“I saw it,” said Downes. “For a college graduate you don’t spell worth shit.”
“You have nothing to say about it, Downes!”
“Sloppiest thing I ever saw. I can’t believe Vanderbilt sells degrees. How did you get a college degree, Duncan?”
Chet said, “I’m gone.”
“You are the most horrible people!” Shana’s eyes were closed. “None of you deserves anything! You never gave Chester a moment of peace! You never appreciated him as much as did his dog!”
“I appreciate him now,” Amy said. “He’s dead.”
“Freedom with moola.” Alixis stretched. “No one to tell me what to do.”
“He always made me feel like shit,” Duncan said. “No one could be as good as he was.”
“You made yourself feel like shit!” Shana said. “You are shit! Worthless shit! None of you is worth one hair of Chester’s head.”
“Where is Arky?” Amalie asked. “I haven’t seen him around all morning.”
“I shot him,” Duncan said. “I’ve been looking forward to doing that.”
“You have no idea,” Shana continued as if talking to herself, “how hard he worked, how much he did for you, tried to do for you, how much he wanted for you, how much he loved you.”
“Sure, sure,” Alixis said, “as long as we met all his demands.”
“If there were justice …” Eyes still closed, Shana rocked a little on her feet. “There’d be a bus outside the front door to cart you all off to prison. You’re all murderers, as sure as God made little green apples.”
Fists tight at her side, head down, Shana turned to leave the room into the foyer.
“You’re the one that’s leaving, Shana old girl. Don’t hesitate.” Clumsily, Duncan lifted himself off the floor into a standing position. “Chet seems to be leaving without you. Did you notice?”
“Justice …” Shana said.
Amalie said, “We haven’t decided yet where to plant Chester. Who votes for near the laundry yard? I hate gravestones where you can’t help seeing them.”
Getting up, Alixis said, “I’m packin’ my bikinis. Down payment on a Malibu house will take more than a hundred grand.”
His finger in her face, Duncan shouted at her, “I told you that’s my money!”
“Oh, stick it up your nose, Duncan.”
“He would.” Rearranging her brassiere, Amy said, “That money goes to paying the servants and keeping this place running. There’s Grandmother to think of.”
“Sure,” Duncan said. “You’re thinking of senile old Grandmother. It would be a little cheaper to put her in a nursery, don’t you think, cow? You we can put in the dairy.” To Nicolson, Duncan said, “My father planned for me to run this show. I’m taking that money.”
“As a matter of fact,” Beauville said, “your father planned for you to start rehab tomorrow.”
Duncan’s face drained of the little pallor it had. “Like hell.”
“Sure,” Alixis said. “I’m sure he had plans for all of us. Plans and plans and plans.” Leaving the room, she said, “Well, he’s dead. So are his plans. Thank God.”
Angrily, Duncan grabbed an end table and tossed it on its side. The lamp on it smashed. “Get me out of here!” Leaving, he stumbled over the table’s legs.
Saying nothing, Amy carried her baby out of the room.
Ashen, Nicolson and Downes remained standing as they were. Beauville was florid.
“Has anything been decided?” Amalie asked from behind her veil.
“Not a damned thing,” Nicolson said. “Except that you sure have four disrespectful, self-centered brats.”
“That’s good,” Amalie said. “I’m feeling tired now.” Uncertainly, she stood up and headed out of the room. “I’m doing well not to weep.”
Downes asked Dunbar, “What kid got run over?”
“You see,” Beauville said to Nicolson, “the children here aren’t used to there being cars on the roads. Shows you how stupid this place is.”
Still sitting on the couch, Nancy Dunbar spoke to Beauville. “I guess I’ve had it with this place, myself. I wasn’t sure until I just heard these people. I can’t stand it anymore. I guess I’ll leave today, too.”
“Oh, that’s great!” Beauville said angrily. “Leave me completely in the lurch!”
“I don’t think I care.” On high heels, Nancy Dunbar began leaving the room. “Unlike everyone else around here, I guess I’ve got what I want.”
Corso said to Fletch, “I guess this wasn’t a good time to question these folks.”
“You’ll never get them together again. Never.”
“I don’t know what they had to say, anyway.”
“Seems to me we heard quite a lot,” Jack said.
“Laboratory accident,” Corso said. “That gas could have been there for years. That’s the easiest answer.”
“Are you looking for the easiest answer?” Fletch asked.
“Somebody had to arrange to release the gas,” Jack said.
“Yeah, well. Maybe.”
“Coming for lunch?” Jack asked Fletch.
“Lunch. Can you do lunch?”
“Sandwiches,” Jack said. “Cheese.”
“I’ll be at your place in a few minutes. I think I saw a date on the label of that gas canister. I’ll just go back to the lab and check it.”
“Yeah,” Corso said. “You do that. Let me know.”
24
As Fletch walked back from the laboratory passing the main house, his pocket phone buzzed. “Hello?” On the driveway in front of the house he stopped to listen.
“Fletch …”
“Hi, Crystal. How are you doing this morning? Did you survive the night?”
“I slept.”
“That’s good.”
“There must have been something in the milk.”
“That was the milk. By itself. It’s the best sedative.”
“I’ve had a breakfast of only grapefruit juice with protein powder in it, one coffee, vitamins and an amino acid tablet called L-Carnitine. Well, I had the tablet before breakfast.”
“That’s nice.”
“I feel very energetic. I’ve done a total of five sit-ups already this morning, and used the ankle and wrist weights a total of twenty minutes.”
“You’ll sleep tonight.”
A small jet airplane taking off from Vindemia’s airstrip roared over Fletch’s head.
Fletch looked up at it.
The plane was marked RADLIEGH MIRROR.
He assumed it was Chet Radliegh leaving Vindemia, his family, his fiancee, leaving well before the funeral of his father.
“How did you get workmen to come to this Godforsaken place on a Sunday morning?” Crystal asked.
“I didn’t. What workmen?”
“They’re replacing the mirrors here in the gym with perfect mirrors. They said the order came from I. M. Fletcher. I do believe you are I.M.?”
“I am,” Fletch said. “It did. But I didn’t ask that the mirrors be delivered Sunday morning.”
“Well, they’re here. The workmen showed up about eight o’clock. They’ve been working all morning.”
“That’s nice,” Fletch said. “Guess I’ll be paying time-and-a-half or double-time, or something.”
“Maybe not,” Crystal said. “Maybe they know about you. Maybe they heard about what you did to that terrible
