Howard Engel - The Cooperman Variation

The name Plevna stabbed me in the ear. I’d heard the name earlier in connection with Bob Foley, the independent-minded technician.

This sideshow didn’t last long. Nobody really drank more than a sip of his drink-Sally and I were excluded from the libations, by the way. Roger grabbed a drink when Raymond wasn’t watching.

“I don’t mind saying that I’m uneasy with even an un signed document in my safe,” Raymond said. “Having the fully executed documents will plague my sleep, Vanessa. You keep those two copies and I’ll take the other two.”

“Why don’t you leave the original and all the copies here and I can get two of them matted and mounted for framing. I’ll send your copies over by courier. They should be ready by Monday or Tuesday. Lots of time before the reception on Wednesday.”

“I hate to let things get away from me, Vanessa. The world around us is fragmenting in every direction. I can’t do much about that. But I can try to keep a few things in order.”

“Don’t be a fusspot, Raymond. I won’t lose them. When did I ever let you down?”

“Vanessa, a man isn’t safe in your hands. All right, keep three copies. I’ll take one along with me. But you keep the others under lock and key.”

“I’ll put them in my new safe. I just got it this morning.” Vanessa shot Ted Thornhill a look that coloured the flesh over his cheekbones. He cleared his throat and didn’t meet Vanessa’s eyes.

“I don’t blame you for worrying, Raymond. I’ll personally see to it that nothing happens to them. But remember this: it’s not every day that NTC commits so much of its resources to one big project. We’re in this together. There’ll be glory enough for all.” Raymond thought that this was the cue for an informal embrace, which caught Vanessa off guard. She entered into the momentary entanglement in a lively spirit, then extracted herself without a hair mussed.

I missed the moment of Ted Thornhill’s departure. It must have been right after the photographer, who’d changed films at least half a dozen times. Thornhill had that rare skill of being able to retreat silently without taking away the feeling of his presence in a room. He and Raymond both made you feel as though you’d just witnessed the signing of a major peace accord.

“Now, tell me,” Raymond said, his voice in another register, and following Vanessa to a free couch, “how are you making out since this horrible murder? Are you all right? Are the police giving you the protection you need?”

“I’m fine, really I am. If I can only escape north again for a long weekend, I’ll be completely recovered.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that. No, no, no. I should think that you’d be more vulnerable at the lake than here. Have they let you go back to the house yet?”

“I don’t want to go back just yet, Raymond. I’ll go when I’m ready. It’s not for the police to decide. They’ve finished taking the place apart, I’m told. But I’m not up to putting it back together again.”

“It’s a Humpty Dumpty situation,” I volunteered.

“What?” said Raymond Devlin, examining my face as though it were turning purple. He seemed to be not so much at sea in Mother Goose as he was surprised that I had uttered at all. “What?” He looked at Vanessa with a quizzical expression. For a moment I thought that my remark might have made it necessary to sign the contracts all over again. But it was only my own craziness. He soon packed up his briefcase, watched over by Roger Cavanaugh, and began shaking hands with the remaining principal signers. The witnesses got a half-smile just before he turned and walked briskly to the elevator. Harry Parlow’s exit was less dramatic and took place not two minutes later. His expression showed a picture of the back room he was returning to.

I sat there for a few minutes, watching the rooftops below me. Time and place had been distorted by this meeting. It made me jumpy. Vanessa went from her valedictory posture near the entrance directly to Sally.

“Damn it, Sally! How was he able to get up here without my knowing it? Isn’t that why we have security? I want you to find out who’s responsible for the slip-up. I mean it. I want to see the name. Do you hear?” Sally immediately picked up the telephone.

“Commander Dunkery, please,” and waited.

“I hate surprises, Benny,” Vanessa said, checking the polish on her fingernails. “I didn’t want Raymond Devlin walking in on me unprepared. I’m lucky it went as well as it did. But I should have been warned.”

Soon Sally was explaining what had happened to the security chief. Meanwhile, Vanessa used the time to return telephone calls that were waiting for her on top of her desk. From the blur of blue message slips, she selected three, dumping the rest into the recycling bin. I tried to follow what she was talking about and make a note of the name of the caller. She used a slightly different voice with each call: Vanessa the repentant procrastinator, Vanessa the wheedler, Vanessa the straight-talking manager, Vanessa of the walking wounded, carrying on under difficulties and against doctor’s orders, Vanessa the neophyte seeking professional help. When I couldn’t take any more, I mimed my departure from the door, and she acknowledged it with a wave of coiled telephone cord.

Outside, there was Sally. Sally who wouldn’t be my pal. Sally who had to be watched. Sally whose loyalty lay outside this office. I wasn’t up to asking her for favours just then, so I skirted her desk heading for the burgundy elevator and the outside world.

Much later, in the dying minutes of rush hour, Sykes and Boyd were sitting opposite me in a Second Cup coffee place across the street from 52 Division on Dundas Street. The kid behind the counter, the one with the metal rings in his ear and nose, knew the cops when we came in, and gave me a look that tried to guess whether I was a suspect in a bank hold-up or a serial killer about to be brought to book. Boyd was still taciturn, Sykes still suspicious. I warmed my hands on the coffee mug and pulled at a Danish pastry contributed by Boyd. In the back of my mind, I was reviewing my last meeting with the official police team. I wondered whether this conversation would lead to another awkward confrontation with my client.

“Have you been talking to those people over in TVland?” Sykes asked, licking his fingers and shaking his head to tell me that he had been as bewildered by them as I had. “I don’t know how they get off being so full of themselves. It was like every one of them imagined he was being photographed and recorded all the time. Like they were being chased around by a film crew. Like they lived under a follow spotlight. I can’t believe it.”

“What do you honestly think of Ms. Moss’s theory that someone is trying to murder her?” I looked at Boyd, challenging him to offer a theory, a word, a grunt.

“Like in that movie? Dana Andrews and Jennifer Jones-”

“Not Jennifer Jones!” Sykes said with more passion than I’d expected. “It was what’s-her-name: Gene Tierney!”

“I think it’s what it sounds like: right out of Hollywood,” Boyd said, proving that the gift of speech was his when he wanted to use it.

“I don’t like the bounce on it,” said his partner.

“But, as you said, we are dealing with professionals at make-believe. To them there’s not much difference between a real villain and reruns of Law and Order . You know what I mean?”

“Yeah. I know.”

“What’s your stake in all this, Mr. Cooperman? Tell me again so I’ll get used to the idea.”

“I was hired to guard Vanessa Moss. Whoever it is out there probably has more shells for that shotgun. If it was a mistake the first time, he may try again.”