Alumni Association Read online

  Alumni Association is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A Ballantine Books Ebook Original

  Copyright © 2019 by Michael Rudolph

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  BALLANTINE and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Ebook ISBN 9780399180491

  Cover design: Art Parts

  Cover images: Shutterstock

  randomhousebooks.com

  v5.4

  ep

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  By Michael Rudolph

  About the Author

  Prologue

  1984

  The entire cadet corps of Bordentown Military Institute marched to first mess across the parking lot in front of the Old Main and entered the dining hall. Colonel Nathaniel Moore, the commandant of cadets at the all-male prep school, watched from the balcony over the building entrance. When Cadet Terrance Berland was reported “UA (Unauthorized Absence)” from the formation, the retired army colonel went up to Berland’s room in the junior school dormitory and found the cadet, wearing blue and red Spider-Man pajamas, hanging by his neck from an oak rafter. His body swung gently like the pendulum of an old clock.

  Directly underneath him was a school desk, and lying on its side next to the desk was a chair, the means by which the thirteen-year-old had been able to reach high enough to tie the rope around the rafter. There were bloodstains on the seat of his pajama pants and on the sheets of his unmade bed. His pillow and his maroon blanket with the BMI seal were lying on the floor next to an envelope addressed in a childish scrawl “To Mommy from Terry.”

  Colonel Moore read the note inside the envelope and immediately went across the street to Dean Wylton Smythe’s house, woke up the elderly headmaster, and accompanied him back to Berland’s room. He waited while Dean Smythe silently absorbed the scene.

  “Oh my Lord, that poor child,” Smythe finally gasped after reading the note. “We have to take him down, Nathaniel.”

  “Better call the police first.”

  “I’ll go to my office right now and call Chief Flynn. Tom will know what to do. His son is a day student.”

  “I’ll wait here for him.”

  “Thank you, Nathaniel. Just make certain that the boy is lying in clean pajamas on a clean bed by the time his mother gets here. She can’t see him this way.”

  “I will.”

  “And Nathaniel…”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “There’s not to be a word about suicide.”

  * * *

  —

  When Chief Flynn arrived, he and Colonel Moore wasted little time in establishing their mutuality of interest and reaching an identical conclusion. Years of antiwar sentiment had seriously depleted BMI’s enrollment, and the scandal of a cadet’s suicide could finish it.

  They worked carefully to untie Berland from the rafter and place him on his bed. The colonel went through Berland’s dresser and found a fresh pair of pajamas and clean linen. After methodically washing the blood off the child, they replaced his bloodstained pajamas with the clean pair, changed the sheets, and covered him with his BMI blanket. Shortly after, the school physician arrived, followed by the county medical examiner, both BMI graduates. After a cursory examination, they agreed the death certificate should certify that the death was due to the congenital heart defect already noted in Berland’s medical records. Neither one of them commented on the bruises around his neck.

  Tom Flynn took the note and the rope with him when he left and dropped them into the furnace in the basement of the Old Main, together with the rest of the bloody evidence he and Colonel Moore had collected. Everything relating to the suicide was soon reduced to a powdery ash.

  * * *

  —

  Colonel Moore was checking Berland’s room for anything that might exacerbate the problem when he heard the doorknob turn repeatedly. He unlocked the door, opened it slightly, expecting the police chief again, and instead saw a tall, husky cadet standing outside with a startled look on his face. “Cadet Gartenberg,” Moore said. “What are you doing in the junior school dormitory? You know it’s off-limits to upper-class cadets.”

  “Sorry, sir. Terry, I mean Cadet Berland, missed breakfast, and we have sailing club with Judge Masters at 0900 hours. Is he sick or something?”

  “There’s been an accident, Gartenberg. Go without him.”

  “Is he okay?”r />
  “Do as I say. Go without him and do not discuss this with Judge Masters.”

  “You’re not going to gig me for this, are you, sir?”

  “No. Just go sail and keep your mouth shut.”

  “Yes, sir.” Gartenberg straightened up to his full six foot five inches and 250 pounds, saluted, and walked away while Colonel Moore relocked the door.

  * * *

  —

  For the balance of the morning, Dean Smythe worked in his office with his son, Francis Xavier, drafting a letter to be sent to the parents of all the cadets. When F.X. left to teach his European history class, Dean Smythe opened up the family bible he kept next to his phone and worked quietly and privately on the message he would deliver to the entire cadet corps at vespers that evening.

  Chapter 1

  Beth Swahn called her stepfather with the news of Clifford Giles’s sudden death while she was still at Clifford’s bedside in the hospital. The next day, Max Swahn was on a flight home from Antigua, and two days later, he delivered a tearful eulogy at the crowded funeral for his oldest friend and cofounding partner of his law firm. Now, he was preparing for their firm’s first meeting since his return.

  Clifford’s fatal heart attack had forced Max back to the land of custom suits after four relatively stress-free years sailing charter parties around the Caribbean with his wife, Andi. The difference between mentoring first- and second-year associates from a laptop in the cabin of their forty-seven-foot sloop Red Sky and hands-on management of the whole firm was rapidly crashing in on him.

  Sitting in Clifford’s corner office, now sadly his again, he outlined the points he wanted to cover with the nervous partners who were being tempted with offers from other firms. The competition was eager to cherry-pick their clients and their expertise.

  He was nearly finished when Beth buzzed him on the intercom. “Max, Mom’s on the line from Antigua. She doesn’t have your direct office number yet. I’m going to transfer her over to you….Speak to you later, Mom.”

  “Bye, sweetheart….Hi, Max.”

  “Hi, love. How’s it going?”

  “I miss you a ton.”

  “I miss you, too.”

  “I should be able to come up to New York within the next week.”

  “It can’t happen soon enough. Did you get someone to watch Red Sky while we’re gone?”

  “I’ll get it handled today. I also canceled our next two charters, but our agent says he’ll be able to find substitute yachts for the parties.”

  “You always handle things so perfectly, but listen, babe, I have to throw you off so I can finish getting ready for the partners’ meeting.”

  “Stay in touch, Max.”

  “Love you,” he replied and hung up the phone.

  * * *

  —

  Max took a deep breath, resolved to return to retirement at the earliest opportunity, and then returned his attention to the outline for the meeting. He struggled through the last several points, made some changes, and polished it until he was satisfied that his message to the partners would accurately communicate his vision for the future of the firm.

  Max was waiting for the printer to kick out a few hard copies when Beth rang him again on the intercom. “Max, I have Judge Masters on the line. He wants you but dialed me, just like Mom did. I’m going to conference you in.”

  “Does he know about Clifford?”

  “He read the obituary in The New York Times. He feels awful.”

  Max picked up the phone. “Tripp, how are you?”

  “Max, my deepest condolences. I’m so sorry to hear about Clifford.”

  “Thanks, Tripp,” he replied sadly. “It’s a terrible loss. We’d been friends and partners since you introduced us forty years ago.”

  “Everything in the office under control?”

  “Oh, sure,” Beth said. “We practice law in groups here, so there’s always at least two attorneys fully familiar with every matter.”

  “Listen, guys, I’m going to be in the city today. Can I drop in this afternoon to discuss some new business?”

  “We always have time for new business, Your Honor,” Beth said.

  “What’s up, buddy?” Max asked.

  “It’s about the sale of the BMI campus to Herb Gartenberg and Al LaVerne.”

  “I knew about Gartenberg, but not Al LaVerne,” Max said. “He was in Gartenberg’s class at BMI. When did he become part of the deal?”

  “Don’t know for sure,” Tripp replied. “But he’s in it now. You know my nephew Chord’s the attorney for the Smythe estate, and he just learned about it.”

  “How many in the BMI Alumni Association voted last month for your resolution to preserve the Old Main and the tunnels underneath it?”

  “A huge majority, Max. They want to make sure the Old Main and the tunnels are protected when Gartenberg and LaVerne begin to build houses on the BMI campus. Maybe we can get Gartenberg to dedicate the Old Main property as a park.”

  “That’s going to be a problem. Gartenberg’s not a builder. He’s the same guy we kicked out of BMI thirty-some years ago on some trumped-up charge of cheating on an exam.”

  “But, Max, that was all Dean Smythe would let us do. He refused to prosecute him for assaulting that Junior School cadet who hung himself.”

  “You know Gartenberg has also done time for real estate fraud.”

  “He sounds like a real nice guy,” Beth said.

  “LaVerne’s a builder, though,” Tripp replied, “and Chord tells me he was a decent guy at school.”

  “Who’s their lawyer?” asked Beth.

  “Some garment center guy. Zeke something or other.”

  “Zeke Shadenheim?”

  “You know him, Max?”

  “He’s been Herb’s attorney for years.”

  “A piece of cake then.”

  “I suspect that business with Gartenberg is anything but…”

  “That’s why the BMI Alumni Association wants to retain you. Gartenberg and LaVerne will need to get their building plans approved by the Bordentown Planning and Zoning Commission before they can even stick a shovel in the ground. The Alumni Association wants you to fight their application for P&Z approval.”

  “Isn’t Chord chairman of P&Z?” Max asked.

  “He’ll have to recuse himself,” Tripp replied.

  “Opposing the application will be expensive.”

  “Deep alumni pockets are backing us.”

  “How’s three P.M. work for you?”

  “Good. See you then.”

  Chapter 2

  Max followed Beth down the long hall to the main conference room, where all the partners were seated around the walnut conference table. He sat down at the head of the table and instantly felt the tension and uncertainty permeating the room. The partners spent the better part of two hours eulogizing Clifford and assuring one another that their firm, Wilcox, Swahn, and Giles, was viable, despite the tragic circumstances. They welcomed Max back and pledged loyalty to his renewed leadership. After a discussion about merger inquiries from other firms, Max suggested without opposition that all of the offers be tabled for at least three months.

  “Okay, next on the agenda is new business,” Max continued. “Beth, I know you have some, so lead off.”

  “We have some nice real estate business coming in this afternoon, a land-use matter with good social media potential.”

  “Excellent,” chorused the partners.

  “It’s Max’s old prep school campus in Bordentown, New Jersey, as a matter of fact,” Beth continued. “Client’s coming in at three. I’ll send out a summary when I send out the conflict-of-interest inquiry after the meeting.”

  “Nepotism!” coughed the partners, most joking, one or two serious, but all eager to participate in any billing
opportunity.

  As each partner reported on new business, it became clear that without Clifford, revenue would be down significantly into the foreseeable future.

  “That all sounds good,” Max said when they were finished, “but if we’re going to continue to grow as a firm, we all have to be rainmakers now.” Heads around the table nodded in agreement.

  “Now, before we adjourn,” he continued, “I’d like to meet with each of you within the next few weeks, so coordinate your dates on my calendar. Elias, if you’re free for lunch today, perhaps you can join me.”

  “I have a date, but I’ll cancel it,” replied Elias Strauss, head of the firm’s corporate group.

  “Good, then we’re adjourned.”

  Beth walked straight down the hall to Max’s office, her athletic stride emphasizing her nearly six feet of height, her spirit buoyed by his return to the firm. At various times since her broken engagement to Sean Harris, she had described her figure as midway between “recovering slender” and “no more ice cream ever again!”