“I hate when that happens,” I say. “You want to come meet our new client?”
“We have a client?’ he asks, his surprise evident and totally reasonable, since we haven’t taken one on in a while. “It’s not another golden retriever, is it?”
“Of course not,” I say. “It’s a Bernese mountain dog.”
“Andy…”
“This one’s not my fault. I swear… Hatchet assigned me to the case. We’re actually getting paid for it.”
“Paid for what?”
“It’s sort of a custody case, although the number of people claiming him has recently been reduced by one. And there may be some complicating circumstances.”
“Like what?”
“Did you hear about the explosion at the Timmerman house?” I ask.
“Of course. It’s all over the news.”
“Well, our client lived there, and he and I were in the house before it blew up. Had we stayed there another two minutes, we wouldn’t be responding to traditional medicinal regimens.”
KEVIN IS WAITING FOR ME on my front porch when I get home.
I asked him to come over so I could pick his brains about the situation regarding the now one-sided custody fight, and because I didn’t want to leave Waggy and Tara alone without first knowing that they get along. He’s beaten me home because I hit traffic on Route 4 in Paramus.
“Sorry I’m late,” I say, as I take Waggy out of the car. “I ran into some unresponsive automotive congestion.”
“You never let things go, do you?” he asks.
I smile. “It’s one of my most appealing traits.”
He points to Waggy. “This, I assume, is our client?”
“In the hairy flesh,” I say.
I ask Kevin to take Waggy around to the backyard, and I enter the house through the front door. Tara is there to meet me as always, and I take out one of the biscuits I keep hanging in a bag by the door. We play a little game whereby she won’t take the biscuit from my hand, but instead feigns disinterest until I put it on the floor. Then she slowly eats it while I watch.
Once she finishes, I say, “Tara, I’ve got someone I want you to meet. And I want you to keep an open mind about it.”
I take Tara out back to the yard, and Waggy goes berserk when he sees her. He starts jumping on Tara’s back and head, and poor Tara just stands there and takes it, as if she has no idea what to make of this lunatic. I do detect a slight wag of Tara’s tail, which I take as a positive sign.
The meeting having gone reasonably well, we all go back into the house, and I’m about to bring Kevin up to date on all that has gone on when Laurie calls. I put her on the speakerphone, and am therefore able to update them both simultaneously.
As I tell the story, I can feel the delayed-reaction anger building inside me at the person who planted the bomb that killed Diana Timmerman and almost killed Martha, Waggy, and myself.
“Are there any suspects?” Laurie asks.
“I have no idea. I’ll call Pete Stanton and ask him to see what he can find out.” Pete is a lieutenant with Paterson PD, and pretty much my only friend in law enforcement. Fortunately, he knows everyone there is to know, and often serves as a reluctant source of information for me.
“But someone has already been arrested for the original murder?” Laurie asks.
“Right. And from what I understand, it’s a kid from the inner city. He had Timmerman’s wallet when they picked him up, so they think the motive was robbery. Since he’s not someone who’s likely to be blowing up mansions in Alpine, especially from prison, I would say his defense just got a bit easier.”
In my view, which is shared by Kevin and Laurie, there are no such things as coincidences in murder cases. Walter Timmerman and his wife being murdered separately, less than four weeks apart, certainly wouldn’t cause us to change that view. The two murders absolutely must be connected, and since the accused is in jail and unable to have blown up the house, he’s most likely on his way to being off the hook.
“This is all fascinating,” Kevin says. “But why do we care? The dog goes to the son, since he’s the only person alive with a claim to it. And then we’re out of it.”
“Diana Timmerman was killed today by a bomb that could have killed me and Waggy. I would sort of like to have someone to blame for that.”
“I understand that,” Kevin says. “But we have no role to play here. The police will find the bad guys, the son will get Waggy, and who knows, maybe someday we’ll find a client without a tail.”
“I think Kevin’s right about this one, Andy,” Laurie says. “Starting your own investigation would be a waste of time and money.”
I’m not sure what I want to do about this. “I know, but…”
She presses it. “You’d be on the outside looking in. For all you know, the police have a suspect already.”
As much as I hate to admit it, she’s right, and so is Kevin. “Okay. I’ll let it go. I’ll represent Waggy, and then I’m out of it.”
“Are you telling the truth, or just telling us what we want to hear?” Laurie asks.
“I have no idea.”
BILLY “BULLDOG” CAMERON arrived at my office at nine o’clock, which means he was alone for an hour. When I show up at ten, he is sitting in a chair in the hallway, just outside my locked door, eating a peach he bought from the fruit stand on the street level. My office is on Van Houten Street in downtown Paterson, which is unlikely to be confused with prime real estate.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, and then follow that with, “Did we have an appointment?”
He chooses not to answer either question, but instead asks one of his own. “It’s hot as hell in here. You can’t afford better than this dump?”
“It keeps me in touch with my roots,” I say as I let him into the office.
He looks around at the receptionist area. “You might want to get yourself some new roots. This place makes my office look like the Museum of Modern Art.”
I turn on the wall-unit air conditioners and then ask, “You know how to make coffee?” It’s a process I’ve never quite mastered.
“Of course,” he says, and walks toward the coffeemaker. “What time does your assistant come in?”
“Probably October,” I say. He’s talking about Edna, who’s been with me since I started the practice, and who makes me look like a workaholic.
We take the coffee and go back to my office. I remove a pile of papers and soda cans from the sofa, and he sits down, a little warily. “So I hear you were at the Timmerman house yesterday.”
I nod. “Just before it went ‘boom.’ ”
“Must have scared the shit out of you.”
I shake my head. “I laugh in the face of danger.”