Chapter 33.
Murray’s resurrection was met with joy from his sister, confusion from the police and guilt from him. Murray claimed he’d been held captive for weeks, by his Polish kidnappers – the truth was, he’d barely been there long enough to work up an appetite. The rage and torrent of threats that the Polish kidnappers made during their arrest, cemented their prison terms. One detective thought it strange that the same kidnappers, happened to be in the possession of two Donald Trump rubber masks – the kind that were used in Max’s ‘staged’ kidnapping. Max argued that Donald Trump was everywhere, like a virus. Murray added that immeasurable numbers of banks, gas stations, jewelry stores and bodegas were robbed by President Nixon, from the seventies, all the way through, until Bill Clinton’s political career took a dive under the Oval Office desk, with a cigar and an intern, and for some reason bank robbers found him more interesting.
There was no time to waste reliving the experience or recuperating from it, Murray went straight into planning our very conscious uncoupling, from Harvey Spinks and his reality TV empire. Murray had taken up office in the shed out at the back of our house. He liked the solitude and I think he liked being around me. He didn’t need to risk life and limb for bathroom breaks – the front door was always open to him.
I visited him regularly. He used to sit in front of an old typewriter – the kind that no one uses anymore. All day long, thick fingers poked out of his large flowing dress like ten sausages and hammered away on the keys. It sounded like a train – clackety-clackety-clackety-clunk, clackety-clackety-clackety-clunk, clackety-clackety-clackety-clunk. I liked the sound, until the bell rang. I sometimes barked when the bell rang. It reminded me of a time when I was a very young dog and was being trained. My handler used to ring a bell when I did something wrong.
Stacks of papers grew on Murray’s desk, next to leather covered books marked with scraps of paper. He told people that he was happy. Whenever asked by a member of my family about how things were going he always smiled and confidently said everything was going well and that he thought he had a case. I wasn’t convinced. He smelled different. It was a stench of anxiety. Not just the kind when someone is worried about something but the scent of someone who knows that they are, to use Max’s new word – fucked. Murray had chewed his fingernails beyond the skin. He had taken to pulling the hairs out of his wig, one by one. The floor was often a nest of orphaned hair.
Within three days of Murray submitting our case to the courts, Harvey Spinks and Flowers arrived at our home, with a man who looked like he broke bones for a living. His name was Vernon Wayco but he didn’t break bones – he was a highly respected lawyer who created havoc in anyone’s life that jeopardized the business interests or reputation of his client. Unfortunately for us, his client was Harvey Spinks who’s business interest was Creative Reality Productions. Vernon Wayco smelled like he bathed in expensive cologne but it could never mask his real scent – fury. His skin reminded me of that giant pickle on the jar, where Chuck kept his Latvian holiday fund. Vernon Wayco didn’t say anything but he observed us like we were prey and he looked like he was trying to find our weakness. Our weaknesses were not hard to find. We were poor and our legal counsel was an aging transvestite with questionable business acumen.
Murray sat with a pen and notebook and pretended to write notes when Harvey Spinks talked but all he did was draw doodles of cats. I didn’t know why he was drawing cats – I didn’t even know Murray liked cats.
“You see folks, I don’t believe in threats, I like to see this conversation as an advanced warning,” Harvey Spinks said. He gestured to Vernon Wayco who was transfixed on the patterns of Murray’s floral dress. “Mr. Wayco here, is one of the best contract lawyers in the business, and to not, put too fine a point on it, could convince Mahatma Gandhi that he was legally obligated to become a beef eating, bare knuckle cage fighter or lose the smock off his back.”
“Impressive!” Chuck said.
Harvey Spinks nodded in agreement. “Yes, it most certainly is Chuck and you know that the odds of you winning this case are less than the odds of you playing the next James Bond.”
Chuck rubbed his belly that looked like it was trying to escape his ‘Stuntmen are hard to Kidnap’ t-shirt. He slapped the half moon of pasty flesh, with a loud shlopping noise. “Are we talking the Connery or Craig period?”
Chuck proceeded to do a really bad Sean Connery impersonation. “Mishter Shpinksh, you’ve got to have faith laddie. You only live onesh.”
Harvey Spinks gave him a patronizing grin. “That’s funny, you’re a funny man Chuck, very funny. But fortunately for me and not so fortunately for you, I’ve got a contract, clad tighter than a gnat’s ass. With that in mind I doubt the laughter will be too plentiful, once the sluice gates of this case come crashing open.”
“That’s what I’m counting on but I’m curious to know why Mr. Wacko is here?” Murray asked. “Window dressing?”
“It’s Way-coh,” Flowers corrected.
“Just remember that after this meeting any shred of civility between us ends, because once I release the junkyard dog, he does not come back until there’s flesh between his teeth and let me be very, very clear, this dog bites,” Harvey Spinks said.
“I’m not sure how I’d take that Mr. Way-Coh,” Murray said looking up from his cat doodles. “Being called a dog. I’m sure that must breach some kind of employer, employee contract or is it a client confidentiality type thing?”
Vernon Wayco didn’t flinch. He looked like a gunslinger, waiting to draw, in one of those old western movies – ready, to blow a forty-five hole, through our collective skull.
Harvey Spinks grinned, a big dirty cat grin. “I’m afraid you’ll have to do a lot better than parlour tricks, Mister Shamowski. This man has seen and heard every trick in the book. He knows it from cover to cover and back again.”
“Well then, I suppose I’ll have to leave my squirting lapel flower at home,” Murray said.
Vernon Wayco cleared his throat and leaned his heavy frame into the conversation. “I have one question,” he said. “Why?”
“Why what?” Rufus asked.
“Why did you sign up for this? All of this.”
The room hunted for a spokesman to answer the threatening force of Vernon Wayco.
“I think it was a case of, be careful for you wish for you just might get it,” Lenny said.
“Ok thank you,” Vernon Wayco said, pretending he’d been enlightened, but he looked like he already knew the answer.
“We’ve said our piece and won’t be staying for refreshments,” Harvey Spinks said. “A wise man once said, trying to design the perfect plan, is the perfect recipe for disappointment.”
“You better bring more than your bag of fortune cookies to trial,” Minnie said. “And refreshments in this house are saved for guests not stray dogs.”
“As always, a pleasure Minnie,” Harvey Spinks said, like he was enjoying jousting with her. “You’re a rare treat Minnie. You’re like a little truffle buried deep, and just waiting to have the mud washed from it.”
She waved him off with a flick of her thin, translucent wrist. The unwelcome party of three, arose and left without any further to-do. No one in the room said a word, until the silence became uncomfortably foreign. Chuck clambered out of the jaws of the couch. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. By the way, no pressure Murray.”
One by one everyone left Murray to contemplate the battle that lay ahead. Four generations of this family had placed their careers, legal woes and financial affairs, in the hands of Murray Shamowski. No matter how fruitless those duties became for Murray, he was always there in our corner. He always found an angle, or the tiniest crack that he could dig his nails into and drag us out to safety – this time he looked lost. He looked lonely sitting by the window. The sunlight revealed a weary looking body through his shapeless dress. I walked over to him and laid down by his feet. He groaned as he leaned down to pat me on my head.
“I envy you Chumley,” he said. “I’d give anything to have a simple life like yours. You know exactly what you want. What am I to do old boy?”
I turned my head to let him scratch under my ear. A voice came from outside the doorway. “Damn, if you’re asking Chumley, then we really are in serious trouble.”
Max shuffled into the room. Murray looked embarrassed and chuckled nervously. “You know my father used to say, sometimes the wisest words come from the quietest of corners,” Murray said.
“Unless you’ve become a dog whisperer, I think Chumley’s corner is going to be pretty damn quiet.”
Max shuffled over and poured two large glasses of brandy. He took a sneaky nip from the bottle.
“Are we screwed?” Max asked with his back to Murray. He looked like he was giving Murray the benefit of not trying to lie to his face. Murray stared down at his feet like he was looking for an answer in the corns and bunions of his two giant hooves.
“It’s not over til it’s over Max. My best rescues often come at the eleventh hour.”
They sat for a short while and sipped their brandies.
“To be honest, this entire circus hasn’t really bothered me that much but Minnie has not enjoyed the invasion into her life,” Max said. “At our age, the years are precious and the thought of another three years of this craziness is too much. But I know you’ll do your best.”
“I will Max.”
Max poured Murray another large brandy and left him in solitude, once again. Murray must have spent and hour looking down at his toes. He stretched them upwards and tapped them on the floor. He folded his big toe over two of his other toes. He had very big feet and very long toes. He pulled himself up and moved out to his makeshift office in the shed. I needed to piss so I followed him out but I was also looking for something to do. He dragged an old wheelbarrow that had been comfortably rusting away at the back of the house, into the front garden and in it, he piled every single one of the notes that he’d spent weeks rattling out on his typewriter. I couldn’t understand what he was doing. He took a swig from the brandy bottle, poured a generous salute of brandy onto his labour and threw a match to it. Black burning papers rose up out of the flames and danced lightly, away in the direction of Hollywood. Murray stoked the fire with an old, bent golf club. His floral patterned dress was scorched and bruised by this unexpected ritual. He stared into the flames and smiled like he’d just been told a secret.