The Silver Anniversary Murder (11 page)

I had asked the lawyer’s name so I could call my friend Arnold Gold, who also has a law office in lower Manhattan, and ask if he had ever heard of her. A lot of people practice law in the city, so it was a long shot, but I called him after I hung up with Ariana.

“Yes,” he said briskly when his secretary put me through.

“It’s Chris, Arnold. And you’ll never guess what I’m investigating.”

“Hey, do you walk into a room and someone gets shot?”

“Not quite. I have a question to ask you.”

“Do I get to decline to answer?”

“Only if you want to. Do you know a lawyer named Beverly Weingarten?”

“As a matter of fact, I do, but not well. She does estate work, not up my alley. I met her at some shindig or other a couple of years ago, and we exchanged cards. A month or so later she sent me a client, someone who had used her services once and now had the kind of trouble she didn’t take on. I’ve returned the favor a few times.”

“Tell me what you know about her.”

“The clients I’ve sent to her have been quite happy. I saw something in a law journal not long ago about a case she handled for a couple of feuding heirs. Sounded complicated and sounded like she did a good job. You and Jack writing a will?”

“We did that. I’m looking for the killer of a couple who lived here in Oakwood. There’s a daughter and a lot of complications. Beverly Weingarten wrote the will for the victims. I’m going to her office tomorrow morning with the daughter.”

“Well, I’m free for lunch. Give me a jingle if you’re available any reasonable time after noon.”

“I will indeed.”

11

I picked Ariana up at the motel after breakfast and we drove into the city. It was a beautiful spring day, the leaves glossy in that burst of spring newness that I love in the northeast. I gave Ariana a guided tour on the way to New York, which consisted mostly of a catalogue of highway numbers. Driving in lower Manhattan is difficult as it’s an area that has more than its share of one-way streets, all running in the opposite direction of your desired goal. However, we found a garage, walked two blocks, and arrived at Beverly Weingarten’s building.

Although downtown New York has many buildings dating back over a hundred years, this was a new one, probably built on the spot where an old one had once stood. The elevators were high-speed and divided into local and express. We rode up swiftly, stopped smoothly, and walked less than ten feet to the Weingarten et al. office. After a very short wait, the receptionist led us into a large, sunny office lined with the usual bookshelves. Out a window I could see the East River and Brooklyn. After introductions and handshakes, we got down to business.

From Chicago yesterday Ariana had spoken to the lawyer and explained who she was and why she did not want to be identified by the police. Ms. Weingarten had agreed to work around the problem as far as the law would allow.

“After talking to Ariana, I called Oakwood, and the police faxed me sketches of the two deceased and copies of the autopsies,” she said. “I can identify both faces from memory and from the photos they left with me.”

I was impressed that the Brinkers had had such foresight.

“At some point you will have to identify yourself to the local police up there, Ariana, and then identify your parents, probably from photos and sketches. If you have any possessions of theirs, like clothing or toothbrushes, that will help make the identification solid. In the meantime, I accept you as their daughter.” She pushed a small snapshot of Ariana across the desk. “They prepared me for a meeting like this.”

“I see.” Ariana was looking unsteady at this point.

“You won’t be able to access their bank accounts yet as there aren’t any death certificates. They’ll be available after the identification is certified.”

“I don’t need money,” Ariana said, not for the first time.

“I don’t know your parents’ whole story but I know they were concerned that someone from their past might try to injure them, or worse.”

“That’s true.”

“And I know it was their unshakable desire that you inherit all their worldly belongings. I have a list here but I’ll hold it until the identification is made.”

“May I ask when you last spoke to them?” I said.

“I would guess a year ago. They came in here two years ago to have their wills written, and they called about a year later, just to say they were at the same address and they were still alive and well.”

“Did you have my address?” Ariana asked.

“Yes, I did. That’s why I asked you over the phone yesterday where you lived. It wasn’t a perfect way to determine who you were, but it was a good way to weed out a bungling imposter.”

“So you’re saying you don’t know any more than I do about this person who was after my parents.”

“I know almost nothing,” the lawyer said. She unbuttoned her dark gray suit jacket to uncover a white silk shirt. She was in her forties, I estimated, with dark hair, wearing a wedding band and diamond ring on her left hand and a watch partly exposed by her shirtsleeve.

“I guess we were hoping you could point us in a fruitful direction,” Ariana said.

“Which means?” The dark eyebrows rose.

“Chris and I want to find out who killed my parents.”

“I would leave that to the police, Ariana. I’m afraid I have no direction at all for you. But I have an envelope. It may tell you all you need to know.” She removed a brown six-by-nine envelope from her file folder. The envelope had several strands of wire around it, and when she laid it on the center of the desk, I saw what appeared to be sealing wax along the flap.

Ariana’s eyes widened. “What’s that?”

“I have no idea. Your parents brought it in on the day they came to sign their wills. They asked if I would keep it until you arrived to tell me they had died. These wires can be opened only once. After that, they break. You can see they added wax that they left their fingerprints in. No one could duplicate the wrapping. You’re the only person I can give this to and you’ll have to sign for it.”

“OK.”

Weingarten pushed a receipt across the desk and Ariana signed it. “You sign, too,” the lawyer said to me. “You’re a witness.”

I signed and pushed it back. The lawyer handed Ariana the package. “It’s yours,” Beverly Weingarten said. “I hope it answers your questions.”

“Do I have to open it now?” Ariana asked.

“You don’t ever have to open it, although I would advise you to do so.”

“Then we’re finished here?”

“We are. I’d like to see you again after you go to the police. Once there’s a death certificate, we can begin probate. You’re the executrix. I assume you know that.”

Ariana shrugged. “Thank you,” she said, rising and offering her hand across the table. She tucked the envelope in her large bag and hung the bag on her shoulder. We were ready to go.

Arnold was still available for lunch and he gave me instructions on how to walk to his office. We set off and I related the origin of my friendship with him to Ariana as we went. I had looked into a forty-year-old homicide soon after I had been released from my vows and left St. Stephen’s Convent. In 1950, at the time of the murder, Arnold had been a young legal aid lawyer representing a mentally retarded defendant. In the course of my investigation, I met him and we became fast friends. Now I do occasional part-time work for him. He pays me more than I’m worth, but it’s always a pleasure to do something different and have an independent income.

“So you started on a really old case,” Ariana said as we neared the familiar old building Arnold’s office is housed in.

“That was it. And since then I’ve been involved in so many investigations that I think I’ve lost count. But this one is different,” I added, hearing myself say precisely what I had said so many times before. “No one’s ever called me and told me a murder was about to happen.” I pushed open the door and held it for her.

We rode up in a slow, noisy elevator from a bygone era. When we reached Arnold’s office, he was haranguing his secretary gently and looked ready to leave with us or without us. We hugged, I made introductions, and we rode down to the main floor in the elevator that was still waiting for us.

Lunch with Arnold is always a good time. First I tell him about Eddie, then Jack. Then he tells me about Harriet, his wife of many decades, and finally a little something about a case he’s been working on that he finds unusual or ridiculous or is memorable in some other way. We went through all this in abbreviated fashion today with no mention of a current case. Then he turned to Ariana and offered condolences.

“But I can tell you, your questions about your parents’ murders are in the best hands. Chris has a unique way of looking at things and she edges in where the police are shoehorned out.”

Ariana smiled at the metaphor. “The answers may be in the envelope Ms. Weingarten gave me.” She dug it out of her bag and laid it on the table. “My parents left this for me. They may have answered all my questions without my needing to lift a finger.”

“Then I would advise you to read the contents before you buy expensive airline tickets to far-off places to look for long-lost relatives.”

“I will do that, probably when I get back this afternoon.”

“In the meantime, let’s eat, drink, and be thoughtful.”

Which is what we did. Arnold didn’t prod Ariana and she occasionally joined the conversation with a comment or personal anecdote of her own. At two, when we were sipping coffee, he glanced at his watch and called for the check. I have learned there’s no winning a battle for the check when I’m with Arnold.

“You’ll have Harriet and me out one day and we’ll let you pick up the bill,” he said gallantly, as though we would take them to a New York–style restaurant in Oakwood.

Ten minutes later, we were getting into the car.

I dropped Ariana at the hotel, where she wanted to open the fat envelope in private. She promised to call when she had a plan arranged to investigate the murders, and I assured her that if she wanted to travel, Elsie would be ready on the spot to take over Eddie. I needed time only to pack a bag and make sure there was food in the house for the next couple of days.

She called back at five-thirty, having spent two hours alone with her parents’ envelope and her thoughts. She had decided to eat in her room, although she wasn’t very hungry after our lunch in the city. There was more in the envelope than a letter, which I had surmised from its irregular bulkiness. In addition to a considerable amount of money, there were addresses and keys and hand-sketched maps. What was entirely missing was an explanation of why anyone would want to murder her parents. Apparently, they did not want Ariana to know, and I found this troubling although I said nothing.

“Besides the personal letter,” she said, “there’s a letter of instructions. It sounds as though they owned that little house in Madison and they want me to go out there. They have a lawyer to contact right away, and I just talked to him.”

“Was he expecting your call?”

“He didn’t know my parents had died but he knew he would hear from me when they did. He asked me some questions and agreed I was their daughter. If you think you can leave tomorrow, I’d like to make reservations.”

“No problem,” I said.

“I’ll be paying for these tickets, Chris, and for all your expenses.”

“Thank you. That’s very generous.”

“There’s enough in this envelope to cover all our costs. I have no idea where we’ll go after Madison, but we can play it by ear as we uncover more clues. It sounds more like a treasure hunt than anything else.”

Her next phone call reported our departure time and other necessary information I would leave with Jack and Eddie.

“I would have thought, if these folks were innocent, that they would tell their daughter what the hunt was all about and who the killers were,” Jack said in the evening.

“Me too, and I’m concerned. If they committed some felony a long time ago, the killer may have had a rightful grudge, although I don’t condone murder under any circumstances.”

“Well, maybe there are more answers in the Madison lawyer’s office. It sounds as though these people planned very carefully for their daughter to inherit.”

“But inherit what?” I asked, not expecting an answer.

“Take a shovel with you,” Jack said with a laugh. “Maybe you’re going to dig for buried treasure.”

We had adjoining seats on the plane, Ariana in the window seat. Since no one sat on the aisle, I did. We talked sporadically and I showed her the list of Brinkers living in Portland that we had taken off the Internet.

Thinking of the silver anniversary, I said, “Did you ever see your parents’ wedding pictures?”

“They had a few, not many. They looked as though they had been taken by a professional photographer, but they weren’t in an album and some of them were trimmed.”

“Maybe they were removed because your parents didn’t want you to see the faces of all the guests.”

“I hadn’t thought of that.” She looked troubled. “That would mean someone at their wedding may have killed them. But you’re right, the only pictures I ever saw were of the two of them. No, wait, that’s not true. My grand-mothers were in one picture and I think maybe a grandfather.”

“How was your mother dressed?”

“In a long white gown. And my father was dressed formally, too.”

“So it was very likely a big wedding.”

“And the killer may have been there,” Ariana breathed. “How terrible to think that someone you cared enough about to invite to your wedding would hate you enough to kill you. If only I could get a list of guests.”

“Not likely if the killers covered their tracks as well as they seem to have. Did your parents have brothers and sisters?”

“They said they didn’t.”

“And you never met an old friend from when they were younger?”

“Never.”

“Will the lawyer see you tomorrow? It’s Saturday.”

“He said to call when we arrive today. I think we’ll get to come to his office this afternoon. If not, I have his home phone number.”

“Your parents certainly found accommodating lawyers,” I said.

“They were nice people. Other people went out of their way to be nice to them.”

I thought about the wedding, the Brinker-Something wedding. Had they been married in Portland? I supposed we could go from church to church, from hotel to hotel, from restaurant to restaurant, looking for the one that had held the wedding. But old hotels are torn down, restaurants go out of business. Even churches sometimes close their doors when the neighborhood changes and their congregation moves to another part of town. I wasn’t optimistic. Maybe there would be answers in Madison.