Poisoned Dreams

by A. W. Gray

  But regardless of whether Nancy’s habit was to come to bed clad in an ankle-length shapeless nightgown, quickly douse the lights, dive beneath the covers like a gopher into its hole, and immediately feign a series of snores; or if Richard hid naked behind the bedroom door, and every time Nancy entered, thrust a hardened penis or vibrating dildo in her direction, it’s obvious that the couple was into family planning. Ding, time to establish careers. Ding, time to blend into the social whirl. Ding, okay, time for kids.

  When Nancy became pregnant in late 1985 or early 1986, her niche at Tramell Crow Partners was well established; she virtually ran the Westchester subdivision on her own while David Bagwell, by now elevated to partner-in-charge of all Tramell Crow residential developments, spent most of his time at the main office or on the road. Also, as befitted her position at the company as well as her legacy as Big Daddy’s little girl, she was deep into high-profile charity work, spending many of her evenings and weekends on Junior League projects or in her capacity as chairman of the Dallas Historical Society. She was into political fundraising as well; her acquaintance with Barbara Bush had to do with a Dallas stop-off for the future First Lady while hustling up voters during the second Reagan campaign.

  And while Richard was well into the second year of his stint with high-flying Hughes Industries, he nonetheless had time for a few charitable endeavors of his own, one in particular. St. Phillip’s School, located in South Dallas’ ghetto area, has in recent years become one of the really “in” charities for which Park Citizens donate time and money. Through Big Daddy’s recommendation, Richard had filled a vacancy on St. Phillip’s board in 1984, and by 1986 acted as the board’s chairman. He also pitched in as a volunteer on the Easter Seals telethon. Both of the couple’s careers in apparent high gear, and both social and charitable priorities in order, it was now time to continue the lineage.

  Aside from its brief interruption of her job, Nancy’s impending delivery had another impact on the Lyons’ orderly family plan. By this time the couple had moved into and renovated their second trendy-area duplex, this one on Llano Street, in the same neighborhood as the avenues with the M-names, but they were still across Central Expressway from Park Cities proper. With a child coming along, the Highland Park school district was the only place to live.

  So, in November 1986, Richard and Nancy made their final move. The duplex on Shenandoah Avenue was just the thing, right in the heart of Park Cities with a front-yard view of the campus at Southern Methodist University. Typical of old University Park homes built with thrifty college professors in mind, the side-by-side upstairs-downstairs units were somewhat less than a dream home. The rooms were cramped—tiny, actually—the floors uncarpeted hardwood, and the house without central air and heat. The price for the rundown old duplex—$240,000—would have caused jaws to drop in dismay in many parts of the world, but in Park Cities the numbers seemed pretty much in line.

  As with all their housing investments, Richard and Nancy went in on a shoestring. The duplex’s owner carried $190,000 of the purchase price on a personal note—backed by Big Daddy’s guarantee, of course—and the First of Park Cities chipped in $70,000 (likely the true loan value of the old house) on a second lien. The $20,000 over and above the purchase price went to renovate the duplex and accompanying servants’ quarters. All told, the payments on the original and second-lien notes amounted to in excess of $3,000 per month, with $1,200 recoverable in rents on the servants’ quarters and other half of the duplex. Added to the loans on the two duplexes for which the couple was already obligated, the Lyons now had monthly obligations that would frighten even the most ambitious of yuppies. They were, however, at long last official residents of Park Cities. On whatever scale the upper class uses to measure things, Richard and Nancy Lyon had finally arrived.

  The move was just in time, almost coincidental with Allison’s birth at Presbyterian Hospital. The baby girl was gorgeous, blessed with Richard’s even-featured good looks and Nancy’s lovely skin and eyes, and was plenty of reason for rejoicing in both the Lyon and Dillard homes. Nancy had a normal vaginal delivery and three-day hospital stay, then proudly remained at home for a month while friends and relatives came by for a look at the new addition. During this time Richard was particularly attentive to his wife. He took several half-days off from work, cooked meals, brought Nancy her favorite treats while she recovered.

  The pregnancy leave was a short one, however. Since she had no plans to remain home with her new daughter on an extended basis, Nancy never considered breast-feeding as a steady diet for the baby. By just after Christmas, in fact, Allison was already weaned to a bottle, and Nancy was preparing to return to work. Since both parents would be plunging ahead with their careers—and since Big Daddy agreed to foot the bill for a portion of the domestic upkeep—Richard and Nancy interviewed a series of prospective nannies. They finally settled on Lynn Pease, and she reported for duty just after New Year’s Day of 1987.

  A soft-spoken, hardworking native of Oxport, Maine, Lynn had served as a Park Cities nanny since she’d been eighteen. Her twelve-year career had earned her references that were top-of-the-line. Though she suffered from multiple sclerosis, the disease hadn’t reached a point that it interfered with her work. She was and is a naturally loving young woman, and eventually came to care for Allison Lyon and her sister, Anna—born two years later—as she would her own daughters.

  Lynn’s employment in the Lyon home was to continue, with a few brief interruptions, for the better part of three years, and there were a couple of things about her work that bear mention here. So close did she become to the Lyon children, and so much an integral part of the Lyon existence was she during the time that both Richard and Nancy worked at their jobs, that she became as family. Both Richard and Nancy discussed many things with Lynn that one wouldn’t normally talk over with a domestic employee. Lynn listened closely to everything she was told, and she has an excellent memory.

  Another thing notable about Lynn’s employment with the Lyons had to do with her living arrangements. It is customary when hiring a nanny that the employer provide living quarters, but Lynn couldn’t live with the Lyons because the servants’ space was rented out. So she bunked in the garage apartment at Big Daddy and Sue’s Rheims Place home, and during her time with the Lyons became as close to Nancy’s parents as she was to Richard and Nancy. Eventually, Lynn’s unservantlike integration in the Lyon and Dillard affairs, along with her closeness to Big Daddy and Sue, would contribute greatly to Richard’s downfall.

  Her new baby’s care now mainly in the hands of a nanny, Nancy went back to work at Tramell Crow Partners in early 1987. Though she’d enjoyed her maternity leave, she couldn’t wait to return to the job. Nancy feared that if she stayed away from the office at the Westchester subdivision for too long, she would lose control; it had taken time for her to wrest employee allegiance from David Bagwell, and she feared loss of the progress she’d made within the organization. At the time she returned to work her conflicts with Bagwell were minor, just the typical friction between a strong-willed young woman and a man from whom she’d taken over the reins, but who now held a position with the company superior to hers. It wouldn’t be long, though, before her rift with David Bagwell would develop into something serious.

  13

  Lest David Bagwell be forever tarred with the villain’s brush in his parting of the ways with Tramell Crow and, ultimately, his role in Richard Lyon’s defense to murder charges, let it be known that the partners in Tramell Crow have historically been in somewhat of a locked-in position. It is true as stated earlier that Crow’s empire was built on the theory that every good performer should be in for a piece of the action and that, on paper at least, many of Crow’s partners have become millionaires. But to picture the company’s founder in a cotton-trimmed red suit and flowing white beard, his mouth drawn up in a bow as he slides down the chimney with goodies for one and all, would be somewhat unrealistic. Mr
. Tramell Crow didn’t just get off the boat from the Old Country with his belongings tied in a bandana hung from a pole over his shoulder. No, indeed.

  The total worth of a Tramell Crow partner’s ownership is deposited in an equity account along with the total worth of all the other partners, and there it remains. Once a Crow employee attains an equity position, raises in salary cease, the company’s sales pitch being that the partner’s three-thousand-a-month salary is more than supplemented by his healthy interest in the equity account. However, since the Crow partner is “encouraged” to own a home in Park Cities, Bent Tree, or another of North Dallas’ super-affluent subdivisions, thus maintaining the company’s image, and additionally receives the “suggestion” that it would be “beneficial” for the partner to belong to the most exclusive country clubs and take a certain number of meals in the to-be-seen-in restaurants, the partner’s salary doesn’t go very far.

  To make up for the deficit between the partner’s salary and his cost of living—which is considerable—the partner may borrow rather freely against his equity. The loans are made at preferred interest rates by the company, and since the advance is truly a loan, supported by all the necessary documents, the partner doesn’t declare the money received on his income tax return. The net result is that just about every Crow partner lives up to his equity and owes the company an amount equal roughly to the worth of his ownership. Additionally, the company takes no FIT withholding from the loan and pays no Social Security benefit. Suffer the tax collector.

  “It’s pretty slick for old Tramell,” our real estate vet tells us, now on his fourth bourbon and water and signaling the waitress for more. “There’s no real equity for anybody but Crow because all these so-called partners don’t have any way to get their money but to borrow it. Works two ways. The partners that are pulling their weight all owe the company too much for them to leave. Eliminates competition for Tramell, you know? And the guys that aren’t pulling their loads, well, all of a sudden they’re looking for a job, and then old Tramell swallows their share of the equity account to pay off their loans.” He snorts as he knocks off the rest of his drink, offers the empty to the waitress, and receives a full glass in return. “They can call it a partnership if they want to, but those guys are just a bunch of high-living slaves, if you want to know the truth about it.”

  There is the occasional partner, of course, whose share of the profits outstrips his debt to the Crow company, and as partner-in-charge of all residential development, David Bagwell was one of those. It is the Crow partner who actually has money coming who eventually becomes disgruntled, because his equity is in name only. If he ever leaves the company, the company simply refuses to buy him out and he remains a partner forever. Moreover, since he has no way to cash in, his equity may as well not exist at all. As David Bagwell prepared to leave the company and go into development on his own, he knew the Crow system very well.

  Since Nancy Lyon was a relatively new Tramell Crow partner, and since she had Big Daddy’s assets on which to fall back, it was unnecessary for her to borrow against her equity. She hadn’t been—and actually never was—exposed to the downside of the Crow partnership system. Therefore, when sums of money began to disappear from the Westchester subdivision accounts in the form of transfers into David Bagwell’s name, she had no choice other than to accept his explanation that the money amounted to draws against his equity in the partnership. Nancy was never comfortable with the situation, but Bagwell was, after all, her boss. She chose to keep her mouth shut and tend to business.

  Also somewhat uncomfortable with the transfer of funds was Kathleen Cunningham, who worked directly for Bagwell as his assistant at the Tramell Crow main offices. Kathleen, a pretty brunette with a willowy model’s figure, was even in less of a position to question Bagwell because, unlike Nancy, Kathleen wasn’t a partner. Furthermore, she respected David Bagwell and liked working for him, and though he could be aggressive in getting his way at times, she considered him a serious, hardworking executive. Bagwell’s direct superior in the company was after all Michael Crow, one of Tramell’s sons, and, Kathleen reasoned, if there was anything improper about the money transfers, surely Michael Crow would have put a stop to the practice.

  Though they talked many times over the phone, Kathleen in the North Dallas office and Nancy at the Westchester subdivision out in Grand Prairie, the two young women met in person only one time. The occasion was a meeting at the Grand Prairie Zoning and Planning offices that Kathleen attended as Bagwell’s representative, and while the two exchanged pleasantries and were cordial enough, they certainly had no reason to discuss their boss-in-common. Throughout David Bagwell’s final months with Tramell Crow, Kathleen Cunningham and Nancy Lyon were the only Crow employees who were aware of the money transfers, and neither had knowledge that the other knew of Bagwell’s activities.

  Though what Nancy perceived to be David Bagwell’s overdomination was a thorn in her side at work, and though she considered her boss a Jekyll-and-Hyde type who might need counseling, she had enough going on in her own life during 1987 and 1988 so that when she was away from the office, she gave him barely a thought. She spent most of her evenings with Allison—Richard was well into his high-flying tenure with Ken Hughes Industries and was often out of town—but still had time for evening and weekend projects for the Historical Society and the Junior League. Then, during the summer of 1987, when Allison was barely six months old, something happened that frightened Nancy. She became pregnant again.

  Besides the potential health hazards of a pregnancy so soon after having Allison, Nancy feared the effect another maternity leave might have on the Lyon family finances. Her concern wasn’t misplaced, either. With the additional load that the Park Cities duplex put on their monthly obligations, the couple needed every dime of their joint incomes just to make ends meet, and the expense of having another child right away would be more than they could bear. Though going to Big Daddy for help never seemed to concern Richard all that much, Nancy absolutely hated asking her father for money.

  Nonetheless, she had no choice but to enter prenatal care once again. To insure that she got plenty of rest, she called on Lynn Pease to work overtime two or three nights a week so that the nanny could care for Allison. Nancy also went on a strict maternity diet and began the same pelvic-strengthening exercises she’d learned in childbirth classes before delivering Allison. As time went on, she got over her initial concerns and let her mothering instincts take over. Finances be damned; if Nancy was to bring a baby into the world she was going to do everything possible to make the child feel loved and wanted.

  However, this baby wasn’t to be. When Nancy was four months pregnant, during one of her regular checkups the doctor heard no fetal heartbeat. After the various additional tests revealed no life within Nancy’s womb, she went to Presbyterian Hospital, where doctors aborted the child.

  The incident crushed her, understandably so, and unlike the period following Allison’s birth, this time Richard wasn’t very helpful. Nancy thought her husband’s attitude over the failed pregnancy cold and uncaring, and confided as much to friends and family. It was the first time outsiders knew of any trouble between the Lyons, but it was hardly the last.

  The abortion and accompanying trauma also caused Nancy to consider her own mortality for the first time in her life. She was now thirty-three years old. Not only did she have herself and Richard to worry about, she now had Allison as well, and the thought of what might become of her baby daughter should she suddenly become motherless cost Nancy quite a bit of sleep.

  Finally she made a decision. She consulted with Big Daddy, who referred her to an expert on the subject, and then she took out a life insurance policy. It contained cash value and annuity clauses, both attractive features to the Lyons since, try as they might, they didn’t seem able to put anything aside for a rainy day. The policy’s face value was a half-million dollars each on Richard’s and Nancy’s lives, with
the survivor of the two as beneficiary, and with Allison as the recipient of the money should anything happen to both of her parents. Richard and Nancy both took physicals and qualified with flying colors. As they signed the company forms at the kitchen table in the downstairs rear of the Park Cities duplex, Richard joked that he was now worth more dead than alive. The premiums were more than they could really afford, but Nancy was determined not to let the policy lapse. To pay for something as important as life insurance, she would even go to Big Daddy for help if she had to.

  A half-million dollars is a nice round figure for life insurance coverage, and was also the amount of damages requested by the plaintiff in the Dallas County lawsuit entitled Tramell Crow Partners v. David Bagwell, filed in the spring of 1989. The suit came into being a few months after Bagwell left the company and went into the residential construction and development business on his own, and was brought largely as a result of matters Nancy Lyon called to Tramell Crow’s attention.

  Once Bagwell had resigned and was no longer Nancy’s boss, one of her first orders of business was to audit the subdivision’s books to determine exactly how much Bagwell had placed in his own accounts. Since the money transfers had come in bits and pieces, Nancy didn’t have an inkling as to the total. Moreover, she hadn’t really had her mind on business of late. She was pregnant once more.

  But when she did finally get down and examine the Westchester books, Nancy felt a chill. The total was staggering, and it immediately occurred to her that since she was in charge of the subdivision, someone might accuse her of taking the money. She first thought about talking the problem over with Richard, then changed her mind. It wasn’t her husband’s decision to make; it was Nancy’s and Nancy’s alone. She then called Tramell Crow’s main offices and made an appointment with the Big Man himself.