Three Can Keep a Secret Page 28

  “Anyhow, Mr. Scott brought me into his room upstairs, where he has his private talks—that’s what we all call them. So I knew right off something was up.”

  “You’d never been asked there before?” Lester asked.

  Aaron looked embarrassed. “No. I let people think so because it makes me sound important. But this was the first time I’ve been asked to do anything like this.”

  “Thanks for being straight with us, Aaron,” Joe complimented him, as if rewarding a pet. “What next?”

  “It was pretty straightforward. He gave me Travis’s number and told me to tell him to go into Marshall’s apartment and remove that stuff.”

  “What stuff, exactly?”

  “A framed photograph, some files, and a pin from a jewelry box. He was really specific describing them and where they were. And he told me to make sure the phone’s message machine was erased.”

  “Details, Aaron,” Joe said. “What photograph? Which files?”

  “A framed black-and-white shot, about five by seven,” he said. “Showing a bunch of people holding glasses and toasting the photographer. And everything out of the C file—he didn’t tell me exactly what—said just to make sure everything was grabbed. And the pin was dark purple, with two gold C’s engraved on it. He showed me one that looked just like it.”

  “He explain its meaning?”

  “No. I’m sorry, but maybe it tied into what was in the C files.”

  “Let’s talk about Travis,” Joe said, recalling what Reynolds had told him earlier. “How was he supposed to get in?”

  “There would be a box behind a Dumpster at the old folks’ home where Marshall lived,” Aaron explained. “A key would be inside, along with a maintenance man’s uniform and some money—or half the money, that’s right. I forgot. Travis was supposed to return the stolen things and the uniform to the same place, and the rest of the money would be there, waiting for him.”

  “Meaning you had a confederate?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t know anything about him. I asked Mr. Scott about that when he assigned this to me, and he said something like, ‘Not your concern.’ I got the message.”

  “What if something went wrong?” Joe asked. “Like Travis grabbed the wrong picture or something? What were you supposed to do then?”

  Aaron looked at him, mystified. “I don’t know. Did something go wrong?”

  “I’m asking, ‘if,’ Aaron.”

  “I don’t know,” he repeated. “That’s all he told me. I made the phone call like I was told. Mr. Scott had told me to use a cold phone—that was the phrase he used, which is what made me think of Dolores’s instead of my cell or something—and that’s what I did. That was the end of it.”

  “But you reported back to Scott?” Joe wanted to know.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “And he was satisfied?”

  Aaron nodded. “As far as I know. He didn’t say otherwise. He did tell me that under no circumstances was I ever to mention this to anybody, including him—that he’d make it worth my while. So that was it, as far as I was concerned. Until today,” he added in a lowered voice.

  “Did Scott say anything about the files?”

  “No.”

  “Did you ever call Travis back?”

  He shook his head, leading Joe to suspect that Scott’s was the second phone call Travis had mentioned—the one he assumed Aaron had made after catching a cold.

  “Had you ever worked with Travis before?” Lester asked, to confirm Aaron’s earlier statement.

  “No.”

  “Aaron,” Joe asked him, “did you ever wonder what it was Scott got you involved in? What this was all about?”

  Whitledge shrugged. “Skeletons in the closet. That’s what I figured. It’s what all these politicians worry about. I figured it was to avoid bad publicity. I had no clue it had anything to do with murder.”

  “You know where Scott lives?” Joe asked him.

  “Sure,” he said, and quickly gave the address. “We’re invited there every December, for the Christmas party. It’s huge.”

  Joe stood up, prompting the rest of them to do likewise. He walked up to Aaron and took his hand in his, as if to wish him farewell. But he didn’t let go as he emphasized, “Aaron, same rules apply with us as they did with Scott. Not a word about this conversation till I get back in touch. There’s one additional incentive to keep your mouth shut, though. You know what that is?”

  Whitledge looked confused. “No.”

  “If you do think you might win points by talking to your boss, keep in mind what he has to lose—and what he might be willing to do to anyone he sees as a snitch.”

  The young man swallowed and remained silent. Joe let his hand drop. “We’ll be back in touch soon to wrap this up. Enjoy your evening.”

  * * *

  Outside on the sidewalk, Sam faced Joe to ask, “What was that? Don’t we want to buckle him up and start building a case against Scott?”

  “One of the reasons I was heading in this direction when you two were parked across the street,” Joe explained, “is that I think Sheldon Scott has bigger worries than Aaron Whitledge right now.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Sheldon Scott lived in a mansion, east of downtown Montpelier, with a sweeping view of the valley below—made all the more spectacular at this time of day by a crimson setting sun coloring the Winooski’s waters like a spilled ribbon of red paint.

  The driveway was marked by pretentious twin granite pillars and—some twenty feet down the broad gravel path—by something that made Joe swear as he steered around it. It was an older model, dark green Buick Skylark.

  “What?” Lester asked.

  Sam answered, “That’s Barb Barber’s old car. The one Joe thinks was stolen by her sister.”

  Joe picked up speed, skidding around the several curves leading up to the house, and spitting stones onto the neighboring grass. “I’m too late,” he said grimly.

  “You think she went after Scott?” Sam asked.

  “I do,” he said, fighting the steering wheel. “And Marshall and Friel and Barb. We’ve been seeing her as a victim through all this. I’m not saying she’s not that—” He paused to slam on the brakes before the huge building.

  “But she could be our killer, too,” Sam finished for him as they piled out of the car.

  They stared up at the building quickly, gauging their approach.

  “Call for backup,” Joe ordered, circling to the car’s trunk and extracting three ballistic vests and the one shotgun he kept back there. “We can’t wait for them, but I want ’em on the way.”

  Still attaching his Velcro straps, he ran up the broad stone steps to the carved double doors of the main entrance and laid his hand on the handle. It yielded, and the door opened a crack.

  He charged the shotgun’s chamber as his colleagues pulled out their handguns. “Okay,” he said, “Exigent circumstances. We’re going in, but no fanfare. Fast and low.”

  He swung open the door and swept in, cutting to the left as Lester and Sam followed suit like parachutists leaping from a plane.

  They found themselves in a large, front lobby, facing an ostentatious curved staircase ahead and a row of doors down both side walls, all dominated from above by a chandelier better suited to a European castle.

  There wasn’t a sound or a movement aside from their own.

  Joe gestured to them to spread out and check the doors as he approached the staircase walking backwards, his weapon at the ready, his eyes fixed on the second-floor balcony that was half hidden by the chandelier—an ideal nest for a shooter anticipating their entry.

  But he saw no one.

  “Joe,” came Sammie’s voice, echoing off the towering walls and marble floor.

  He left the stairs for the door she’d opened to enter the library, which turned out to occupy most of the house’s left wing, and which—unbeknownst to any of them—resembled Scott’s office in Montpelier.

  Lester joined him
to see Sam standing near the center of the room, before an elaborate antique wingback chair.

  Sitting there comfortably, with a surprised look on his face, was Sheldon Scott.

  “He dead?” Joe asked, thinking—in one of those disconnected moments that challenge one’s sense of proportion—that Gail’s current woes were going to be considerably lessened by this development. She was still facing a storm of her own—no doubt about it—but with Scott’s demise, its primary driving force had been suddenly removed.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “No carotid,” she answered. “He’s still warm, but I know dead.”

  Joe could attest to that. He turned to Lester, who anticipated him by reaching for his cell phone and saying, “Upgrade the BOL on Carolyn and get a full homicide response on this, including the crime lab.”

  Joe nodded, adding to them both, “And let’s make sure the house is clear. Right now. We can come back here once we’re sure we’re alone.”

  They quickly made a tactical sweep of the entire building, ending up in the four-car garage, where they discovered a vehicle missing and one of the doors wide open. A phone call to VBI Dispatch revealed that Scott had four cars registered to him; the missing one was added to the alert.

  Minutes later, they were back at the library door. “Did you see what did him in?” Joe asked of Sammie.

  “Small puncture wound over the heart,” she replied. “But smaller than a bullet, and no gunshot residue. That seemed to be it.”

  Joe recalled Beverly’s finding with William Friel. “Like an icepick?”

  “That would fit.”

  They stayed where they were, not wanting to further contaminate a crime scene. Sammie added, pointing, “The pillow on the chair opposite him looked depressed, unlike any of the others. Like somebody had been sitting on it.”

  Joe nodded, mostly to himself, and turned to face the front entrance across the lobby. “So maybe she knocks on the door, he opens up, they begin to talk and he brings her in here. They sit, she hears all she needs to, and she sticks him.”

  The three of them retreated to the foot of the stairs, hearing sirens approaching from afar. “God only knows where Carolyn is now,” Joe said, “but I bet she’s not moving too fast, given how long it’s been since she drove regularly. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

  Sam sighed, “Let’s hope somebody gets her before she does any more damage. She’s doubling the state’s homicide rate.”

  * * *

  They didn’t find Carolyn Barber. They located Sheldon Scott’s BMW, abandoned in a nearby grocery store parking lot and covered with Carolyn’s fingerprints, but of her, they found no further trace.

  They did discover the stolen photograph from Gorden Marshall’s apartment—along with the key and the uniform that Travis Reynolds had used to infiltrate The Woods. They were in Scott’s office, off his upstairs bedroom, lumped together in a pile. There was no CC lapel pin, however, and no files—which were now presumed to have been stolen by Carolyn for their contents on the same day that she smothered an alcoholically impaired Gorden Marshall. Intriguingly to Joe, a single thumbprint of Carolyn’s was lifted from the photograph’s glass, as if she’d held it contemplatively after stabbing Sheldon downstairs. That discovery made him think as well that she’d possibly removed the purple and gold Catamount Cavaliers memento, perhaps as an ironic souvenir. If that was true—and since she remained unaccounted for—Joe couldn’t help considering that she might have more ex-Cavaliers on her list of men to kill. Indeed, that possibility had led to a thorough and ongoing effort to identify who might be left among Scott and Marshall’s fellow club members.

  Fueling the concern about Carolyn’s motivation, a search of Scott’s home uncovered a trove of Cavalier artifacts in a large wall safe, along with hundreds of unrelated confidential files. There was only one pin—probably Scott’s own—but many letters, more vintage photos of people in high spirits, and other documents attesting to the faux-formal nature of the organization’s genesis, complete with a salacious but official-looking framed listing of “Rules of Mis-Behaviour,” handwritten in mock Old English style.

  Finally, in what amounted to a pathetic footnote, there was a memo in Scott’s hand, informing Marshall to play along with Carolyn’s demand for money and to be named Governor-for-a-Day, complete with attending pomp and ceremony—part of her price for keeping her pregnancy quiet. Then, as inevitable and as cold as revenge can be, there were copies of adoption documents, legally rendering a female infant over to the care of Mr. and Mrs. Gorden Marshall, and a copy of the same commitment papers that Joe had read earlier in the state hospital archives, dated the same year, along with hand-lettered notes indicating the establishment of a mood-altering regimen that was to be perpetually—and illegally—maintained to keep Carolyn Barber in a state of permanent stupor.

  Sheldon Scott had clearly been a man to keep track of his favors to others.

  * * *

  Joe was organizing his paperwork several nights later, closing out as much of the case as possible, and repeatedly reminded of its cost in human misery—not unlike that of Tropical Storm Irene. He kept wondering how and if Carolyn could have possibly survived, assuming that recent events hadn’t already taken their toll, sweeping her away like so much trash in a flood. She was no youngster, after all, and by now had no family, no resources, and—as far as they’d been able to determine—nowhere to go.

  Her prior missing person notices had all been taken down, replaced by wanted posters and, sadly, more sensationalist media coverage than she ever received when she was simply presumed missing.

  His desk phone rang, as if responding to his ruminations.

  “Gunther,” he answered.

  “Agent Gunther, this is Michelle Mahoney, Gorden Marshall’s daughter?”

  “Of course, Ms. Mahoney. What can I do for you?”

  “It’s probably nothing,” she said. “But I was putting the final touches on moving my father’s junk out so they can sell his apartment. I found something I thought you should know about, just in case it’s helpful. Are you able to meet with me right now? I’m on the interstate, heading south, near Brattleboro. I think that’s where you work, no? I am sorry for the short notice, but—”

  “Absolutely,” Joe interrupted her. “I’m still at the office. Would you like to come straight here? It’s not far from exit two.”

  “That would be great,” she said, her gratitude plain. “Just give me directions.”

  He heard her approaching down the hallway, less than fifteen minutes later, and went out to usher her in. She was elegantly dressed, as usual, in the casual country look that places like Orvis and J. Crew idealize, and he offered her Sammie’s office chair.

  “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

  “I found something a little disturbing,” she told him. “This morning, as I was making one last check around.”

  “Okay,” he replied leadingly.

  “There’s not that much left,” she went on. “All the walls are stripped, and half the furniture is gone. So the place is pretty much empty.”

  He remained silent, sensing her difficulty in wording what came next.

  She touched her hair absentmindedly. “Well,” she admitted. “It’s left me for a loop, to be honest. I came into the apartment and found something in the middle of the floor, placed on top of a handwritten note.”

  “The apartment wasn’t locked?” Joe asked, his interest sharpened.

  “No. I didn’t see the point. Plus, the movers don’t have a key.” She reached into her handbag and extracted a small item that she held out for him to examine.

  He extended his open hand and received a dark purple lapel pin, engraved with twin golden capital letter C’s.

  “Ah,” he said, surprised.

  “You recognize it?” she asked.

  “Yes. I do.”

  “This was with it,” she added, going back into the purse.

  She handed
over a small piece of paper, on which was written, I have always loved you. It was signed, Mom.

  Joe looked up to see tears brimming in Michelle Mahoney’s eyes.

  “I don’t understand,” she said simply.

  He pulled his own chair over so that they were sitting almost knee to knee in the semi-darkened office.

  “I think I do,” he said. “Let me tell you what I can about your real mother.”

  EPILOGUE

  Paul Canfield read the article slowly and carefully, as if watching for any movement among the words before him. He was a deer hunter by passion—or had been before old age had brought that and much more to an end. Trophies in the form of antlers, mounted heads, and celebratory photographs by the dozen adorned his log home outside of Bradford, Vermont. The entire place had a distinctly male feeling to it—he lived alone, having been married three times to women who’d found his company quickly objectionable. He also had three children, whose names he knew, if little else. Sharing space, or anything else, had never been his strong suit.

  Canfield had been a man in a hurry for most of his life, given to the pursuit of advancement and reward, and not so interested in the care and nurturing of his fellow human beings. A smart man, most colleagues and acquaintances had to concede, but rarely a kind one.

  He dropped the newspaper onto his reading table and watched the portrait on its front page become haloed by the circle of light under the lamp. SCOTT INVESTIGATION CONTINUES, the headline read, with a smaller subhead underneath it admitting, “Police releasing few statements.”

  No kidding, Canfield thought. You can’t release what you don’t have. The cops had said that they had several good leads about who’d killed Sheldon Scott, but they refused to give up names. That seemed telling to Canfield. They were stuck.

  He frowned at Scott’s photograph. It was a glamor shot, clearly circulated by his office, which was apparently running smoothly following his death. He looked dashing and incisive, his white mane offset by black eyebrows and a piercing look. Canfield assumed the whole thing had been touched up in the darkroom—or whatever they used nowadays—but he had to admit that he hadn’t seen Scott in years.