The Anonymous Client

to deal. That was part of his game. He was most agreeable. He would be delighted to return me Marilyn Harding’s ten grand in return for small bills. The only catch was, he wanted twelve thousand.”
    “So you brought Marilyn’s bills back?”
    Kemper grimaced. “I thought I did.”
    “And you put them in an envelope and sent them to me. Along with the letter.”
    “That’s right.”
    “Why?”
    “Marilyn was in trouble, big trouble. I wasn’t sure I could deal with it alone. I knew she needed help, and a special kind of help. This wasn’t something you could take to the cops. Or to any regular lawyer. Then I thought of you.”
    “Why me?’
    “I know Sheila Benton. I met her a long time ago through Marilyn. Happened to run into her just before she left for Europe. She told me about her case. What you did for her. Not so much in court. She said you did other things. Discreetly. Confidentially. Things no one would ever know about. She said you were a genius. I figured that’s what Marilyn needed. So I typed the letter and sent you those bills as a retainer. But I had to be very discreet. Very below board. I didn’t want to implicate Marilyn by mentioning her by name. I knew if you were as quick as all that, you’d immediately trace the serial numbers of the bills and find out who’d withdrawn them from the bank. You’d find out it was Marilyn, and you’d start protecting her.
    “Only I hadn’t figured on Bradshaw.”
    “He switched the bills?”
    “Of course. As soon as I offered to buy them back, Bradshaw knew what I was after. So he played me for a sucker. He charged me twelve grand, and instead of Marilyn’s ten grand, he sold me ten bills he’d drawn out of the bank himself.”
    “Which you promptly mailed to me,” Steve said. “Making my life a living hell ever since. Tell me something. Did you mention my name?”
    “What?”
    “To Bradshaw. When you called on Bradshaw. Did you mention me?”
    “Yeah. As a matter of fact, I did. I told him you were my lawyer, and if he made any more trouble he’d hear from you.”
    Steve shook his head. “Jesus Christ.”
    “What’s wrong with that?”
    “Little presumptuous, don’t you think? You hadn’t even consulted me.”
    “Yeah. At first I was bluffing. But that’s when I decided to. Hire you, I mean.”
    “Great. And when was this?”
    “Monday.”
    “The seventh?”
    “Yeah.”
    “That’s when you met Bradshaw and bought back the bills?”
    “Right.”
    “Then why did Marilyn go see him on Tuesday, the eighth?”
    “’Cause she didn’t know I’d got the bills back. I hadn’t been able to talk to her.”
    “You hadn’t told her you were going to do it?”
    “No. I hadn’t figured it out at the time. When I was talking to her, I mean. I only told her she made a mistake giving ’em to him. She was worried about it, and she went to Bradshaw to try to straighten things out herself.”
    “That’s on Tuesday?”
    “Yeah.”
    “What happened?”
    “Nothing. Bradshaw was nice as could be. He was sorry she’d upset herself, but there was nothing to worry about. I’d been there the day before and bought the bills back, hadn’t I told her? Relax, everything was going to be just fine, and if she didn’t believe him, why didn’t she talk to me.
    “Which it turned out she couldn’t do, because when she met me on the boat I was with my wife and we never got a moment alone.”
    “All right. That’s Tuesday. What about Wednesday?”
    Kemper grimaced. “Just what you’d expect. Bradshaw made another pass at Marilyn. The son of a bitch. He’d just told her everything was straightened out to let her think she was off the hook. To give her one peaceful day. To let her see just how good that felt, just how wonderful that feeling of relief could be. Before he jerked the rug out from under her.”
    “What happened?”
    “She called me at work. She was hysterical. You gotta remember, that was the same day she found out her father’d been murdered. She’d had cops at the house all morning. She’d just gotten rid of them when she got the phone call. It was Bradshaw at his oiliest best. He was so sorry, but he needed more money, and the whole spiel. He had another photostat of the motel reservation—what a surprise, right?—and he had the bills she withdrew from the bank, proof she paid blackmail. Of course that shocked the hell out of her. She thought I’d bought them back. He told her different. He had her ten