PW01 - Died On The Vine (13 page)

“Were you Winslow’s attorney?” I asked.

“What, a wet-behind-the-ears cub like me?”

“I guess not.”

“No, the family legal is handled in his rather dottery fashion by old George Milton. He was Priscilla’s lawyer, her father’s lawyer too. He did Obie’s will for him, though I think Lest We Forget had an attorney on retainer for their business.”

“So maybe we should go see this George Milton about who gets what,” Julia suggested.

“Oh, I’m the executor,” Andrew said. “Look, here’s the will right here.” He picked up a file folder from the end table and handed it to Mary. Julia and I clustered around, craning our necks to read.

Amid yards and yards of legalese was the bequest of the estate known as Billington Forge to Andrew Billington Smith, the bequest to “my illegitimate daughter Mary Nguyen, to enable her to get a start in life”, various stock, bond and real holdings to Andrew, and the residue to the Lest We Forget organization.

Mary frowned thoughtfully. “So if the murder has a financial motive, it’s between this organization and – well – you.”

Andrew chuckled and shook his head. “Just me. As executor, I’ve been going over Obie’s accounts, and if the residue amounts to a couple thousand dollars, I’ll be surprised. He received a good income from the organization, but he didn’t save. Virtually everything he had he inherited from Priscilla, and that comes back to me.”

He pointed to the line leaving him Billington Forge. “He gave my family’s estate back to me; wasn’t that big of him?” He looked around the room possessively. “My family has owned this land for almost two hundred years.”

“How did he get it in the first place?” I wanted to know.

Andrew sighed. “Because Priscilla never got around to making a will. She must have thought she would live forever. I think she kept expecting to have children, but that never happened. So when she died, her entire estate went to her husband as next of kin. I was only a teenager, but I remember old Milton almost had a coronary about the situation.”

“Why is that?” Julia asked eagerly.

“This place was Obie’s absolutely. He could have sold it, subdivided it, anything he wanted. Actually, he was surprisingly decent about everything, let me stay on, and didn’t move in a harem or anything. I think he wanted to keep his country squire image and stay in the good graces of the horsie set. Didn’t like horses himself, but he liked owning them, liked hosting the hunt, all that sort of thing.”

“It must have seemed like the big time for a shoestore owner’s son from Indiana,” Julia surmised. My, that woman has a memory for details.

“Is that what he was?” Andrew chuckled. “He always gave the impression that he was born full-grown in the mud in Nam.”

One of us had not been taking part in this conversation. Mary was still eying the will, doing a slow boil. Now she boiled over. “’My illegitimate daughter, Mary Nguyen’! Why did he feel it necessary to underline it like that? Whose fault was it, anyway, if not his?”

Andrew stared at her for a moment. Finally he answered, “Stop giving yourself airs; I’m a bastard too.”

I knew I liked the guy.

TWELVE

Mary was surprised into a giggle.

Andrew sat back and smiled. “That’s better. And look on the bright side; at least you know who your father was. I haven’t the slightest idea.”

“Maybe you should consider yourself lucky,” Mary suggested.

After that they traded childhood horror stories, in an orgy of oneupsmanship. Mary told of being hidden in a crate while a crowd of desperate boat people fought off an attack by pirates in the West Pacific. She spoke in a very matter-of-fact way, but so gripped her audience that when the pirates finally sailed away, we all cheered.

Andrew told the story, which he couldn’t remember but had been told, of being found as a toddler in a one-room third floor walkup almost a week after his mother had died of a heroin overdose.

In the middle of this story, Mrs. Griffith arrived with a plate piled high with sandwiches. Andrew smiled at her, the sort of smile any woman would give a lot to be on the receiving end of. “And Mrs. Griffith has been trying to fatten me up ever since, haven’t you, Griffy?”

Mrs. Griffith put down the plate and folded her arms. “Oh, Mister Andrew, what a mess you were when you first arrived here! And Miss Priscilla says to me, “Griffy, what on earth shall I do with a baby?’ and her only just past her debut. That fancy girls school that finished Miss Priscilla didn’t teach the girls a thing about how to get rid of head lice.”

Andrew scratched his head thoughtfully.

Mrs. Griffith nodded her head emphatically and departed noiselessly.

We dived into the sandwiches and Julia said to Andrew, “We’re told you have political ambitions.”

Andrew laughed. “It’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it. Actually, the Democrats were looking for someone willing to go up against Hobart and at least put up a good fight. Not many people want to take the time out of their lives for what they consider a hopeless quest. I thought if I gave it a try, the party would owe me something.”

“Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came,” said Mary ominously around a mouthful of wonderful crab salad.

“Something like that,” Andrew admitted. “I don’t have a political reputation to lose anyway, so I thought it might be fun, in a sick kind of way.”

So we talked Virginia politics through the lunch and in that fashion got a reasonably complete account of Andrew’s schedule for the past several weeks.

He didn’t realize we were fishing for an alibi, at least I don’t think he did. But his schedule was crowded enough that killing Winslow would have required him to have gone without sleep two nights – the night the grave was dug and the night Winslow died. The round trip to Passatonnack County would take six hours, and then there was the time and mess associated with grave digging and surrogate father stabbing.

And assuming that the murderer followed Winslow to the winery on Sunday, Andrew was in the clear; he was hobnobbing with politicos that afternoon.

Not that I seriously suspected Andrew anyway. There was something about him, that dreamy Ashley Wilkes quality. I suppose anyone is capable of murder in the right circumstances. But only certain types of murder. Making the plan and sticking to it through a long night of grave digging just didn’t seem like Andrew’s type of murder.

After lunch, we took our farewell. Andrew was reluctant to see us go, and promised Mary fervently that he’d be in touch.

As we drove away, Julia said comprehensively, “That was interesting.”

“I can’t see him as a murderer, if that’s what you mean,” I answered.

“Me neither,” said Mary. I hoped that was a good sign for Andrew.

Julia nodded sagely. “No, he was awfully busy running around to political fish fries and what-not. But that freed up a lot of time for someone. And did you notice who witnessed the will?”

Good old Julia, never misses a trick. I was impressed. “No, I can’t say I noticed.”

“Well, I have no idea who Greg Albertson is, but the other witness was Lizette Griffith.”

“As in Griffy?”

“So I would assume.” Julia looked smug. “So she was at least aware that the estate goes to Mister Andrew.”

“I don’t know,” Mary said doubtfully. “I’ve never had any Old Family Retainers, so I wouldn’t know the ethics and mores of it, but does family loyalty cover murder?”

“I’m not saying she did, just that it’s possible.”

“So what’s our next stop?” I asked.

Mary spoke decisively. “D.C. We’re going to visit Lest We Forget.”

“Oh, good. Are we journalists?” Julia wanted to know. I made a mental note to rent the video of All The President’s Men, so I’d know what to expect from Julia’s latest craze.

“No, you two are my good friends. And I’m the Next of Kin.” Mary looked grim.

So on we rolled in style and comfort to the trendy environs of Georgetown. Lest We Forget was housed in a storefront between a revolutionary bookstore, where one could purchase the complete works of V.I. Lenin, and what appeared to be a health food store. (At least I think that’s what a “Tofuterie” is.)

The door was draped with black crepe paper, and there was only one person visible in the shop. She was occupying a desk and talking on the phone.

“Okay,” we heard her tell someone as we entered, “I’ll fax them my resume. Do you think I should just leave this job out, I mean with the boss being murdered and all? Or should I list the organization’s name and hope they don’t make the connection? Huh? Okay, I’ll do that. Talk to you later.”

She hung up and turned to us. “Can I help you ladies?”

“Who’s running things now?” I asked. “What with Mr. Winslow’s death?”

“You heard about that? Awful, huh? A patriotic guy like that.” She shook her head in a display of regret and lit a cigarette. “Mr. Calgary was the Colonel’s ‘second in command’, like they say, but Colonel Winslow was really the whole show. I don’t know what Mr. C. intends to do.”

“Mr. C. intends to pay the bills and shut this operation down, which is all that Mr. C can afford to do.”

We turned to the speaker. He was a small balding man in a three piece suit who had just entered the room from an office in the back. He greeted us with a slight bow. “Emmett Calgary, ladies. And you – ?”

“I’m Mary Nguyen,” Mary said. “Colonel Winslow’s daughter.” She made the last statement with difficulty.

Calgary raised his eyebrows. “The daughter! Yes, I heard about the will. That certainly came as a surprise to us. Come on back.” He turned to the girl at the desk. “If anyone calls, tell them that all Lest We Forget activities have been suspended until further notice. Did you cancel the Colonel’s San Diego trip?”

“Yes, but we won’t get the full price back on the plane tickets.”

Calgary sighed. “Can’t be helped.” He waved us into the back and led us to a small office crowded with filing cabinets. Julia and I found seats by moving file folders off the two visitor chairs. Mary perched on the radiator.

Calgary seated himself behind the battered wooden desk and leaned back. “She’s right, you know. I mean Lisa out there. This was a one man show. Can you picture a veteran’s group paying me to fly to San Diego to give a speech?”

No one answered. We really couldn’t picture it.

Calgary nodded, as if silence were a response. “Exactly. But I was in Nam too, you know. Spent more time in country than the Colonel did. But he had the presence. He got the donations.”

Mary leaned forward. “And did you accomplish anything with these donations?”

“I used to think so. Obie kept saying we were on the verge of the big breakthrough. But most of the money we raised just went to sustain more fundraising trips. I kept the books, so it was hard to hide from me how little of our funds actually went to research.”

“Research?”

“Informants, refugees, smugglers. Nothing authoritative, nothing you could take to court.”

Julia joined the conversation. “Mr. Calgary, do you think this operation was anything more than a scam?”

“I did when I started working here. Then I began to believe the Colonel was deluding himself. Lately I’ve started to think he was deluding everyone but himself. I don’t know. I’ve been meaning to quit for some time now. Too bad. If I’d gotten out sooner, I’d have avoided a murder investigation.”

“Do you have anything to worry about with an investigation?” Mary asked.

“I certainly do,” Calgary snapped. “I have to worry about anyone being willing to hire an administrative assistant whose previous boss was murdered.”

“Good point,” said Julia.

“Thank you. Who are you, by the way?”

Mary performed the introductions. “Mrs Barstow and Mrs. Rayburn. They’re helping me investigate my father’s death.”

“What do you want from me?” Calgary asked.

“Was there anything strange about Winslow lately? Any mysterious visitors?”

Calgary shook his head.

“Did he seem worried or preoccupied?”

“Not worried, but I have to say he did seem a trifle preoccupied for the past few months.”

“Do you know why?”

“Not a clue.”

I decided to join the game. “Did his behavior change in any way?”

There was a long pause. “I don’t know if this is what you’re looking for, but when I was doing the accounts, I did notice that the Colonel was taking fewer long speaking trips than this time last year. I wondered if he was wearing down or losing the faith or something.”

“Assuming there was any faith to lose,” Mary muttered.

“Granted. But he was spending more time in the office and at his home. He said he had research to conduct. But about what, I have no idea.”

Mary had a gleam in her eye. “May we go through the files? Maybe we could find something.”

Calgary waved us toward the file cabinets. “Have at it. The police have already been through them. But I believe their search was a bit cursory. All they took was some of the financial files and a few letters. Contributor lists, expense statements, and so forth.”