William Lashner - Past Due

“Oh God,” he said, remembering, perhaps, his prayer as he lies awake through the night with her, staying awake to savor it all, desperate not to lose a second. He had never been a religious man, my father, he always claimed he left the mumbo jumbo to his own pious father, a cobbler who spent his life pounding on the last or praying at the neighborhood shul, but here, now, in this room, this bed, with his true love sleeping on his chest, he prays. My father prays that this night, this perfect night of true and unyielding love, will never end. My father prays that he and this girl, this angel asleep on his chest, will be together, forever.

“Oh God.”

My father lay on his hospital bed, alone except for the son who never forgave him for being what he had become, lay with his eyes closed remembering, I was certain, remembering his prayer and the night God failed him for the final time.

WHEN I WASa kid, we used to head out to the creek by the railroad tracks, catch crawfish, stick them in a cup, prod and poke them for no better reason than to satisfy our sad, sadistic impulses. That’s sort of the idea behind a legal deposition.

“I understand, Mr. Manley,” I said, “that you own a partial interest in a strip club on Columbus Boulevard called the Eager Beaver.”

Derek Manley sucked his teeth. “Just a small piece.”

Derek Manley was quite a big man to own only a small piece. Tall and thick and looking like he had swallowed a basketball, he leaned heavily onto the oaken table of our shabby little conference room, his meaty hands rubbing one against the other. He had the air about him of a guy who had secrets, who had connections, who lived life hard. And to say his bulbous nose was mottled was to say Hoffa was hard to reach. His nose was a Jackson Pollack painting.

Manley sat beside his lawyer, a small bespectacled man named John Sebastian, who looked like a scared lion tamer sitting next to his big cat, unsure what unspeakable piece of horror his pet would unleash next. Beth and I sat across from them, perfect prodding position. Between us was a pitcher of water and a fetid plate of Danish. At the head of the table, taking down every word, was our court reporter, a nice old lady with blue hair and fast hands.

“How small a piece of the club do you own?” I said.

“Just enough sos I can tell the girls I’m an owner,” said Manley.

“Be specific, Mr. Manley. How much stock?”

“Who knows from numbers. Ike said I would get a third of everything, but that’s been a third of nothing. And that was before the IRS started chewing on his butt.”

“Is the club liquid?”

“We got ourselves a liquor license, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“If you requested Mr. Rothstein to buy you out, could he accommodate you immediately?”

“Nah, the club ain’t got no cash flow. Truth be told, a club like that is worse than a boat. I thought the only thing swallowed more money than a vagina was a boat until I got involved with Rothstein and his club. But I never done it for the money, I only done it for the girls.”

“And how did that part work out for you, Mr. Manley?”

“Don’t answer that,” said John Sebastian.

“Not so good,” said Manley, ignoring his lawyer, as clients are wont to do. “A couple of hand jobs is all.”

“Keep quiet, Derek,” said Sebastian. “I object to the question. The purpose of this deposition is to search for assets, nothing more.”

“On advice of counsel,” said Manley, “I ain’t gonna say nothing more about the hand jobs. But is that what yous looking for, Victor? Would that make yous happy? He leaned forward, raised an eyebrow. “Ever see that Esmerelda down at the club? They call her the Brazilian Firecracker. That I can maybe set up, but the money, forget about it. By the way, I got regards from a mutual friend. Earl? Earl Dante? He said I wouldn’t have no trouble here. Sos I don’t understand why yous coming down so hard.”

“That was off the record,” said Sebastian.

“Like hell it was,” I said.

“Let’s go off the record and talk this through,” said Sebastian.

“Absolutely not. Keep typing, Mrs. Mumford. Your client just mentioned his connection to an alleged organized crime figure. I take his mentioning that connection as an implied threat and believe any such implied threat should be on the record.”

“Well, ain’t you the blue-nosed son of a bitch,” said Manley. “I was just passing on a hello.”

“And thank you for that,” I said. “Now, there’s a Cadillac registered in your name. Where is that located?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“I lost it.”

“A black 2002 Eldorado? You misplaced it?”

“One day it’s there and then I can’t find it no more. The day before I lost my keys. The next day I lost my reading glasses. Funny, ain’t it?”

“I’m sure the judge will find it hysterical too. But you do own the Lincoln you drove up in today.”

“Well, that one, you can check the papers, it don’t belong to me. It belongs to my girlfriend.”

“What about the luxury apartment you live in on the waterfront?”

“My girlfriend’s.”

“And the time share in Florida?”

“Same.”

“This is the girlfriend who works as your secretary?”

“Office manager.”

“You must pay a hell of a wage.”

“Actually, the wage ain’t so much, really, but the benefits…” He waved his thumb at me.

“What about Penza Trucking?” I said. “You own that, don’t you?”

“Not really no more. It’s the bank what owns it now, with the thing mortgaged like it is up the wazoo. First Pennsylvania gave me this loan yous got without any security. Things was a little more flush then. They decided I was good for it. Too bad for them, huh?”

“Is there anything more?” said Sebastian. “It’s been four hours already. I think we’ve covered everything.”

Beth leaned toward the lawyer, opened her eyes wide, and said, “Are you sure you’re not the singer John Sebastian?”

“Positive,” he said.

“Woodstock?” she said. “The Lovin’ Spoonful? ‘Summer in the City’? Ring a bell?”

“Stop it now,” said John Sebastian.

I looked around. It was time. Manley was hot, his lawyer was bothered. The whole deposition had been leading to this moment. Sometimes you get right to the point, sometimes you dance around a bit, get everyone hot and bothered before you spring, with an innocent tone of voice, the crucial question. By then the guard is lowered, by then sometimes, against all odds and counter to all intentions, the truth slips out.

“All right, Mr. Manley,” I said. “Just one more topic. You started with Penza Trucking when?

“Geez, I was just a kid. Seventy-eight, seventy-nine.”

“And what was your position?”

“I drove. Penza, what owned the place, always hired young kids ’cause he could pay ’em squat.”

“So what was your pay?”

“I think the most it went up to was like six an hour.”

“And when did you become the owner?”

“A few years later. Penza was getting old, his daughter wanted nothing to do with the business. He was looking to get out.”

“And so you got in?”

“Yeah, imagine that. Like Horace the Algerian, it was.”

“Horatio Alger?”

“Who?”

“How much did you pay for the business?”

“Not much, really. It wasn’t worth much, the trucks was old, the accounts was small. He almost gave it away.”

“Fifty thousand dollars.”

“What?”

“Mr. Penza is living in Boca. He said he sold the company to you for fifty thousand dollars. Ten thousand down, the rest on a note.”