The problem was that he was using the Lighthouse contract as his guide. Since the New World policy was so new, it had a much shorter grace period. Penny told Matthew about the situation, and Matthew realized that he would have to confide the situation to one of his siblings since he couldn’t bring it up to Peggy himself after the masquerade he’d acted out when he needed her to believe that he and his father were in disagreement over the policies. Penny didn’t know which sibling Matthew had confided in, but she was sure that whichever it was, that was who Matthew had suspected in his father’s murder.
***
Schwartz was shaking his head. “That’s not necessarily correct. The sibling he’d confided in might have shared the information without informing Matthew. However, assuming that the confidence brought about the murder, it would indicate complicity on behalf of the party Matthew had given the confidence. Now I have some questions for you.”
Penny stiffened her back and squared her shoulders and nodded. Schwartz continued. “You say you can’t sell the car because you don’t have the title, yet you claim to have legally inherited the car from your father’s estate. Why not just have a duplicate title made?”
“My father,” she said, and she stopped to consider the most tactful way of saying it. “My father may not have gained possession of the car in a way that would make a title search prudent. All of the VINs have been filed down and washed over with acid. I don’t say that I think he stole the car. In fact I’m sure that he didn’t. I think he won it in a card game just as he claimed. However, I think that he knew or that he believed that it had been stolen at one time.”
“I see,” Schwartz said. “I suppose there was a provision in your contract with the loan shark stipulating compounding of interest?”
“Yes,” Penny said. “He’s been compounding the interest monthly for twenty-three months.”
“Have you been keeping track of what you owe, or would you prefer that I do the math?”
“That won’t be necessary. I owe him nearly a hundred thousand dollars. The money I would have gotten from Matthew’s share of the policy would have been more than enough to cover what I owe the shark plus that much left over for myself.”
“You know,” Schwartz said, “there are people who would pay you that much for the car even without the title.”
“I know,” Penny said, “but I don’t know anyone with that kind of money who I could trust well enough to make the deal. I’d be beholden to them or worried that they’d blackmail me or turn me in. It wouldn’t change my situation, it would only redirect it. I’d still be living in constant fear of exposure. It would just be a different kind of exposure. I wish I’d never seen that car. It’s a curse.”
“Curse?” Schwartz said. “There’s no such thing as a curse. Or if there are curses, there are an equal number of blessings, but that’s another matter. Why not simply sell the car to somebody who you have something on?”
“You mean blackmail?” Penny asked. “Are you suggesting…?”
Schwartz imposed, “I’m not suggesting; I’m inquiring. It seems possible to me that you know more than you are saying, and that you plan to use what you know to force the killer or killers to share their insurance windfall. Maybe you even intend to force them to purchase your car. Or perhaps you might compel your employer to purchase the car. You have leverage to use on him. You’ve just described a conspiracy in which you and he are both participants.”
“How could I possibly compel anyone to do such a thing? I don’t have legal title? They aren’t car collectors or anything. The sale would draw attention.”
“We’ll forgo this for now. It’s off track at any rate. Can you get me a meeting with the same company representative who made the deal with Matthew Hanson that secured for you your position with New World Life?”
“I suppose so, yes,” Penny said. “When do you want the meeting?”
“Tomorrow afternoon. Tell him or her that I may be able to save New World Life a large portion of the Hanson death benefit.”
“It’s a him,” Penny said. “Thornton Felix. Now can I ask you some questions?”
“You may ask,” Schwartz said, “but I reserve the right to withhold my answers.”
“How did Matthew die?”
“I’m glad you asked. It shows that you are concerned about him; that he wasn’t just a method to clear your debt. He was poisoned with the same chemical that killed his father. Somebody mixed it in his scotch.”
“Scotch?” Penny said. “Matthew didn’t drink scotch. He drank ice cold vodka.”
“That’s part of why I believe it was murder. Vodka is clear, but Chlordane has a golden color that would have made it visible in vodka, whereas it would blend in with the color of scotch. Do you know if any of Matthew’s siblings were scotch drinkers?”
“I couldn’t tell you. I don’t know any of them. We were forced to keep our relationship a secret, so I never met his family. What else makes you think it was murder?”
“The supposed suicide note. They found a message in his laptop computer. Ostensibly it looks like a confession and suicide note, but the style is terse and disorderly. Would you say that Matthew was disorganized?”
“No,” Penny insisted, “just the opposite. He was a list maker.”
“I thought as much,” Schwartz said. “Do you have any other questions?”
“Are you going to be able to prove that Matthew is innocent?”
“I believe so, yes.”
“Why are you doing this? If the police have settled the case, then you have earned your fee. What’s in this for you?”
“I was wondering why you were being so patient with my blunt, accusatory questions. Now, I see that you and I are of a similar mind on this. Nobody’s motives are inviolate, are they? Well, the fact that a murderer is walking around loose is reason enough, but I have other reasons. My meeting with Mr. Felix may make it lucrative for me. I don’t meet with insurance companies for my health.” He found this remark comical and began giggling at his own joke. Penny looked at me puzzled, and I shrugged. “Insurance,” Schwartz said. “Health. Don’t you get it?” Penny and I both shrugged, but we smiled. What else could we do?
Chapter 25
That evening must have been the answer to a life-long dream for Schwartz. Penny spent the night in the third floor bedroom which meant that every extra bedroom in Schwartz’s house had a woman in it. The following morning she joined us for breakfast, and then left for work to set up the meeting between Felix and Schwartz for that afternoon. Schwartz decided that he would spend the morning in the garage with Mia while I ran some interviews. He was desperate to get to his cars; having missed the whole day before.
He’d decided that my whole day would be spent interviewing the surviving Hanson siblings and their spouses. He wanted to let them continue to believe that the case was closed, and that I was merely tying up the loose ends for my article. The angle I was to take was that I was interested in hearing where they thought Matthew might have gotten the Chlordane and why he had wanted to kill his father. If it was possible, I was to steer the conversation to find out how each described the sequence of events after Coneely and Donatelli had gone the day they’d come to administer the last rights to the Hanson father. Schwartz handed me the key to his Fiero, and I decided to start with the most difficult subject, so I went to the familial Hanson residence to speak with Peggy.
Peggy came to the door looking exhausted. I’d been expecting a fight from her, but she was uncharacteristically subdued. She showed me into the kitchen and offered me a coffee. I started by telling her how sorry I was for the loss of her baby brother. She accepted my condolences cordially and blew her nose into a tissue. “I just can’t believe that he could have killed Daddy like that.”
“Do you have any idea where he might have gotten the Chlordane?” I asked.
“None. I tell ya, I really thought it must have been that priest. I’d really convinced myself of it; partly because I couldn’t th
ink how any of us could have gotten Chlordane. I mean, except for me. I probably could have gotten it. I know all kinds of poison suppliers from work. But none of the others had any real access; especially Matthew. But apparently he must have gotten some somewhere.”
“Well,” I said, “when do you think he managed to slip the poison to your father?”
“I don’t know. I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Can we maybe retrace the events of that night a little? Kind of try to piece the story together?”
“Oh, I don’t know. That seems kind of creepy.”
“Please. It would really help me to draw a sympathetic picture of your brother if I can demonstrate that he was considerate in his approach to euthanizing your father.” I was on dangerous ground here. I’d chosen the most delicate wording I could, but even the word euthanasia was inflammatory with Peggy. She sighed and shrugged and told me her version of the events from the time the priests had gone.
She had been fuming as the door closed on the holy men, so she started up the steps toward her bedroom, but decided to stay with her family instead. As she had started for the stairs, the others who had been at the door went into the living room except for Carl who joined his wife with Sam and Melissa in the kitchen. She joined her unmarried brothers and her sister with her husband in the living room.
At this point, I should give a more thorough description of the layout of the Hanson residence. When you came into the front entrance which was on the south wall you were faced right away with the stairwell to the upstairs part of the house. This stairwell was about eight paces in front of you. The area to your left opened to a nicely sized foyer and against the wall to your left was an upright piano. The front door opened to the right as you entered, and behind the door was the main entrance to the living room. If you kept the living room to your right and passed to the right of the stairwell, you found yourself in a short narrow hall. To your left, it opened into the kitchen. To your right, it opened into another narrow hall. Halfway down this hall to your left were the French double-doors to the family dining room which had recently been serving as the senior Hanson’s hospital room. At the end of the hall on the right was a second entry to the living room. The only other exit from the house was a kitchen exit on the west wall. There was one other door on the main floor which was also in the kitchen and which took you to the basement pantry. It was on the south wall of the kitchen directly under the stairwell to the upstairs.
Peggy sat on the couch next to Lewis who was talking with Matthew in the single chair. Marjorie and Melvin were across the room in the love seat, but they became uncomfortable and went into the hall to play the piano. Peggy admitted that what had probably made them uncomfortable was her staring at them. After a while, she had gotten up and moved to the love seat where the television remote was sitting. She turned on the television and switched around the channels, but there was nothing playing that she wanted to watch. She got up and went to the hall to go up to her room once more, but halfway up decided to come down again, and she went into the kitchen. Sam was there trying to calm Melissa, so Peggy went to the pot to make another batch of coffee.
When she got there, she discovered that they’d run out of filters, so she went to the basement pantry to get more, but Sara was already there. Peggy said to her, “We’re out of coffee filters,” and Sara said she knew and showed her that she had gotten out a fresh box. At that moment she heard Matthew come into the kitchen and begin talking to Sam. Matthew was standing in the archway to the kitchen; and she walked past him, down the hall and into the living room where she found Carl talking with Melvin. Lewis was now in the hall with Marjorie at the piano. Peggy had finally begun to calm down, so she went back to the love seat and tried to read the evening paper. Matthew returned to the living room through the main entrance, and handed Peggy a cup of fresh coffee and sat beside her. She put her head on his shoulder, and he suggested that they go and check on their father. “My God,” Peggy said. “He must have just come from poisoning Dad. He already knew that we were going to find him dying or dead.”
I felt I’d gotten about all that I was going to get out of Peggy, so I commiserated with her for a few minutes, made some excuses and left for my next stop. I didn’t want to deal with any more grieving women at the moment, so I chose the other single brother for my next visit. Lewis was living in a hotel near the airport, so I had a long drive. I decided to use some of the drive time to touch base with the magazine. I hadn’t spoken with Jana for several days, so I had to fill her in on some of my progress so she could update the editors at the next editorial meeting. I told her about how Matthew had died and the police assumed suicide over the guilt of having killed his father, but that Schwartz was investigating another track. She wanted to know what Schwartz thought had happened, and I had to confess that I had no idea. Jana found that amusing.
When I got to Lewis’ hotel, I called him on the house phone and asked him if he’d meet me in the coffee shop. This would be my third cup of coffee for the day, and it was barely noon. I ran through the same song and dance, and he told me roughly the same story as Peggy had, though from a slightly different vantage. The door had closed on Coneely and Donatelli, and Peggy had started up the stairs but had decided to follow them into the living room instead. He’d gone into the living room and sat on the couch to talk with Matthew about the Pirate’s winning streak. Peggy had glared at Marjorie and Melvin until they’d gone together into the hall to the piano. Peggy had moved to the love seat and switched through the channels. Lewis and Matthew had pretended to continue discussing baseball, but they had really been commenting under their breath about how peculiarly Peggy was behaving. Eventually, Peggy had gotten up and started for the stairs, but she changed her mind and went into the kitchen. He and Matthew went into the hall to check on her, and when they saw that she had gone into the kitchen, Lewis had joined Marjorie and Melvin at the piano, but Matthew had kept watching the kitchen door. Eventually, Matthew had gone into the kitchen and Melvin had gone into the living room, but Lewis stayed with Marjorie to play the second part of Clair de Lune with her. Soon he saw Matthew return from the kitchen and go into the living room with a cup of coffee. A few minutes later, Matthew and Peggy (who must have entered the living room from the other entrance since he hadn’t seen her come in) went to check on their father. That was when they’d found him dead.
I asked him when he thought Matthew had administered the poison. He answered, “He must have done it while I was on the piano with Marjorie. That must have been what he was doing watching the kitchen entrance, he must have been waiting for the opportunity to slip into my father’s room.”
I thanked Lewis for his help with my article, and he said he was glad to help a fellow journalist, but that he hoped I would be kind toward his brother’s memory. I bought a sandwich to go, left him and went to my next stop promising myself that I’d drink no more coffee that day.
I guess I was lucky, because I found both the Carl Hanson family and the Marjorie Hanson-Melhorne family together at the Melhorne home, and they told me that the Sam Hansons would be joining them shortly. Peggy had called them and told them I was making the rounds, and they decided to make my life a little easier. I think they really just wanted for it all to be over. Marjorie offered me coffee which I declined, but I did ask for a glass of milk to wash down the tuna salad I’d eaten on the way over. I started with my stock question. “So where do you all think Matthew got the poison?”
“I don’t think we’ll ever know that,” Melvin said. “It was probably just a circumstantial thing. He needed a poison and he stumbled across the Chlordane somewhere.”
“Melvin’s probably right,” his wife agreed. “Matthew had a strange way about him. He was secretive and outgoing all at the same time. He always had some kind of scheme working.”
“He was a good kid,” Carl said. “But he wasn’t really like the rest of us. Him and Peggy had a bond though.”
“Yeah,” Sara agreed. “
They were close. This has really hit her hard.”
“So do you think Peggy knows more than she’s willing to say?” I asked.
“Oh, no,” Sara said. “She couldn’t possibly be involved.”
“But if she knew something, do you think she’d keep it quiet to protect Matthew’s memory?” I asked. Sara and Marjorie had begun to shake their heads, but Carl said, “That’s not something we can really talk to, you know. I mean, who can really know what’s going on in somebody else’s head?”
“Are you talking about me?” Melissa said as she and Sam walked into the room.
“No,” Sara said. “We’re talking about Peggy.”
“Oh,” Melissa said. “I thought you might be discussing my, you know, my breakdowns.”
“Now, Melissa,” Sam said. “That’s not at all pertinent.”
“Well,” I said. “It might be. Didn’t you have a little spell the night Mr. Hanson died? Would that keep you from remembering the sequence of events?”
“Why do you need to know the sequence of events anyway?” Melvin asked. And I thought Penny had said they considered him a fool.
“I’m writing an article about this investigation,” I said. “The more facts I have, the more clearly I can tell it. I don’t want to say anything that will make Matthew look plotting and cold if that’s not how it was. Lewis says that Matthew seemed to be — well — I guess hovering would be the word; waiting for an opportunity to poison his father. I don’t want to describe it that way if that’s not how it was.”
“We’re not going to be able to help you much,” Sam said. “We were in the kitchen the whole time while the others came and went. We were there from before the priest left to the moment Peggy and Matthew found Dad dead.”
“Did any of you see Matthew hovering in the hall?” I asked.
“I was in the kitchen the whole time too,” Sara said. “Except for when I went to the pantry for the coffee filters.”
“I’m afraid I was at the piano from the time the priests left until the death was discovered,” Marjorie said.