Richard Patterson - The Lasko Tangent

He stared at the table. “There wasn’t enough in me. You know, I knew that I was a born lackey.” The voice had gone starkly bitter. “In college I was the class clown.” Gubner smiled faintly in rueful recollection. “Between then and now I must have kissed enough ass to fill a stadium. The one time I tried to get out from under myself is when I started my own business. I was going to be a boss. But I wasn’t cut out for being a boss. I kept looking for someone to please, for someone to tell me what to do. Or what to be.” He paused, then pronounced judgment on himself in a final tone. “And that’s the bottom line on me, Mr. Paget. I’m someone else’s boy.”

And now he was my boy. The thought must have shown in my face. “What do they call you, Mr. Paget?”

“Chris.”

“Tell me, Chris, have you ever wanted to please someone else, even when you thought it was wrong?”

“More often than I’d like.”

“What keeps you from doing it?”

I thought. “I honestly don’t know, Mr. Lehman. I guess I’m afraid to.”

Lehman nodded; he knew what I meant. For a moment, we were almost friends. But he was a witness, and I needed to use him. I decided to put a cap on self-analysis. “Let’s just say that I understand what you’ve told me.”

But Lehman was looking beyond me at some middle distance. The bar reverberated with the echo of a long-ago psychic explosion, of which the current Lehman was the remains, a crazy quilt of roles with no stuffing. The act of contrition was the only thing which was making Lehman real to himself. But I was going to have to push it to the end.

“Let’s talk about what you’ve got for me,” I said.

Lehman snapped to as if wrenched out of hypnosis. “I don’t know about any manipulation. But I’ve got proof of something different. A lot worse.” Whatever it was lent an awed tone to his words. “I’ve got a memo at home that will deliver the whole thing.” He looked around. “But we can’t talk about it here.”

I felt impatient. “Look, you’ve got to tell me sometime.”

Lehman’s voice was thick with knowledge. “Mr. Paget, you don’t want to talk about this here either. I know I’m doing a mental striptease. But I didn’t want to sit in a government office, like a criminal. You’ve been very decent. Come to my place after dinner tonight, and I’ll show you what I’ve got. You can handle it the way you think best.” His voice slowed to a low, emphatic rhythm. “And you are going to want to think about it.”

It was a strange scene and sad. The man had wanted to see me-be friends-before he put his future in my hands. But I couldn’t give him that. “You know, Mr. Lehman, I can question you, under oath, any time. And have you sent up for perjury if you lie.”

Gubner cut in sharply. “He knows that.” I looked from Gubner to Lehman. He nodded.

“All right, Mr. Lehman, 7:30 tonight. And I hope it’s good.”

Lehman stood up, smiling in a lifeless way which made my words sound foolish. “It’s better than you imagine. Or from my perspective, worse.” He paused. “You should remember, Mr. Paget, that Lasko is a very ruthless man.”

He should know, I thought. But Lehman seemed like a weak reed for Lasko to be trusting. “One thing bothers me. Just why does Lasko trust you with whatever this is?”

The bleak smile held. “Because I’m his controller,” he said with irony. “Besides, he’s got me by the balls.”

I could see that. “Then why are you here?”

He exhaled, staring at his feet. Then he looked directly at me. “Because this is my last chance to like myself.”

I nodded. He turned to Gubner. The two friends looked at each other for a moment. Gubner wore the rueful half-smile. Lehman saw it and reached out with one hand to touch Gubner’s arm. Then he turned and walked from the bar. Gubner stared after him, as if regret had turned him to stone.

I let him stare for a moment, then spoke. “Marty, I’ll buy you a martini. They’re good here, and you could use one.”

Gubner turned, then sat down heavily. I ordered two martinis, straight up. They arrived in record time. I pushed one toward Gubner and picked up mine. I felt pretty good, sort of. But not perfect. Lehman appeared in the window, walking with the comic stagger of a penguin. He looked as if he had been shot, but didn’t know he was dead. Which he was, in a way. I sipped on the martini and watched my new star witness walk across the street.

I saw the black car before I knew what it meant. It seemed to have pulled out from the sidewalk. Lehman was crossing Arlington, not looking. From the bar, I saw the car accelerating silently toward him. I half-rose, a strangled yell in my throat which tasted like gin.

Then Lehman saw the car. He stood stock still for a split second, as if he had expected it. Then he gave a pathetic little skip, stretching forward to the sidewalk. The car smashed into Lehman in mid-stretch, his hands reaching toward the Garden. I saw him flying above the car in slow motion, arms flailing like a spastic rag doll. He seemed to snap in mid-air as the black car moved by. Then he fell in a precipitous dive, hit on his head, and folded into a shapeless heap. The heap didn’t move.

Gubner’s mouth was hanging open. I ran from the table, shouting for an ambulance. I smashed into someone in the entrance of the bar and bounced him off the wall. I kept moving. Lehman lay where he had fallen, alone. A few pedestrians stared at him from the sidewalk. A sticky splotch of blood spread like oil from his head. I reached him and felt for his pulse. Nothing. Then I looked at his face. It was a garish nightmare. But out of it stared one pale blue eye. It still looked sad.

Gubner was squatting next to me, chanting “Oh, my God” over and over, like an incantation. I got up, feeling sick. A lump of passers-by were gawking at me. I went for the nearest one, a thin middle-aged man, and grabbed him by the lapels. “Be useful, you moron. Go to the Ritz and make sure the cops come.” The voice I heard was very clear and very cold. It was mine. The man nodded soundlessly, gaping at my bloody hands. I stared at him for a second, then dropped him from my grasp. He clambered off to the Ritz. I watched him to the door. Then I went to the iron fence, grabbed it, and threw up.

After a moment I stood, staring at the swans and the flowers in the Garden. Then I turned back to the street. Gubner was still stooped by Lehman’s body, standing guard. The squad cars arrived in a squeal of sirens, with an ambulance. Three policemen got out and squatted around Lehman. A white-coated man probed him with his fingers. Then he and another man lay Lehman on a stretcher and bore him to the ambulance. The ambulance moved away. No sirens and no hurry.

Gubner and the cops drifted to the sidewalk. It all had a strange, dreamlike quality, as if I were stoned, watching a movie. The street was eerily empty, like a stage without props or actors. The only trace of Lehman was the splotch of blood.

I liked being alone. But I forced myself to cross the street. A crowd had gathered. One of the cops was asking questions, a big sharp-eyed man with dark sideburns and mustache and a low voice. He turned to me. I pulled myself together, and told him who we were. What had I seen, he asked. It was a Cadillac, I thought, late model. I hadn’t seen the hit-skip driver. Or the license plate. I guessed the car was going thirty-five, forty, and accelerating fast.

He was watching me closely. “Anything else?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I think he was murdered.”

The cop’s eyes narrowed. He turned and barked something to another cop. Then they trundled Gubner and me into the back of a squad car. A crew-cut cop drove while the sharp-eyed one asked some more questions. We didn’t speak unless spoken to. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had stumbled into a surrealistic film. Gubner leaned against the corner of the car, white and waxen. We had stepped outside of our profession. And Lehman was dead.