by David Linzee
“To be exact, because she died here. In her house on Linden Avenue, a few blocks away. Anyway, you don’t have to feel bad. Don told them all that himself and more. Before I got here and told him to shut up.”
“Oh!” said Renata. Seldom, in a lifetime of feeling guilty, had she received such prompt and total absolution. But there was no time to luxuriate in it. “Did he tell them things that incriminated him?”
She was leaning in and whispering. But Samuelson seemed to see no need for discretion. He resumed walking and spoke in a normal voice, heedless of the police passing by.
“I’m hoping I can get some of that stuff suppressed. Problem is, Don didn’t think it was incriminating at all. He didn’t see any harm in telling the cops. He found Dr. Stromberg-Brand composed and calm. She assured him that her husband’s efforts to get the donation back would come to nothing. In fact she suggested old Bertrand was not going to be her husband much longer. Don was only in the house about fifteen minutes, he said. He left her alive and well.”
“And she was alone? Her husband wasn’t there, I mean?”
“She was alone.”
“What I can’t understand is, why isn’t the husband in jail? Don’t the cops always suspect the husband? I told them all about what he said at the party last night.”
“I’m afraid you were wasting your time. Bertrand is in the clear.”
They had reached the elevator lobby. Renata turned to face him in surprise.
“He has an alibi witness. One Luis Reyes. The Stromberg-Brand gardener. Bertrand had a flat tire, stopped at a bar, and called this Reyes guy for a ride. Reyes drove him home and was with him when he discovered the body.”
As Samuelson pressed the call button, Renata folded her arms across her middle and walked in a distracted circle. This was bad news. In the interrogation room she had told McCutcheon all about last night’s party and the argument. It had seemed so inescapable to her that Bert was guilty. McCutcheon had listened impassively. Now she knew he had been dismissing everything she said. She felt foolish.
The doors opened and they stepped into the elevator. No one else was in it. Renata said, “The main thing now is to bail Don out.”
“He’ll be arraigned tomorrow. I’ll make the argument for bail.”
“Yes, of course. He can put up his house, can’t he? You’ll need the deed. I’ll look for it.”
Samuelson pressed the button for the ground floor, then put his hand in his pocket. He looked at the floor. “The thing is, Renata, I’m not confident the judge will grant bail. It’s far from automatic, in a high-profile homicide. And, well, the prosecution case is firming up.”
The words chilled Renata. She looked hard at his averted face. “Dick, my brother is innocent.”
“Well, of course he is. Don couldn’t kill anybody. But there are problems. The cops can place him in the house that night. He admitted it himself. Of course I haven’t seen the M.E.’s report yet. I don’t know what it’ll say about time of death. But they’ve got him in the house. And it looks like they’ve got his blood in the house, though again we have to wait for the lab work.”
“His blood?” Renata remembered a detail of the arrest that had gone out of her head until now—the bandage on Don’s hand, which she hadn’t seen before.
“The murder weapon was a large crystal bowl that sat on a hall table in the house. The murderer broke it over Dr. Stromberg-Brand’s head. Fractured her skull. Apparently the bowl shattered in a hundred pieces. Don had a cut on his right hand—”
“What does Don say?”
“That she gave him a glass of Scotch while they talked. He dropped it, and then picking up the pieces he cut himself. Dr. Stromberg-Brand bandaged it for him.”
“But that must be true! That’s just like Don. He’s so clumsy. He’s always breaking glasses and cutting himself picking up the pieces.”
“Yes, but if they do have his bloodstains in the house … well, the prosecutor could do a lot with that. We just have to wait for the report.”
“But why would Don kill Helen Stromberg-Brand? There is absolutely no reason.”
She had made this point numerous times to the stolid McCutcheon. It didn’t impress Samuelson either. “At this stage—I mean the initial bail hearing—they don’t get into motive or lack thereof so much as physical and circumstantial evidence.”
The doors opened and they stepped out. The small lobby was empty, apart from one uniformed man at the security desk. The glossy tile floor reflected the colors of the flags lined up around the walls. Samuelson started to speak, glanced at the desk man, and took her elbow to guide her out onto the sunny pavement. There was no one around.
She wondered why he’d suddenly become concerned about being overheard. “Renata, what did you tell them about Don’s relations with Dr. Stromberg-Brand?”
“Relations?”
“Sexual relations.”
“Well … nothing. Don said those accusations Bert made were completely groundless. That’s what I told the detective.”
“Did the detective ask if you believed that?”
“I told him I had no reason to disbelieve my brother.”
Samuelson’s eyebrows rose, clearing the tops of his horn rims. “Nicely put. As it turns out, Bert’s accusations were not groundless.”
She said nothing.
“Don and Helen spent last Tuesday afternoon and evening together at the Five Gables Inn. The cops didn’t go into detail, but apparently Bert was able to document it to their satisfaction.”
“Oh, he’s a DIY matrimonial investigator as well as a philosopher?” asked Renata bitterly. She was trying to remember last Tuesday: rehearsals had run late; she’d been at SLO until 10 in the evening. She did not recall that she had spoken to Don at all that day. “Did Don admit the affair to the cops, too?”
“By that point in the interrogation, I was at Don’s side, so he admitted nothing.”
“I suppose I ought to ask what Don told you.”
“I’m afraid that’s covered by attorney-client privilege.”
“Good. I can’t face anymore today.”
Samuelson walked to the curb and looked down the street. Following his gaze, she saw a big, expensive-looking sedan slowly approaching. Renata had never owned a car and couldn’t tell one make from another, but she recognized this one from the SLO parking lot. It occupied the space closest to the entrance, the one reserved for the general director.
The car stopped beside them and the tinted window glided down. Congreve looked up at her in silence. A thoughtful, appraising gaze? Or had he forgotten her name as usual?
Samuelson obviously thought it was the latter. “Phil, I’ve offered Renata a ride back to Webster, if that’s okay.”
Congreve shook his head. “We’re not going to Webster. Renata can get a cab at the Ritz-Carlton.”
“I, uh, don’t have any money.” She had not been able to grab her purse as she left Don’s house last night, being handcuffed at the time.
Congreve opened the door and got out of the car to face her. This time it was definitely the thoughtful, appraising gaze. He was wondering how she was going to respond in this crisis. She was asking herself the same question about him, and her thoughts were not reassuring.
Philip Congreve was not tall, but he had wide shoulders—or at least his expensive suits had a lot of padding—and he seemed to loom over her. Twenty years ago, when he was making his name as head of operations at the Metropolitan Opera, he had had a magnificent head, and it was still imposing, with a wave of silver hair topping a high forehead and chiseled cheekbones. Now, though, his jowls sagging over his collar rather muddled the effect.
SLO was a young company, and when its dynamic founding director moved onward and upward, the board thought an experienced hand on the tiller would be a good idea. It might have been, but Congreve arrived with a secret plan, which was to rest on his laurels. SLO’s abbreviated season made it possible for him to spend most of the year at home on Centra
l Park West. His management style stressed delegation. When a crisis arose—and there had been a few lesser ones before this—he roused himself and acted decisively, which generally meant firing the people he had delegated to. You never knew how you stood with Congreve, but you could be certain that he cared more about what people in New York might be saying about him than the future of the company or the well-being of its employees.
“Renata, reporters will be trying to contact you,” he said as he took out his wallet and extracted a bill. “Don’t talk to them.”
“Oh. I suppose the media interest has been rather intense?”
“Not one word,” said Congreve, and handed her a $50 bill. He glanced at Samuelson and got back in the car.
The glance had been peremptory, but the lawyer lingered to say one more thing to her. “Um … Renata? By tomorrow afternoon, Don ought to be cleared to receive visitors. I’ll make sure you’re on the list. Go see him if you can.”
“How is he?” Renata’s stomach dropped sickeningly as she asked the question that she should have asked hours ago.
Samuelson opened his mouth, but for once words failed him. He sighed and shrugged, and walked around the car to get in on the passenger side.
Chapter 10
Fifteen minutes later, Samuelson and Congreve were sitting at a long table surrounded by high-backed chairs. They were alone and not speaking to each other, being fully occupied with their text messages. Tall windows behind them overlooked the collegiate gothic spires and verdant quadrangle of the main campus of Adams University.
Adams had been founded by an eminent Unitarian clergyman. But since he thought the slaves should be freed—a controversial position in St. Louis before the Civil War—the benefactors had decided to name the fledgling university for the second President of the United States instead of him. It turned out to be an appropriate choice. John Adams was called the under-appreciated Founding Father, and Adams U would come to feel that it was under-appreciated, too. By the early 2000s, it was consistently ranked in the top fifteen universities in the country by U.S. News & World Report, but something, perhaps its location in a fly-over town, denied it the name recognition of Harvard or Stanford.
The upshot was that Adams spent a lot of money improving its image. This conference room in the public relations department was paneled in dark, lustrous wood and richly carpeted. The table at which the men from SLO sat was polished to a high gloss, reflecting their images as they plied their cellphones. The door opened and Roger Merck entered, apologizing for his tardiness.
“Hello, Roger,” said Congreve. “This is our counsel, Dick Samuelson.”
The men shook hands. Roger, the Associate Deputy Vice Chancellor for Public Relations, was an African American of around sixty, with a head of pure white hair and glinting gold spectacles. He had a round face and a benign smile.
He turned grave as they sat down. “I’m sorry you folks are in such a tough position. I’ve fielded some calls from the local media already, and some of the questions were very unpleasant.”
“It’ll be the national media soon,” said Congreve. “To be frank, we’re hoping for a little help from you.”
Roger folded his hands and deliberated silently for half a minute. “In a case like this, with a high-profile faculty member who can no longer defend herself, we’re prepared to go proactive.”
Congreve looked relieved. He brushed back a lock of silver hair and glanced at Samuelson. The lawyer said, “Those unpleasant questions, I assume they concerned a possible affair between the defendant and Dr. Stromberg-Brand?”
Roger nodded and sighed. “They were just fishing. They didn’t know anything. They had a murder and were hoping to turn it into a romantic triangle.”
“I’m afraid that’s going to happen on this evening’s newscasts.”
Roger frowned. “Your guy, Radleigh—do you mean he said something to—”
Samuelson and Congreve shook their heads vigorously. Congreve said, “He won’t be our guy much longer. I’m just waiting for the next news cycle to suspend him. In the cycle after that, he’ll be terminated.”
Samuelson said, “He’s not a problem anyway. He’s in jail. Tomorrow he’ll go before the judge, say ‘not guilty’ and then go back to jail. Our problem is the husband.”
“Bert?”
“I got a call from Justine at Channel 5 News not an hour ago,” said Congreve. “She claimed Bert had just given them an interview, in which he said he had proof of a … I suppose you’d have to say an assignation between his wife and Don, at a Clayton hotel last Tuesday.”
“And you said—”
“No comment.”
“But we’re going to have to give ground,” said Samuelson. “Don admitted to me that he and Dr. Stromberg-Brand were having an affair.”
Roger emitted a grunt of surprise and pain, as if someone had punched him in the stomach.
“He said that in finalizing her gift to SLO, they were thrown together a lot, and in the atmosphere of excitement surrounding a new production of an opera … well, they lost their sober judgment. Don said he was sorry for her. She told him she was very unhappy at home.”
Roger continued to look as if he was in pain. He kept silent.
The men from the opera company exchanged glances. Congreve leaned forward. “The damage is done. We’ll cope. But we don’t want to be hit with something else in the next news cycle. Bert works for the university. Do you know him—I mean, personally?”
“Yes.”
“Well, can you talk to him? Make him see that blackening his dead wife’s name this way is … well, indecent?”
“I’m afraid I’ve never had much luck talking to him about anything. Bert’s the head of a committee of humanities professors who’ve made it their business to complain about Public Relations. They say we don’t devote enough space in our publications and press releases to their departments. All I can say is that seventy-five percent of the university’s income is research grants to the medical school, so it’s not surprising that the medical school gets most of the attention. Bert has not been receptive.”
“In other words, he’s mad that medical professors, like his wife, get so much attention,” said Samuelson. “How far back does this resentment of his wife go?”
“I suppose there’s no point trying to be discreet about this anymore. Fifteen years ago the head of our molecular microbiology department spotted Helen Stromberg-Brand’s potential and set out to hire her away from Indiana University. She asked if Adams had a spot for her husband, who was also on the Indiana faculty. Of course we do our best to accommodate a hire we want as badly as Helen, but budget realities being what they are, the only possible position was NTT.”
Puzzled, Congreve looked to Samuelson, who said, “Non Tenure Track. Had he been tenure track at Indiana?”
Roger nodded.
“Fifteen years ago, and he still holds a grudge?” asked Congreve.
“You don’t know academics, Phil,” said Samuelson, smiling. “Just because they dress like slobs and don’t make real money, we think they’re not competitive.”
“They’re the most competitive people in the world,” said Roger. “Their first-grade teacher gave them an A, and it changed their whole lives.”
“And when you’re Non Tenure Track, the best you can ever hope for is C-plus.”
Congreve massaged his jowls thoughtfully. “So Bert’s bitter towards Adams, and bitter toward his wife for not making them improve their offer?”
Roger nodded. “And bitter toward a society that would rather be well than wise. It never ends. He’s not the most mature person, I’m afraid.”
“But there must be someone who can talk to him,” said Congreve. “Surely he has friends.”
“Of course. But they’re resentful humanists like himself, who would not be receptive to a call from me, asking them to do something for the public image of Adams U.”
“How about the public image of Helen herself?” asked Samuelson. �
�Do you know some friend of hers who has leverage with Bert?”
Roger looked at him. Then he took off his glasses, breathed on the lenses, and pulled out a handkerchief to polish them. All this took several moments. The men from SLO waited patiently.
“I’ve thought of someone,” he said finally. “But I can’t call him myself. I’ll have to talk to his doorkeeper, who guards the door rather zealously, I’m afraid.” He rose to his feet. “I’ll be in touch, but probably not as soon as you’d like me to be. This person is very busy.”
“Who is it?”
“I’d rather not say until I talk to him.”
Samuelson was smiling. “I think I can guess.”
“Please don’t.”
“Do you really think he would help? That would be great.”
Roger did not reply. He put out his hand to Congreve, ending the meeting.
Chapter 11
Clayton’s business district was all but deserted on a hot Sunday afternoon. The clean and pretty mini-city would have to wait until Monday morning to be repopulated. Here and there a car parked at the curb indicated that somebody was in one of the glittering office towers, but sidewalk cafés had no diners, shop windows no browsers, shaded benches no loungers. Flowerbeds bloomed only for the bees, and small fountains roared like Niagara in the silence.
On the wide, sun-blasted sidewalk of Bonhomme Avenue there was only one pedestrian, a tall woman with tousled black hair, wearing a badly wrinkled blue party dress. She walked slowly, with a long, hip-swinging stride, her arms folded and her head down. She had a beautiful face full of woe. Had her hair been red, she would have looked like an Old Master’s Magdalene.
Renata was completely absorbed in going over her conversation with Dick Samuelson, so brief but so over-charged with bad news. What was vexing her at the moment was the end of it. Samuelson and Congreve had driven off in the direction of the Ritz-Carlton. They could have given her a lift to the hotel and its cabstand. But they needed to talk, and she was not to hear. She wasn’t sure what that meant, but it did not bode well for her brother.