Dead Certain

Great-grandfather, and they’re feeding them to the press.”
    Mother handed me a manila envelope. Inside was what appeared to be the draft of a magazine piece entitled “Blood Money.” A note clipped to the front indicated that it was slated for publication in NorthShore , a glossy lifestyle magazine that circulated in the city’s affluent northern suburbs. I skimmed it quickly. It was about the purported origins of Chicago’s most famous family fortunes and how many of the city’s most prominent philanthropists owed their good fortune to an ancestor who hadn’t hesitated to rob, smuggle, or even commit murder for financial gain.
    While Everett Prescott was featured prominently, his exploits running opium and guns in the China trade were hardly the only misdeeds the article chronicled. I had to hand it to Gerald Packman. There was almost nothing that would mortify my family more than to be pilloried in public, except perhaps knowing that their friends were being subjected to the same treatment on their account.
    “Denise says she’s received phone calls from reporters at the Tribune and the Sun-Times saying that they’re thinking of doing similar articles,” complained Mother.
    “I warned you this would happen,” I said, trying my best to sound sympathetic. “You have to see this for what it is, a sign that we’re getting to them. I told you they would never go down without a fight. Well, this is how they’re fighting.”
    “If they publish this, it will kill your grandmother,” declared Mother dramatically. “You might as well just go ahead and order the coffin.”
    “There is nothing new in this,” I said, pointing to the manuscript. “Every single one of these allegations—that Everett Prescott made his money selling drugs and guns, that he kept Chinese women—every single one of them has been in print before. Hell, how else do you think they managed to dig it all up so fast? Believe me, Grandmother will live through it.”
    “That’s easy enough for you to say. You didn’t get this in the mail today.” Mother reached into the Neiman Marcus bag at her feet and pulled out a package just slightly larger than a shoebox and handed it to me. It felt terribly light.
    “It’s empty,” I said.
    “No, it’s not. Look inside.”
    I lifted up the top. Inside was a sheet of white paper on which someone had scrawled in red crayon the single word, BANG!
     

CHAPTER 19
     
    That night I took Mother’s Neiman Marcus bag along with me to dinner. I was meeting Elliott at Brasserie Jo, the pretty French bistro on Hubbard. He’d called while I was in with my mother, and Cheryl had accepted his dinner invitation on my behalf. Unfortunately, she hadn’t thought to ask him whether the judge had handed down a verdict yet in the fraud case, so I didn’t know if Elliott was back from Springfield for an hour or for good.
    A quick call from Cheryl to the personal shopper at Saks solved the problem of what I was going to wear—a dove gray suit with a cropped jacket with a round feminine collar and a short and narrow skirt. There was also a scoop-necked blouse to wear underneath. When I held it up to my shoulders, it looked like it would expose more skin than I usually show at the beach.
    I laid it over the back of my chair and took the black Manolo Blahnik pumps out of their box and set them gingerly on top of my desk. They looked so dangerous I was afraid I might hurt myself.
    “I’m assuming you’re not supposed to actually wear these on your feet,” I declared. “I mean, they’re really just a form of weird fetishist sculpture—”
    “According to what I read in Vogue magazine, they are considered the sexiest shoes made,” my secretary informed me. “They’re remarkably comfortable, and they never go out of style.”
    I set them down on the carpet and stepped into them. “You’re absolutely right,” I said, doing my best to adjust to the altitude in the stiltlike stilettos. “I’m sure the hookers of ancient Rome wore something similar.” I didn’t like to say it, but they actually were comfortable. “What else is there?” I asked as Cheryl dug through the tissue at the bottom of the bag.
    She came up holding a lacy black push-up bra and matching panties.
    “And who, pray tell, are those supposed to be for?” I demanded.
    “Elliott,” replied my secretary as she flashed me a knowing smile.
     
    Elliott was waiting for me at the door, still dressed for court in a dark blue