“The man is dead, Doug. This qualifies as an extreme medical circumstance. Now just exactly who in the hell did Bob tell you to contact?”
Glynis Fairchild-Forniaux worked out of a stone cottage on Turkey Neck Road that had originally served as the town icehouse. It was built right into the granite ledge next to her riverfront center-chimney home, which had been a tavern back in the 1700s when Turkey Neck was a commercial district serving the ferry passengers who were crossing over to Old Saybrook. Des knew all of this because Glynis had represented her at the closing when she’d bought her house. Hers was the oldest and bluest of Dorset’s blue blood legal practices. Glynis had taken it over from her late father, Chase Fairchild, who’d taken it over from his father before him.
Glynis had three kids, two dogs and a veterinarian husband, Andre Forniaux, who she’d met while she was on a college ski trip to the French Alps. Dr. Andre was out in the driveway loading veterinary supplies into the drawers of his specially outfitted pickup when Des pulled in alongside of Glynis’s Dodge minivan. Dorset’s mobile vet was a tall, slender Frenchman in his early forties, with thinning sandy hair, a narrow face and a long nose with rather pinched nostrils. He cared for hundreds of Dorset’s dogs and cats by driving from house to house just like an old- time general practitioner. Dr. Andre was totally on board with the feral stray rescue program Des and Bella had undertaken. He inoculated and neutered the healthy cats at no cost, and humanely put down those too sick to be saved. He was a good vet who cared about animals. He was not so in sync with their owners, some of whom called him Andre the Drip due to his dismissive bedside manner.
“How goes it, Andre?” Des called to him as she started inside.
He puffed out his cheeks-the classic Gallic shrug for which there is no American equivalency. “It goes, Des. Round and round it goes, eh?” Andre had studied veterinary medicine at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, so in addition to his French accent he had a slight drawl. “And how are your wards?”
“Doug Garvey may adopt one. If you hear of anyone else who’s interested, please let me know, okay? We’ve got to move some of those kids out.”
Aside from the elderly secretary who she’d inherited along with the practice, Glynis Fairchild-Forniaux worked on her own. Her office was very old-timey. There was a huge oak rolltop desk. Legal books in glass-doored walnut bookcases. Clubby leather armchairs. A potbellied stove. There was also action. The phone in the outer office rang constantly from the moment Des walked in.
Glynis was a snub-nosed, fluffy blonde in her late thirties, with a trim figure and a lilting voice that could fool people into thinking she was a dippy airhead. She was not, and had the framed diplomas from Smith College and Harvard Law School to prove it. Glynis was also a highly dedicated runner who was training for next month’s Boston Marathon, which would be her seventh. She was dressed casually in a turtleneck and jeans. As she showed Des into her office, she appeared to be limping.
“Girl, what did you do to yourself?” Des asked, noticing the Ace bandage wrapped around her right ankle.
“Absolutely nothing serious. I just slipped on some ice this morning while I was running on Route 156.”
“What time was this?” Des asked, settling herself into a leather chair.
“Early. I usually get my road work in by dawn.”
“You weren’t up near Four Chimneys, were you?”
“No, I wasn’t.” Glynis hobbled over to her desk and sat in her tall-backed chair, wincing.
“You are really hurting, Glynis. Have you seen a doctor?”
“I see one every morning across the breakfast table.”
“Andre’s a vet,” Des pointed out.
“And an ankle’s an ankle. I slapped some ice on it and I wrapped it. It’ll be fine. And there is absolutely no way I’m not running tomorrow.”
“Spoken like a true fanatic,” said Des, who had a jumble of feelings about Glynis Fairchild-Forniaux, attorney at law. Glynis was gen-next-a modern, open-minded career woman who Des could vibe with better than most. But she was still a purebred member of Dorset’s inner circle and a careful keeper of confidences. Also very shrewd politically. Des had heard that Glynis might challenge Bob Paffin next election.
“Doug Garvey just alerted me that you’d be coming by,” she said in her fluty little voice. “This is an official visit regarding the death of old Pete, correct?”
“Correct.” Des pulled out her notepad and pen. Whenever the phone stopped ringing, it got real quiet there in Glynis’s icehouse office. She could hear the ticking of the wall clock, the firewood sizzling in the stove. “Did you know him well?”
Glynis did not choose to answer her. Just leaned back in her chair, bandaged ankle propped up on the desk, and said, “His full legal name was Peter Ashton Mosher. “Date of birth-March thirtieth, 1943.”
“Place of birth?”
“Dorset, Connecticut.”
“Can you provide me with a next of kin?”
“By contacting me you’ve fulfilled your legal obligation under the laws of the state of Connecticut.”
Des looked at her in surprise. “You represented Pete?”
“I had that privilege,” Glynis confirmed. “And I wish I could tell you more, but I’d be violating my responsibility to my client.”
“Even though he’s dead?”
“Especially because he’s dead. According to the terms of his will, I’m also executor of his estate.”
“There’s an estate?”
“A considerable one.”
“Glynis, are you telling me that our Can Man was an eccentric millionaire?”
“I didn’t say he was a millionaire. I said there is a considerable estate.”
“May I ask how you represented him?”
“By managing his portfolio.” Glynis gestured at a fat file on her desk. “His financial statements came here to the firm. I kept track of his income and reinvested it for him as I saw fit. Also dealt with the IRS on his behalf.”
“How often were you in contact with him?”
“I was never in contact with him. I never even met Pete. We were retained by a third party.”
“Whose identity is?…”
“Confidential, Des.”
“You said ‘we’ were retained.”
“My father was the attorney of record before me. This arrangement goes back quite some time.”
“So you basically inherited Pete as a client?”
“I did.”
“And would this third party you spoke of also be a client?”
Glynis smiled at her faintly. “Again…”
“Confidential, right.” Des took this to mean yes. “Who do I contact regarding the disposition of Pete’s body?”
“I’ll arrange for his burial. His plot at Duck River Cemetery was purchased some time ago.”
Des sat there soaking this in. “Glynis, is this all just a bit not normal?”
The blonde attorney relaxed her guard somewhat. Des doubted she ever completely lowered it. “From my end it’s not so unusual. I perform precisely this kind of service for a number of wealthy widows in town. Their late husbands have seen to it. It’s strictly Pete’s lifestyle that makes it seem odd.”
“You mentioned you’re his executor.”
“Correct.”
“Doug Garvey has been watching out for him for several years. Does he have an expectation of some money coming his way?”
“You’d have to ask Doug what his expectations are. I wouldn’t know.”
“How about First Selectman Paffin?”
“Bob merely served as an intermediary. There’s nothing more to that.”
“Well, who does get Pete’s money?”
“Des, you know perfectly well I can’t disclose the contents of my client’s will. The names of his beneficiaries are strictly confidential. You’ll have to convince a judge that this information is vital to your investigation. I’m sorry to make you jump through hoops, but those hoops are there for a purpose.”
