T. Bunn - Winner Take All

“Yes, your honor.”

“Tomorrow.”

“First thing, your honor.”

“I am hereby charging Erin Brandt with felonious contempt.” Her upraised hand halted Caisse before he could begin. “Be careful, else I include you. A warrant will be issued for her arrest. If she cares to change her mind and appear before this court, without delay , I will consider rescinding this order.”

Judge Sears rose from her desk, marched to her door, plucked it open, then turned back to add, “These walls are awful bare, Marcus. Even so, I’d hate to nail your hide up there for decoration. Are we clear on this point?”

Marcus ushered Dale Steadman from the judge’s chambers. Hamper shoved his way between them, rudely impatient to move on to the next fray. Dale gave no sign he even felt the lawyer’s passage. He had not spoken at all since his ex-wife had appeared on the screen.

Omar Dell moved up to Marcus’ other side. “I need to have a minute, counselor.”

To his other side, Dale remained in lockdown mode. Marcus said, “Now is not the time.”

“Sorry. Deadlines say otherwise.”

“I am telling you to back off.”

“Easy now. I just want to pass on something.” He stepped in closer. “The lead you gave me. Sephus Jones. He’s vanished into thin air.”

“When?”

“The quarry boss claims it was the very same morning you and Hamper had the set-to in this hallway.”

Marcus tried to make room in his mental jumble. He tracked Hamper’s progress down the hallway, and said to no one in particular, “I get the impression that man is working on something more than our declared agenda.”

“Hamper Caisse is just another courtroom junkie. Whoever heard of any junkie with a conscience?”

But there was more at work here. Marcus was certain of that. He was fighting a case to retrieve a missing baby girl. If Caisse was involved with Sephus Jones and the bogus New Horizons check, he had another agenda entirely. Even so, the day’s events and Kirsten’s absence bore down like a ton of stones loaded onto his chest. It was hard to draw a decent breath, much less come up with a solution.

When Omar saw he was gaining nothing more from Marcus, he said, “I need to ask your client something that you’ve got to hear.”

Dale Steadman showed only blind resignation. Even the courthouse reporter used the soft tread of one approaching the recently bereaved. “Mr. Steadman, I’m sorry to bother you, sir.”

Dale blinked slowly, drawing himself into the here and now. “You want to ask about my being fired.”

Once again, the day proved remarkably adept at blindsiding Marcus. “Say what?”

“They canned me this morning.”

“I got the skinny from an inside contact,” Omar confirmed. “New Horizons is issuing a statement this afternoon. They claim they have no choice but to terminate Mr. Steadman’s position as chairman.”

“This was inevitable,” Dale replied.

“I’ll tell you what it is,” Marcus fumed. “It’s typical.”

“The New Horizons spokesperson repeated the recent character assault brought out in court. Seemed positively delighted to do so. Didn’t show a bit of interest in the testimony that ran counter to Hamper Caisse’s witnesses. She claimed they simply can’t afford more adverse publicity.”

When Dale resumed his blank inspection of the distance, Marcus said, “That’s nothing more than a perfect excuse. My guess is, they’ve already started rolling back Dale’s changes. The increased wages tied to higher productivity, the new doctors and factory clinics, the child care centers, they’ll be gone before you know it.”

Omar flipped to a blank page in his notebook. “Can I quote you?”

“Be my guest. New Horizons will return to their same old tactics. Only now they’ll trumpet how these new ideas brought them nothing but more bad news.”

“Do you think they’re behind this little girl’s abduction?”

“You know I can’t answer that.”

“Mr. Steadman, do you have any-”

“Don’t respond, Dale.” Marcus resisted the urge to shove the reporter aside. “We’re leaving now.”

When Marcus did not pick up his phone, Kirsten listened to the answering machine’s message, waited through three tight breaths, then hung up and dialed Dale Steadman. He answered before the first ring was halfway finished. “Mr. Steadman, this is Kirsten Stansted.”

“Where are you?”

“Düsseldorf.”

“Have you seen Erin?”

“Not since my arrival. But she’s here.”

“I watched the video of you serving her with the court papers.”

It had not even occurred to her that he might be present. “I’m very sorry about that.”

“Don’t be. The judge watched it too. It made all the difference, believe me.”

“I needed to check with you about a couple of things, please.”

“Sure. Do you like opera?”

“What I’ve heard, which isn’t a lot.”

“I always figured myself for a bluegrass sort of guy. The year after I busted my shoulder, I was doing rehab at a sports clinic outside Boston. My trainer and her husband were real opera fanatics. I got tickets to the Met and flew us down for the weekend. Figured if she could put up with me groaning and sweating on the table for six hours a day, I could sit through three hours of people hollering words I couldn’t understand.”

She refused to offer what he wanted, which was an invitation to delve further into reminiscences and regret. “The reason I’m calling, I’m facing some unexpected expenses here in Germany.”

“Spend whatever it takes.”

“I can fax you an itemized breakdown.”

“Don’t bother. I’ll be a moving target for a while. I actually thought your call was going to be the New Horizons board rep telling me I’ve been canned.”

She didn’t want the man’s trust. Nor did she want to feel more sympathy and shared sorrow than she already did. But the emotions welled up unbidden. “I’m so sorry.”

“The way I see it, they knew about my drinking and they made it their business to find out about my marital problems.”

“You’re saying that was why you were hired?”

“They wanted somebody they could yank up the flagpole, wave in front of the press, and say, Look at what we’re doing. We’ve hired ourselves a reformer. But when I started putting into place things they didn’t like, they could cut the rope and say it was on account of my personal difficulties. I was a patsy from the get-go.”

“Could you please fax me an authorization to give the detectives a retainer?”

“No problem.” He made note of the number, then added, “Marcus is lucky to have you.”

That was definitely a course she had no intention of taking. “I was wondering if you could also fax me a photograph of Celeste.”

“I suppose so.”

“I’d like to have something to show around.”

“Give me five minutes.” A pause, then, “This is hard on you too, isn’t it.”

“A large black and white picture would probably come through more clearly,” she replied, then hung up the phone. Kirsten sat on the edge of the bed, staring at her hands. She glanced at her watch, rose, reached for her purse, headed for the door.

Downstairs she waited as the fax pulsed through the machine. The receptionist took one look and beamed back at the smiling baby. “What a lovely child! Is she yours?”

Kirsten accepted the fax and headed out the door. “For the moment.”

It was the hour before sunset as the taxi drove Kirsten through a middle-class residential quarter. Neat apartment blocks stood tightly abreast. Trees and a meager strip of green formed a rivulet down either side of the central trolley tracks. The buildings were of a regimental order, all six or seven stories, all freshly painted, all double-glazed and politely ornamented. They broke ranks only to permit in the side streets and more battalions of close-ranked buildings. When a trolley rattled down the street, the residential cavern trapped the sound and kept it there forever.