Carolyn G. Hart_Henrie O_01 Read online

  I was listening but still fuming—until Trevor’s words finally registered and knocked everything else out of my mind. I stared at him, aghast. “Trevor, that’s crazy! Talk about asking for trouble!”

  He was defensive. “It wasn’t the least bit crazy at the time. Look, the IRA put a price on Chase’s head—his British papers waged all-out war against the IRA—and he’d just extended his loans, bought a major newspaper in New York. This was—God, time goes fast!—this was more than ten years ago. Closer to twelve now. If anything’d happened to Chase then, Prescott Communications would have gone down faster than the Titanic. The policy reassured some damn nervous investors.”

  “Okay, let me see if I’ve got it straight. This was a variation on the old double-indemnity policy, but this particular policy—”

  “Lloyd’s.” He drank deeply.

  “—pays double to the company in the event Chase is murdered. A clear one hundred million, right?” I was sitting bolt upright, which isn’t easy in a pool chair.

  He downed the rest of his drink. “Right.”

  I leaned forward. “So the answer’s simple. Cancel that policy. Get back to the mainland and a phone and cancel it tomorrow’.”

  “Yeah. Well, you can talk to him. I’ve talked till I don’t give a damn.” He sprawled back in the chair, a man who had endured too much sea, sun, and Chase.

  “I’ll talk to him.” I had, in fact, quite an agenda in mind. “Why didn’t he tell me about this?”

  “He says it’s irrelevant. He says why the hell would anybody want to enrich Prescott Communications?” Wearily, Trevor pushed out of his chair, crossed to the bar, and splashed more scotch in his glass. No soda this time. “I said, ‘Chase, stop acting like a goddamn ostrich and look around.’ But he made me spell it out. It’s so clear a blind person can see it. Finally I told him that Lyle Stedman is a cold-eyed, greedy, ambitious bastard with the soul of an anaconda. I did my good deed of the day, I told Chase Prescott the honest-to-God truth, and you know what?”

  I waited for the bitter voice to continue.

  “He told me to go to hell.”

  I poked my head in the kitchen door.

  Rosalia’s head jerked my way. A thin breath whistled through her teeth.

  “Has Enrique been back?”

  She and Betty shook their heads, but the fear in Rosalia’s eyes didn’t lessen.

  “It will be all right.” Betty tried to sound cheerful. “I’ve moved our things into the room next to yours, Mrs. Collins. Are you sure—”

  “Positive. Thank you for taking care of it.” I started out, then paused and said casually, “Oh, Betty, we need you upstairs for a minute. In the music room.” I led the way.

  When we reached the music room, I motioned for her to enter. I followed her inside and closed the door. “This won’t take long.” Again I was opting for a reassuring voice. I pointed at the rose petit-point chair. “Please sit down.”

  The maid looked around the empty room, realized she’d been decoyed, and stared at me, her eyes anxious. She tried to edge past me to the door. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I’ve got to set the table for dinner …”

  “I won’t keep you long.”

  “I need to get back. Enrique’ll be there pretty soon.”

  Betty was closer to fifty than forty, with a pudgy abdomen, too-broad hips, and a face that might once have had a candy-box prettiness. But now lines of fatigue clustered at the corners of her eyes and her mouth had the permanent sag of lips that had forgotten how to smile.

  Not a sexy woman. Especially not to a young man like Haskell. What had prompted Chase to suggest a tryst between Haskell and Betty? It was ludicrous. But it had occurred to Chase when I told him someone had hidden in the shadows late last night and refused to respond to my call. It made me wonder about Chase’s perceptions of his stepson. And of this woman!

  She was obviously wary of Enrique. Surely his rule of force didn’t extend to her. No, that was unlikely. But it’s easy enough for a powerful personality to cow underlings. If I’d had more time, I would have pursued it, asked how he treated her, what kind of overseer he was. Because I intended to become a big monkey wrench in Enrique’s future. But right now I didn’t have time for side excursions.

  “Betty, I want you to relax.” I could see both of us in the mirror behind the piano. Betty stood rigidly, her arms tight to her side, her eyes flared wide. I had a genial smile on my face and so, hopefully, looked more like a mother hen than a swooping hawk. She continued to stare at me mutely. A nervous tic fluttered her left eyelid. So much for my effort to soothe.

  Okay. I knew how to play it. Easy questions first.

  “Betty, how did you find your job with Mr. Prescott?” This should put her at ease. It was a long time ago and had nothing to do with the attacks on Chase. I remained between her and the door.

  “I came to work for Mrs. Lee when Haskell was born. She brought me with her when she married Mr. Prescott.”

  She was nervous about taking the time, darting occasional glances at the porcelain clock on the mantel, but I had truly touched the right chord. She was eager to say how lovely Carrie Lee Prescott had been and to tell me about Haskell as a little boy.

  Which made Chase’s suggestion all the more outrageous and puzzling.

  I heard about Carrie’s beauty—“Why, you’d never know she and Miss Valerie were sisters, they looked so different. Mrs. Carrie had dark brown hair and the most beautiful skin you ever saw. Mr. Haskell looks just like his mother”—and Haskell’s superiority at sports—“He can swim like a fish, Mrs. Collins. And he’s a wonderful tennis player”—and how dreadful it was when Mrs. Carrie’s plane went down. “I was the one had to call Paris to find Mr. Haskell.”

  Then I asked a simple question. “Now let’s see, Betty, where did you grow up?”

  Panic flared in her eyes. She opened her mouth, closed it. Finally, grudgingly, she muttered, “Waynesboro.”

  “Does your family still live there?” I smiled.

  She watched me with sick fascination. It seemed forever before she nodded, jerkily, not saying a word.

  I knew I’d uncovered something. But there was no point in pushing her. If only I had a telephone that really worked …

  I shifted away from the personal. “I suppose it’s been exciting being a part of Mr. Prescott’s staff, getting to travel and meet famous people.” Once again I was as genial as a talk-show host.

  “Yes, ma’am.” She looked longingly toward the door.

  “As you know, Mr. Prescott asked me to try to find out who’s behind the attacks on him.”

  She licked her pale lips.

  “And he wants you to help me.”

  She blinked at that. “Me? Mr. Prescott wants me to help?”

  “Yes. Because you have been a part of his household for so many years, and you may have seen people do things or heard them say things that could tell us if they were really very angry or upset with him.”

  “Oh, no, no.” Betty shook her head violently. “Not me. I don’t pay no attention. I don’t care how people do. I just clean up. And straighten. And put things where they go. I don’t pay no attention.”

  With that she moved roughly past me, her hands scrambling for the door, and then she was through it and running heavily toward the kitchen.

  Obviously, she had paid a great deal of attention.

  I skidded into my room in a hurry. I can shower and dress in seven minutes. I had twenty minutes before dinner.

  The singed book was still in place, secreted among the folders.

  I carried it to the table and settled down to scan.

  It didn’t take long to figure out why Chase loathed this unauthorized biography. Jeremy Hub-bard had a talent for unearthing the unattractive, including the accusations that Chase had brilliantly engineered a meeting with his first wife, Elizabeth Warren, and pursued her solely because of her father’s substantial media holdings; that Chase had deliberately forced Elizabeth’s brother Aaron out
of the business and refused to help him later when he was in financial trouble; that Chase had been responsible for a market rumor that had dropped a competitor’s stock price until Chase was able to amass a controlling interest at an incredible bargain; that Chase was ruthless in jettisoning older employees no matter how long and how loyally they’d served him.

  But the meat of the book—to my mind—was a series of ugly revelations about Chase’s personal relationships:

  Chase never visited Elizabeth when she was hospitalized.

  Chase delegated his secretary to select birthday presents for Roger.

  Chase went to Europe on business when Carrie was hospitalized for a miscarriage.

  Chase had no time for friends other than those who could help him in a business sense.

  Chase didn’t attend Roger’s graduation from college.

  There was more in the book, of course: questionable stock deals, rapacious mergers, unjustified dismissals.

  Hubbard was clearly a clever, skilled writer. He’d pieced together a series of facts and the result was a damning portrait.

  I showered quickly, thinking about the revelations in the book and about all the conversations I’d had.

  I knew so much.

  Why couldn’t I put a face to Chase’s attacker?

  As every newspaper reporter knows, there comes a moment when the facts fall into place, when it is clear what matters and what doesn’t. Then the story writes itself: The lead focuses on the most important element, the follow-up paragraphs support the statement made in the lead, and the body of the story amplifies and explains subsidiary information.

  I’d counted on learning a lot from conversations. I had.

  I’d counted on learning a lot from the book I’d retrieved from the incinerator. I had.

  But nothing jelled. The mass of data I’d acquired was as formless as a spilled deck of cards.

  I couldn’t point a finger.

  Say I opted for Lyle Stedman as a power-and-money-hungry executive intent on taking control of Prescott Communications.

  A poisoned chocolate piece?

  Shots from behind a tree?

  From this type-A guy with an international reputation for naked ruthlessness?

  Weren’t these two attempts much more likely to be efforts by a young woman whose passion for a man had turned from love to obsession?

  Neither of the attacks on Chase, when you studied them, seemed designed to succeed. Wasn’t that perhaps the result of conflicting motives in Miranda’s subconscious, the desire to possess warring with a lust to hurt?

  For dinner I chose a royal-purple cotton damask coatdress. I like bold colors. But I wished it didn’t remind me of tonight’s sky. Though the storm building on this island in the half-glimpsed, not-quite-understood relations among its visitors might well erupt long before tomorrow’s storm.

  I clipped on oversize pearl earrings and a two-strand pearl necklace to match the faux-pearl front buttons.

  I gave myself a last glimpse in the mirror: My hair was smooth—upswept tonight—and my makeup even.

  Only my eyes reflected the turbulence in my mind.

  It was as if we were all bit players awaiting our cues. Only our host and hostess were absent.

  His sunburned face obviously painful, Trevor slumped morosely in a club chair, a drink in his hand, ignoring everyone. Valerie’s lips were pinched. The actress’s eyes kept darting toward the doorway. She was looking for trouble, it was evident in the glitter in her eyes, the rapid drumming of her crimson nails on her chair arm. Roger leaned against a bookcase, his back to the room. He held an oversize volume open in his hands, but he never turned a page. Burton stood stiffly by a huge Oriental screen, as if he were not a part of the gathering in the room. The secretary looked ill at ease and even weedier and less impressive than ever. Haskell paced by the French doors and occasionally opened them to step out onto the terrace. Each time he returned to the room his frown was darker. Lyle Stedman’s fiery red hair was still faintly damp from his shower. He leaned back in one of the club chairs, seemingly at ease, but his eyes watched us all warily.

  Since that revealing—and personally upsetting—talk with the sunburned lawyer, I certainly appraised Lyle in a new light. At the track that morning—and didn’t that seem like a decade ago?—Lyle had indicated deep concern over Chase’s confidence in his ability to refinance the huge outstanding loans. Prescott Communications would certainly have no difficulty at all in refinancing—if that Lloyd’s of London policy on Chase’s life paid off.

  The French door clicked again. Haskell closed it behind him. Roger reshelved the book—an atlas?—and turned to face the room. Valerie toyed with the heavy gold chain at her throat.

  Of course, if that enormous policy paid off, it would only enhance the worth of the ultimate estate … to the benefit of almost everyone in the room. How many of them, I wondered, knew about that policy? Actually, I was quite certain that had any persons wanted to know—and were knowledgeable about corporate life—they could easily have discovered it. That kind of information is included in annual reports and would most certainly have been included because that was the whole point—to reassure investors.

  The sullen quiet was becoming oppressive, unnatural. I had just resolved to break it when brisk footsteps sounded in the central hallway. Chase and Miranda swept into the room.

  It was an entirely different Chase, affable, smiling, exuding good humor with a touch of embarrassment.

  If he was changed, Miranda was transformed. Her face glowed with happiness and contentment, her pretty eyes sparkled.

  “For God’s sake,” Chase cried, his voice deep and vibrant, “we aren’t holding a wake, people. Here, now, everyone have a drink. Val, do you want sherry? Henrie O, a gin and tonic?”

  When a logjam breaks, there is a rush, a surge of logs, crashing and tossing and buffeting one another.

  In just that instant the two of them ignited conversation and it was almost as if the dreadful interlude of the morning had never occurred.

  I accepted my drink—marveling again at what Chase had discovered of my likes and dislikes after so many years—and observed the suddenly invigorated gathering, Roger in lively conversation with Trevor, even Burton unbending enough to accept a drink from Enrique. I was impressed anew with the power of Chase’s personality, his charm, his persuasiveness, his intensity, and ready, when I had a chance, to tangle with him. Leave me a bequest! Not if I could help it. But his ebullient good humor made me smile, irritated as I was.

  The only nonresponsive face belonged to Haskell. He looked toward the French doors, then squared his shoulders and approached his stepfather. He waited patiently until Chase finished talking to Lyle.

  I strolled close enough to hear.

  “Chase, we need to get the hell off this island. I checked the weather again—from the Miranda B.—and they think the hurricane’s picking up speed. Right now it’s heading for Miami. But you know how quick that can change.”

  “I know, I know.” And still Chase’s tone was good-humored. “Everybody, everybody—” He held up his hand.

  The conversations died away. Every face turned toward Chase.

  I will never forget him as he stood in that elegant room that evening. His blue blazer was a perfect fit, of course, and his white slacks a dramatic counterpoint. He never looked better, an aristocratic face—sharply defined, classic features, a firm chin, full lips. His dark hair had just enough silver to qualify as distinguished, his dark eyes were commanding—but, tonight, pleasant.

  There was no sense of anger or urgency, and certainly none of fear.

  “Some of you—those of you who are old salts—can’t have helped noticing the deterioration in our weather. My stepson’s been monitoring the progress of the storm on our ship radio, as has Enrique. The upshot is, well leave the island after breakfast tomorrow and return to the mainland.” His face hardened. “This morning I indicated we’d stay here until we knew the truth of the shots that we
re fired.” He paused for a long moment, his mouth compressed, then managed a wry smile. “This afternoon my legal counsel convinced me that was an unwise decision. Further, I became aware of our weather situation. And finally, I decided I didn’t like the idea of continuing as a sitting duck. So the decision’s been made. Let’s enjoy our dinner and our evening. Tomorrow morning we leave.”

  Dinner was almost festive. Sometimes the laughter seemed forced. But there was certainly an undercurrent of relaxation. Chase was making every effort to charm. He went out of his way to speak genially to Trevor and even restored prickly Valerie to good humor, promising to look over her play. “It would be fun to back a show again. Give Miranda and me an excuse to spend more time in New York.” And he gave Valerie’s arm a friendly squeeze.

  I was glad, truth to tell, to have the; burden of this investigation lifted from me. And perhaps I could get myself deleted from an official list of suspects, if the investigation was handed over to the police. After all, I’d been nowhere near Chase’s New York brown-stone when the poisoned candy killed the dog and Trevor and I had been standing together when this morning’s shots were fired. I held tight to that hope. Perhaps I could slip away unnoticed, unheralded. Because if the jackals started digging into my past …

  I felt almost relaxed. I foresaw my own escape from the turmoil of Chase’s problems. However, I still intended to get out of Chase’s will. And I certainly had much to say to him about Rosalia. But all of that could be handled easily enough. Then I could return to my life, free at last of Chase and his grip on my past. I had come when summoned. I hadn’t accomplished Chase’s objective, but I felt that I had gone a long way to pay an old debt.

  In any event, I was no longer involved.

  But, as we walked out of the dining room, Chase leaned toward me and said, “Come to my study. In half an hour.”

  9

  Chase leaned against the mantel above the unlit fireplace and waited for me to answer his request, a request I definitely wanted to reject. He was frowning, as he always frowned when it appeared he might not have his way. But his presentation tonight had lacked the force and fury of our previous encounter. He was determined, yes, but tonight he no longer looked driven and feverish. His face was calm. He smoked, but he lifted the cigarette to his mouth almost absentmindedly.