by JOAN HESSS
She threw back her head. The cackle came from her mouth like a ribbon of bile, coiling through the dreary room, stinging our ears, and scalding our skin. The noise hung in the air long after the policemen escorted her out of the house.
Caron rolled her eyes at me.
Rodney’s car was the only one in the driveway as he came to the porch. Ellie’s had been impounded, and she and Buzz were rumored to be implicating each other more quickly than an gator slipping off a log. Immediately after we’d returned from the funeral (sparsely attended and minus one pallbearer), Stanford had packed his bags and stormed out of the house, muttering about an appointment in New Orleans. Maxie and Phoebe had gone straight to the attic to commence an inventory that would end in the darkest corner of the basement.
Our suitcases were on the porch. I sat in the swing, idly listening to Caron on the telephone in the library. Rhonda Maguire’s future had taken a downward turn.
“Hello,” I said to Rodney. “Thanks for offering to give us a ride to the airport. It’s going to be a while before I take any taxis. You look exhausted.”
“I stayed up all night sorting through the files and ledgers in D’Armand’s office,” he said as he sat down beside me. “They were jumbled, as if someone had taken everything out and then stuffed it back in without regard to date or content.”
“No kidding?”
“No kidding,” he said without inflection.
“Did you find the file with Miller’s name on it?” I asked. He nodded, watching me closely. “I’ve been thinking about it. D’Armand kept every last document pertaining to the family—with the singular exception of anything to do with the distribution of Miller’s life-insurance policy and army benefits. Supposedly, no one would have access to the files until he retired and turned them over to another attorney, so he had no reason not to include the paperwork. There was no indication he ever attempted to locate the woman and her child.”
“And what did this lead you to theorize?”
“Several different things. One is that there was no child,” I said. “Bethel D’Armand was the defender of the Malloy family name, and he might have felt an illegitimate child sullied its reputation. The mother, of course, would have to bought off—and kept bought off for the rest of her life.”
“Are you hinting that D’Armand convinced the woman to have an illegal abortion, and, in return, she was promised lifelong employment?”
“I could be hinting that,” I said, although I was doing more fishing than hinting. “One possibility comes to mind, and she’s had countless opportunities for revenge, hasn’t she? I’ve never been confronted with worse food in my life. Imagine facing thirty years of it!”
“One possibility,” he murmured.
I gave the swing a push, and we sat companionably in the sunshine, the squeaks of the swing in harmony with the cries of distant birds and the sound of an airplane taking some lucky souls out of the parish.
“But,” Rodney continued, “that would make me an impostor—if I’d ever claimed to be this child. I did not I was planning to emphasize that yesterday, but I couldn’t bring myself to rescue Mrs. Malloy-Frazier from her worst nightmare.” He gave me a quirky little smile that melted my frown. “Oh, come on, it was pretty damn funny, wasn’t it? For awhile there, she looked as if she’d swallowed her tongue, her teeth, and all of her platinum fillings.”
“It was definitely the highlight of the weekend.” I stopped to think, then shook my head. “But abortions were hard to come by thirty years ago, even illegal ones. If the woman had moved away, Bethel simply could have pocketed the money and thrown away the paperwork to cover his tracks. She and her now-grown child could be anywhere in the country.”
“I suspect we’ll never be sure,” Rodney said. “In any case, only one qualified heir was at the table Saturday night.”
“Which means Caron is the sole beneficiary of the Malloy fortune. She was unbearable as a pauper. I don’t know how I’ll handle her once she ascends the throne.”
“It won’t be too high off the ground.” Rodney glanced at the open windows and lowered his voice. “You guessed why Bethel fled so abruptly, didn’t you?”
I wanted to pretend I had, but the sunshine was an opiate and I’d been malnourished and deprived of sleep for several days. I admitted as much.
“Miss Justicia discovered he was embezzling money,” Rodney said. “She wanted to divide the estate fairly—well, somewhat fairly, and she told me to examine everything as soon as possible. He stalled for a week. My call two nights ago sent him over the edge.”
“It sent him somewhere,” I said dryly. “How bad is it?”
“He’d been stealing money for years, with the aid of Miss Hurstmeyer, who controlled the household accounts and signed Miss Justicia’s name to various financial documents. A preponderance of these were withdrawal authorizations. The house has three mortgages. D’Armand was on the board of directors at the local bank, and he persuaded them to make some hefty loans against it, resulting in a considerable negative equity. There’s a lien against the contents, too. Mrs. Malloy-Frazier and her daughter are facing some severe challenges, beginning with back property taxes for the last few years.”
“Oh dear,” I said, clucking softly. “You will let them know before the dealers arrive?”
He nodded. “And you might have a word with Caron before she applies to a Swiss boarding school. There are federal and state death taxes to be paid, along with an accumulation of unpaid debts and claims on the estate. Income taxes are in arrears. The jewelry is missing from the safe-deposit box, but the personal property taxes and insurance must be paid.”
“All in all?”
“I’ll do my best to cut a deal with the government to allow her to make monthly payments.”
The squeaks were loud, but they weren’t originating from the chains holding the swing. He caught my hand before I could strangle myself, and said, “Just kidding, Claire. I can jiggle assets and liabilities, and even things out. Neither of you will have to go to debtor’s prison.”
I stood up. “Rodney, I think I’ll let you explain this to the heiress. We have a few minutes before we leave for the airport. I’m going to take a walk.” I stopped at the bottom step and frowned at him. “But if you’re not Miller’s son and a potential heir, then why did Miss Justicia write an olographic will?”
His teeth glinted in the sunlight, and dimples appeared on both sides of his mustache. “Client-attorney confidentiality.”
“With a degree from Yale, you must have had tempting offers from prestigious firms all over the country. Yet you chose to open a practice in LaRue, Louisiana, where you knew you’d be faced with a two-hundred-year-old tradition of bigotry and discrimination.”
“My mother worked two jobs and took in laundry so that I’d have the opportunity to concentrate on my studies and do well enough to receive scholarships. She was the one who suffered from the bigotry and discrimination, and I promised myself I’d return to the South to carry on the fight. Substantial fees from families like the Malloys enable me to take on clients less able to afford decent representation.” His smile of complacency was eerily familiar. “That doesn’t mean I’d ever care to make public any entanglement with such a family. I have a reputation to protect, and the last thing I need is to be considered an offshoot of loons.”
“But I won’t be out of line if I send you Christmas cards?”
“Of course not, Claire. I’ll be delighted to keep in touch with you and Caron in the future. I suppose I’d better tell her the bad news.”
I went around the house and took a series of paths to the bayou. The silky brown water was placid, although by no means inviting. An egret watched me from the smooth knee of a cypress tree, and a mammal of some sort fled into a hole. Something sent ripples splashing on a mossy log. A few muddy footprints remained in the grass, but the next rain would erase the last vestiges of Miss Justicia’s death.
General Malloy might continue to gallop across t
he yard when the moon was full, but it seemed likely that in the future no one would be watching him from the second-story windows of Malloy Manor. His legend would fade. The moon was waning, and, with each passing night, would less and less be able to diminish the stars surrounding it. As Miss Justicia had diminished those surrounding her.
The only ghosts that would haunt the banks of the bayou were children. Stanford, Maxie, and Carlton, squabbling as they poled a boat in search of gators and gars. Miller, who’d no doubt done the same things for the same innocent reasons.
I tried to picture Carlton as a boy, to put aside the intense professor who’d given me both happiness and pain, who’d never freed himself from the influences of a decaying family. I wanted to see freckles, a gape-toothed smile, eyes bright with mischief or drowsy with idle daydreams. All I could see was Caron’s face.
And as I walked back to the house to catch our ride to the airport and flights that would return us to Farberville, to the Book Depot, to Peter Rosen and his many talents, I heard Caron’s voice.
“Mother!” she wailed. “This Isn’t Funny!”
Also By Joan Hess
A Really Cute Corpse
A Diet to Die For
A Conventional Corpse
Dear Miss Demeanor
The Murder at the Murder at the Mimosa Inn
Strangled Prose
Roll Over and Play Dead
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ST. MARTIN’S | MINOTAUR PAPERBACKS
DEATH BY THE LIGHT OF THE MOON
Copyright © 1992 by Joan Hess.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 91-37884
ISBN: 978-1-4668-0762-4
St. Martin’s Paperbacks are published by St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
