Conspiracy of Silence (8 page)

“Now don't jump to conclusions, Lizbeth,” I said.

We were sitting at the A1 Pancake House on Colfax Avenue in Pompton Lakes. Gene and I had crashed at a nameless flophouse for what little remained of that night, and now we were doing our best to wake up our brains and bodies for what promised to be even more difficult work in the coming days.

Lizbeth, I suspect, hadn't gotten a wink of sleep, but her energy was irrepressible. And she looked more tempting than ever. Maybe there ought to be a law against beautiful eighteen-year-old girls.

“C'mon, Joe,” she chided me. “I was right all along, wasn't I?” She gave me an impish smile, as if she'd beaten me in a game of checkers.

“Lizbeth,” I said, pouring more coffee into me than was good for me, “I don't want to put a damper on things . . . but the fact that Frank's coffin is empty doesn't mean that he's alive. He could still be dead.”

I didn't want to add, “And your father could still have killed him,” but I think the unspoken thought flashed through Lizbeth's mind, for her face clouded over for a moment—but only for a moment.

“Oh, Joe,” she scoffed, “you don't really believe that.”

“I don't know what to believe,” I said.

And I meant it. This turn of affairs had complicated, not simplified, the situation. All it indicated was that some shenanigans had gone on both during that fateful dinner of March 19, 1924, and its immediate aftermath. The conspiracy of silence and deceit that I had encountered in my investigation had now turned into a conspiracy of some other kind—exactly what, I didn't have enough evidence to say. But it was clear that it was the work of multiple hands.

Let's assume that Lizbeth was right and that her Uncle Frank was still alive. What did that mean? It meant that he and his brother James had staged his death—and, at a minimum, that Dr. Granger was involved. Could we extend the conspiracy any further? To Frank's mother, Helen Ward Crawford? To James's wife, Margaret? I had my doubts. In a case like this, the fewer people who were in the know, the better. Joseph the butler's nearly apoplectic reaction to the empty coffin made it clear he was not in the loop—and why should he have been? Even that police chief, Myron Franklin, was probably just bought off with a wad of dough: there was no reason for him to know what the plan was, or where it was heading.

And that was my difficulty, too.
What was the plan?
First of all, why stage Frank's death at all? Merely to have him escape the clutches of Eva Dailey, who expected him to marry her? A powerful family like the Crawfords could easily have thrown money at her to skedaddle to parts unknown, taking her bastard child in tow—or to have Frank do so. Someone like Eva simply didn't have the power and influence to create any kind of scandal for Frank Crawford or anyone else.

And, overriding this perplexity, was an even greater one:
Why did James Allen Crawford confess to a murder he didn't commit?
This, really, was the crux of the whole affair. If Frank's death had been staged, then why did James willingly inflict decades of incarceration upon himself for no discernible reason? What could possibly have been his motivation? From what I knew about Crawford, he didn't strike me as some kind of masochist, willing to throw the best years of his life away for a murder that didn't even happen.

This whole puzzling scenario was based on the premise that Frank Crawford was actually alive. But I had no evidence of that. Frank may not have been in his grave, but there was still not the slightest indication that he was still on this earth; and if he was in fact no longer in the land of the living, there was still a substantial amount of evidence that James, at a minimum, was complicit in his death. Twelve years had passed, and no one had caught the faintest glimpse of him.

I hadn't let Lizbeth know the full upshot of my talk with her father in prison . . . especially his chillingly despairing indictment of himself—“I deserve to be here.” Those words carried conviction to me, even if I couldn't penetrate to their full meaning.

So I wasn't yet ready to give James Allen Crawford a free pass.

Lizbeth was thirsting to confront all and sundry—her mother, her grandmother, even her father—about what we had unearthed. I cautioned her against that, and with difficulty convinced her to let me handle the case as I saw fit. I had to remind her that I was the professional and that she had hired me to do a job. I told her that knowledge was our only weapon here—and that, in fact, we didn't have as much knowledge as she may have thought. We were still playing with a weak hand—and the only way to strengthen that hand was to gather more information.

“I need to go through your father's effects,” I said. “I recall someone saying he had a study in the house that's kept locked. I need to get in there.”

She brightened at the prospect. “That's easy, I can arrange that. Joseph has the key. I can get it from him . . . he'll do anything for me.”

We had all made it clear to Joseph that he'd better keep his mouth shut about what he saw at the gravesite if he knew what was good for him. It didn't take much persuading, and I could tell that his almost fatherly devotion to the youngest of the Crawford clan would seal his lips better than any threats we could make.

“OK,” I said, “get that key. I think I'll be back for another session at Thornleigh tonight.”

This was a solo job, and I wanted even Lizbeth to stay out of my way as much as possible.

She had gotten the key from Joseph almost immediately upon returning to the house, and she had handed it to me as I waited in the long gravel driveway after our late breakfast. There was nothing more to do here until the dead of night, and after dropping Gene off at the
Herald Tribune
building I went back to my own place for a little shut-eye.

Nightfall came early at this time of year, and, even though Lizbeth said her family all tended to retire early, I knew I would have to give the entire household plenty of time to drift off to sleep before invading their domain. Luckily, James's study was in the east wing of the house, where no one slept, so there was a good chance I could do my work undisturbed.

At one
a.m.
I was let in a side door by Lizbeth . . . and I tried not looking too intently at her nightgown, as she had neglected to wear a wrap. Gliding like a ghost, she almost ran up the stairs to the second floor of the east wing, stopping me in front of a solid oak door in the middle of an immense corridor.

“Here it is,” she whispered.

I inserted the key, and the door opened easily. Lizbeth made motions to follow me in, but I barred her with an upraised hand.

“You'll have to stay out here, Lizbeth,” I said. “I need to do this alone.”

She almost exploded with outrage. “I want to know what you find!” she hissed at me in a loud whisper.

“No.”
I said the word as forcefully as it is possible to say in a whisper. “This is my job. Let me handle this.”

We stared at each other for what seemed like minutes. At last, with a hint of tears, she yielded without a word, stepping back into the hallway.

I closed the door and locked it from the inside.

The room was spacious but sparsely furnished. Aside from book-filled shelves lining the walls and a file cabinet or two, the only prominent object in the room was a large rolltop desk, its cover shut tight. I was afraid that it was locked, but it proved not to be. Although well-swept, the room had a deserted air to it. It seemed inconceivable that this was where the operations of the Crawford family business were run. And if this study really had been shut up since James's incarceration, it was not clear what usable evidence it would contain.

Quite frankly, I didn't know what I was looking for. What could I find that would verify either the death or the continued existence of Frank Crawford? I was beginning to doubt that that was even the central issue in this whole case—it was starting to seem like some kind of obfuscating sideshow. But if I could at least ascertain that Frank was still alive after March 19, 1924, that would be something.

But there was nothing—at least, nothing that seemed to be of any real value. All the papers and files contained material only prior to that fateful day. There was virtually no correspondence here—certainly no personal letters of any kind. James Allen Crawford must have had some kind of mania for tidiness and organization, for nothing seemed out of place. Files relating to Crawford Rubber and Tire were indeed present, but all predating 1924; and I was not enough of a businessman to make head or tail of the receipts, ledgers, and other paraphernalia that cluttered the cabinets. The desk contained almost nothing of personal interest. Unless a cache of material lay elsewhere, this investigation was leading nowhere.

After an hour or so, I cautiously opened the door. On the wall facing the room, Lizbeth had slumped to the floor, disheveled and half-asleep. But as I quietly approached her she quickly snapped awake and stared at me wide-eyed.

“What did you find?” she asked breathlessly.

“Nothing,” I conceded. “Nothing at all.”

She bowed her head, crestfallen.

Neither of us spoke for a time. Then I said: “Is there any other place where personal records—letters, diaries, anything of that sort—might be found? There's almost nothing of recent vintage in that room. What about the family's current business papers? Where would they be?”

She looked up at me with a sense of despair. “You'll never be able to get a look at those,” she said. “My mother and grandmother guard them like hawks. Even the servants aren't allowed near them without a family member present.”

“Is there any kind of storage room that might have old files or papers?”

She screwed up her face in thought. “Well, there might be something like that . . . but honestly, Joe, I've never been there. It's also kept locked. Grandma has the only key.”

“And there's no way you can get it from her?”

“Not a chance.”

“Where is this room?” I asked.

“It's on the third floor of this wing, toward the back.”

I did some quick thinking. “Is there a window in the room?”

“Well, I think so,” Lizbeth said uncertainly. “I think there must be—you can see it from the outside. But how . . .?”

“Never mind that. Tell me something else: Is there a way to get on the roof?”

“The roof?” She almost spoke the words aloud. “What are you thinking . . .?”

“Just tell me. Is there a way to get on the roof?”

“Yes . . .” hesitantly. “I think so. You go up to the third floor, and there's a ladder at the very back of the wing built into the wall, and that takes you to a trap-door onto the roof.”

“Good. I'm going there . . . tomorrow night.”

“Why tomorrow?” she asked.

“I'll need some . . . equipment.”

I was beginning to think I was getting too old for this kind of work.

I was standing on the flat roof of the east wing of Thornleigh, looking down over the edge to the flat brick façade. My target was a window at the very back corner of the wing, only six feet below the roof. Lizbeth had let me in, in a reprise of the night before, at around 1
a.m.
, and we had little difficulty finding the ladder leading to the trap-door opening onto the roof. As I left her peering apprehensively up at me through the trap-door, I shut it and realized that the hard part was ahead of me.

In addition to other paraphernalia, I had brought with me four large suction-cups that I proceeded to attach to my feet and hands. It had been years since I had engaged in this kind of gymnastics, and I was not at all sure how well they would hold up. And if I took a tumble down the walls of Thornleigh, I'd probably be fit for Frank Crawford's empty grave.

A three-story structure—especially with the high ceilings that dominated Thornleigh—is higher than it looks; or maybe it just seemed that way when looked at from above. But I didn't have much choice in the matter.

So I began crawling over the edge of the roof and down the wall.

I went feet first, affixing my feet to the wall first, then my hands. After that, I was careful to move only one limb at a time. The suction-cups worked well enough, although occasionally some grime or other impedimenta caused a slight slippage that made me freeze abruptly until I was certain that all four cups were secure. I felt vaguely like Count Dracula climbing down the wall of his castle in Transylvania while Jonathan Harker looked on in horror—although, from my recollection of both the book and the recent Bela Lugosi film, the count had gone down head first, something I wasn't quite so foolish as to try.

The six feet from the roof to the window seemed like sixty at the pace I was going. I managed to pull my body parallel with the entire window-frame, positioning myself to its left, and felt comfortable conducting the next phase of the operation.

This involved withdrawing a contraption of my own construction, made up of a small suction-cup attached to a foot-long metal rod; from the rod itself extended a string, to which a glass-cutter was affixed. Fastening the suction-cup to the center of the lower windowpane directly under the window-latch (which was, of course, placed on the inside, hence at the moment out of my reach), I proceeded to cut this section of the pane—about ten inches by twelve—out of its wooden frame. Having completed this operation, I put the faintest bit of pressure on the suction-cup and was rewarded with a virtually inaudible crackling sound indicating that the pane had been severed. I carefully removed the suction-cup from the pane and placed both items in a carryall slung over my shoulder. I performed this entire task while my two feet and one hand were affixed to the wall of the house by their suction-cups.

It was when I reached inside to flick the latch to open the window that disaster struck.

In my haste, or carelessness, I moved too fast—and felt both suction-cups on my feet to be slipping. In a panic, I grabbed whatever I could—and that proved to be nothing more than the very narrow windowsill at the bottom edge of the window. I was now hanging precariously, three stories from the hard, frozen ground, my fingers clinging spasmodically to about two inches of wood.

For a time my feet swung wildly beneath me. In spite of the cold, I felt sweat pouring from my face and, worse, from my palms. My hands were quickly losing their grip. Forcing myself to calm down, I affixed first one of my feet's suction-cups, then the other, to the wall below the window. This lent me enough stability to pull my left forearm up to the windowsill, which restored my balance to some degree.

I had, unfortunately, failed to flick that latch to open the window, so I was not in much better position than before. It would require a full three-foot extension to reach that latch: I attempted to touch it with my right arm fully extended, and found that I was still several inches shy. My only option would be to raise myself bodily to a higher level.

Bracing both my arms on the narrow windowsill, I first pried off my left foot off the wall. Making sure it was now fastened at least half a foot above its former position, I did the same with the right. This had the result of allowing me to extend my arms at full length on the windowsill, as if I were doing some kind of push-up. But I was able to reach the latch, and I flicked it with a certain harried impatience.

I wasn't out of the woods yet. The bottom half of the window had clearly not been opened for years, and it stuck fast. I again forced myself to pause—not only to calm myself, but to gather my strength. It was impossible to use both hands simultaneously to open the window, so all I could do was to use the palm of one hand, then the other, to nudge the window upward.

But it was no go, so I had to proceed to Plan B—to bring the upper part of the window down so that I could clamber in from above. The wooden frame around each of the six windowpanes afforded less than an inch of play, and the sweat on my fingers wasn't helping matters. Nevertheless, after what seemed like an hour, I managed to get the upper window to descend in such a way as to allow my body to go through it.

Almost before I was aware of it, I had stumbled into the room, falling heavily—but, I hoped, more or less silently—onto the floor.

I hoped to heaven that that cut windowpane had survived intact in my bag, for I was intent on reattaching it when I left. But that was a secondary concern right now. I was in, and I had to make the most of my time.

I felt it was safe enough to turn on the light-switch, which I could dimly make out near the one door in the room. What faced me when the light flooded in was a room piled high and in a certain disarray with trunks, papers, files, ledgers, and other miscellany whose function was not immediately apparent. From the dust encumbering virtually every corner of the room, it was clear that this was not a repository for any kind of current personal or business records. But if there was anything here after 1924, it might afford a clue.

I do not have a head for business, so I was not able to make much of the immense ledgers that lay stacked in a far corner of the room. These ledgers did indeed date to the mid-1920s up to about 1930, but they seemed to contain nothing untoward. Their neat, feminine handwriting was, I gathered, that of James Allen Crawford's mother, who was clearly running the show in his absence.

What I was looking for were
personal
documents, rather than business records. Correspondence, diaries, anything that might shed light on what exactly had happened on—and subsequent to—that fateful night of March 19, 1924.

My canvassing of the room finally focused on a large trunk that lay in another corner, beneath mounds of papers that didn't seem of any interest. The lid of the trunk was locked, but that proved a minimal impediment. A lock-pick that I habitually carried with me made short work of that large and clumsy lock.

What met my gaze seemed indeed to be a gold-mine, although in some senses it was an embarrassment of riches. The trunk was full of an immense mass of correspondence, all addressed to Helen Ward Crawford and extending back many years. It would take hours to go through this cache, so I did my best to sort through it by its apparent relevance. Many items could be put aside quickly—invitations to parties and weddings, idle chatter from fellow bluebloods, even some very old letters from Helen's husband, dating from before the war. I was about to give up—or, rather, to conclude that this ocean of documents needed to be examined more carefully in a less compromising situation—when I came, near the bottom of the trunk, upon a series of letters, still in their envelopes, that had been neatly fastened with two rubber bands.

Every one of the letters was postmarked from Ojinaga, Mexico. The addresses varied, and the postmarks ranged from the summer of 1924 to the winter of 1930.

All were written by one Félix Calderón.

All were, without question, requests—or demands—for money.

Once again, I felt I had something—but I didn't know
what
I had.

Who was this Calderón? Why was he asking for money? Blackmail was the obvious answer—and the fact that this batch of letters dated to no earlier than the summer of 1924, a few months after the “death” of Frank Crawford, did not escape my notice.

I quickly returned to the business ledgers. I found no record of any such payments to a Félix Calderón. And the payments would not have been insignificant: ordinarily he asked for about $20,000 every six months. This may still have been peanuts to a clan as well off as the Crawfords, but us ordinary folks it was a fortune.

I pocketed the letters and closed the trunk, restoring the papers over it as best I could.

I'll not trouble you with my escape from this increasingly claustrophobic third-story room. My exit out the window; my closing the window and flicking back the latch; my reaffixing of the glass pane I had cut, with glue I had packed with me; and my ascent to the roof by means of my suction-cups—all went without a hitch. I descended through the trap-door and clambered down the ladder.

Once again I found Lizbeth crumpled up on the floor, fast asleep in her gauzy nightgown.

She awoke with a gasp when I touched her shoulder; I almost covered her mouth to make sure she didn't cry out, but she gained control of herself quickly. She gazed at me with a poignant mixture of hope and apprehension; all she could say was:

“Did you find anything?”

“I may have,” I said. “I think I need to take a trip to Mexico.”