Bury the Lead - By David Rosenfelt Page 0,69
guess what? Walter Castle hated Margaret Cummings.”
It could be because I’m still half-asleep, but it takes me a while to mentally process this information and identify Walter Castle. He is the Cleveland billionaire whose company lost over a hundred million dollars when Linda Padilla identified it as having caused a leukemia cluster. It is the connection I wished I would have had Marcus check out while he was in Cleveland. We have since gone over all of Padilla’s possible enemies, but none, including Castle, jumped out at us.
The fact that he even knew, no less hated, Daniel’s wife is a significant piece of news. “Why did he hate her?” I ask.
Now Vince gets smug, knowing his statement has jolted me from wanting him out of my house to anxiously waiting to hear more. “What happened to that coffee?”
I get Vince the coffee and wait while he downs a donut, not too long a wait, since he does so in one bite. “Margaret had a lot of time on her hands, and she tried to put it to good use. So she was active in a lot of causes, the environment, public health, that kind of thing.”
He inhales another donut, taking his time and relishing the fact that he has the floor. “She was the first one to raise the possibility of a leukemia cluster, and she wouldn’t let go of it. Padilla didn’t get in until much later, which made the story go national. And get this: Daniel wrote a story about it.”
He hands me the story and I skim through it. It’s really just a few paragraphs, obviously early on in the health controversy, recommending that it be thoroughly looked into.
“There’s not that much here,” I say.
“Right. But it was Margaret he hated. Daniel was just backing her up. The whole episode destroyed Walter Castle’s reputation . . . his legacy. So he has Margaret killed and then ruins Daniel. The perfect revenge.”
I’m not nearly as confident as Vince that this is the break we need, but it’s certainly an interesting development requiring and deserving much more investigation.
Laurie comes into the room, still in a bathrobe. “Good morning, Vince, want some granola?”
“Are you crazy? That stuff’ll burn a hole in your stomach.”
She goes into the kitchen and comes out a few moments later with a tasty bowl of granola and skim milk. Vince tells her about the Walter Castle connection, and she thinks it’s worth Marcus going back there to check. I agree, and also think I will put Eliot Kendall’s people on it, since it’s on their turf. I call Eliot on his cell phone, and he is excited about the news. He’s on the way to visit Daniel in the jail, and I give him permission to update Daniel on the developments.
For the next hour and a half, Vince peppers me with questions about Lassiter and whether I’ll be able to get my suspicions about him before a jury. He’s pleased, as I am, about the press coverage my interview has gotten. “You were the only thing on television last night,” he says.
“Not in this house. Laurie and Tara watched Harrison Ford.”
Vince puts his finger down his throat in a gagging gesture, which sends Laurie upstairs to put on a sweat suit for her morning jog. I use this opportunity to get Vince out of the house so I can spend the rest of the day preparing for court on Monday. I have a tradition, which is even more important during football season, to rest the day before I open my case, which is why I want to be free to spend Sunday in front of the television.
• • • • •
IF GOD HAD WANTED humans to communicate, he wouldn’t have invented caller ID. But I’m glad that somebody did, because I love it. It’s not the greatest invention of all time, which is to say it’s not quite up there with the point spread and the remote control, but it’s in that still-wonderful second tier, right alongside the cash machine, satellite TV, and light beer.
Combined with the answering machine, caller ID enables me to permanently avoid anyone I don’t want to talk to on the phone, which is most of the world’s population.
The Giants are playing the Dallas Cowboys today, and nothing short of an earthquake above 7.0 is going to get me off the couch. Certainly, a ringing phone won’t do it, though the phone rings repeatedly during the game. One of those times is