cognoscenti to be the man who-working for the same Wall Street gang trying to control the current gubernatorial election outcome-brought about the downfall of the bankers' archenemy, the crusading reformer Eliot Spitzer.
Chapter Twenty-eight
I left word on Timmy's voice mail that I would be out late.
I said I'd leave a key card for my motel room at the front desk, and he should come on in and not wait up for me.
I drove over to Staples and bought four large padded envelopes. Then to Target for a cheap wash cloth. At ampm, I bought a bottle of Snapple iced tea, then went into the men's room and flushed the contents-way too sweet for me-down the toilet. When I topped off my rented Honda's tank, I also filled the Snapple jar with gasoline and capped it. Something was missing, so I went back inside and asked for some matches with the pack of Lucky Strikes I purchased, and then tossed the cigarettes in the trash and kept the matches.
The Honda came equipped with an excellent Garmin GPS. I had looked up the address online, and I keyed in the Belgrade Grotto in Hummerston, New Jersey. The driving time was given as three hours, ten minutes.
I left Colonie at nine and was actually in Hummerston by eleven forty-five-traffic was light-and I drove in and out of the parking lot of the Belgrade Grotto. A few cars were still there, although it looked as if closing time was probably going to be twelve. Among the vehicles was a black Lincoln Navigator with a green dump sticker on a rear side window.
The club was a featureless single-story cinder block rectangle with a couple of blacked-out windows about seven feet up.
Some grotto.
I picked up a coffee at an all-night 7-Eleven and then sat in the car and sipped it and read the Hummerston Courier from cover to cover. The health department had warned Mikey's Eats about reusing its cooking oil more often than the department recommended, and the Tarantella twins had just turned three.
Just after one, I drove back over to Belgrade Grotto. All the cars were gone and the place was quiet. There were a couple of security lights blazing out in front, but the rear of the building was dark. I parked down the road at a disused gas station that had been turned into a used car lot. The place was deserted, so there was no chance anybody would be making an offer on my rented Honda in the next ten minutes.
I made my way in the darkness behind a muffler dealer and a porn shop back to the Belgrade Grotto. A few cars drove by out on the highway, but none slowed down or stopped.
The Grotto had a mailbox next to the road. I flipped it open and inserted an envelope containing one of Bud's four disks. On the front of the envelope, I had written From Sam Krupa. Copy to USCIS, the immigration service. Handwriting?
Fingerprints? I didn't think either was going to be a problem in this particular situation.
A car approached and I sank back behind a portable sign that said KARAOKE THURSDAY. After the car went by, I made my way to the rear of the Grotto. I assembled my petrol bomb-a bottle of gasoline with a gas-soaked rag as a wick and then smashed a window just above my head with a steel bar that lay nearby. An alarm went off- whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop! I ignited the bomb and tossed it through the window, and it exploded with a frightful ka-bang!
I trotted back behind the porn and muffler shops to my car, tripping once but catching my balance, and got into the Honda and drove off.
By the time I hit the Garden State Parkway, I was no longer shaking, and after I got on the Thruway, with Albany a straight shot north, I stopped at a service area and left with a large bottle of cold water and a slice of pizza. The pizza smelled of gasoline, however, from my hands, and as I pulled back onto the highway I tossed it out the car window.
Littering! That, I was ashamed of, and I almost went back and picked up my garbage. But the pizza was biodegradable, after all, and I was bone tired.
Timmy stirred but didn't awaken when I came in at four thirty-five. I showered and crawled into the second bed in the room. I lay awake for fifteen or more minutes, and then I was far away from it all. **** Just after nine Wednesday morning, Timmy brought some coffee back to the room, and I woke up.
'Donald, I think I heard you when you came in. What time was it?'
'Late. After midnight.'
'Where were you?'
'Making a mail delivery. Did you look at Bud's disk?' I had left a CD and a note for Timmy suggesting he examine the contents on my laptop.
'It's all incredible. Except it's not. They're the same people who brought Eliot Spitzer down. They're monstrous. They destroyed the US economy with their recklessness, and they're so morally bankrupt-or in such total denial-that they can't stand the idea of mending their greedy ways and abiding by regulations meant to protect ordinary investors and promote even a semblance of economic justice. And Sam Krupa, that evil old Republican troll! Wouldn't you just know.'
'Everything old is new again. Not all of Nixon's thugs found Jesus and repented.'
'So apparently you were being manipulated all along?
Krupa wanted you to get the goods on Louderbush, so he had you roughed up, knowing how pigheaded you are and how you'd just keep at it?'
'The question is, how did he know me so well? Some PIs would have said the hell with this, these people must not be messed with. He was sure I'd react the way I did. There's a reference to someone who claims to know me and who assures Krupa I could be danced around like a marionette.'
'I could have told them how you'd react to being pushed around. But I didn't.'
'What do you think Myron told Dunphy about me?'
'Probably that you were stubborn and a pain in the ass but a decent human being and quite effective at what you do.
And, yes, probably that you'd only be spurred on by a dangerous and challenging situation.'
'I'd ask Dunphy, but he's obviously not going to admit to anything.'
'I'm not sure he's that cynical. It could have been a lot of people. You're known around Albany.'
I climbed out of bed and had a slug of the motel's watery coffee. 'Did you listen to the CD and my interview with Trey Bigelow about Louderbush? Speaking of cynical.'
'No, I fell asleep before I got to that.'
'It's sickening. And heartbreaking.' I described Louderbush's brutal treatment of this sad case of a young man and Bigelow's story about at least one other boyfriend Louderbush had apparently put in the hospital. 'And then there's Greg Stiver. Louderbush got drunk and violent one time when Bigelow threatened to lock him out and said he'd once killed a recalcitrant boyfriend, and if Bigelow didn't cooperate he'd do it again. He said he had pushed this guy off a building.'
Timmy sat down. 'God. It's what the woman at SUNY almost saw happen.'
'Possibly. Or it might only have happened in Louderbush's head. I'll have to ask him.'
'Why would he admit anything to you? Anyway, he thinks he's got you defanged with all his blackmail crapola-the Bud stuff and so on that…who? Sam Krupa? — shoved through his mail slot.'
'Yes, but I've got my own Bud crapola, and Assemblyman Louderbush's mail slot is about to be the recipient of another eye-opening deposit.'
Timmy had called his office to say he'd be a little late, but now he was transitioning into his chief of staff mode, and he began climbing into his elegant costume. I said I wouldn't be back until late in the day and I'd be in touch. We kissed, and he was on his way.
I phoned the air service that had flown me to Kurtzburg and asked if somebody could fly me out there again that morning. They said they'd have to get an okay from the McCloskey campaign, but I told them I'd use a credit card and get reimbursed, and they said they thought Walt was around somewhere with his Cessna.
The day was breezy, and Walt did a couple of inadvertent loop-de-loops, but we arrived in Kurtzburg in one piece. There was no rental car waiting this time, but Walt suggested I call Dom's taxi.
