Family Jewels (A Stone Barrington Novel)

by Woods, Stuart

  “Excellent,” Stone said.

  “Shall I write you a check?”

  Stone laughed. “I’ll draw up a contract, you can have your attorney go over it, and when you’re ready, we’ll close the deal.”

  “Stone,” Nicky said, “you are our attorney.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t represent both sides in the sale. I can recommend an attorney, if you like, or you can choose someone to read the contract for you.”

  “I’ll call you with a name,” Nicky said.

  Stone stood up to see them out. “I can have the contract for you in a few days, then take whatever time you need to have an attorney review it, and we’ll make a date for the closing. By the way, I heard from Harvey again. He’s trying to claim a piece of jewelry that wasn’t on the list you saw—says he gave it to Carrie as a wedding gift.”

  “That would make it hers, not his, wouldn’t it?”

  “Exactly what I told him. Nicky, will you tell me again about seeing Harvey in Santa Fe?”

  “Well, we ran into some acquaintances—Derek and Alicia Bedford, you met them in East Hampton.”

  “I remember them.”

  “Well, we bumped into them in the plaza and adjourned to the Inn of the Anasazi for lunch. That’s right off the plaza, across the street from the old governor’s mansion. As we left the hotel, we walked across the plaza to their car, and on the way we saw Harvey looking at the Indian jewelry under the portico of the mansion.”

  “Did the Bedfords know Harvey?”

  “They had met him once or twice, I think.”

  “Would they testify to seeing him there?”

  “I expect so.”

  “After Harvey is caught, the DA might want to interview them.”

  “If I run into them again, I’ll tell them. Why don’t I write down their number for you?”

  Stone gave him paper and pen, and he wrote down the information.

  “Thank you, Nicky.” They left, and Stone called Jamie Niven. “How are the plans for the sale going, Jamie?”

  “I’ve got a date for you, Stone—six weeks from today, if that’s convenient for you.”

  “It is,” Stone replied, marking it on his calendar. “Now, I have some fine pieces of furniture and art for your people to look at, mostly in New York, but a dozen pieces in Palm Beach, as well as a hundred or so pieces of jewelry.”

  “I think we should bring the Palm Beach pieces here, and have one big sale with everything in it, and the necklace at the very end. We’ll get a huge attendance. The publicity campaign is starting immediately.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “I’ll send some people to Palm Beach tomorrow, and let’s make a date for my team to see what’s in New York.”

  “Any day this week.”

  “Tomorrow at nine AM?”

  “Let’s make it ten AM.”

  “We’ll see you there.”

  —

  Half an hour later Joan came into his office. “That Biggers guy is on the phone again.”

  “Call Dino and get a trace started.” Stone picked up the phone. “All right, what is it this time?”

  “I understand that you’re going to sell my necklace at auction,” Biggers said.

  “You’re very well informed, except about the ownership of the necklace.”

  “That sale will never happen,” Biggers said.

  “It will, and you can’t do anything to stop it.”

  “Mark my words, Mr. Barrington, your sale will blow up in your face.” He hung up.

  Stone buzzed Joan. “Never mind the trace, just get me Dino.”

  “Bacchetti.”

  “Biggers is still calling me. I couldn’t keep him on long enough for a trace. The guy is very savvy about that.”

  “Leave it to me,” Dino said.

  44

  Stone met Jamie Niven and his people at Carrie Fiske’s apartment the following morning. The Sotheby’s people were very impressed.

  “I’d like to sell the entire contents,” Jamie said.

  “I’m afraid I sold all three of her houses yesterday, and most of the art and furnishings.” He gave Niven a listing of the others. “Here’s a list of the unsold pieces, with photographs. You can add them to your auction.”

  “Right. I’ve got people at the Palm Beach house right now,” Jamie said, “and we’ll get to the East Hampton property tomorrow.”

  They went into Carrie’s dressing room, and Stone opened the safe for Niven and his jewelry appraiser.

  “This is quite a collection,” Jamie said.

  “It’s three generations’ worth,” Stone pointed out. “Why don’t you have a look through the clothes, as well—you might want to include some of the things in the auction with the jewelry.”

  “We’ll do that. My people are going to be here most of the day,” Jamie said.

  “And here’s something nice.” He gave him the box for the necklace.

  “We’ll touch it up a bit and display the necklace in it.”

  Stone gave him keys to the properties. “The Hockneys and a Modigliani went to the buyer,” he said. “Lock up here when you’re finished.”

  “I’ll bring you the key and a receipt for whatever we take with us.”

  “Good enough.”

  Stone went back to his office and entered through the street door.

  “Another unannounced Cabot,” Joan said.

  Stone went into his office and found Lance Cabot stretched out on his sofa, sipping coffee and reading the Times.

  “Good morning, Stone,” Lance drawled. Lance seemed always to drawl. He had succeeded Kate Lee as director of Central Intelligence.

  “Mind if I sit down?” Stone asked.

  “Oh, shut up.”

  “To what do I owe the pleasure, Lance?”

  “You’re interfering with one of my people, and I thought we should have a chat about it.”

  “I haven’t spoken to any of your people recently,” Stone said. He was under contract to the CIA as a consultant, though he still wasn’t sure what that meant.

  “I’m referring to Harvey Biggers,” Lance said.

  Stone sank into his chair. “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “I’m not surprised that you’re surprised,” Lance said. “You weren’t meant to know—even his wife didn’t know.”

  “Do you understand that the police are looking for him? That he’s a suspect in the murder of his ex-wife?”

  “That’s a load of horseshit, Stone, and the police are not looking for him. I had a word with Dino and with that bumpkin from East Hampton. If you knew Harvey, you’d know that he would never have killed her.”

  “I know no such thing.”

  “Please cite for me the evidence of his guilt.”

  “He was seen in Santa Fe the day before she was murdered, fifty miles away.”

  “So what?”

  “He threatened Carrie.”

  “That’s her story. Lots of women feel threatened by their ex-husbands.”

  “Then he came here and told me that she was trying to kill him, not the other way around.”

  “Oh, that story was just a little tradecraft. Harvey probably thought it would throw you off his scent. He’s always had more imagination than was good for him.”

  “I thought Harvey was something in finance, not a CIA officer.”

  “He used that as a cover—so did Holly Barker, when she had to reveal all to a co-op board to buy her apartment. We established the firm twenty-odd years ago, and it’s entirely fake. Harvey is a career officer. We recruited him right out of Yale. He was Holly’s operational deputy in the New York station, before she went to the National Security Council.”

  “Well, all that is wonderful, but how do you know Harvey didn’t kill his wi
fe?”

  “Because, on the afternoon of the day Harvey was spotted by your friends in Santa Fe, he boarded an airplane for D.C.”

  “And how do you know he was on that airplane?”

  “I know, because I sent the plane for him. He was needed at the interrogation of a former asset of his. And he arrived on time. The Agency is the family business for Harvey—his grandfather was OSS, then CIA.”

  “Tell me about the grandfather,” Stone said.

  “Ah, Henry Biggers, what a character! Henry was an associate in Bill Donovan’s law firm. When Roosevelt decided we needed an intelligence agency during the war, he appointed Wild Bill to run it, and Bill pretty much staffed it out of his own address book. Henry had some language skills, and he was sent, first to London to learn what the Brits knew, then into France as an agent. He roamed far and wide, doing pretty much whatever he wanted to, and he was very productive.”

  “Was he ever a paratrooper? Harvey told me he was.”

  “That’s nonsense. Henry told people whatever they wanted to hear—this was at the end of the war, when he was running around in various military disguises, chasing Nazis.”

  “Did he have anything to do with capturing Goering?”

  “No, he was too late. He got to Goering’s house on the Obersalzberg less than an hour after Hermann had fled. When the first American troops arrived at the house they found Henry Biggers sitting in the dining room, wearing the uniform of an army colonel, eating a large steak, and washing it down with—legend has it—a Lafite ’29 from Goering’s cellar. Shortly after that, he drove away in one of Hermann’s cars, a nifty Mercedes Roadster, with several pieces of Louis Vuitton luggage strapped to it, allegedly containing various valuables from the house and quite a lot of Swiss francs.”

  “Was one of those pieces of luggage Frau Goering’s jewelry box?”

  “Indeed, it was. Henry motored down to the Swiss border, changing clothes along the way, and passed himself off as an American diplomat, which wasn’t difficult, since he had a diplomatic passport, among several pieces of identification, all of them in different names.”

  “How’d he get the car into Switzerland?”

  “Oh, he had a nicely forged bill of sale for it, on Goering’s personal letterhead. Anyway, he looked up his pal Allen Dulles, who was OSS station chief in Bern, and moved into his place for a few days, while he got things squared away. He sold several loose stones from Frau Goering’s collection, bought a lakeside villa, and with Allen’s help, secured a Swiss passport and opened an account in a rather elegant private bank, where he deposited his cash and put the jewelry box in the vault. Word was, that he put Harvey through Yale with the proceeds from that box.

  “He worked for Allen until Dulles was sent to Berlin, then discharged himself from the OSS and lived the life of Riley in Bern, until Dulles summoned him home to help out at the Agency in 1950, after Beetle Smith took over as director.”

  “All right, then, if Harvey didn’t murder Carrie, who did?”

  “Someone else, I expect. That’s for you and that county sheriff in New Mexico to figure out.”

  “Lance, tell Harvey for me that the necklace his grandfather lifted from Goering’s house is being sold at Sotheby’s next month, for the benefit of the Holocaust Museum in Washington, and there’s not a goddamned thing he can do about it, and to stop calling me.”

  “I’ll pass that on, dear boy,” Lance drawled, then excused himself and left, taking Stone’s Times with him.

  45

  Stone called Dino.

  “Bacchetti.”

  “I understand you and Lance Cabot are in bed together these days.”

  “Don’t tell Viv, she’ll be jealous.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me that Harvey Biggers was no longer a suspect? You’re keeping secrets from me?”

  “Jesus, Stone, we’re not married. Didn’t you know that?”

  “Don’t evade the issue.”

  “What’s the issue?”

  “I’ve been running around thinking I have to capture Harvey Biggers if I get a chance.”

  “Well, I’m happy to tell you that you don’t have to do that anymore.”

  “How long has this been going on?”

  “How long has what been going on?”

  “You and Lance and Harvey Biggers.”

  “We’re not having a threesome.”

  “How long?”

  “I don’t remember, exactly.”

  “Now you’re being evasive.”

  “I’m a public official, I have a constitutional right to be evasive.”

  “Okay—now who’s the chief suspect in Carrie Fiske’s murder?”

  “I’m told there was a couple in Santa Fe who might have been involved, but I don’t know their names yet.”

  “Hang on a minute.” Stone rummaged around his desk until he found the piece of paper Nicky Chalmers had given him. “How about Derek and Alicia Bedford?”

  “Who’s that?”

  “The couple who were in Santa Fe when Carrie was murdered.”

  “How do we know we’re talking about the same couple?”

  “Well, at least I’ve got names—what have you got?”

  “Just Harvey’s contention that he saw this couple in the plaza. Who are Derek and Alicia Bedford?”

  “They’re a couple I met at Carrie’s house in East Hampton.”

  “And why do you think they may have murdered Carrie?”

  “Why does Harvey think so?”

  “He thinks they’re sneaky people.”

  “Sneaky? Is that a motive for murder these days?”

  “Harvey thinks so. He thinks they murdered her to get that necklace you’re selling at Sotheby’s.”

  “How did you know it’s being sold at Sotheby’s?”

  “I read it an hour ago on Page Six of the Post, not that I read Page Six of the Post.”

  “You know you do.”

  “I saw it by accident, as I was turning to the sports pages.”

  “Well, Jamie Niven is moving faster than I thought.”

  “Sotheby’s is good at publicity for their sales. Hang on a second, I want to run these two names you gave me.”

  “I’m hanging.” He could hear keyboard clicks from the other end.

  “Okay, I ran them—they don’t exist.”

  “What do you mean they don’t exist? I met them.”

  “Well, they don’t exist under those names.”

  “I’ve got a phone number for them.”

  “Give it to me.”

  Stone read it out.

  “That’s a throwaway phone,” Dino said.

  “Well, maybe they haven’t thrown it away, yet.”

  “You want me to call them?”

  “If they’re suspects, I want you to catch them. Do a search on the phone.”

  “Hang on.”

  “Hanging.”

  More clicking of keys. “I got a ping at what seems to be the Carlyle Hotel.”

  “Go get ’em.”

  “I’ll send somebody over there and see if we can find them. They might be just having lunch.”

  “If so, interrupt them. I’ll get my sheriff buddy in Rio Arriba County to check out the hotels in Santa Fe.”

  “Lots of hotels in Santa Fe.”

  “All right, then the ones near the plaza.”

  “Okay, you do your thing, and I’ll do mine.”

  “Oh, Dino?”

  “Yeah?”

  “How do I get in touch with Harvey?”

  “He’s back at his apartment. I’ll give you the number.” He did. “Why do you want to get in touch with him? I thought you never wanted to speak to him again.”

  “Who knows? I may want to apologize to him for thinking he was a murderer, when he
’s only a CIA agent.”

  “Lance told you that?”

  “He did. Harvey is a career man, joined right out of Yale.”

  “I thought that was a secret.”

  “Well, he told you, didn’t he?” Stone hung up.

  46

  Stone Googled the Rio Arriba County Sheriff’s Office and called the number.

  “Sheriff’s Office.”

  “May I speak to Sheriff Martinez, please?”

  “Who’s calling?”

  “Stone Barrington.”

  “One moment.” A pause, then, “Mr. Barrington?”

  “Yes, how are you, Sheriff?”

  “Call me Ray.”

  “And I’m Stone.”

  “I’m real good. You?”

  “Good. Tell me, have you made any progress on the Carrie Fiske murder?”

  “Well, that’s a real embarrassing question, and I’m afraid the answer is embarrassing, too. It’s no. I got a call from somebody in Washington, D.C., alibiing that fella, what’s his name, Biggert?”

  “Biggers, Harvey.”

  “That’s the one. Well, I got this call saying that Biggers was in New York at the time of the murder, and the guy wrote me a letter, too. First time I ever got a letter from the CIA. I had it framed.”

  “No other suspects, then?”

  “Nope, not a single one.”

  “I’ve got two for you.”

  “I’m real glad to hear that. Who are they?”

  “A couple, Derek and Alicia Bedford.” He spelled the names.

  “They live around here?”

  “No, and where they live is something of a mystery. Their names might be bogus, too. I think they might have been in a Santa Fe hotel the night before the murder, though.”

  “Which one?”

  “I don’t know—possibly the Inn of the Anasazi. If not, then maybe one of the ones around the plaza. Could one of your people check that out?”

  “I’ll put a deputy on it right away. We can do that on the phone. What do you want me to do if I find them?”

  “I doubt if you will find them, but you might get an address on them. If they paid by credit card, you could get that number and run it for a name and a billing address. You could try the rental car agencies, too.”