by Lee Harris
“How long did you know them?”
“Years. I’ve been working here half my life. My cousin owns the place. They started coming here when they were kids in their twenties. Val had more hair then, Clark was a little thinner. Matty didn’t change much. He was the cutest guy you ever laid eyes on.” She smiled as though the image pleased her.
“Did you know them outside the restaurant?”
“Me? No. I have a cousin who once dated Clark. She should’ve married him. Maybe this wouldn’t’ve happened.”
“Tell me about that night.”
“It was like any other night. They walked in, waved to me, and came over to this table. They always sat in my section if there was a table free. I brought them drinks and took their order.”
“How much did they drink?”
“One apiece. Clark always had a bottle of beer. Val drank Johnnie Black. Matty had something fancy, a Rusty Nail, I think. One had chicken, one had veal, one had the osso bucco special.”
“What kind of mood were they in?”
“They were always in a good mood, those guys. It was Val’s birthday that day, did you know?”
“Carlotta told me.”
“One of the others kinda whispered it to me when they came in, and I brought little cakes to the table with a candle for Val and we all sang. Can you believe he died on his birthday?”
“Did you hear any of the conversation, Peggy?”
“Some. It was friendly stuff. They were talking about a summer vacation, I think, where they would go. Matty talked about his new car, that big four-wheel drive they found at the beach the next day. And they talked about going down to the lake and playing ice hockey.”
“Is that what they said? That they would play ice hockey on the lake?”
“I think that’s what it was. They wanted to clown around. That’s the way it sounded to me.”
“Did anyone say anything about walking across the lake to Canada?”
She stopped and looked uncomfortable. “Yeah, I think so. Remember, I only heard bits and pieces of what they were saying. I was in and out of the kitchen, I had a bunch of other tables I was serving. I didn’t hear a lot of whole sentences, you know what I mean?”
“I do know, Peggy. I’m just asking for whatever you heard.”
“When I brought the check over, I think they were talking about maybe walking across.”
“You recall who said it?”
“No. They were all talking. I thought they were nuts or maybe just kidding around. That was a crazy thing to do. These were guys with wives and families.”
“Do you remember when they left?”
“Not late. Eight, eight-thirty.”
“Did they drink wine with dinner or have another drink after the first?”
“You know, they didn’t. That’s what makes me think they were planning this hike before I heard them talking about it. Usually Clark would have another beer, Val would have a glass of wine.”
“And Matty?”
“Depended. But he usually had a second drink, too. None of them drank a second that night.”
“And they seemed happy and friendly when they left?”
“Oh, yeah. Just like always.”
“Peggy, did you have the feeling that all three of them intended to make the hike?”
“I couldn’t be sure. I didn’t hear anyone say he wouldn’t go, but like I told you, I didn’t hear everything.”
“I guess that’s it,” I said. “Unless you can think of anything else they said.”
She thought a moment. “Nothing important. One of them said something about not having boots on. That’s about it.”
“Do you remember who that was?”
“I couldn’t tell you.”
“But you heard someone mention boots.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure. Somebody said something about boots. It was February. There was still plenty of snow around.”
“Thanks, Peggy,” I said. I shook her hand and went to the bar to find Carlotta.
Carlotta drove from Giordano’s to the beach and clocked it. It was five miles and took about fifteen minutes. All the streets we traveled were local, and although there was no longer any snow or ice on them, we both agreed that fifteen to twenty minutes was a fair estimate of the time.
“If the men had driven from Giordano’s to any of the three houses, what would those times be?” I asked as she turned away from the beach.
“We’re the closest and Clark’s the farthest.”
“What are we talking about in time?”
“Maybe fifteen minutes to our house, maybe half an hour to Clark’s. And average the two for Matty’s. What’s this all about?”
“Until I talked to Peggy, I thought one of the men might just have had a gun with him at dinner. But if one of them went home to change his shoes or put snow boots on, he could have picked up a gun at the same time.”
“Val didn’t have a gun.”
“Annie says Matty didn’t own a handgun either, that all he had were hunting rifles. She was home with the kids that night, and Matty didn’t come home after he left for dinner with his friends.”
“So that leaves Clark.”
“Or maybe one of the others had a gun that his wife didn’t know about.”
“And Val’s the easiest target,” Carlotta said. “No one was home to see him go in and out, and he lives the closest. And besides, if Matty went back for a gun, how come he ended up being the one shot?”
“I’ll have to talk to Bambi. It’s really very important now. I wonder if she’s already told this to the police and she doesn’t want to go over it again. It can’t make her very happy to think that her husband killed his best friend.”
“Try dropping in on her tomorrow, Chris. She’ll get the kids off to school, and then maybe you can find her at home.”
“Does she go into the store? You said Clark owned a hardware store.”
“I think she does, but not full-time. She’s got a good staff there, nice people, very trustworthy. She doesn’t have to be there all the time.”
“Then that’s on for tomorrow. And the other person I have to talk to is Val’s partner.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
6
At home Carlotta got a fire going in the family room, expertly laying the kindling with the heavier wood on top, starting it up with some newspaper that did its work effectively. In seconds the fireplace was ablaze, and the warmth floated to where we sat several feet away.
“That’s one thing I haven’t mastered,” I admitted. “Jack’s much better at it than I.”
“I always watched Val,” she said. “He had a way of placing all the different materials and sizes so that one lighted the other in sequence. I don’t know where he learned how to do it, but when I came home from Oakwood, after I met you in February, I decided I didn’t want to live without my evening fires. I’m not as good as Val, but the fire reminds me of him in a very happy way. That day we met on the ski slopes, in the evening we sat in front of a fire in a huge stone fireplace. It was so hot we had to move away from it.”
I watched her as she spoke, her eyes on the fire, her cheeks just slightly pink. The cool, somewhat crisp facade of the businesswoman had melted away and the distraught wife—or widow—was plainly visible.
“You must be very observant. You do it so well.”
“You think he’s dead, don’t you?” She turned to me. “You think his body’s stuck at the bottom of the lake.”
“I think it’s very likely. But that doesn’t mean I won’t give it my all.”
“If I could just think of where he would go. I sat and made a list one night.”
“What did you come up with?”
“I started with the ski resort where we met. I know that sounds foolishly sentimental, but I thought maybe he would go there because we’d been so happy that first weekend—and there were other weekends later. But he had no money, Chris, except for what he had in his pocket.”
“How much could that have been?”
“Several hundred. Maybe more. Enough to get on a plane, to buy some food, to get some new clothes. But what happened after that?” She looked at me as though she expected me to find an answer.
“He would have gone to a friend or relative,” I said.
“But his friends were here, and they were dead.”
“Parents?”
“Oh, they’ve gone.”
“Dead?”
“No. They went back to Europe before I met Val.”
“Were they at your wedding?”
“They weren’t able to come.”
“Were they Russian?”
“Actually, no. Well, I guess they were originally, or the family was. But they were German.”
“I see. So you’ve never met them.”
“No.”
“Did they keep in touch?”
“Not really.” She looked uncomfortable. “I don’t really know—Val didn’t talk about them much.”
“Were they from the east or the west?”
“The east.”
“Did he grow up there?”
“No, he was born here.”
“I would think after the Berlin Wall came down they wouldn’t have had much trouble coming over, especially with a son living here, an American-born son.”
“I really don’t know, Chris. I assume there was something between Val and his parents that he didn’t tell me about. I see from your face that you think this is very strange and you’re right, but I’ve told you what I know.” As though to change the subject, she reached for a crystal bowl full of candy and passed it to me. “Have a mint. I always like one after dinner.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s not alcoholic, so you don’t have to worry.” She smiled.
“Then I’ll take two. I have a sweet tooth.”
“You don’t look it. You must do a lot of exercise.”
“Haphazardly at best. I walk in the morning. I’m an early riser, and I can get out and back in time to have breakfast with Jack before he leaves for Brooklyn.”
“Val and I always had breakfast together.”
“Let’s get back to your list. What other places did you think Val might go to?”
“One obvious person is his partner. They’ve known each other a long time, and they trust each other. I’ve talked to Jake frequently since Val’s disappearance, but he swears he hasn’t seen Val since Valentine’s Day.”
“Has he heard from him?”
“He says no. As everyone else does.”
“Well, he’s high on my list, so let’s see what we can do there. I have another question. It’s a subject I don’t like to talk about, but what I found in his desk has made me wonder. Do the two of you have wills?”
“I don’t. I’ve never thought about it. I assume Val doesn’t either. He never told me he did.”
“Do you have a lawyer?”
“No. We’ve never needed one. If we did, I’d ask around and get a recommendation. Come to think of it, Val must know a lawyer. He’s in a partnership in his business. They must have some legal agreement, don’t you think?”
“That’s very likely. And if he used that lawyer to set up his business, he might use him to write a will.”
“Why are you asking about this?”
“Because there’s a lot of money, Carlotta, almost three hundred thousand dollars in those three books. For all we know there could be more. He may have stock certificates in a safe deposit box. The thing that struck me was that all three accounts were in his name alone. None of them were joint accounts or in trust for you—or for anyone else. I would think that someone with that much money would have a will directing where it should go.”
“I’m his wife. Wouldn’t I inherit if he died?”
“Probably. It just seems a little strange. I don’t know a lot about these things, but Jack and I have a joint checking account, and when we got married, we made all our savings accounts either joint or in trust for the other.”
“Our checking account is joint, and we have a joint savings account at a local bank.”
“Besides those three in his desk.”
“Yes.”
“Did you know about those accounts?”
She took a moment to answer. “I knew he had other accounts. He told me a long time ago there were bankbooks in his desk. I never saw them till after he disappeared.”
“Were you surprised at how much money there was?”
“Maybe a little. We never talked about money, Chris. When we wanted to buy something, like the house, Val would say we could afford it or he didn’t think we could afford it. He knew what I was earning, and I had a pretty good idea of what he was earning. I just didn’t think about it. And we never talked about writing wills.”
“Do you have a safe deposit box?”
“Yes. It’s in both our names. Want to go down there tomorrow and see what’s there?”
“If you don’t mind.”
“How’s nine A.M.?”
“It’s good for me.”
“Me, too. I’ll set my alarm for seven-thirty.”
“Fine. We’ll take it from there.”
We got to the bank just as it was opening, and as Carlotta signed the card, it seemed to occur to both of us at the same moment that this was something to check. She got the assistant manager to go through the records to see whether Val had accessed the box any time after February fourteenth. The search took only a few minutes, and the answer was no. The last time anyone had used the box was in January, and it had been Carlotta.
We went back together to the boxes. The one Carlotta pulled out of the slot was larger than the one I had inherited from Aunt Meg and now owned jointly with Jack. We took it into a small room with a single chair and a door that closed and locked.
Carlotta opened the box and started through the papers. “I keep some jewelry here,” she said as she looked. “Stuff I don’t wear often. Here are some automobile papers, our marriage certificate. What’s this?” She pulled out an envelope and looked inside. “This looks like papers for Val’s business. And the envelope has the lawyer’s name and address on it.”
“Let’s write it down. We may want to talk to him.”
She continued through the papers. “Here’s Val’s birth certificate. He was born in Connecticut.” She handed it to me. “And here’s the deed to the house.”
I wrote down the information on the birth certificate, glanced at the deed, and asked her if there was anything else that looked important.
“I can’t find anything.”
“So there’s nothing that looks like a will.”
“Nothing at all. You want to have a look?”
“No, that’s fine.”
“Then that’s it. No, here’s something I missed. It’s from an insurance company.” She pulled out an envelope and looked inside. “It’s a life insurance policy. I never knew Val carried any. My God, Chris, it’s a million dollars on his life.”
“Who’s the beneficiary?”
She looked pale. “I can’t believe this. Matty is. Matthew Franklin.” She looked at me, her face asking the question she could barely articulate. “Why would he do this, Chris? Val’s left a million dollars to Matty. A million dollars.”
I wondered if she was thinking that he hadn’t left anything like that to her.
* * *
She was somber on the way home. The envelopes with the insurance policy and the business papers lay on the seat between us.
“You don’t think there were any other insurance policies in the box besides this one?” I asked.
“There weren’t. I looked.”
“We’ll have to find out if there’s a will.”
“Wouldn’t he keep that in the box?”
“Maybe it’s with an attorney.”
“I’ve never felt so confused in my life.”
“I know you’re thinking that this makes it look as though Val had a motive for ki
lling Matty, but it doesn’t. He could have cancelled that policy at any time, or changed the beneficiary. Maybe he took it out before you were married and he forgot about it.”
“How do you forget about a million dollars?”
I was asking myself the same thing. “He may have stopped paying the premiums, Carlotta. Anyway, whether Val is dead or alive, he isn’t legally dead so no one’s going to inherit that insurance.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“And I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that Annie Franklin doesn’t have to know about it.”
“She certainly won’t hear it from me.”
“And maybe we’ll turn up a reason.”
“I’d rather turn up a husband.” She turned quickly toward me and gave me a fleeting smile. “If it’s all the same to you.”
7
I left Carlotta in Val’s study, going through his desk drawers to see if she could find the answers to the disturbing questions we had just unearthed. As I drove toward Bambi Thayer’s house I wondered whether the insurance policy could have lapsed, whether Val had taken it out years ago and then stopped paying the premiums on it, perhaps when he married. It had been the bottom envelope in the box, indicating that it might be the oldest. I would have to check when I got back.
Bambi’s house was more modest than Annie’s, but well cared-for, lots of shrubs planted near the front of the house and handsome specimen trees on the front lawn. I parked at the curb. A car was in the driveway and the garage door was open.
I was a little nervous as I walked up to the front door. Bambi didn’t want to see me, and she might exercise her right not to invite me in and talk to me. I didn’t look forward to a confrontation and hoped there wouldn’t be one.
The door opened after the first ring. The young woman who stood just inside was slim, with lots of curly dark blond hair, and pale skin. She wore no makeup and was dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up.
“Yes?”
“Mrs. Thayer, I’m Chris Bennett.”
“Who?”
“I’m looking into the disappearance of Val Krassky.”
