Steve Martini - The Arraignment

“What’s important is to understand that this is a threshold legal issue, the question of who is to be paid under the insurance policy.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean the way it’s structured, the insurance company has to pay somebody. They don’t particularly care who it is, just as long as they’re out from under when it’s all over.”

“And?”

“There may be a way for both of you to win.”

“What was your name again?”

“Paul Madriani.” I reach into the breast pocket of my suit coat, find the small stash of business cards, pull one out, and hand it to her.

“Let me tell you, Mr. Madriani, so that you understand. I will take two million dollars and not a dime less,” she says. “You can go back to your client, that harlot, home wrecker,” she says, “and tell her that as far as I’m concerned she can go to hell. Fuck her, fuck you, and fuck the horse you rode in on. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have things I have to take care of.” She gets up out of the chair.

“I have one question,” I say.

“What’s that?”

“Do you mean it when you say you’ll only release your claim to the insurance policy in return for two million dollars?”

She looks at me through mean little slits, the anger of a lifetime welled up in her eyes, bitterness and betrayal. “You can bet your life on it,” she says.

This morning Dana is wearing a pair of silk pajamas, black and slinky, bare-footed, sitting up straight on the edge of a wingback chair in her living room, one leg curled under her, trying to explain how she found Nick’s copy of the insurance policy but forgot to call and tell me.

“I swear to you, Mr. Madriani. I got busy. It slipped my mind.”

“Call me Paul,” I tell her.

“All right. Paul. I found it after we talked. It was up in his safe, in the study.” Dana looks at me over a haggard smile, desperate to be believed, innocent, beseeching, sitting next to the fireplace.

“You do believe me?” She flashes her long lashes in my direction. The body language is good, the shiver in her voice authentic, so if I didn’t know her better, I might even buy this. She sent me on a goose chase to the law firm to get a copy of the policy when she already knew what was in it.

“Please believe me,” she says.

I stop looking at her. Instead, seated on the couch, I turn my attention to one of those kinetic toys that Nick had strewn around his office. This one is on the coffee table, the kind with five shiny steel spheres on strings, clicking against one another as they transfer energy through a cycle. I let her listen to this for a second or two before I ask: “How did you get the safe open?”

“I found the combination.”

“Where was it?”

“It was in one of the drawers. In Nick’s desk upstairs.”

“Maybe we should look and see what else is inside the safe. There could be other important documents.” I start to get up off the couch.

“No. That’s not necessary,” she says. “I’ve checked everything that was there. There’s nothing else.”

I look at her. She refuses to return my gaze. “You know, you’re pretty good. You’re not the best, but then you haven’t had a lot of practice. At least I hope you haven’t.”

“Practice at what?”

“Lying.”

“What do you mean?”

“You expect me to believe that Nick would go to all the trouble of locking his private papers in a safe and then leave the combination in his desk drawer where any after-school roustabout teen who broke into his house could find it? Maybe you were married to a different Nick Rush than the one I knew.” I start to get up off the couch like I am going to leave.

“All right.” Now the pleading tone is gone from her voice, replaced by an edge. Her posture sags in the chair, as she looks down, smoothing the soft wrinkles from the silk fabric on one thigh. “Fine. I had the insurance policy all the time.” Then in a softer, weaker voice, the kind she uses for feminine persuasion, she says, looking up at me, “But I didn’t know what to do. I saw her name on it and I panicked. I was desperate, broke. I had no one to turn to. You do understand? You don’t know what it’s like not having someone… Well you know. Someone to rely on.”

“Someone like Nick?” I say.

“Well, yes. He handled everything. Our finances, taxes, the investments. I had no idea. I thought we were secure. I don’t know anything about that stuff.”

“Then how do you know you’re broke?”

She takes a deep breath, sighs, looks away from me at a blank wall. “I, I had Nathan look at our finances. After Nick died.”

“Fittipaldi?”

She nods.

“It’s good to know you weren’t entirely alone,” I tell her.

She doesn’t appreciate the sarcasm. “I had to turn to someone. What did you expect me to do?”

“Why didn’t you turn over the insurance policy to Mr. Fittipaldi?”

“We talked about it. He didn’t know what to do either.”

“Ahh-uhh.”

“I figured you were a friend of Nick’s. I thought… I thought that since you’d known Nick before we were married, that perhaps…”

“You thought I’d go over to the firm, find out that your name wasn’t on the policy, that I might feel sorry for you, and that maybe I would go over and talk to Margaret Rush, is that it?”

“Well.” First she looks at the ceiling, then back to me, batting her lashes a little. “Yes. I thought you might know her. That maybe you were a friend.”

“You thought I might be able to intercede, is that it?”

“Was I wrong?” she says.

“No. Maybe a little naive,” I tell her, “but that was more than made up for by your seamless manipulation of the situation. I mean it was worth a try, friends being friends and all.”

“Yes. I thought she might listen to you.”

I laugh and click the little steel balls on the table one more time. “Actually I’ve only met her once. But even if we were bosom buddies, you’d have to think very highly of friendship to believe that Maggie Rush or anybody else would give up a claim on two million bucks based on that.”

“So she refused?”

“In words that I wouldn’t want to repeat in polite company,” I tell her.

Dana is up out of the chair, turns her back to me, the nails of one hand to her mouth as if she’s going to bite them to the quick. I gaze at her reflection in the mirror over the fireplace. She stands there, nibbling, pupils searching an invisible horizon as she contemplates her next move.

Suddenly she turns, looks at me, and says: “What do we do now?”

Before I can say anything, she’s sitting on the couch next to me, pushing the kinetic toy out of reach so that she has my undivided attention. Silk rubbing against the worsted wool of suit pants.

“I suppose you should call Nathan and give him the news,” I tell her. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. Probably go back to the office and get some work done.”

“You know what I mean,” she says. She reaches over and takes my left hand in both of hers. “You will help me, won’t you? You talked to the woman. You know how she feels toward me. She hates me. You know that Nick didn’t intend to leave her all that money. They were divorced.”

“That’s true.” I start to get up off the couch.

“You’re not going?” she says. “Please don’t go. You’re the only one who can help me. You talked to the firm. You know they treated Nick unfairly. You would think they would want to help now.”

“I talked to Adam Tolt.”

“And?”

“It seems he’d rather not get involved. As far as he’s concerned, it’s between you and the insurance company.”