Howard Engel - The Cooperman Variation

“I knew him first years ago. He did some legal work for me out of his tiny office off Bay Street. Not too far from where he is today. But that first place was more of a shoebox than an office. Of course, I’ve had to work close to him since the Plevna Foundation was set up. The Dermot Keogh Hall deal has taken a lifetime of work, Benny, not all from me. There are a lot of people working on it.”

“Do you like him? Do you trust him?”

“He needs a lot of looking after.”

“I know; you told me about that. What else?”

“He’s a good lawyer; he’s thorough, dependable. Solid from a business standpoint.”

“You don’t like him?”

“I don’t dislike him. I have no reason to dislike him. I know, I know. Okay, let’s stick to facts. I have nothing against him but a feeling. Can you deal with a feeling?”

“It’s a start. Did you ever visit him in Muskoka?”

“He tried to lure me to his cottage one weekend, but he did that to everybody. Everybody of child-bearing years, that is. Sally narrowly escaped. I ran into him once when I was visiting a publisher on Lake Muskoka. I gather that he enjoyed upsetting some of the old Muskoka traditions: taste, decorum, manners, things like that.” Vanessa had taken my hand in hers. There was no suggestion of intimacy or romance. No, it was just a curious object that was handy, and she thought she wanted a closer look. It didn’t hold her interest long after I pressed her for more information.

“I do remember hearing that Dermot threw Devlin out one time. I forget what it was about, but he was banned from Dermot’s cottage, forbidden the use of his boats. You know, cut off at the ankles. And Dermot wasn’t hard to get along with.”

“Well, that’s something. Who would be your source on that?”

“Probably Philip Rankin. He’d be good on Dermot too, of course.”

“It’s your bacon I’m trying to keep from frying, Vanessa. It’s too late for Dermot. Although, from what I’ve heard, I would like to have met him.”

“If you like walking tightropes. He was quirky, Benny. For instance, he couldn’t abide sharp objects: sharp pencils, knitting needles, knives. He’d go crazy if he saw a blade of any kind. You can imagine what it was like trying to edit audio tape around him in the old days. It was all done with razor blades. He would never allow anything sharp in that place of his on Clarence Square. Blades were just one thing. There were lots of them. You could never tell when you were crossing him until he was so peeved at you, you were done for.”

“Was he peeved with Renata?”

“Renata Sartori? No! Of course not. He was in love with her. She was with him when he was drowned. She was in the boat, helping Foley manage the rafts and equipment.”

“Does the name Bowmaker ring any bells with you?”

“That’s what he used to call Renata: his little bowmaker. I never understood why.”

“It doesn’t have to mean anything. It’s enough to know that it means Renata. Who saw him up in Muskoka last year?”

“From around here?” I nodded. “Ken Trebitsch, I guess. Ken is addicted to power and money. Dermot had both. I don’t think Dermot liked him much, but he was fascinated by Ken’s hunger for making it. Ken’s a simple sort, really. Deadly, but uncomplicated. I think Dermot wondered how someone like that could climb so high. He didn’t come around often enough to see that there are hundreds just like him.”

“Did you go to the service for Alma Orchard?”

“Alma? How do you know about … Oh! From Ed Patel. You do get around, don’t you, Benny? Yes, I was there. The place was thronged. When I’m depressed, I think they were morbidly curious, but usually I remember that she had lots of friends. I hope I have that many when it’s my turn to go. Do you think of dying, Benny?”

“Only when I’m a passenger. I don’t think about the things I don’t think about.” We finished up our drinks, had another round and went out into the unair-conditioned world below. Vanessa was hungry, so we took a taxi to the Montreal Bistro where she had another Scotch and some roasted eggplant. I didn’t choose very well. I had a salad with goat cheese on top. It looked like an albino hockey puck.

The bistro was located in an old building on Sherbourne Street. The brick walls inside were supported by huge foot-thick wooden beams. Music was supplied by a quartet of jazzmen from Cuba. The piano player, Hilario Duran, was great; a blend, as Vanessa whispered to me, of Art Tatum and Rachmaninov. As soon as we were seated, the waiter reminded us that while the musicians were playing, there was a no-talking policy in place. Even whispering was frowned upon. No wonder Vanessa chose this place. If sitting with Vanessa hadn’t so many other redeeming features, I could have become peeved with this woman.

Wednesday

I was up not long after the sun, also after a night of diving a sunken wreck in cold waters, to a day that looked like it was going to be a burner. This spring was turning into midsummer without a murmur from the weatherman or the man on the street. Most of my stay in Toronto had been in air-conditioned comfort. I’d been spoiled. My few excursions outside had been brief exposures to the frying elements. I try to keep track of my blessings when I remember.

After showering and getting dressed, I looked fairly presentable in the mirror over the bathroom sink, while I did my duty by my whiskers and teeth. My trousers had won back an echo of a crease under my mattress overnight. The shirt I was wearing represented the last of the clean clothes I’d brought from Grantham. If this case lingered on much longer, I was going to have to do some shopping, my least favourite activity. In returning my wallet, pen and handkerchief to my pockets, I came across the name and phone number of Vanessa’s sister out west. I called the number and left a message on her machine about where to find me.

Outside the front door, the heat I’d guessed at through my window made good on its threats. I found Chuck Pepper at a table at the back of the Open Kitchen just a few doors north of my hotel. He was dressed for the heat in a short-sleeved shirt and a tan hat with a wide brim. It sat at the edge of the table on top of a newspaper.

“Good morning!” he said, shaking hands rather formally. I could see he had already finished at least one cup of coffee. Soon we both had cups in front of us. It was fresh and only slightly bitter when I tasted it.

“What luck did you have with the lock?” Chuck grinned and shook his head.

“I wasn’t able to fool Jack and Jim,” he said. “They knew what I was on about.”

“So you took a ribbing on my behalf. I’ll owe you for that. But did you get the numbers?”

“In the end Jim gave them to me.” Here he reached into his breast pocket and brought out a slip of pink paper.

“Just a minute!” I said, reaching into my own back pocket and retrieving from my wallet my own slip of paper. “I don’t know how to organize this, but let me try.” I flagged down a waiter, who came to the table at once. I told him that I wanted him to watch and listen to what happened next. He looked puzzled, but folded his arms and nodded to show that the entertainment could begin. “Chuck, give your paper to the waiter.” Pepper did so. I handed Chuck the paper I’d taken from my wallet. Chuck’s eyebrows shot up. “Read the numbers on your paper,” I said to the waiter. He did so, while Chuck’s eyes followed an invisible bouncing ball on the paper he held.

“Right 2 turns to 25, left 1 turn to 11, right to 39.”

“It’s the same combination!” Chuck said. The waiter leaned in to see the paper Chuck was holding. He nodded agreement. Later, I got the waiter’s name, in case any of this should end up in a courtroom.