Bloodlines (25 page)

The first five years after Todd was lost at sea had been the most hellish time of Warren's life, but he had managed to get through them without doing either of the two things that seemed most likely to him: killing himself or confessing to the authorities. Warren believed it was his cowardice and not his courage that had prevented either. That, and Auburn's friendship. Auburn had extracted weekly promises from him not to commit suicide, until a day when Warren finally promised not to try it without notifying Auburn first.

Warren's life had changed. He no longer attended social events. Once a man who could seldom tolerate being alone, he now found himself seldom able to tolerate the company of others. His reclusiveness was seen by others as an indication of his grief--after all, others would say, the man had lost most of his family in one evening. That much was true.

One person, however, could command his presence at any gathering: Mitch Yeager. He realized that Yeager was monitoring his moods, as well as making sure that Warren knew where things stood. He wasn't sure what Mitch Yeager had planned for him. Yeager, once confronted, said Warren had nothing to worry over, provided he wasn't overwhelmed by an urge to make accusations that couldn't be proved.

Yeager surprised him unpleasantly one day by telling him of a recording. The tape, Yeager said, made clear that Warren desired his parents' deaths and wanted to take over his father's company. Warren was assured that on the tape, Yeager would be heard adamantly refusing to be a part of any murder plot and advising him to seek psychiatric help.

Warren, reflecting on the work that had been done recently on the Nixon tapes, now wondered if specialists could determine that the tape Yeager secretly made of their conversation had been altered. And he was beginning to suspect that such a tape could not be used as evidence against him.

But no one in this room knew any of that.

Instead, he told Lillian what he had told Zeke and Auburn sixteen years ago, about the event that had led to this gathering. How it happened that Warren, leaving the Las Piernas Country Club after a luncheon engagement with Auburn, literally bumped into Yeager's wife Estelle, who was not too steady on her pins. He was surprised to see her in that condition. He later learned that on the days when her adopted son was in preschool, it was not unusual for her to polish off three martinis in the country club bar.

She smiled up at Warren and asked him if he could help her figure out where she had parked. He gave her his arm and guided her to her car. He offered to give her a lift back to her house, but she shuddered and said, "Mitch wouldn't like that much."

Perhaps because of the booze, or perhaps because she hadn't realized that Warren wasn't truly a friend of the family, before she settled herself into her BMW, Estelle invited Warren to her young son's fifth birthday party. Believing this was another appearance commanded by her husband, Warren accepted the invitation.

"I'd be pleased to come. I don't think I've ever met Mitch Junior, have I?" he had said.

"Oh, probably not--I try to keep him out of the way when Mitch has his friends over. And he's not Mitch Junior. We decided to call him Kyle. That was Adam's middle name. Did you know Adam--Mitch's brother?"

Warren shook his head.

"Oh. Well, he's been gone for some years now," she said uneasily, and looked away.

"I like the name Kyle," Warren said, mostly to distract her from what were obviously unhappy thoughts.

She smiled. "Me too. Besides, I could only cope with one Mitch in the house at a time." She blushed, then said, "Please don't ever tell Mitch I said that."

"I promise I won't," he said. She thanked him and hurried off, as if afraid of making further unguarded remarks.

Yeager had smiled tightly when Warren arrived at the party, his eyes glinting as he turned to his wife--who was perfectly sober on this occasion. Warren, correctly guessing that Yeager neither expected nor wanted him to be there, saw the color drain from Estelle's face, and hurriedly spoke before Yeager could lash out at her. "I hope you don't mind my only coming by for a few minutes--I can't stay long. Just wanted to wish your son a happy birthday."

Warren had by this time learned to hide his emotions, behind a bland look perceived by Yeager as a mixture of stupidity and meekness.

Yeager laughed and said, "What could be more important than my son's birthday? Come in and stay as long as you can."

Warren saw Estelle's relief and smiled.

He moved into a room crowded with adults. On the back lawn, a clown entertained a half dozen young children. Two young men were shooed away from raiding a table of hors d'oeuvres--Mitch's nephews, Eric and Ian, he later learned--then they sat pinching and lightly punching each other whenever their harassed Aunt Estelle wasn't looking. He thought they were probably in their twenties--too old to be acting so childishly.

Warren carefully set the wrapped gift he had purchased--a Tonka dump truck--at the base of a great pyramid of birthday plunder. He heard familiar laughter and turned toward it, smiling.

Todd! Todd's laughter. In the next instant, he told himself that was not possible, was it? But the memory of that laugh was so clear...

The sound came again, and he realized it was a child's laugh. He could not control the disappointment he felt, even as he chided himself for reacting as he did. The laughter of one boy as he ran from another, that was all. The laughing boy came to stand before Warren. A dark-haired, dark-eyed child.

The boy studied him, then glanced at the package Warren had added to the pile of gifts. "Did you bring that for me?"

"Are you Kyle?"

"Yes."

Warren wondered how the child had managed to take note of one among so many, but he said, "Yes, that's for you. Happy birthday, Kyle."

"What is it?"

"Something I hope you'll like."

"Me too," he said, and ran off to join the other children.

"Me too," a voice said behind Warren, startling him. He turned to see Mitch Yeager.

He wondered how long Yeager had been standing there. He managed to say, "You'll have to let me know if he does."

"Come and sit down--you look as if you've seen a ghost."

Warren laughed. "Thanks, but I'm fine. Just don't like to be in crowds anymore." It was something Yeager knew to be true of him. He saw Yeager's expression clear, so he added, "I really can't stay."

"No? Why is that?"

"I've got to meet with Auburn Sheffield this afternoon."

Yeager frowned. Mention of Warren's arrangements with Auburn never failed to irritate--and distract him. "I'll never understand what made you give that old geezer so much control of your money. I could have helped you do much better with it, and you wouldn't have to live like some beggar in the meantime. You sure you can't get out of that deal?"

"Not a chance," Warren said. Zeke Brennan had made sure that Yeager could never pry him out of the agreement. Warren shrugged helplessly, and again used the truth to distract Yeager. "I never was smart about money. That's why I went to Sheffield. And you said ...I knew you didn't want contact with me."

Yeager looked quickly around him, then said in a low, angry voice, "Watch what you say and where you say it, Warren."

"Sorry."

"Try not to be such a stupid ass all the time."

Warren was pleased to make his escape shortly after receiving that bit of advice.

Warren had cleaned that part of the story up a bit when telling it today. His mother had once hinted to him that Lillian Vanderveer Linworth had run wild as a young woman, but you'd never believe it now. Now she was the picture of sophistication and restraint. He wondered if Katy would have matured in the same way. Somehow, he couldn't imagine it.

She heard him out, then said, "Do I understand you to say that you believe Kyle Yeager is Todd and Katy's son--that he is really Max Ducane?"

"Yes."

"Warren, that's impossible. He was adopted before Max was taken."

Warren looked over to Auburn.

"I was as skeptical as you, Lillian," Auburn said, "at first."

"At first...?"

"The adoption records are sealed, of course," Zeke Brennan said, "and discreet inquiries by an investigator who works for us have led me to believe there is little chance of proving any of Mr. Ducane's suspicions in a court of law." He paused. "All the same, we were able to learn a few things."

"Things that led me to believe Warren hadn't just been imagining a resemblance to Todd," Auburn said. "One was that the judge who approved the adoption had long been suspected of being--let's say, indebted to Mitch Yeager and his associates. Another was that no one--absolutely no one-- other than a few of Mitch Yeager's closest henchmen claims to have seen the child until after Max was taken. Strangely, all of the Yeagers' servants were given a paid leave of two months--something Yeager had never done in the past. Yeager claimed it was to allow time for his new family to become acquainted, but rumor has it that when the servants returned, there were plenty of adjustments still going on."

"Even natural parents may need more than two months to adjust to a new infant in the house," Lillian said.

"Yes," Auburn agreed. "But Mrs. Yeager, who had supposedly taken care of the child during those months, suddenly did not know how to manage his care--a nursemaid was hired in January."

"Forgive me, I don't like to speak ill of the dead, especially of someone who was once a friend. But the truth is, Estelle was one of the biggest lushes in town. It could be that Mitch finally had to accept the fact that a drunk shouldn't be the only one caring for his son."

"You misremember that bit of history, I think," Auburn said. "If you think back, I believe you'll realize that Estelle was just starting to drink around the time when Kyle started preschool."

Lillian shrugged. "It makes no difference to anyone now."

"Have you ever met Kyle Yeager?" Warren asked.

"No, I don't know the boy."

"It isn't surprising that you haven't met him," Auburn said. "Mitch has never introduced his adopted son into local society. He was sent away to boarding school at the age of nine, and the moment he graduated, packed off to New Hampshire--to Dartmouth. He wasn't brought home for holidays or vacations. I know a few people who met him briefly at Estelle's funeral--he was only eleven when she died. Why did Mitch hide him away?"

"Mitch started a new family not long after that," Lillian said reasonably. "Not everyone can manage to make a new wife comfortable with the children of a first marriage."

"Mitch and his son have been at odds for years now, Lillian."

"Where have you been, Auburn? It's called the generation gap.'Don't trust anyone over thirty,' remember? Even that's a little dated, I suppose. Now it's the Alliance for Survival telling them to 'question authority.'"

"Perhaps that's all it is. Perhaps it's the natural set of differences between child and parent. However, when you see Kyle, I think you'll better understand why Warren and Zeke and I feel as we do."

"Does he really look so much like Todd?"

"No. Nor does he look exactly like a male version of Katy. But there is something of each of them in him, I'd say."

"Auburn," she said, her voice a shade more brittle than before, "what you have offered as proof is hardly enough to justify the sort of accusation that goes hand in hand with this... this notion of Warren's. You're saying, then, that Mitch arranged the murder of the nursemaid? That he kidnapped my grandchild? It makes no sense. Why would he do such a thing? He has the resources to adopt any number of children. Why would he go to such lengths?"

"You will forgive me for asking this, Lillian, but isn't it true that you were once close to Mitch?"

"Yes," she said, without hesitation. "Shall I name a few of your youthful follies now, Auburn?"

He raised a hand, in the gesture of a fencer acknowledging a hit. "That won't be necessary--we haven't got all day."

"Indeed not. Now..."

"Your pardon, Lillian. I only bring up your ties to Mitch Yeager because I know that he never forgives anything he perceives to be an injury or an insult."

"I'm fully aware of Mitch's ability to hold a grudge."

For a moment, Warren saw what he thought was another small change in her composure--as if she had briefly reminisced and found the reminiscence unpleasant.

Then she looked directly at Warren and said, "Auburn is right, Mitch doesn't forgive easily. Mitch had a high school crush on me. I don't think I meant much to him at all--certainly not enough to bring him to murder anyone or kidnap a child decades after our little teenage romance had soured. Your accusations, however, were they to become known, would displease him to a degree that might lead him to respond in ways ...well, in ways I don't like to contemplate."

"By the time he learns of my plans," Warren said, "I'll be beyond his reach."

She studied him for a moment, then said, "And so your plans include leaving me here to deal with his wrath? He's very touchy about his reputation these days."

"No. I'm not asking you to be involved in this in any way. I just wanted you to know... in advance. I didn't want my plans to come as a shock to you."