Читать книгу Job or death in Philadelphia. An American crime novel - - Страница 4

At thirty-five, I retired as a cab driver and acquired the most exquisite taste in clothes, furniture, architecture, design, landscaping and jewelry, all by virtue of my marriage to his highness, prince, landowner, and international lawyer, Alexander Davidoff. My new husband owned a family castle in Mooresville, NJ. Built a hundred years ago by his relatives as a hunting shed, the castle was an exact copy of a French mansion from the Champagne province. When I first saw this castle, two things became clear to me. First, I’d retired as a cab driver, and second, I have a lot of time on my hands to read mystery novels.

We moved in and spread out evenly through its fifty rooms. Under «we» I mean Alexander, his daughter Evana, me, my daughter Iris, Alexander’s butler Mark, the girls’ tutor Larissa, Alexander’s German shepherd Elvis, and my black cat Pepper.

Pepper was the first one to step inside our new house, according to the superstition rules of Alexander’s old country. I agreed that the three-story gray stone mansion needed some good guardian spirits. We took the cat to the door in his basket and let him inside. He stepped on the shiny hardwood floor with his legs straight and inflexible, like a little parading Pakistani soldier. The cat crossed the spacious entrance hall and then turned towards the kitchen. The shepherd, Elvis, surprised he wasn’t the first one this time, trotted behind Pepper, sniffing the air.

«Hey,» Alexander said, smiling. «They know their place in a house.»

Our animals disappeared into the kitchen. Surprised, we rushed there too. I stopped at the door. The countertops and a round dining table were loaded with tons of pizzas, chicken pies, salads, cakes, grilled meat, and fruits. Amid this abundance stood a British-looking man, holding a baking sheet filled with hot rolls.

«Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,» he said. «Where have you been the whole morning? I was about to eat it all myself!»

That’s how I met Mark, my husband’s butler.

Tired of eating, we took a trip around the house. There was a huge kitchen with a sunroom, dining room, living room, library, sauna, and a fitness room on the first floor. On the second floor were the master bedroom, my office, my husband’s office, and the girls’ bedrooms. Four spare bedrooms comprised the third floor. To clean all those square feet, we hired a cleaning aide, a middle-aged single mom named Claudia, against Joe’s advice about how dangerous it was to have other people in the house. According to him, there was a scam running through the cleaning community. They work for you two months, and then they sue you for bodily injuries and mental abuse. They see that you have money, and why not try to nibble on your bank account a bit? My husband usually listened to Joe like the old guy was his godmother, but this time Alexander ignored his advice. The first time in my life, I wasn’t doing housework and working for money. The first week I felt like a queen; the next week I caught myself watching soap operas at midday and having a second lunch. When, in the third week, Mark woke me up for dinner after my lunch nap, I took it as a real wake-up call and decided to start my own charity.

It was a late spring Friday. In anticipation of a nice long family dinner and a romantic evening with my husband, I made a mountain of sandwiches and went to drop some food at Joe’s office. Wheeling into the parking lot, I saw Joe’s Ford and somebody’s Honda parked there. Not wanting to interfere, I walked in and placed a package with lunch on a kitchenette table and turned to leave.

«Rachel? Come here this instant.»

Joe, who spent part of his life in the Navy, had a booming, husky voice that could reach you and stop you in your tracks from a block away. I entered his office and greeted him and his client, a short, bulky woman with brown hair.

«Listen, you nincom… Rachel, this is Deborah. Mrs. Cooper, this is Rachel, my assistant and my right hand. Can you please repeat your story to her? I found it very important that she would hear it from you.»

Deborah looked at me. Her slightly bulging eyes welled with tears.

«I had just started a new job and my co-worker accused me of stealing money and jewelry from her. She was leaving for a new location, and I was taking over her position. I waited for this position for four months,» she interrupted herself, sobbing. I brought her a cup of coffee, and she told us her story.

Debbie Cooper was from a family of college professors and scientists. In her parents’ house, people discussed numbers and laws of physics as if it was breaking news and weather updates. She had known the multiplication table since she was five, thanks to her uncle Bruce, who made it a routine when coming for dinner to play a numbers game with her, he called Number of the Day. «You can’t go wrong with math,» he liked to say. Being a genius mathematician himself, he worked for years on Wall Street as a market analyst, and after retirement at thirty-five, he took a tenured position at Princeton. His sister-in-law Elizabeth, Debbie’s mother, herself was a professor of physics at the community college. Debbie’s father used to be a financial analyst for Vanguard Group, but died a year ago of pneumonia complications.

Debbie’s love of numbers made it very easy for her to get an honorary scholarship at NYU. She graduated with a Bachelor of Finances and became the youngest woman to work as an accountant for Goldman Sachs. That is where she had met her husband, Pitt Cooper, working for the IT department. Ten years older, he was a big, forceful man who always knew what to do, and to her, a calm, scholarly girl, he looked like a safe haven. They had their share of city dating, which means fast, quick and in a hurry, before their roommate or parents showed up. They got married after sixteen months of dating, got a Tribeca apartment and had two children one after another. Debbie worked part-time, trying to concentrate on her sons, especially the oldest son, Matthew, who developed ADD at the age of four.

She had wanted to move to the suburbs, she said, and after seven years, God heard her prayers: Pitt became the Head of the IT department at Gordon’s Electronics in Philadelphia. They bought a spacious house in Cherry Hill and moved. Relaxed and happy in her new life, Debbie gets pregnant again, this time with a girl. Pitt, forty at the time, was completely crazy over this «little angel,» as he called her.

Away from the New York intensity, Matthew seemed to outgrow his emotional problems. Life was perfect until Debbie realized Pitt had a drinking problem. She suspected him of having affairs: he was coming home late or not at all. The final straw was his moving in with his lover. Debbie filed for divorce.

«It was five years ago,» she said, drying her eyes with a tissue. «We finalized our divorce only two months ago. It was all custody issues. He didn’t want to give me the kids. He just tormented me.»

Their family house was sold, and she and the kids rented a house. They couldn’t stay in their family house because Pitt took it as a habit to come over every night, shouting and cursing her, and blaming her for their paradise lost. Deciding to buy a house, she took a full-time accounting and case-working job in the city with NOSE: The National Office of Services to Emigrants. She started on the 4th of May, and five days later, she was accused of stealing by her co-worker, a job developer, Mrs. Gamma Woods.

«I worked in the corporate world and I know the rules, so I filed an Irregular Incident Report the next day.»

She opened a manila folder and read slowly, first, then faster.

«At the beginning of our conversation, Mrs. Gamma Woods notified me that she and her husband were coming at 8 pm to pick up the boxes with teaching materials from the office we shared for four days. When I told her that she was welcome to store her books and materials as long as it was convenient for her, she said that she wanted to pick up all her stuff on Monday night because she was concerned about the safety of her materials.»

«She said, „My money and jewelry were stolen from my handbag on Friday, May 8. I left my bag on the desk and was in and out of the office. Around lunchtime, I put the bag in the desk drawer. I took my bag from there around 8 at night and found that my money and jewelry were stolen. I thought that you would take care of my bag and look after it. I thought,“ she said, „that you would constantly be present in the office, making your phone calls, and would watch my handbag. Now, $110 and my jewelry has been stolen from my handbag. I have been working here for twenty years, and it has never happened before.“»

Joe listened, looking at Deborah with a funny expression on his face. His eyes were laughing.

«Did you see this damn handbag?» He asked, when Deborah stopped reading and reached for water.

«I did not see Mrs. Woods’ handbag among her other belongings and teaching materials,» she said firmly, as if he were a judge.

«Did she ask you to take care of her possessions?»

«She did not ask me to watch her bag. Why did she assume that her new co-worker was supposed to watch her bag?»

«I don’t know,» Joe replied. «I don’t know what this woman is doing, but she definitely knows what she’s doing. She’s trying to destroy you. Anything else, ma’am, that you want to tell me?»

Deborah wiped her nose with a tissue. «Yes. I think it’s very important that she had a financial transaction in the nearest drugstore from 3 to 3:30 pm, buying an inhaler for her husband, Mr. Woods, who was having an asthma attack. She had her handbag with her. If something was missing from her bag, why didn’t she tell you about it at the time?»

«I don’t know,» Joe said. «And I would ask her a couple of questions. What items of jewelry were missing? Can she present photographs of her jewelry? You said that people from the Carolinas Institute had been moving the furniture. How many of them? Who was moving the furniture? Why didn’t Mrs. Woods notify the police?»

«I found out,» Deborah replied, «that Gamma Woods contacted everybody in our local office and in the head office and told people that her money and expensive jewelry had disappeared from her handbag while I was in the office. Last week, everybody was talking about it. It’s like a slap in my face. I never took even a match from anybody. It’s simply not me. I can’t work, I can’t concentrate. I feel I should quit, but I have waited for this job for so long. I have bills to pay. I have to put food on the table.» Deborah blew her nose. «Please, help me. I have to sue this woman. She wants me to be fired because I took over her position.»

«It’s a terrible way to keep your job,» Joe muttered and lit up a cigarette. He was lounging in his chair, looking up at the ceiling. «How long has she been working there? Gamma Woods… Right?»

«Right.» Debbie nodded solemnly. «She has been working there for twenty years. She is a Philippine woman who came to this country about twenty years ago. I don’t think she has as good an education as I do, but she has got tons of experience. She knows exactly what this job needs.»

«Why was she getting removed?» I asked, still a little stunned by Joe calling me his «assistant.» Until now, he hadn’t called me anything but «nincompoop.»

«I don’t know the real reason,» Debbie responded. «She seems very well fit for this place.»

«She definitely sounds so,» Joe laughed, and then coughed. «You, ninc…, I mean Rachel! What would you do if you worked for twenty years for a company, and then got replaced and even fired?»

«I would cry,» I said after a brief consideration. I never worked over six months in one place, but I didn’t want Joe to know that.

«Well, Gamma made somebody else cry. Deborah, this is my little scenario for you for the next two weeks. In a couple of weeks, they will fire you for something, for anything: using too much toilet paper, having blue eyes, being right-handed or wearing gray business skirts.» Joe puffed his Newport.

«No, they can’t fire me. I’m a very good worker. I have great education and experience.» Debbie started sobbing, this time becoming angry with the attorney she decided to hire. Honestly, I felt like throwing my shoe at the guy.

Joe just smiled. «They can, and they will. Babe, what poked you in the eye to take a job for a Philadelphia company? You live in New Jersey, so get work in New Jersey. Go and work for your kids’ school district. You will be around them. You can always take a day off; you know all the news. You’re a single mom! Leave the corporate world to bitches like Gamma Woods. Pennsylvania is an At Will state. Employers have all the rights there. They can fire you at any time for any reason at all, and you can’t sue them for that. But there’s something else here. Seems to me, you’ve got in the middle of something. You want to sue them? Let’s sue them! File a libel, slander and defamation of character lawsuit. Are they a corporation?»

«Yes, they receive government money for working with immigrants. It’s a big corporation. I actually found it very bizarre the way they treat refugees. They have this interoffice code, and they call their immigrant clients «moo-moos.»

«I like that. I truly do.» Joe frowned. «Let’s sue them for a couple of million dollars. You’ll get a half million-dollar settlement, buy a new house and start working for your local school district.»

Joe pulled a pile of paper out of his drawer and offered Debbie an agreement to sign. She even smiled, listening to his intense speech. I heard him once in court arguing on my behalf and knew that he could be loud and eloquent in defending his clients.

Walking her to her car, I promised Debbie that everything would be great. She grabbed my hand. «I’m so glad you’re a woman. You can understand me; how terrible this is! First divorce, then this… I try to do everything I can for my children, but I have to work and pay bills. I don’t understand why I must suffer so much. Please, work on my case. This woman is evil.»

I promised her to do everything in my power and returned to the office. Joe was sitting in the kitchen, munching on sandwiches.

«So? Why did you call me your assistant? This poor woman really hopes we will work on her case.»

«So? Do you believe she is not a thief?» He had this horrible habit of giving you a question for answer.

«I believe her. She’s a single mom, and she needed this job desperately. The other woman was losing her job. They wanted her out after twenty years. It’s not good either, but Debbie has nothing to do with it.»

«Are you sure?» Joe looked at me with his impossible black eyes. «What if Debbie had a relationship with their boss? What if they’re lovers? You’re a nincompoop. Somewhere, somehow, there is a reason she got into this situation. If we find the reason, we find the best way to defend her in court. Now you, young lady, just look for this reason.»

«Me?»

«Who else? Not me, thank you very much. I’m staying in my office because I’ve got other stuff to do. Some very urgent and important stuff. If you like her, if you like this case, be my assistant. Interview her co-workers, take depositions, arrange a polygraph test for her. If she doesn’t flunk it, we will take her case to court. They bid for federal money, they need a squeaky-clean reputation. And in this case, their reputation won’t be so squeaky-clean anymore.»

Getting outside, I squinted at the shiny spring afternoon. I thought it could happen only to a book character, to have your life completely overturned in a moment. This morning I didn’t know what to do and felt useless while my life was slipping through my fingers. My husband worked day and night looking for war criminals and defending their victims. Our daughters opposed my slightest attempt to mother them. Our house was cleaned, and food cooked by somebody who was making a living out of my laziness. Suddenly, it all started to make sense because I realized what I should be doing my entire life. I would be a lawsuit investigator! I would gather all the bits and pieces of information that would constitute our victory over evil.

Angels blew their trumpets, it was my life calling, I knew that.

«I’m a lawsuit detective,» I repeated to myself over and over again, driving home. I felt a sharp, intense energy boiling inside of me. «I’ll become the damn best lawsuit detective ever.» Since it was almost four in the afternoon, I decided to start my investigation right after dinner.