The Bonfire of the Vanities

Kramer, Martin, Goldberg, and Bernie meet in Weiss’s office. Martin and Goldberg tell the group a rumor they heard from drug dealers they recently arrested. According to those drug dealers, Roland Auburn had been walking with Henry Lamb to get takeout. On the way, Roland told Henry that he could show him how to rob a car. Henry wanted no part of it. Roland said he wasn’t going to actually do it. He was just going to show Henry how it would be done. Henry still wanted nothing to do with the plan, but Roland threw a tire out onto the road, which led Sherman and Maria to stop. But Roland’s plan went south when he didn’t succeed in robbing them and Sherman and Maria hit Henry with the car.

Kramer doesn’t believe the theory, especially now that he’s gotten to know Roland better. He tells the group that it sounds like the theory could have come from the story in The Daily Wire that Sherman’s team had planted. Just then, Milt Lubell comes into the office with the newest edition of The City Light. The headline of the article, written by Fallow, names Maria as the unknown woman with Sherman at the time of the hit and run. Weiss says they’ll have to check it out. He tells Kramer to tell Maria that if she cooperates with them against Sherman, they might be able to give her immunity.

Kramer, Martin, and Goldberg then go to Maria’s apartment. There’s a crowd of press outside. When they reach the apartment, Kramer is overwhelmed by its lavishness. Maria is accompanied in the apartment by her lawyer, Tucker Trigg, and by a lawyer named Clifford Priddy, who is well-known for defending prominent people in federal criminal defense cases. Kramer thinks that their Ivy League pedigrees may serve the lawyers well in federal court, but they won’t help them much in the Bronx courts.

Kramer takes out his briefcase and is ashamed by the scuffs on it, which he thinks clearly mark him as an underpaid assistant district attorney. He feels intimated by the wealth and opulence around him, and his voice falters as he starts to question Maria. But then Maria takes a large gulp, revealing that she is afraid, and Kramer feels a sense of power return to him. Kramer identifies that power as the kind of power that the government holds over its subjects, and Kramer has access to that power as a representative of the government.

Sherman goes to see Killian at his office. Killian tells him that after the news story naming Maria came out, Maria called him (Killian). She wants to meet Sherman. Before Sherman goes to meet her, Quigley once again equips him with a wire to record the conversation. Sherman then goes to Maria’s secret apartment to talk with her. When he arrives, Maria tries to embrace him, but Sherman is nervous that she’ll feel the wire, so he awkwardly moves out of the way. Maria seems to notice something is wrong but then tells Sherman how much she’s missed him. She says she went to Italy to get away from Arthur, not Sherman.

Maria also says that Kramer has been threatening her. Essentially, she says, if she testifies against Sherman, she’ll be granted immunity, but if she doesn’t, she’ll be charged with a felony. Maria once again says she missed Sherman and tries to embrace him. Sherman tries again to avoid the embrace, but Maria moves closer to him. She then asks what he has on his back. Sherman pretends to not know what she’s talking about. Maria keeps asking, and eventually she gets her hands on the wire and pulls it out. She can’t believe Sherman’s dishonesty and starts yelling at him. Sherman runs out of the apartment, amazed that he lost his one last hope through his own stupidity and incompetence.