Dark Tort

“Do you think one or more thieves might have murdered her?” asked Michael Radford, the divorce attorney.

“I wonder if she could have been helping the thieves,” Ookie Claggett said. I wanted to drop a plate of vegetables in her lap, but refrained.

Richard Chenault shook his head. “That’s my niece you’re talking about.” He sighed. “She worked hard, but she wasn’t always able to keep up. So I guess it’s possible she fell in with the wrong crowd, but I hate to think that might have been true. I just hate to think it.”

“She didn’t fall behind when she was working for me,” Donald piped up. “Richard? She labored endlessly for me over a very complicated case—”

Michael Radford went on: “I don’t know. I just think paralegal work is too demanding for a twenty-year-old who hasn’t been to college.”

I was picking up Donald Ellis’s plate and was thus close by him and able to hear his whispered “Baloney.”

“Donald, come on,” Richard put in. “She really couldn’t manage your oil-and-gas- lease bequeathal, plus do all the work for Charlie Baker, which turned into work for Charlie’s estate.”

“Richard, Charlie Baker was ecstatic with the work Dusty was doing for him,” Donald said, his tone defensive. “He told me so himself.”

There was a silence: an associate had corrected a partner, and that partner, I well knew, had what they call in the psych biz “ego issues.” I paused, a dirty salad plate in each hand.

“Now, Donald,” Bishop Uriah Sutherland said mildly, “careful. Remember the old saying in the church: ‘He who is too big for his breeches may soon lose his shirt.’”

“Did Jesus say that?” Marla asked, her face wrinkled questioningly. “I never actually saw that anywhere in Scripture. Bishop, maybe you could remind me of the exact—”

“Actually,” Nora Ellis piped up, “Louise told me that she suspected Dusty of stealing from the firm.”

“Stealing?” Donald said, dumbfounded. “Stealing what—pencils? Legal pads?” I wondered at his courage at contradicting both his boss and his wife.

“You had a lot of valuable stuff in there, Donald,” Nora went on. “Richard put in quite a few lovely things, didn’t you, Richard? They’re yours, right? And not the firm’s?”

Richard Chenault beamed. “Yes, they’re mine.” Then his face soured. “They’re lovely things that I may end up selling, if K.D. and her ravenous lawyer have their way.”

Nora sighed. Marla snatched a glance at me and rolled her eyes.

Back in the kitchen, I was filling the steamed vegetable platter when my cell phone buzzed. Omigosh, I had forgotten to call Arch.

“Mom,” Arch began. “You promised I’d be able to have a driving lesson today. Did you forget?”

“We’ll do it, we’ll do it,” I promised. And then I remembered that we had Julian’s Range Rover. “Oh no, hon, maybe not. We’re just here in Julian’s Rover, and it might not work—”

“Should we just do it another time?”

My shoulders slumped in defeat and guilt, a stance I took quite often as a mother, matter of fact.

“What does he want?” Julian whispered.

“To have a driving lesson in your Rover,” I replied. “I forgot I’d promised him.”

Julian shrugged. “So let him. Tell him to have the Vikarioses drop him off over here. Or they could walk, I guess.” Then he lofted the tray containing the tenderloins, potato puffs, and vegetables. Out in the dining room, the guests were still talking, and Nora hadn’t appeared to tell us to hurry up with the next course.

“All right, hon, listen. The clients are just starting the lunch, and then we have cake. Mrs. Ellis has a maid helping who’s going to do the cleanup. Julian says you can drive his Rover—”

“Wow! Is he sure? When do you want us?”

“Look,” I said, “why don’t you and Gus walk over here”—this would take almost an hour—“and by the time you get here, Julian and I will be able to go. Or at least, we should be.”

“Really?”

“We’ll be ready.”

And surprisingly, we were. The guests all loved the beef, so much so that they downed it and the accompaniments in record time. Vic Zaruski played a rousing rendition of “Happy Birthday” as we presented Donald with his cake, complete with tall candles. He still didn’t look entirely happy. But he did brighten up during the opening of the presents. Richard gave him a couple of expensive silk ties. The neighbors gave him history books, to which he was apparently partial. And Marla gave him four bottles of wine that I knew had cost her two hundred bucks a pop.

“Oh, Marla, thank you,” Donald said, with the first truly appreciative tone he’d had all day.

“Well,” Nora announced, “I have two things for you. First is a trip to a place where they make that wine, the Burgundy region of France.”

“Oh, honey, you shouldn’t have,” Donald Ellis said, and leaned over to give his wife a kiss on each cheek.

“And your final gift,” said Nora, “is behind the needlepoint I gave you last year.”

Donald wrinkled his brow while his wife carefully removed the lawyer-hugging needlepoint. Behind it was a framed picture by Charlie Baker. It was entitled Journey Cake.

It really was gorgeous, and vintage Charlie Baker, which tugged at my heart. While Nora explained to Donald how valuable the painting was, part of the Cake Series II that Charlie had been doing when he died, I read Charlie’s list of ingredients. Flour, cinnamon and other spices, sugar, butter, cider. But I stared at the painting. Something was still wrong with this recipe; I just didn’t know what. I happened to glance over at Richard, who was smiling more widely than Donald.

Alonzo Claggett commented, “That must have set you back a few pretty pennies, Nora.”

Nora ignored him and put her hand on my forearm. “Don’t you like it, Goldy?” She seemed eager for approval, even if it was from the caterer. Richard was murmuring praise of the painting.

“It’s fabulous, Nora,” I said. “Happy birthday, Donald. You’re a lucky man.”

Donald Ellis gave me another Demerol-deprived look. I smiled sympathetically and bustled back out to the kitchen, where I could quietly begin to round up our supplies and almost be done with this job.

Arch and Gus arrived just before two, their faces flushed from walking. Arch’s countenance was its usual pessimistic self, as if he didn’t believe I was actually going to let him drive. Gus was bubbly, as usual.

“This house is so cool! And you worked here? Did you fix tacos? Just kidding,” he burbled on, in typical Gus fashion.

Julian tousled Arch’s hair, a show of affection my son still permitted, but only from Julian. “Big Arch! Going to drive us home, eh? And in the Rover, too?”

“I’m going to go study your dashboard,” Arch announced, his voice serious. “So I can know where all the controls are.”

Julian and I used the last of our time packing up the steamer and other utensils I’d brought. Nora Ellis actually came out to help us.

“Hi there!” Gus greeted her. “I’m Gus Vikarios. Were you Goldy’s boss today?” When Nora replied that she was, Gus piped up, “How did she and Julian do? Did you have a nice party?”

“Yes, it was very nice,” Nora said, pushing her blond hair out of her face.

“Are you going to give them a good tip?” Gus asked brazenly.

“Gus!” I cried, although I was wondering the same thing myself.

We immediately followed Nora back in for our last box so she could be spared an answer. As we were leaving, she said, “Could you take the trash out, please? Lorraine has so much to do.”

With a quickly mumbled “Of course,” I started toward the enormous black plastic sack she was pointing to. And then, out of the blue—the unconscious, or wherever these things come from—I remembered Wink’s comment about Uriah Sutherland: He likes to poke around, ask questions and I caught him going through our trash. My question was this: Why? Furthermore: Hadn’t he seemed a bit too attentive to Alonzo and Marla’s discussion of trusts? And hadn’t that also been Dusty’s area of expertise? Also, how about that bracelet? Had Uriah’s champagne tastes—in women, say, or jewelry—made him look for a receipt for