Larkspur (11 page)

"You're awfully philosophical."

He took another large swallow. "Not philosophical. Confused. The will threw me for a
loop. I was trying to rearrange my thinking when Kev barged in with the news about Miguel. We
posted the APB and drove out to question Domingo. The Peltzes were gone by then."

"To hear the will read?"

He gave a brief grin. "Are
they
in for a surprise. The lawyer said he'd be reading
it tomorrow in his office. Mrs. Peltz gets a small annuity and the cabin. Access road, no
land."

"Good for Llewellyn."

"I'm sorry for her. Peltz will give her hell."

"I suppose so, though he probably spoiled her chances when he got himself
arrested."

"No, the lawyer said the will is two years old. I wonder why the old guy didn't warn
Dennis. It's crazy to leave that kind of money to a..."

"A woolly lamb?"

"Something like that. Dennis is not exactly a high powered intellect."

"He's just naive and inexperienced."

"Naive, inexperienced, and thirty-eight years old," Jay said wryly.

"Wasn't Denise named in the will?"

"No."

"That says something."

"It says Llewellyn didn't trust her with money."

"But she's shrewd about money."

"According to Dennis?"

"Oh." The buzzer went off. "Food?"

He heaved a sigh. "I had a Danish sometime around eleven, and I've been on the go
since."

We were too hungry to talk. We polished off the fettuccini (with a nice mild Alfredo
sauce), bread, salad, and a thawed cheesecake, and then we talked.

There was more exclamation (me) and information (Jay) about the will. The lawyer had
not read it to him, merely described it, but Jay had made him detail any provision that mentioned
the guests and servants at the lodge. The Huff Press was down for $250,000 to use in seeking
grants for its publication of new poets and another quarter of a million for new equipment, and
Llewellyn had forgiven two hefty loans. Domingo would get a handsome pension, and a codicil
added $25,000 for Miguel.

"Not a lot."

"He could support his family for ten years on that in Baja."

"I suppose so." A depressing thought.

The provision that made me sit up (we were in bed by then) was the establishment of a
non-profit Foundation to run a writers' colony. Llewellyn had left the lodge, the lake, and the land
around it, plus a generous cash endowment, to Siskiyou Summit--that was the name he had
chosen for his Foundation--and he had specified that Winton D'Angelo was to serve a ten year
term as its first director.

The Foundation board was to include Llewellyn's accountant, his lawyer, and three poets
"of national stature." I wondered if Ma had got word of the Foundation--from D'Angelo? from
the lawyer? It was right up her alley.

I mentioned my suspicions to Jay, along with an account of Ma's phone call. "I'll bet ten
bucks she's lobbying to be named to the board."

He pulled me back down beside him. "Why not? She's a logical choice."

"Yes, but she'd be out here every summer! Maternal surveillance!"

He laughed.

"Maybe Ma hired Miguel to poison Llewellyn." I pinched his bare arm. "Have you
looked into that?"

"No, and I'm not going to. Miguel didn't poison his boss."

"Then why did he run?"

"I'm more worried about how he managed to slip a pearl gray Mercedes out of town. It's
not exactly inconspicuous."

"Out of town?"

"He told Domingo he was going into town to gas up and have the oil changed. Cowan
was on duty near the Peltzes' access road, and Miguel even waved at him. The kid drove the car
to the Chevron station on Grand, did what he said he was going to do, and took off. The station
attendant thought he headed west on Grand but isn't sure. That's as far as we can trace Miguel.
We did a helicopter search, and the county cars have been poking down every back lane and log
skid. The highway patrol didn't come up with anything either. Maybe some citizen will call in
tomorrow with more information. Until then we're completely at sea."

"He probably got on I-5 and headed south."

"No." Jay was stroking my back with happy results. I purred. "Somebody would have
spotted him at that patch of construction north of Weed."

"Where it's down to one lane both ways?" I rubbed against him.

"That's the spot,"

"Mmm-mmh," I murmured, distracted. "That's the spot," and we forgot about
Miguel.

Jay was gone before I woke up the next morning. I dimly remembered the telephone
ringing. I got up, showered, and ate breakfast to the country and western twang of the local radio
station. The news break revealed no further developments in the disappearance of Miguel
Montez.

I opened the store at ten, reminding myself that Ginger did not know Dennis was the heir
to fourteen million dollars and to keep my mouth shut. I did that so well she thought I was mad at
her. I explained that I was worried about Miguel.

"Worried about him?"

"About his disappearance. It made Jay look bad with the sheriff."

"Oh." She accepted that. We were too busy to carry on a discussion. Around three the
phone rang. I was waiting on a customer who seemed to be a customer. She wanted a copy of
The
Secret Garden
for her granddaughter. Ginger answered the phone.

I had waited on three more people before I noticed Ginger was missing. I rang up the last
sale and ducked into the back room.

She was sitting at the desk, staring at the telephone.

"Hey, snap out of it."

She lifted her dazed brown eyes to me. "That was Dennis. He said old Llewellyn was his
father and that he just inherited millions of dollars."

I tried to project astonishment. I am not a good liar.

"You knew!"

"Well, Jay talked to the attorney yesterday. But he said I couldn't tell anybody.
Congratulations, I think."

"I'm scared."

"How was Dennis?"

"He sounded..." She screwed up her face. "He sounded lost." She started to cry. "It's not
fair. The filthy old bastard. Why did he have to do that to Dennis? He could have told him."

I handed her the box of tissues on the desk. "It is strange."

Ginger hiccupped. "Dennis is going to be rich, and he won't want me anymore."

I assured her Dennis had good taste and was as faithful as a collie.

"But Denise hates me."

"Drive a stake through her heart."

She hiccupped again. "I'm being silly, aren't I? Gosh, Lark, what am I going to do?"

"Wipe your eyes, check your makeup, and come out front. It sounds like a riot out there.
I need you." I dashed back to the cash register.

Ginger finally gathered herself together. Around five, things slacked off. I sent her out
for hamburgers, waited on a lone hiker who wanted a map of the Rogue Valley, and was tidying
the paperback racks when the phone rang again. I answered, dragging it around to the front
counter.

It was Lydia. She gossiped a bit about the will. Apparently the lawyer had called the
Huffs and explained their legacy. Lydia was deeply touched. She had also heard about the writers'
colony. D'Angelo had called her from San Francisco.

"Did he say anything about the Peltzes?" I asked in the first pause.

Lydia chuckled. "I feel sorry for Angharad, God knows, but it is funny. They're planning
to sue. But my dear, only think--Denise and Dai. How strange." My own word bouncing back at
me.

"I don't think Dennis knew he was Llewellyn's son."

"Really? That's hard to believe. Denise is not exactly close-mouthed." There was a
thoughtful pause. "Of course things were different forty years ago--about gays, I mean. Dai never
did proclaim his sexual preference. But everybody knew. Denise didn't want Dennis to know his
father was, er, queer."

That was an interesting thought. Jay had been assuming it was Llewellyn who had
refused to acknowledge Dennis. Maybe Denise would not allow him to claim her son. I could
imagine Denise being that melodramatic--and that egotistical. If she had not known to begin
with, it would have offended her sense of womanliness to realize that her lover preferred men.
Perhaps Dennis's ignorance was her revenge.

"...a quiet little family dinner," Lydia was saying. "Tomorrow, sixish. Bill and I are
flying south next morning for the memorial service. Can you come?"

"Who did you say would be there?" I watched a middle aged couple in matching tee
shirts and slacks enter the store.

"Win, Bill and I, and Janey. And yourself." She did not invite Jay.

"I'd have to hire a replacement at the store. Uh, thanks, Lydia. I have a customer. Can I
get back to you?"

"Surely, my dear."

Between customers I toyed with the invitation. I also remembered I was supposed to
reserve a plane ticket for myself for Thursday, so I called the commuter line. Ginger came back
with my burger, having eaten hers in peace. I ate and fed some data into the inventory program
and brooded some more. Finally I called Lydia and said yes. She sounded ecstatic.

Jay came in a little earlier that night. I told him I was having dinner with the Huffs the
next evening, and he said he'd probably survive. I kicked him under the table and said I would
keep my ears open for dramatic revelations. He said fat chance. We ate.

The early phone call had been a false lead on Miguel. A gray Mercedes 300 had surfaced
in Medford, Oregon--stolen. Mercedes appeared to be the vehicle of choice for car thieves. I
reminded myself not to buy one.

Jay had spent the day in the courthouse digging for background on the suspects while
Kevin supervised the ongoing search for Miguel. The state lab report came, verifying the
toxicologist's opinion. Jay wasn't very forthcoming about his own discoveries. It was just gossip,
he said rather irritably, when I pressed him for more detail.

The long-term relationship between Llewellyn and his friend Hal had begun shortly after
Dennis's birth and had had ups and downs. Both men had had flings outside the "marriage" but
they had always come back together. Jay was trying to track down the flingees.

Denise had never married, nor had she taken another long-term lover after Dennis's
birth, though she had been seen in fashionable places with a variety of leading men. Jay thought
he would find evidence that Llewellyn supported her. She had not danced professionally in
fifteen years, though she taught master classes at the prestigious Wayne Studio until she was
fifty-five.

Dennis had attended public schools in San Francisco, and Humboldt State. He had
worked for the Forest Service summers while he was still in school and permanently after that.
Single-minded, our Dennis. He had spent two years in Alaska and the rest of the time in northern
California. He had had girl friends but had never married. (Poor Ginger.) Everybody thought he
was a nice guy. Nobody thought he would amount to much.

The Huffs were slightly more colorful than Dennis. Bill's father, who inherited the paper
from his father, had built a reputation as a crusty eccentric. Bill attended Muir, majored in
journalism, and landed a job as a reporter for the
Chronicle
after three years with the
Navy. He covered the police beat for awhile and did sports, married Janey's mother, and sired
two daughters. When his father died of a heart attack, Bill moved the family to Monte and took
over the paper. They had seemed a model family. The divorce came as a big surprise to
everybody, including, apparently, Bill's wife. Bill and Lydia got acquainted at meetings of the
county arts council. When they met, Lydia was already widowed, no children.

Lydia had grown up in the Midwest, the daughter of a hardware store owner with a
fondness for hot cars. She went to college in Iowa and was still famous at her sorority for
daredevil pranks and speeding tickets, but her marriage to an insurance broker had seemed sedate
enough.

When he died in a plane crash, she moved west and tried her hand at several small,
craftsy businesses. That was during the seventies when craftsy businesses sprang up all over
California like magic mushrooms. Lydia had managed to avoid bankruptcy, no mean feat, but
had never made a killing. Her interest in paper-making and book-binding was the key to her
connection with Bill Huff, and from then on it was love's middle-aged dream. Both Huffs were
popular locally, and Lydia had a reputation for public service. She was on the library board.

The Huff Press had been expanded ten years before. It enjoyed a growing reputation for
excellence, both in the quality of the writers represented and in the workmanship of the books. It
was not particularly profitable, but it broke even. The paper, by contrast, produced solid profit
margins every year, probably because it was the only newspaper in the county. It carried the book
publishing end.

As far as Jay could find out, Janey Huff was squeaky clean. Her mother had taken the
daughters north to Portland after the divorce. The mother had eventually remarried and now ran
three successful newsletters out of her home. Janey's sister was a graduate student at the
University of Oregon. Janey had attended the University of Washington. Neither girl was
married. Dull stuff, I thought.

Jay was close-mouthed about Winton D'Angelo. D'Angelo had a Ph.D. from Stanford
and had begun his academic career on the tenure track at Presteign, a small, very exclusive liberal
arts college. He had married at twenty-five, the year he took the job at Presteign, and divorced at
thirty, the year he came to Monte. Two sons. Was known as a man-about-town. Skied. That was
as much as Jay was going to give me. I accused him of holding back.

He sighed. "D'Angelo's holding back. I don't know what. Why don't we watch
It
Happened One Night
on cable and forget about the damned case? I don't want to think about
it any more. How's Ginger?"

I told him about that, and we watched half the film and went to bed.