Lethal Legacy (35 page)

“Apparently so, Ms. Cooper. I wasn’t aware of
that. I know he despised Jonah from the time he set foot in the boardroom. No
class, new money—that sort of thing. You know what I mean.”

Jewish. That was mostly what Talbot Hunt meant.
“So your father made a deal?”

“Yes.”

“With whom?”

“Leland Porter, the president of the library.”

“How convenient that Porter is somewhere in Outer
Mongolia this weekend,” Mike said.

“Well, I assume that’s the way Father got the
psalm book back. Leland is the only person in a position to negotiate something
at that level.”

“Are you telling me you don’t
know
?”

“The key word is supposed to be ‘transparency,’
Mr. Chapman. But behind the scenes, where many of these transactions occur,
it’s thick as mud.”

“Thick as thieves, we say in my business.”

“My father wanted me to have the Bay Psalm Book.
In exchange, he told me he was giving the library something they wanted even
more.”

“What’s that?” Mike asked, looking to me to vet
the credibility of Talbot Hunt’s answer.

“A book of illustrations—twenty rather macabre
watercolors—that were done by William Blake in 1805.
Designs for Blair’s
Grave,
it’s called. The poet kept a set of the paintings for himself. Had
them bound into book form. Simple, but quite striking—a meditation on mortality
and redemption.”

“That must be the only complete set,” I said.
There had been a major controversy just a few years earlier, when Sotheby’s had
broken up a recently discovered group of nineteen plates from the same work—unbound—for
sale at auction.

“That’s correct, Ms. Cooper. If you know that,
then you’re aware that it’s worth many more millions than our prayer book.”

“And the library owns that volume of watercolors
now?”

“The library’s Berg Collection is strong on Blake.
They’ve coveted this for a very long time. Pleaded with my father to pass it on
to them. The book is in their hands, not to be displayed until after Father’s
death—at his own direction—to avoid controversy about the transaction.”

Footsteps in the hallway announced Minerva’s
return.

Her gait was firm and fast. She walked past me and
directly to her brother, stopping only to slap him across the face before she
turned away.

“If you paid any attention to your father you’d
know there was an intercom in every room, so the nurses can hear him if he
calls for anything,” she said. “What else have you swindled me out of, you
selfish bastard? What else, besides that precious little book?”

TWENTY-EIGHT

Mike stood up and stepped between the spoiled
siblings.

“No secrets anymore, Mr. Hunt. Looks like your
sister trumped you on this one. When did the psalm book disappear from your
home?”

“Check with his wife, Detective. She probably took
it to the consignment shop for resale, along with those dreadful things she
calls clothes. She’d have dug those jewels out with her teeth, were it
possible.”

“About three weeks ago, Mr. Chapman,” Talbot Hunt
said. “And leave Josie out of it, Minerva.”

“She is out of it, Tally. Always has been. Father
despises her. Imagine, Detective, leaving her church-mouse-of-a-husband
minister for Talbot Hunt. True love, I’m sure.”

“Why didn’t you report the theft to the police?”

“Not very complicated, is it? I knew it had to be
an inside job—someone who understood the personal value of its worth to me.
Nothing else was disturbed in the entire apartment. I figured it was about blackmail,
and that at the right moment, I’d be contacted. One can’t very well call the
police about a theft of an object for which one doesn’t even have proper title.
The Bay Psalm Book still belongs to the New York Public Library, in theory.”

“Where were you when the theft occurred?” Mercer
asked.

“I was—I mean, we were,” Talbot said, correcting
himself immediately to protect his wife from Minerva’s sharp tongue, “we were
in Millbrook.”

“The family estate, Mr. Wallace. My
great-grandfather bought land in Dutchess County before he died. My grandfather
loved it there, too. A big horse farm,” Minerva said. “Just not big enough for
all of us at any one time.”

“Who else besides you and your wife lives in the
apartment?”

“The children are away at college. It’s just the
two of us. And a housekeeper, but she traveled with us to the country.”

“Do you mind if we get some guys in to go over the
place with you?”

Talbot Hunt
pfumphed
for a few seconds. “I
told you, it’s been weeks. There’s no harm in it, certainly, but what do you
expect to find?”

“You never know. We might catch a break,” Mike
said. “Where exactly did you keep the psalm book?”

Hunt stared at his sister but didn’t speak.

“Do you have a library in your home?”

“Yes. Yes, I do. But that isn’t where I had it.”

“Like I give a damn, Tally. Tell the man, will
you? I’m not after your books.”

“Then how come your maid was clutching it when she
died?” he shouted at her. “Who were you expecting to meet there? Your low-life
buddy Eddy Forbes?”

“Imagine one family with this much dirty laundry,
Mr. Chapman. It’s lifesaving that my brother married a washerwoman,” Minerva
said. “You see, Tally couldn’t keep the book in his safe—the one in the bedroom
closet—because that’s where the cow keeps her jewelry. Don’t be shocked, Ms.
Cooper. Father always called Josie the cow. Suits her dead on.”

“How do you know about the safe in your brother’s
bedroom closet?” Mike asked.

“Because Tally’s first wife—his
late
first
wife—was a very dear friend of mine. I went there often when she was alive to
borrow some of the pieces my mother had left to her. And yes, she died of
natural causes—don’t think I wasn’t on his case about that.”

“There’s a bureau in my dressing room, Detective.
I kept the book in a false drawer. Actually locked in that drawer, at the base
of the bureau.”

“Locked…with a key?”

“Yes.”

“Do you still have the key?” I asked, thinking of
the one I found on the floor in the stacks.

“I do. It’s at home. You can have it if you like.”

“Was the lock broken?”

“Not at all. Picked, I’d say.”

“Who knew about the drawer?”

“Well, obviously, my wife.”

Minerva crossed her arms and let out a long, low
“moo.”

“I’m not sure anyone else would know.”

“The housekeeper?”

“Certainly, she cleans in there, but I can’t
imagine she’d be involved. She’s been with me for twenty years, Mr. Chapman.”

“Anyone else?” Mike asked. “Workmen, guys doing
construction or repairs, people in the building?”

“It’s a Park Avenue building. Quite secure. And no
one was doing any work for us inside the apartment.”

“Who was helping you in the library?” Minerva
asked, rearranging the French tulips in a vase near the sofa. “You’ve always
had someone to watch out for the books. Who now, Tally?”

“The same curator I’ve had for years. He’ll be
happy to talk with you. He’s only there one day a week.”

Minerva Hunt snapped the stem off one of the
flowers and focused her attention on her brother. “That’s not what I mean,
Tally. Who’s your book doctor these days, hmmm? Who’s been doing your
preservation assessments? Mending your tears? Checking your clamshell boxes?”

Talbot Hunt was trying to ignore Minerva, but she
was like a steam engine picking up speed.

“Now I see it,” she said. “Tell the nice
detectives what they ought to know.”

“It has nothing to do with this.”

“Tina Barr was working for my father, Mr. Chapman.
She was treated well here, as you might guess. Then all of a sudden she quit.
Quite abruptly.”

“And started working for Alger Herrick,” Talbot
said.

“Only part-time,” I said. That’s what Herrick had
told us.

“You hired her away from Father, didn’t you? You
knew Tina had all the information about his collection that you weren’t able to
get from him yourself. How far in did you let her, Tally?”

His face was red and he looked like he was ready
to spit at his sister.

“She wanted the extra work. She didn’t enjoy it
here. This is more like a mausoleum than a library. I was doing her a favor,
Minerva. Can you understand that?”

“How far did you go, Tally? That’s all I asked.”

“It’s not what you think,” he said, gritting his
teeth.

“You were sleeping with her, weren’t you?”

“Stop it!” he shouted at Minerva. “Don’t be such a
fool.”

“A fool to figure it out, or to say it in front of
the detectives?”

I’d only seen Tina Barr in the immediate aftermath
of her first victimization. It was hard to think of the distraught young woman
as anyone’s paramour.

Talbot Hunt started toward the foyer.

“Didn’t figure she was your type, Mr. Hunt,” Mike
said, following him. “So what kind of favor did you do for her? How long did
your affair go on?”

Hunt stopped long enough to say, “Hardly an
affair, Detective. Tina came on to me, that’s all it was. She was lonely—and,
well…things happened.”

“I get lonely myself, Mr. Hunt. Doesn’t mean I
crawl into bed with the first weasel that comes along,” Mike said. “What kind
of things? Did you and she have a sexual relationship?”

He looked past Mike at Minerva, his teeth
clenched.

“I won’t tell Josie,” Minerva said. “You must
understand, Mr. Chapman, he’s terrified of his wife. He’s already given her far
too much stake in Hunt properties, and she dangles that over his head like a
sword.”

“Did you sleep with Tina Barr in the bedroom of
your apartment?” Mercer asked. “Where you kept the book?”

Hunt took too long to think. The answer must have
been yes.

“But where was your wife?” Mike asked.

“One of the cats must have his tongue, Detective.
Josie spends most of her weekends in Millbrook. Tally’s to the manor born, of
course. And she’s to the barn born—but to the manor well-adjusted. Loves living
the grand country life there.”

Mercer stepped closer to Talbot Hunt, pressing
Mike’s arm to encourage him to move away. “We need to have this information,
sir. Did Tina Barr know about the psalm book?”

“Of course she did. She’s a—she was a very
accomplished conservator. It interested her as much as anyone else in our
world.”

“Were you intimate with her?”

They were face-to-face, ten steps away from
Minerva and me, in the darkened foyer.

“Yes, Mr. Wallace, I was.”

“We’re going to need to know when that
relationship started and when it ended.”

“I told you that it wasn’t a relationship. I’ll
try to give you any specifics I remember.”

“Did she spend time in the bedroom of your
apartment?”

“Yes, Mr. Wallace. Are you through humiliating me?
Yes, she did.”

“Did she have a key to your apartment?”

“Of course. She was doing work there for me. I
trusted her with my entire collection. Why wouldn’t I give her a key?”

Mercer’s voice seemed to get lower with every
question he asked. “Did she know where the drawer was, the one in which you
locked the book when you left town?”

Talbot Hunt paused for several seconds. “I—I guess
she might have. It’s possible she saw me fetch it from the bureau after a
weekend away.”

Minerva turned away, reached for a small silver
bell on one of the tables, and rang it. “I think I need a drink.”

“My sister, the virgin queen. Hard to take
criticism on this subject from you.”

Mercer tried to keep Talbot focused on Tina Barr.
“After you realized the book was missing, did you talk about it with Tina?”