reason. All of your needs will be met from my personal funds. When I die, I will bequeath you the remainder of my inheritance from Arrington.”
Peter seemed to be speechless.
“Do you understand?”
Peter nodded. “Yes, I do. Thank you, Dad.”
“Now, you have to do something hard, Peter,” Stone said.
“What’s that, Dad?”
“You have to forget that you’re going to be a billionaire and just live your life like an ordinary person. That won’t be as easy as you might think, but you should start by not telling anyone-and that includes Hattie and Ben- anything about your inheritance. You can just say that you have a trust, and that it won’t be available to you until you’re thirty-five. If people think of you as a billionaire, you’ll find that they-even your very best friends-will have their perceptions of you altered by their knowledge of your wealth. I’m sure you want your friends to like you for who you are, and not what you have.”
“I see,” Peter said, “and I think you’re right.”
“Also, if anyone, such as your school or a charity, should ask you to donate money to them, tell them to call me, that you have no access to substantial funds.”
“All right, I will.”
“Any questions?” Eggers asked.
Both Stone and Peter shook their heads.
“Now the good news,” Eggers said. “Due to an anomaly in the national budget created by the Bush tax cuts ten years ago, a folly of our Republican friends, there are no federal inheritance taxes on the estate of anyone who dies in this calendar year.”
“You mean there’s nothing to be paid?” Stone asked.
“No, not a cent.”
“Wow,” Stone and Peter said simultaneously.
54
S tone was back at his desk when Joan brought him the New
York Post.
“You should see this,” she said, opening the paper.
Stone looked at it. The headline read: VANCE CALDER WIDOW SLAIN IN VIRGINIA SHOOTING. There was only one photograph, a shot of the house down the driveway. He made a little groaning sound, then read the piece, which was bylined Kelli Keane and said that the police were looking for a person of interest. When he finished it he closed the paper and handed it back to Joan.
“Well, that was more restrained than I would have expected from the Post,” he said. “This Keane woman came down to Virginia as the assistant to the art director from Architectural Digest.”
“I thought so, too,” she said. She handed him the Times, open to the page. “They’re even more restrained, and Arrington’s obituary is fairly brief.”
Stone read the two pieces. One line in the obit said, “She is survived by her second husband, Stone Barrington, and a son, Peter, 18, both of New York.” The implication was that Peter was Stone’s son.
“It will be on the AP wire, of course,” Joan said, “but they will pick up the Post piece.” The phone rang, and she picked it up. “It’s the sheriff, in Virginia,” she said, handing him the phone.
It suddenly occurred to Stone that he had not given a thought to Tim Rutledge since speaking to the sheriff at the house. “Good morning, Sheriff,” he said.
“Good morning, Mr. Barrington,” the sheriff replied. “I just want to give you an update on Tim Rutledge. He left town the day of the shooting and left a note for his department head, saying that he was moving to California to take up a teaching appointment there.”
“So, he’s on the run?”
“He is. We’ve sent out a nationwide alert to police agencies. We don’t think there is a teaching appointment in California, and he could be anywhere. He cleaned out his bank accounts last Friday, so that would indicate premeditation.”
“I see.”
“The shotgun was processed for fingerprints, and the only ones found were those of my deputy. Rutledge apparently wiped it clean. Shall I return the shotgun to you?”
“No, please give it to the butler at the house. He will send it to me in New York, along with some other items from the house that are being packed.”
“Just one other thing,” the sheriff said. “The autopsy on Mrs. Barrington revealed that one of her ovaries had been removed, and the remaining one was in the early stages of ovarian cancer. The pathologist says that it’s unlikely that she knew. Whether she would have survived the illness would have depended on how long she waited to be treated.”
“I see,” Stone said. “She had an examination in December, but nothing was found.”
“As the pathologist said, the cancer was in the early stages.”
“What are the chances of finding Tim Rutledge?” Stone asked.
“That will depend on how well he prepared his disappearance. We know, since he cleaned out his bank accounts, that there was premeditation, but we don’t know how long he was planning this. We’re tracking his credit cards, but nothing has been charged as yet.”
“How much did he take from his bank accounts?”
“About two hundred thousand dollars in cash, from checking and savings, and a cashier’s check for half a million from investments, including an IRA. That check hasn’t cleared the bank yet. When it does, we’ll find out where he cashed it, and that might help us.”
“So, he’s not hurting for funds.”
“No. He left the station wagon in his parking spot at the university, so we think he has a second car, though there is not one registered anywhere in his name.”
“Finding him may be harder than you think,” Stone said.
“You could be right. In any case, I will keep you posted on any developments. May I have your e-mail address?”
Stone gave it to him. “Thank you for checking in, Sheriff.” He hung up.
“Anything?” Joan asked.
“Nothing. The man is on the run, he’s smart, and he’s got money. My bet is he’s already out of the country, probably in Mexico.”
The phone rang again. “It’s Sean Patrick for you,” Joan said. She handed him the phone and went back to her office.
“Hello, Sean.”
“Hello, Stone. Thank you for being so kind to Hattie while she was in Virginia.”
“It was a great comfort to Peter to have his friend there,” Stone said.
“We were both very taken with Arrington, and we’re sorry we won’t have her as a permanent friend.”
“Thank you.”
“Stone, when we left to fly back to New York with Mike Freeman, one of your pilots was kind enough to show me your Gulfstream jet. Mike thought you might want to sell it.”
“I think so, Sean. The Mustang is adequate for my purposes.”
“My partners and I have been looking for an airplane to buy, and I think a G-III might suit us very well.”
“It’s a very nice airplane,” Stone said. “Arrington bought it a little over a year ago, and it had had only one elderly owner up until then, so it’s a low-time airplane. I’d be happy to send you copies of the paperwork she used to make her decision. Mike advised her on the purchase, so he knows a lot about it, too.”
“Thanks. I’d like to see the paperwork and perhaps have our consultant on the purchase go down to Virginia and see it.”
