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1
OPENING DAY.
Said separately,
they're just two ordinary words. "Opening" and "day."
No big deal. But put them together, liberally
sprinkle some thirty-year-old memories, and they take on a meaning that
can simultane-ously bring a rush of excitement and a threat of tears. At
least to me.
"Opening day." My
mind's eye conjures up men in pin-stripes racing onto a lush green field
as the public address announcer booms, "Ladies and gentlemen, the New
York Yankees!" That field is a clean spring slate; none of those players
have yet made an error, or hit into a double
play, or thrown a bat in disgust. Nor have they plans to.
The feeling I have
on opening day is one I shared with my father and one he shared with his
father before that. Today it takes on an added significance, because I'm
going to continue that legacy. The experience won't be quite identical,
but we in the Carpenter family are nothing if not adaptable.
I should mention the
differences, subtle though they are. First of all, since I don't have
any children, the offspring I am passing the sacred tradition on to is
my golden retriever, Tara. Also, with the baseball season a good month
away, we won't be going to Yankee Stadium, and we won't be seeing a
base-ball game. The particular opening that
we are attending is that of Paterson, New Jersey's first-ever dog park.
I've never actually
been to a dog park; I'm not even sure what one is. Tara hasn't been to
one either, unless it was during the first two years of her life, before
I knew her. If she has, I suspect the experience was less than
thrilling, since I told her yesterday that we'd be going, and she was
not awake all night in eager anticipation.
This dog park is
supposed to be a pretty big deal. It was even a campaign issue in the
recent election for mayor. Every candidate promised to have one, so I
guess Paterson must have a lot of people like me, concerned citizens who
vote the straight dog ticket.
As Tara and I drive
over, I'm not getting the feeling that she's into the swing of things.
She sits on the front seat, munches on a rawhide chewy, and doesn't show
the least bit of interest in where we might be headed. Even when we get
close, and we can hear the barking, she doesn't bother to look up and
just keeps chomping away. Now I know why my father never gave me chewies
on the way to Yankee games.
The park itself is
nothing more than a very large dirt area, maybe the size of a football
field, fenced on all sides. There must be a hundred dogs running around,
getting to know each other, stopping to drink at numerous and
well-positioned water fountains. Sort of a canine singles bar. There are
maybe half as many humans, almost exclusively women, standing off to one
side, talking and occasionally throwing a tennis ball, which sends the
dogs into an absolute frenzy.
As we near the
entrance gate, Tara seems to watch this scene with some measure of
horror, much as I would approach a mosh pit. But she's a good sport; she
checks her dignity at the door and enters with me. I walk toward the
humans, and so does Tara. She'll do this for my sake, but she's not
about to go fighting for a tennis ball like some animal.
The conversation, as
might be expected, pretty much centers around
all things canine. The dog park, the dogs, dog food, dog toys...it all
seems fascinating, except as a male I'm not included. Tara keeps leaning
against my leg, in a subtle suggestion that we bail out of here. I am
preparing to do just that when a woman deigns to speak to me. "Your dog
seems a little antisocial." She's talking about Tara, and if she hadn't
said it with a smile on her face, we'd be duking
it out right now.
I decide to go with
glib. "This isn't really her scene. She's an intellectual. Bring her to
a poetry reading, and she's the life of the party."
The woman,
nice-looking despite her "yuppie puppie" headband, for some reason
decides this could be a conversation worth continuing. "I have a friend
looking for a golden retriever puppy. What breeder did you get her
from?" I shake my head. "I didn't. She was in the animal shelter." She
is amazed by this, as I was, as would be any normal human being. "You
mean somebody abandoned this dog? And she could have been. . ."
She doesn't want to
say "killed" or "put to sleep," so I take her off
the hook with a nod. "She was on her last day when I got her."
The horrified woman
calls some of her friends over to tell them this story, and before I
know it I'm holding court in the middle of
maybe twenty women, all of them gushing over my sensitivity for having
rescued this dog. The dog in question, Tara, stands dutifully by my
side, enduring the embarrassment and apparently willing to let me take
the credit, even though she was the one stuck in that shelter.
After a few minutes
of embellishing the story about the animal shelter, which I am now
referring to as "death row," I move smoothly into light banter. This is
interrupted by a woman standing toward the back.
"Hey, aren't you
that lawyer who won that big case? I saw you on television. Andy
Carpenter, right?" I nod as modestly as I can manage. She is talking
about the Willie Miller case, in which I proved Willie's innocence in a
retrial after he had spent seven years facing the death penalty. The
women connect the dots and realize that I am that rare person who saves
both dogs and people from death rows everywhere, and the group attitude
quickly moves toward hero worship. It's daunting, but that's the price I
pay for being heroic.
Suddenly, there is a
sign of life and interest from Tara, as she moves quickly toward a woman
approaching our group. The newcomer, to my surprise, is Laurie Collins,
the chief (and only) investigator for my law practice, and the chief
(and only) woman that I am in love with. She would not have been my
first choice to interrupt this meeting of my all-female sensitivity
class, but she looks so good that I don't really mind. As Laurie comes
closer, I can see that she doesn't only look good, she looks intense.
She doesn't even lean over to pet Tara, an uncharacteristic oversight
which surprises me and positively shocks Tara. Laurie comes right over
to me, and my devoted fans part slightly and grudgingly to let her
through. "Alex Dorsey is dead," she says.
"What?" It's a
reflex question. I wasn't asking it to get more information in the
moment, but that's exactly what I get. "Somebody decapitated him, then
poured gasoline on his body and set it on fire."
If you ever want to
get rid of twenty adoring women, I know a line you can use. My fans
leave so fast you'd think there was a "70% off" sale at Petco. Based on
the gleam in Laurie's eye, that's exactly what she expected. Within
moments it is just Laurie, Tara, and myself.
"Sorry to interrupt,
Andy," she says. "At first I wasn't sure it was you. I thought it might
be a rock star." I put on my most wistful look. "For a moment there, I
was." "You up for breakfast at Charlie's? Because I'd like to talk to
you about Dorsey."
"Okay," I say. "I'll
meet you there." She nods and walks to her car. I'm going to drop Tara
off at home and then go to Charlie's, which is just five minutes from my
house.
On the way there, I
reflect on Dorsey's death and what it might mean to
me. The answer is that it means absolutely nothing at all to me,
except for the impact it will have on Laurie. But that will be
considerable.
Alex Dorsey was a
lieutenant in the Paterson Police Department when Laurie was making
detective, and she was assigned to his command at the time of her
promotion. It didn't take long for her to realize that whatever he once
had been, he had ceased to be a very good cop. If there
was an easy way out, Dorsey would find an
even easier one. He was a walking billboard for the twenty-year
retirement rule, although obviously he had chosen to take his retirement
while still on the job.
It took a while
longer for Laurie to realize that laziness was not Alex Dorsey's biggest
vice. Like most of her colleagues, she had heard the rumors that Dorsey
was on the take, but she came to believe that the truth was something
even worse. Dorsey was playing both sides; he was partners in business
with the criminals he was supposed to be investigating. And he was such
a tough, resourceful son of a bitch that he had been getting away with
it for a long time.
Laurie agonized
about what to do but emotionally didn't really have a choice. Her father
and uncle had been cops, good cops, and she learned from a very early
age that what Dorsey was doing was the worst kind of public betrayal.
Laurie developed some evidence against him, circumstantial but a
compelling start, and presented it to Internal Affairs. It was not her
job to prove the case, and besides, she knew that they could take it
from there. Conclusive evidence would not be difficult to uncover, and
it wouldn't be long before Dorsey paid for his sins.
But the first sign
that Dorsey was not going down easily was the almost immediate public
knowledge that Laurie was the person who had turned him in. That leak
was a violation of department policy, which guarantees anonymity to
those who turn over evidence implicating an officer in a crime. Laurie's
action was also considered by some a violation by her of the ridiculous
code of silence, which says that cops don't turn on other cops, no
matter how slimy those other cops might be. The controversy brought
chaos and bitterness to the department. Dorsey had developed quite a
power base over the years, and he was aware of skeletons in closets
where most people didn't even know there were closets. The rank and
file, and probably the department leadership, were
drawn to one side or the other, and it became perceived as Alex Dorsey
versus Laurie Collins. His supporters viewed her as the enemy, or worse,
as a traitor.
It became apparent
to Laurie that the investigation, mired in departmental and even mayoral
politics, was going to be neither complete nor fruitful. So when the
word finally came out that Dorsey was merely reprimanded for
"improprieties," rather than dismissed and charged with felonies,
Laurie's disenchantment and disgust were complete, and she left the
department. She opened her own investigative agency, and I became one of
her clients. Happily, I became much more later on. A week ago, word got
out that new information had surfaced and that Dorsey was facing
imminent arrest. Unfortunately, that word must have also gotten to
Dorsey, who proceeded to disappear. Laurie openly admitted to feeling
vindicated by the turn of events, which was the last we had heard of
Dorsey until today's grisly discovery.
I drop Tara off,
give her a biscuit, and head over to Charlie's.
It is basically a sports bar/restaurant, but it has recently added a
terrific breakfast menu. One of the many things I love about Laurie is
that she likes Charlie's as much as I do, which is about as much as is
possible to like a restaurant. Even on Sunday mornings, when there are
no games on the ten television screens, it's a great place to be.
I order some fresh
fruit, hash browns, and black coffee, then sit back and prepare to
listen. I know Laurie well enough to realize that in this case, when she
says she needs to talk to me, that isn't
exactly what she means. What she needs to do right now is talk period,
and she feels a little silly if there's nobody around to hear it. So I
am the designated listener.
Laurie starts a
five-minute soliloquy about Dorsey, rehashing some of their history
together. It's nothing I don't already know, and nothing she doesn't
know I already know. She wraps it up with, "He was a bad guy. A really
bad guy. You know that."
Recognizing that it
is my turn to speak, I nod. "Yes, I do. He was a bad
guy. Absolutely. A bad guy." Laurie is silent for a few moments,
then says softly, "The thing that bothers me,
Andy, is that I'm glad he's dead. When I heard about it, I was glad."
This is a major admission from someone who, when she catches a fly,
takes it outside and turns it loose. "That's normal," I say.
She shakes her head,
unwilling to be let off the hook. "Not for me." "He was a dirty cop who
had it coming." I twirl my imaginary mustache and inject some humor.
"Said the liberal to the conservative."
She seems completely
unamused, which I have to assume reflects her emotional state rather
than the quality of the joke. I try again, continuing with the same
theme. "At today's performance, the role of tough law-and-order advocate
will be played by Andy Carpenter, and the role of defender of the
indefensible will be played by Laurie Collins."
She ignores this one
as well; I should be writing them down to use on
more appreciative audiences. The fact is,
I can't get that exercised about Dorsey's death; the planet is a
healthier place for his being gone. He represented a terribly unpleasant
chapter in Laurie's life, an emotional toothache, and I'm hoping she can
now put it behind her. But she's not letting it drop, so I decide to
steer the conversation toward the nuts and bolts of today's news. "Do
they have any suspects?" I ask.
"Doesn't seem like
it. Pete's theory is that his mob friends turned on him once he was no
longer of any value to them." "Pete" is Lieutenant Pete Stanton, my
closest, and only, friend on the police force, and one of the few
officers who openly supported Laurie during the tough times. I'm not
surprised that he would be the one to provide her with informa-tion
about Dorsey's death. "Where was he found?" I ask.
"In a warehouse on
McLean Boulevard. Kids called in an alarm when they saw smoke. Turned
out it was Dorsey that was on fire."
She takes a deep
breath and continues. "They think his head was sliced off, maybe with a
machete. Whoever did it must have kept it as a souvenir. And the body
was burned beyond recognition. They only ID'd him based on some unusual
kind of ring he was wearing." My antennae go up. "That's all?"
She nods. "But
they're running a DNA test to be sure." I'm glad to hear that. I
wouldn't put it past Dorsey to murder someone else and fake the whole
thing. People on both sides of the law have a tendency to stop chasing
you when they think you're dead.
We talk about the
Dorsey situation some more, until there's nothing left to say about it.
"Are you going into the office tomorrow?" she asks. I nod. "Probably
late morning. I'm meeting with Holbrook on the Danny Rollins case at
nine-thirty." "Wow. Practice is really taking off, huh?"
Laurie is gently
mocking both the fact that I'm representing Danny Rollins, who happens
to be my bookmaker, and the fact that I've got absolutely nothing else
to do. I haven't taken on a significant client in the six months since
the Willie Miller case. And it's not that I haven't had the
opportunities. The way the trial ended, with Willie getting off and the
real killers exposed, I became a media darling and Paterson's answer to
Perry Mason. I've been at the top of every felon's wish list ever since.
But I've rejected them all. Each turndown had its own rationale.
Either the potential
client seemed guilty and therefore unworthy, or the case wasn't
challenging, or interesting, or significant. Down deep it feels like
I've been inventing reasons to decline these cases, but I truly don't
know why I would. I think I have lawyer's block.
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