I decided to stop playing games. “Where’d it come from? A Nazi payoff?”
Donaldson raised his half-empty glass and toasted me. “You are the right man for the job.”
I kept my beer on the table. “Not me. The right man for the job is a woman. Nakayla did the research that led to the Silver Shirts. That’s the money’s source, isn’t it?”
He left his glass in the air and the smile on his lips, but his voice rang cold. “Be careful what you say. Asheville may have dark secrets that some people want to keep buried.”
I stared back at him. “Is that why I’m here? So you can tell me to stop digging?”
Donaldson leaned across the table so far he came out of his chair. “No. I want to hire you, Sam. I don’t like surprises, and it’s time I stopped denying the past and faced the truth.”
“Is that because your aunt’s dead?”
“Partly. I could never get beyond her mumbo-jumbo and the fantasy world she lived in.”
“You could have hired a private detective years ago.”
“Let’s say maybe I never wanted to ask a question to which I didn’t already know the answer. Being a lawyer isn’t a vocation, it’s a curse.” He stopped and the façade on his face cracked. His eyes welled. “And that young guard might have died because of something I let go unchallenged.”
“Sorry. I already have a client on this case.”
“Who?”
“Your aunt.”
He relaxed into his chair. “I visited her last Sunday and mentioned we had a detective moving next to our office. She likes to read mysteries. You could say I’m the reason she hired you. And she’s not exactly in a position to pay you.”
So Ethel’s having Captain contact me hadn’t been coincidence, and I now had an explanation for why her nephew happened to be beside us. But she hadn’t told Donaldson she was hiring me. Why?
“She made an arrangement,” I said. “I, too, have a few shreds of decency left. I won’t double-bill a case.”
“Then whom will you report your findings to?”
I wanted to say my conscience, but I’d just told Donaldson I was working for a fee under a contract that went beyond the client’s death, assuming Fitzgerald’s gift was still in the lockbox. “I guess the proper procedure will be to file a report with the executor of her estate.”
His smile returned. “Precisely. And as the executor, I’m requesting that you say nothing to my cousin about your investigation. And that you clear everything with me before sharing information with the police.”
I slid back the chair and got to my feet, my artificial leg buckling slightly with the rapid rise. “Then I’m resigning. Consider our conversation your final report.”
“Hold on.” He licked his lips and laid his palms flat on the table. “You’re still going to investigate, aren’t you?”
“You said you could read my face.”
He nodded. “Sit down, please. Let me rephrase my concerns, and I hope you’ll excuse my erratic behavior. I’m upset about what happened to my aunt and the young woman.”
“And your own safety,” I added.
“I suppose. You see I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t like it. That’s when I make mistakes, like trying to control you. Stay on the case and work however you want. If your fees go beyond what my aunt authorized, I’ll make up the difference. All I ask is that you do your best to keep me informed. I’d appreciate not being blindsided, especially where it regards my father.”
I eased into the chair. “All right. What about your cousin?”
“My cousin will have no qualms about the money. He resents that I’m due an equal share and he’ll try to stop you from doing anything that might delay or negate the settlement.”
“What could I do? I assume the will is straightforward, if you drew it up.”
Donaldson lifted his hands and clasped them together so tightly his knuckles turned white. “But I didn’t. My father drew up the will on file, the only one she’s ever had.”
“When?”
“In 1935. Ten years ago she had another attorney amend it naming me as the executor. Her son went ballistic, but I think for all of our differences, my aunt trusted me to carry out her wishes.”
He stopped as our waiter approached the table.
“Would you gentlemen care for another round?”
“Not me,” I said.
Donaldson also declined and asked for the check. The waiter cleared the empty glasses and left.
I began to understand what was troubling him. “Why are you in her will? In 1935, neither you nor your cousin had been born.”
“That’s right, and when my father died, my mother received my father’s estate except for these same funds that were earmarked for his sister, with the stipulation that half of them would come back to his progeny upon her death, provided they hadn’t been used.”
“Your father went to a lot of effort to keep them intact, and your aunt must have never touched them.” The obvious point came to me. “Wouldn’t the probate of his estate have shown the source of the money?”
“Normally.” Donaldson sighed. “Man, I’ve got to hand it to him. My uncle too. I’m sure they both put the scheme together.”
“What scheme?”
Donaldson smiled with what might have been pride. “The funds came from a life insurance policy. Life insurance proceeds go directly to the beneficiary. There’s no court filing, no income taxes, just a check. And no one goes back to look at the source of the premium.”
“Have you seen the policy?”
“No. It would have been surrendered with the claim. But it had to be taken out before 1935, because my aunt’s will references the policy. That’ll come to light during her probate.”
“Is there a policy number?”
“No. Just the company name. The Pollosco Life Assurance Society. I’ve checked on them. They were gobbled up years ago.”
“What about old check records? Somebody paid the premiums.”
Donaldson shook his head. “Maybe there’s some record in the lockbox, but I suspect there was only one premium paid. He probably made a large enough prepayment that the policy was instantly in force and would never lapse. It would grow in cash value without any income tax liability, could be surrendered for cash or borrowed against, and paid out a death benefit that grew over the years, particularly if dividends were used to buy additional insurance.”
“Maybe your father just wanted some life insurance.”
“Then why didn’t my mother get the money? Even if he took out the policy before he married, it’s common practice for a new husband to change the beneficiary of his insurance.”
Donaldson’s suspicions were contagious. I couldn’t come up with a plausible explanation.
“But there’s another consideration I can’t dismiss.” He shifted in his seat, and I sensed he moved from prosecutor to defense attorney.
“What?”
He wagged his finger. “Remember we’re talking 1934 and ’35. The Great Depression. Thirty-eight percent of the banks failed. But only 14 percent of the life insurance companies went under. Limits had been put on how much of a policy’s cash you could pull out or how much you could borrow. If you didn’t need your money for a while, that regulation provided comforting stability.”
My financial expertise bordered on zero. Only within the previous three months had I dealt with circumstances more complicated than depositing an Army paycheck. “But wouldn’t that make your father’s actions prudent even if the money had been earned legitimately?”
“That’s my point. And maybe Aunt Ethel’s husband was uninsurable, so my father was making certain she’d be cared for. In return, his offspring would share in the payout.”
“What you’re telling me is that you don’t know.”
Donaldson held out his hands palm up like they were a pair of scales. “I’d like to believe my father was very clever with his funds at a time of financial turbulence.” He let his left ha
nd drop lower as the right rose. “That the payout arrangement took care of his sister and both their heirs. On the other hand, why has my aunt been so secretive in preserving those funds for over sixty years?”
“Maybe she read more into your father’s will than he intended.”
“And maybe I’m reading more into the fact that he was a key member of the defense team when William Dudley Pelley went on trial for fraud in 1934 and again for sedition in 1942.” He quickly reversed his hand motion till the left was above his head and the right smacked the top of the table. “My father represented a man who idolized Adolph Hitler, who wanted to confine the Jews to one city in each state, and who wanted to be the transitional dictator as he turned our country into a Christian bastion against what he called the International Jewish-Communist Conspiracy headed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, whom he called the Russocrat.” He brought his hands together and twiddled his thumbs, mocking the seriousness of his charge. “You’re the jury. What do you think?”
“I think you need more evidence before you take a pass on two and a half million dollars.”
The smile returned. “That’s why I want to hire you.”
“I’m working for your aunt,” I repeated. “But I’ll keep your questions in mind.”
“Sam, the most important question in my mind is one I haven’t asked yet. You said you were afraid my aunt was murdered because you tried to help her. What you didn’t say was whether that was because you’re a private detective or because you’re Sam Blackman.”
A shadow came over the table. Our waiter returned, but not from inside the inn. Donaldson looked up and reached for his wallet, expecting to receive the bill. Instead, the waiter handed me a slip of paper. “A gentleman at the edge of the terrace asked me to give you this.”
Unfolding a torn scrap of a brochure, I saw a note written in the white margin. “Chief, he’s here.” I glanced back in the direction the waiter had come. Calvin leaned against a stone column at the edge of the terrace. The distant buildings of Asheville lay behind him, reflecting gold from the setting sun. He gave a quick jerk of his head toward the lobby and walked away. I crumpled the note and dropped it in my coat pocket.
“Sorry, something’s come up,” I whispered. “Would you mind waiting five minutes before leaving? I want it to look like I’m coming back.”
Donaldson arched his eyebrows. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“That’s because I don’t know the answer.” I stood, shifting my weight to make sure my stump was snugly fitted in my prosthesis. “But I expect that’s about to change.”
I caught the departing waiter. “Excuse me. Where’s the restroom?” I asked the question loud enough for adjoining tables to hear.
He pointed through the terrace doors to the Great Hall. “Turn right at the registration desk and it’s in the Sammons Wing on your right.”
As I crossed between the giant fireplaces, I saw Nakayla sitting in a chair and thumbing through a magazine with her eyes subtly scanning the room. She froze when I motioned her to stay seated. Calvin’s tall silhouette stood just inside the entrance from the parking lot. He waited beside the valet station where he could watch the doors to either side. The expression on his face was obscured by shadows, but his location told me our quarry was still inside.
I glanced back at Nakayla. She closed the magazine and stood. As she walked by, she whispered, “Behind information.”
The information desk was less than twenty feet away, near the elevator we’d taken to Fitzgerald’s room. A young couple had a map spread out in front of the attendant. I doubted our adversaries had a male/female team tailing me. Beyond them, a fair-haired man stood at a brochure rack. He looked up and for a split-second our eyes locked. Then he dropped his gaze back to the pamphlets and eased to his left, moving behind a column. He sported a neatly trimmed beard, and something about him seemed familiar. I couldn’t swear to it, but clean-shaven he might have been Evan Lucas, one of the ex-Blackwater men whom our Ali Baba investigation had targeted.
I waited a few seconds for him to emerge. During that time, I took in the surroundings. A woman who looked like the grandmother was photographing an older man and child in front of the fireplace. Two businessmen exited from the elevator and walked toward me, momentarily obscuring my view of the column. I looked over my shoulder. Calvin took a step closer, his right hand reaching behind his back. He wasn’t looking at the column but to the far end of the fireplace beside the entrance to the Vanderbilt Wing. Another blond man in a windbreaker was reading the quotations that had been written on the various stones. Even though the Great Hall was warm, he’d zipped his jacket to his neck.
“That’s him,” Calvin said. “He’s been following you since the library.”
“Stay with the exits,” I said to Calvin. “I’ll try to lead him where it’s not so crowded.”
Nakayla stepped beside me. “If he makes a break, there are too many exits to cover.”
“He’s armed. I want you out of the line of fire.”
Nakayla’s eyes blazed. “I’ll be where I need to be to bring him in.”
“Then call the cops and cover the parking lot in case he gets to his vehicle.” I looked at the suspect. He’d turned from the fireplace and was watching us. With a single motion, he pivoted and walked into the Vanderbilt Wing. “Damn. We’ve spooked him.” I hurried in pursuit, cursing myself for wearing the wrong leg.
What must have been a busload of senior tourists flowed along the Vanderbilt Wing’s hallway toward me. Canes, walkers, and wheelchairs set a moving obstacle course impeding my progress. But above the gray heads, I could see Blondie also dodging his way. He looked back, saw me, and doubled his speed. Then I lost sight of him.
A glass door leading to the Vanderbilt Atrium blocked the end of the hall. I didn’t see it open, which meant Blondie had turned left into an area of shops. Another split and I faced the choice of entering a restaurant or taking a second hall into the atrium. I gambled that the restaurant wouldn’t have as many exits, which meant Blondie would avoid it.
I heard a commotion and saw a bellman’s cart topple. People dispersed, revealing Blondie entangled with potted plants that must have en route to another location. I sprinted forward as fast as my leg allowed.
Blondie scrambled to his feet just out of my grasp. I pursued him into the atrium, a spacious room several stories high with a maze of open staircases surrounding a central elevator. The architect had peppered the stairs with landings where patrons could enjoy the internal view.
Seeing me, Blondie unzipped his jacket. I followed as fast as I could, snatching my pistol from its holster and flipping off the safety. I was no more than a few yards behind him, but I knew he’d beat me in a foot race. He veered right onto a landing that displayed an antique pool table. He turned down another short flight to a second landing. It dead-ended on the left at a staff entrance.
Straight across and more than ten feet away lay a separate landing below the glass door we had bypassed. That was the way to the ground floor. To reach it, Blondie would have to hurdle the railing, sail through the air, and safely clear the second railing. Not an impossible task for Jack Bauer or James Bond, but his challenge was more than Olympic athleticism. Nakayla crouched on the opposite stairway, her twenty-five-caliber pistol rock-steady and trained on Blondie’s chest. Calvin eased down the stairs behind her, his gun pointed at the ceiling.
“Stop!” Nakayla shouted. “Hands in the air.”
For a second, Blondie hesitated. Then he dropped and rolled. He came up on one knee, a coal-black pistol in his hand. He swung the barrel toward me.
I squeezed off three rounds. The Kimber jumped and the loud reports reverberated through the atrium like sonic booms. The silver-tipped .45s knocked Blondie backwards. I saw a muzzle flash from his pistol but heard no sound. My ears were already deafened.
He bounced off a rock wall and fell face down on the green carpet. Red splotches began soaking through the ripped fabric of the
back of his windbreaker.
I don’t know how long I stood there, my finger on the trigger and my eyes searching for any movement. The ringing in my head faded and I could hear Nakayla calling me. I risked a glance and saw her and Calvin with their weapons still drawn. Hewitt Donaldson stood on the stairs above them, his ashen face dwarfed by his wide eyes.
“Are you all right?” Nakayla asked.
“Yes. I think he fired once but the shot went wild. Keep him covered.” I turned around, worried that the stray bullet might have injured someone in the atrium. People had come to the edge of the balconies all the way to the top floor. Most turned away when they realized they were looking down on a dead body. I approached the man with caution and kicked his pistol beyond his reach. Then I knelt and checked his neck for a pulse.
“Hewitt,” Nakayla said. “Get Grove Park security and tell them to keep everybody clear.”
“Is he history?” Calvin asked.
I nodded. History. But what history did this son of a bitch take with him? What history had he known that could keep us alive?
Chapter Fifteen
“That’s the man I saw at the restaurant.” Nathan Armitage made the positive ID as he knelt over the upturned face of the dead gunman.
“And you two say he’s Evan Lucas?” Detective Newland asked Calvin and me.
Calvin nodded. “I was covering Chief’s back and noticed this guy eyeing him. I sent Chief a note on the terrace, and when he saw us together he took off. I never got that close to Lucas in Iraq, but that’s the ugly face I saw on surveillance photos.”
The dead man wasn’t so much ugly as plain. Straight straw hair, a broad nose that looked like it had been broken at least once, and skin both freckled and pockmarked. He hadn’t carried any identification or room key. A set of Hyundai car keys on a Hertz chain and three hundred dollars in cash were the only items on his body.
“What about you?” Newland prompted.
“I agree with Calvin. I’m 90 percent sure he’s Lucas.”
Newland turned to the EMTs. “Then bag him and get him out of here. We’ll lift his prints and run a check against those Nathan got this afternoon.” He stepped away from the body and went up to the landing with the antique pool table. Calvin, Nakayla, Donaldson, Nathan, and I followed.
The Fitzgerald Ruse Page 14