Leslie LaFoy (38 page)

“Let's call that company MacPhaull,” she suggested, wondering how long he'd be able to keep talking, and knowing that he must feel strongly about the matter to make the effort. Despite the craziness of his notion, the least she could do was give him her attention long enough to distract him from the roiling of his stomach.

“All right,” he said, barely nodding. “Let's say someone wanted to make money through the MacPhaull Company holdings.”

“But they don't own the MacPhaull holdings.”

“No, they don't. But if the manager or the owner of the company could be motivated to sell a property for pennies on the dollar, that person could pick up the property, hold it for a while, and then sell it for a profit.”

“And how would this person motivate Richard and me to sell a profitable company?” she asked gently, hoping to make him see the error of his assumptions. “It goes not only against logic, Jack, but good business sense.”

“They know that,” he countered, slowly rubbing his free hand over his jaw. “They also know that good business judgment usually calls for disposing of an unprofitable holding. All they have to do is see that a company turns from a money maker to a financial drain. When you and Richard do the logical thing and decide to cut your losses by putting it up for sale, they're there to buy the property.”

“And just how would they be in any position to turn around the fortunes of any particular holding?”

“They see that there are fires, materials are stolen, machinery breaks down, that tools go missing, shipments disappear, roofs collapse, water pipes are broken. The list is endless, Lindsay.” He exhaled hard before adding, “A creative man would never run out of ideas.”

“Deliberate sabotage,” she said.

“With every incident looking like an accident.”

“All right, Jack,” she said patiently. “Assuming that you're correct—and that's a significant assumption—why
would it be necessary for this person to create a false persona? In this case, that of Percival Little and Little, Bates and Company.”

“It's not just Little, Bates and Company, Lindsay.” His breathing quickened and his skin suddenly took on a telltale sheen. “It's also Michaels, Katz, and Osborne. It's the MacWillman Company, as well as Hooper, Preston, and Roberts, Limited.”

“All four? All four of the largest companies with which MacPhaull does business?” she scoffed, laughing. “Jack, your brain is sloshing.”

“No, it's not.” He cocked a brow and gave her a smile that was both pained and rueful. “My stomach sure as hell is, but my brain's working just fine.”

And they hadn't even left the dock yet. He was going to be flat on his face before they ever cleared the harbor. “All right, Jack. We'll finish out the logic of this utterly illogical hypothetical situation. You think that there are four persons out there sabotaging the MacPhaull Company holdings in order to force Richard and me into selling properties at a loss so that they—these four mysterious and unknown persons—can purchase them, hold them, and sell them at an obscene profit. Am I understanding your thoughts on this clearly?”

“There aren't four persons,” he corrected, closing his eyes.

“Eight? Maybe ten? And keep your eyes open, Jack. Closing them only makes it worse. You're focusing only on how the world is moving beneath you. Open them and look at me.”

“One, Lindsay,” he said, doing as she'd told him. While his gaze held hers, he gripped the rail with both hands again. “One person. That's why the facades are necessary. One person owns all four of the companies. If you knew you were dealing with only one person, you'd get suspicious, you'd see the pattern. The shell game depends on your attention being divided so that you don't see the pattern.”

“And how is it that
you've
seen this alleged pattern, Jack?” she asked, her anger sparked by his words. “Is it
that you're so very much smarter than either Richard or me?”

“I'm looking at the history of the company from the outside, Lindsay,” he said blandly, almost as though he wasn't the least bit aware of having stirred her ire. “I don't have the blind loyalties and faith that you do.”

Lindsay clenched and unclenched her fists. “No one's ever accused me of being blindly faithful about anything, Jack. No one.”

“Well,” he countered, his voice edged with frustration. “just because they've never said it aloud doesn't mean that they aren't counting on it, just the same.”

“That would imply that this person sabotaging the MacPhaull Company is either someone whom I trust implicitly or someone whom I wouldn't consider capable of such a complicated act of thievery.”

“Yep.” He swallowed with what seemed to be difficulty and a great deal of thought. “On both counts.”

“How long do you think these purported thefts have been occurring?” she asked, her hands on her hips.

“At least fifteen years.”

“I haven't accepted your supposition, Jack,” she stated, thinking that he looked like he could collapse at any moment. “But I am willing to run with it a bit longer just for the sake of argument. Setting up false companies would take a great deal of thought and legal work; not to mention what amounts to confidence operations in distant cities. Henry might be motivated to steal, but he doesn't have the intelligence to actually do anything on a scale this large or for the length of time you think it's been happening. Ben's certainly capable of actually doing it, but he's the most loyal man on the face of the earth. Otis Vanderhagen, however, meets the requirements on all counts.”

“So does Richard Patterson,” he offered softly, his eyes full of regret.

“Richard would
not
steal from me.”

“And there's your implicit trust and blind loyalty.”

“Richard would
not
steal from me,” she asserted again, angry and unshakeable in her conviction.

Jack moistened his lips with the tip of his tongue. “If I'm
wrong, I'll apologize. But I'm not wrong, Lindsay. I'm sorry, but I'm not wrong. Richard Patterson's behind it and I'm betting Otis Vanderhagen has a finger in the pie as well.”

He was ill. He didn't know what he was talking about, and he clearly didn't understand the depths of betrayal he was suggesting. “You're going to have to give me irrefutable and undeniable proof of Richard's involvement.”

“That's why we're going to Boston. You're going to be with me when my letter to Percival Little arrives in the hands of whoever deals with the game on the Boston end. You're going to be there when I ask the hard questions and you're going to hear the answers from the mouth of Richard's shill. I'm not going to give you a choice to believe anything except the ugly, bitter truth.”

An order rang out behind them and, in almost the same fraction of time as the mooring ropes were cast free, there was a sudden scrape of unfurling canvas and then the pop and lurch of wind filling the sails. The vessel surged away from its berth in the next heartbeat, its hull plowing and rolling hard against the incoming waves. Lindsay grasped the railing to keep from being pitched off her feet.

“And assuming that this shill points his finger straight at Richard … What are you going to do about it, Jack?”

“Theft is against the law,” he answered tightly, his breathing growing quicker and more shallow.

“You can't try and imprison a dead man,” Lindsay countered, watching in alarm as his face went whiter than the sails over their heads. “At least not in New York.”

“But you can challenge the settlement of his estate. If you can prove his property was gained from embez—” He leaned out over the railing and lost the battle to keep his stomach down.

“Oh, Jack,” Lindsay said softly, gently rubbing her hand over the width of his shoulders.

“If I die,” he half-moaned, “for godssakes don't bury me at sea. Have a heart and find—”

She waited until the second purging episode had passed before she asked, “Do you want me to haul your body back to Texas?”

He laid his forehead against the wooden railing. “Only if you promise to take me overland.”

“Where exactly should I take you? I understand that Texas is quite large.”

“Little town called Waterloo.” He gagged, but managed to keep from having to lean out over the rail again. “Just started up nearby. By the time you get me there, it'll probably be called Austin. Talk was swinging that way when I left.”

“Waterloo,” Lindsay repeated, still rubbing his shoulders. “As in Napoleon. Or Austin. As in Stephen Austin. I can remember that, Jack. Do you have any special requests for a funeral service? Will I need to hire professional mourners?”

“God, Lindsay.” His laughter was somewhat strangled, but she was glad to hear that he was capable of the attempt.

“I just want to do this right, you understand. I need very specific instructions.”

“Just get me to the Hill Country. Central Texas.”

“I'll ask for directions,” she assured him, running her fingers gently through the hair at his nape. It felt like strands of warm, dark silk. “Surely people will point me in the right direction; if for no other reason than to get rid of me. You're going to smell awful by the time I get you there, Jack.”

“Oh God.” He tried to laugh again, and this time the effort ended with him leaning out and retching again.

“I'll get you a proper headstone,” Lindsay promised him when he returned his forehead to the rail. “Of course, I'm going to have
HE WAS WRONG ABOUT RICHARD
P
ATTERSON
carved in it.”

“I'm not wrong,” he muttered miserably. “I'm not.”

“We'll just have to wait and see.” She stepped against his side and, sliding her arm around his waist, tried to draw him away from the rail, saying, “Right now, though, let's get you to the cabin.”

“I can't move,” he moaned. Even as the words left his mouth, he belied them by sinking slowly to his knees.

“Oh, Jack,” Lindsay whispered, easing down onto the
deck and wrapping both arms around him. “We'll come back to New York by coach.”

“Doesn't matter,” he answered morosely. “ 'Cause I'm dying right here.”

Drawing him down so that his head rested on her lap, Lindsay gently brushed damp tendrils of hair from his brow. “I'll take care of you,” she crooned. “You'll live to see Boston.”

He groaned. Lindsay loosened his tie and undid his starched shirt collar. He sighed in relief and nestled his head deeper into the cradle of her lap. After a few moments, his breathing evened and deepened and she knew that he'd escaped his misery in sleep.

Still winding her fingers through his hair, she leaned her head back against the gunwale. Crew members scurried in the ropes overhead and the languages of at least fifteen nations billowed on the wind. When they were well under way and when the frenetic activities of departure were done, she'd get someone's attention and ask them to help her get Jack to their cabin. He'd rest more comfortably in a bunk with a soft mattress under him. She'd open the porthole so that he'd have plenty of cool, fresh air.

“My poor, sweet, deluded Jack,” she whispered, looking back down at the massive, vibrant man made so utterly vulnerable by the forces of nature. “How very badly you must want to get to Boston.”

How strongly he must believe. Lindsay frowned and thought back through all that he'd told her of his suspicions. Four companies with one owner, whose single purpose was stripping the MacPhaull Company of assets? Using deliberate sabotage to reduce the value of the holdings so that the properties could be acquired for a mere fraction of their real worth? It was, she had to admit, a brilliant strategy, if indeed it was being done.

What would be required for someone to manage the game for the fifteen years Jack maintained it had been going on? Certainly an initial amount of capital would have been necessary. But, if it worked as Jack thought it did, the process would have more than paid for itself after the first one or two purchases and subsequent sales.

The logistics of making it work would be complicated, though. Four companies, each in a different city and some distance from New York, meant that whoever—if indeed there really was someone—couldn't realistically travel between them to conduct the correspondence and business from all ends. They had to have established a system for making it all look real. There had to be people in Boston, Richmond, Philadelphia, and Charleston who were participating in the scheme, who took their instructions from whoever was behind the thefts and were rewarded for their complicity.

Why would someone want to strip the MacPhaull Company? Lindsay quietly snorted in a most unladylike way. Money was always a first consideration. Revenge usually counted among the other most popular motives, too. The desire for wealth was a universal thing, though, and that made for an impossibly long list of persons who could be behind it all. Vengeance, however, produced far fewer possibilities. Unfortunately, she couldn't think of anyone who might think that the MacPhaull Company had done them an injustice.

Perhaps it was a personal vendetta, she mused. Perhaps someone wanted either herself or Richard to be punished for some unintentional or imaginary wrong they were thought to have committed. It was so easy to step on people's social toes, but surely no damage had ever been inflicted that would warrant such a long-term, concerted effort at retaliation. If it had begun fifteen years ago, she would have been just beyond childhood and incapable of hurting anyone to a sufficient degree to bring such a hatred to bear on the MacPhaull Company.

Could Richard have inadvertently stirred someone's wrath? Lindsay sorted through her memories. Richard had been at the helm of the company since long before she had been born. She remembered being a young child—no more than five years old—and sitting at the top of the stairs watching him cross the foyer toward her father's study. Richard had had long strides and she could remember thinking that it said he was a man of concentrated purpose. Everything about him had been larger than life, too. His
laugh had been loud and exuberant in those days. His eyes had been bright and quick and he'd had an air about him that said nothing could put so much as a dent in his spirit.

It had been his sense of confidence and resiliency—and the peppermints in his pockets—that had been her harbor in the marital storms that shook the walls and rattled the rafters of MacPhaull House. Those same qualities had been nothing less than her salvation in the days and months following her father's departure.