Джозеф Файндер - Company Man

Nick thought about Michael Milken, Sam Walton, those other billionaire-next-door types. They lived in little split-level ranch houses and were completely fixated on adding to their Scrooge McDuck vaults, day after day. He remembered hearing about how Warren Buffett lived like a miser in the same little suburban house in Omaha he bought for thirty thousand bucks in 1958. He thought about Scott’s nothing-special house and how much money he had. Maybe she was right.

“Scott McNally has his mind on winning this round, so he can play in the big-stakes games,” Cassie went on.

“They teach this after the lotus position or before?”

“Okay, then let me just ask you this. What do you think Scott McNally wants to be when he grows up?”

“What do you mean?”

“Does he want to be selling chairs and filing cabinets, or does he want to be a financial engineer at Fairfield Partners? Which is more his style?”

“Point taken.”

“In which case, it’s fair to ask yourself, who’s he really working for?”

Nick gave a crooked smile.

She stood up. “I’ll be right back.”

Nick watched as she made her way to the ladies’ room, admiring the curve of her butt. She wasn’t there long. On her way back, she walked past Scott’s table, and stopped there briefly. She said something to the lawyer, then sat down next to him for a moment. She was laughing, as if he’d said something witty. A few moments later, he saw the lawyer hand her something. Cassie was laughing again as she stood up and returned to her seat.

“What was that about?” Nick asked.

Cassie handed him the lawyer’s business card. “Just check him out, okay?”

“That was quick work.” Nick glanced at the card and read, “Abbotsford Gruendig.”

“Just being neighborly,” Cassie said.

“By the way, I can see what’s in front of my face,” Nick said. “You’re in front of my face. I see you quite well, and I like what I see.”

“But as I said, we don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are.”

“Does the same go for you?”

“Goes for all of us. We lie to ourselves because it’s the only way we can get through the day. Time comes, though, when the lies get tired and quit.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Cassie looked at him steadily, searchingly. “Tell me the truth, Nick. What’s the real reason the police were at your house?”

For a moment, he was at a loss for words.

He hadn’t told her about the police searching the house and yard, which was a pretty damn huge thing not to have told her about. Especially given the connection to her father. Both Lucas and Julia knew the police had been searching for traces of Andrew Stadler. They just didn’t know the real reason.

“Lucas told you,” Nick said neutrally. He tried to keep his pulse steady, his breathing regular. He took a forkful of steak for which he had no appetite.

“It freaked him out.”

“Yeah, well, he seemed to think it was a hoot. Cassie, I should have said something to you about it, but I knew how it would upset you. I didn’t want to bring up your dad—”

“I understand,” she said. “I understand. And I appreciate it.” She was toying with a spoon. “They actually think my father was the stalker?”

“It’s just one possibility,” Nick said. “I think they’re really groping.” He swallowed hard. “Hell, they probably even wonder if I had something to do with it.” The last words came out in a rush, not the way he had heard himself say it in his mind.

“With his death,” Cassie said carefully.

Nick grunted.

“And is it possible that you did?”

Nick couldn’t speak right away. He didn’t look at her, couldn’t. “What do you mean?”

She set down the spoon, placed it carefully alongside the knife. “If you thought he might have been the one doing all that crazy stuff, maybe you could have intervened, somehow. Helped him to get help.” She broke off. “But then, these are the questions I ask myself. Why didn’t I make him get help? Why didn’t I intervene? I keep asking myself whether there was something I could have done that would have changed things. Stratton’s supposed to have all these great mental health programs, but suddenly he wasn’t eligible for them anymore — that’s a real Catch-22, isn’t it? Because of a mental illness, you quit and lose your right to treatment for your mental illness. That isn’t right.”

Warily: “It’s not right.”

“And because of these decisions — decisions you and I and God knows how many other people made — my daddy’s dead.” Cassie was weeping now, tears spilling down both cheeks.

“Cassie,” Nick said. He took her hand in his, and fell silent. Her hand looked pale and small in his. Then a thought came to him, and he felt as if he had swallowed ice. His hand, the hand with which he tried to comfort her, was the hand that had held the gun.

“But you want to know something?” Cassie said haltingly. “When I got the news about — you know—”

“I know.”

“I felt like I’d run into a brick wall. But, Nick, I felt something else too. I felt relieved . Do you understand?”

“Relieved.” He repeated the word numbly.

“All the hospitalizations, all the relapses, all the agony he’d endured. Pain that’s not physical but every bit as real. He didn’t like the place he was in — the world that, more and more, he had to live in. It wasn’t your world or my world, it was his world, Nick, and it was a cold and scary place.”

“It had to have been hell, for both of you.”

“And then one day he disappears. Then he’s dead. Killed — shot dead, God knows why. But it was almost like an act of mercy. Do you ever think that things happen for a reason?”

“I think some things happen for a reason,” Nick said slowly. “But not everything. I don’t think Laura died for any particular reason. It just happened. To her. To us. Like a piano that just falls out of the sky and flattens you.”

“Shit happens, you’re saying.” Cassie palmed away the tears on her face. “But that’s never the whole story. Shit happens, and it changes your life, and then what do you do? Do you just go on as if nothing happened? Or do you face it?”

“I choose option A.”

“Yeah. I see that.” Cassie rumpled her spiky hair with a hand. “There’s a parable of Schopenhauer’s, it’s called ‘Die Stachelschweine’ — the porcupines. You’ve got these porcupines, and it’s winter, and so they huddle together for warmth — but when they get too close, of course, they hurt each other.”

“Allegory alert,” Nick said.

“You got it. Too far, and they freeze to death. Too near, and they bleed. We’re all like that. Same with you and Lucas.”

“Yeah, well, he’s a porcupine, all right.”

“Got to hand it to you Conover men,” Cassie said. “You’re as well defended as a medieval castle. Got your moat, got your boiling oil over the gate, got your castle keep. ‘Bring it on,’ right? Hope you got plenty of provisions in the larder.”

“All right, babe. Since you see so much more clearly than I do, let me ask you something. How much do you think I have to worry about my son?”

“Well, some. He’s a stoner, as you know. Probably gets high a couple of times a day. Which can do a number on your ability to concentrate.”

“A couple of times a day? You sure?”

“Oh please. He’s got two bottles of Visine on his dresser. He’s got Febreze fabric spray in his closet.”

Nick looked blank.

“Fabric freshener. You spritz it on your clothing to remove the smell of the herb. Then he’s got these Dutch Master leavings in his wastebasket. For making a blunt, okay? This is all Pothead 101 stuff.”