. How about a break tonight? I need a date for one of my cocktail parties. We’re announcing the deal we just made with Wagner College. Lots of booze, good food and plenty of academics you can deflate.”

“Want me to pick you up?”

“No. I have some things to do for the party. I’ll meet you there. Come around 7.”

CHAPTER 7 – GARDEN PARTY

I never liked the term “friends with benefits,” since it implies sexual availability without commitment and often puts vulnerable young girls at a disadvantage. That probably makes me an old hypocrite, because the phrase describes my relationship with Nancy Robart. We have been benefiting from each other on and off since a memorable fling down on the Jersey shore during our 20’s. Mostly off, since I only see Nancy between husbands. She doesn’t like the term either.

“We’re just fuck buddies,” she said. “Leave it at that.”

Now I’m not so sure I don’t prefer “friends with benefits.”

Our relationship transcends sex, or at least our kind. A couple of years ago Nancy came to me for help shortly after she was hired to run the Garden. In the dog-eat-dog world of Staten Island not-for-profits, all of which make profits for a lot of people – especially board members – executive directors without an edge have the tenure of a mayfly. The edge normally involves steering certain contracts, hiring certain relatives and occasionally sleeping with certain board members. Nancy adores sex, but in her own way is choosy about who she has it with. And she runs a tight, honest ship. The Robarts of Staten Island fought in the Revolutionary War, although it’s not too clear on which side. But the family has a long history of public service in the borough and a reputation for honesty. That brought Nancy into almost immediate conflict at the Garden.

As at most Island nonprofits, her board was controlled by an all-male executive committee that gave lip service to the bylaws and basically ignored the other board members, who were mostly recruited for their bank accounts and constantly dunned at various luncheons, galas, golf outings, casino nights, days at the races and cocktail hours. The executive committee was headed by a builder who was in the Building Code Violations Hall of Fame. He’d stacked the exec committee with his handpicked cronies from the construction trades and financial industry and made it clear to Nancy early on that she was expected to rubberstamp their contract and hiring decisions. A couple of them also said that an occasional blow job behind the fuchsia would also be nice.

“I’m caught between a rock and a hard-on,” she’d told me. “I love the job and don’t want to quit. If I go public, it’s my word against the old boys’ network. They’ll smear me. I have been known to fool around a bit. If I sue, the same thing and I’ll never get hired anywhere. I don’t go along, they’ll find a reason to fire me.”

I disliked doing a J. Edgar Hoover on people, but the word scumbag was invented for men like those pressuring Nancy. So blackmail it was. But even I’d been surprised at the number of mistresses, love pads, hidden bankruptcies, DUI’s, S.E.C. sanctions and other potential embarrassments her exec committee had accumulated. Armed with the information I provided, Nancy now ran the show and the exec rubberstamped
her
decisions. Nancy’s performance reviews read like she wrote them, which she probably did. Amazingly, she forced the entire committee to stay on.

“I don’t want to have to do this again,” she explained. “Now they’re
my
bitches.”

I’d thought about advertising her strategy to attract clients:
“Are You an Executive Director at a Not-For-Profit? Want Lifetime Job Security? Contact Alton Rhode, Professional Snoop.”
That probably wouldn’t cut it. Discreet word of mouth was probably the way to go.

Given that background, I was actually looking forward to the cocktail party as I pulled into the parking lot of the Botanical Garden. I’d been to several of Nancy’s events as part of my vetting of her problem directors. It’s helpful to meet the people you are investigating, especially when they – and their significant others – are getting smashed. A lot of other prominent and wealthy are also usually in attendance, and in the past I’ve even picked up some clients along the way. I usually go solo, and I’ve also met some interesting and available women, some of who are even unmarried. But since I was with Nancy, I was determined to be a perfect consort, even though I know she would ignore me for much of the evening as she schmoozed donors.

Weather permitting, most Garden events are held outdoors, on the lawns and terraces surrounding the facility’s huge greenhouse, which was also utilized for mingling and munching. But it was cold and the crowd was too large to fit in the greenhouse, which was fine by me. It can get pretty stuffy in there and the martinis reach room temperature almost as fast as you can drink them. And it’s a bit disconcerting to chat with people among plants and vines that could hide a platoon of Viet Cong sappers. One guest once claimed he lost a shrimp to a Venus Fly Trap, but he was very drunk. So the party was switched to the main hall of the Snug Harbor Cultural Center, a 44-acre sylvan paradise of gardens, theaters, artist studios, museums and galleries that has somehow avoided the wrecking balls and backhoes of the Island’s rapacious developers. The Botanical Garden is one of the Harbor’s five constituent non-profits.

A group of volunteer ladies sitting behind a table just outside the hall were checking arrivals against several alphabetical lists. Suits predominated among the men, with a sprinkling of sports jackets and a few tuxedoes. The poor bastards wearing the tuxes probably had another function to attend later. Staten Island would stop functioning without its functions. Most of the women were wearing short, brightly colored dresses and enough jewelry to make the Pink Panther plan early retirement. I was wearing a mid-weight grey worsted wool single-breasted suit with peak lapels that set me apart from the notch-lapel herd, or so the guy at Barney’s told me. A dark blue silk tie was set off nicely by a light-pink pinstriped Charles Terwhitt shirt. My black hip holster didn’t match my tasseled cordovan loafers, but I didn’t think anyone would notice. I was feeling pretty good about myself and was almost through the door when one of the volunteers stopped me. Actually, apprehended is probably the better word.

“Pardon me sir, but we have to check your name off the list.”

She had to be at least 80 and spoke in that loud voice used by the hard of hearing. I explained that I was a guest of Ms. Robart and probably wasn’t on the list. She didn’t give any sign that she heard me.

“What’s your name?”

People looked our way. I should have kept walking, but it’s not easy to blow off a senior citizen whose gnarled hand is clamped around your jacket sleeve. So I told her. She went over to the appropriate list. She traced a bony finger down the sheet. Her other hand still had hold of me. I half expected her to pick up a ruler and whack me for not doing my homework.

“Randazzo, Randolph, Rendt, Richman, Riccio, Russell. Nope, no Road.”

“Not that it matters, ma’am,” I said. “but I spell my name R-h-o-d-e.”

“The only thing that matters, sonny, is that you’re not on the list, however it’s spelled.” She looked at me as if I was something on the bottom of her shoe. “You didn’t pay.” Loud. “Did you?” Louder. She looked at the other people in line and shook her head in abject disapproval and triumph.

“I said I’m a guest.” I had to raise my voice for her to hear me. “The ticket has been taken care of.” That didn’t go over well with some of the paying customers who had shelled out $100 each. Neither did yelling at someone who looked like the grandmother in a Norman Rockwell painting.

This went on for another minute and there was some grumbling from people in line behind me, who undoubtedly thought I was either a deadbeat or a senior molester. I reached in my pocket for money. It was better than being lynched. I was counting out some twenties when I was spotted by Fran and Bob Huber, who were just inside the door greeting arrivals. Fran is the Executive Director of Snug Harbor and one of the few people Nancy trusts. Bob is a journalist and we’ve always hit it off. Fran nudged him and he galloped to my rescue.

“It’s all right, Eloise,” he said. “Mr. Rhode is with us.”

Eloise looked dubious. Nobody had ever given her a freebie in her life. But she wasn’t done with me. She’d caught sight of the cash in my hand and whipped out a raffle book faster than Wyatt Earp on a good day.

“Well, then, the least you can do is buy a raffle ticket for a chance to win a cruise to the Bahamas?” I’m pretty sure people in Bayonne heard her. “It’s $5 for one, $25 for a whole book.”

I gave her $25.

“Darling,” I said. “Fill in your own name on the stubs.”

She looked startled. But now she had a freebie.

“Sorry about that,” Bob said, as we headed toward one of the four bars set up in the cavernous hall. “Nancy told me you were coming. Hell hath no fury like a volunteer who thinks someone is trying to cheat their not-for-profit. Eloise can be a pain, but her heart is in the right place.”

“As is her wallet, I presume.”

We had reached the bar.

“You’re a cynical bastard, Alton.” He looked at the bartender. “Two Beefeater martinis, straight up. The way I like them.”

That meant that the vermouth was only barely allowed in the same room.

“And, as usual, you are right,” he continued. “She is one of our biggest contributors and the Harbor is in her will.” He handed me my drink and raised his glass. “To Eloise.”

“She should be working security at JFK.”

“It’s the only job we can give her. We tried her as a docent, but her tours were a disaster. She knows her stuff, but people were suffering hearing damage during her spiels. Look, Fran is giving me the high sign. I’ll catch you later.”

I was content to hover near the bar and exterminate any hors d’oeuvres that entered my killing zone. Unlike some executive directors, Nancy fed her guests well at her events. Martha Stewart would have approved her selection of canapés. I was often tempted to replace a tray of Beef Wellington with a smuggled-in platter of pigs in a blanket just to see her reaction.

I looked around the room, which was filling up. I spotted a tall good-looking black man in a tuxedo who I recognized from news photos as Spencer Bradley, president of Wagner College. His selection the previous year to run the school, which had never had a black administrator and even today had few black professors, had been a surprise. He was quickly putting his own stamp on the college, even to the point of hiring non-educators to manage the educators. I’d been told that spurred considerable grumbling from entrenched professors. Which I thought placed Bradley firmly on the side of the angels.