Chapter 34

I HAD SET up a date with R.T. at Alden Park, so we could lehaul away Manley’s LeBaron, but before that little joyous prank I had something else that needed doing.

Philadelphia College of Art is pressed between the Franklin Institute, with its great silver ball of static electricity that stands hair on end, and the Pennsylvania Museum of Natural History, with its giant skeletal T-Rex, posed to pierce flesh and bone. The art students hanging outside PCA seemed to have cheerily passed through both hazards and decided they liked the look. I liked the look too – on them. They glanced warily my way as I passed by in my navy blue suit, heavy black wingtips, narrow red polyester tie. I suppose the art students in their black clothes, colored spiky hair, piercings, their tattooed necks and shaved eyebrows considered their garb as a wry comment on society’s mores. Funny, about the professional clothes I wore I felt the very same way.

So here I was back at school, feeling out of place among the throng, off to see the dean. Some things never change.

“I don’t believe I can help you, Mr. Carl,” said Dean Sandhurst, a tall rawboned woman with bright eyes and big hands, whose jaw twitched as she spoke. Her crisp white shirt was open at the top and, though her gray hair was so tightly bound it eased the deep lines around her eyes, a few stray wisps were left free to soften the edges of her face. “Our admissions policies here are very strict and our responsibility is to the whole student body. No personal appeals, other than the usual letters of recommendation, are generally allowed.”

“I understand that, Dean.”

“I only agreed to meet with you as a favor to Philip, who helped me through a difficult time a few years ago.” A divorce case, Skink had said, the usual thing, you understand, Skink had said. I did. No one loves a PI more than a woman in trouble. “My return of the favor only goes as far as allowing this meeting. It won’t affect the admissions decision.”

“Of course it won’t. And it shouldn’t. I just hoped I’d be able to ease any concerns you might have about an applicant and maybe request the decision, whether positive or negative, be made sooner rather than later.”

“When would you need to hear? February? March?”

“By early next week.”

“Mr. Carl, that simply won’t be possible. There is a process that must be followed. There are committees. We can’t rush these things. What is so important that the applicant must hear by early next week?”

“That is when he is due to be sentenced in Common Pleas Court by Judge Horace Wellman.”

“Ah, I see. Yes. You’re a lawyer, Mr. Carl.”

“That I am.”

“Philip didn’t tell me.”

“I find he often leaves out the best parts.”

“And the applicant you want to discuss is a client.”

“Yes, he is.”

“Nice try, Mr. Carl, but I can’t help you. This is an institution of higher learning. We are not a tool to be used by sly lawyers for the reduction of criminal sentences. You will have to find some other angle to help your client.”

“This is not an angle, Dean Sandhurst. I have too much respect for PCA and for my client, Rashard Porter, for that. I’ve been a lawyer for almost a decade, but this is the first time I’ve ever spoken up for a client to a college dean. Most of my clients have talents in areas I don’t want to encourage. But Rashard Porter is a good kid, in bad circumstances, who happens to be a stellar artist. Partly I’m here, yes indeed, because I think an acceptance would help at his sentencing. But I’m also here because I believe the sentencing itself could help Rashard in the next crucial phase of his life. The criminal justice system doesn’t only have to be a way to mete out jail time, it can also be the one time a kid in perilous circumstances gets a clear-eyed look at his situation and a meaningful plan to transcend it. For some it’s drug rehab that’s needed, for some it’s psychiatric counseling.”

“But we are not a drug rehabilitation facility, Mr. Carl, nor a psychiatric institution.”

“Of course not. But if Rashard is accepted at PCA, I could have his attendance and performance here made an important condition of his probation. Nothing focuses the mind like a judge looking over your shoulder. Rashard needs a little discipline, most nineteen-year-old kids do, but maybe the criminal justice system, and his lawyer, and PCA might help counteract the other forces in his life and give him what he needs to pursue his destiny.”

“So, it is up to us to save him, is that it?”

“Like I said, Rashard’s a good kid. The trouble he is in is minor. There’s a lot in his life pushing him in the wrong direction, but in the end, I have no doubt that Rashard will save himself, on his own, like each of us in the end is forced to do. But you, Mrs. Sandhurst, you might be able to save the artist. Give him the training he needs, the validation he craves, show him the opportunities he doesn’t know are out there. He doesn’t believe you can make a living at art. Prove to him he can.”

“And what if he’s not good enough?”

“Then don’t waste his time.”

Mrs. Sandhurst pursed her lips, leaned back in her chair, put a hand to her throat, spun back and forth. Her jaw twitched as if in memory of something. “How is Philip doing?” she said.

“Fine.”

“Still worried about his cholesterol?”

“Always.”

“He was a big help to me in a difficult time. And not just with his professional services.” With a finger she slowly curled a stray wisp of hair. “He listened to me, he heard me, and he helped. He’s a strange man, and not one to follow all the niceties, but his heart is gold. Very tender. Very empathic.”

“A model for us all.”

She startled for a moment, as if awaking from a reverie. “God, I hope not. But he does have a fine set of teeth. Rashard Porter, is that it?”

“Yes.”

“His application is complete?”

“So the registrar has told me.”

“I’ll need to speak to him personally.”

“I can have him here at an hour’s notice.”

“You understand, I can promise nothing. Everything must be decided in committee, and any decision will, of course, depend almost entirely on his portfolio.”

“So I always assumed.”

“We need to see more than just routine adolescent scribbles. You said he was an artist. Do you know much about art, Mr. Carl?”

“Some. Who’s that guy? Say what? Say what?”

“Cézanne?”

“That’s the one. I like him, and I’m also a sucker for pictures of dogs playing poker.”

She laughed. “I’ve always liked them too. We have a committee meeting tomorrow night. I will consider discussing your situation with the committee. That’s all I can promise.”

“Thank you.”

“Give my regards to Philip, please.”

“Oh, I will.”

“You slept with her, didn’t you?” I said.

Skink, sitting beside me in the car at the Alden Park parking lot, across from a blue LeBaron convertible, crossed his arms and said, “Get your mind out of the gutter, why don’t you?”

“You’re the one always talking about his ethical responsibilities and then you go and pull something like that.”

Skink merely looked away.

“Have you no shame?” I said. I was enjoying this.

“It ain’t shame what I got. It’s called discretion, mate. I don’t talk about my personal life one way or the ’nother. When’s your cowboy coming?”

“He’s coming.”

“You know, the car, it hasn’t been moved since first time I spotted it.”

“Really,” I said, starting to wonder. “Has he visited the girlfriend during that time?”

“Not that I’ve seen. Our boy, he’s disappeared.”

I thought about the insurance and the kid in New Jersey and Manley’s sad slump of resignation. I didn’t want to tell Skink, but I suspected we’d never see Manley again. “We were talking,” I said, to change the subject, “about the dean.”