Tender Death (15 page)

“D
ONNA
, I’
M SORRY
.” Wetzon pulled out her file drawer and leafed through the
R’s
for Donna Rhodes’s suspect sheet.

The outside door slammed, and Smith barreled in. She kicked their office door shut and dropped her new black diamond mink coat carelessly on her chair, making no move to stop it as it slid to the floor.

“Wetzon,” Donna said, “I think I’m finally ready to sit down and talk.”

“At last!” Wetzon pulled Donna’s suspect sheet out and studied it. “I’m so glad you thought through what I said.” What a coup it would be to get someone of Donna’s caliber out interviewing.

“You’ve been really professional, and I have no interest in working with anyone else, so I think we should meet.”

Smith was waving at Wetzon with wide sweeps of her hands, trying to get Wetzon’s attention. Wetzon turned away. Smith should know better than distract her when she was obviously talking business. “Thank you, Donna. That really makes me feel good. What’s your schedule like this week? Except for today, I’m fairly clear ...”

“How about sushi lunch on Thursday?”

“Thursday it is, sushi, you’re on. I’ll call you in the morning and we’ll pick a place. I’m partial to Takesushi on Vanderbilt. But give me a clue about your thinking, so I can put my mind to work. What’s going on?”

“A lot of things, I guess, starting with the new manager. He took me to dinner not long after he got here, and you know me, I listen, and sometimes I hear between the lines. He’s old style, from Charleston. He’s got three sticks after his name. I said to him, ‘Tell me about yourself,’ and he starts giving me his family pedigree, would you believe it, starting with George Washington’s wife. All I wanted to know was his background in the business. I don’t give a shit about his family tree.”

“He’s not New York. He’s going to have trouble here.”

“And lately we can’t even get the cold callers we used to get—”

Behind her, Wetzon could hear Smith begin banging and thumping things on her desk. “Doesn’t he like using the cold-calling system?” Not all managers did. In fact, many managers felt cold calling—that is, calling strangers over the telephone and trying to sell them stocks, or bonds or products—was bad for the brokerage business and was closer to a bucket shop sales approach.

“No, it’s not that. He said he’s open, and if it works, he’s willing to keep it up, but we can’t get enough callers because half the ones we had didn’t pass their drug tests and they were let go.”

“That gives me a start. I’ll talk to you Thursday.” Wetzon hung up the phone and jotted the time of their meeting on her calendar for Thursday and a reminder to call Thursday morning to fix time and place. “I don’t know what this business is coming to, Smith.”

“You don’t know what?” Smith demanded. She was sitting on her desk, swinging her feet impatiently. Her knee-high designer waterproof boots were near her desk, leaving muddy puddles on the parquet floor.

“Half of the cold callers at Bernard Schultz couldn’t pass their drug tests and were fired.” Wetzon pulled an old
Business Week
from her wastebasket, rose, opened it, and put it under Smith’s muddy boots. She straightened up and grinned at Smith. “Okay, brat, what do you want?”

“You are such a fusspot,” Smith said, arms folded.

“Do you want to have to pay to get the floors sanded again?”

“That is so unimportant in the scope of things, Wetzon. You always think so small. I’ve tried so hard to teach you my way of—”

“Spare me, please, Smith.” Her jaw tightened involuntarily.

B.B. knocked at the door and teased it open. “Lunch orders?”

“Chef salad for me,” Smith said, “with vinaigrette dressing and an onion roll.”

“Rare roast beef on a roll with Dijon and no greens.”

“My lord, what have we here?” Smith said, clapping her hands. “Rare roast beef! To what do we attribute this change in diet?”

To the fact that we’d like to kill you,
Wetzon thought. It was weird. Anger always gave her an intense craving for rare beef. Some atavistic memory. “‘A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,’” Wetzon quoted Emerson. B.B. laughed.

“You really talk such garbage sometimes, Wetzon,” Smith said resentfully. “Close the door please, B.B.” B.B. got out of the room quickly. “I don’t think you should perform for B.B. You are really making him into some kind of a pet. It’s unfair of you when he’s working for both of us—”

“Oh, shut up, Smith! You have some nerve saying that to me when you had Harold read you my messages. Are you spying on me, or what?”

“Oh, sweetie, no,” Smith gushed, a you-have-wounded-me-to-the-quick expression on her face. “I would never do that. I just worry about you. The cards, you know, and that Teddy Lanzman. I thought you might not tell me if you were going to meet him.”

“Don’t worry,” Wetzon said without gratitude. “I’ll keep you informed.” She already regretted having involved Smith in this. “Do you want to tell me about the detective?” She couldn’t resist returning the needle.

“What detective?” Smith slipped off her desk and flipped through her messages. “Oh, look, Jake Donahue called.”

“Probably wants to thank you for his coming-out party. That’s the fastest in and out of prison I’ve ever seen, and with no trial.”

“Wetzon, you have no forgiveness in you. Leon had Jake plead guilty and cooperate and you have to understand that three months is like thirty years to someone like Jake. He was absolutely devastated by the experience.”

“Oh yeah? He didn’t look devastated to me.”

“You don’t understand him as I do.”

“I’ll bet. I wonder what kind of deal they made.”

“Well, of course, I know because Leon told me, but I’m not at liberty to say ... Leon is so brilliant.”

“Is he really?” She was being sarcastic, but it was wasted effort. “What did the detective tell you?”

“Are you having dinner with Arleen Grossman tonight?”

“Yes—after I meet with Kevin De Haven.” Smith frowned. “We do have a business to run, you know. And after I see Hazel, which reminds me ...” She picked up the phone and dialed Hazel.

“I’ve been waiting for your call. How did it go in Little Odessa yesterday?” Hazel’s voice was mildly reproving.

“Very interesting, if nothing else. I’ll tell you about it later. How are you feeling?”

“Mentally, just brimming over with energy,” Hazel said, “but physically, pooped.”

“I’ll come up after an end-of-the-day interview, how’s that?”

“Oh goody. How about stopping at Patek’s and picking me up some pasta salad and chocolate chip muffins and whatever else looks good?”

“What time are you meeting Arleen?” Smith was going through her messages yet one more time, throwing most of them away. She rarely responded to her phone calls. Wetzon compulsively called everyone back, even the people who were trying to sell her something. “Waste of time,” Smith said, throwing another slip away. Smith’s dictum was that returning phone calls was not an efficient use of time. “If someone really wants to talk, they’ll call back.”

“Catch me up on what’s happening,” Smith said.

“We have Maurice Sanderson going to see Bob Curtis this afternoon.”

“What an embarrassment. The old fart should just retire gracefully.”

“He can’t, Smith. It’s his whole life. I told you that. He’d die without something to get up for every morning. We’ve been through this before. So let’s just agree to disagree. Do you want to tell me what you want to know from Arleen so I know what I’m doing?”

The phone rang twice. The light stayed on the first button, so Harold was talking.

“I know she’s going to try to get information out of you, Wetzon, so don’t you dare tell her anything about me.” Her voice was sharp.

Wetzon stared at her. There were strain lines around her eyes and around her mouth. She looked worried. “Why would I tell her anything about you?”

“Oh, Wetzon, I love you, but you’re such a simpleton. Arleen’s very smart. She’ll wheedle it out of you and you won’t even know it. I want you to promise me you won’t tell her anything.”

“Okay, I promise, but I still don’t know what you want me to get out of her—”

Smith dug into her huge Ferragamo handbag and pulled out a small box. She crooked her finger at Wetzon. “Come here a minute, sugar.”

Wetzon got up, curious. The box contained a Sony minicassette recorder. “I don’t believe this,” Wetzon groaned.

“Don’t say no, please, Wetzon, sweetie pie. It’s so important to me. I just need you to do this.”

“No.”

“Please.” Smith looked up at Wetzon, teary-eyed. “You know I would do it for you.”

“Oh shit, Smith. How do I always let you get me into these things?”
And it always ends up backfiring on me somehow
, she thought, remembering the key she had found after Barry Stark was murdered and how Smith had gotten her into trouble with Silvestri because of it.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you. I am so grateful to have a loyal friend like you.” Smith jumped up and planted a big kiss on Wetzon’s cheek. “Now, look.” She turned back to the little machine on her desk and pressed a button.

Wetzon’s voice repeated, “Oh shit, Smith. How do I always let you get me into these things?”

Smith hit the Stop button and rewound the tape. “Look, all you have to do is put it in your bag and press it on as soon as you sit down with her in the restaurant.”

The phone rang. For Harold again, obviously, because he didn’t interrupt them.

“But what if she should find out I have it?”

“Wetzon, please don’t be foolish. How would she find out?” Smith pressed the minirecorder into Wetzon’s reluctant palm. “Just put it in your bag and don’t forget to turn it on.”

Wetzon looked at the machine in her hand. It was tiny and clever, and if she didn’t feel as if she were being used, she might have been more fascinated by its size. It was not much bigger than a pack of cigarettes.

Harold knocked and opened their door. “I didn’t know you knew Ted Lanzman,” he said to Wetzon, part accusatory, part respectful.

“He’s so ...” He looked for the right word “ ... nice,” he finished lamely.

“Well, he is and I do.” Wetzon smiled and put the cassette recorder in her carryall. “Why?”

Smith turned in her chair and looked at them, annoyed.

“He’s on the phone for you, Wetzon.”

She picked up the phone. “Teddy? What’s up?” Smith was paying rapt attention.

“Peter Tormenkov, that’s what.” His voice was low and full of pent-up excitement.

“I haven’t been able to reach him. I’m really sorry. They said he was out—”

“Yeah, with me—” He was actually crowing.

“You? Oh no, Teddy. I asked you not to.”

“Wetzi, look, I’m sorry. It’s a big, big story—you don’t know how big—and it’s all mine! I’ve got an exclusive. Shit, and I have you, my old friend, to thank for it.”

His old friend. Ha! “Teddy, stop for a minute.” He had betrayed her confidence. How could he have done that to her? She slumped dejectedly over her desk.

“Can we meet tonight?” He plowed right through her, her upset, her feelings. “I’ll tell you the whole story, Wetzi, honest. Listen, you did the guy a favor. And by the way, I think you were right.”

“Right? About what?” She had been wrong about
him
, certainly.

“The old lady.”

She snapped to attention. “Peepsie Cunningham?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell me—”

“Later. I’m meeting with Tormenkov again tonight. He’s getting me proof. I’ll have the rest of it. We’re making a little exchange.” His laugh was a derisive bark. “I’ll fill you in on everything later.”

“I’m not going to be free till after nine or nine-thirty.” She felt torn. She wanted to know more, but she was furious with him.

“Look, that’s cool with me. I’ll be at the studio writing the voice-over, cutting the tape for the next segment. You can pick me up there.”

“It may be as late as ten.” She would have liked to tell him what she really thought of him, but she had to know the truth about Peepsie’s death. “You’re sure you’ll be there that late?”

“Yeah. Late night for me. You know the address. Go in the main entrance. I’ll leave your name with the security guard and he’ll give you a pass. He’ll tell you where to find me.”