Chương 5
“You never do.”
He took the cup.
She remained beside him.
“Did you know about the cellar?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“Who else knew?”
“Anyone who worked here before the renovation. It used to connect to the lake tunnel.”
“What lake tunnel?”
She gave him a long look. “The one your grandfather used during Prohibition.”
“My grandfather was twelve during Prohibition.”
“Then perhaps he used it for something less interesting.”
Despite himself, Adrian smiled once.
Mrs. Weller adjusted the cuff of her blouse. “The tunnel was sealed in 1998. The cellar door was covered during the marble installation, then restored because your father insisted history should remain accessible.”
“My father liked secrets he could stand on.”
“Yes.”
The answer carried fourteen years of private judgment.
“Could someone lock it from outside?”
“Not originally. Mr. Mercer added an electronic latch after Sophie began walking. He said the ring handle was a hazard.”
Adrian looked toward the blue sitting room.
“When?”
“Six years ago.”
“Who could operate it?”
“The security system. There was also a manual release in the study.”
“Why the study?”
“Your father wanted everything controlled from one room.”
Of course he had.
The paramedic opened the morning room door. Isabelle sat on the edge of a sofa with a blood-pressure cuff around her arm. Sophie leaned against her side, eyelids heavy.
“Mrs. Vale has signs consistent with exposure to a sedative,” the paramedic said. “No indication of serious injury, but I recommend hospital evaluation and toxicology testing.”
“I’m not going to a hospital,” Isabelle said.
The paramedic had the tired expression of a man accustomed to wealthy people treating medical advice as a negotiation. “You lost consciousness after an unknown substance was placed over your face.”
“I know.”
“Then you know why I’m recommending it.”
Sophie looked between them.
Adrian said, “We’ll go.”
Isabelle’s eyes sharpened. “You don’t decide that.”
“No. But you’re going.”
“That sounded like deciding.”
“It sounded like begging badly.”
The paramedic looked down at his equipment to hide a reaction.
Isabelle studied Adrian for a moment. Some of the anger left her face, though not enough.
“Fine,” she said. “Sophie comes.”
“The hospital may not allow—”
“She comes.”
Adrian nodded. “She comes.”
A state police detective named Elena Ruiz asked to speak with him before they left. She was in her forties, with dark hair pulled into a low knot and a raincoat folded over one arm despite the clear sky. Her manner was neither impressed by the manor nor hostile to it, which immediately distinguished her from most visitors.
“Your wife says she hid the documents before being attacked,” Ruiz said.
“She hasn’t told me where.”
“She told us.”
Adrian felt something small and humiliating move through him.
Ruiz noticed.
“She wants the location protected,” the detective continued. “Given the circumstances, that’s sensible.”
“Where are they?”
“I’m not sharing that until we recover them.”
“This is my trust.”
“This is her evidence.”
He nearly corrected her. Then he stopped.
Ruiz watched him stop. “Who benefits if those amendments are accepted as authentic?”
“North Harbor Stewardship.”
“What is that?”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“We searched public records. It’s a Delaware limited-liability company created fourteen months ago. Its manager is another entity registered in Wyoming.”
“By whom?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Leonard appeared at the corridor entrance. “Detective, my client is preparing to accompany his wife to the hospital.”
Ruiz looked at him. “Which client?”
Leonard paused.
It was the first useful question anyone had asked him.
“I represent the Vale family and associated entities.”
“Families don’t hold privilege. People and companies do.”
“I am aware.”
“Then decide whom you represent before the interviews continue.”
Leonard’s face cooled. “Mr. Vale has not been accused of anything.”
“Neither had Mrs. Vale when someone put her in a cellar.”
Adrian expected Leonard to answer. Instead, the attorney looked at him.
Choose, the look said.
For most of Adrian’s life, Leonard’s presence had meant that choices could be rearranged into safer shapes. Now he saw the cost of that convenience. Leonard had protected the family by deciding what the family was. Usually, it meant the assets. Sometimes the name. Rarely the people.
“You don’t represent Isabelle,” Adrian said.
Leonard’s jaw tightened. “That would be her decision.”
“It already was.”
The hospital allowed Sophie to remain until Isabelle’s examination began. Then a nurse found a quiet consultation room and gave the child crackers, apple juice, and a box of crayons. Mrs. Weller arrived with an overnight bag and took the chair beside her.
Adrian stood at the window overlooking the parking garage. The glass reflected his open collar, rolled sleeves, and the loose strand of hair across his forehead. He looked like a man performing distress in an advertisement for expensive watches.
He removed the watch.
Sophie was coloring a house with a purple roof.
“Is that ours?” he asked.
“No.”
“Good.”
She pressed harder with the crayon. “Ours has too many windows.”
He sat across from her. “That’s true.”
“And doors.”
“Yes.”
She colored in silence.
After a while, she asked, “Did one of the guards do it?”
Mrs. Weller stopped folding Isabelle’s sweater.
“We don’t know,” Adrian said.
“Mom thinks so.”
“Did she say that?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“She looked at them.”
He had no answer.
Sophie drew a black square beneath the purple house.
Adrian reached across the table and placed his hand over the paper.
She pulled it away.
“It’s the basement,” she said.
“Of course.”
“You said don’t lie when things are scary.”
He remembered saying something like that after she found a dead bird beneath the library window. He had meant adults should not tell children the bird was sleeping. He had not imagined she would retain the principle for use against him.
“I won’t lie,” he said. “Someone hurt your mother. We don’t know who yet. The police are helping us find out.”
“Will they go to jail?”
“Maybe.”
“Even if we know them?”
May you like
“Yes.”
She looked down at the drawing. “That’s worse.”
