Misfortune (34 page)
“Perhaps you should raid Wall Street and see if any insider traders can help you out.” Aurelia laughed.
“Maybe.”
“Well, I’m sorry that you have to be in the middle of this.”
“I’ve done it to myself.”
“As usual.”
Aurelia reached over and touched Frances’s hand. Her fingers felt warm. “I worry about you,” she said.
Frances pulled her hand away. “I saw you and Malcolm chatting it up.”
“He’s charming.”
“The consummate politician. He’s even working a donor’s funeral,” Frances said.
Aurelia sat back in her chair and took a sip of wine. “Are you happy in that office?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
Aurelia furrowed her brow. “Is it possible that my own daughter doesn’t understand what ‘happy’ means? I’m asking if you like your job, if your work is satisfying.”
Frances hadn’t thought about the issue so directly. As she tried to formulate an answer, she realized how saturated she was by her frustrations with the legal system, with its inability to help the victims of crime, and by her mounting sense of the futility of what she had done, day in and day out, for the last thirteen years. The sweet Hortons, whose life savings were wiped out by a crook who wouldn’t serve a day in jail, the Andrew Bryants of the world who would be prosecuted for political revenge…Frances felt little pride in what she had done recently. Although her focus on Clio’s murder had distracted her in recent days, it didn’t change her basic feelings.
She watched her mother chew. What did Aurelia want her to say? Did she really want to explore the complexity of Frances’s attitudes? Was she just making conversation? If so, perhaps all that was required was a dismissive answer.
Aurelia always had put her own happiness before that of anyone else. Her work, her art, her identity as an artist, these things had seemed in Frances’s mind to take precedence over her children or her husband. Frances and Blair had spent months in Southampton under the critical eye of Clio Pratt while their mother had searched for some notion of happiness and self-satisfaction in various art programs, summer colonies, and European retreats. How many times had Frances begged her mother to come back and rescue them? Her pleas to Aurelia, like her pleas to the judges before whom she appeared in her role as a prosecutor, had fallen on deaf ears.
Frances wanted to think she and her mother were very different, but looking at Aurelia across the table, she wondered if that were true. Frances’s stomach turned as she thought of her father, alone. Unlike Blair, who was able to demonstrate tenderness on what had to be the worst day of his life, Frances stood behind her emotional wall. She had focused on the flowers in the church, as if somehow an elegant arrangement would lessen her father’s pain. Instead the quantity and diversity of arrangements sent by others to fill the altar made her efforts seem wasted. Would her ability to find Clio’s killer turn out to be similarly futile? It seemed as if she could do nothing right in terms of helping her father.
“Work’s great,” Frances said. “Dinner’s great. What more could I possibly want?”
T
oo tired to drive home, Frances had spent the night on Aurelia’s large worn couch. Her mother had insisted. Hadn’t she been driving the forty-five miles between Orient Point and Southampton back and forth for days now? Aurelia had offered her own bed, but Frances’s willingness to stay was contingent upon not displacing her mother. The compromise was struck. Aurelia fixed a makeshift bed, puffed a pillow, and made chamomile tea as Frances took a hot bath. A call to Sam insured that Felonious and Miss Demeanor would be fed and let out.
Frances awoke, disoriented. She couldn’t remember the last time she had spent the night in a room not her own. The interlocking ring patterned quilt that had covered her when she’d fallen asleep lay in a heap on the floor. Her back ached from the sagging springs, and her sinuses felt clogged. Summer allergies. She heard sounds in the kitchen.
“I’m making blueberry muffins,” her mother called into the living room when Frances started to stir. The domesticity was unfamiliar but appreciated.
The Blue Book of the Hamptons on the coffee table caught her eye as she headed for the shower. A combination social register and telephone book, it listed residents of the Hamptons, Water Mill, Sag Harbor, and Quogue who were willing to pay $60 to advertise their summer and winter addresses, children, and children’s schools. Frances flipped through her mother’s copy of the distinctive directory. Aurelia Penelope Watson, home on Halsey Neck Lane,
Miss Frances Taylor Pratt, Brown University ’84, New York University Law School ’87; Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Robert Devlin (Blair Pratt), Trinity College ’87
. She found Beverly Winters, with her maiden name of Blodgett indicated in parenthesis, located on Meadowmere Lane. She had one daughter:
George Washington University ’87
.
Did the Blue Book of the Hamptons list Clio’s killer?
Frances stuffed the directory into her backpack.
After breakfast she stepped outside into another cloudless day, got into her truck, and headed in the direction of Meadowmere Lane. She decided not to call first. The distance from her mother’s house to the home of Beverly Winters, a five-minute drive, would give her a moment to think what it was she wanted to ask.
Beverly Winters lived in a Tudor-style stucco home with a slate roof and midnight blue shutters. The landscaping of boxwoods, azalea, and rhododendron, though unoriginal, was well maintained. A slate patio off the left side of the house overlooked a swimming pool. As Frances stood at the front door, she could glimpse the water through the slats of weathered fence surrounding it. The image of Dudley Winters wheeling to the edge in the middle of the night and toppling himself to his drowning death, the scene that Blair had described in their initial conversation about Beverly, flashed in Frances’s mind. She shivered despite the warm temperature.
Frances rang the doorbell and heard the timbre echo inside. After a few moments a woman appeared. Her streaked hair was wet, accentuating the difference between the blond highlights and darker roots. She wore a pink terry bathrobe belted loosely at the waist and smoked a cigarette. Frances diverted her eyes from the woman’s partially exposed breast.
“May I help you?” She spoke in a raspy voice.
Frances introduced herself to Beverly Winters.
“I’d offer you a condolence or something, but you didn’t come over here uninvited just to hear me say I’m sorry for your loss, now, did you.” Beverly’s eyes seemed focused behind Frances on a spot out by the road. She tightened the belt around her waist and leaned against the door frame, rubbing one foot on top of the other. The ash of her cigarette dropped to the floor, and she brushed it away with a burgundy-painted toe.
After several moments it became apparent that Frances would not be invited in. Beverly seemed in no mood to play hostess.
“I wanted to ask you a couple of questions.” Frances tried to sound official. As Beverly leaned toward her, she could smell the stale cigarettes that saturated the woman’s pores. “You were one of the last people to be with Clio before she died. I understand you played tennis together that morning.”
Beverly gave her a suspicious look.
“What time was it that you played again?”
“Nine.” She stretched out the word.
Ny-anne.
“For an hour?”
“A little longer.”
Frances took a step back away from the door and Beverly’s nicotine perfume. “Who else played?”
“Ann Helmut, Susan Carver, Clio, and I. Why are you asking me these questions?” Beverly sounded bored. She slouched her shoulders.
“I’m trying to reconstruct Clio’s last moments. Did she talk to you at all, I mean, during the game?”
“Other than to keep score or make a call? Not really, no.”
“What happened after you finished?”
“I can’t remember. Listen to me, early onset of Alzheimer’s. Either that, or too much sun.” She took a drag of her cigarette and blew the smoke in Frances’s direction. Frances coughed but didn’t move. “Ann left. She was meeting her personal trainer. It exhausts me just thinking about her schedule.” Beverly twirled her cigarette around in her fingers.
“And the other women?”
“Susan and I went up to get a drink. We saw Clio again a few minutes later on the clubhouse porch. I figured she hadn’t wanted to be seen socializing with us.” She took a long drag. Frances prepared herself for another nicotine onslaught, but it didn’t come. Instead Beverly tilted her head back and exhaled up to the sky.
“I understand you two had your differences.” Frances tried to sound diplomatic.
Beverly raised her eyebrows. “I’d just as soon let bygones be bygones, under the circumstances. I’ve put her out of my mind.”
“Why did you play tennis?”
“It wasn’t Clio’s idea, I can tell you that much. Clio, Ann, and Susan have a regular match. I was filling in for Constance Von Furst, their usual fourth. I assume they tried everyone who can hit the ball over the net before they called me. But Saturdays it’s hard, and July Fourth is especially tough. Women out here have their matches booked long in advance. Susan asked me to play.”
“Did you talk to Clio on the porch?”
“I might have made a reference to our match in passing. Just to let her little group know.” Beverly laughed again.
“Do you remember who was with her?”
“Marshall and Beth Bancroft. I don’t remember anyone else.”
“Louise’s parents,” Frances confirmed.
“A nice girl. She’s not much for the club anymore. Not since it turned down her husband.” This first piece of unsolicited information from Beverly made Frances wonder why the Membership Committee’s proceedings weren’t simply open to the public. The pretense of confidentiality seemed to last no longer than the meeting itself.
“What do you know about that?”
Beverly squinted at Frances. “Not much.”
“Please, it could be very important.”
“I’ve heard what I assume everyone’s heard.”
“Which is?” Frances prompted.
“Henry’s black. Clio objected on account of his race. Jack Von Furst, he’s the president of the Membership Committee, certainly agreed. Gail Davis, the secretary, kind of straddled the fence, as did Peter Parker, although he never has an opinion about anyone, just votes the way the momentum is going. Only George Welch—he was vice president—put up a fight. He flew off the handle. Wallace Lovejoy was with him in principle, wanted Henry Lewis to be admitted, but not to the same extent. Wally wasn’t adamant like George. George resigned from the committee in protest.” Beverly spoke as if she were reading from a grocery list.
“Who did you hear that from?”
“A good reporter never reveals her sources.” Beverly flicked her butt past Frances into the driveway. “That’s all I can tell you.”
“Were you at the club when Clio’s body was found?”
“I certainly was. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to dry my hair.” Beverly stepped inside and started to shut the door.
“Just one more thing.” Frances put up her hand to block the door from closing.
Beverly Winters released her hold on the door frame. “What?” she barked.
“I have to ask you about your husband, your late husband.”
“What about him?”
“Uh…” Frances fumbled for words, not knowing precisely how to lead into what she wanted to ask but wanting to keep Beverly engaged in conversation. “When did he die?”
“August twenty-third. Three years ago.”
“I’m really sorry.”
“I bet you are,” Beverly snorted.
“Before his death, you and he were friends with my father and Clio.”
“I guess you’d call us that. Richard and Dudley played golf occasionally at Shinecock. We weren’t members of the National.”
Shinecock Hills Golf Club, the site of several major PGA tournaments, was considered the more challenging of the two private golf courses in Southampton, but nothing compared with the beauty and luxury of the National Golf Club’s well-kept greens, expansive vistas, and first-class clubhouse. It was a golfer’s Mecca. Richard belonged to both clubs.
“We saw them socially out here, but not much in the city,” Beverly said.
“Any reason?”
“I didn’t have the time or the money for the ladies’ charity circuit.”
“The what?”
“You know, women who aren’t employed, and who hire domestic help so that they don’t have to raise their own kids. They’ve got to have rich husbands. The money buys them control of charities to keep them busy. It gives them an excuse to get dressed up and do lunch, plan some fund-raiser. Dudley never had that kind of cash. I wasn’t part of that scene.”
Frances sensed the bitterness in her voice. Apparently she had wanted to be.
“What does this have to do with anything?” Beverly removed a pack of Marlboro filters from her bathrobe pocket and lit another cigarette.
“Did you have any conversations with my father about Dudley’s death?”
“We talked. He called me periodically, at least in the beginning.” Frances could sense that Beverly had lost patience.
“Then what happened?”
“What always happens. Life goes on. We went our separate ways. Look, I don’t know what this is all about. Dudley has been dead for three years. I thought you were interested in Clio’s death. That has nothing to do with my personal life. Now, I have to go. I have an appointment in the city.” Beverly stepped inside and quickly pushed the door shut in Frances’s face.
Frances rang the bell again. She heard footsteps and a loud cough, but Beverly did not come back to the door. The interview, and the extent of Beverly’s cooperation, was over.
As she climbed back into her truck, Frances realized how mentally exhausted she was. For the past four days she had done nothing but probe and ponder who might have had reason to kill her stepmother. All she’d found was bitterness and discontent behind a veneer of affluence. What had she been thinking? Grasping at straws. Various hunches and theories seemed to be leading nowhere, so she had seized on some ill-conceived notion of her sister’s to question a bitter widow about her late husband’s tragic demise. It had been a while since she’d stooped that low.