Death Under the Lilacs (7 page)

“Fine.” Lyon scooped up the stamps and stuffed them into the London envelope.

“Mr. Wentworth. Really! Your attitude toward those precious items is most cavalier. What sort of collector are you?”

“Well, actually I'm not a collector.”

“These stamps are being used as kidnap ransom,” Rocco interjected.

Edward Brumby stared at them incredulously. “Ransom? Then you are the Wentworth from Connecticut who's been on television.”

“My wife,” Lyon answered.

Brumby continued staring at them in amazement. “Of course, I must ask that you return those stamps. The firm of Brumby and Company will not be a party to any such nefarious undertakings. I will not allow those items you hold to be desecrated by criminal elements.”

Rocco turned away. “Oh, Jesus God,” he said in a low voice.

“I have a certified check for the price,” Lyon said.

“I am perfectly willing to forgo my commission on this matter and resell the stamps at auction,” Brumby replied.

“Mr. Brumby, unless these stamps are sent to an overseas address immediately, my wife's life will be in deep jeopardy.”

“We may have to fight our way out of here,” Rocco mumbled.

“Besides,” Lyon continued, “I am positive that the culprit intends to resell these stamps at once. So, as you can see, they will shortly be back in the hands of true collectors who will appreciate their value.”

“Well, that is a good point,” the stamp dealer said. “I can understand your concern, Mr. Wentworth, but it is so distasteful.”

“It is for all of us,” Rocco said.

“You can be of further help, sir,” Lyon said. “When he receives these stamps, how will he get rid of them for profit?”

“Well, he could have already made arrangements with a private collector, or he could work through one of the large houses.”

“There can't be many of them,” Lyon said.

Brumby beamed. “Oh, with currencies being what they are, and a rather unstable market in diamonds and gold, stamps are a fine investment. More and more money is poured into them, even by the Arabs.”

“Just our luck,” Rocco said.

“Where and how?” Lyon pressed.

“It would have to be a large auction house to carry such a consignment, and the lot should probably be broken up and sold separately. Now, if I were doing it”—he was apparently beginning to relish the details of the scheme—“I would sell the four 24-cent inverteds through H. R. Harmer in New York, the Cape of Good Hope through Robson Lowe in London, and the Confederate Provisional through Edgar Mohraman in Hamburg. Of course, there are many other fine houses who could carry the consignment!”

“Can it be done through a blind submission?”

“Surely. They could be handled through a Swiss bank account. You know, of course, that counterparts to these very same stamps are due for auction within the next two weeks?”

“No,” said Lyon, “we didn't know.”

“I would say,” Brumby continued, “that it will be nearly impossible to check back on them. Whoever it is will clear a fortune.” There was a buzz, and Brumby picked up a phone bracketed out of sight behind his desk. He spoke in a low tone for a few moments and then hung up with a scowl. “It would seem that there are several policemen on the display floor.”

“They are waiting for me,” Rocco said. “I told them I would meet them here.”

“Most unsavory,” Brumby said as he accepted Lyon's check. “Most.”

Within five minutes Rocco had taken the sealed envelope containing the stamps from Lyon and was riding with his police escort to Kennedy International Airport. Lyon was behind the wheel of the Murphysville police cruiser and swerving through the madness of Manhattan traffic.

Lyon drove without conscious thought up Manhattan and across the South Bronx. Only in the Bronx was he aware of his surroundings when he glanced out the car window and saw the shells of buildings and the burned testament of a society turned inward in a rampage of self-hate.

As he approached the Connecticut Turnpike, he cringed back against the seat as if physically feeling the pain Bea might be suffering. The solution had to do with lilacs. She had told him as much, and he still couldn't fathom what she meant.

5

Lyon Wentworth dreamed of lists. In his sleep he ran his fingers down endless columns of computer printouts. The list seemed to stretch forever as it fell over his feet, ran through the door of the study, and down the hall and through the French door onto the patio. And still it continued. He moaned and ran his fingers down the long lists, mouthing each name to see if it struck a chord of familiarity.

The FBI had compiled the lists and provided the state police and Lyon with duplicate copies. The agent named Dupress had been succinct: “We'll run the names for possible MOs and Wanteds. We want you to see if you know anyone.”

The lists were compiled from two sources: plane manifests of flights to London or other cities in Europe that might provide connector flights to London; and the subscription list of the
American Philatelic Journal
. He was to pick up names on the manifests and compare them to the other list.

Lengthy groups of Williamses, Smiths, Browns, and Whites complicated the task.

He dragged himself from sleep and blinked open his eyes. The list dream was still vivid. He moaned. Not only had all day yesterday been spent on the lists, and all of today was so destined, he had done it in his sleep. He rolled out of bed and staggered toward the shower.

He sat in the breakfast nook with a mug of coffee in front of him, the lists to one side, and a yellow legal pad for notes on the other. Sun shone through the window and dappled the walls of the brightly lit room. It was a lovely day completely alien to his mood.

He sipped coffee and said aloud, “The bastard probably used a forged passport.” He stared at the ceiling and reviewed the process of obtaining a passport. A birth certificate. You need only check the newspaper obits for the death of someone your own age and write to the Bureau of Vital Statistics with the proper fee in order to get a new copy. Passport photographs and an application under the assumed name, and in days you had a passport under a new identity.

Too easy, but in this instance would it even be necessary? That was the slim hope they had to work on. He bent over the lists again.

At ten o'clock he found an unmistakable name that was familiar. “R. Traxis,” he said aloud. Possibly it belonged to Robert Traxis of Connecticut. He picked up the subscription list for the stamp journal and hastily searched it for Traxis.

It was there. His fingers trembled as he underlined it. Robert Traxis, 7 Overview Drive, Wessex, Connecticut. The coincidences were remarkable: Not only had R. Traxis flown to London on the Concorde several days ago, he was also a stamp collector. Most important of all, he was Bea's most virulent and dedicated political opponent.

Lyon spilled coffee as he rushed to the kitchen phone. He flipped the phone from its cradle and began to punch numbers.

He stopped. Rocco was gone, and there wasn't any evidence to present to the heavy-handed Captain Norbert. He would make the investigation himself. Where did Traxis work? He owned a medium-sized industrial concern of some sort down near the Connecticut shore. What was its name?

He dialed information and then the number.

“Traxis Machine Company,” an alert female voice answered.

“Can you please tell me where Mr. Traxis can be reached in London? I have an urgent message for him.”

“Mr. Traxis returned from Europe last night. We expect him in the office later today. If you will leave your name?”

Lyon felt numb. It was too early for him to have returned from England. It was too soon for the stamp delivery. Rocco would have called if any contact had been made.

“Hello. Are you there?” the voice from the machine company pressed.

Lyon glanced at the Concorde's flight manifest. Traxis, if he was presently at home, had been in Europe less than twenty-four hours. “Does Mr. Traxis fly to England often?”

“Oh yes, sir. Constantly. We have a plant near Birmingham.”

“I see. Thank you. Oh, could I please have his home phone number?”

“I am sorry, but that number is unlisted. If you will leave a message?”

“Thank you. I'll call back.” Lyon slowly hung up. He tapped the wall impatiently. Continuing to go over the endless lists of names was impossible; it was time to do something. He lifted the phone again and dialed the Murphysville Police Headquarters and asked for Jamie Martin.

“Good morning, Mr. Wentworth,” Jamie answered with a sense of relief in his voice. “For a minute I was afraid it was another housewife who wanted to be locked up.”

“I need an unlisted phone number. The name is Robert Traxis; he lives in Wessex.”

“Is it a police matter?”

“Something Rocco wanted me to follow up on.”

Lyon could sense the officer's hesitation, but then he said, “I'll get it from the phone company and call you back.”

Bea Wentworth watched the sputtering Coleman lantern in horrified anticipation. It was running out of fuel, and there wasn't any more in the small stock of provisions remaining. In minutes she would be in total blackness.

She couldn't turn away from the failing lantern. She could put up with almost anything, including her imprisonment, but not the total dark.

How long had he been gone? She glanced down at the small diamond-chip watch Lyon had given her last Christmas. It read 2:23. Day or night? Good God, she couldn't be sure, and now she was uncertain as to how long she had been held here.

She had once read of an American prisoner of war who had spent a good deal of time in solitary confinement. In order not to go mad, he had spent the time mentally building a dream house.

That was what she would do. She would rebuild Nutmeg Hill from the beginning.

Bea closed her eyes and recalled the first day she and Lyon had stumbled across the boarded house. She relived the day of the closing and that afternoon when they had entered the house knowing it was theirs.

The house had been a shambles. Over the years the boarded windows had developed chinks, and an assortment of debris had forced itself through tiny apertures. The hardwood floors were deeply rutted, as if teams of cleated sportsmen had performed complicated folk dances on them. Bea would have cried at the condition if she hadn't been so happy to have possession of their white elephant.

Just as they had started with the long center room, now their living room, so did Bea begin in the darkness the slow, methodical task of mentally refurbishing Nutmeg Hill.

Wessex was only a twenty-minute drive from Murphysville, and Lyon would have been stopped for speeding if any state troopers had clocked him. He slowed as he approached the village and down-shifted as the car turned into Main Street and the center of town.

One of the oldest towns in the state, Wessex had once been a small but thriving seaport located a few miles above the mouth of the Connecticut River. The town had slept from the demise of whaling until after World War II, when it had been “discovered.” Due to the combination of the passing time and a vigorous historical society, the original nineteenth-century facade of the village center had been preserved.

Wessex differed from most New England towns in that it was not centered around a green, but radiated from the small harbor that had once been its hub.

He parked in front of the Captain's House that was the Traxis address. The house itself was a freshly painted white with a widow's walk on its slate roof. Its long leaded glass windows were shrouded from the inside by lined draperies. Around the corner of the house Lyon saw a well-kept lawn that led down to the water at the edge of the harbor.

He left the car, walked the few steps to the door, and pressed the doorbell. A chime rang in the interior of the house.

He thought back to the last time he had seen Robert Traxis.

In order to gain popular support for the controversial passage of a bill increasing welfare benefits, Bea Wentworth had her committee hold public hearings in various parts of the state. One of those meetings had been held at the Wessex Junior-Senior High School.

Robert Traxis had gained early possession of the floor microphone and had dominated the hearing with a long speech on individualism, Americanism, welfare fraud, and a host of related topics that culminated in a patriotic plea whose code words were a suggestion that if “they” didn't like it, let them leave.

Bea had impatiently snorted from the podium and spoken an aside to a fellow senator that was amplified throughout the auditorium: “What he really means is that everyone should go out and inherit a factory.”

The remark had released the audience's pent-up tension over the Traxis diatribe, and they had burst into laughter.

Robert Traxis had never forgiven Bea, and since that day he had devoted time, energy, and money to her defeat or embarrassment. He was a logical candidate for Bea's worst enemy.

The door was opened by a blond man with hair nearly white who appeared to be in his mid-twenties. He wore a T-shirt that exposed well-muscled arms and shoulders, sweat pants, and New Balance running shoes. “Yeah,” he said in a flat voice. His slate-gray eyes were hard.

“I want to see Traxis.”

“He's in the gymnasium and is never disturbed.”

“It's important. I'm coming in one way or the other,” Lyon said in a quiet voice.

“Really.” The slate eyes appraised him. “Okay, what's your name?”

“Wentworth.”

“Come in.” The eyes flicked to the side of the door as he drew it back. Lyon stepped into the narrow hallway with its highly polished hardwood floors. “He gets mad as hell if I break into his workouts.”

“Ask him.”

The man shrugged and padded silently down the hall into the far recesses of the house. The facade of the building that fronted on the street was deceptive. The house extended far to the rear, with a dozen first-floor rooms opening off the hall. Midway down the hall, a steep stairwell rose to the second floor, while on the walls framed paintings of sea captains stared unemotionally out of past centuries.