Bran New Death (A Merry Muffin Mystery) (27 page)

Pish gathered us all in his gaze, and said, “I didn’t realize when I set out this morning that I would be giving this information to the police. Let me work my way through it from the start. Merry called me with troubling questions about Turner Wynter Construction, Dinah Hooper, the Turners, and all of their dealings with Autumn Vale Community Bank. Here is what I think has been happening, and what we ought to do about it.”

While dramatic in his day-to-day life, Pish eschews the use of italics in his speech while giving evidence or talking about his profession. He can be succinct, and gets to the point rapidly and clearly. The tale he told was riveting, and introduced me to the new word
smurfing
as it pertained to financial crimes.

His take had a lot of facts, but involved some conjecture, too, relating to people other than Dinah Hooper. It took some convincing, but Virgil finally agreed to let Pish and me run a scam of our own on the bank employees, namely Isadore Openshaw and Simon Grover. We set it up to happen the very next morning, getting the confirmation late that night that federal investigators would be involved as well, since it looked like this was going to be part of a federal investigation of a con group that extended farther afield than just Autumn Vale.

None of it would be possible without Pish’s help, but after a few phone calls, the feds knew that Pish was a reliable and competent aide who had done this kind of thing before.

Virgil took me aside before he left. “I think I owe you an explanation about your uncle’s death.”

“Dinah Hooper did it.”

“Yes, but not with her own car,” he said. “I’ve known for some time that Isadore Openshaw’s car was the one that ran Mel off the road, but I knew she wasn’t the one who did it. I had a reliable eyewitness account that placed her at home that morning. Ms. Openshaw swore up and down that she didn’t know who could have stolen her car and brought it back.”

“It was Dinah who had the car, then,” I filled in. “And Isadore was . . . maybe scared to tell the truth?”

“That’s what we think. Tomorrow we’ll know more. I’m glad you’re okay, but I’m mad as hell at the chances you took,” he said gruffly, his hand on my shoulder. “Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

*

IT WAS ABOUT A HALF HOUR AFTER THE BANK OPENED
the next morning. Pish, Shilo, and I drove into town and parked on Abenaki. Dinah’s apartment door had a crime seal on it. I had heard (during a second, late-night call from a gruff and very sexy-sounding Virgil Grace, thanking me for our information and giving me confidential updates) that she had several impressive computer systems set up, ones that had been confiscated by the federal agents who were now swarming the town. What was on the computers would likely give forensic accountants many months of work to untangle. Dinah Hooper was a grifter extraordinaire, I had a feeling, and she had not been working alone.

As we walked down Abenaki, I gave Pish the official tour of the town, such as it was. He noted all the empty storefronts and clucked his tongue. “This place has potential,” was all he said.

Shilo took off to meet up with McGill, (who had indeed warned Zeke and Gordy, on pain of legal punishment, to keep their mouths shut until everything was sorted out) so Pish and I strolled into the Autumn Vale Community Bank together. I allowed Pish to take the lead. Isadore looked nervous at the sight of me and my briefcase-carrying, Brooks Brothers–wearing companion, but Simon Grover, in his glass office, appeared oblivious, drinking coffee and reading the only local paper, the
Ridley Ridge Record
. We approached the teller window, just as Gogi Grace entered through the curved, glass doors.

Isadore tried a smile, but it looked ghastly, a rictus grin. “Ah, there is Mrs. Grace. You know, I had better look after her. Such a busy woman! How are you, Gogi?” she called out, straining to look over our shoulders. “How are you doing with that shocking book we’re reading in club?”

Gogi ignored Isadore as she examined Pish and met my gaze, eyebrows raised. I had a sense that she might already know what was happening from her son. “I’ll wait, Isadore. You look after Merry and her companion, first.”

Pish set his briefcase on the teller window ledge, opened it, and took out several bank records, and laid on top the envelope—now open—addressed to Turner Wynter Global Enterprises.

Through the barred teller’s window I said, “Miss Openshaw, this is Pish Lincoln, my financial adviser. He has questions regarding my uncle’s accounts. As Melvyn Wynter’s heir, I give you permission to tell him anything and to fully answer any questions he may have about accounts involving my uncle’s company.”

“I . . . I believe I already told you . . . I’m not sure—”

“It’s quite all right, Miss Openshaw,” he said comfortably, with much the manner of a genial doctor. “I’m a trained professional. Now, looking through Merry’s uncle’s records, we came upon odd references to all kinds of bank accounts opened under different names, some variations of Turner Construction and Turner Wynter Construction and even Wynter Estates.”

That was not quite true, beyond the one envelope with “Turner Wynter Global Enterprises” on it. We had done some guesswork, and Pish was an excellent bluffer. You do not want to play five-card stud with him, as many have discovered to their poverty. He may look like an effete art dealer, but he has a sharp and pliable mind, and a great poker face.

Miss Openshaw stoically held her tongue. Hoping the wire I was wearing was not visible, I said, “I just want to know what is going on, Miss Openshaw.” I watched her face, over which an array of expressions, from fear to indecision, played. “I’m sure you’re aware that Dinah Hooper was arrested yesterday for murder and attempted murder. She’s been talking. A
lot
. Of course, being the kind of woman she is, she’s been trying to shift the blame onto others for things she has done.”

That was all true. She was now trying to blame Isadore for everything, including my uncle’s murder. Isadore had been desperate to point me in the direction of Dinah, but didn’t have the guts to come right out and accuse her. I wanted to know why. “I keep thinking there is more to her staying in Autumn Vale, and her dealings with this bank and Turner Construction, than meets the eye. Do you have anything to say, or do we need to call in the feds and have them go over the bank records account by account, starting with anything labeled Turner or Wynter?” They were going to do that anyway, but she didn’t need to know that yet.

She folded. I mean that literally; she actually
crumbled
, as in, sank beneath the counter, wailing incoherently.

“Goodness. What’s this all about?” Gogi said with a glance at me. “I think it would be permissible for us to go behind the counter to help the poor woman,” she said.

By the time Simon Grover clued in that his teller was distressed, and had bumbled out, loudly asking what was going on, we were all behind the desk, helping Isadore to her feet and over to a chair by a desk.

“Why don’t you tell us what’s up, Miss Openshaw?” I asked, giving Gogi a look to keep her quiet.

Gogi satisfied her need to do something by getting a glass of water and offering it to Isadore, who gulped greedily, then waved it away.

“What’s going on here?” Grover blustered. “I’ll call the police. You people should not be behind . . . why, it’s trespassing!” He wailed on in the background, but no one paid any attention.

“I want a lawyer,” Isadore said.

Pish straightened. “All right. I was hoping there was a rational explanation exonerating you and the bank, but I guess I have no further business here.”

“No, wait!” Isadore clutched at his sleeve, her gooseberry-green eyes wide with fear. “Are you really a financial adviser?”

He nodded. I spoke up, as gently as I could, “Miss Openshaw, we aren’t trying to pin anything on you. But there is going to be an investigation into Dinah Hooper’s involvement with this bank, and what we suspect are a number of accounts opened to launder money, using Turner Construction and Turner Wynter, among many, many other shell companies, as vehicles. Dinah Hooper has admitted to me that she killed my uncle and Tom Turner. I believe she masterminded a lot more. Now, if you were to cooperate, I’m pretty sure you can help us find the truth.” I was careful not to promise anything legally, because that was not up to me.

Isadore wept a bit, and again called Dinah names, including what I had thought she said was the “devil’s pawn,” but was apparently “devil’s spawn,” or child of Lucifer. She was convinced of that. She finally calmed enough to tell her story. She came to Autumn Vale about eight years before to live with a cousin (not a brother; she had only claimed the fellow was her brother so no one would think it scandalous that she lived with him) but when he died, leaving her his bungalow and car, she decided to stay. It sounded to me as if she had escaped a hardscrabble life, and finally had what she had always wanted: a home and a couple of jobs, one part-time at the bank, and one part-time doing bookkeeping and secretarial work for Turner Construction. Everything was good for a few years.

But then her past, in the person of Dinah Hooper (not her real name, by the way) showed up. Dinah was a grifter, and had used Isadore before in an illegal enterprise. She was sent to torment her, Isadore said, spawn of Satan that she was. Isadore had escaped her clutches, determined to
go
straight and
stay
straight, but Dinah had finally tracked her down and threatened her with exposure if she didn’t go along with a scam. Autumn Vale was the perfect town for what she had in mind, Dinah told Isadore, and her job at the bank made it even
more
perfect.

All Isadore had to do was first, quit her job at Turner so Dinah could have it. Coincidentally, the former bank teller was retiring about then, so Isadore was promoted to a full-time employee. Then she had to deposit the money Dinah gave her into Rusty’s bank accounts. Isadore did that, but of course the demands escalated until she was opening accounts for Dinah, using a dozen or so different shell company names, and making cash deposits to each account, small enough that the FDA would not be alerted to any impropriety. There is a threshold below which banks are not required to inform government agencies about deposits, and Dinah was careful to keep well below limits. That is called, in the banking industry, “smurfing,” as Pish had explained the night before.

Isadore babbled about a lot of stuff. Dinah had created a ghostly workforce to go along with these different shell companies, which allowed even more accounts to be opened. She was running another kind of scam, too, a version of the so-called 419 or Nigerian swindle, which was why she had the multitude of computers and the knowledge of high-speed Internet in Autumn Vale. I had a feeling we were going to find out a lot more over the next few days.

As sometimes happens, I was right.

T
HE NEXT DAY
, observed by Becket, who sat like a statue on the flagstone terrace, I supervised Zeke and Gordy’s continued cleanup of the castle grounds. Binny’s white van roared up into my now-weed-free (thanks to Zeke!) parking area. The baker got out, carrying a box, and striding toward me. Had she come bearing cannoli?

“How are you? How is your dad?”

“He’s going to be awesome, thanks to you. I don’t think I really . . . in the craziness yesterday, I didn’t get what you did for him, you know, and how much I have to thank you for.” Her face, now adorned with a more open, natural expression, was very pretty. Her dark hair tied back, she looked relaxed and almost happy. I hoped she would accept all the changes that were about to come her way.

“Don’t mention it. I’m relieved it all turned out okay. So he was hiding out since he disappeared last year because Dinah told him someone was out to kill him, right?”

“Yeah. That note I got . . . it said to meet him at the hunting cabin on the Turner Construction land—it’s an old cabin back in the woods where he used to take me when I was a kid—but like I said, he never showed.”

“You really didn’t see him until yesterday.”

She shook her head. “I wasn’t even a hundred percent sure the note was from him. I just didn’t know!”

“Look, do you want to come in for a cup of tea, or coffee?” I said, waving my hand toward the castle.

“No, I’m on my way to the hospital to pick up my dad. They say he can go home now.”

“He is one tough bird,” I said in admiration. “Did he really live out in the woods all that time?”

“Sometimes in the woods, sometimes he broke into sheds to sleep, sometimes he even went back to the house, but he didn’t dare stay there.” She shook her head. “Can you believe it? Dinah had him convinced Russian gangsters were after him.”

“Russian gangsters?” I wanted to laugh, but that would have been inappropriate.

“I know, right?” she said, shaking her head with a smile on her pink-cheeked face. “It was a couple of guys she worked with. I remember them . . . they came into town with fake accents and black suits.” She laughed out loud, a great honk of sound.

I could see Lizzie in her; the Turner gene pool was strong in both of them. “Dinah had him reeled in.”

“Still, who believes that kind of crap? I guess I shouldn’t be so hard on him, but he should have talked to me.” She shifted the bakery box from one arm to the other.

“He probably didn’t want you to be involved.” Or he didn’t want his beloved daughter to know about the mess he had made of things. “If you don’t mind me asking, did he know about what she was doing, at any point?” I had been wondered about that; was Rusty aware of the illegal nature of what Dinah was doing from the start, or was he totally oblivious?

“Not really.” She grimaced and shrugged. “He kind of knew about some of it, but she told him there was a legal way to make money by setting up some corporations. He and poor old Melvyn had been working on a plan to develop this place to be Wynter Acres.” She shuffled in place, kicking at the flagstones that edged the drive. “Tom drew up a plan, and got his buddy Junior to give it the green light, and it got bundled into the whole scam operation. My dad found out, but he didn’t want Tom to get in trouble. Then Melvyn got wind of it, got POed, filed a lawsuit to stop them using his name, and threatened to expose the whole thing.” She shook her head.

That explained the shoddy plat. “It’s a mess,” I said, “and it’s going to take time to sort out.” Junior Bradley was going to be in some trouble, too, it sounded like.

“You better believe it,” she said fervently.

“But the good thing is, it looks like we’ll be able to get rid of any outstanding lawsuits between us. We’ll talk about it another day.”

She nodded. “Anyway, when Dad got scared by her fake Russian mobsters, Dinah told him he should use his hunting cabin in the woods, just disappear for a while. She’d help him out. He took money out of the bank and gave it to her to help him. She supposedly used it for food. He lived in there for a long time, and she kept upping the ante, telling him the thugs were back, and if he came out of hiding they might kidnap
me
to try to pressure him.”

“She is some piece of work!”

With a glowering look that reminded me of Lizzie, Binny said, “I can’t
wait
to see her in court for murdering Tom!” She hung her head for a moment. “Anyway, poor Melvyn must have been suspicious, and I guess he told Dinah that he was going to the cops to tell them what he knew.”

“He got a bank statement in the name of Turner Wynter Global Enterprise, one of Dinah’s shell companies,” I explained. “He was suspicious, all right. All that time he had thought Rusty was in on it, but I think he finally figured out it was Dinah at the heart of it. Especially after Rusty disappeared.”

“Melvyn’s death scared Dad. He heard about it, and I think that’s when he began to wonder if Dinah was scamming him. He left the hunting cabin in the late spring, from what he told me last night, and Dinah has been looking for him ever since.”

“That’s why she kept showing up on her dirt bike in my woods! If I’d known it was her . . . but everyone looks alike, on a dirt bike in a helmet.”

“Anyway, that’s why I want to give this to you,” she said, shoving the box at me.

I stared at the box, which clunked when it moved. Okay, so not cannoli. Darn!

“It’s the Italian teapot you admired in my shop. It’s something Dinah gave to me, and I don’t want it. She said it was valuable . . .
real
valuable. Told me to keep it on a shelf in the shop for good luck. But
you
like it and have no connection with it so . . . would you take it? Partly as thanks for . . . for everything?”

And partly just so she didn’t have to look at such a vivid reminder of Dinah Hooper and all she represented, I thought. “I’d love it,” I said sincerely. “I’ll look after it well.”

“I’d better go,” she said, looking off to where Zeke and Gordy were taking a break in the shade. “It’s looking better out here. Not so much like an abandoned graveyard.”

Which reminded me . . . “Binny, there’s one thing I still can’t figure out . . . why was Tom digging holes on my property? Did he or did he
not
know that Rusty was still alive?”

“I just don’t know,” she said on a sigh. “I can’t believe he knew Dad was alive, or he’d have told me. Maybe Dinah will spill her guts.”

“If Dinty was alive you’d have him to contend with, too.”

“I know, but Dad still feels bad about that. Dinty was a lug, but I don’t think he knew what his mom was up to. My dad has a feeling Dinah told Dinty that he—Dad—was trying to kill her, and that’s why Dinty went after him.”

“Hey, it was him or Dinty. I just don’t understand why Dinah stayed around Autumn Vale for so long. It would have made sense for her to tie up loose ends and take off, start fresh somewhere else.”

Binny shrugged, then snuck a look at my face, and looked away, shuffling awkwardly. “I gotta get going. I’m going to pick up my dad, and we have a lot to talk about. Uh . . . Gogi Grace said . . . she told me something in confidence, something she says you already know.”

I waited.

She eyed me again, but then broke eye contact and looked up at the sky. “I guess . . . that girl who has been hanging around, that Lizzie Proctor . . . she’s Tom’s daughter, Gogi says. Now I get why Emerald kept coming into the bakery. She always looked like she wanted to talk. Maybe she was trying to get the guts to tell Tom the truth. I only knew her as an old high school girlfriend of Tom’s, but I guess they were more.”

I believed that Tom already knew the truth, or suspected, and that’s why he wanted to make money, to help his daughter, but I didn’t say anything. “Have you told your dad yet?”

She shook her head, tears welling up in her eyes. “I want to be sure, first.”

“Gogi is sure and Hannah is sure; I think they both have good instincts about it all. By the way, Lizzie took some pictures out here of the castle and promised to take them in to the library to show Hannah. Can you—”

“I’ll make sure she does it,” said Binny, already in stern-aunt mode.

They were all going to be okay.

*

TWO DAYS OF HECTIC ACTIVITY FOLLOWED. I BAKED
muffins at the bakeshop, fielded a few irate phone calls from Janice Grover (she thought I was behind the tub of boiling-hot water Simon Grover and his bank were now in; I set her straight, then went there to buy some stuff), orchestrated, along with Gogi Grace, an emotional meeting among Lizzie Proctor, her grandmother, and mother, and Binny and Rusty Turner. Among all the bustle, I chauffeured Pish back and forth to the police station. My dear friend was “helping” federal officers as they tried to figure out, with the assistance of Isadore Openshaw and a sniveling, frightened Simon Grover, all the financial monkey business Dinah Hooper had created. The woman had been busy with several different scams, among them, ones using the US Postal Service, which, ironically, could wind up costing her as much jail time as the murder charges would net.

I finally had a day to myself, and was out on the front step, drinking a cup of coffee, accompanied by my ginger cat, Becket. Gordy and Zeke struggled manfully along the arboretum forest, clearing brush from the edge; they were almost halfway along. Those guys were proving to be worth every penny I paid them, and the goodwill I was getting in town from hiring locals was astounding. I was making friends. Befriending Gogi Grace, capturing the murderer of Uncle Melvyn and Tom Turner, and restoring Rusty Turner to his daughter and the community didn’t hurt, either.

Shilo was gone somewhere with McGill, who had finished all of the hole filling, even the one poor Tom Turner died in, and she had offered to ferry Pish into town this time, where he was yet again consorting with the federal forensic accountant. This was like a grand holiday for my wise and wonderful pal; financial scams were a hobby of his, and he knew a lot about them, enough so that he was writing a book on the topic, of which this would be a chapter, I was sure. It said a lot about his reputation that he was actually being utilized rather than shut out of the process.

I heard before I saw the giant truck lumbering up my long and winding drive. It finally came into sight, and pulled up in front of the castle. A burly, sweaty driver jumped down, grumbled his way over to me, and announced, in a growl, that he had my stuff.

He had my stuff . . . yay! It was here, out of storage, at long last! I gave a little hop of happiness, overjoyed at the prospect of unwrapping treasures that I hadn’t seen in years. Zeke and Gordy helped him offload, which only took an hour or so; I directed and Becket oversaw the whole affair from a place of honor, the round table in the center of the great hall. Everything labeled “Teacups” or “Teapots” was to go into the dining room, where the box with the Italian teapot still sat, unopened, on the huge dining room table. Everything labeled “Kitchen” went into the kitchen. Every other box should be piled in the great hall, I told them, so I could unpack and disseminate the contents.

I then declared I was serving a big meal in the kitchen for Zeke, Gordy, and the sweaty driver, who proved to be more human once he was given a towel and washcloth and offered a place to cool off. They all accepted my invitation. We were having a spurt of indecently hot weather in upstate; it was enough to make anyone a little tetchy, as locals called it.

But I still had made soup and sandwiches, as well as a batch of corn muffins. After a long lunch, the truck driver gave the two fellows a ride back into town—neither had a car, but that hadn’t been a big problem while they used Gordy’s uncle’s tractor, which had now been returned—and I was left alone in my beautiful castle.

My insanely beautiful, despicably impractical, infinitely precious, huge castle.

I wandered through, admiring the furniture. Once Shilo and I had taken all the Holland covers off, we found there was a theme to the furnishings, in the largest part of the castle. Eastlake was the most common style, but Pish told me that it was all part of a Gothic neo-medievalist–style revolution of the late Victoria, era. I’m glad he knew that, because I didn’t have a clue. It was all big, garish, and yet strangely magnificent, scaled to fit thirty-foot ceilings and forty-foot rooms.

I made my way into the dining room, where the boxes labeled “Teacups” and “Teapots” had been piled. I hadn’t opened the box Binny had brought yet, but I pulled it toward me across the oak table and used my fingernail to cut through the tape, which held down the lid. I opened the flap and took out the gorgeous Italian teapot, a Capodimonte piece with a raised relief pattern of a girl and donkey. It was in beautiful condition. I took the lid off and examined it carefully, but there were absolutely no chips.