Corpses at Indian Stone (12 page)

"Jim and Byron Waite, naturally, did business for George and for me. George and I only put up capital--they ran things. We made money. And then the panic of 1907 came along. You don't recall that--but you do remember 1929."

"I was in Sumatra--mostly--"

Sarah scowled. "I mean--you've read newspapers. You're more or less cognizant of the fact that there
was
a depression after the crash. You can possibly recall the bank closings, the bonus marchers, the bread lines, the riots, the strikes and shutouts, the chimneys that were not smoking--all that."

"Vividly."

"Well, the 1907 panic wasn't exactly like that--but similar enough. It raised sin with Indian Stones. Calder was cleaned out. Davis lost most of Marilyn's money. The Pattonssold their Fifth Avenue mansion. I dropped a handsome chunk of the ancestral Plum fortune. Waite lost less, perhaps, than the rest of us. But he was the worst scared and the most bitter. He was older-by five years or more-than most of us. He's nearly seventy now. Anyway--we were very thick in those days. Entertained for each other in New York all winter. Had a whist club up here that met two nights every week--without fail. I mean to say--we'd grown up together--like this present generation here. We were in grooves together; we established habits--ruts. We knew each other as well as if we were in one family. Do you see?"

Aggie nodded.

"All right. Think of us. Then think of the people you knew who acted batty after the 1929 crash. People hoarded so much gold, for example, that the government had to call it in. Plenty of people, in 1932, were actually stocking their country places with supplies--as if for a siege. It was like that in 1907--exactly. And the worst feature--in 1907--for all of us was a scarcity of cash and liquid assets. A lack of cash wrecked Jim. A lack of cash cost Waite a whole railroad."

Sarah drew a deep breath. "That was where Hank Bogarty came in. He'd been up here in 1905. Distant relative of the Scotts--who have died out. They called him a wild kid and a black sheep--because he'd slammed out of Harvard his first year and gone to the Far West and done as he pleased. I never thought of him
as
wild. In fact--" she cocked an eyebrow at her nephew--"if Hank had made a proposal to me--instead of Waite and a few of his ilk—I daresay there would be other Plum heirs and assigns, besides you!" She grinned reminiscently. "I had too much tongue for Hank, I presume.

"Hank played whist with us and Hank talked mines. Gold and silver and lead. All summer long. He talked about canoes and portages, maps and lodes, white water, and living off the country. If he had a small capital to fit out an expedition, he said-Oh, you see the point! He was romantic
as
Satan--and plausible-and we were all flush. Putting up twenty thousand from four of us
was
a cinch. We dangled Hank all summer because we liked his company--and we sent him west with his 'grubstake' in the fall--and practically forgot about it. He didn't write much. In the 1907 panic, when we were scratching every private till to the bottom, we did try to get in touch with him. But he was out in the back country somewhere--and we dismissed any hope of collecting the twenty thousand dollars."

"And then--" Aggie said-"Hank came through."

Sarah nodded several times. "He came through like an Oklahoma gusher. He showed up here in 1909. It was gold and plenty of it, and he wouldn't hear of taking more than the fifth allowed him by his original deal. Nobody--" Sarah snorted--"nobody but me suggested it, in any case! The mine was in Canada. We'd felt the terrible penalty of a lack of cash. We were ambitious--that is, the men were--and imaginative. Rugged individualists. All that. Legality was not ever a chief concern of Waite or Calder--or Davis. We decided to use the proceeds from the mine to establish a joint cash reserve. We arranged to have the gold refined and molded and shipped--but not marked
as
gold. I don't know when we decided to keep it here--"

Aggie literally jumped. "Keep it here!"

She went on impassively. "Here. Calder didn't trust any bank. Waite didn't.

You've got to see us as we were--or them, rather. Scary, suspicious, determined--and possessed of a source of liquid funds that couldn't be checked exactly, ever. Half the proceeds of the mine went into regular channels. The other half came here."

"But why here?"

Sarah smiled. "When we decided not to use a bank--we talked and talked about what place
to
use. We'd formed, by then, one of those secret societies. Done everything but signed in blood. Sworn never to speak about our hoard. It was a lot of fun--at the time." She paused. "Aggie, you know that the club was built on the foundations of the old Sachem House."

"My God," he said softly. "The cellar!"

Sarah's voice sank. "You used to play in it. Part of it. Under that old hotel was the cellar for the heating plant and for wine. The one for tools. There was an exit, too: for those mauve decade beaux--the married ones--who wanted to hurry away when their wives appeared suddenly in fine carriages accompanied by furious mothers. Life then wasn't quite as dull--as this jitterbug generation likes to think. The Sachem House was a gay dog's paradise. Yes, Aggie, the cellar. When the hotel burned down, and your grandfather's generation built the club, only part of the cellar was known. I discovered another section. I found the architect's original drawings in the library--and when we were thinking of a proper hiding place--I got the drawings out. The men secretly broke through a wall one autumn. That's where we started depositing the gold."

Aggie thought for a long time in silence. "Well?"

"Hank wouldn't join in the scheme. He handled his fifth through his bankers. The mine paid off--handsomely--for almost twenty years. Waite and Calder dipped into our gold during the war. Again, in 1929, it was handy. What we took--we replaced. Then--a little later--gold was called in. We four held a meeting.

"I was for turning over the gold. Calder and Waite refused. They said we'd be branded as economic royalists. Said the mere fact would hurt their businesses. There wasn't any record of it. They said that if an inflation came--our gold was our only cushion. I argued. I like to be more or less lawful. Finally, it occurred to me to trade my quarter for platinum. That was legal. I made some indirect inquiries from people I knew, and, in the end, I bought platinum and I had it put in our joint cache, by George, and Jim, and Byron, too. They thought, as usual, that I was an old fool. Platinum wasn't stable.

They expected that gold would be remonetized soon. It hasn't been, yet--as you know.

Now, of course, they're scared to budge.

"Legally, if they turned in all that treasure, they could be sent to prison. Actually, I don't believe it would happen. But you can see how they might almost rather die than surrender that gold--if you stop to think what sort of men they are and how long they've depended on it. You can see why they're afraid to exchange it--these days. Let it sit.

That's their idea. You can also see why the wire about Hank's approach, his mention of a

'new grubstake', and the sudden, violent death of Jim Calder got all three of us in a tizzie.

It looked as if our sins would find us out. That's what Jim was razzled about when he barged in here!"

Aggie felt a need for his pipe. "I can 'see' everything you've said," he replied, after lighting it. "Except that I can't yet understand why none of you came out with it--under the present circumstances."

"I
am coming out with it," Sarah said. "In doing so, I'm spilling private matters that have been in the dark for thirty-odd years. I'm betraying George Davis and Byron Waite. At least, they'd consider it betrayal.
They
haven't told this story to Wes Wickman--

or to the coroner--or anybody. I'm risking their hatred. I'm risking revenge, even. I've said to myself ten thousand times in the last three days that if I tell, and if it proves that Hank is still somewhere in the lake, and Jim
did
stumble into some youngster's deadfall, I'll never be able to hold my head up around here again. We felt mighty serious about that cache. Even Jim would never have dared to violate it, I--I--think."

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure," she answered after a moment. "Yes. Certain, almost."

"Couldn't you check?"

"I've got the mumps! I'm sick! I can't poke in cellars--"

"I mean--have George Davis check. Or Waite."

"It's difficult now; the club is constantly milling with people. Guests all day.

Employees at night. We made our deposits in the winter, when it was empty. Our own manager was in charge. We'd bring up what he thought was wine. We all had our own wine stock, and bins, in the cellars."

"Couldn't your 'other' cellar have been found by somebody else?"

Sarah shrugged. "Nobody living knows where it is--except the four of us. Three--

now. We made sure of that. It's cut in bedrock--and we're using an old safe which belonged to the Sachem House. It's beautifully hidden; it was meant to be. The smoothies in the seventies and eighties used that safe. In all these years-nobody has ever tampered with the place--or found the entrance--"

"What about somebody like Jack--who's up here alone all winter?" Sarah smiled.

"Jack? If he found the cellar--he'd tell the world! It would be a game for him. Fun. We'd get telegrams: 'Come up! Great mystery uncovered!' You know. He might love discovering such a place, but he'd never crack it open without permission. He's such a lamb! The truth is--he'd never find it. You'd have to blast. It isn't something you can stumble on. You've got to know it's there, and know how to get to it."

Old John's feet sounded on the stairs. He brought in a tray on which were coffee cups and a steaming glass container. He looked reproachfully at Sarah. "You should be in bed, Miss Sarah. Since you're not, I thought you might like some coffee. I heard you talking--"

"Yes, John. I'm going back, soon. I wanted to have a talk with my nephew. It's done me a world of good! And this is very thoughtful!"

Aggie nodded. "Genius, John."

They waited until John had gone downstairs again. Aggie dropped four lumps of sugar into his aunt's cup. "That puts a new face on what's happening here!"

"Does it, Aggie? Are you sure?" She stirred the coffee and drained the cup.

"I don't know exactly what I mean, myself. But--a fortune in gold stowed away in a cellar! That, somehow, is more in scale--with things." He smiled at his aunt. "I'm mighty glad you told me. At least--we know what to think about. What to check on next.

You better get back to your room--"

Sarah nodded, leaned ponderously forward, and tried to stand. The effort sapped the blood from her brain. She tottered, smiled rather foolishly, and fell back in a faint.

Aggie heard his voice shouting for John; the old man's feet clattered on the stairs. He wrapped one arm around his aunt's back and thrust the other under her knees. With a strain that enlarged the veins along his temples, he lifted his aunt and carried her to his bed.

"Call Dr. Davis, at once," he said, when John entered.

John hurried down the stairs again. Aggie listened to Sarah's heart. It was feeble and uneven, but not desperately so. Just a faint. Fatigue. Strain. Relief. Good old Sarah.

He unwrapped the cold, moist towel from her neck and began to wipe her face with it, roughly. Sarah stirred.

"Old fool," she muttered. "Old sissy! How'd you get me in this bed?"

Aggie grinned. "Levitation."

Sarah's answering grin was faint but game. "What a powerhouse! Well! All the Plums were dynamite in their day. I feel terrible, Ag."

"John's calling Davis." He heard feet again. "I can't get them," John said anxiously. "Wire out of order, the operator says."

Aggie dropped the towel on a chair beside the bed. He was immobile for a second-two--three. He became paler. Perspiration dampened his forehead. On a chair were his black trousers, casually folded. He' put them on over his pajamas. He stuffed in the tops as if they had tails, like a shirt. "I'll go over," he said quietly. "You stay with Sarah. Get her some water to drink. She's all right, but Dr. Davis should be here." He started for the door and came back for his pipe, tobacco and matches. Sarah was watching him and her eyes were scared.

He went through the steps he had taken on the night of the twentieth: getting keys from the teapot, reassuring Windle, starting the station wagon, driving swiftly through the blue dark, and banging on the Davis door. This time, lights flashed on. But Danielle came down the stairs in the same negligee. He sucked in his breath when he saw her. She swung open the door and said, "Yes?"

"Sarah's pretty sick. Your phone's not working--"

"Oh. I'll wake Dad."

She was gone. Sharp steps upstairs. Distant knocking. her voice, calling her father. A door squealing open. Then the steps--running. She talked on the stairs. "He's not in his room! Hasn't been there! He--! Come on!"

Aggie followed her through the house again--as before. She threw words over her shoulder. "He said something--when I came home from the club--about going to his darkroom for a while."

They went through the large, old-fashioned kitchen, a pantry, a woodshed. Down steps. Into the moonlight again. Danielle cried, "Yes! The light's on! Thank heaven! I was frightened!"

He could see a small square of light on the leaves of a maple. They entered the garage, passed the cars there, turned into the hall, and Danielle knocked on a door. No response. She twisted the handle. "Locked," she said. "Maybe he fell asleep." She raised her voice again. "Dad! Oh, dad!"

Aggie reached in front of her and tried the handle. The door was locked, all right.

And it was a sturdy door. He was trying to keep calm. "We could go out to that window--

and look in. He may be taking a stroll. Visiting somebody. Something."

She jerked her head affirmatively and they ran back outdoors. She led the way around the garage. The window from which the light streamed was small and high--

higher than Aggie could reach. Its panes were set in a hinged frame that was open so that light fell into the leaves of a big maple which grew near the barn, at a slight angle from the window. He could see black paint on the panes to make the room totally dark for daylight photographic development. He looked for a box, a wheelbarrow, a barrel--to stand on.