Nothing Lost Page 8

  J.J. took a deep breath.

  “And then there’s Percy Darrow. He was ready to go at eleven. Made his peace with his maker, he’d pay the penalty, he even offered his organs. Eyes. Liver. Kidneys. I thought the chair would microwave them. Guess not. Then he has to wait for eight hours. That’s a long time to wait for the man with the hood.” Poppy waited for him to continue. “He did not go gentle into that good night.” J.J. smiled wearily. “Another Celtic play-wright heard from. After this one, Poppy, I think I might I exit public service.”

  “I’m not sure you have a private-sector personality.”

  He supposed she meant a gift for solvency. Count on Poppy to shoot from the lip. He was an expense on her tax return. A depreciable item.

  Poppy’s cell phone rang again. “Congressman McClure.” She listened. The caller seemed to irritate her. Or more probably I had, J.J. thought. Poppy carefully enunciated every word, as if in disbelief. “The Rhino boosters want an advance copy of my remarks. Since when.” The impertinence of the request turned her voice edgy. “It’s the red-meat speech. ‘You elect Poppy McClure, you elect a flat-out, unashamed, unabashed sworn foe of the federal government. You send a message to the welfare bureaucrats. To the fascist in-your-face environmentalists. To all the do-gooder something-for-nothing boys who don’t know an honest dollar when they pick it from your pocket’ . . . blah, blah, blah. And no, you don’t get a copy.”

  Poppy tossed the phone away in disgust.

  “You know what I like best about the red-meat speech?” J.J. said after a moment.

  Poppy eyed him carefully. “What?”

  “The blah, blah, blah.”

  She reached for the mirror she kept on the bedside table, the mirror he often said would fall and break in the middle of the night and bring her seven years of bad luck, but she did not pick it up. “Do you vote for me?”

  “We get our picture taken at the polling booth on Election Day. Then I pull the curtain shut behind me and exercise the franchise.”

  “And?”

  “I have never voted against you.”

  Poppy chose not to pursue the point. “You don’t like politics.”

  J.J. stretched and put his hands behind his head. “Every time I think I might weaken, I run into Willie Erskine. He pulls me back to reality.”

  She did not come to Willie’s defense. He worked for her. Performed the necessary unpleasant services with relish and always with her benediction. When the zeal for the unseemly diminished and he had outlived his usefulness, as it would most certainly would, he would be dismissed without a thought. “I do like it. In fact I love it. It’s like I grew up and got to join the circus.” Poppy stood up and smoothed her slip. It clung to her angular figure. Small breasts, small waist, small hips, prominent hipbones. My Dolores Del Rio look, she called it. “I’m good at it. It’s the only thing in my life I did get really good at. All by myself.”

  “All by yourself?” He let the statement sink in. He knew it was difficult to get under her skin, but he saw no reason to stop trying. It was like cross-examination. It sharpened his skills. This was payback time. The appreciation of the depreciable item. “That’s one way to put it.”

  Poppy wet a forefinger and checked a possible flaw in her panty hose. Good legs. Trim ankles. “How would you put it?”

  “I might say that the last will and testament of Jim Ford might have helped get the ball rolling.”

  Her answer was equable. “You’re a real pain in the ass this morning.”

  “It’s not every morning I’ve seen two people die the night before. One I didn’t get all that choked up about. The other was a bit of a surprise.”

  “And you’re feeling sorry for yourself?”

  J.J. closed his eyes. “Just tired.” After a moment, he heard water splashing in the bathroom sink. “By the way, Poppy. You ever hear of the Loomis Cattle Company?”

  A piece of information that the bizarre events of the evening had not jarred from his memory drum. Precipitating a second call to Allie from Warden Pugh’s office as the sun rose over Durango Avenue. Check the property taxes of all the major landholders in Loomis County, he had told her. Why? she had said. Just do it, he had said.

  Poppy came to the bathroom door, a face towel in her hand. “It’s a contributor.”

  “Believes in what you stand for?”

  She disappeared back into the bathroom. “Get some sleep, J.J.” Then she was in the doorway again. She had an acutely sensitive early warning system. J.J. normally evinced no interest in her public life. Which meant he had something on his mind. Something that would affect her. Of that she was sure. “What’s your sudden interest in the Loomis Cattle Company?”

  “One Lewis Colin. Formerly Colinsky. Born in the San Fernando Valley. That’s in California someplace.”

  “Los Angeles.”

  He knew where the San Fernando Valley was. He just wanted to keep Poppy’s attention. When she was off balance, not in total command, she was desirable. Private time was her way of staying in charge. Controlling, not cuntable.

  He detected the slightest quiver of urgency. “Get to the point, J.J.”

  “Lewis Colin. Owns the Loomis Cattle Company.”

  “So.”

  “In the world of adult cinema, Lewis Colin is known as . . .” He made her wait. “Cowboy Collins.”

  “Shit.”

  “The Trail Rider himself. The Cowboy and his trusty Chinese side-kick, Hard Ahn.”

  “Jesus.” The morning was turning into a minefield for Poppy. “Where did you pick that up?”

  He did not offer an answer. Poppy would know he would not pass on that kind of information just to make mischief. Nor would he volunteer how he got it. She would not believe a lead from Charley Buckles. Even with Allie nailing it down. Listen to Charley when he was alive and you could get an unauthorized history of South Midland. Dead men tell tales, Charley liked to say. Don’t believe that other stuff. “Have Willie check it out. You wouldn’t want the Worm to get hold of that. Too bad Koppel didn’t have it. Been a lot more interesting than George Bernard Shaw.”

  She was already punching in a number on her cell phone.

  “Protector of family values like yourself, and your campaign’s being backed by the films of Cowboy Collins. You have a favorite? Bucking Brenda?”

  She ignored him. Insistently into the phone: “Pick up, Willie, pick up.” Finally.

  “Willie. What took you so long? The Loomis Cattle Company . . .”

  “. . . Riding Regina? Cowboy and Indians . . .”

  Poppy wheeled toward him. “Will you shut up?”

  J.J. picked up the harmonic tremor of unhappiness. He rolled over contentedly, tucking a pillow under his head.

  He dozed. In the fading background he could hear Poppy ordering Willie Erskine to find out all he could about a contribution from the Loomis Cattle Company, and to figure out a way to return it quickly and quietly. In the haze of half-sleep, he wondered if Poppy had ever slept with Willie Erskine. No. Willie was double-locked and dead-bolted in the closet. And Poppy would never sleep with anyone on the payroll. Too risky. Too much economic incentive. A vineyard of extortion or exposure. No man is a hero to his valet, or whatever the female equivalent is. Even with the confidentiality clause in the employment contract she made all her staff sign. Easy to sneak around that one. No, no, no, no. If Poppy did it, she would insist on someone who regarded avoidance of risk as not just a virtue but a necessity. Probably married. Definitely someone important. Or better yet, self-important. Maybe a woman. No. Don’t think so. But. But what? There were whispers. A hint. No. Let that rest. I’m liberated. To a point.

  He turned over, fighting sleep. Why? Why these bad thoughts, like dark scudding clouds in a twister? He knew why. So he didn’t have to think about Emmett. He could scarcely remember what his brother looked like. The only photograph he still had was sealed in an unmarked envelope in a locked desk drawer at his office. Forgetting what happened was not an opti
on. As hard as he tried. Would still try. Emmett grasping for air, going under, his spindly three-year-old arms flailing in the water, then floating, facedown under the boat dock. And up on the hill, Walter, chained to his wheelchair. Trying to get to the dock. Falling forward, the braces on his polio-withered legs locked so that he could not move. Crawling. Pulling himself forward, his fingers digging into the grass and into the soft turf. It’s not your fault, Jamie, he had said. It’s not your fault. He knew. J.J. knew that he knew. Think of something else. God, Charley Buckles was fat. And there was Percy Darrow with duct tape over his mouth to stop his screaming, handcuffed, carried feet first from the holding cell into the chamber with his legs in plastic restraints. The restraint team was wearing hard hats, tinted face shields, and body armor. “A cell extraction,” the tie-down manual called it. Extraction. What dentists did to a diseased tooth. Percy Darrow was a diseased tooth. Q.E.D.

  Poppy was shaking him. Poppy was dressed. Poppy in severe designer black.

  “J.J.”

  He snapped awake.

  “I’ve got Willie on that.”

  J.J. did not think he had ever seen a Dolores Del Rio movie. “You want to fuck?”

  “I have a coffee.” She picked up her bag. “Then a women’s forum. But tomorrow. After the 5-K Run. I’ll make some private time.”

  “Private time lacks a certain spontaneity.”

  Poppy checked her appearance in the mirror until her eyes caught his. “Is that what you have with Allie? Spontaneity?”

  Of course she would have known about Allie Vasquez. Willie would have heard. Willie would have dropped hints.

  “Spontaneity, yes.” He wondered why she brought it up now. All right. Her way. “And enthusiasm.”

  Accused Parlance Killers: “Not Guilty”

  WEB POSTED 13:29

  Regent, SM (ABCNEWS.COM)—In a brief arraignment at the Loomis County Courthouse today, court-appointed lawyers for Bryant Gover and Duane Lajoie, accused of the brutal slaying of Edgar Parlance last month, pleaded their clients not guilty before Judge Ellen Tracy, who will preside over the trial.

  The state was represented by Maurice Dodd, a senior prosecutor in the Attorney General’s office. Dodd said that he would press vigorously for the death penalty for both defendants.

  Gover is represented by Francis Howar of Regent and Lajoie by Earle Lincoln from nearby Questa. Refusing to answer questions after the arraignment, Howar told reporters that he would argue his client’s case in court and not in the press. Lincoln, who only passed the bar in June, also declined comment.

  Because of the sensitivity of the case, which is expected to draw full media coverage, Judge Tracy, a veteran jurist, was selected by lottery from a pool of senior judges.

  Present at the arraignment was Los Angeles Clippers superstar Jamaal Jefferson, who flew in to Regent by chartered helicopter after his private jet brought him to Capital City from Indianapolis, where the Pacers beat the Clippers last night 107–92.

  Jefferson had paid for the Parlance funeral last week.

  On behalf of the NBA and Cyrus Ichabod, CEO of I-Bod, the sneaker and sportswear conglomerate, Jefferson presented a $10,000 check to Clyde Ray, 59, who identified Lajoie’s pickup as it sped from the location where Parlance was killed on the night of the murder. This identification led to the arrest of the two former ex-felons.

  Ray was able to remember the 1989 Ford pickup by an obscene sticker on its rear bumper.

  PART TWO

  CHAPTER ONE

  This is a story Teresa Kean told me.

  If I were a writer, not a lawyer, or as good a writer as I am a lawyer, I would have introduced her earlier. Since you could say this narrative is about her. Because without Teresa, there is no narrative. If you were giving billing, she is above the title.

  Prima inter pares.

  J.J.’s above the title, too. And I suppose Carlyle.

  Although you haven’t met her yet either.

  In due course.

  Anyway.

  My elaboration on Teresa’s story.

  During Poppy’s first two terms in Congress, J.J. would occasionally visit her when the House was sitting. “What do you do, Mr. McClure?” a party functionary once asked him at a Heritage Foundation cocktail party. “Other than being Poppy’s husband, that is.”

  “I put people in prison,” J.J. said. “Other than being Poppy’s husband, that is.”

  You can see why he hated it there.

  He spent an awful lot of time in green rooms waiting for Poppy to finish whatever chat show she was on. The last time he went to Washington, Poppy was interviewed on C-Span by Brian Lamb. J.J. was alone in the green room with all the morning papers and a table covered with Snapple iced tea and bottled water and bagels and cream cheese. Poppy was live on one of the two monitors, and on the other there was a rerun of a three-hour interview about books with Joyce Carol Oates. About halfway through Poppy’s show, a P.A. came in and asked if he needed anything. She was tall, blond, coltish, about twenty-seven, wearing a black T-shirt, black linen culottes, and a black cotton sweater knotted around her waist. Her hair was pulled together with a tortoiseshell barrette. She said she was a great fan of Joyce Carol Oates’s, that an old boyfriend would give her copies of Oates’s books as birthday and Christmas presents. She said she no longer had the boyfriend, but still had the books. Then she asked again if there was anything she could do for him.

  Yes, J.J. said.

  He never did get her name.

  They began going at it while Poppy was on live, taking listener calls, doing her rap. On the other monitor, Joyce Carol Oates hid behind her tinted glasses. The P.A. said someone might walk in and see them, they had to stop or go in the bathroom, lock the door, and do it in there. J.J. brought the cream cheese with him. He pulled up her T-shirt, spread cream cheese on her breasts, and started to lick it away. She pushed him onto the toilet seat and began sucking him off. J.J. lifted her off her knees, turned her around, bent her over the sink, and fucked her. When he was done, he pulled up his trousers and started to wipe the remains of the cream cheese from her breasts with a damp paper towel. She took the towel from him, said she would do it herself, and sent him back to the green room while she finished getting dressed.

  On the monitors, Poppy was finishing up her interview, while Joyce Carol Oates was deep into an explanation of how the literary ecology between the senator who was not Ted Kennedy and the young woman who was not Mary Jo Kopechne led her to write Black Water. Brian Lamb signed off, and a moment or so later Poppy walked into the green room. J.J. was sitting on the couch. Good job, he said, as in the bathroom the toilet flushed and the P.A. exited, carrying the dish of cream cheese, a dab of which had stuck to her black T-shirt.

  Poppy looked from J.J. to the P.A. and then back at J.J. There was a small smear of cheese on his upper lip.

  You didn’t, she said equably. It was as if the P.A. were not present.

  Poppy, you are embarrassing this young woman, J.J. said. Then he guided Poppy out of the green room, out of the C-Span building, and into her waiting car.

  J.J. never returned to Washington after that visit.

  I may have added some details, but the cream cheese came from Teresa.

  CHAPTER TWO

  From an unpublished manuscript written by Teresa Kean and stored on her laptop in a locked folder called RECIPES. Also in the folder was a haphazard collection of notes, observations, and miscellaneous journal entries.

  My father was a gangster. He was, in fact, a murderer. I don’t know how many people he actually killed, but there were two cut-and-paste biographies about him and about his role in the opening up of Las Vegas, and he is listed in The Encyclopedia of American Crime as a top hit man, the murderer of twenty or so people, perhaps even more. He did not of course advertise the number and names of his alleged victims, or the means by which he allegedly dispatched them, but then neither did he deny the claims, his silence only further gilding the myth he seemed, according
the tattered clippings about his life, to so enjoy. Firearms, piano wire, explosive devices, claw hammers, screwdrivers, suffocation, battery, drowning—his chroniclers claimed there was no form of mayhem in which he did not exhibit a master’s skill.

  My father never knew he was my father. He was shotgunned to death before he knew my mother was pregnant. He was building a hotel in Las Vegas called King’s Playland (his name was Jacob King), and there were shortfalls and overruns, and he was hit. The shooter was a childhood friend. (“Hit” and “shooter” were in the rhetorical style of both books written about Jacob King, books which, when I finally read them, I found essentially worthless, a compendium of clips and rumors and self-aggrandizement, but then of course I had an emotional investment in believing in their paltriness and inconsequence.) It was only after my father was murdered that my mother discovered that she was pregnant. They were of course not married. My mother was a movie star. A child movie star who was trying to cross over and become a grown-up movie star. Her name was Blue Tyler, and if she is remembered now largely as a crossword puzzle entry or a question on Jeopardy!, there was a time in her prepubescent and adolescent years in which her name on a marquee was a guarantee of gold. The crossover did not happen. Jacob King’s occupation and his dramatic and bloody demise, both of which fell under the moral-turpitude clause in a motion-picture contract, were two good reasons, my mother’s putative talent for fellatio and her equally putative appreciation of a prominent phallus were two more, two that to a certain degree are my only inheritance from her.