TWENTY-NINE

I was trying to get a number on my cell when the doctor emerged from Joey’s bedroom. He had a pleasant, almost humorous face custom-built for bedside consultations. “You won’t get a signal here; I’ve tried. Ask the houseboy if you can use the landline.”

“Dr. Nagler?” I shook the hand he offered. “Amos Walker. I’m working for Mr. Ballista’s lawyer. How is he?”

“I gave him something to slow his heartbeat. The body’s a complex arrangement of self-contained units; when one organ perceives that the others aren’t operating up to code, it goes into overdrive to compensate, regardless of the strain to itself. He should be in a hospital, but he says if he’s going to be cooped up he’d rather it was here. He asked if I could recommend a good-looking nurse.”

“I’m sure he put it that way.”

“He’s his father’s son. Any more detail would fall under the category of doctor-patient confidence.” He smiled.

“How well did you know old Joe?”

“He helped me pay my way through medical school after my father died. My father lost his license to practice medicine for failure to report treatment of gunshot wounds. I suppose the loan was Joe’s way of setting up a family health plan. I should add that I paid back every cent.”

“Did you treat Joey’s mother?”

He touched his glasses. “Did you say you’re representing Joey legally?”

I gave him a card. “His lawyer’s trying to get him a new trial on an old conviction. It’s the first step toward getting that bracelet off his ankle. His mother died not long before he was tried the first time. If I can get a picture of what was going on then I’ll know better what I’m dealing with.”

“I couldn’t do much for her. I recommended a therapist.”

“Did she follow up on it?”

“No. She took her own life.”

“Any idea why?”

He touched his glasses again. They looked fine as they were.

“She’s dead,” I said. “You can waive the oath. I won’t quote you.”

“It helps to have grown up in that atmosphere to understand it. Joe was old-school, and shielded her from the ugly part of his profession as far as possible. In return she shielded him by pretending ignorance. Then came the press: Someone wrote a series of articles about the Ballista family legacy, then others joined in. Try pretending to live a normal life when there are reporters in the trees surrounding your house with TV cameras and telephoto lenses.”

“Joey was under arrest for planting a bomb in a reporter’s car. They tend to take that kind of thing personally.”

“You’ve mixed up the order of events. His mother swallowed a lethal dose of barbiturates weeks before that incident.”

“I didn’t know that,” I said. “Her death didn’t get as much play as the rest.”

“I was able to help with that.”

“You signed the death certificate?”

Glasses. “I cited cause of death as cardiac arrest, which it was. Everything else I told you is speculation based on evidence found at the scene. I broke no laws and violated no code of ethics, but I managed to keep a family tragedy from turning into a grotesque circus.”

“I guess you figured you owed Joe Balls that much.”

“I didn’t owe him a thing except medical treatment when he asked for it. I’d repaid him by then.” His voice was cold.

“Just the same, it was a long limb to climb out on if the authorities ordered an autopsy. Their interpretation of the law is less elastic.”

“It was a question of human sympathy, not obligation. My father blew out his brains with a revolver when they took his license.”

*   *   *

I got a signal six blocks from the house and returned Lucille’s call.

“I haven’t had lunch,” I said when she answered. “I’ll make a quick stop, then go over and talk to Iona Cuneo and Marcine Logan.”

“What about?” Her voice gargled a little. We were both on cells.

“We were right. Marcine’s a full partner.”

“When did you find this out? Where are you?”

“Just now, and leaving Canton.” I bent the light at Telegraph Road and turned north. I was only a dozen miles south of Iroquois Heights and Iona’s Simple Solutions and a hell of a hike from Canton. “Lee Tan told me about Marcine. She found out Joey tried to call her recently; it spooked her, being retired from all that, and she made the decision to come clean.”

“How did Lee Tan come to know about Marcine?”

This was trickier, not having had time to practice my stroke, but I took a deep breath and pushed off. “That omerta thing is a Mafia myth. They gossip like old ladies among themselves. Anyway it means I’ve found Severin’s paid informant. The department must’ve really wanted Joey to shake loose that much case dough.”

“What if she lied?”

“She had to have made it convincing. I’ll ask her after lunch. I don’t ask questions well on an empty stomach.”

“After all these years? She’ll just lie again.”

“I’m used to it. So are the cops, and they’ve got plenty to lose if her testimony falls apart during Joey’s new trial. They’ll get the truth out of her if I don’t.”

“It doesn’t make sense. If it’s common gossip, how come we’re only hearing about it now?”

“She doesn’t have to know that’s all it is.”

“That didn’t answer my question.”

I should’ve taken more time to practice. She’d cross-examined experts. “You’re starting to break up.”

“Okay, we’ll talk later. Anything else?”

I thought about Barry lying on the floor of his apartment, Bobby Lee Jayson trussed up and bleeding in the stairwell, the .45 that had probably killed Randolph Severin, the cell phone that had disappeared from Severin’s marina, probably from his dead hand. He had to have been occupying himself with something when the bullet came; say, ringing off after ordering live bait from his supplier. I thought about what Ojha and Dr. Nagler had told me at Joey Ballista’s house, about the missing phone card and Joey’s mother’s suicide.

“Nope. I’ll report later.” I hit End.

*   *   *

Next I called John Alderdyce’s line at 1300. I argued with a woman and then a man, who transferred me to his cell. The whole world was rolling around jabbering like peas in an animated cartoon.

“I’ve been trying to get you for an hour,” he said.

“I was at Joey Ballistic’s. No signal there. I think it’s all the antibugging equipment in the house.”

“That where you went after you shook your police tail?”

“Yeah. You should’ve known me better than to try.”

“Hornet’s idea. I told him to go ahead and knock himself out. Anything to keep him busy. What’d you get from Joey?”

“Not much. He’s under the weather. What’s up?”

“Bobby Lee came out of the anesthetic, yelling for his lawyer. Guess what name he yelled.”

“Lucille Lettermore.”

The radio waves crackled. “You take all the fun out of guessing games.”

“I stuck her at the top of my list when she tried to claim she was being investigated by the Justice Department instead of Treasury.” I sketched out my brief encounter with Agent Gull. “She was a little too eager to find out if I’d had a chance to look at those discs he stole from her office in a computer. I didn’t tell her I’d gotten a good look at Gull’s ID.”

“IRS?”

“She’s won every round she ever had with Justice. It wouldn’t be the first time a lawyer failed to report under-the-counter income on her ten-forty. She needs a big win in court to generate new business, enough to buy her way out of jail.”

“That’s a long way to shinny up a rope as loose as that.”

“She hasn’t had a high-profile case since Washington lost its interest in domestic terrorists. She can’t afford to blow this one. Who represented those would-be school shooters?”

“Firm based in Toledo. No link there.”

That took some helium out of my balloon. I needed Lucille to be the one who funneled the .45 they’d stolen from the collector in Harper Woods to Bobby Lee.

“How’s Barry?” I asked.

“Resting comfortably, as they say. I’m at the hospital still, waiting to get in to see him. Where are you headed?”

“Tell you when I get there. Don’t give up on those shooters. Those out-of-state attorneys usually consult with locals on the Michigan statutes.”

“What’ve you got going, Walker?”

“I’m—” I tuned into my favorite all-static station on the radio, held the phone to the speaker, thumped it a couple of times on the dash for good measure, then snapped it shut and turned it off. I could kick myself for all the years I’d wasted resisting wireless technology.