Philanderers Gone

by Beth Byers

  “I have no idea who killed Leonard. I almost suspect myself except I know I didn’t do it!”

  Hettie laughed as she crossed to the bar and started making a new pair of cocktails, and Ro groaned and picked up the cocktail glass and spray of papers.

  “I feel in my bones that Reginald was behind this.”

  “He’s a favorite suspect, certainly,” Hettie agreed. “From what I’ve seen and heard about them, both from you and from others, Leonard and his brother were beasts.”

  “I know what Mr. Cooper said about Reginald knowing he was removed from the will, and I can’t find anything else that supports my theory.”

  Hettie pressed a drink into Ro’s hand, squeezed her shoulder, and reclined on the chaise lounge.

  “I want Reginald to be the murderer.”

  “Of course, darling,” Hettie agreed. “Then we’ll be rid of all of them.”

  “We’re biased,” Ro sighed. “I have always detested that man. At least we know there was definitely foul play involved,” she said, taking a deep breath. “I wasn’t convinced until now.”

  Hettie nodded.

  Ro sipped her drink slowly, then asked, “What did your afternoon produce? More than mine, I sincerely hope.”

  “I received similar confirmation about foul play. I believe the saboteur was Mr. Stone. I suppose I am convinced that it was him who killed everyone, but who told Mr. Stone his wife had lovers? Remember how we thought the poor bloke had no idea his wife was stepping out on him? Everyone believed that. It was…it was common knowledge.”

  Hettie nodded as Ro scowled and then took her drink to pace around the boxes like she was working through an office obstacle course.

  Hettie watched Ro with something of a smirk. “The thing is, I really think he was oblivious. What I saw today? That was a man who had fresh rage. And who wouldn’t have been able to hide and calmly watch his wife cuckold him. He was oblivious. Now, he’s not.”

  “Are you sure?” Ro demanded.

  Hettie considered then flinched as she nodded. “He’s not nearly as placid or unaware as we thought. He may even be abusing her. Perhaps he even deserved her behavior, finding what happiness she could. He actually made me feel grateful for Harvey.”

  Ro gaped.

  “I know,” Hettie said, smiling a little. “I suppose I hadn’t thought about him that way. Harvey could have been so much worse even if he wasn’t what I thought he should be. He wasn’t what he could have been either.”

  “I always thought of Mr. Stone as somewhat senile. How odd to think of him as a person Mrs. Stone feared. It seems…impossible. So his motive for sinking my yacht would have been revenge? To kill Leonard for his relations with Marilyn Stone? Do you think he intended for Mrs. Stone to die on the yacht? If it was him, of course. I’m still feeling Reginald is involved. He’s such an excellent villain. Why would Mr. Stone take out his revenge on everyone else?”

  “Oh.” Hettie shook her head. “I think Mrs. Stone is legitimately afraid of her husband, and I think he was involved with the murder. But he didn’t work alone.”

  “Didn’t he?” Ro sighed.

  Hettie shrugged and took another drink. “I tried to convince Marilyn to talk to me, but she refused. Either she doesn’t know or doesn’t want us to know. Whatever the case, I think she’s terrified of her husband.”

  Ro shivered and looked down at the mess of the boxes. “Mr. Cooper is coming here tonight to officially read the will. He’s agreed to contact Reginald to get him here as well. If he thinks he’s getting anything from Leonard’s estate, he’s guaranteed to show up. Detective Truman and perhaps Harris have also been invited. I hope that you don’t mind that I’m using your rooms for this.”

  “Not a bit,” Hettie said. “I’d far rather have you here while we go through this than be alone. Maybe we’ll know more after tonight. So, Mr. Cooper is convincing Reginald to come because he’s receiving something in the will?”

  “Reginald only knows what the letter from the solicitor said, not what the will says. The letter says I was made the executor of the estate and the main beneficiary. It is still possible that something was left to Reginald.”

  Hettie glanced around at the mess. “I’ll call for dinner and a maid. I had a horrible thought today,” she added weakly.

  Ro looked at her in alarm.

  With a wince and a sick look, Hettie said, “We have funerals to plan.”

  Ro felt dizzy at the thought. “That certainly adds insult to injury, doesn’t it? I don’t know the first thing about planning a funeral, Hettie. How can I possibly plan a funeral while I’m still attempting to clear my name of murder?”

  “I can’t help but think, do I take Harvey home? Or bury him here? I’m afraid to go home and find myself being pulled into the same life I had before. Ro—” Hettie nibbled her thumb and then looked up with shining eyes. “I don’t want to live the life I had before. I don’t want to go back. I’m afraid if I do, I’ll be trapped again. I can’t do this again. I just…can’t.”

  “Then don’t,” Ro said. “Please don’t. Stay here with me. Or let’s leave together. But don’t go home.”

  Hettie nodded, but Ro could see the conflict in her friend’s gaze.

  They chatted throughout dinner delivered to the room. Hettie had ordered a full meal with several courses and dessert. She’d made the depressing aside that food in prison would never be as good as the hotel provided. Just in case—they should overindulge.

  Hettie looked up from the pudding with a wicked grin. “At least you’ve learned that you won’t be destitute. If we get out of this, it’ll be nice to have an excess of ready money.”

  “I wouldn’t have been destitute either way, but I certainly won’t be beholden to my aunt’s wishes any longer.”

  “I’ll drink to that.” She turned thoughtful after setting down her glass. “Reginald seems to have had quite a reason to kill his brother except for the most recent change in wills. I do wonder exactly how biting those announcement letters were that Reginald received. Every time he got one, Reginald wouldn’t only know that his brother was taunting him again—Reginald would know that others knew of it. Sooner or later, rumors would have started flying.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.” Ro took a deep breath in. “It was just like Leonard to torture someone in that manner. To reveal casually his cruelty and then expect you to gloss over it. It was his way of ensuring that you were subjugated.”

  Hettie shuddered.

  “Your suspect is equally compelling.” Ro put aside her fork, glancing at the remnants of their meal. It had been divine, and she sincerely hoped to have many more. “Mr. Stone has to be involved. But how did he find out about the yacht, the cuckolding, and the rest? If he was so cruel, so overtly upset, was he the one who sabotaged the ship? Or did he simply ensure his wife survived?”

  “Why would he do that? He might have found her at the hospital, realized what she’d been up to, and was furious for that very reason? Just being associated with such a thing—it would be enough to set off a controlling, cruel man.”

  Hettie nodded. “He is certainly those things.”

  With a sad sigh, Ro lifted her glass. “Here’s to our husbands. They may be dead, but even alive, they weren’t as bad as Mr. Stone.”

  “A low bar,” Hettie observed.

  “But one they scaled all the same,” Ro said, leaving the table for her room. There was time enough to rest and gather her thoughts before she discovered more of Leonard’s cruelty.

  Chapter 16

  Ro attempted to nap off her cocktails and worries over the will before the gents arrived, but it was futile. She only managed to toss and turn and muss her hair. At 8:30, she abandoned hope of getting any sleep and took a few minutes to clean up her appearance. She examined her options in the closet. She’d packed rather quickly, but the maid who had helped had been good enough to put in somber dresses, as though the woman thought Ro should put up the pretense of mourning.

&nbs
p; Ro, however, didn’t think that pretending to mourn Leonard with Reginald as an audience would work for either of them. Reginald had never liked Ro, and that was when he had been Leonard’s heir. Now that Ro had, somehow, received the bulk of the estate? Surely they’d end up sworn enemies. Even if they didn’t, Reginald wouldn’t let her get by with a playacting version of devastated widow.

  She wasn’t. He knew it. She knew it. She wasn’t going to pretend otherwise. But then again, her husband had died. Rather than pretend mourning with a black dress, Ro selected a light grey dress with darker grey embroidery about the edges. It wasn’t flashy, and it seemed to suit the moment as well as she could.

  She felt as though she were going into battle with the detectives and Reginald, and she wasn’t going in without armor. She ran a brush through her hair, freshened her makeup, and added a lovely set of pearls around her neck and diamond earbobs. Ro didn’t mind her face usually, but when she examined it in the mirror, she disliked much of what she saw. She knew it was her mood and exhaustion more than her looks, so she made a face, stuck out her tongue, and warned herself to rise up to the challenge ahead of her.

  Mr. Cooper arrived five minutes early and was escorted into the sitting room of Hettie’s hotel suite. He made brilliant small talk, Ro thought, as the solicitor genially discussed the weather, the traffic in London, the state of crowded seaside holiday destinations. He never once lost his composure despite the pressure of knowing that both women had lost their husbands, were suspects in their murders, and that his presence here was to help Ro explain what had happened with the will.

  He, at least, didn’t believe that the will automatically made her a suspect given that the hijinks being conducted were to torment Reginald, not Ro.

  “Thank you, Mr. Cooper, for agreeing to do this so late in the evening. I’m eager for Scotland Yard to hear from you that I had no knowledge of the state of Leonard’s will before today. That, at the very least, will help them adjust their focus to someone else.”

  “It is my pleasure, Mrs. Ripley. It was evident that the changes to the will were for the…ah…displeasure of his brother. If Mr. Ripley were still with us today, I have little doubt he’d have changed the will again, only to taunt his brother again.”

  “Call me Ro or Ms. Lavender, please.”

  “Yes, of course, of course. Ms. Lavender.” He said her name as though trying it on for size.

  A few minutes later, there was a knock at the suite door and Hettie let in Detectives Truman and Harris as the room service cart arrived, loaded with coffee, tea, biscuits, and small sandwiches. It wasn’t quite a full high tea, but there was enough that one would be able to sidestep gazes and questions with a well-timed sip of tea or nibble of a sandwich.

  “Mr. Cooper,” Truman addressed the solicitor, “I understand there were changes to Mr. Ripley’s will. Could you give me information as to the timeline of the will changing and the awareness of all concerned parties regarding said changes?”

  “Certainly,” the solicitor replied. “Leonard had a reason, unknown to me, to adjust his will with a request that Reginald be notified by phone and by letter. I personally phoned Reginald earlier the day the yacht sunk and told him he’d been removed as the primary beneficiary of Leonard’s estate. He was shocked and seemed to disbelieve me, mentioning something about an ongoing prank and multiple wills. I assured him it was a legally-binding change and that was the end of our conversation.”

  “And when was Mrs. Ripley informed of the change?”

  “Today, only a few hours ago. Mr. Ripley expressly requested that she not be notified because he would likely be making another change soon. As he was my client and still very much alive at that point, I agreed to withhold notifying Mrs. Ripley for two weeks while he contemplated his next decision.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Cooper.”

  A bit more conversation and finally, at fifteen minutes after nine, Reginald graced them with his presence, tightly gripping a disheveled stack of worn letters and documents. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair uncombed, and he reeked of too much alcohol. If Ro didn’t know better, she’d simply assume that he was taking the death of his brother quite hard. But she knew better.

  He was devastated by his loss of Leonard’s estate. Ro braced herself for what would likely be a contentious meeting. The headache that had been looming all day increased at his presence. She couldn’t wait to get this over with. If Leonard had any wishes about his funeral or how to handle his remains, she’d know in a few minutes. Then she could get on with the unsettling business of arranging the funeral and finalizing the necessary details.

  She looked at Reginald and decided in that moment not to stand or shake his hand. No need to offer warm welcome to her snake of a brother-in-law who accused her of murder.

  “Reginald, you’re here. Have a seat, would you?” Ro said through gritted teeth. “Mr. Cooper, if you’d like to begin?”

  “Yes, of course, Mrs—Ms. Lavender.”

  Reginald scoffed at the use of her maiden name. “You’ve already dropped the family name?”

  “I did.” She wouldn’t apologize for it either. It wasn’t as though she’d lost the love of her life. She’d lost her greatest burden.

  He glared at Ro then turned his focus to Mr. Cooper. “Before you begin,” Reginald demanded, “I want to know when exactly my brother changed his will. I don’t think any of this is legally binding. I have proof”—he waived about the stack of papers—"that my brother wanted me to handle his estate. She,” he spat with another glare to Ro, “had no affection for my brother and was an unfit wife. That is being quite generous on her behalf.”

  “I can assure you the will I am about to disclose is the most recent and therefore legally binding. If I may read it?” Mr. Cooper shot Reginald a disgusted glance. Perhaps the solicitor knew why Reginald and Leonard had descended into such a nasty level of taunting and hatred?

  Reginald’s face was beet red and his mouth moved as if to argue, but Detective Truman cleared his throat. Reginald glanced at the detectives, flushed a ruddy purple that appeared quite unhealthy and closed his mouth. With an ahem, Cooper opened the file and began to read the will. As was usual, he read the words verbatim.

  After several paragraphs listing out the properties owned by Leonard and a summary of the balances in his various accounts, Ro was rapidly becoming aware of the magnitude of her late husband’s estate.

  A house in Chelsea, another in Bath, a hotel in Lyme, quite a number of investments in various brewing, automobile, paper, and even makeup companies. With every asset listed, Reginald’s eyes darted more and more quickly from the solicitor to Ro and back again.

  When it came time for Mr. Cooper to list out the beneficiary, Ro was genuinely concerned for Reginald’s health. His eyes were bulging from their sockets and he tapped his leg so aggressively that the entire sofa moved. The ruddy purple flush had turned mostly purple. The grip he maintained on his crumpled papers tightened to the point Ro was certain they would tear. She’d never seen him so out of sorts, and she’d seen him so drunk he’d fallen down stairs.

  Detective Truman seemed to notice Reginald’s odd behavior, but Truman’s glances between the parties were much subtler. If someone wasn’t watching him as closely as Ro was, they wouldn’t see that his posture was quite different in the company of a clearly agitated man. His expression was relaxed, but his shoulders were squared and she could see the tendons in his neck were flexed. That made Ro’s rising angst in the face of Reginald’s volatility diminish. Surprising, that. Her first impression of Detective Truman increased her anxiety and now his presence was calming.

  Mr. Cooper continued, with an occasional wary glance at Reginald, and Ro turned her attention back to the will.

  “I, Mr. Leonard Albert Ripley, of 1992 Piper Ave, London, England, HEREBY REVOKE all former wills and testamentary dispositions made by me AND DECLARE this to be my last will.”

  Reginald’s face fell at this statement and the papers in his
fist made a tearing sound. He looked to be holding his breath.

  “I appoint my wife Ro Lorraine Lavender Ripley Executor and Trustee. In the event of her death, I appoint my brother, Reginald Ripley, to be named the executor and trustee in her place.”

  Ro’s blood chilled at that last sentence and she didn’t hear much of the next few minutes. It wasn’t what Mr. Cooper said, as it was Reginald’s reaction to it. When he heard that Ro’s death would leave him everything, an eerie calm came over him. His hands relaxed and he smoothed out the papers he’d been clutching. He stopped tapping his leg and his eyes lost their agitated movement and instead became clear and calm. It was like the effects of the alcohol and rage wore off instantaneously and he was normal Reginald again.

  It seemed as though normal for Reginald involved plotting someone’s murder and Ro was now directly in his crosshairs.

  Ro glanced frantically towards Hettie who looked almost as alarmed as Ro felt and then the two friends looked towards the detectives. Neither appeared all that concerned by the change in Reginald. Was that because he’d removed himself as a suspect by being told of the change in the will? Harris seemed completely oblivious to the change in Reginald. As for Detective Truman, he was his usual placid self, or was he simply a good actor?

  “He’s going to kill us in our sleep,” Hettie told Ro. “Your brother-in-law, Mr. Stone, Mrs. Stone, the general state of affairs have all combined together to let me know Harvey wasn’t the worst. Awful, but not the worst.

  Ro laughed and then asked, “Did you hear all that I inherited?”

  “I did.”

  “Even part of a makeup company. I love Artemis’s kohl liner and the mascara cakes. I buy them often.”

  Hettie laughed at the awed look on Ro’s face.

  “I had no idea that Leonard had bought into that company. He’d asked me what I thought of them and I assumed he was going to buy some of it for one of his mistresses.”

  Hettie’s head tilted. “So you told him what you thought, and he bought into the company?”