Monument to the Dead (7 page)

When I walked toward the elevator, I ran into Shelby in the hallway. “I’m coming with
you,” she announced.

“Where am I going?”

“Marty’s house, I assume.”

“If she’s there and looking for a little privacy, she’ll be mad at us. But thanks,
Shelby. I could use the company.”

Together we left the building and turned left toward Rittenhouse Square and the Schuylkill
River. I’d been to Marty’s town house before. It was a nice brick building on a quiet
side street, in a good neighborhood. The house was filled with an eclectic mix of
antiques, mostly inherited, and modern touches that Marty had added, and somehow they
all worked together. Not that Marty made any apologies for the unlikely mix. Her attitude
was take it or leave it, and she really didn’t care what anyone else thought.

It took about ten minutes to reach her town house, and I think we were both dragging
our feet for the last block. If Marty answered the door, we could go ahead and share
whatever new information we had garnered over the last twelve hours, including about
the new death. If she didn’t answer . . . well, we’d take that hurdle when we came
to it.

In front of Marty’s place, I walked up the few steps leading to the front door and
rang the doorbell. I could hear it faintly inside, so I knew it was working, but I
didn’t hear any footsteps. Maybe Marty wasn’t wearing shoes. I rang again, and waited,
Shelby hovering on the step below me. Nothing. I grasped the polished brass knocker
and rapped firmly a few times. Silence. Marty was either not there, or not answering
for some reason.

“Now what, Nell?” Shelby said.

Like I knew. I called James. He answered. At least
someone
was where he was supposed to be. Since this was business, I cut to the chase. “James,
have you heard from Marty today?”

“No. Why?”

“She’s not at the Society. Rich hasn’t seen her. In fact, nobody’s seen her. Shelby
and I have been calling her all morning on her cell and at home, and she hasn’t picked
up. We’re at her house now, and there’s no answer. Do you have any idea where she
might be?”

James didn’t answer immediately. I assumed he was turning over the possibilities in
his mind, and probably coming to the same conclusions that Shelby and I had, and it
wasn’t that Marty was indulging herself in a three-hour bubble-bath.

“I have her key. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes.” He hung up abruptly.

I turned to Shelby. “The reinforcements are coming.”

Shelby and I felt conspicuous standing on the doorstep,
so we sat down on the top step to wait for James to arrive. It was a delightful neighborhood,
with plenty of shade trees and little traffic, yet still convenient to both Center
City and the highways that led out of town. There were few people on the street. I
kept peering in both directions, not so much watching for James as hoping that Marty
would miraculously appear, either on foot or by car. She didn’t.

When James arrived, I was both glad to see him and also a little afraid, because he
would let us into the house and we would find . . . something. Or maybe nothing. Finding
nothing would be only slightly more encouraging than finding . . . something worse.

James looked somber as he approached. “Nell, Shelby.” He nodded. “Still no sign of
Marty?”

Shelby and I stood up. “Nope, and no sounds from inside the house,” I said. “Are we
going in?”

He climbed the steps to stand beside us. “
I’m
going in. You two wait here.”

I was both frustrated and relieved by his order. Shelby and I stayed put, sitting
side by side without talking. Marty didn’t believe in wall-to-wall carpet, so I could
hear James’s footsteps moving slowly through the building, up the stairs . . . and
down again. It must have been five minutes before he opened the front door. I turned
reluctantly, searched his face, and felt a wave of relief: he didn’t look grim.

“Nothing,” he said. “No one home, and nothing looks disturbed. Have you considered
the thought that she might have gone somewhere of her own volition? She does have
a life outside the Society, you know.”

“Sure, but can you blame us for worrying? Yesterday she was concerned that she could
be a target of this killer that nobody will acknowledge officially, and today she’s
nowhere to be found. Do you think she hopped on a plane to a foreign country? Does
she have a summer place or three where she might be hiding?” I was working up a good
head of steam, stoked mainly by tension.

“Nell,” James said carefully, “I’m not questioning your concern. I’m here, aren’t
I? I’ve checked the place out, and everything looks normal. I don’t know where Marty
could have gone, but her absence may be completely innocent. Okay, maybe she should
have let you know that she was going to disappear, but I can’t exactly launch an investigation
when she’s been gone less than a day.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered. I knew I was being unreasonable, but I had to do something.
I looked at Shelby. “So I guess we return to work, and to worrying.” Then I turned
back to James. “I’ll let you know if we hear from her. If we don’t, how soon can you
actually investigate?”

“Not before tomorrow. Nell, I’ll do what I can, I promise. Right now, I’d better get
back to the office.”

“Go,” I said. Needless to say there was no parting kiss. I knew I had no right to
be mad at him, but I needed to be mad at somebody. When and if Marty showed up, I
could get mad at her.

Shelby and I had covered a few blocks toward the Society before I stopped fuming.
“Sorry about that,” I said to her. “I was acting like a brat. I know there’s not much
that he can do. At least we didn’t find her . . .”

Shelby finished my statement for me. “Dead? Hey, I think it’s sweet that he came when
you called.
And
tried to spare you from finding the body, if there was one, which, thank God, there
wasn’t. Haven’t all the other victims been found at home?”

“Good point. Thanks, Shelby. Want to get some lunch on the way back?”

“Sure. We need our strength.”

We settled for a fast sandwich at the small shop down the street from the Society.
When we’d taken our orders to a table in the corner, I said, “What do we do now?”

Shelby chewed a large bite of her sandwich. After she had swallowed, she said, “
We?
I seem to recall that you keep dumping a whole lot of research in my lap. I’m not
going to pretend that we’ve covered all the bases with the people on our list. Even
if I focus on our three prime organizations, there’s still a lot of digging to do.
In addition to all the regular stuff for my job.”

“I know, I know. I think I’ll have little ‘I Apologize’ cards made up to hand out—it’ll
save time. And now you’re making me feel guilty, since I’m your boss and I’m supposed
to be running the Society.” For which I depended a whole lot on Marty’s help and backup,
but I couldn’t say that to Shelby. “Thank goodness we’re between major events.”

“The Board Bash is next, isn’t it?” Shelby asked.

“Yes, but not for months. Why?”

“You know, maybe I could kill two birds with one stone. If I have to look up all this
stuff about the Forrest Trust, maybe we could use our Forrest collection as the focus
for the event? Didn’t I see something in the file about using the income from that
endowment to promote the guy? We could easily justify spending the money on the party.”

I stared at her. “Shelby, you’re brilliant! From what I know, Edwin Forrest was quite
a figure. We could really have some fun with it.”

“Oh yeah? Tell me a little more about this Edwin guy.”

“All right, let’s see. He was born in Philadelphia, and his career began here, when
he was in his teens. And he was still performing right up to his death in the 1870s.
He was wildly popular, and from all that I’ve read, he was considered a pretty good
actor, too—at least compared to some of his more over-the-top contemporaries. He took
his fame seriously and tried to use it for good purposes. But he had his share of
problems. For one thing, he married an English actress, but when they split up they
both sued each other for divorce, very publicly—each claimed they’d found the other
in the act of being unfaithful. The transcript of their divorce proceedings goes on
for over a thousand pages. Edwin more or less lost, but not before dragging her name
and his own through a lot of mud. Anyway, he ended up paying alimony forever.”

“Nell, why do you know all this?” Shelby asked.

“He’s part of Philadelphia history. And it’s an interesting story.”

“It is that. That divorce must have been pretty shocking for the nineteenth century.
Did it hurt his career?”

“Not hardly. I mean, this guy was a megastar by standards back then. People literally
died for him.” When Shelby looked at me, I explained, “He had this rivalry thing going
with an English actor named Macready, and they were performing in New York at the
same time. There were riots in the streets between fans from both sides. And a bunch
of people died—there are conflicting reports about how many. Again, Edwin picked himself
up and kept on going. And, more relevant to our problem here, he made lots of money.”

“That’s where the trust comes in?” she asked.

“Exactly. He never remarried, and he and his wife had no children. As he got older,
his health went downhill—it’s kind of hard to piece together, but gout and arthritis
are on the list.”

“Maybe we’ll skip the gout and arthritis part in the party-planning,” Shelby joked.
“Do we need approval for the theme? Like from the board?”

“Well, since I, the president, and you, the director of development, both endorse
it, I think they’ll agree. Let’s pull together a presentation and see what we’ve got
in the collection.”

“I’m on it.”

At least lunch had ended on a relatively cheerful and productive note. We walked back
to the Society, where everybody looked energetic and happy, oblivious to the possibility
of a lurking killer. Upstairs I stopped at Eric’s desk hoping for a phone message,
but there were none from either Marty or James.

“Good lunch?” Eric asked.

“Not bad. I should be in my office the rest of the day. If you’ve got any paperwork
I should deal with, now would be a good time to get it done.”

“I’ll get the folder out.”

Mindless paperwork was a great distraction, I had found. I found myself thinking about
the idea Shelby had hatched for our next big event, and I still liked it. The Society
holds two major social events each year: a gala, usually in the late fall, and another
more relaxed event in the spring. The gala is usually intended to draw in our more
affluent members and impress them with what we’re doing with their money. The other
event brings in a broader slice of our membership and we try to make it fun. The latter
was still more than nine months away, but we like to have the theme nailed down by
the fall. I was amazed that nobody had thought of using Edwin Forrest before, especially
since we were sitting on an abundance of materials
and
the money to help pay for the event, in the name of preserving Edwin’s memory. Poor
Edwin: he definitely had slipped from public memory, even locally, even though he
had been a major public figure for a large part of the nineteenth century—not to mention
a very colorful individual.

I knew we had a rather generic finding aid—basically a simple list—for the items related
to him that had come with the loan of the collection, but it was probably too vague
to be of much use. Our staff processors were all very busy dealing with implementing
our new database (Nicholas) and cataloging the FBI collection (Rich and Alice). Maybe
I’d save the research for myself. We weren’t in a rush, and it had been a while since
I’d spent any quality time in the collections. Besides, I rather liked what I knew
of Edwin, and wouldn’t mind finding out more about my marble friend. I’d start by
pulling out the original inventory now, to see what it could tell me about the Forrest
Trust and its holdings.

Somehow I managed to get through the afternoon without obsessing about Marty’s whereabouts
too much, though I’ll admit that I flinched every time the phone rang, holding my
breath until Eric forwarded the call to someone else. Not the most efficient way to
get anything done, but luckily the chores I’d assigned myself didn’t take much focus.

Shortly before five, however, I looked up—and saw Marty standing in the doorway. I
bounded out of my chair, and practically threw myself at her.

“Marty, where the hell have you been? We’ve been going crazy!”

Marty appeared bewildered by my reaction. “I thought most of the time you were happy
to get me out of your hair. Why the big fuss? You heard about Edith’s death?”

“Yes, of course. James called me as soon as he found out. We worried that maybe you
were next. I even got James to let us into your house to check, just in case.”

Marty gave one of her unladylike snorts. “I’m touched. I was with cousin Harbeson.”
When I continued to stare blankly, she clarified, “Edith’s brother. They shared the
family house.”

“God, Marty, you could have let James know. Or me.”

Marty looked contrite. “Sorry. I wanted to get over there as quickly as I could, and
then I had to deal with Harbeson.”

James had mentioned a brother. “Where was he when Edith died?”

“He’d been playing golf at his club yesterday, and he stayed on at the bar with some
friends. He came home late. He thought Edith had fallen asleep on the couch, so he
just went upstairs to bed. He wasn’t exactly sober. When he came down in the morning
he realized she wasn’t breathing, and he called me. I told him to call 9-1-1. Then
I headed out there, fast. Harby doesn’t . . . handle things well. The police came,
then the medical examiner; he pronounced Edith gone and carted her away. Harby wants
me to help with the funeral.”

“I’ve got to tell James,” I said, picking up the phone. When he answered, I said without
preamble, “Marty’s here.”

“I heard. I’m coming over. Stay there.”

I hung up, feeling happier than I’d been all day. “Will Harby talk to James?” I asked
Marty.

“About Edith? Why not? Harby knows Jimmy—they’re cousins, too.”

“Marty, I still don’t understand how you could just disappear like that, without telling
us. You know that Edith was on the list of board members?”

“Of course I do. That’s one reason I needed to get out there. I didn’t want Harby
to screw up any evidence, if there was any.”

“Did you find anything?”

“I never had a chance to look. By the time I got there, the police had arrived and
Harby was dithering, so I had to take charge of him, and by then it was too late to
look.”

“And what did the police think?” I was pretty sure I knew the answer, but I had to
ask.

Marty’s expression was bleak. “Natural causes.”