Authors: H. Terrell Griffin
If Rundel Enterprises was incorporated, it would have had to file all sorts of documents with the Secretary of State of the state in which it was incorporated. If it had been incorporated in some other state, but was doing business in Florida, it should have filed something in Tallahassee. If not, I would have to check all fifty secretaries of state if necessary, and see what I could get.
I fired up my computer and brought up the web site of the corporations division of the Florida Secretary of State’s office. I got lucky. Rundel Enterprises, Incorporated, was indeed a Florida corporation. It had been incorporated about two years before, but had been involuntarily dissolved at the end of the last month for failure to pay its annual corporation fees to the state. It has been my experience that a corporation can get away with a lot of things, but withholding the annual state fees is not one of them. I wondered if Murder, Incorporated could have withstood the kind of scrutiny the bureaucrats in Tallahassee give.
The documents listed Hale Rundel as president, Samuel Cox as Vice-president, and Maria Cox as corporate secretary and treasurer. One thousand shares of common stock had been issued, at a par value of one dollar per share. There was no information of how the stock was distributed. Donald Jones was listed as resident agent for service of process. The corporate charter stated that Rundel Enterprises was in the business of leasing, buying and selling airplanes.
Rundel’s home address was listed on Gulf of Mexico Drive in Longboat Key, Florida. Both Coxes were shown as living at the same address in Miami, and Jones’ address was in Sarasota, obviously an office address, since a suite number was included.
I assumed Jones probably was the lawyer who drew up the corporation papers. It is not unusual that the lawyer who does the paper work is listed as resident agent. It makes it easier for the sheriff to serve process on somebody if the corporation is sued. Time to call Mr. Jones.
Jones’ receptionist passed my call to his secretary who wanted to know what I was calling about. I know secretaries do this because their bosses tell them to, but it always gets under my skin. If the guy thinks he is too important to talk to anyone who takes time to call him, I wouldn’t want him as my lawyer. My experience has been that the better the lawyer, the less rigamarole one has to go through to talk to him. I was about to make a sharp comment when it occurred to me that I needed this guy, and it made no sense to make him mad to begin with. I told her I was a lawyer and was calling in reference to Rundel Enterprises.
“I’ve heard a lot about you, Mr. Royal,” Jones oozed. “What can I do for you?”
“I appreciate your taking your time to talk to me, Mr. Jones,” I said. “I’ve got a client who is interested in buying an airplane that he heard Rundel Enterprises has for sale. We’ve tried to get in touch with someone from the company, but the phone has been disconnected and the letter I sent was returned. I checked with the Secretary of State and found that you were the resident agent, so I thought you might be able to tell me how to get in touch with them.”
“I wish to hell I knew. They owe me a couple of grand, and the whole company seems to have disappeared.”
Rundel had made a big mistake. Never stiff a lawyer on a fee. It makes the lawyer angry as a swarm of horny bees, and he will tell you anything you want to know about his client. It’s a breach of professional ethics, of course, but the lawyer feels the biggest breach of all is when a client doesn’t pay his bill. “What can you tell me about the outfit?” I asked.
“Not a whole lot. Guy name of Rundel had me incorporate the business and do a few other small items for him. Nothing big, but then if it had been big, I guess he would have gone to one of the larger firms here. I have a one man general practice, is all. I’m sure not in your league, Mr. Royal.”
I’d been a pretty good lawyer, and pretty well known in the Orlando area, but I certainly didn’t have a statewide reputation, and I couldn’t figure out where this guy was coming from with all the compliments. However, I seemed to have some clout with Jones, and I wasn’t about to blow it by asking him how he knew about me. I may have met him somewhere and didn’t remember it. “What about the president, Rundel?” I asked.
“That’s kind of funny, you know. He seemed to be a real money man. Drove a big Mercedes, and he lived in one of those high priced condos on the Gulf out on Longboat. But one day he came into the office with another guy, who didn’t look like he had money for bus fare, and said this other guy was putting up money to buy the first plane for Rundel. They wanted me to hold the money in my trust account until they told me the name of the seller. I was then supposed to send a trust account check to whoever it was.”
“What happened?”
“The guy gave me a cashier’s check for one million dollars, made out to my trust account, and about two weeks later he sent me a certified letter telling me where to send the check. My first thought was that it may have been a drug money laundering deal, but you don’t get a cashier’s check when that is going on. Do you?”
“It doesn’t sound like the usual way. Can you tell me who the check was made out to?”
“This was over a year ago, but my trust account records would show that. You know how the Bar is about keeping accurate records of trust accounts. They’re probably in storage, but I can find them and call you back.”
“ Why don’t I just call you back this afternoon. You wouldn’t remember the name of the man who gave you the check, would you?”
“Sure do. It was John James. Don’t know why that name has stuck with me. It was the only time I ever saw him. Lived in Gulfview, up in Ware County, in the big bend country.”
I thanked him again for his time and cooperation, and told him I would call back later that afternoon. It had apparently not occurred to him to wonder why I needed the name of the payee on the check, if all I wanted was to buy an airplane.
The address given by the Secretary of State’s office for Rundel was on the south end of the Key, an imposing ten stories of concrete, blocking the view of the Gulf. I entered a driveway off Gulf of Mexico Drive at a sign announcing that I had arrived at Gulf Breakers, Exclusive Condominium Living at its Best. About a hundred yard down the driveway I came to a gate, with a guard dressed in a khaki uniform. I told him I was going to see the manager, and he raised the gate, giving me a sloppy salute. The rest of the driveway was another hundred yards or so of brick pavers, lined with coconut palms. The grand entrance at the end of the driveway was fit for one of the finer hotels. I drove underneath a frescoed overhang and was met by a doorman wearing the same uniform as the gate guard. He was expecting me, apparently called by his buddy on the gate, and directed me to the manager’s office on the first floor, next to the elevators.
A woman of about fifty, dressed as if she were twenty, invited me into her private office. She had blond hair, which had the dried out look of too many bleachings, done in waves falling almost to her shoulders. She wore a tight blouse of pale yellow, unbuttoned enough to show an ample cleavage. Her dark blue shorts were about three sizes too small and hugged a butt of a size and shape that cried out for a loosely draped skirt. Her feet were encased in plastic mules with six inch heels. She was the typical New Yorker, moved to Florida, with her youth recaptured.
“We have two nice units for sale, Mr. Royal,” she said, “and right now the mortgage rates are about as good as we’ll see.”
I said, “Actually, I’m looking for an old friend, Hale Rundel. His brother gave me this address, and I thought that while I’m in the area I’d buy him a drink.”
“Oh, goodness. You’re not interested in buying a unit?”
“Sorry. Just looking for a friend.”
“Well, you won’t find him here.” Her breezy mood disappeared as the thought of a nice sales commission danced out of the office. “He moved out three months ago in the middle of the night owing a months rent.”
“He wasn’t an owner?” I asked.
“No. He rented Penthouse A during the off season while the owner was living in North Carolina. I can tell you the owner was mad, getting stiffed on a months rent. He wants me to give him back the entire commission I made on the deal. Says if I’d been doing my job I’d have made sure the rent was collected in advance.”
“How long did Hale live here?” I asked.
“About two months this time. But he rented the place two years in a row, for six months each year. He was supposed to stay six months this year. How was I to know he’d skip? He’d always paid the rent before.”
“What did he do for a living?”
“Hey, I thought you were his friend.”
“I was. I haven’t seen him in several years, though. When I knew him, he was a pilot.”
“Well, he wasn’t flying airplanes while he was here. I don’t know what he did. I always thought he was retired. He seemed to have plenty of money, and he threw a lot of parties. We got a few complaints about the noise from some of our residents, but if you called him about it, he was always polite and would quiet everything down real quick like.”
“You haven’t heard anything from him since he left, I take it.”
“No. And I don’t want to hear anything either. Unless he’s calling to say he’s sending me the rent. You sure you don’t want to take a look at one of those units we got for sale?”
“Some other time, maybe.”
“Sure.”
I thanked her for her time and left.
I stopped by O’Sullivan’s. It was still early, but the girls were always there.
Molly came over as I walked in. “Want something to drink, Matt?”
“No, thanks. I wanted to bring you up to date on your tip this morning. The man you saw is named Sam Cox, and he works for a guy named Hale Rundel who used to live on the Key. Do you know either one of those names?
“Sure, I know Hale. About fifty years old, getting fat and likes to wear those muscle shirts the kids wear. Looks pretty funny in them too. He’s like a lot of the people that come down here, wearing clothes they shouldn’t, and trying to stay young.”
“What do you know about him?”
“It’s funny, you know. He was a quiet type. He’d come in regularly for drinks at happy hour, and occasionally he’d have dinner. Always by himself. He’d sit at the bar, but didn’t usually talk to anyone, and I don’t think I ever saw him have dinner with anyone. He got to know one of our waitresses and invited her to a party at his condo one night. She later said she’d never go back there. Seems he had some pretty weird friends.”
“What did she mean?” I asked.
“I don’t know. She didn’t say anything more about it, and I didn’t feel it was my place to ask.”
“Does she still work here?” I asked
“No. She left when the season was over and moved back north someplace.”
“When did you last see Rundel?”
“I haven’t seen him in several months. He just stopped coming in. I figured he might be embarrassed to see that waitress again, or figured she told us something about that party that made him not want to face us. I did see him a couple of times with Dick Bellinger at the bar at Pirates’ Cove. He might know something.”
“I need to stop and see Dick anyway. I’ll check it out.”
“Look Matt, I’ve got to get back to the drudgery. It was good to see you again. I hope this leads you somewhere good for Logan”
I called Don Jones from my cell phone as I drove north toward Pirate’s Cove Inn and Marina. He told me that the one million dollar check he wrote on his trust account was made payable to Hawker Industries, an aircraft manufacturer.
On the bay side of Longboat Key, down a short road and across a narrow creek, sits a small island, perhaps five acres in size. It is protected from the open bay by a hook of the main island that comes out to the east and around to the south. The water between the hook and the little island forms a natural harbor called Pirate’s Cove. The only establishment on the little island is the Pirate’s Cove Inn and Marina. The Inn consists of a grand old restaurant and bar decorated as a Pirate’s den dreamed up by Walt Disney. The marina has about fifty boat slips arranged in a semi-circle around the little island’s protected shore. It was to here that I ran away from the world when Laura left. And it was here that Jason Clark rescued me.
A marina is always in a state of change, metamorphosing like a giant amoeba on a weekly basis. The liveaboards suddenly move ashore. The permanents, those who keep their boats in the marina, but don’t live aboard, decide that the next marina down the line is a better deal. The regular transients sell their boats and don’t come around anymore. The winter liveaboard decides to try the other coast this year. There’s always somebody new at the bar. In the years since I’d sold my liveaboard boat and moved into the condo, there had been a complete turnover, except for me and the dockmaster, Dick Bellinger.
Dick had been a good friend during my down times after Laura left. He lived in the marina on a production boat that looked like a working tug boat, but was in fact a pleasure yacht of about thirty-six feet. He was my age, and the spitting image of a television series star, one of those balding guys with a gray beard who always looked distinguished. If a female tourist on the island happened to mistake Dick for the T.V. star, he was not one to disappoint her. I suspect that a lot of small town school teachers in Ohio still go to sleep nights, reflecting on their good fortune in having had an affair, although brief, with a television personality.