Her sporty MX-5 wouldn’t look out of place parked in front of the Whitehouse. What the hell. She moved up and parked directly in front of the entry.
The residence was of a scale that a maid in black and white wouldn’t have surprised her. Instead, a stylish woman with her hair in a classic French twist and wearing beige linen Capri pants with matching top opened the door. She guessed it was Mrs. Kidde. She was wrong.
“I’m Mrs. Wolff, his secretary. Are you a constituent? I’m sorry, the Congressman doesn’t receive here at his residence. His Florida office is downtown. I’m sure you appreciate this is a private home. Let me give you the office address.”
“I’m Sandra Reid. Mr. Kidde will be handling something nonpolitical for me. He’ll want to see me immediately.” Sandy stepped passed the woman into the foyer. The woman had no choice but to close the door behind her.
The woman studied the smile Sandy had frozen on her face. “Wait here please.” She returned in a few minutes. “Regretfully, the congressman will be engaged entirely this morning. But he does want to talk with you. If you could give me your phone number, he’ll be certain to call you as soon as possible.”
“Mrs. Wolff, I understand your problem. I really do. But skip the ‘Your call is important to us, that’s why we’re putting you on hold’ routine. It’s wasted on me. Now please go and actually speak to him and tell him I’m here.”
The secretary gave a cynical shrug meaning Kidde should screen his own visitors. Again with the, “Wait here.” After five minutes, she came back and escorted Sandy across the glowing hardwood floors to the congressman’s home office located at the rear of the house.
Congressman Frederic J. Kidde stood at a large teak desk in front of a built-in teak bookcase that stretched across one long wall of the wood-paneled office. Windows and French doors were opposite, looking out on an lush span of green around the pool and patio area. A perimeter of sabal palms looked down on the peaceful green. Abundant ferns and sculptured shrubs bordered a large terraced area then a broad span of lush lawn sloped down to a shiny-white sport fishing boat undulating comfortably at a private dock on the wide canal.
The secretary surely had far more important things to do than play hostess, nevertheless she waited politely until his offer of iced tea was turned down. She left and Sandy was alone with the congressman.
“What should I call you, your Honor, Congressman Kidde, or what?”
“Freddy.” He motioned toward the over-stuffed leather armchair facing his desk.
She sat comfortably in the offered chair and looked about the room. On the wall behind his desk was a row of photographs displayed in matching teak frames across the wall. In each, a smiling Congressman Kidde was posed shaking hands with various men. All distinguished looking and all unrecognizable to her except for George H. W. Bush. Sitting now, in real life at his desk, Kidde appeared pleasant, middle-aged, and utterly uptight. So serious in his dark suit and tie, it wouldn’t have surprised her if the coat was permanently buttoned. His rigid formality reminded her of the affluent characters in old movies wearing tuxedos and gowns for a routine dinner at home, sitting alone at opposite ends of an impossibly long table.
“I apologize for walking in on a U.S. Representative,” she began. “I’ve a confession to make. I don’t know who you are. I’ve never heard of you.”
“Senators get all the publicity. Congressmen come and go, although I’ve stayed around awhile. You’d better register so you can vote for me. I’m a seven-term congressional representative. Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Natural Resources. Have you heard of the Kidde-Hartford Act? Possibly the best known and consequential of all the laws I’ve sponsored. It prevents coastal communities from building structures that impede recreational boating on the Intracoastal....” He stopped when he noticed she was looking up at the hand carved coving in the corners of the high ceiling. “Excuse the commercial. And who are you again?”
“Sandy Reid. I’m the one that’s going to cause you a hellava lot of trouble or help you clear up everything. Your choice.” She thought that sounded impertinent enough to get his attention and take control of the conversation.
He chuckled for the last time that morning. “God, what am I into now?”
“The situation up in Park Beach.” She didn’t know how she came up with that broad bluff, but it covered a wide area of possibilities. A shotgun is best if you don’t know what you’re shooting at. It did the trick. Kidde reacted badly. He didn’t need to pound his head down on the desk; the distress on his face said it all.
“Park Beach isn’t within my congressional district,” he said weakly, trying to recover. “I think you’ve made a mistake.”
“We have to talk about Toby.”
“I don’t believe I know the name.”
“No? How about the frizzy blonde who was here three days ago?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now I’m busy. I think perhaps you should leave.”
In her former job as field investigator, she had perfected a phrase that invariably convinced guilty people she already knew what she was trying to find out. The all-purpose phrase was so broad that it worked with every conceivable wrongdoing from a petty mistake to murder. She’d say the words, look sympathetically at the person, and wait for their conscience to take over. A little guilt can go a long way. Frequently, the person would start confessing or at least talking. Sometimes they’d start crying. She used the magic phrase now, “You hoped all this would go away didn’t you.”
It worked. He stood and ran his fingers through his hair. “Where do you fit in? Have those two told the entire world?”
There she had it. A secret he didn’t want told meant blackmail. “Not the entire world, there’s merely the three of us, unless you count the police, the state attorney, the house ethics committee, and the news media.”
He sat again. He folded his arms across his chest, tilted his head back, and whispered something unintelligible to the ceiling. When he brought his head back down, she noticed an eyelid twitching and his hands were now trembling. This was more serious than she’d suspected. He was as jittery as a trapped bird. She truly felt sorry for him.
His breath was short, “Miss Reid, please leave.”
They were putting the shake on him over something. “Look, I’m the one who can get you out of this. Your political career is on the line here. You don’t realize who you’re dealing with.”
“This is crazy. I’m not going to deal with the three of you. I’m not giving you one cent. I didn’t give that woman anything either. I told her I‘d deal with Toby only. Forget Toby, she said, he was no longer a threat. I must now do business with her. Said she wouldn’t hesitate to ring the bell on me. It was very upsetting. I didn’t know what to believe. I didn’t go for it. I told her to leave. And that’s what I’m telling you right now.”
The buzzing of his desk phone startled him. He took a deep breath and answered, “No, Mrs. Wolff, I can’t talk to the vice-president just now. I’ll call him back. And hold my calls please.”
Then to Sandy, “I thought I’d have my staff run a check on her...the blonde.”
“Do that and your staff will know something’s up.”
“Perhaps a private investigator.”
“You don’t need to bother. What do you want to know? Her name’s Abigail Olin and she’s a somehow or other girlfriend of Toby Towalski. I can tell you about both. Why don’t I start with Toby since he was murdered two days ago?”
“What! The man that was here...murdered. Are you sure?”
“You mean the police haven’t been here yet. Yes, I’m sure. There’s still some blood on my ankle. Want to see it?”
“Do they know who shot him?”
“Maybe it was you. Murder is an excellent remedy for blackmail.” She let that one sink in for a full minute. “Where were you two nights ago around 8 p.m.?”
“You mean I need an alibi? You can’t be serious. You think I would kill someone?”
“After the police nail down the blackmail angle, how long do you think it’ll take for them to decide you had a good motive to kill him?”
“Me? I couldn’t do anything like that. Do you really think the police will come here?”
“It’s a tangled web you’re weaving. Now someone has shot the man who was blackmailing you. Abby Olin’s already under arrest for killing someone else from up north and is out on bail. I’ll bet she didn’t tell you that. So,
