Маргарет Миллар - The Murder of Miranda

“I’ve never really liked Miranda Shaw,” Iris said, “but I can’t think of anyone else offhand.

It was only the second time since he’d worked for Smedler’s law firm that Tom Aragon had been summoned by Smedler himself up to the penthouse office.

The penthouse wasn’t far in terms of distance. The city of Santa Felicia had a building code limiting the height of buildings, so Smedler’s office was in fact only three stories from the sidewalk. But in terms of accessibility it might as well have been a mile. It was serviced by an elevator whose movements could be controlled by Smedler through a circuit breaker beside his desk. There were, of course, little buttons in the elevator for clients to press, giving them the comfortable feeling of being in command of the situation, but a few minutes trapped between floors, or behind a door that wouldn’t open, left them with reasonable doubts.

Smedler’s secretary, Charity Nelson, wearing her orange wig slightly askew, was gluing on her fingernails for the day. She said, without looking up, “Aragon, you’re late.”

“Sorry.”

“We expect our junior employees to be like the Boy Scouts, trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, punctual—”

“Punctual is not part of the Boy Scout creed.”

“Let’s add it right now. Punctual.”

“I couldn’t get the elevator moving,” Aragon said. “It happens all the time. The air conditioners and electric machines still function and the lights are on, but the elevator won’t work.”

“Electricity is a very mysterious thing.”

“Not all that mysterious. I was the assistant manager of an apartment house when I went to law school. If I could take a look at the transformer—”

“Well, you’re not the assistant manager here, so mind your own business. Sit down. Smedler’s on the phone.” Charity filed the glue and the rest of the fingernails under B for bite. “Did he tell you what he wanted?”

“No.”

“Maybe he asked for you specifically because you did such a bang-up job on the Lockwood case. By the way, we’re still waiting for Mrs. Lockwood to pay up. But that’s a mere trifle, forget it. We can’t have you worrying your pretty little head about anything as crass as money, can we? No indeedy.”

Aragon sat down in a leather swivel chair facing Charity’s desk. Though it was late October and only ten thirty in the morning, the room was uncomfortably warm and humid. Charity had turned off the air conditioner to protect her house plants, massed like a bonsai jungle in the east corner of the room. The plants didn’t like air conditioning, and she felt the same maternal obligation to them that she would have to a child or pet, rejoicing in their growth and good health and fighting off their enemies like aphids and mealybugs and red spider mites.

Aragon looked at one of the plants, wondering if Charity talked to it, and if she did, why it hadn’t shriveled up and blown away.

“You want to know why I believe you’ll make it as a lawyer, Aragon?”

“Not particularly.”

“You look dumb. Not dumb dumb, more innocent-like dumb. Any judge or jury would feel sorry for you seeing those calf eyes peering from behind those horn-rimmed glasses. Juries hate a smart-looking lawyer who dresses well.”

“Do you talk to your plants, Miss Nelson?”

“No.”

“I thought not.”

“I’m not a loony. What in hell would I say to a plant?”

“Oh, something soothing, pleasant, complimentary — you know, the way you talk to the new employees.”

“I don’t talk like that to any employees. You trying to come on funny, junior? Better think twice.”

Aragon thought twice and changed the subject. “What does Smedler want?”

“What he always wants, everything. ”

“I meant from me.”

“The file sent up was from Probate, so don’t expect any fun and games like last time. Probates are ho hum.” A light flashed on the intercom. “Okay, he’s off the phone. You can go in.”

Even on Monday morning Smedler looked fit and vigorous. Though office rumors had him spending every weekend fighting with his third wife at the country club, he showed no signs of injury, physical or mental. He wore a vested pin-striped suit, a Dartmouth tie and a small permanent smile unrelated to anything he happened to be saying. His admirers, mostly female, thought this smile made him look inscrutable and they were always disappointed to find out how scrutable he actually was.

“This matter is more of a nuisance than a problem,” Smedler said. “So far, anyway. The reason I called you in is because I hear you get along well with women. Is this correct?”

“It depends on the circ—”

“Yes. Well, anyway, to get down to business, I have some probate papers that must be signed. An elderly man, Neville Shaw, died last spring, leaving his wife, Miranda, as the administrator and sole beneficiary of his estate. I made it clear to Mrs. Shaw that probate was often long and involved and that she’d better keep in touch with me, since there’d be matters coming up from time to time which would require her notarized signature. Well, matters have come up, a lot of them, but the past week I haven’t been able to contact her. There’s no answer when I call her house, she doesn’t respond to messages left at her club, and two registered letters have been returned to the office undelivered. Even with her full cooperation, probate may drag on for months. So find her.”

“I’ll try.”

“You shouldn’t have much trouble. I’m sure this isn’t a deliberate evasion on her part — she’s a nice little woman, a good deal younger than her husband, well-bred, pretty, not too bright, always acts somewhat scared. In this case she has damned good reason to be scared.”

There was a long pause, which Aragon recognized as a standard courtroom tactic: dangling question, delayed answer. He said nothing.

Smedler looked annoyed. “Don’t you want to know why? ”

“I figured you’d tell me.”

“Of course I’ll tell you. The problem is how much. It’s important not to start any more rumors about Neville Shaw’s will. There are enough already. He was nearly eighty when he died, and the fact is the estate should have had a conservator for the last few years of his life. He was getting senile, making a lot of crazy purchases and investments, highly speculative stocks, foreign currency, real estate syndicates. He even put up his house as down payment on a stud farm in Kentucky. I didn’t know any of this was happening — and merely acted as his attorney when he made his will a dozen years ago — but I found out in a hurry. When the routine notice to creditors was published, they began coming out of the woodwork: brokers, bankers, developers, even the real estate hustler who’d handled the Kentucky transaction. To put it briefly, the creditors outnumber the credits. Shaw died broke.”

“And Mrs. Shaw doesn’t know this?”

“No.”

“That seems peculiar for this day and age.”

“The Shaws didn’t live in this day and age.”

“When are you going to bring her up to date?”

“The first step is yours, Aragon. Now, here’s the address and phone number of her residence and her club. When you contact her, inform her firmly that she must come to my office to sign some papers. After that, I’ll... well, I’ll simply tell her that she’s not quite as rich as she was at one time and that she’ll have to make substantial reductions in her standard of living.”

“Maybe you’d better tell her the truth; that she’s broke.”

“You don’t tell women the truth,” Smedler said. “Not all at once anyway, and certainly not a woman like Mrs. Shaw who’s been protected and insulated from the world. My God, she might scream or cry or faint. She might even shoot me.”