depth and degree I didn’t like thinking about. Probably because there was something else wrong with my head, this related to multiple beatings of an entirely different kind.
FIFTEEN
THE MORNING AFTER my consultation with Markham Fairchild I woke to a slightly chilled, smooth-skinned naked body sliding under the covers of the daybed where I slept on the screened-in porch. Before I fully reached consciousness, or even opened my eyes, all sorts of pleasant things occurred.
“That was your wake-up call,” Amanda whispered, her lips brushing my left ear.
I held her and burrowed deeper into the covers. I’d taken off the storm windows, perhaps prematurely, since you could see your breath if you were brave enough to look.
“What happens if I reset the alarm?”
“We send in Helga with a bullhorn and riding crop. Not nearly so agreeable.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
“In the kitchen there’s espresso to be made and eggs to scramble. Ham to fry and dogs to greet.”
“Dogs?”
“Okay, one dog. Multiple personalities.”
“You have no idea.”
While Amanda worked up breakfast, I took a shower in the outdoor stall. All frigid and steamy glory, no vertigo or weird little clicks. The morning light was pale, but deepening with the season.
When I got back to the porch, in clean blue jeans, work shirt and threadbare wool sweater, Amanda had a fire going in the woodstove and mounds of steaming delectables arrayed on the pine table. She wore one of my flannel work shirts, which must have been warm enough since that was all she had on.
“Before you thank me,” she said, using her fingers to explore the back of my head, “which I flatter myself to think you’d do, I need to ask you a favor.”
“I’m not sure I can take another quid pro quo.”
“More like tit for tat.”
“Fair enough.”
“I’m meeting with the DEC today. I’m feeling out of my depth,” she said, rocking me back and forth.
“Okay.”
“But I need the reasonable Sam. The engineer. I want the prizefighter to stay home.”
“With Eddie. The other schizoid in the house.”
“That’s right,” she said. “I need your brain.”
“The reliability of which is up for debate.”
“I don’t care. I’ll take it as it is.”
“Your money.”
——
The meeting was held in a tiny claustrophobic conference room on the ground floor of Southampton Town Hall. The two DEC guys who sat at the end of the table were wearing light-blue polyester shirts and sporting oily complexions and do-it-yourself haircuts. They both had stacks of paper pouring from manila folders in the style of Jackie Swaitkowski and an assortment of hand-held electronic devices, the purposes of which were as obscure to me as the monuments of Stonehenge.
Amanda had a file of her own, stuffed with site drawings, correspondence and official approvals to move forward with construction. I had a ballpoint pen, a pad of paper and the determination to get out of there without a lawsuit or related catastrophe.
When we walked in the door the DEC guys fumbled awkwardly to their feet and offered to shake hands.
The older one, Dan, had convinced himself that a goatee would make him look youthful. It was mostly gray, like his hair, though the part that would have been a moustache created a muddy brown outline around his mouth. He bought his glasses from the same catalog as Ross Semple. He was taller than the other guy, and only slightly paunchy, where the other guy was unambiguously fat. His name was Ned. His hair was still its original color, and looking at his boss every day had probably spared him from a goatee. His features were inversely proportionate to his girth. Tiny nose, mouth and close-set eyes clustered in the middle of his fleshy face. He wore a permanent expression of curiosity and expectation reinforced by the way the whites of his eyes encircled his pupils.
“I’m Amanda Anselma. This is Sam Acquillo. He’s the engineering consultant on the project,” she said as she dropped her leather briefcase on the table with a commanding thud.
Dan dropped back into his chair as Ned offered us coffee. This left Dan alone with us in a dead silence that Amanda allowed to hang until Ned came back in the room.
“Beautiful town, Southampton,” said Dan, as Ned handed out the coffees. “This is our favorite duty, right Ned?”
“Only way we can afford to stay around here,” said Ned with a misplaced claim on our empathy.
“My mother was supposed to inherit her uncle’s place in Montauk,” said Dan, “but he surprised everybody by giving it to the Catholic church and moving to Florida. Then my mother died and where does that leave me?”
“Staying with me in a motel on Montauk Highway,” said Ned.
“Not the same room,” Dan made clear. “So,” said Amanda, calmly, “what can we do to resolve this?”
The two of them straightened up in their chairs.
“Right,” said Dan. “Let me introduce ourselves. Ned and I are the field investigators for DEC Region One.”
“Nine regions. Figures the Hamptons would be in number one,” said Ned.
“Regional offices dispense service licenses, enforce regulations, monitor local conditions, but policy directives come out of Albany. We’re the feet on the ground.”
“My certification from Albany says I’ve passed the required phase-one environmental impact study,” said Amanda. “No one said it could be arbitrarily revoked.”
Dan anchored his elbow on the table and pointed at her.
“Suspended, ma’am. Important distinction.”
“Arbitrarily suspended. And you can call me Amanda. Dan.”
“I can understand your concern, Amanda, but this action has been executed through full due process.”
I suddenly regretted not having Jackie Swaitkowski along. This was her home turf. Murder trials were just a fun hobby. Burton Lewis had guided Amanda through her father’s estate settlement, but even he would have deferred to Jackie on matters of local real estate. But that was an impossibility. Amanda never spoke ill of Jackie for defending Roy Battiston, but there was a bigger problem—Jackie was still his lawyer, an insurmountable conflict of interest.
“What due process?” Amanda asked. “All I received was notice of the suspension.”
“Right,” said Dan, “here’s the way it works. In order for the DEC to overrule certification we have to go to the State’s Attorney General and show just cause. If he agrees, then he takes it to a State judge, who issues a temporary restraining order. If he agrees. The judge. Or she. Whichever.”
Amanda looked over at me and I shrugged.
“Let’s reel it back to the just cause part,” I suggested.
“Right,” said Dan again. “That’s when something significant comes to our attention, something heretofore unknown, that might, if proven, represent a noteworthy threat to the environment, then that would constitute just cause. That’s how I understand it. Right, Ned?”
Ned didn’t look like he’d been listening, but he quickly agreed.
“That’s right. A significant threat.”
The two of them nodded in unison.
“So what sort of significant thing came to your attention?” Amanda asked.
“That’s what we’re here to investigate.”
I was starting to like Dan. He reminded me of the government liaison people I used to deal with offshore. Usually all the serious stuff had been negotiated, the bribes paid and backs scratched by the time I got involved. People who communicate officially all day only know the elliptical and oblique. Suggestive, just shy of insinuation. Sometimes quite elegant and lyrical, a triumph of nuance over substance. A form of bureaucratic poetry.
