Candidate number two, a black beauty, due to go on the block in Amelia Island, Florida, had accumulated a slew of awards during a pampered life. Five owners: New York, Toronto, Savannah, Miami, Fishers Island.
Bingo came in the form of a car that had taken first place at the Pebble Beach Concourse d’Elegance ten years ago, a gleaming behemoth benefiting from a six-year frame-off restoration by Andrew O. Zeiman.
Program notes from the award ceremony noted that care had been taken to replicate the car’s original cerulean/azure paint job as well as the “precise hue of its robin’s egg blue convertible roof, now replaced with modern but period-reminiscent materials.”
The proud owners were Mr. and Mrs. F. Walker Monahan, Beverly Hills, California. A winners’ circle photo showed them to be mid-sixtyish, immaculately turned out, flanked by a burly, white-bearded man. Andrew Zeiman was clad, as was Mr. Monahan, in a straw Borsalino, a navy blazer, pressed khakis, conservative school tie.
I had my eyes on Zeiman’s photograph when the phone rang. “It’s Andy again.” Low-tech Skype. “You must be one of those fortunate sons, maybe we should hit the blackjack tables.”
“The case resolves, I might just take you up on that.”
“The current owners agreed to talk to you. They’re good people.”
“Do they remember the Asherwoods?”
“Talk to them,” said Zeiman.
CHAPTER
17
Researching the person you’re trying to influence is a handy tool when peddling gewgaws, pushing con games, and practicing psychotherapy.
The same goes for witness interviews; before reaching out to the F. Walker Monahans of Beverly Hills, I searched their names on the Web.
Mister sat on the board of two banks and Missus, a woman named Grace, occupied similar positions at the Getty, the Huntington, and the volunteer committee of Western Pediatric Medical Center.
The hospital affiliation made me wonder if she’d be the link to Dr. James Asherwood.
A search of his name pulled up nothing but a twelve-year-old Times obituary.
Dr. James Walter Asherwood had passed away of natural causes at his home in La Canada-Flintridge, age eighty-nine. That placed him at forty or so during the period Ellie Green had lived at the house in Cheviot Hills. Easily feasible age for a relationship. For unwanted fatherhood.
Asherwood’s bio was brief. Trained at Stanford as an obstetrician-gynecologist, he’d “retired from medicine to pursue the life of a sportsman and financier.”
The Times hasn’t run social pages in a while and being rich and wellborn no longer entitles you to an obit. At first glance, nothing in Asherwood’s life seemed to justify the paper’s attention, but his death was the hook: “A lifelong bachelor, Asherwood had long voiced intentions to bequeath his entire estate to charity. That promise has been kept.”
The final paragraph listed beneficiaries of Asherwood’s generosity, including several inner-city public schools to which Asherwood had bequeathed a hangarful of vintage automobiles. Western Peds was listed midway through the roster, but unlike the cancer society, Save the Bay, and the graduate nursing program at the old school across town, the hospital wasn’t singled out for special largesse.
Fondness for the nursing school because he remembered one particular RN?
Had ob-gyn skills meant detour to a career as an illegal abortionist? Did dropping out of medicine imply guilt? A legal concession as part of a plea deal?
Lifelong bachelor didn’t mean loveless. Or childless.
Doctor to financier. Moving big money around could mean the ability to purchase just about anything, including that most precious of commodities, silence.
No sense wondering. I called the F. Walker Monahans.
A beautifully inflected female voice said, “Good evening, Doctor, this is Grace. Andy told us you’d be phoning.”
No curiosity about a psychologist asking questions on behalf of the police. “Thanks for speaking with me, Mrs. Monahan.”
“Of course we’ll speak with you.” As if a failure to cooperate would’ve been unpatriotic. “When would you care to drop by?”
“We can chat over the phone.”
“About cars?” Her laugh was soft, feline, oddly soothing.
“About a car once owned by Dr. James Asherwood.”
“Ah, Blue Belle,” she said. “You do know that we’ve sold her.”
“I didn’t.”
“Oh, yes, a month ago, she’ll be shipped in a few weeks. Immediately after Pebble Beach we were besieged with offers but refused. Years later, we’re finally ready. Not without ambivalence, but it’s time to let someone else enjoy her.”
“Where’s she going?”
“To Texas, a natural gas man, a very fine person we know from the show circuit. He’ll pamper her and drive her with respect, win-win situation for everyone.”
“Congratulations.”
“We’ll miss her,” said Grace Monahan. “She’s quite remarkable.”
“I’ll bet.”
“If you’d like to pay your respects before she leaves, that can be arranged.”
“Appreciate the offer,” I said. “If you don’t mind, could we talk a bit about Dr. Asherwood?”
“What, in particular, would you like to know?”
“Anything you can tell me about him. And if you’re familiar with a woman he knew named Eleanor Green, that would be extremely helpful.”
“Well,” she said, “this is a person we’re going to discuss and that deserves a more personal setting than the phone, don’t you think? Why don’t you drop by tomorrow morning, say eleven? Where are you located?”
“Beverly Glen.”
“We’re not far at all, here’s the address.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Monahan.”
“You’re quite welcome.”
Board seats and ownership of a multimillion-dollar show car had led me to expect residence in Beverly Hills’ uppermost echelons. A manse at the northern edge of the flats, or one of the mammoth estates nestled in the hillocks above Sunset.
The address Grace Monahan gave me was on South Rodeo Drive, a pleasant but low-key neighborhood well away from the try-too-hard glitz and glassy-eyed tourism of the twenty-four-karat shopping district.
The numbers matched a nondescript, two-story, not-quite-Colonial apartment building on a block of similar structures, shadowed by the white marble monument on Wilshire that was Saks Fifth Avenue.
Monahan: 2A. A once-wealthy couple who’d fallen on hard times? The real reason for selling the blue Duesenberg?
I climbed white-painted concrete steps to a skimpy landing ringed by three units. The wooden door to 2A was open but blocked by a screen door. No entry hall meant a clear view into a low, dim living room. Music and the smell of coffee blew through the mesh. Two people sat on a tufted floral sofa. The woman got up and unlatched the screen.
“Doctor? Grace.”
Five and a half feet tall in spangled ballet slippers, Grace Monahan wore a peach-colored velvet jumpsuit and serious gold jewelry at all the pressure points. Her hair was subtly hennaed, thick and straight, reaching an inch below her shoulder blades. Her makeup was discreet, highlighting clear, wide brown eyes. The Pebble Beach photo was a decade old but she hadn’t aged visibly. Nothing to do with artifice; smile lines and crow’s-feet abounded, along with the inevitable loosening of flesh that either softens a face or blurs it, depending on self-esteem at seventy.
The duration and warmth of Grace Monahan’s smile said life was just grand in her eighth decade. One of those women who’d been a knockout from birth and had avoided addiction to youth.
She took my hand and drew me inside. “Do come in. Some coffee? We get ours from Santa Fe, it’s flavored with piñon, if you haven’t tried it, you must.”
“I’ve had it, am happy to repeat the experience.”
“You know Santa Fe?”
“Been there a couple of times.”
“We winter there because
we love clean snow—have a seat, please. Anywhere is fine.”
Anywhere consisted of a pair of brocade side chairs or the floral sofa where her husband remained planted as he continued watching a financial show on the now muted TV. Still canted away from me, he gave an obligatory wave.
Grace Monahan said, “Felix.”
He quarter-turned. “Sorry, just a second.”
“Felix?”
“A sec, sweetie, I want to see what Buffett’s up to, now that he’s a celebrity.”
“You and Buffett.” Grace Monahan completed the three steps required to transition to a tiny kitchenette. She fiddled with a drip percolator.
I sat there as Felix Walker Monahan attended to stock quotes scrolling along the bottom of the screen. Above the numbers, a talking head ranted mutely about derivatives. Watching without sound didn’t seem to bother Felix Monahan. Maybe he was a good lip-reader. The same tolerance applied to TV reception that turned to snow every few moments. The set was a convex-screened RCA in a case the size of a mastiff’s doghouse. Topped by rabbit ears.
The room was warm, slightly close, filled with well-placed furniture, old, not antique. Three small paintings on the walls: two florals and a soft-focus portrait of a beautiful, round-faced child. Great color and composition and the signature was the same; if these were real Renoirs, they could finance another show car.
The blowhard on the screen pointed to a graph, loosened his tie, continued to vent. Felix Walker Monahan chuckled.
His wife said, “What can you get out of it without hearing it?”
“Think of it as performance art, sweetie.” He switched off, swiveled toward me.
Unlike his wife, he’d changed a lot since Pebble Beach: smaller, paler, less of a presence. Scant white hair was combed back from a wrinkled-paper visage that would’ve looked good under a powdered wig or gracing coinage. He wore a gray silk shirt, black slacks, gray-black-checked Converse sneakers sans socks. The skin of his ankles was dry, chafed, lightly bruised. His hands vibrated with minor palsy.
He said, “Jimmy Asherwood, fine man. Better than fine, first-rate.”
“Did you buy the Duesenberg from him?”
He grinned. “Even better, he gave it to us. To Gracie, actually. She was his favorite niece, I lucked out. When I met her I knew nothing about cars or much else. Jimmy’s collection was quite the education.”
His wife said, “I was his favorite niece because I was his only niece. My father was Jack Asherwood, Jimmy’s older brother. Jimmy was the doctor, Dad was the lawyer.”
Felix said, “If Jimmy had twenty nieces, you’d still be his favorite.”
“Oh, my.” She laughed. “I already give you everything you want, why bother?”
“Keeping in practice for when you finally say no.”
“Scant chance—here’s coffee.”
“Let me help you,” he said.
“Don’t you dare be getting up.”
“Oh, boy,” he said. “Starting to feel like a cripple.”
“The difference, Felix, is that cripples remain crippled while you can be up and around soon enough. If you follow orders.”
“Hear, hear,” he said. To me: “Had surgery five weeks ago. You don’t want to know the details.”
Grace said, “He certainly doesn’t.”
“Let’s just say plumbing issues and leave it at that.”
“Felix.”
He rotated his arm. “They cored and bored me, like an engine. Roto-Rooter wasn’t picking up their messages so I had to go to a urologist.”
“Fee-lix! TMI.”
“What’s that mean, sweetie?”
“Don’t play innocent with me, young man. The grandkids always say it when you’re overdoing.”
“Ah,” he said. “Too Many Issues.”
“Exactly.” She brought a silver tray holding three coffees and a box of cookies. “Pepperidge Farm Milano Mints, Doctor. Cream?”
“Black’s fine.”
Pouring, she sat down next to her husband. They lifted their cups but waited until I’d sipped.
I said, “Delicious. Thanks.”
Felix said, “Here’s to another day aboveground.”
“So dramatic,” said Grace, but her voice caught.
I said, “Nice paintings.”
“They’re all we have room for, I don’t like crowding, art needs room to breathe.” She sipped. “In Santa Fe we have oodles of wall space but not being there much of the year we don’t like to hang anything too serious.”
“In S.F., we patronize the local artists,” said Felix. “Nice level of talent but not much in the way of investment.”
“Life’s about more than compound interest, dear.”
“So you keep telling me.”
I said, “Have you lived here long?”
“Ten years.”
“Bought the building fifteen years ago,” said Felix. “Followed it up by buying the rest of this side of the block.”
“There you go again,” said Grace. “Making like a tycoon.”
“Just citing facts, sweetie.” Working to steady his hand, he put his cup down. Bone china rattled. Coffee sloshed and spilled. His lips moved the same way Milo’s do when he wants to curse.
Grace Monahan bit her lip, returned to smiling at nothing in particular.
Felix Monahan said, “The original plan was to tear the entire block down and build one big luxury condo but the city proved obdurate so we kept the block as is and went into the landlord business. The last thing on our minds was actually moving here, we had a fine Wallace Neff on Mountain Drive above Sunset. Then our daughter moved to England and we said, what do we need thirty rooms for, let’s downsize. The house sold quickly, those were the days, caught us off-guard and we hadn’t found a new one. This apartment was vacant so we said let’s bunk down temporarily.”
Grace said, “We found out we liked the simplicity and here we are.”
“Tell him the real reason, sweetie.”
“Convenience, darling?”
“Walking distance to shopping for someone who’s not me. By the way, Neiman phoned. They’re prepared to offer you a daily chauffeur if strolling three blocks proves too strenuous.”
“Stop being terrible, Felix.” To me: “I buy only for the grandkids. We’re in our post-acquisitional stage.”
I said, “Perfect time to sell the car.”
Felix said, “On the contrary, perfect time to keep it. And all the others. One day the entire collection will go to a deserving museum, but Blue Belle is taking her leave because we believe cars are to be driven and she’s gotten too valuable for that.” His eyes softened. “She’s lovely.”
I said, “Dr. Asherwood was a generous man.”
“Generous doesn’t do him justice,” said Grace. “Uncle Jimmy was selfless and I mean that literally. Nothing for himself, everything for others. He left every penny to charity and no one was resentful because we respected him, he’d given us so much during his lifetime.”
“I read about the donations in his obituary.”
“His obituary doesn’t begin to describe it, Dr. Delaware. Well before Jimmy passed he was giving away money and things.”
I said, “I used to work at Western Pediatric and I noticed the hospital on the list of beneficiaries. Did he attend there?”
“No,” she said, “but he cared about the little ones.” Scooting back on the couch, she sat up straight. “Why are you curious about him?”
Her voice remained pleasant but her stare was piercing.
Know the person you want to influence. The real reason she’d wanted a face-to-face.
I said, “Did you read about a baby’s skeleton being dug up in Cheviot Hills?”
“That? Yes, I did, tragic. What in the world would Jimmy have to do with such a thing?”
“Probably nothing,” I said. “The burial date was traced to a period when a woman named Eleanor Green lived in the house.”
I waited for a reaction. Grace Monahan r
emained still. Felix’s hand seemed to shake a bit more.
He said, “You think this woman was the mother?”
“If we could learn more about her, we might find out,” I said. “Unfortunately, she seems to be somewhat of a phantom—no public records, no indication where she went after moving. Dr. Asherwood’s name came up because his Duesenberg was spotted parked in her driveway on more than one occasion.”
Grace said, “Eleanor Green. No, doesn’t ring a bell.” She turned to her husband.
“Hmm … don’t believe so.”
His palsy had definitely grown more pronounced. Her fingers had stiffened.
She said, “Sorry we can’t help you, Doctor. Jimmy knew lots of women. He was an extremely handsome man.”
She crossed the room to a low bookshelf, took out a leather album, paged through and handed it to me.
The man in the scallop-edged black-and-white photo was tall, narrow, fine-featured, with a downy pencil mustache under an upturned nose and pale, downslanted eyes. He wore a cinch-waisted, pin-striped, double-breasted suit, black-and-white wingtips, a polka-dot handkerchief that threatened to tumble from his breast pocket, a soft fedora set slightly askew. He’d been photographed leaning against the swooping front fender of a low-slung, bubble-topped coupe.
“Not the Duesenberg, obviously,” said Felix Monahan. “That’s a Talbot-Lago. Jimmy brought it over from France immediately after the war. It was decaying in some Nazi bastard’s lair, Jimmy rescued it and brought it back to life.”
Grace said, “He was barely out of med school when he enlisted, was assigned to an infantry unit as a field surgeon, served in the Battle of the Bulge, raided Utah Beach. He was injured on D-Day, earned a Purple Heart and a host of other medals.”
“A hero,” said Felix. “The real deal.”
Grace said, “Now, would you like to see Blue Belle? She’s downstairs in the garage.”
As smooth a dismissal as any I’d heard. I said, “She’s here?”
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