emblem. Below it, in black, gothic lettering was the framed inscription, “Zero Defects.” Impressive. All he needed was running water, a stain on the wall, and a young girl on her knees to make it Our Lady of Law Enforcement.
Behind the desk, leaning back in an oversized black leather chair, sat Ralph McKinley Tinkerton himself, talking into a telephone he held cradled in the crook of his shoulder while his tapped a gold Cross pen on a pad of legal paper. I had no idea what Tinkerton looked like, but it had to be him. That was what the nameplate on the desk said and no else one in that law office would have had the balls to sit in the managing partner's chair and put their stocking feet up on his desk, not with his pet Troll lurking outside the door. He was a big man: tall with long legs, broad shoulders, and the neck of an offensive tackle. He looked to be in his late 40s, trim and fit, but with the first signs of crow's-feet digging in around his eyes and mouth. His hair was thick and dark, which made me wonder if he had a little bottle of Grecian Formula 16 hidden somewhere inside that big desk. A big-time lawyer with a big- time ego trying to cheat the clock? Who would have guessed? Not that he didn't look comfortable, hiding away here in his inner sanctum. He'd rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt to his elbows. He'd pulled his tie down and his vest was unbuttoned. However, from his expression, the managing partner did not look as if he was managing to have a good day, and that was before I barged in.
I set the two white bags on the coffee table and plopped down on Tinkerton's expensive brown-leather couch. His eyes followed me across the room as he listened, talked, and wrote on the legal pad. Good job, I thought, wondering whether he got it from the Troll or she got it from him. With some luck though, he could triple- bill and in a place like this, that was all that mattered. I'm not sure how much of his brain had focused on me yet. Probably not much. I stuck my nose inside the bag and pulled out two sandwiches and one of the bottles of Doctor Brown's. That was when Tinkerton finally noticed me. His eyes were battleship gray and as cold as a rainy November day as they looked me up and down. He frowned. Why would a mere sandwich delivery boy barge into
“Can I help you?” he snapped in an exasperated West Texas twang that sounded like it blew straight in from a hot, dusty oil field.
“That's a real nice watch you've got there, Ralph,” I pointed. “They gave my grandfather a silver one when he retired from the Santa Fe, but it was nothing like that big goober you got. Guess he should have tried the Justice Department, 'cause it's amazing the loot you can score these days in public service. Now, which do you want? The corned beef or pastrami?”
“Pastrami? What? Who in the Holy Hell are you?” he demanded to know as the office door rattled back and forth, as someone on the outside tried frantically to open it.
I heard a key rattling in the lock. The door suddenly flew open and his angry and somewhat disheveled Troll stumbled into the office. I looked at her and smiled pleasantly. After all, I was nothing if not a good sport and a gracious winner, but the Troll had not come alone. Behind her, she had brought reinforcements: two young associates who rear-ended her and almost knocked her down. They peered cautiously over her shoulder, still not certain that “bouncer” was part of their job descriptions.
“Mr. Tinkerton, I don't know what to say,” the flustered Troll stammered. “I called Security…”
“Hi, Ralph. My name's Talbott, Peter Emerson Talbott,” I told him. “Does that name ring a bell?”
Tinkerton started to speak and then he paused. He stared across the desk at me and I swore I could see the wheels going round and round behind those cold, November-gray eyes of his. “That won't be necessary, Edna,” he finally told the Troll with a forced smile. “I have it covered.”
“But Mr. Tinkerton,” she sputtered. “He… he ...”
“It's all right, Edna. But thank you for your concern.”
Despite his reassurances, her eyes never left me.
“Edna,” I said to her. “You look like the wild-and-crazy pastrami type. Here, fresh from the Bouncing Bagel across the street, so you enjoy, girl.” I reached out and placed a thick, wax-paper wrapped sandwich in her hands. Her mouth dropped open as she looked over at Tinkerton for help, then at me, then back at Tinkerton as she slowly backed out of the room, not knowing what to do with the sandwich.
The door closed behind her and Tinkerton and I were alone again. I opened one of the corned beef sandwiches and held the other one out to him, but he didn't move. He just stared at me. “You sure?” I offered again as I took a big bite out of mine. “There's a little place on Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena that does it better, but this ain't half bad.”
He hung up the phone, ignoring whoever it was on the other end. “You're pretty damned sure of yourself, aren't you?” he glowered.
“About the corned beef? You'd better believe it. Or do you mean about the scam you guys are pulling?”
“The scam?” he erupted indignantly. “Who the hell are you?”
“Ralph, I haven't got it all figured out yet, not all of it anyway, but I will.” He still had not accepted the other sandwich, so I shrugged and took another big bite out of mine.
“Now I remember,” his cold gray eyes narrowed suspiciously. “You're the individual Larry Greene told me about yesterday.”
“That individual? Yeah, I bet he did.” I laughed, my mouth full of corned beef. Clearly, the managing partner was not accustomed to treatment in this manner, not in his own office, but I was just getting rolling.
“He said someone stopped by his funeral home yesterday afternoon alleging to be the late Peter Talbott.”
“Alleging? God, I love you lawyers. Alleging.”
“Now see here ...”
“It's real simple, Ralph. You screwed up. Me? I got no dog in this fight, as they used to say on those old hardscrabble farms in West Texas. So why should I care about this little con ya'll are running anyway? Me? I'd much rather be minding my own business back in Boston right now, but you Bozos had to piss me off by dragging my wife into this thing of yours, didn't you?”
“Your wife?”
I leaned forward, my eyes boring in as I pointed an angry finger at him. “Yeah, and that was your big mistake, Ralph. I'm not going to let you get away with it.”
He sat and studied me for a moment, as if he had missed something, as if he wasn't quite sure anymore. When he did speak, he was the composed, self-assured lawyer carefully choosing his words. “Look, Mr. Talbott, if that really is your name...”
“That's exactly how my conversation with your pal Larry Greene started. I thought you guys talked?”
“Mr. Talbott, you have this all wrong. One of my clients did indeed die in a tragic automobile accident — him and his wife. From what you say, apparently you and he shared the same name and some background. With three- hundred million people in this country, it's a wonder it doesn't happen more often.”
“A wonder, an absolute wonder.”
“I'm sorry for any inconvenience and emotional distress that may have caused you or your wife, but I don't see how this was any fault of mine.”
“My wife's dead, as you well know.”
“As I know? See here, Mr. Talbott…”
“So you knew old Pete?”
“Our Mr. Talbott? Of course, I knew him. Not well, I must admit. He ran a small accounting business here in town.”
“The one over on Sickles? Don't make me laugh. I doubt an honest 1040 ever came out of a dump like that. He couldn't afford one hour of your billing time, much less the retainer a firm like this would require and I'd have proven it too, except you guys cleaned the place out.”
“You guys?” He looked at me in disbelief. “Exactly what are you are alleging I've done, Mister Talbott?”
“Ah, that wonderful word again, “alleging.” You cleaned out his office. Hell, you even cleaned out his dumpster. It was sanitized, like the house on Sedgwick. Packed up, picked clean, and gone down the street before the last shovelful of dirt landed on those caskets up at Oak Hill Cemetery. Yep, you are thorough, Ralph, I'll hand you that much. But who the hell parks two associate partners in a residential street all morning watching some movers pack a truck? Someone with an unlimited budget, or no budget at all.”
I was watching his eyes. When I mentioned shoveling dirt up at Oak Hill and the moving truck, he did a
