Murder at Monticello (10 page)

19

“You know, if I ever get tired of home, I'll come live in your barn,”
Paddy promised.

“No, you won't,”
Simon, the possum, called down from the hayloft.
“You'll steal my treasures. You're no good, Paddy. You were born no good and you'll die no good.”

“Quit flapping your gums, you overgrown rat. When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it.”
Paddy washed one of his white spats.

A large black cat permanently wearing a tuxedo and spats, Paddy was handsome and knew it. His white bib gleamed, and despite his propensity for fighting, he always cleaned himself up.

Mrs. Murphy sat on a director's chair in the tack room. Paddy sat in the chair opposite her while Tucker sprawled on the floor. Simon wouldn't come down. He hated strange animals.

The last light of day cast a peachy-pink glow through the outside window. The horses chatted to one another in their stalls.

“I wish Mom would come home,”
Tucker said.

“She'll be at Eagle's Rest a long time.”
Mrs. Murphy knew that calling upon the bereaved took time, plus everyone else in Crozet would be there.

“Funny how the old man dropped.”
Paddy started cleaning his other forepaw.
“They're already digging his grave at the cemetery. I walked through there on my rounds. His plot's next to the Berrymans' on one side and the Craigs' on the other.”

Tucker walked to the end of the barn, then returned.
“The sky's bloodred over the mountains.”

“Another deep frost tonight too,”
Paddy remarked.
“Just when you think spring is here.”

“Days are warming up,”
Mrs. Murphy noted.
“Dr. Craig. Wasn't that Larry Johnson's partner?”

Paddy replied,
“Long before any of us were born.”

“Let me think.”

“Murph.”
Tucker wistfully stood on her hind legs, putting her front paws on the chair.
“Ask Herbie Jones, he remembers everything.”

“If only humans could understand.”
Mrs. Murphy frowned, then brightened.
“Dr. Jim Craig. Killed in 1948. He took Larry into his practice just like Larry took in Hayden McIntire.”

Paddy stared at his former wife. When she got a bee in her bonnet, it was best to let her go on. She evidenced more interest in humans than he did.

“
What set
you
off?
”

The tiger cat glanced down at her canine companion.
“Paddy said he walked through the cemetery. The Randolphs are buried between the Berrymans and the Craigs.”

Tucker wandered around restlessly.
“Another unsolved murder.”

“Ah, one of those spook tales they tell you when you're a kitten to scare you,”
Paddy pooh-poohed.
“Old Dr. Craig is found in his Pontiac, motor running. Found at the cemetery gates. Yeah, I remember now. His grandson, Jim Craig II, tried to reopen the case years back, but nothing came of it.”

“Shot between the eyes,”
Mrs. Murphy said.
“His medical bag stolen but no money.”

“Well, this town is filled with weirdos. Somebody really wanted to play doctor.”
Paddy giggled.

“In 1948,”
Mrs. Murphy triumphantly recalled the details told to her long ago by her own mother, Skippy,
“The town smothered in shock because everyone loved Dr. Craig.”

“Not everyone,”
Paddy said.

“Hooray!”
Tucker jumped up as she heard the truck coming down the driveway.
“Mom's home.”

“Paddy, come on in. Harry likes you.”

“Yeah, get out of here, useless,”
Simon called down from the loft.

The owl poked her head out from under her wing, then stuck it back. She rarely joined in these discussions with the other animals since she worked the night shift.

The dog bounded ahead of them.

The tuxedo cat and the tiger strolled at a leisurely pace to the front door. It wouldn't do to appear too excited.

“Ever wish we were still together?”
Paddy asked.
“I do.”

“Paddy, being in a relationship with you was like putting Miracle-Gro on my character defects.”
Her tail whisked to the vertical when Harry called her name.

“Does that mean you don't like me?”

“No. It means I didn't like me in that situation. Now, come on, let's get some supper.”

20

The upper two floors of Monticello, not open to the public, served as a haven and study for the long-legged Kimball Haynes. While most of the valuable materials relating to Mr. Jefferson and his homes reposed in the rare books section of the Alderman Library at the University of Virginia, the Library of Congress, or the Virginia State Library in Richmond, only a small library existed upstairs at Monticello.

One of Kimball's pleasures consisted of sitting in the rectangular room above the south piazza, or greenhouse, which connects the octagonal library to Jefferson's cabinet, the room he used as his private study. Kimball kept a comfortable wing chair there and a private library, which included copies of records that Jefferson or his white employees kept in their own hand. He pored over account books, visitors' logs, and weather reports for the year 1803. As Mr. Jefferson was serving his first term as president during that year, the records lacked the fullness of the great man's attention. Peas, tomatoes, and corn were planted as always. A coach broke an axle. The repairs were costly. The livestock demanded constant care. A visitor assigned to a third-floor room in November complained of being frightfully cold, a reasonable complaint, since there were no fireplaces up there.

As the night wore on, Kimball heard the first peepers of spring. He loved that sound better than Mozart. He thumbed the copies blackened by the soil on his hands. Ground-in dirt was an occupational hazard for an archaeologist. He had used these references for years, returning to the rare books collection at the University of Virginia only when he'd scrubbed his hands until they felt raw.

After absorbing those figures, Kimball dropped the pages on the floor and leaned back in the old chair. He flung one leg over a chair arm. Facts, facts, facts, and not a single clue. Whoever was buried in the dirt at Cabin Four wasn't a tradesman. A tinker or wheelwright or purveyor of fresh fish, even a jeweler, wouldn't have had such expensive clothing on his back.

The corpse belonged to a gentleman. Someone of the president's own class. 1803.

Now, Kimball knew that might not be the year of the man's death, but it couldn't be far off. Whatever happened politically that year might have some bearing on the murder, but Kimball's understanding of human nature suggested that in America people rarely killed each other over politics. Murder was closer to the skin.

He recalled a scandal the year before, 1802, that cut Thomas Jefferson to the quick. His friend from childhood, John Walker, accused Jefferson of making improper advances to his wife. According to John Walker, this affair started in 1768, when Thomas Jefferson was not yet married, but Walker maintained that it continued until 1779, seven years after Jefferson had married Martha Wayles Skelton, on January 1, 1772. The curious aspect of this scandal was that Mrs. Walker saw fit to burden her husband with the disclosure of her infidelity only some time after 1784, when Jefferson was in France.

Kimball also remembered that upon Jefferson's return from France, he and John Walker began to move on separate political paths. Light-Horse Harry Lee, father of Robert E. Lee, later volunteered to mediate between the two former friends. As Light-Horse Harry loathed Thomas Jefferson, the result of this effort was a foregone conclusion. Things went from bad to worse with James Thomson Callender, a vicious tattletale, fanning the flames. It was at this time that the infamous allegations against Jefferson for sleeping with his slave, Sally Hemings, began to make the rounds.

By January of 1805 these stories gained enough currency to cause the
New-England Palladium
to castigate Mr. Jefferson's morals. Apparently, Mr. Jefferson did not stand for family values.

The fur flew. Few cocktails are more potent than politics mixed with sex. Drinks were on the house, literally. Congress wallowed in the gossip. Things haven't changed, Kimball thought to himself.

To make matters murkier, Jefferson admitted to making a pass at Mrs. Walker. Acting as a true gentleman, Jefferson shouldered all the blame for the affair, which he carefully noted as having occurred before his marriage. In those days, the fellow accepted the stigma, no matter what had really happened. To blame the lady meant you weren't a man.

Thanks to Jefferson's virile stance, even his political enemies let the Walker affair go. Everyone let it go but John Walker. Only as Walker lay dying at his estate in Keswick, called Belvoir, did he acknowledge that Jefferson was as much sinned against as sinner. By then it was too late.

The Sally Hemings story, however, did damage the president. A white man sleeping with a black woman created a spectacular conundrum for everyone. A gentleman couldn't admit such a thing. It would destroy his wife and generate endless jokes at his expense. Let there be one red-haired African American at Monticello and the jig was up, literally. That little word-play ran from Maine to South Carolina in the early 1800s. Oh, how they must have laughed in the pubs. “The jig is up.”

It did not help Mr. Jefferson's case that some fair-skinned African Americans did appear at Monticello bearing striking resemblance to the master. However, as Kimball recalled, Thomas wasn't the only male around with Jefferson blood.

So what if a cousin had had an affair with Sally? Bound by the aristocratic code of honor, Jefferson still must remain silent or he would cause tremendous suffering to the rake's wife. A gentleman always protects a lady regardless of her relation to him. A gentleman could also try to protect a woman of color by remaining silent and giving her money and other favors. Silence was the key.

One thing was certain about the master sleeping with a slave: The woman had no choice but to say yes. In that truth lay lyric heartache sung from generation to generation of black women. Broke the hearts of white women too.

Stars glittered in the sky, the Milky Way smeared in an arc over the buildings as it had centuries ago. Kimball realized this murder might or might not have something to do with Thomas Jefferson's personal life, but it surely had something to do with a violent and close relationship between a white man and a black woman.

He would go over the slave roster tomorrow. He was too sleepy tonight.

21

The Crozet Lutheran Church overflowed with people who had come to pay their last respects to Wesley Randolph. The deceased's family, Warren, Ansley, Stuart, and Breton, sat in the front pew. Kimball Haynes, his assistant Heike Holtz, Oliver Zeve and his wife, and the other staff at Monticello came to say good-bye to a man who had supported the cause for over fifty of his seventy-three years.

Marilyn and Jim Sanburne sat in the second pew on the right along with their daughter Marilyn Sanburne Hamilton, alluring in black and available thanks to a recent divorce. Big Mim would apply herself to arranging a more suitable match sometime in the future.

The entire town of Crozet must have been there, plus the out-of-towners who had occasion to know Wesley from business dealings, as well as friends from all over the South.

The Reverend Herbert Jones, his deep voice filling the church, read the Scriptures.

Somber but impressive, the funeral would have been remembered in proportion to Wesley's services to the community. However, this funeral stuck in people's memories for another reason.

Right in the middle of Reverend Jones's fervent denial of death, “For if we believe we are risen in Christ . . .” Lucinda Payne Coles whispered loud enough for those around her to hear, “You sorry son of a bitch.” Red in the face, she slid out of the pew and walked back up the aisle. The usher swung the door open for her. Samson, glued to his seat, didn't even swivel his head to follow his wife's glowering progress.

As the people filed out of the church, Mim cornered Samson in the vestibule. “What in the world was that all about?”

Samson shrugged, “She loved Wesley, and I think her emotions got the better of her.”

“If she loved Wesley, she wouldn't have marred his funeral. I'm not stupid, Samson. What are you doing to her?” Mim took the position that men wronged women more often than women wronged men. In this particular case she was right.

Samson hissed, “Mim, this is none of your business.” He stalked off, knowing full well she'd never refer a customer to him again. At that moment he didn't care. He was too confused to care.

Harry, Susan, and Ned observed this exchange, as did everyone else.

“You're going to get a call tonight.” Susan squeezed her husband's forearm. “That's the price of being such a good divorce lawyer.”

“Funny thing is, I hate divorce.” Ned shook his head.

“Don't we all?” Harry agreed as the source of her former discontent, Fair, joined them.

“Damn.”

“Fair, you always were a man of few words.” Ned nodded a greeting.

“My patients don't talk,” Fair replied. “You know, something's really wrong. That's not like Lulu. She knows her place.”

“It's going to be a much poorer place now,” Susan wryly noted.

“Mim will wreak vengeance on Samson. Bad enough he told her to bugger off, he did it in public. He'll have to crawl on his belly over hot coals—publicly—to atone for his sin.” Ned knew how Mim worked. She used her money and her vast real estate holdings as leverage if she felt a pinch in the pocketbook would suffice. When her target was a woman, she generally preferred to cast her into social limbo. But the human is an animal nonetheless, and harsh lessons were learned faster than mild ones. Had Mim been a man, she would have been called a hard-ass, but she'd have been lauded as a good businessman. Since she was a woman, the term
bitch
seemed to cover it. Unfair, but that was life. Then again, had Mim been a man, she might not have had to teach people quite so many lessons. They would have feared her from the get-go.

Larry Johnson, physician to Wesley and the family, climbed into his car to follow the funeral procession to the family cemetery.

“Hear Warren wouldn't let anyone sign the death certificate but Larry,” Fair mentioned. “Heard it over at Sharkey Loomis's stable.”

“That must have been a sad task for Larry. They'd been friends for years.” Harry wondered how it would feel to know someone for fifty, sixty years and then lose them.

“Come on, or we'll be last in line.” Susan shepherded them to their cars.