Death and Honesty

by Cynthia Riggs

  Lincoln made a beckoning sign. “The assessors?”

  “Hold your horses,” said Joe. “Ashpine comes out shouting, ‘You didn’t give me the check!’ …”

  “Mrs. Trumbull stiffed him?” asked Sarah, appalled.

  “Seems so. Then Ashpine runs across to Ellen Meadows’s place. The assessors been confabbing all afternoon.”

  Lincoln crossed his ankles. “Transacting town business?”

  Joe lifted his faded red cap that read “Drains R Us,” and scratched his head. “Think they care if it’s illegal? Ellen, Selena, and what’s her name. All three together.”

  “Ocypete,” said Sarah. “‘Oh-SIP-i-tee,”’ she repeated.

  Lincoln detached himself from the door frame, went to the edge of the porch, and peered at Ellen’s house across the road. “I’d give two cents to know what they’re talking about.”

  “That much?” said Joe.

  While the Alley’s regulars tried to figure out what the assessors were scheming, the three women had seated their clerk on the dining room chair that had one leg shorter than the others, then returned to their places on either side of him.

  “Sorry to hear about your neighbor,” said Oliver in an attempt at normal conversation.

  Ellen stared at him without a word and moved the Tiffany reproduction lampshade so the lightbulb shone on his face. “You are a very stupid man,” she said. “Very.”

  “You’re killin’ the goose that laid …”

  “Selena!” Ellen slapped the table and both Oliver and Selena jumped.

  “I only meant that …”

  “Enough!” snapped Ellen.

  Oliver’s chair rocked onto the shorter leg as he sat forward. “Perhaps you ladies can tell me what the problem seems to be.”

  “Seems to be!” Ocypete stretched her arms out dramatically, and the gauzy fabric of her sleeves rippled like the wings of a moth.

  “A small problem of triple-dipping,” said Ellen.

  “Avaricious bastard,” muttered Ocypete.

  Oliver sat back again. “I have no idea what you ladies are talking about.”

  Ellen interrupted him. “We’d agreed on a four-way split of Delilah Sampson’s fifteen thousand dollars you’d allegedly deposited in the setting-aside account, right?”

  Selena referred to the notes in front of her. “Three thousand to Oliver, four thousand to each of us.”

  “Three thousand wasn’t enough for you?” snarled Ocypete.

  Oliver held both hands in the air. “I haven’t the least idea where all this is leading.”

  “You wearing a wire?” Ocypete asked suddenly.

  He turned on her. “What?”

  “A wire. You taping this conversation?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” A drop of sweat appeared from beneath Oliver’s hairline and trickled down his temple.

  “You underestimate Miss Sampson, and you underestimate us,” said Ellen. “Now Victoria Trumbull seems to have become involved. Are you underestimating her, too?”

  Oliver let out his breath. “Mrs. Trumbull? What about Mrs. Trumbull?”

  “Everyone in the village saw Victoria Trumbull drive up in Delilah Sampson’s limousine,” Ellen said. “I suppose she marched up to your office simply to give you a check for her taxes?”

  “She didn’t give me the check …”

  “What do you intend to do about this hornet’s nest you’ve stirred up?” Ellen tapped her pencil to demonstrate the stirring up of a hornet’s nest.

  Ocypete lined up the stack of property cards in front of her. “Victoria Trumbull is not someone you want to diddle with, Oliver.”

  Oliver shuddered.

  Selena read off some figures. “The amount we had agreed to divide was fifteen thousand, three hundred, and some odd dollars …”

  Ellen interrupted with her own figures. “You planned to skim off an additional ten thousand. Did you intend to share that, Oliver?”

  “Unscrupulous!” exclaimed Selena.

  “What do you plan to do about this, Oliver?”

  “About what?”

  Ellen stood, looming over him. “You’re even more stupid than Tillie. We were fools to trust you.”

  A second and third drop of sweat trickled down Oliver’s forehead. Selena handed him her hanky. He wiped his face with it and continued to hold it, picking absently at the tatted lace edging.

  “Well?” said Ellen.

  “There’s been a mistake, ladies.”

  “Goddamned right there’s been a mistake,” said Ocypete.

  “I mean, I’ll tell Miss Sampson I made a mistake.”

  Ellen rested both hands on the table and moved so her face was inches from his. He backed up and the chair rocked. “A three-million-dollar mistake, Oliver? Or a five-million-dollar mistake? Which one, Oliver?”

  The clock in the church tolled six.

  Oliver stood and his chair fell over. “I’ll talk to you first thing in the morning. I’ve got to leave now.”

  Ellen stood up straight. “I think not, Mr. Ashpine.”

  CHAPTER 7

  The Alley’s porch regulars continued to watch the Meadows house across the road. Lincoln, at the far end of the porch, moved his head one way then the other to get a better angle on what was happening inside.

  “Can you see anything?” asked Sarah.

  “They got a lamp turned so it shines on his face, like cops giving him the third degree. Looks like he’s sweating.”

  “Those harpies would make anybody sweat,” said Joe.

  Sarah shivered and pulled the sleeves of her black sweatshirt over her hands so just her fingers showed. “You wouldn’t think they’d want to meet at Ellen’s so soon after that murder. I mean, it was only just last night.”

  Lincoln said, without turning his head away from the Meadows house, “Wonder why anyone would kill Lucy Pease. Nice lady. Used to do yard work for her. Looks like Oliver’s trying to back away.” He laughed. “Doesn’t seem to know what to make of those three. He’ll learn.”

  “Hard to believe he’s been here for almost five months,” said Sarah. “Whatever did happen to Tillie?”

  “Walked off the job. Can’t blame her, working for them.” Joe jabbed his thumb toward the Meadows house.

  Lincoln laughed again and pointed his own thumb toward the house. “Ashpine just knocked over his chair.”

  Joe cut off another chunk of Red Man and popped it into his mouth. “Tillie ran off with someone, for sure.”

  “You know her?” asked Sarah.

  “Year behind me at the high school.”

  “Who’d she run off with, her boyfriend?” Sarah asked.

  “Edgartown guy. Someone else’s husband.”

  “They turned the light out,” said Lincoln. “Heading for the door.”

  Sarah, Lincoln, and Joe looked toward the Meadows house. An ashen-faced Oliver exited, followed by Selena in her pink sweater and pleated gray skirt. Ocypete came next, floating along in pastel draperies, and then came Ellen in her navy pants suit. Ellen pulled the door shut behind her and the four marched across the road to Town Hall and disappeared from view around the building.

  “Ain’t that something,” said Lincoln.

  Sarah turned back to Joe. “Whose husband did Tillie run off with?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “She seemed like a nice person.”

  Joe jammed both hands in his pockets and rocked from heel to toe and back again. “Think so, eh?”

  Darcy turned left onto the less traveled road and brought the long white limo to a stop.

  Victoria spoke up. “What are you doing at Delilah Sampson’s, Emery?”

  “My name is Darcy now, Mrs. Trumbull. Darcy Remey.”

  Victoria leaned forward. “The last time I saw you, someone’s jewels were involved.”

  “Uncut stones. With no discernible provenance.”

  “What happened to them?”

  Darcy grinned. “That’s for me to know,
isn’t it?”

  “Miss Sampson’s jewels this time?”

  “Miss Sampson’s jewelry?” Darcy laughed. “No, Mrs. Trumbull. No self-respecting thief would touch her stuff.” He leaned over the seat. “Mrs. Trumbull, please don’t address me as anything but Darcy, from now on.”

  “What’s going on?” asked Victoria. “Who are you working for this time?”

  Darcy’s grin formed an attractive crease down one side of his face, but he said nothing.

  Victoria regarded secrecy as one of the world’s great evils, the antithesis of democracy. Should she ask Emery—or Darcy—to take her home on principle, or should she wait and see what happened next?

  Curiosity won. “All right, Darcy. Take me away.”

  “Yes, madam,” said Darcy. He slid shut the glass divider and the limousine moved on sedately. A short distance from the fork in the road, they passed through an opening in a high stone wall, and the road from there to the house was paved with Belgian block—square—cut stone set in a semicircular pattern. The paved road led toward what was once the old Hammond place and was now Delilah Sampson’s trophy house.

  Darcy pulled up in front of the grand entrance stairway, and helped Victoria out. She gazed up at the vast new house that stood where the old Hammond place had been. The house was at least three stories high with four chimneys that she could see, and seemed to be a combination of antebellum South and New England as some newly graduated architect imagined New England. The house was shingled, as Island houses should be according to Victoria, but the shingles were still a raw unweathered yellow. Salt air and wind would silver them in time. Glossy black woodwork around the windows reflected the sunlight, and she wondered for a moment if the shutters were plastic. A wide marble staircase led up to a broad porch. On either side of the stairway, pineapple-shaped stone balusters held up the curving marble balustrade. Victoria could see rocking chairs set artistically on the terra-cotta tiles of the porch floor.

  “Oiled teak,” said Darcy

  “Oh?”

  “The rocking chairs.”

  “Well,” said Victoria, taking a breath.

  “If you’d like, you can leave your papers in the car, Mrs. Trumbull. I’ll make sure they’re safe.”

  “Thank you,” said Victoria, taking his arm.

  He escorted her up the marble stairs, through a heavy oak door that an attractive young woman in black trousers and a white blouse held open for them. Victoria stepped carefully on thick oriental rugs that carpeted the long hall, not wanting to disturb the pile. They passed imposing rooms, windows embellished with heavy rose-colored draperies. Oil paintings that lined the wall were equally divided between ships at sea and stern portraits of someone’s ancestors. When they finally ended up at the glass door to Delilah Sampson’s slate-floored conservatory, Victoria was ready to sit down and rest.

  Delilah had been seated in a wrought-iron chair. She stood when Victoria approached, and held out her hands. “Thanks for coming on such short notice, Mrs. Trumbull. I’m embarrassed about how I acted at your place.” She still wore her gold sweater, but had changed from shorts into cream-colored linen slacks.

  “I’m delighted to be invited.” Victoria plopped into a white couch that was lower than she expected. She looked around. Along the left side of the conservatory was a well-stocked bar. The right side of the glass-enclosed room was banked with dozens of blossoming plants. “I’ve never seen so many orchids in one place.”

  “Those?” Delilah glanced over at the banks of potted plants. “They’re Henry’s hobby.”

  Darcy was still standing by the door with his hands behind his back, feet apart.

  “Thank you, Darcy. That will be all,” Delilah said.

  “Very well, madam.” He bowed himself out of the room, but before he did, he winked at Victoria, who turned away toward the view of Vineyard Sound and the Elizabeth Islands spread out in front of her. The islands stood out so clearly, she could almost make out individual trees. Below them, a wide sloping lawn led to a small pond that was separated from the sound by a narrow barrier beach. Two swans with four half-grown cygnets trailing behind were mirrored on the still surface.

  Victoria sighed with pleasure. “How peaceful.” But as she watched, one of the cygnets suddenly lifted its wings, threw its head back, and sank out of sight. “Good heavens!” Victoria struggled to her feet.

  “If that was another baby swan, Mrs. Trumbull, we can’t do anything. There were eight babies originally.”

  “Snapping turtles?”

  Delilah nodded. “I don’t know how many there are. The other day I saw one that was two feet across.”

  Victoria sank back into the low couch. “I hope you don’t swim there.”

  “Hardly.”

  After a brief flurry, the swans and the three remaining cygnets continued to search for food among the reeds at the edge, and the surface once again calmed.

  Delilah broke into Victoria’s silence. “Would you like something stronger than tea? I’ve got sherry.”

  Before Victoria could switch her thoughts from cygnets to sherry, Delilah rang a silver bell on the table, and summoned the young woman who’d opened the front door. Her black trousers, white silk shirt, and shoes with blocky two-inch heels were not quite a uniform, but almost.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  She was probably in her late twenties, with pale, translucent skin. Victoria wondered if Darcy had noticed her. Of course he had, she told herself.

  “What can Lee get for you, Victoria?” asked Delilah.

  “Sherry would be nice.”

  “Sherry for Mrs. Trumbull, Lee, and the usual for me.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Lee bowed and disappeared.

  Once she’d left, Delilah looked down at her nails and rubbed the bright polish with her thumb. “Did you have a chance to speak with that man?”

  “A most uncivil person,” said Victoria. “Completely uncooperative. When he stepped out of the room to take a personal phone call, I made copies of some of his files.”

  Delilah sat forward. “My files?”

  “Files marked ‘DS’ at any rate. I didn’t take time to examine them. I’ll wait until I get home.”

  “Why don’t we look at them now?”

  Victoria intended to study the files before she showed them to anyone else. “I don’t have the copies with me.”

  “Are they in the limo?”

  “Yes, but …”

  “Then I’ll ask Darcy to get them.” Delilah reached for the silver bell.

  Victoria changed the subject abruptly. She felt possessive about the files she’d purloined. “It’s unusually clear this afternoon. You can make out houses on the mainland. The oldtimers called this kind of day a ‘weather breeder.’ Heavy weather is moving in, they’d say.”

  “Every day is different,” said Delilah. “I used to love to look at the view. I’ll ask Lee to get Darcy …”

  “You say, ‘used to,”’ Victoria said, raising her voice slightly. “Not anymore?”

  “With that pond full of reptiles eating baby swans, the view seems sinister.” Delilah reached her hand out again, and again, Victoria stopped her.

  “Tell me more about your plan to become a farmer.”

  Delilah clasped her hands under her chin. “I’ve never been so serious about anything, Mrs. Trumbull. I told you I’ve put in an order for baby chicks, right in time for Easter. They’re dyed Easter egg colors, isn’t that sweet? When they grow up they’ll lay eggs and I’ll sell the eggs. And if I can get a rooster I can grow my own baby chicks.”

  Victoria refrained from remarking that, considering the law of averages, half of Delilah’s baby chicks were likely to become roosters.

  “And the goats, Mrs. Trumbull. Lambert Willoughby, who works for the town, has built the most beautiful goat pen. There are only about two thousand fainting goats in the whole wide world. I’m going to join the fainting goat association.”

  “Don’t the goats hurt themselves wh
en they faint?”

  Delilah looked shocked. “Of course not. I’d never allow that. When you say ‘Boo!’ they just keel over, and after about twenty seconds they get up and walk away.”

  Before Delilah could reach for the bell again, Victoria said, “I was working in my garden this morning. Not as interesting as your farm, but I planted lunaria seedlings that my friend Jordan gave me.” She brushed at her dirt-stained knees.

  “Lunaria? I don’t know what that is.”

  “Honesty.”

  “Maybe I can take some honesty to the assessors,” said Delilah with a pleased smile.

  “I’m not sure they’d get the joke.”

  Victoria continued to divert Delilah’s attention away from the files on the front seat of the limousine. “You have such accommodating people working for you. Both Lee and Darcy are so professional.”

  “My servants are my friends. I don’t like to call them servants, though. That seems demeaning, don’t you think, Mrs. Trumbull?”

  “Darcy seems a superior person,” said Victoria. “Has he been with you long?”

  “A little over two weeks, actually. He’s amazing. He knows the Island’s roads like a native.”

  “In such a short time. How did you happen to find him?”

  “Pure luck. I was taping one of my shows in West Virginia, where Henry’s church is. Zebulon is where they produce my television show.”

  “I interrupted. You were telling about finding Darcy.”

  “Well, after the show, this nice man came up to me with a bouquet and told me how much he loves my show. We got to talking, and it turned out he’s been a chauffeur to Saudi Arabian royalty. Can you imagine that!”

  “Remarkable,” said Victoria. “Why did he leave his former employer?”

  “The emir or rajah or something he was working for was shot in a palace rebellion. Isn’t that exciting?”

  “Very,” said Victoria. “Did you have a chauffeur before Darcy?”

  “He was nothing like Darcy. I gave him a handsome separation bonus and he was quite happy.”

  Victoria shifted position on the soft couch. She was cushioned too well. She longed for her firm old-fashioned sofa with its unyielding horsehair stuffing.