Chương 8
He looked up.
“Yes.”
“When?”
He considered it.
“That’s a fair criticism.”
“It wasn’t criticism.”
“Worse.”
She watched warehouses give way to trees.
After a while, Marcus said, “What made you become a mechanic?”
“My aunt’s car broke down when I was fifteen.”
“That’s it?”
“No. I’m giving you the short answer.”
“What’s the long one?”
“My mother dated a mechanic named Rob for six years. He taught me because I wouldn’t stop hovering. He thought girls should know enough about cars to avoid being robbed.”
“Did it work?”
“I became the person doing the billing.”
Marcus smiled.
“What happened to Rob?”
“He married somebody else.”
“Oh.”
“My mother dumped him first.”
“Oh.”
“She hated camping.”
“That was the issue?”
“One of them.”
Marcus laughed.
David glanced at them in the mirror.
Hannah ate the second half of the sandwich.
After another hour, Marcus said, “My father taught me to sail.”
She looked out the window.
“Did you like it?”
“No.”
“Why’d you keep doing it?”
“I liked him.”
Hannah turned.
Marcus shrugged.
“He was terrible at teaching. Every instruction sounded like a disappointed question.”
She understood that immediately, though she had never met Jonathan.
“What did Evelyn teach you?”
Marcus looked down at his hands.
“How to enter a room.”
Hannah thought he was joking.
He wasn’t.
Martin Bell lived in a yellow house outside Brattleboro with a sloping lawn and three bird feeders. He was seventy-eight, broad in the middle, and wore red suspenders over a plaid shirt.
He opened the door and looked at Marcus.
“You’ve got Jonathan’s nose.”
Then he looked at Hannah.
His expression changed.
“My God.”
Hannah tightened her grip on the box.
Bell stepped aside.
The house smelled like toast.
A television played softly somewhere in the back. A woman called, “Is that them?”
“Yes, Ellen.”
“Tell them shoes off if they’re muddy.”
Bell looked at their shoes.
“Apparently the law no longer protects visitors.”
They removed them.
The ordinary awkwardness helped Hannah breathe.
They sat at a dining table covered with newspapers and a half-finished jigsaw puzzle.
Bell put on reading glasses.
Hannah took out the letters.
When she handed him the first one, his fingers trembled slightly.
He read it.
Then the second.
He removed his glasses.
“I did not write this.”
Marcus leaned forward.
“You’re certain?”
“I’m seventy-eight, not dead.”
“Sorry.”
Bell examined the letter again.
“This letterhead was ours. The reference number is right. Whoever produced it had access to the file.”
“Could my father have dictated it to somebody else?” Marcus asked.
“Possible. But he wouldn’t have signed JRC.”
“Could a secretary have made that error?”
“Possible.”
Hannah watched his face.
“But?”
Bell took off his glasses again.
“But I remember this matter.”
“Why?”
“Because your father came to my office angry enough to knock over an umbrella stand.”
Marcus sat back.
“What was he angry about?”
“Your mother.”
The room changed.
Bell glanced toward Hannah.
“Claire knew Evelyn had discovered the arrangement. Jonathan believed Evelyn had contacted Claire directly. He wanted the trust completed quickly.”
“Then why wasn’t it?” Hannah asked.
Bell’s eyes dropped to the table.
“Because three days later his personal secretary called and said he had withdrawn instructions.”
“You believed her?”
“At the time, yes.”
“Did you call him?”
“I tried. He was traveling.”
“Then?”
“Then I received this.”
He tapped the second letter.
“I thought it was strange.”
“But you accepted it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Bell looked at her.
There was no good answer available.
He chose an honest one.
“Because wealthy clients often behaved strangely, and because I was busy, and because the letter gave me permission to stop dealing with an unpleasant family matter.”
Hannah stared at him.
Bell swallowed.
“I have regretted that this morning more than I did for twenty-eight years.”
“That’s convenient.”
“Yes.”
Marcus started to speak.
Hannah raised a hand.
Bell nodded slowly.
“You’re entitled to that.”
“Did you ever meet my mother?”
“Once.”
“What was she like?”
The question surprised all three men.
Bell looked toward the window.
“Angry.”
Hannah almost smiled.
“Good.”
“And scared.”
The smile disappeared.
“Of what?”
“Not Jonathan.”
Bell looked at Marcus.
“Evelyn.”
Marcus stood and walked to the far end of the room.
Hannah said, “What did Evelyn do?”
“I don’t know.”
“You said my mother was scared.”
“She asked whether the trust could be structured so Evelyn could never identify where she and the child lived.”
Hannah’s skin went cold.
“Why?”
“She wouldn’t say.”
Marcus turned.
“Did my father know?”
“I told him.”
“And?”
“He said he would handle Evelyn.”
Bell’s mouth twisted.
“Jonathan was very confident about his ability to handle problems he had created.”
That sounded true enough to hurt.
David, who had remained quiet, asked, “Do you have files?”
Bell looked at him.
“Old files were transferred when the firm merged.”
“Where?”
“Archive vendor, maybe. Some were digitized. I don’t know what survived.”
“Can you authorize access?”
“I can request it.”
David nodded.
“Do that.”
Bell looked annoyed.
“I was a partner for thirty-two years, son. I know what to do with a file request.”
David inclined his head.
“Fair.”
Hannah gathered the letters.
Bell touched the edge of the second one.
“There is one thing.”
She stopped.
“Your mother sent me a letter years later.”
“When?”
“After Jonathan died.”
Hannah stared.
“Why?”
“She asked if I still had records.”
“Do you?”
“No. But I remember answering.”
“What did you say?”
“That I did not keep personal copies of client materials.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
Bell’s eyes were sad.
“I can’t answer that.”
Marcus returned to the table.
“Do you remember what year?”
“Two thousand fourteen, maybe fifteen.”
Jonathan Cross had died in 2013.
Hannah was seventeen.
On the drive back, nobody spoke for nearly an hour.
Then David’s phone rang.
He put it on speaker only after asking Marcus.
A woman from his office said, “We traced the recent payment.”
Hannah sat straighter.
“It did not go to Ms. Reed.”
May you like
“To whom?” Marcus asked.
“LLC formed six weeks before the transfer. Registered agent leads to an attorney named Paul Hensley.”
