Mr. X (65 page)

Nettie and May sat rooted to their chairs.

“In addition,” Creech said, turning to another page, “my client held two insurance policies on his life. His wife was the original beneficiary of both policies. Upon her death, he named Valerie Dunstan as his beneficiary or, in the case of her demise, her son, Ned Dunstan. Each policy provides a three-hundred-thousand-dollar death benefit, so the total death benefit is six hundred thousand dollars. I have spoken to Mr. Kraft’s insurance agent, and he and I will be handling the forms. With luck and the cooperation of the authorities, the checks from the insurance companies should arrive within three to four weeks.”

He may have smiled again, but I could not tell. “Mr. Dunstan, soon you will be a rather well-off young man. If you do not already enjoy the services of a good accountant, I suggest that you find one.”

“I didn’t hear my name yet,” May said.

“You aren’t going to,” Nettie said. “How much are you getting out of this deal, Creech?”

“I will overlook that remark, Mrs. Rutledge.” Creech straightened the papers and closed the folder. “Under stress, people often speak rashly.”

“You haven’t begun to hear rash,” Nettie said. “How much was it?”

“Well, let me think,” Creech said. “For the preparation of Mr. Kraft’s will, I was compensated at my usual hourly rate. The
total fee probably came to something like five thousand dollars, what with the various changes made over time. Mr. Dunstan and I have entered into no prior arrangement, apart from the one executed in front of you, for which I received one dollar. Mr. Dunstan will be invoiced for the time I spent on his behalf earlier today, which had no connection to this matter. Far from colluding with me to change the terms of Mr. Kraft’s bequests, I believe it is clear that Mr. Dunstan had no prior knowledge of those terms. I would go so far as to say that Mr. Dunstan is flabbergasted.”

Nettie whirled in her chair and sent out storm signals. “I want to hear the truth. Did you know what was going to happen when you came in here?”

“I had no idea,” I said. Miss Wick’s pen flew across her pad. “I’m flabbergasted, all right. Toby told me he was going to take care of me, but I thought he was talking about a job in the pawnshop.”

“Now I see it,” Nettie said. “Now I know why you told the old scoundrel he should come to the hospital. I bet you’ve been paying him social calls.”

Creech’s emotionless voice was like a splash of cold water. “Mr. Kraft’s will was last amended two weeks after the death of his wife. The date was April seventeenth, 1965. At the time, I believe Mr. Dunstan was a few months short of his seventh birthday. I also believe it is clear that Mr. Kraft’s intention was to bequest the bulk of his estate to Mr. Dunstan’s mother, and that he has inherited by default.”

“Nettie,” May said, “did the old swindler leave everything to
Star
?”

“He sure did,” said Nettie. “And because she was taken from us, the whole wad comes down to her little boy.”

May craned her neck to look at me. “Neddie, you’re not going to keep it all, are you? Maybe you haven’t gotten very far in life, but you’re a good-hearted boy all the same.”

Without deigning to turn his head, Clark said, “For a factory hand, you’re getting a whole lot of money, boy. I hope you can stay on the straight and narrow.”

“Mr. Dunstan,” Creech said, “have you any intention of assuming my client’s pawnbroker business?”

“No.”

“In that case, we can arrange to liquidate the shop and sell the
property. If you wish, we can also put the other properties on the market. My client’s will must be probated, a process that customarily takes at least a year to conclude, but it would be advisable to take care of these details now.”

“Thank you, yes,” I said. “Arrange to sell Toby’s properties.” I watched Miss Wick’s pen dance over her notebook.

“Fast cars,” Clark said. “A big house. French champagne and buxom girlfriends. You know what they say about a fool and newfound wealth. If you were to let me handle that money, you might have a chance of coming out of this with a few cents in your pocket.”

“Uncle Clark,” I said, “I have to think about what I’m going to do, and I wish you’d all shut up for a second.”

“I have to speak from my heart,” Nettie said, not to me but to the air in front of her, like Clark. “I have to say one little, tiny thing, or it will magnify itself into a great burden and weigh on me forever. Mr. Toby Kraft married our beloved sister. Although he took Queenie from us, we never failed to welcome him into our homes. When our sister passed away, Mr. Toby Kraft remained a member of our family circle. You could say, he even became a pest. Toby Kraft was in the habit of dropping in uninvited and staying for dinner, and for the sake of my dear sister’s memory I prepared a whole lot more meals for that man than I ever felt like cooking, and the same is true of my sister May. If you were to add up the costs of all the times Toby had the pleasure of a home-cooked dinner, it would come into the thousands of dollars, all out of Christian charity. That old crook never gave any signs of having a fortune squirreled away, did he, May?”

“He did not,” May said.

“To look at the man, he barely had two nickels to rub together. Wore the ugliest clothes you ever saw in your life. He was a drinker, as we knew, and a scoundrel, on top of all that whiskey. But we gave him our love, because we knew no other way. That is the kind of people we are.”

C. Clayton Creech looked at her in undisguised admiration.

“Neddie,” May said, “think what your mother would do.”

“I am thinking of what my mother would have done,” I said. “Mr. Creech, I’d like you to draw up an agreement dividing Mr. Kraft’s estate into four equal parts. One for Aunt Nettie, one for Aunt May, another for my Aunt Joy, and the last for me.”

“Do you want to sleep on it for a night?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

“Are the death benefits from the insurance policies to be included in the division of the estate?”

“Yes,” I said. “How much would each share come to?”

Creech took a notebook from a desk drawer and lit a Lucky Strike from the pack on his desk. “Are we keeping up with these developments, Miss Wick?”

Miss Wick assured him that the developments were being entered into the record.

Creech bent over the notebook and exhaled a substantial plume of smoke. “We have five hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars in cash on hand. Add to that the probable value of the real estate holdings and the insurance benefits, and we have one million, nine hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars. A one-quarter share of Mr. Dunstan’s inheritance comes to four hundred and eighty-one thousand dollars, more or less.”

“Draw up the papers,” I said. “Toby left the money to my mother, and I know she would have shared it with her aunts.”

“Your decision is final,” Creech said.

“You heard the boy, Creech,” Clark said. “Get hopping.”

May looked at me again. “You know, Joy doesn’t need all that money. And Neddie, four hundred and eighty-one thousand dollars sounds like an awful lot to give to a young fellow who has his whole life in front of him.”

I smiled at her. “You’re right. Mr. Creech, I want to donate twenty thousand dollars from my share of the insurance benefits to a woman named Suki Teeter.”

“Could you spell that name for me?” Miss Wick asked.

I spelled Suki’s name. “She’s at the Riverrun gallery on Archer Street, in College Park.”

“That’s all I require,” Creech said. “Would you like me to inform Ms. Teeter of her good fortune?”

“Please.”

Nettie glared. “You’re giving money to that
Suki
?”

“Star would have,” I said. “I saw Suki Teeter the other day, and she needs the money. If you think I shouldn’t do things like that, I could always keep everything for myself. Which would be … ?” I glanced at C. Clayton Creech.

“One million, nine hundred twenty-five thousand dollars.” His delivery made it sound like what you would spend to get into a movie and pick up a medium-sized container of popcorn.

“Suki was a dear friend to Star,” Nettie said. “Your mother would be proud of you. I knew you had a good heart.”

Creech suggested attaching to my gifts the condition that all funds remaining be returned to me upon the death of the recipients, and Nettie said, “I don’t plan on leaving any money to the Red Cross or museums about Nazis. Draw it up and get probate cracking. I want a gas range with two ovens and a griddle, the kind they have in restaurants, and I’d like to get it before they plant me in the ground.” When we all stood up, Creech asked me to come back at 5:30 to sign the papers.

Downstairs, I opened the front door of the townhouse onto a burst of sunlight and a shimmer of green.

Clark wobbled down the steps with the hint of a strut. Nettie and May filed out into the brightness of Paddlewheel Road, and I came down behind them. The Buick gleamed from a parking meter two spaces from Commercial Avenue. A feeling of unreality clung to me. I had given away about a million and a half dollars.

Clark inspected the sleeves of his jacket. “Seems to me I’m in danger of falling a little bit behind the current styles. How much are we supposed to get from Toby?”

“Four hundred and eighty thousand,” Nettie said.

“It isn’t that much, considered in the cold light of day. You couldn’t say that a man with four hundred and eighty thousand dollars in the bank is a man of wealth, so don’t start putting us in that category.”

“I want a big gas range with a griddle,” Nettie said. “And I’m going to get one, no matter what category we’re in.”

“Do you know what I’d like?” May said. “A home entertainment center and a satellite dish, instead of my no-good little TV that only gets three stations.”

“We can both have one,” Nettie said. “But I can’t get over the idea it’s wrong to pay for a frivolity like that.”

“We don’t have to
pay
for our home entertainment centers,” May said. “I’d just like one, that’s all.”

“New clothes,” Clark said. “The day we get that first check, I’m going into Lyall’s and coming out
clean
. Then I’ll stroll over to the Speedway and buy Cassie a double Johnnie Walker Black in honor of old Toby, God rest his soul.”

“Clark,” I said. “There’s something you should know.”

“Toby Kraft will rest easier now,” May said. “I have always said that in spite of his faults, Toby was a very loyal man.”

I said, “Clark, this morning—”

Nettie broke in. “Since he did not wish us to aggravate our grief, we should honor his wishes and let him have the dignified burial he requested. Reverend Swing is officiating at Star’s burial, Neddie. Reverend Swing is famous for his funerals.”

“I’m sure I’ll love Reverend Swing,” I said. “But I have to tell Clark—”

“You don’t want to go against the last wishes of a dying man,” Clark broke in.

“Clark,”
I said, too loudly. “You won’t be buying any drinks for Cassie Little.”

Irritated, he said, “And why is that, pray tell?”

“She’s dead.”

“You’re mistaken. She had a little cold the other day, but otherwise that girl’s in the pink.”

“I’m sorry, Uncle Clark.” It was too late to go back and do this the right way. Ashen shock was already moving into his face. “Cassie was killed in her apartment last night. Her boyfriend, Frenchy, was killed too, in a cell at Police Headquarters.”

May said, “They were in that Clyde Prentiss gang. Killed to keep them quiet, that’s what they were.”

Clark’s eyes looked glazed.

“Bruce McMicken found her body. It was in the paper this morning.”

Clark closed his mouth, opened it, closed it again. “That’s cold, boy. Cold. You should have broken the news a little easier.”

“I tried,” I said, “but everybody kept interrupting.”

“You should have more respect for a man’s grief.” He sneered ferociously at the sidewalk. “That Frenchy murdered her to keep her away from other men, and then he killed himself in remorse. I hope I can get my new clothes in time for her funeral rites.”

“Here we are, baking on the sidewalk,” Nettie said. “Time to get home.”

I said, “I’ll see you at Little Ridge, ten o’clock tomorrow morning.”

“They can’t put her in the ground all that fast,” Clark wailed.

“It’s Star’s funeral tomorrow, not your girlfriend’s. Open up that car, so it airs out.” Nettie brought a slip of paper from her bag. “You had calls this morning, Ned, from Mrs. Rachel Milton
and your friend Mrs. Hatch. We had a nice conversation. I wrote down their numbers.” She thrust the slip at me.

92

I felt as though I were no longer quite anchored in reality, or in what I had assumed to be reality. In Merchants Park the grass flared brilliant green. Hard, white-gold light shattered across the tops of the cars. I alternated between gliding above the pavement and slogging against a heavy current. Toby Kraft’s blood-soaked body and disgruntled face kept swimming into view.