Three Classic Thrillers, Page 2

  “What type of work will I do initially?”

  They nodded and approved of the question. Lambert and McKnight looked at Lamar. This answer was his.

  “We have something similar to a two-year apprenticeship, although we don’t call it that. We’ll send you all over the country to tax seminars. Your education is far from over. You’ll spend two weeks next winter in Washington at the American Tax Institute. We take great pride in our technical expertise, and the training is continual, for all of us. If you want to pursue a master’s in taxation, we’ll pay for it. As far as practicing law, it won’t be very exciting for the first two years. You’ll do a lot of research and generally boring stuff. But you’ll be paid handsomely.”

  “How much?”

  Lamar looked at Royce McKnight, who eyed Mitch and said, “We’ll discuss the compensation and other benefits when you come to Memphis.”

  “I want a ballpark figure or I may not come to Memphis.” He smiled, arrogant but cordial. He spoke like a man with three job offers.

  The partners smiled at each other, and Mr. Lambert spoke first. “Okay. A base salary of eighty thousand the first year, plus bonuses. Eighty-five the second year, plus bonuses. A low-interest mortgage so you can buy a home. Two country club memberships. And a new BMW. You pick the color, of course.”

  They focused on his lips, and waited for the wrinkles to form on his cheeks and the teeth to break through. He tried to conceal a smile, but it was impossible. He chuckled.

  “That’s incredible,” he mumbled. Eighty thousand in Memphis equaled a hundred and twenty thousand in New York. Did the man say BMW! His Mazda hatchback had a million miles on it and for the moment had to be jump-started while he saved for a rebuilt starter.

  “Plus a few more fringes we’ll be glad to discuss in Memphis.”

  Suddenly he had a strong desire to visit Memphis. Wasn’t it by the river?

  The smile vanished and he regained his composure. He looked sternly, importantly at Oliver Lambert and said, as if he’d forgotten about the money and the home and the BMW, “Tell me about your firm.”

  “Forty-one lawyers. Last year we earned more per lawyer than any firm our size or larger. That includes every big firm in the country. We take only rich clients—corporations, banks and wealthy people who pay our healthy fees and never complain. We’ve developed a specialty in international taxation, and it’s both exciting and very profitable. We deal only with people who can pay.”

  “How long does it take to make partner?”

  “On the average, ten years, and it’s a hard ten years. It’s not unusual for our partners to earn half a million a year, and most retire before they’re fifty. You’ve got to pay your dues, put in eighty-hour weeks, but it’s worth it when you make partner.”

  Lamar leaned forward. “You don’t have to be a partner to earn six figures. I’ve been with the firm seven years, and went over a hundred thousand four years ago.”

  Mitch thought about this for a second and figured by the time he was thirty he could be well over a hundred thousand, maybe close to two hundred thousand. At the age of thirty!

  They watched him carefully and knew exactly what he was calculating.

  “What’s an international tax firm doing in Memphis?” he asked.

  That brought smiles. Mr. Lambert removed his reading glasses and twirled them. “Now that’s a good question. Mr. Bendini founded the firm in 1944. He had been a tax lawyer in Philadelphia and had picked up some wealthy clients in the South. He got a wild hair and landed in Memphis. For twenty-five years he hired nothing but tax lawyers, and the firm prospered nicely down there. None of us are from Memphis, but we have grown to love it. It’s a very pleasant old Southern town. By the way, Mr. Bendini died in 1970.”

  “How many partners in the firm?”

  “Twenty, active. We try to keep a ratio of one partner for each associate. That’s high for the industry, but we like it. Again, we do things differently.”

  “All of our partners are multimillionaires by the age of forty-five,” Royce McKnight said.

  “All of them?”

  “Yes, sir. We don’t guarantee it, but if you join our firm, put in ten hard years, make partner and put in ten more years, and you’re not a millionaire at the age of forty-five, you’ll be the first in twenty years.”

  “That’s an impressive statistic.”

  “It’s an impressive firm, Mitch,” Oliver Lambert said, “and we’re very proud of it. We’re a close-knit fraternity. We’re small and we take care of each other. We don’t have the cutthroat competition the big firms are famous for. We’re very careful whom we hire, and our goal is for each new associate to become a partner as soon as possible. Toward that end we invest an enormous amount of time and money in ourselves, especially our new people. It is a rare, extremely rare occasion when a lawyer leaves our firm. It is simply unheard of. We go the extra mile to keep careers on track. We want our people happy. We think it is the most profitable way to operate.”

  “I have another impressive statistic,” Mr. McKnight added. “Last year, for firms our size or larger, the average turnover rate among associates was twenty-eight percent. At Bendini, Lambert & Locke, it was zero. Year before, zero. It’s been a long time since a lawyer left our firm.”

  They watched him carefully to make sure all of this sank in. Each term and each condition of the employment was important, but the permanence, the finality of his acceptance overshadowed all other items on the checklist. They explained as best they could, for now. Further explanation would come later.

  Of course, they knew much more than they could talk about. For instance, his mother lived in a cheap trailer park in Panama City Beach, remarried to a retired truck driver with a violent drinking problem. They knew she had received $41,000 from the mine explosion, squandered most of it, then went crazy after her oldest son was killed in Vietnam. They knew he had been neglected, raised in poverty by his brother Ray (whom they could not find) and some sympathetic relatives. The poverty hurt, and they assumed, correctly, it had bred the intense desire to succeed. He had worked thirty hours a week at an all-night convenience store while playing football and making perfect grades. They knew he seldom slept. They knew he was hungry. He was their man.

  “Would you like to come visit us?” asked Oliver Lambert.

  “When?” asked Mitch, dreaming of a black 318i with a sunroof.

  The ancient Mazda hatchback with three hubcaps and a badly cracked windshield hung in the gutter with its front wheels sideways, aiming at the curb, preventing a roll down the hill. Abby grabbed the door handle on the inside, yanked twice and opened the door. She inserted the key, pressed the clutch and turned the wheel. The Mazda began a slow roll. As it gained speed, she held her breath, released the clutch and bit her lip until the unmuffled rotary engine began whining.

  With three job offers on the table, a new car was four months away. She could last. For three years they had endured poverty in a two-room student apartment on a campus covered with Porsches and little Mercedes convertibles. For the most part they had ignored the snubs from the classmates and coworkers in this bastion of East Coast snobbery. They were hillbillies from Kentucky, with few friends. But they had endured and succeeded quite nicely all to themselves.

  She preferred Chicago to New York, even for a lower salary, largely because it was farther from Boston and closer to Kentucky. But Mitch remained noncommittal, characteristically weighing it all carefully and keeping most of it to himself. She had not been invited to visit New York and Chicago with her husband. And she was tired of guessing. She wanted an answer.

  She parked illegally on the hill nearest the apartment and walked two blocks. Their unit was one of thirty in a two-story red-brick rectangle. Abby stood outside her door and fumbled through the purse looking for keys. Suddenly, the door jerked open. He grabbed her, yanked her inside the tiny apartment, threw her on the sofa and attacked her neck with his lips. She yelled and giggled as arms and legs thrashed ab
out. They kissed, one of those long, wet, ten-minute embraces with groping and fondling and moaning, the kind they had enjoyed as teenagers when kissing was fun and mysterious and the ultimate.

  “My goodness,” she said when they finished. “What’s the occasion?”

  “Do you smell anything?” Mitch asked.

  She looked away and sniffed. “Well, yes. What is it?”

  “Chicken chow mein and egg foo yung. From Wong Boys.”

  “Okay, what’s the occasion?”

  “Plus an expensive bottle of Chablis. It’s even got a cork.”

  “What have you done, Mitch?”

  “Follow me.” On the small, painted kitchen table, among the legal pads and casebooks, sat a large bottle of wine and a sack of Chinese food. They shoved the law school paraphernalia aside and spread the food. Mitch opened the wine and filled two plastic wineglasses.

  “I had a great interview today,” he said. “Who?”

  “Remember that firm in Memphis I received a letter from last month?”

  “Yes. You weren’t too impressed.”

  “That’s the one. I’m very impressed. It’s all tax work and the money looks good.”

  “How good?”

  He ceremoniously dipped chow mein from the container onto both plates, then ripped open the tiny packages of soy sauce. She waited for an answer. He opened another container and began dividing the egg foo yung. He sipped his wine and smacked his lips.

  “How much?” she repeated.

  “More than Chicago. More than Wall Street.”

  She took a long, deliberate drink of wine and eyed him suspiciously. Her brown eyes narrowed and glowed. The eyebrows lowered and the forehead wrinkled. She waited.

  “How much?”

  “Eighty thousand, first year, plus bonuses. Eighty-five, second year, plus bonuses.” He said this nonchalantly while studying the celery bits in the chow mein.

  “Eighty thousand,” she repeated.

  “Eighty thousand, babe. Eighty thousand bucks in Memphis, Tennessee, is about the same as a hundred and twenty thousand bucks in New York.”

  “Who wants New York?” she asked.

  “Plus a low-interest mortgage loan.”

  That word—mortgage—had not been uttered in the apartment in a long time. In fact, she could not, at the moment, recall the last discussion about a home or anything related to one. For months now it had been accepted that they would rent some place until some distant, unimaginable point in the future when they achieved affluence and would then qualify for a large mortgage.

  She sat her glass of wine on the table and said matter-of-factly, “I didn’t hear that.”

  “A low-interest mortgage loan. The firm loans enough money to buy a house. It’s very important to these guys that their associates look prosperous, so they give us the money at a much lower rate.”

  “You mean as in a home, with grass around it and shrubs?”

  “Yep. Not some overpriced apartment in Manhattan, but a three-bedroom house in the suburbs with a driveway and a two-car garage where we can park the BMW.”

  The reaction was delayed by a second or two, but she finally said, “BMW? Whose BMW?”

  “Ours, babe. Our BMW. The firm leases a new one and gives us the keys. It’s sort of like a signing bonus for a first-round draft pick. It’s worth another five thousand a year. We pick the color, of course. I think black would be nice. What do you think?”

  “No more clunkers. No more leftovers. No more hand-me-downs,” she said as she slowly shook her head.

  He crunched on a mouthful of noodles and smiled at her. She was dreaming, he could tell, probably of furniture, and wallpaper, and perhaps a pool before too long. And babies, little dark-eyed children with light brown hair.

  “And there are some other benefits to be discussed later.”

  “I don’t understand, Mitch. Why are they so generous?”

  “I asked that question. They’re very selective, and they take a lot of pride in paying top dollar. They go for the best and don’t mind shelling out the bucks. Their turnover rate is zero. Plus, I think it costs more to entice the top people to Memphis.”

  “It would be closer to home,” she said without looking at him.

  “I don’t have a home. It would be closer to your parents, and that worries me.”

  She deflected this, as she did most of his comments about her family. “You’d be closer to Ray.”

  He nodded, bit into an egg roll and imagined her parents’ first visit, that sweet moment when they pulled into the driveway in their well-used Cadillac and stared in shock at the new French colonial with two new cars in the garage. They would burn with envy and wonder how the poor kid with no family and no status could afford all this at twenty-five and fresh out of law school. They would force painful smiles and comment on how nice everything was, and before long Mr. Sutherland would break down and ask how much the house cost and Mitch would tell him to mind his own business, and it would drive the old man crazy. They’d leave after a short visit and return to Kentucky, where all their friends would hear how great the daughter and the son-in-law were doing down in Memphis. Abby would be sorry they couldn’t get along but wouldn’t say much. From the start they had treated him like a leper. He was so unworthy they had boycotted the small wedding.

  “Have you ever been to Memphis?” he asked.

  “Once when I was a little girl. Some kind of convention for the church. All I remember is the river.”

  “They want us to visit.”

  “Us! You mean I’m invited?”

  “Yes. They insist on you coming.”

  “When?”

  “Couple of weeks. They’ll fly us down Thursday afternoon for the weekend.”

  “I like this firm already.”

  2

  The five-story building had been built a hundred years earlier by a cotton merchant and his sons after the Reconstruction, during the revival of cotton trading in Memphis. It sat in the middle of Cotton Row on Front Street near the river. Through its halls and doors and across its desks, millions of bales of cotton had been purchased from the Mississippi and Arkansas deltas and sold around the world. Deserted, neglected, then renovated time and again since the first war, it had been purchased for good in 1951 by an aggressive tax lawyer named Anthony Bendini. He renovated it yet again and began filling it with lawyers. He renamed it the Bendini Building.

  He pampered the building, indulged it, coddled it, each year adding another layer of luxury to his landmark. He fortified it, sealing doors and windows and hiring armed guards to protect it and its occupants. He added elevators, electronic surveillance, security codes, closed-circuit television, a weight room, a steam room, locker rooms and a partners’ dining room on the fifth floor with a captivating view of the river.

  In twenty years he built the richest law firm in Memphis, and, indisputably, the quietest. Secrecy was his passion. Every associate hired by the firm was indoctrinated in the evils of the loose tongue. Everything was confidential. Salaries, perks, advancement and, most especially, clients. Divulging firm business, the young associates were warned, could delay the awarding of the holy grail—a partnership. Nothing left the fortress on Front Street. Wives were told not to ask, or were lied to. The associates were expected to work hard, keep quiet and spend their healthy paychecks. They did, without exception.

  With forty-one lawyers, the firm was the fourth largest in Memphis. Its members did not advertise or seek publicity. They were clannish and did not fraternize with other lawyers. Their wives played tennis and bridge and shopped among themselves. Bendini, Lambert & Locke was a big family, of sorts. A rather rich family.

  At 10 a.m. on a Friday, the firm limo stopped on Front Street and Mr. Mitchell Y. McDeere emerged. He politely thanked the driver, and watched the vehicle as it drove away. His first limo ride. He stood on the sidewalk next to a streetlight and admired the quaint, picturesque, yet somehow imposing home of the quiet Bendini firm. It was a far cry from
the gargantuan steel-and-glass erections inhabited by New York’s finest or the enormous cylinder he had visited in Chicago. But he instantly knew he would like it. It was less pretentious. It was more like himself.

  Lamar Quin walked through the front door and down the steps. He yelled at Mitch and waved him over. He had met them at the airport the night before and checked them into the Peabody—“the South’s Grand Hotel.”

  “Good morning, Mitch! How was your night?” They shook hands like lost friends.

  “Very nice. It’s a great hotel.”

  “We knew you’d like it. Everybody likes the Peabody.”

  They stepped into the front foyer, where a small billboard greeted Mr. Mitchell Y. McDeere, the guest of the day. A well-dressed but unattractive receptionist smiled warmly and said her name was Sylvia and if he needed anything while he was in Memphis just let her know. He thanked her. Lamar led him to a long hallway where he began the guided tour. He explained the layout of the building and introduced Mitch to various secretaries and paralegals as they walked. In the main library on the second floor a crowd of lawyers circled the mammoth conference table and consumed pastries and coffee. They became silent when the guest entered.

  Oliver Lambert greeted Mitch and introduced him to the gang. There were about twenty in all, most of the associates in the firm, and most barely older than the guest. The partners were too busy, Lamar had explained, and would meet him later at a private lunch. He stood at the end of the table as Mr. Lambert called for quiet.

  “Gentlemen, this is Mitchell McDeere. You’ve all heard about him, and here he is. He is our number one choice this year, our number one draft pick, so to speak. He is being romanced by the big boys in New York and Chicago and who knows where else, so we have to sell him on our little firm here in Memphis.” They smiled and nodded their approval. The guest was embarrassed.

  “He will finish at Harvard in two months and will graduate with honors. He’s an associate editor of the Harvard Law Review.” This made an impression, Mitch could tell. “He did his undergraduate work at Western Kentucky, where he graduated summa cum laude.” This was not quite as impressive. “He also played football for four years, starting as quarterback his junior year.” Now they were really impressed. A few appeared to be in awe, as if staring at Joe Namath.