Hiss and Tell (11 page)

“I thought you told Sunny that you had proof that this Taxman existed,” Will challenged him, and Randall rose to the bait.

“I’ve got ten years’ of files from a damned good crime
reporter and conversations with several probable victims, but nobody who’d speak for the record,” he responded.

Will gave that a dismissive nod. “You also suggested that Eliza Stoughton died because she recognized this so-called Taxman, who’s apparently been in business at least ten years. At this point, our main suspects seem to be the young people in the compound. For one of them to have been running this extortion racket, they’d have had to have started while still in college—or even high school.”

“Not impossible,” Randall argued. “Augustus de Kruk tightened the purse strings on Carson after a very free-spending freshman year. It’s possible that pushed his son to extortion.”

“What about Peter Van Twissel?” Sunny asked. “He’s in a much lower financial bracket than the others. A little blackmail would go a long way to fund his friendships.” She paused. “And if he’s really a computer genius, he’d have the programming smarts to bounce payments all over creation.” She looked over at Will. “You said that the surveillance cameras on Neal’s Neck are recorded on hard drives. If anyone knew how to spoof a computer, it would be Peter.”

She also remembered his hands, with all their tiny scars from years of circuit board accidents. Bony but strong.

Randall nodded, but admitted, “You’re right. Frankly, I’ve been looking more at the older generations too. To me, the most likely—” He broke off, waving his hands. “I’ll say it again, this is only my personal theory, there’s no hard proof behind it.”

“Okay, this won’t be for attribution. Did I get that right?” Will asked.

“Spoken just like a veteran newsperson,” Sunny assured him.

Randall nodded, leaning toward them over the table and lowering his voice. “I think it’s the old man. Thomas Neal Kingsbury.”

“The Senator?” Sunny frowned dubiously, remembering the patrician man at the dinner table, unconsciously posing for media cameras that were no longer there.

“
Former
senator,” Randall corrected. “And the way he lost his seat, with people deserting him for a younger, more approachable rival, it’s understandable that he might be a bit vengeful. He got treated shabbily by a lot of his supposedly loyal supporters.”

“I know,” Sunny said. “My dad mentioned that during his last campaign, Kingsbury was even reaching out to the Kittery Harbor dissidents. Not that it did him much good.”

“The Senator still has some friends in Augusta,” Will protested. “Enough to get a state police detachment on duty whenever he’s in residence on Neal’s Neck.”

“But that’s nothing compared to the weight he used to swing.” Randall rested his forearms on the table. “When I heard stories about the Taxman, one of the things that really fascinated me was how he dealt largely in favors, dictating corporate and political decisions. It almost seemed as if the money was of secondary interest.”

“Favors are the currency of politics,” Will admitted. “You can see it even in the sheriff’s department.”

“And here I thought it was campaign contributions,” Sunny said. “Or do you have to get higher up the food chain before that happens?”

Randall was still busy making his case. “To hijack both of
your metaphors, I think favors would be important currency for someone who got thrown off the food chain. Someone who used to be powerful, but who got the old heave-ho.”

But Sunny could see other suspects. “Even so, what about people who are still involved in politics—like the governors? Favors could be just as crucial to them.”

“Those two are politicians who won’t go much farther than their respective state houses,” Randall replied confidently. “Lem took his shot at being the fresh new face in the presidential race and blew it. And unless something huge changes, Tom is a long shot for the next couple of election cycles. I think they’ll both end their careers as political has-beens.”

“Like the Senator, but not reaching as high.” Will scowled at the table. “Could the Taxman be one of them trying for some under-the-table influence?”

“And what about Caleb Kingsbury?” Sunny asked.

Randall shrugged. “A political never-was. He’d barely gotten elected to his first term as a congressman before that scandal broke over his head. After that, he was political poison. Some people even suggest that was the beginning of the end for the Senator. Certainly, it was a big blot on the Kingsbury name.”

“So, who’s left? We’ve pretty much covered all the Kingsbury males and most of the guys in the wedding party,” Will said.

“I’ve got a black horse,” Sunny piped up. “How about Lee Trehearne?”

Both Will and Randall turned to stare at her. “What?”

“It just strikes me that an operation like the Taxman’s would necessarily require a lot of information. That’s what
a security guy deals in, too.” Sunny recalled Trehearne’s furious face when she and Ken Howell had penetrated his defenses. “We know he’s got surveillance stuff set up around the compound. And he’d be in a position to find out a lot of stuff, going back to when the Senator was more connected. Maybe he’d relish being the power behind the scenes.”

“I hadn’t thought of him,” Randall admitted. “Or it could be someone on his staff. . . .”

“Or crooked NSA wonks getting transcripts of phone calls and satellite photos of people up to dirty deeds.” Will was tired, and he’d obviously had enough of Randall for one night. “You’ve got a dandy theory, MacDermott, but nothing to back it up. I’m on shaky ground with the state police investigator as it is. If I accuse Trehearne of blackmail, or anybody else for that matter, I’ll get laughed off the case. I need more than your say-so, especially when you’re saying it could be any of half a dozen different people.”

“I’d need access to those people to narrow it down,” Randall told him. “And they’re all in a private compound behind a state police barricade.” He turned to Sunny. “But you, you’re inside there. Don’t you want to do something more substantial than the puff piece about going out on the bounding main that you wrote tonight?”

“I’m still trying to find my feet in there,” she told him. “And it’s not exactly easy to toss a casual, ‘Hey, have you blackmailed any interesting people lately?’ into the conversation.”

Randall looked into his coffee cup. “I’d hoped to keep all of this on the down low until I could prove the Taxman existed.” He shot a look at Sunny. “Thanks a lot for bringing the cops into it.”

“If you’re worried about your story leaking, I can assure you that Sunny and I will keep it confidential.” Will’s tone suggested that it wasn’t worth spreading around.

“No, it was interesting to discuss the Taxman with a law-enforcement type—even if you dismissed my ideas,” Randall said. “Maybe what I really need to do is find a professional who’ll accept them.”

Good luck with that.
Sunny could just imagine how the no-nonsense Lieutenant Wainwright would react to Randall’s theorizing. Aloud, she said, “I guess you’ll have to do what you think is best. Nobody’s going to hear about the Taxman from Will or me.”

That pretty much ended the meeting. Will picked up the tab, and in moments he and Sunny were back in his car. “This is just what we need,” Will muttered, “some amateur messing around in the case.”

“Right,” Sunny agreed. “That’s my job.”

Will glanced over at her. “It doesn’t help that he’s an ex-boyfriend.” He took a deep breath. “It also shouldn’t matter.”

Sunny took the cue. Keep it work related. “So, tomorrow, you figure I should try and tackle Beau Bellingham?”

“He’s a person of interest as of now,” Will said. “At least you can see if what he tells you jibes with what he’s telling Wainwright.”

“Was he the last to see Eliza?” Sunny asked.

Will shook his head. “She was last seen on a security monitor, passing the main house around midnight.”

“Did the surveillance catch her leaving the guesthouse?”

Will nodded.

“And she was heading someplace where there’d be no cameras to record whatever happened.” Sunny frowned. “Beau is Carson’s friend, and Carson said this was Beau’s first visit to Neal’s Neck. So how would he know which areas were private—and which weren’t?”

“Maybe Eliza set the meeting place,” Will suggested. “She was also Priscilla’s friend; maybe she’d been there before. We’ve got a guy meeting a girl. That’s pretty simple,” he argued.

“Not so simple,” Sunny countered. “It’s a guy who’s been going out with a girl—and just had a big fight with her.”

“I’ve got three words for you,” Will said. “Make-up sex. Or is that only two?”

“Then Beau Bellingham just happened to strangle Eliza after?” Sunny shook her head.

“The word you’re looking for is unpremeditated,” Will responded. “And after the way they made a spectacle of themselves that afternoon, it might explain a certain amount of sneaking around when they decided to bury the hatchet—or whatever. Bellingham creeps off for a booty call, things go badly, and he’s left with a dead girlfriend and no alibi.”

He grinned at Sunny. “I’m sure you’ll figure out a way to toss that question into casual conversation.”

“Sure.” Sunny sighed. “And speaking of sneaking, now I’ve got to get back into the house without waking anybody—or disturbing whatever else they may be up to.”

Even without an
alarm clock or a schedule, Sunny still found herself waking up the next morning at the same time she usually rose for work. The old house was quiet as she got washed and dressed, so she was surprised when she padded down the stairs to find coffee, rolls, and various fixings already prepared in the kitchen—and Priscilla and Carson having breakfast. Cillie smiled as Sunny joined them at the table. “Tommy is a partner in his firm and makes his own hours, and Yardley likes to sleep in. But I guess us regular working people are programmed for early rising.”

“Not that we necessarily like it.” Carson smothered a yawn. “And Peter is the mad genius type who’ll work on something until five in the morning and then crash all day.”

Sunny saw an opening. “What’s the story with your friend Beau?”

Maybe it was the matrimonial hormones speaking, but Cillie went straight into matchmaking mode. “He’s single, available, and going to be a doctor.”

“Um.” Sunny tried to figure out an answer to that without blowing her cover as a murder investigator. “I was really asking why he seems to be asleep most of the time.”

“That’s because of the brutal schedule he leads.” Carson shook his head. “Beau can put in eighty, even a hundred hours a week as a resident. Besides working in the hospital, he’s still doing conferences and lectures by day, and he’s on call every other night. When he gets some time off, the first couple of days go toward catching up on sleep.”

“According to Carson, Beau should be coming out of hibernation today.” Priscilla grinned.

“I gotta admire him,” Carson said. “Back in school, most of us were just learning how to shuffle money. But from the beginning, Beau was on the premed track. He wanted to do something useful with his life, even if he was also our beer pong champ.”

“I suspect he was also the life of the party in the frat houses.” Sunny grinned. “So if we wind up doing a beer pong tournament tonight, set me up on his team.”

Carson’s face took on an interesting expression. “Beer pong. Do you think we could get away with it?” he asked Cillie.

“As long as the Senator doesn’t hear about it,” she replied. “Maybe out here by the pool. I could talk to Uncle Cale about it.”

“It will have to be tonight,” Carson said. “There was a text message waiting for me when I got up. My parents get in tomorrow.”

Sunny’s reportorial antennae quivered. “You make it sound like all fun ends then.”

“No, but things will get a bit more . . . conventional.” Priscilla chose her words carefully, glancing at her fiancé. “In old WASP families, in the privacy of our summer places, things tend to be a bit, well, informal.”

Translation: shabby,
Sunny thought.

Carson looked around at the comfortable but hardly stylish dining room. “And, while de Kruk is an old name in New York, there wasn’t money behind it until my grandfather made his pile, which then Dad parlayed into the stratosphere. Our new wealth requires a lot of marble, gold plating, and publicity—plus some pretty starchy manners. As my father once put it to me, ‘No goddamn SOB is going to call me gauche!’”

“Oh, dear. Will I have to dig out my long white opera gloves for dinner?” Sunny asked.

That got a laugh out of them. “No,” Cillie responded, “but I think you will see ties on the guys.”

“In that case, I think I’d better go home and collect some more-appropriate clothes.” Sunny sighed. She’d hoped to get by with a more casual look, hanging out with Cillie and the younger set. But now she had no choice but to raid what she considered her reporter’s wardrobe for anything that would pass muster with the de Kruks.

“Just let me know when you want to go, and I’ll arrange for a car,” Cillie said.

“Thanks.” Sunny poured herself a cup of coffee, got a roll, cut it open, and spread some preserves on the two halves. The warm roll was delicious, and so was the brew. “And now, a nosy blogger question: I was thinking that today’s post might be about wedding presents.”

“Oh, there’ve been several parties already with gifts galore.” Carson rolled his eyes.

Priscilla dove into the nuts and bolts. “We have a few wedding registries, though of course some people sent old family pieces.”

“AKA, ancient monstrosities that they didn’t want in their own houses anymore,” Carson put in. “Maybe someday, when we have the space, we could have a ‘dud gifts’ room, where all that stuff can sit around and be ugly together. Which is sort of what they’re doing right now, up at the big house.”

“The gifts are here, not still in New York?” Sunny asked in surprise.

“Oh, yeah, taking up most of the old rear parlor,” Carson said. “We needed the space. Some of the stuff was large, as well as ugly.”

“And some of it is interesting—living history.” From Priscilla’s tone of voice, this was a discussion they’d had more than once. “I’ll walk you over once we’re finished here, Sunny. You can look the collection over and decide whether it’s worth a story.”

Sunny allowed herself to savor another cup of coffee before she told Cillie that she was ready. Priscilla led the way past the roadblock and along the path that led to the main house. They passed one of the ever-present security guys in his black Windbreaker. Sunny looked back, but for once this guy wasn’t checking them out at all—either of them. Instead, he was talking into a microphone set on his shoulder.

As Sunny and Cillie approached the house, one of the compound’s golf carts came zooming up from the opposite direction, and Lee Trehearne jumped off in front of them.
His greeting was polite enough, especially to Priscilla, but he looked at Sunny as if she were a one-woman torch-waving mob advancing on the house.

Hmmm,
Sunny thought,
I guess I know who that guy we passed was talking to on his radio.

She went to go around Trehearne, but he stepped into her path, saying, “Well, Ms. Coolidge, what brings you here?”

“Priscilla is bringing me to take a look at the wedding gifts,” Sunny replied. “I’m planning on doing a blog post, maybe taking a few pictures. . . .”

Trehearne’s lips quivered a little. “The gifts that my people are supposed to keep secure?”

Here’s a chance to extend an olive branch,
Sunny thought. “Well, sure. I think your security efforts deserve some good press. We could have you and some of your guys in the pictures, too. Let any bad guys out there know what they’re up against.”

“The idea is not to let them know anything about the compound,” Trehearne said.

“It might help discourage them a little,” Sunny countered pleasantly, “if they knew the house was surrounded by surveillance cameras, for instance.”

“That’s possible,” Trehearne admitted. Then his eyes sharpened. “Who told you about the house surveillance?” His tone suggested that whoever had opened his mouth wouldn’t have a job much longer. Sunny drew a deep breath. The last thing she wanted to do was get into an argument with this guy. “Look, Mr. Trehearne, I don’t want to give away any security secrets. I’m just looking for a nice story to humanize the proceedings here.”

“Really, Lee,” Priscilla joined in, “do you think anyone’s
going to come in and steal the crystal and silverware? Besides,” she gave a little shudder and said as an aside to Sunny, “as for some of the old family pieces that came our way, I’d never admit it in front of Carson, but I wouldn’t exactly be heartbroken if some of those monstrosities magically disappeared.”

She continued on her way into the house, Sunny behind her, and Trehearne right behind them both. Sunny’s wisecracking alter ego immediately sprang to life.
What’s his problem? Is he afraid you’re going to slip some soup spoons into your pocket?

Sunny had only a hazy idea of the layout of the mansion. The only parts she knew were the entrance hall and the route to the dining room. Now she followed Priscilla into one of the wings and down a long hallway, then took a right and came up to a pair of beautiful old sliding doors with yet another security guy standing in front of them. He drew himself up to attention, shooting a “What do I do now, Boss?” look at Trehearne.

The security honcho sighed. “Open the doors, Alvin. Ms. Kingsbury wants to inspect the gifts.”

After this buildup, Sunny was anticipating something on the order of Ali Baba’s cave. And as Alvin the guard pushed one of the doors aside, the view seemed pretty damned close. The first thing Sunny saw was something that looked like a lazy Susan on steroids—or maybe hit by gamma rays. It was a sort of buffet centerpiece that rose almost three feet high. In the middle was a basket in the form of a Chinese pagoda, surrounded by a framework of a good dozen arms disguised as sinuous tree limbs, each
holding out serving dishes. Altogether, the thing was larger than Sunny’s kitchen table.

Priscilla stood beside it with a critical glare. “It’s a solid silver epergne, more than two hundred years old, and takes up more space than some pieces of furniture,” she said, echoing Sunny’s thoughts. “What are we supposed to do with it?”

“Well, it’s got lots of room for chips and dips at a party,” Sunny suggested. “Or you could put in plumbing and have private bird baths.”

Cillie laughed at that. “I like the idea. But no, we’ll probably hide it somewhere, then spring it as an awful surprise when the next generation of the family gets married.”

They went around the huge, ornate, and heavy serving tray to a table filled with crystal glassware of all descriptions. Sunny stared. “Now I get it. If you’re going to have a party big enough to use all those glasses, one of those silver thingies isn’t going to be enough.”

Cillie ducked her head in embarrassment. “Having every kind of glass is sort of a de Kruk thing. They’re completists.” She moved over to a small wooden chest. “Now this is an heirloom I actually like. I’m hoping it will be our everyday silver.” She opened the top to display a dully gleaming set of knives, forks, and so on, all of them looking old enough that George Washington could have eaten with them.

Sunny hefted a soup spoon heavy enough to brain someone. “Solid silver again, huh? Well, you’ll burn calories just by hefting these things while you eat.”

They went through the rest of the wedding loot. The
chinaware was modern, and some of the “old gifts” were hilarious, like the moose head that was supposedly a hunting trophy from Teddy Roosevelt, or the shark-tooth necklace some Kingsbury ancestor brought back from a missionary stint in the South Seas. Sunny pulled out her digital camera and shot a few pictures, starting with a photo of a glowering Trehearne next to the oversized epergne, for scale. Other shots featured a smiling Priscilla holding up various items.

By the time she finished with the photography, Sunny had the rough outline for her post already in her head. She thanked Priscilla, smiled at Lee Trehearne and Alvin, and headed back to the guesthouse and her computer. Then it was a case of generating her story and weaving in appropriate photos. By the time she was done, they were well into the day, but Sunny was pleased.

I bet Ken will like it, too,
she thought. Which reminded her that she should go for more local color, something the
Courier
’s readers might appreciate.
Maybe I can talk to Fiona Ormond and get a list of local companies involved in the wedding. I’m sure there must be some; Priscilla would have wanted to use them, even if the snooty de Kruks might not have considered it.

As Sunny typed in a reminder note to herself, someone knocked on the door to her room. Cillie stood in the doorway, dressed in a damp bathing suit and her terrycloth beach wrap. “I hope I’m not disturbing your work,” she apologized.

“Just finishing,” Sunny said.

“Oh, good.” Priscilla paused for a moment, then lowered her voice. “Uncle Cale volunteered to get some
supplies for the—um—activity you suggested, and he asked if you wanted to share the ride. I wondered if you wanted to use it as an opportunity to go back to your place and get some more clothes.”

Sunny had a brief flash of being forced to sit down to dinner with the de Kruks in her old bathing suit, and sighed. “I suppose the sooner I get some more stuff together, the better.”

“Uncle Cale said you could meet him in the parking area with the golf carts in, say, half an hour. Is that okay?”

“Yes, I’ll be done and ready.” Sunny watched Cillie set off down the hallway, and then shut the door. She returned to her computer, and sent an e-mail to Ken that her blog post was ready to go. Then she got out her cell phone. Her dad sounded as if he’d been roused from a nap, but he was happy to hear from her. “Are you going to be discontented with your old room now that you’ve been sleeping in the lap of luxury?” Mike teased.

“The furniture in my old room is probably newer than the stuff in here,” she told him. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I had a salad supper last night, afraid the food police would come in and bust me if I had a hamburger.” Mike paused. “You’re missed—not just by me, but by your furry friend. He’s been moping around, barely touching his food. Spends most of his time by the living-room window. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think he was watching for you.”

“Shadow was pretty upset when I left,” Sunny said. “But that sounds more like dog behavior. Something that I’d expect from Toby—except he’d probably chew off the windowsill while he was waiting.”

Mike laughed, but his heart wasn’t in it. “That dumb dog,” he growled.

“But I wasn’t calling to make cracks about Toby,” Sunny said. “I have to come home and get some more clothes. The de Kruks are arriving tomorrow, and apparently that means the dress code gets stricter.”

“Well, I’ll be glad to see you,” Mike told her. “As for the furball, we’ll just wait and see.”

About twenty minutes later, Sunny walked along the path that led to the miniature parking lot with the golf carts and found Caleb Kingsbury leaning against one. “I hope we’re not climbing aboard that jalopy to go into town,” she told him. “It’s a little open for my taste.”

He laughed. “No, the real cars are over there.” He pointed into the distance. “But I figured it was easier to meet you here than give directions.” He and Sunny strolled along in the direction he’d pointed. Clothes on her mind, Sunny noticed that Cale himself was wearing a faded T-shirt and a pair of disreputable cargo shorts. The only decent things on him were a new-looking pair of Top-Siders.