'I don't think you can train without that. But like I said, I'm not a runner, and unfortunately, nobody on the staff here is. Biking and rowing, sure. But the marathon? No.'
'How can I find somebody?'
'You mean like to train you? That costs a fortune. Tell you what. I can go through some magazInes at the library.'
'Magazines?'
'Yeah, like Runner's World, that kind of thing. They got to have an article on doing your first marathon.'
'Elie, I don't want you to go to any trouble.'
'No trouble, really. They're all out in the open, second floor.'
'Elie, thanks but no. I can check the library on my own. Any other suggestions?'
The concerned look again. 'Friend to friend?'
'Yes.'
'Don't do it.'
'Did Nancy get to you?'
'Nancy who?'
'Never mind.'
By the time I left Elie, it was pretty sunny, so I walked downtown along Commonwealth Avenue. Commonwealth begins at the Public Garden and rambles forever westward. Over the first ten blocks, a wide center strip hosts civic statues and grand Dutch elms that so far have survived both the disease and occasional hurricanes. With a dusting of snow, my route would have been a postcard.
Midway through the Public Garden, I stopped on the bridge spanning the Swan Pond. In warmer weather the city raises the water level to provide swan boat rides. In colder weather the city lowers the water level to form a rink. Tourists with cameras, many of them Asian, stood at the edges of the ice, taking pictures of some locals playing pick-up hockey. None of the skaters was very good, but Boston does have the knack of creating photo ops at every time of the year.
Crossing Charles Street, the Common was bleaker, as usual. Centuries ago, the site really was used in common by farmers for grazing their livestock. Now the three-card-monte dealers and souvenir wagons had flown south for the winter, replaced by raggedy runaways hopeful of peddling themselves for a warm bed and manageable abuse. Further on, groups of three or four men stood around benches, glancing in every direction while gloved hands traded glassine envelopes or plastic vials for folded currency.
My office was in a building on Tremont, near the Park Street subway station. Derelicts clustered in irregular patterns around the entrances to the station, grateful for the canned heat from below and the solar variety from above. A few jerked up their heads as they became aware of how close I would come to them. I looked away to calm their fears of being rousted.
There used to be a lot of pigeons on the Common. Now there are a lot of homeless people and not so many pigeons. You figure it out.
I used my key to get into the building, taking the elevator up to my office. On a piece of paper, I wrote 'Cuddy, ring bell' and drew an arrow underneath. Back downstairs, I taped the directions to the glass door. Then I returned to the office to kill some time and paperwork, waiting for two o'clock.
They made a striking pair, if not quite a couple.
Alec Bacall ('Call me Alec, please') was as tall as I am but slim, with a ramrod posture and a steel-clamp handshake to go with the steel-trap mind. Pushing forty, his hair was still the color of wheat and probably streaked toward platinum if he spent much time outdoors in the summer. The Prince John beard and mustache were a shade darker, clipped so perfectly that trimming might be a daily exercise. Bacall wore a light gray suit with double- pleated pants. His shirt was a long-point requiring a collar stay. The paisley tie was woven in a pattern that catalogs caption 'ancient madder.' Bacall sat in one client's chair, or friend of client's chair, and crossed his right leg over the left.
Ines Roja ('I am the secretary of Professor Andrus') wore very little makeup and needed less. Early twenties and perhaps five two in sensible shoes, she had lustrous black hair wound into a bun, high cheekbones, and irises that were almost black. Wearing a simple blue suit with schoolgirl blouse, Roja held a burgundy briefcase on her lap and crossed her ankles as she sat in my other client's chair. Or secretary of client's chair.
Bacall said, 'Perhaps it would be easier if you were to tell us what Tommy has already told you. So that we won't bore you with details you already know.'
'Tommy wants me to keep this as lawyerly as possible, Mr. Bacall – '
'Alec, John.'
'Alec, so maybe it would be safer for you to tell me what you think the situation is.'
Bacall used his left index finger to touch both lips, then said, 'I'll try. Then you can ask anything you want. Ines, please feel free to jump in anytime.'
Bacall looked at the woman only as he spoke her name, coming back to me with the rest of the sentence. I got the impression Roja didn't feel all that free to jump in.
'Maisy Andrus is a full professor of law, meaning with tenure, at the Law School of Massachusetts Bay. She's been a controversial figure in legal education for some time, but I'm not versed enough in legal theory to give you all the ins and outs of why. Her stand on the right to die is what draws most of the fire. She's put her money where her mouth is, so to speak.'
'How do you mean'?'
'Well, Maisy was never a poor woman, but after graduating from law school she made some shrewd investments with family money, and her writing and lectures have pulled in a good deal more. She also was involved in, well, the incident in Spain.'
'Somebody in her family, right?'
'Her husband. Or former husband, more precisely. A Spanish doctor named Enrique Cuervo Duran. A virtual Dr. Schweitzer in his own country, but suffering horribly toward the end from a stroke. He was considerably older than Maisy.'
'You ever meet him?'
'No. Oh, no, I've known Maisy for only… what, eight years now? The tragedy with Dr. Duran was all in the seventies, just after the generalissimo died.'
'Who?'
'Franco.'
The little I knew about Franco I'd learned from Saturday Night Live. 'I remember reading an article that claimed Professor Andrus helped – sorry, do you use the word 'euthanasia'?'
'Actually, 'help' is just fine, John. It's both descriptive and down-to-earth. Maisy used humane means at hand to help the doctor end his agony. An injection.'
I was thinking, 'easy to say,' when Roja did jump in. 'Perhaps, Alec, if we could show Mr. Cuddy the letters, he would see the problem we are bringing to him.'
She spoke precisely, a Hispanic accent beneath New York-accented English.
Bacall sat back. 'Good idea.'
Roja unzipped the briefcase and fished out a couple of sheets. 'These are Xerox copies of the three letters.'
I reached across the desk as she passed them to me. Calling them letters was being generous. In scissored syntax, with words of varying size and background, all were pretty similar. The first read, 'ONLY GOD NOT YOU CU-NT,' the 'CU' in
the last word from a different source than the 'NT.'
The second read, 'THEY DIE YOU DIE BIT – CH,' with different sources for the last word again.
The third read, 'YOUR TIME COMES SOON SLUT,' the letters in the final word all from the same source.
