Death at King Arthur's Court

by Forrest, Richard;

Morgan smiled. ‘Is that right? Fair is what I say it is. You two seem to have forgotten that I’m the one who makes up the rules.’

  Five

  ‘Where did you find the sword?’ Rocco asked as they entered the stand of pine trees.

  Lyon pointed to a spot a dozen feet back from the cliff. ‘Over there. I woke up just about where I’m standing now.’

  ‘I don’t see any blood on the ground,’ Rocco said. ‘Strange.’

  Lyon shivered as if a cold wind that reeked of must and decay had blown in from a distant place.

  Halfway back to the house, Rocco abruptly halted. He pointed at his patrol car parked in front of the main entrance. ‘Wasn’t Morgan’s RV about where the police cruiser is now?’

  ‘That’s right. And Ernest Harnell’s Ford was next.’

  ‘The other cars that arrived later were parked in a line down the drive directly behind the RV?’

  ‘Yes,’ Lyon answered.

  ‘Which means that Morgan’s vehicle could not have been moved in any direction during the evening without extracting it from that minor traffic jam.’ It was a statement and not an assumption. ‘And you’re sure you saw Morgan close the RV’s door and punch numbers into the door’s combination box before he came to the patio?’

  ‘Yes, we all saw him do that.’

  ‘An action that would have relocked the door,’ Rocco mused. ‘Which means that, while you were all on the patio, no one could have sneaked into the RV to wait for Morgan’s return. Any intruder would have to posses the combination.’

  ‘Yes,’ Lyon agreed as they continued toward the house.

  ‘If we assume that possibly you didn’t knock Morgan off with Excalibur, we seem to already have at least two other suspects.’

  ‘Garth and Ernest?’

  ‘Yes, although it’s difficult to believe that someone who could write The Gentle Americans could murder someone with a cleaver that size. I’d put Garth down for poison, Derringer or stiletto, but it boggles the mind to picture him waving around an instrument as destructive and bloody as a broadsword.’

  ‘Garth can turn his personality around according to the way he reads the circumstances. I’ve seen him do it countless times. He’ll exhibit a certain behavior with me or in a classroom, and then he pushes some sort of mental button to turn himself “on” when he wants to provoke Ernest. I wouldn’t make that sort of generalization about the man, Rocco. The appearances are deceiving. During the last war, Garth served as a platoon leader in a rifle company for the First Cav. He won a Purple Heart and Bronze Star and finished his tour as a first lieutenant commanding his company.’

  ‘And Ernest was leader of an A team in the Green Berets?’

  ‘Actually, Ernest was a corporal who taught typing at Fort Benjamin Harrison. I believe that’s in Indiana.’

  Rocco laughed. ‘It would seem as if cojones are not all that transferable,’ he said as they entered the house.

  Bea sat stiffly on the couch in the living room. She looked up from leafing through a New Yorker magazine. ‘Well?’

  ‘What I don’t understand,’ Rocco said, ‘is why someone didn’t obliterate Morgan years ago? Our victim does not sound like an endearing person. Why did you invite him to your house under any circumstance? Did he have any friends or admirers?’

  ‘He was the best teacher I ever knew,’ Bea said defensively.

  ‘I agree,’ Lyon said. ‘Morgan may have had definite social lacks, but he was a superb teacher. He was one of the few department chairmen I know of who insisted on teaching a section of freshmen in an English survey course. He had a rare talent in his ability to reach out and encourage young men and women. He had a true calling that took great energy. Perhaps that was the reason for his problems with others. His teaching ground up every available particle of compassion that he possessed. Because those qualities are now gone, we are all diminished by his loss.’

  ‘Morgan had the ability to alienate anyone he wanted. He could be ruthless to young teachers,’ Bea said. ‘But sometimes in life you accumulate certain people along the way and they become part of your fabric of living.’

  Rocco nodded. ‘I have a few friends like that. Anything else from last night’s events that’s germane?’ he asked.

  ‘Appetizers and another drink seemed to calm them down a bit,’ Lyon said. ‘I was still trying to smooth things over when the twins arrived. Rina and Clay Dickensen are Morgan’s younger half-brother and sister. Clay’s my accountant and had stopped over to do some tax work for me. Rina’s newest boyfriend, Skee Chickering, was with them. I suppose you could say that the second half of the party began with the eagle sighting. Or at least when someone thought they saw an eagle. Well, perhaps it was when someone wanted to see an eagle …’

  ‘I see one!’ Rina screeched in a high-pitched voice that teetered on the cusp of hysteria. ‘He’s up there! Oh, God, my eagle!’ She climbed on the patio parapet and stretched her arms overhead in a gigantic embrace. ‘Oh, mighty winged creature, soar high above us and cast down your regal benediction.’ She reached for the hand of a muscular man with white-blond hair and the light complexion of a near albino. ‘Help me with this.’

  Skee chanted what seemed to be a rather garbled mantra as he climbed to the wall next to her. He stood with his feet planted securely apart and grasped her waist with both hands. With flexed knees he hoisted her overhead.

  Rina Dickensen’s peasant skirt billowed around her hips as she balanced horizontally above Skee’s head. She arched her back and extended her arms in a wing-like imitation of flight. He slowly turned her until she faced out over the valley high above the Connecticut River. Her perfectly balanced body seemed poised for a momentary flight over the hills.

  It occurred to Lyon that Rina’s pose was identical to the earlier flying configurations assumed by his Wobblies. The similarity between monster and woman stopped with the positioning of their bodies. His benignly ugly Wobblies were neuter, while the lithe person bracketed against the night was definitely a vibrant woman. Her body, outlined clearly against the sky, exuded an animal sensuality.

  Rina had the slender taut figure of the gymnast, with the firm hips and buttocks of the trained athlete. The brisk river wind swirled her clothing to reveal long legs, while its slight chill through the thin material of her blouse stiffened her nipples. Her presence disturbed Lyon, not because of her bizarre exhibitionism, but because he suspected that the real reason for the taunting exposure was a seductive game that she persisted in playing. He wasn’t able to measure the seriousness of her intent, and wasn’t about to explore it further.

  Skee slowly shifted position on the parapet. He turned in a half circle until Rina’s head pointed directly toward the house, where Lyon stood framed in the window of his study. She smiled. Her lips mouthed words lost in the wind. Skee shifted position again as he slowly lowered her to the ground. She slid from his arms and performed a perfectly executed back flip culminating in a dexterous curtsey in Lyon’s direction. They gave her a polite smattering of applause.

  ‘That performance was nearly as good as the day I ran with the bulls in Pamplona,’ Ernest said.

  ‘One does not run with the beasts,’ Garth said. ‘It’s corrida de toros.’

  Rina’s eyes locked with Lyon’s until her companion grasped her elbow and steered her toward the far end of the patio.

  ‘Your sister reminds me of a gypsy,’ Lyon said to the man intently bent over the computer on his desk. ‘She has a certain wild elan about her.’

  ‘Change that to uncontrolled lust for eagles, men and money, not necessarily in that order. Although a rich man who donated to her Eagle Foundation might head the list.’

  ‘Her new boyfriend has money?’

  ‘Whatever Skee has besides muscles, it’s certainly not money, but I’m not about to ask Rina what it is.’

  Clay Dickensen, working at Lyon’s desk, had the hair and skin coloring of his fraternal twin. Brother and sister had the identical shade of black hair that
appeared a darker hue when contrasted against their alabaster skin. That combination accentuated their sensual features. Their builds were also similar, although the primary differentiating characteristic was Clay’s serious and nearly perpetual half frown, as contrasted against her uninhibited openness.

  Lyon sank into the worn leather chair behind the desk and sipped on his sherry. ‘How bad is it?’

  Clay thumped the thin pile of records by the computer. ‘Rotten and lousy!’ he said as he swivelled the chair to face Lyon. ‘Your financial records are a travesty. I’m going to have to do a lot of interpolating, since I can’t ask the IRS for another extension.’

  ‘Interpolation sounds like accountant talk for guessing.’

  ‘It’s also secret CPA code that means, I hope to God you don’t get audited.’

  ‘I don’t want to cheat.’

  ‘With the condition of your records, even strict honesty is going to look suspicious.’ He bent over the keyboard with a deepening of his usual frown. ‘If you had only kept a travel diary like I suggested last year. I could have given you a hell of a lot more legitimate travel deductions.’

  ‘I tried it,’ Lyon said.

  ‘I know,’ Clay replied. ‘I read it. The first two entries were terrific. You had dates, exact amounts for train fares, taxis, and the lunch with your publisher, all duly noted. Then I got to page three, which turned into a long description of two Wobbly monsters riding the roof of an Amtrack train as it struggled back to Connecticut in a snow storm.’

  ‘Who’s Rina’s new beau?’ Lyon asked in an attempt to divert talk away from his tax problems.

  ‘Skee Chickering is an appropriate addition to my sister’s gypsy caravan. He’s not only a professional bodybuilder, but is now her business partner in a fitness studio. She leads the acrobatic classes while he instructs on the machines, power-lifting, and tends the juice bar while she goes eagle watching.’

  Lyon laughed. ‘I don’t know if it’s due to her interest or not, but the bald eagles are returning to the river valley.’

  Clay turned his chair at an angle that allowed him to simultaneously see Rina on the patio and Lyon in the leather chair. ‘I shouldn’t bad-mouth Skee. He’s the one who’s gotten her into the health business, and that’s a relief from past obsessions with a certain rock band.’

  ‘She seems to be the type of individual who’s extremely enthusiastic about everything she does.’ Lyon watched Rina suck on an orange with gusto and then throw back her head to laugh at Garth’s quip. It was impossible not to notice the way a patio lantern backlit her figure. He realized that Clay was watching him with his usual half frown and he quickly poured another sherry.

  ‘She’s always had a crush on you,’ Clay said.

  ‘Hey, I’m a happily married guy,’ Lyon said.

  ‘You forget that Rina is an aging flower child. The fact that you’re married doesn’t concern her in the least. She believes in what she calls the full and natural expression of feelings. You and I might call it sexual license. I’ve never been quite sure if this philosophy is based on some sort of Zen or the residue of too many past drugs. In addition to her girlhood crush on you, I think that she’s really got her heart set on the house. She considers Nutmeg Hill as the best location on the river for an eagle sanctuary.’

  ‘Bea and I would never sell this place.’

  ‘Rina knows that. Bea has already told her.’

  ‘I hope you’re not suggesting anything. I have no intention of sharing my house with very large feathered friends. And other alternatives won’t work, since I’m too old for her,’ Lyon said with what he hoped was a note of finality.

  ‘Nothing is too good for the eagles. There is no sacrifice too extreme, although Skee seems to be helping to relieve some of that obsessive pressure. Our older brother doesn’t understand that. Morgan still holds it against Rina for dropping out of college in her junior year. It drove him up the wall when she followed the Grateful Dead for fifteen months as a Dead Head.’

  ‘I’m surprised he didn’t try and stop her,’ Lyon said.

  ‘Oh, but he did. Big brother turned off the money spigot.’

  ‘How could he do that?’

  ‘Although Morgan is only our half-brother, he is the one in charge of the trust our grandparents established. He has so much control that when Rina left college he was able to stop half her money.’

  ‘Morgan’s an academic,’ Lyon said. ‘That breed believes that dropping out of college is the equivalent of deserting an army under enemy fire.’

  Clay clicked off the laptop and carefully placed the slim batch of financial records in a file folder. ‘The situation got worse. He finally caught up with her at a Dead concert in Foxboro, Massachusetts. There was enough marijuana smoke hovering over the stadium to fog-in an airport. As usual, Rina was exuberantly participating in the festivities. She was wearing a pair of skimpy denim shorts and no top while she sat on some guy’s shoulders and screamed and waved her arms every time Garcia plucked a note. Needless to say, Morgan was not amused. That’s when he stopped the other half of her trust payments.’

  ‘I’m surprised he has that sort of absolute power under the trust once you reached your majority,’ Lyon said.

  ‘I know. It’s illogical, but that’s how it was set up. His control doesn’t end until he decides that we are able to watch over our own affairs. Then he will make final distribution of the principle. When he cut Rina off after the Dead concert, he began to apply financial pressure on me. I was in the midst of studying for my CPA exam when he lowered the boom. He took the position that I was required to bring peer pressure down on Rina. Twin pressure was the exact phrase he used. I was to wrench her away from the arms of the Grateful Dead, detox her from drugs, and turn off her sexual engine. It was just about this time that she discovered eagles. Birds, not the group. Since birds don’t seem to thrive at rock concerts and you don’t see many zonked bird-watchers, it seemed like a healthy outlet to me. It worked in a way. She traded one obsession for another. She swapped the music for bodybuilding and eagles. The sex stayed.’

  ‘Do I detect a little bitterness here?’ Lyon asked.

  ‘Hell, yes! We both resent our pompous half-brother making decisions concerning our lifestyles. He decides what is permissible and punishes us financially if we defy him. Our granddaddy who set the terms of the trust should be dug up and a stake pounded through his heart. We’d both sell our souls to be out from under Morgan.’

  ‘And Rina feels the same?’

  ‘Jesus, yes! Don’t get her started on the subject. The only reason she’s here tonight is to help me force Morgan to set the exact date for the financial distribution.’

  ‘Rina’s not a Dead Head anymore, she’s creating a successful business, and her work with an endangered species is certainly a positive step. What reasons does Morgan give for not making the distribution?’

  Clay stared intently out the window as if answers floated in the reflections mirrored there. ‘I tried to resolve that last month. He told me that I still wore brown shoes and Rina had gone to the birds. Brown shoes and eagles were the obstacles to our getting the money.’

  ‘I don’t understand that non sequitur,’ Lyon said.

  ‘Morgan insists that there are certain kinds of anal retentive people who wear brown shoes after five at night. Since I fall into that category, I am pegged as retentive. It is his responsibility to me and the trust to change my personality so that I stop hoarding feces, bank accounts and IRS receipts.’

  ‘In other words,’ Lyon said. ‘The problem in Morgan’s eyes is that your sister wants to give her money to an endangered species, and you don’t want to spend any of yours?’

  ‘You got it. When I hear contradictions like that, my accountant’s mind rings an alarm,’ Clay said.

  ‘Have you tried discussing this with him?’

  ‘Come on, Lyon. You know what a pompous ass he is. You don’t discuss with big brother. He allows you an opinion as long as it does
n’t disagree with his authoritative decree. His democracy gives Rina and me one vote to his six.’

  Lyon laughed. ‘That’s just about how he runs the English department at the university.’

  ‘He’s gone too far this time,’ the accountant said. ‘The situation has reached such serious dimensions that I’m afraid something violent could happen.’

  Lyon tried to manufacture a reassuring smile, but was afraid that it probably appeared more of a grimace. ‘Garth and Ernest may exhibit a lot of bluster and spout words, but they’ve fought each other and Morgan for years. They are upset right now over a new man coming into the department, but I don’t think that they would do anything violent to your brother.’

  Clay laughed. ‘If they don’t get him, there’s another candidate in my sister and that muscle-bound hunk she shares her cave with. Skee will do anything Rina tells him, and I’m worried about what she might be whispering in his ear recently.’

  ‘New England families have argued over trust funds for generations,’ Lyon said. ‘If even a small percentage of those fights ended in mayhem, our cemeteries would be overflowing.’

  ‘The money in the trust was nurtured for two centuries. Sea captains chased whale or sailed two-year trips on the China Run. When the manufacturing age began, they invested in the mills. Now, our half-brother is involved in the worst possible New England sin.’ His voice lowered to a hoarse tone that signified his desperation. ‘Morgan is dipping into capital.’

  Lyon recognized his alarm. Capital depletion was a gross violation of the New England puritan ethic. Profligate spending transcended ordinary sins and other high crimes and misdemeanors. ‘Morgan has an excellent salary from the university,’ he said in defense of his former teaching mate.

  ‘As a full professor and chair he’s drawing eighty-five thousand dollars and you can add another fifty from the trust fund. Deduct a proper per cent for federal and state income taxes for that bracket and he’s taking home …’ He punched some numbers into a small pocket calculator. ‘Exactly eighty-nine K a year.’