Linda Fairstein - Likely To Die

“When are you going to learn that it’s really obnoxious to talk that way?” Mike’s ethnic slurs were a constant irritant in our conversations.

“Easy, Coop. I’m an equal opportunity offender. The other guy is Coleman Harper-don’t you hate those fancy names? I’ve probably insulted him already-he’s undoubtedly a third or a fourth or a fifth, named after granddad’s maternal great-grandmother.”

“My favorite’s that orthopedic surgeon who had the office next to Dogen,” said Mercer, “the young guy with the slicked-back hair and the phoniest grin I’ve ever seen. Bonded teeth, of course. D’you see him? I swear he thinks he’s Ben Casey. I think the only thing he’s worried about is whether they can get the bloodstains out of Dogen’s office so he can move into it. It’s one doorway closer to the dean’s office, and he’s awfully keen on moving up.”

I was full long before the fish arrived, and fading quickly. Patrick had taken the imprint from my American Express card. I told him to give the guys whatever they wanted and add on twenty percent for service.

“I’ll see both of you tomorrow,” I said, pushing away from the table.

“Don’t you want a nightcap?”

“No, thanks. I’m ready to fold.”

“Can’t leave without a fortune cookie. Hey, Patrick, give Miss Cooper a good one, will you?”

“Only have good fortunes at Shun Lee, Mr. Mike. No bad news.”

I ripped off the cellophane wrapper, split the crisp cookie in half, and pulled out the small white strip to learn my fate. “Thanks, Mike, I needed this news: ‘Things will get much worse before they get better. Be patient.’ ” Not my long suit.

“Want me to walk you out?” Mercer asked.

“I’m fine. I’m parked right in front, and I’ll go directly home, into the garage.”

“I’ll see you in your office by noon.Ciao. ”

I told the night attendant I wouldn’t need my car the next morning, unbolted the door leading into the apartment building from the garage, and climbed the stairs to the lobby. One of the doormen handed me my dry cleaning and the stack of mail, which contained too many magazines to fit in the box. I shifted the Redweld to support the pile of paper, tried to hold the hangers in my left hand so they didn’t pinch my fingers in their heavy load, and pressed the twentieth floor. As I opened the two locks and pushed the door in, I spotted a sheet of David Mitchell’s note paper on the floor of my entryway.

When I had unloaded the bundles, I picked up the missive and read it: “Going to Bermuda for the weekend to escape the weather. Can you look after Prozac or shall I use the kennel? I’ll call your office in the morning. David.”

That’s an easy deal. I’ll babysit his affectionate weimaraner, Zac, while he’s off-with his latest squeeze, no doubt-relaxing and catching some rays on the beach. In exchange I can ask him to find a hospital bed at Mid-Manhattan for the newly ailing Maureen Forester.

I stepped out of my shoes in the living room as I scanned the mail. Fashion, decorating, and garden journals were the weightiest of the bunch, as spring approached; four mail-order catalogues filled with schlocky gadgets and gimmicks, destined for immediate dumping in the garbage pail; bills from all kinds of local merchants and take-out places, which I set aside on the credenza; and I carried Nina’s postcard into the bedroom with me while I shimmied out of my panty hose and threw them in the hamper.

As I read about her weekend in Malibu, written on a card with a Winslow Homer seascape, I longed for a heart-to-heart talk with my closest friend. We had been roommates in college, and although separated by three time zones and two hectic lives, we tried to keep in contact by daily messages and mailings of the art postcards we both collected. We filled them with running commentaries of our thoughts and experiences. There were years when she complained, in mock earnest, that my life was so much more interesting than hers. We had penned lively descriptions of our beaus and our romances, and she had eased me through the months of mourning when my fiancé had been killed in a freakish car accident the year I graduated from law school.

Lately, the news of her weekends with Jerry and their son at the beach house, coupled with her high-powered legal job at Virgo Studios, had made my winter seem even duller and lonelier than it was. But tonight, back in the center of the excitement of a breaking case, I was anxious for Nina to know that all was well.

I stripped and hung up my suit as I played back the three messages on the machine. First was my father from his home on St. Bart’s. An old partner had phoned to tell him about the tragedy at Mid-Manhattan and he was offering his assistance if I needed it. Next was Nina responding to my rush-hour call and asking me for all the details of the case. Last was Joan Stafford reminding me that I was expected at her dinner party at eight o’clock Saturday evening-“No far-fetched excuses like murder, if you don’t mind.”

I tried to relax and escape from the day’s gloom by picking up the copy of Trollope that was next to my bed. I had startedThe Eustace Diamonds over the weekend and knew it would take only ten or twelve pages of tasteful nineteenth-century crime to cause my lids to droop and convince me to turn out the lights.

I thought I had pushed all consciousness of Gemma Dogen out of my weary brain but I couldn’t stop myself from thinking about whether her death was keeping anyone else awake tonight-out of a need for mourning, out of a sense of loss, or out of guilt.

DON IMUS MAY NOT BE EVERYONE’S IDEA of a wake-up call but he worked like a charm on me.

The alarm went off at seven and the radio came on automatically. Imus was doing the news and led with the story of Mid-Manhattan, referencing everything from the murder to the teeming underground life in the medical center’s bowels. “Sounds like the Bates Motel has nothing onthis joint,” he said, launching into his imitation of one of the Stuyvesant Psych patients giving a tour of the place. I hated to turn off the radio and walk out the door when I finished dressing, fearful that he and his crew, who had carried more insightful daily commentary on the Simpson trial than the entire national news corps, would divine the killer’s identity before the cops did.

I wrapped myself in my black shearling coat and prepared for the brisk, thirteen-degree temperature as I walked from the building to Third Avenue to hail a cab to the office. The driver knew the route to the Criminal Courts Building in Lower Manhattan, so I sat back and looked over the headlines in theTimes.

Gemma Dogen’s death had claimed her a front-page position, not the usual Metro section. Some of that might be attributed to her prestige, but more had to do with the geographic location of the brutal act.Times readers were generally at a fair remove, physically and emotionally, from the housing projects and street gang turf that were so often killing grounds, the expected backdrop for violence and homicide. But knock off somebody in a milieu that “we” frequent-a major city hospital, Central Park, or the Metropolitan Opera House-and the death always took on a different dimension. Page one, above the fold.

I read the story carefully to see how accurately the facts had been reported and whether anyone from within the NYPD had leaked information. So far the plugs were still in place and no one had made the mistake of naming likely suspects, including our eight precinct “guests,” or of pointing a finger prematurely.

By the time I read the editorials, the book review, and the Thursday Living Section feature on an upcoming auction of antique samplers, my taciturn driver had pulled in front of 100 Centre Street and opened the plastic safety partition to collect his fourteen dollars and thirty cents.