Steve Martini: Shadow of Power

Aubrey was left speechless in the doorway.

Scarborough thought for a second. “No, on second thought, tell them that I’ll go public. I will accuse them of being in lockstep with the White House and involved in a racial cover-up. That’s much faster, and it doesn’t involve all those nasty little pieces of paper that seem to fly around courtrooms.”

The thought of the publisher’s Manhattan office illuminated by burned-out cars and flaming trash cans flashed through Aubrey’s brain like a strike of lightning.

Scarborough turned back to his suitcase looking for a pair of socks. “They have a number-one New York Times bestseller, rocketed there out of the box, and they want to end the publicity tour.” He found the socks and tossed them on the bed.

“Not end. They didn’t say end,” said Aubrey.

“They don’t have to. I can read between the lines. Go away. Don’t call us, we’ll call you. The check’s in the mail.” Scarborough was working up a head of steam. “Listen,” he said, “I want you to give them a message. Tell ’em it’s from me. Tell them that they didn’t put this book on the list. The media put it there. Twenty million angry African Americans put it there. So if they think they’re gonna plant their tail between their legs, drop the book, and run, they’re wrong. Why? Because black people finally woke up and realized that the words that kept them in chains for two hundred years are still in black and white, right there in the Constitution for the world to read. Well, it isn’t gonna happen. Your people are not going to cap the book. Not this book.”

“Nobody is talking about capping the book,” said Aubrey.

“Good. Then we can move on with the tour and pretend that this conversation never took place.”

“I…I don’t know,” said Aubrey. “I’ll have to call them.”

“You do that. And you give them my message. Word for word. You understand?” Scarborough turned and fixed him with a glare. “Now I need to get some rest. Dick can show you to the door. Unless you want to use the phone out in the living room to make the call?”

“No. No. I’ll call them on my cell.” Aubrey wanted to do it from outside the room, as far away from Scarborough as he could get, so that the author couldn’t hear the screaming from the other end in New York. Aubrey felt very much like what he was at this point, the man in the middle.

“Dick. I need you to go, too,” said Scarborough. “I need to be alone for a while, to get some rest, have a light meal in the room, and then I need to relax and pull my thoughts together for tonight.”

The agent took the hint, put his arm around Aubrey’s shoulder, and headed for the door. A few seconds later, Scarborough heard it close behind them. Between the hall and the lobby, in the elevator, Bonguard would be busy pumping concrete up the editor’s spine and giving him advice on how to deal with his boss, the CEO and publisher back in New York.

Scarborough finished up in the bathroom, picked up the newspaper, and went out into the living room. He called room service and ordered breakfast-two eggs scrambled, toast unbuttered, a small cup of mixed fruit, and black coffee. He could never wake up entirely until he’d had his coffee.

Then he unzipped a large leather portfolio that he always carried with him wherever he went. It contained background materials for Leno and another document of several pages folded in thirds. He took this out and looked at it, made a few mental notes to follow up on later, and placed the portfolio and the folded pages on a small table near the television. The limo taking Scarborough to L.A. for the late-afternoon taping would arrive shortly after noon.

He took the other papers and settled into one of the large club chairs opposite the big television screen and started reading about the details from last night’s mini-riot. When he finished, he turned to his notes.

He had briefing notes from two talent agents in New York and L.A., people with celebrity clients who’d made recent appearances on Leno, filled with information on everything from what to expect in the green-room to how to sit, and where, on the couch. Ten minutes passed, and there was a knock at the door. Breakfast was here. He was in the middle of a backgrounder on Leno. First rule in any game: Know who you’re playing.

Still reading, paper in one hand, he got out of the chair and headed for the door. Without taking his eyes off the words on the page, in one smooth movement he reached for the knob, pulled the door open, turned back toward his chair, and said, “Come on in. Put it on the table. Leave the check, and I’ll sign it later.” In less than four seconds, he was back in the deep slouch, surrounded by the crushed-leather pillows of the club chair. His eyes continued to devour the words on the page.

A slight breeze from out in the hall fanned the small hairs at the back of his neck from the open door behind him. There was an instant glimpse, a reflection of movement in the dark screen of the television. Before he could turn his head, a bright flash pulsed through his brain, jagged and vivid as fireworks. The roiling pain from his torn scalp and punctured skull registered but for a brief instant as he bridged the gulf between consciousness and the lightless pit of eternity.

I open the envelope and start to paw through the photographs, the stuff sent to me in response to our discovery motion two weeks earlier. There are color glossies of the murder weapon, a common claw hammer with a fiberglass handle covered by a molded-rubber hand grip. In the photo it is lying on a tiled surface in a pool of blood. A small ruler lies on the tile next to the hammer for scale.

The next picture is a close-up of the claws themselves. A patch of bloody skin trailing several wisps of dark hair clings to the edge of one of the claws. The police photographer must have shot with a macro lens to get all the detail. No doubt they will want to use this one in front of the jury.

The next photo shows an elongated skid mark, apparently made by a shoe that slid in the blood and left a red comma coming to an end at the wall. The skid mark arcs out of the picture, making clear that its owner must have gone down when he hit the blood.

The fourth photo is a particular problem for us. I show it to Harry, who is seated next to me at the small metal table in the jail.

Harry Hinds and I have been law partners, “Madriani & Hinds,” since our days back in Capital City years ago. We handle many kinds of cases, but predominantly we do criminal defense. Harry is more than a partner. For years he has been like an uncle to my daughter, Sarah, who is now away at college. I am widowed. My wife, Nikki, has been dead for almost fifteen years. To look at him, Harry hasn’t seemed to have aged a day in the twenty years I’ve known him. He takes the evidence photo in his hand and looks at it closely.

It shows a palm print in blood and three very distinct fingerprints: the first, second, and third fingers of the right hand superimposed in rusted red on the clear white tile of the entry hall’s floor.

“And they’re a match?” he asks.

“According to the cops,” I tell him.

“How did this happen?” says Harry. “How did you get your fingerprints not only in the blood on the floor but on the murder weapon itself?” This, Harry puts to the young man sitting on the other side of the table across from us.

Carl Arnsberg is twenty-three. He has a light criminal record-one conviction for assault and battery, another for refusing to comply with the lawful orders of a police officer and obstruction of justice during a demonstration in L.A. two years ago.

He looks at Harry from under straight locks of dark hair parted on the left. The way it is combed and cut, long, it covers one eye. He snaps his head back and flips the hair out of his face, revealing high cheekbones and a kind of permanent pout. Then he rests his chin on the palm of his left hand, elbow on the table holding it up.