Graveland: A Novel (32 page)

“What?”

“That … that I wish I was still drunk.”

She has a knot in her stomach.

“Where are you, Frank?”

“I’m in this shitty hotel, the Bromley. Deb says the FBI is being difficult. They told her we’re not going to see the body …
see Lizzie
 … until at least…”

There’s a long pause here. She stares at the back of her couch.

“Frank?”

“Until—”

He makes a loud gulping sound. It’s followed by another one, even louder, and some heavy sniffling.

Then the line goes dead.

“Frank?”

She tries the number again immediately, and a couple more times after that. It goes to message each time.

She puts her phone down.

Poor bastard.

She sits there swiveling from side to side.

She shouldn’t have called him. Why did she call him?

After a moment she hears the ping of an incoming e-mail. She turns to the keyboard. It’s from Jimmy Gilroy. He says yes, let’s meet up, he has tomorrow night off, how about then? She writes back, okay, and suggests a time and a place.

She hits
SEND
.

Connections.

Then she sits there, still swiveling in the chair, staring out across the room. At nothing in particular. But this strange, weird feeling she’s got? This chill?

She can’t shake it.

*   *   *

He sees the absurdity of the situation, the irony, he gets it—he’s an old man and he’s acting like he’s some young kid trying to score a dime bag, if that’s what they still call them. And not just any old man either, an old man who used to
own
the very pharmaceutical company that’s developing the drug he’s so desperate to get his hands on.

It’s ridiculous.

At least he can do it over the phone. He doesn’t have to hang around on a street corner, waiting.

“You going to bed, sweetheart?”

“In a minute. I have a call I need to make.”

He heads for the study.

Though it’s barely ten o’clock, he and Meredith are just back from dinner at Dick and Maria Wolper’s. This was a big deal for the Wolpers, apparently—to have him there. And they’d obviously been briefed about timing and procedures. The old man has his medication regimen. Needs his sleep. No dairy or gluten. As for wine, French only, and don’t stray too far from Bordeaux. Whatever. But the thing was, Vaughan felt he could have outpaced anyone there. He was seated next to Felipe Keizer, the architect who designed 220 Hanson Street, and they were having this great conversation, Keizer talking about the litigation he’s currently involved in, Vaughan reminiscing about his dealings with Mies van der Rohe in the early sixties and the construction of the Snyder Building. It was a process, he told Keizer, that he found awe-inspiring in its speed and complexity. It was like time-lapse photography—the derricks and cranes appearing, the steel skeleton climbing up into the midtown skyline, the pipes and ducts sliding into place, followed by the partitions and suspended ceilings. It was pure magic. Keizer agreed, and then quizzed him about Mies. What was he like to work with? Was he difficult, approachable? Vaughan was happy to answer these questions, but before you knew it the whole table was listening in.

Not an experience Vaughan has had for a while—being at the center of attention, and firing on all cylinders—but he liked it. And he wasn’t too happy when a clearly terrified Maria Wolper started shunting them out the door at nine thirty.

Anyway.

He’s only got a few of these pills left, and he’s having a hard time getting in touch with his contact at Eiben. This guy, Arnie Tisch, who’s now an executive vice president in charge of worldwide business development, used to run R&D projects under Jerry Hale in the Oberon days. He was an easy enough mark—but now, what, he won’t take Vaughan’s calls?

He’s left three messages already.

Sitting at his desk, he tries him again.

“Hello?”

“Arnie?” A miracle. “Jimmy Vaughan.”

“Oh, Mr. Vaughan, good evening. I’m so sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner, I—”

“You
didn’t
get back to me, Arnie. That’s the whole point. It’s what, ten o’clock on a Friday night, and
I’m
getting back to
you
?”

“Oh? Oh yes, of course. Sorry.”

“And you know why I’m calling, don’t you. I need you to get me some more of those pills.”

When he says it like that it sounds sort of pathetic. Not so much a kid looking to score a dime bag as a degenerate lowlife junkie pleading for his next fix.

Like his degenerate lowlife junkie
son
.

When was that? Jesus, 1981? Feels like a century ago. Feels like yesterday.

“The problem, Mr. Vaughan, is that—”

“No, no. There
is
no problem. This is a repeat prescription, my friend.” If this bastard wants to be difficult, Vaughan will instigate proceedings to buy Eiben-Chemcorp
back
. Which he could do. In a heartbeat. “Just see to it that what we did last time happens again, okay? You know the terms. They’re very generous. So I’ll expect to hear—”

“But, Mr. Vaughan—”

“I’ll
expect to hear from you on Monday or Tuesday
. Thank you.”

He hangs up.

That has agitated him a little, and he doesn’t like it.

This drug works, it’s as simple as that, and he wants more of it. He heard all the scare stories ten years ago about MDT-48, and he wouldn’t have gone near the stuff with a ten-foot pole. But now? Now he’s
old
and he doesn’t give a damn. Besides, this is clearly MDT-lite.

Very lite.

His doctors are amazed—and baffled—at his improved condition, so why would he back away from this? Why would he not take advantage of it? He’s been involved with companies developing innovative products and services all his life, in pharmaceuticals, electronics, communications, the agri and energy sectors, you name it, and when has he
once
benefited personally or exploited his position in any way?

He gets up from his desk and leaves the study.

He should go to bed.

Instead he goes in search of Meredith. He finds her down the hall, in the main living room, splayed out on a couch with a soda in one hand and the TV remote in the other.

He steps into the room and stands there, looking at her.

The way she’s positioned, all languorous … her skirt pulled up a bit, lots of stocking showing, one shoulder strap slipped off and—

He feels—

“What are you watching?” he says.

He’s got a
hard-on
.

She looks up, distracted, and presses
PAUSE
on the remote. He turns and glances at the screen.

Connie Carillo, frozen in sober gray, staring out over the courtroom.

“I DVR’d it,” she says. “It’s
so
depressing.”

“Then why are you watching it?”

She takes a sip from her drink. “I don’t know. It’s
Connie
.” She pauses. “I still can’t believe it. I mean, she stabbed him in the chest with a
carving knife
.”

Hard-on’s gone.

“
If
she did it,” he says, only for something to say. He’s grown bored with the trial and hasn’t followed it for days.

“Of course she
did
it.”

Attempting to sit up now, Meredith gets a splash of soda on her dress.

“Jesus.” She reaches down and puts the can on the floor. Then she inspects the stain. “Shit. They’ll
never
get this out.”

“Well,” Vaughan says, “I’ll leave you to it. Good night.”

He goes to bed and falls asleep pretty quickly, but after maybe an hour something wakes him, a passing siren maybe. He stares into the darkness. He was in the middle of a dream … Ray Whitestone cross-examining Connie Carillo in the kitchen of their house in Palm Beach, asking her how many ladles and soup spoons and pepper pots she had, and if she could describe them.

It was extremely vivid.

But also stupid and meaningless.

He turns over and tries to go back to sleep.

*   *   *

When he’s leaving the room, Frank puts the
DO NOT DISTURB
sign on the door handle. There’s a big fat crack on the plasma TV screen from the Stoli bottle, and he doesn’t want to have to deal with
that
today. He may be coming back here, he may not be, he doesn’t know. He’s paid through till Wednesday. It was the easiest thing to do.

He gets a cab outside the hotel and tells the driver to head downtown.

This is something he
really
doesn’t want to do, but what choice has he got?

They’re on Seventh Avenue, and when they get to Fourteenth Street, he tells the driver to go east. Then, when they get to Orchard, he gets him to crawl along, says they’re looking for a car—but that if they reach Delancey to turn left, and on
no
account to go straight on. It’s bad enough being down here, but he doesn’t think he could bear going right past the building. Looking around, what strikes him first is how ordinary everything is, how there’s no … there’s no trace of what happened. But why would there be? It was a week ago, which is the second thing that strikes him … the relentless, forward-moving, unidirectional, fuck-you nature of time itself. There was before, there was the event, and now there’s afterward. If you’ve got a problem with that, then … you’ve got a problem.

Car’s not here.

They turn left on Delancey.

“No car, sir?”

“No.”

Parking’s pretty crazy in New York, with times, alternate side regs, etc. Also, he can’t remember exactly where he parked, if it was at a hydrant or a loading zone.

“They boot your car, probably.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t see it. It’d still be there. Let’s spin around one more time.”

They loop back onto Grand and then onto Orchard again. It’s definitely not there.

“When you leave it, sir?”

Frank exhales. Yeah, it’s kind of obvious now, isn’t it?

“Week ago,” he says, knowing what’s next.

“Ah, even if they boot it, sir, after two days it gets towed. You want to go to the pound.”

Pier 76.

West Thirty-eighth and Twelfth.

“Okay.” He rolls his eyes. “Let’s go.”

On the way there he calls Deb. He doesn’t want any surprises at the pound, like alarm bells triggering when he hands over his credit card or anything. She’s left him multiple voice messages over the last few days, but he hasn’t actually spoken to her.

So this isn’t going to be easy.

“Jesus,
Frank
.”

He gets it out of her pretty quickly that he’s not being sought for further questioning, at least not yet. She says that Lloyd has been fielding all of that stuff, and that as she said in one of her messages the FBI is refusing to give them a release date.

Frank swallows.

He looks out at languid, sunny Twenty-third Street, quiet Saturday morning traffic cruising by.

A release date
.

He asks how John is.

John went back to California two days ago. He has stuff to do at college. He’ll be back again, though.

He’ll be back when …

Yeah.

“But how are
you,
Frank? I’m worried about you.”

The reflex response here would be
I’m fine,
but he’s not fine, so he isn’t going to say it. He mumbles something and turns it around by asking her how she is.

“I
guess
I’m fine, but counseling helps. It really does, Frank. You should consider—”

“Are there still media people outside your building?”

“Erm … no. They’ve moved on. The damn world has moved on. I can’t even
watch
the news anymore.” She pauses. “Frank, where are you? Why don’t you come and see us? Let’s talk. Come for dinner. Come tonight.”

“I can’t.”

“Well then, how about—”

He makes a vague commitment for early next week sometime and gets off the phone.

Pier 76.

Oh God.

The waiting room is more than half full. It’s hot and stuffy, and peopled by the hungover and the dispirited. It doesn’t take too long, though. He gets called to the window after about twenty minutes. He’s allowed to go and get his registration and other documents from the car, and then after another maybe ten minutes he’s paying with his credit card and being handed a retrieval slip.

Another ten minutes again and he’s heading north on the West Side Highway.

The drive back to West Mahopac passes in a dream-like rush, and it’s only when he gets near his apartment building that he starts feeling weird, and actually a bit sick. That’s when he realizes he hasn’t eaten in … how long? He can’t remember. Eating seems like a sort of weakness, a betrayal, a surrender to the future.

Anyway, once inside the apartment, he makes straight for the bathroom and throws up, or spends a couple of minutes trying to, at least—retching and groaning.

There’s nothing he’d eat in his fridge or in any of the cupboards, and he doesn’t want to go out again, not just yet. Eventually, he finds a couple of granola bars, which he tears open and eats standing at the sink. Then he makes some coffee.

He gets his laptop out, sits on the couch with it, and for the next several hours reads anything and everything he can find on Craig Howley and the Oberon Capital Group.

*   *   *

When Ellen sees Jimmy Gilroy coming through the door, she gets quite a shock. He’s put on a little weight and has a beard. The callow look is gone. He surveys the room, and when he spots her sitting at the bar his face lights up.

They embrace, double-take, reembrace, and then get settled, Jimmy doing a quick survey of the taps and bottles before ordering a Theakston XB.

Ellen is fine with her Leffe.

It’s early Saturday evening, so the place isn’t too crowded. She’d been going to suggest Flannery’s, but she knows too many people there and they’d never be left alone. This place—the Black Lamps, on East Sixteenth—is small, dark, and rickety, with a tiled floor and worn oak fixtures. It’s perfect for a quiet reunion like this.