THE VIRON CONSPIRACY (JAKE SCARNE THRILLERS #4) (3 page)

CHAPTER 4 - THE WIDOW

“My firm represents Katherine Vallance,” Todd said. “The widow of Bryan Vallance, who, as you may know, was killed in a tragic skydiving incident almost five months ago.”

Scarne had no trouble recalling the circumstances. Vallance’s death had been a media sensation, with shocking cell phone images plastered all over the Internet.

“Hawaii, right? A murder-suicide.”

“Yes. The police established that the man jumping with Bryan had already murdered most of his family and decided to take his own life. A group of BVM Corporation executives, led by Bryan, who was the chairman and chief executive officer, participated in the jump as part of a corporate retreat.
They call it tandem skydiving, suitable for first-timers.”

“And last-timers,” Scarne said, dryly.

“Yes, well that’s true, I suppose. Anyway, the man left a note that included a rant against corporate America, which he apparently blamed for our recent wars. He was an Army veteran. Poor Bryan was basically just a symbol to him.”

The door to the Mahogany Room opened and two waiters arrived with their food and wine. Todd told them he didn’t want to be disturbed and he would handle the wine pouring himself. He waited until after they left and he and his guests started eating before continuing.

“Katherine was devastated, of course.” Todd took a sip of his wine and smiled appreciatively. “The death was a shock, and the media frenzy afterward was, well, frankly disgusting.”

“It was that,” Tierney said. “But what did you expect, Winston? Vallance was the C.E.O. of one of the nation’s largest corporations. He did his swan dive onto a field full of high school kids playing baseball.”

The food and drink were certainly excellent, Scarne mused, but he wished Todd would stop beating about the bush.

“Where do I fit into all this, Winston?”

Todd cleared his throat.

“Well, I suppose I have to get to it.” He affected a rueful smile. “Mrs. Vallance thinks her husband was murdered.”

Scarne laughed. He couldn’t help it.

“I hope you didn’t bill her for that information, Winston. Everyone else on the planet thinks the same thing.”

Todd shook his head.

“You don’t understand. She doesn’t believe that the skydiver who killed Bryan was making some sort of political statement and just picked him because he was a handy target. She thinks Campbell, that was the fellow’s name, was put up to it by someone else. It was a murder, just not the one the police assumed.”

Scarne looked at Tierney, whose face was impassive.

“She bases that on what?” Scarne asked.

“Well, for one thing,” Todd continued, “this Campbell fellow specifically asked to be paired with Bryan Vallance when the jumpers were broken down into teams. Gave the guy who was set to go with Bryan some cock-and-bull story about friends in common. Man never questioned it and just switched.”

“So,” Scarne said, “what’s strange about that? Campbell wanted to kill the head man.”

“Then, there was Campbell’s family.”

“What about it? I don’t remember the exact details, but I seem to recall that the cops were sure he killed them. A confession. Lots of forensic evidence.”

“They still are convinced,” Todd said, “which makes all this so much more difficult. Katherine doesn’t think Campbell murdered his wife and daughter. For one thing, there was another child, a baby boy, who was not harmed. She thinks a truly deranged person would not have spared him.”

“Deranged means crazy,” Scarne said. “You don’t know what was going on inside the guy’s head. Maybe he didn’t have the stomach or the heart for it.”

“That’s what I told Katherine,” Todd said, waving a fork with a piece of crackling pork at Scarne. Then he put it in his mouth. “But she’s adamant.”

“Adamant about what? Who does she think killed the wife and daughter?”

Now, Todd looked really uncomfortable.

“Whoever forced Campbell to kill her husband. She believes the family was probably being held hostage until Campbell murdered Bryan
, and then killed anyway to silence them.”

“Does she have anything to back any of this up?”

“No.”

“Has she gone to the police with her suspicions?”

“No. She came to us first, for advice. She knows that without proof she could open herself up to slander charges from some of the people she suspects.”

“She gave you names?”

“No. Katherine Vallance sees a conspiracy of some kind and will spare no expense to uncover it. She says Bryan’s death was just too convenient for some other people. But she realizes that some of those who benefited from Bryan’s death didn’t necessarily kill him.” Todd paused. “If anyone did, that is. Obviously, when there is a change at the top, opportunities arise for advancement within the company. But she believes that this goes beyond mere corporate ambition. And there is another consideration. She is afraid that if she is correct and the purported killer, or killers, finds out she is suspicious, she’ll be next. She’d only be safe if the police believed her and started an investigation. But without any proof, she doesn’t think that is very likely. So, she is counting on you to get her the proof she needs, while keeping her involvement secret.”

“Does Mrs. Vallance jump out of planes, too?”

“You are being flip, Jake. I’ve heard that you value a sense of humor that is not always appreciated by others. In this case, of course, I respect your incredulity.”

“Winston, you are from Chicago,” Scarne said. “I know a couple of first-rate investigation firms in the Windy City. Why me?”

“Would you believe me if I said she wants the very best?”

“He would,” Tierney said. “Jake doesn’t suffer from excess modesty.”

“Well, why should he, Don?” Todd pointed his cigar at Scarne. “Your cases have been pretty notorious, Jake. Ballantrae. That business with Arachne. And more recently, the publishing thing with Quimper.” He smiled. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but personally I would have preferred a man with a lower profile. But Mrs. Vallance was very insistent.”

Todd stood up.

“Excuse me a moment. I think the help is taking my request for privacy to extremes. They may never come back.”

He went to the door and left the room. Scarne looked at Tierney. He’d already decided not to take the case. It had professional disaster written all over it. He was always willing to risk that in the service of a good cause, but this was something else. The Vallance woman was right to be worried about slander suits.

“Don, I’m inclined to pass. I would think it’s Todd’s fiduciary duty to talk Mrs.Vallance out of this nonsense before she makes a fool of herself.”

Tierney leaned forward.

“You are preaching to the choir, Jake. I told Todd that. He got a bit uppity with me. Sibellius, Rockford and Todd is old school. It has a rock-solid reputation for putting clients first. Which is why it has the best client list in Chicago. Winston said they’ve done everything they could to talk Mrs. Vallance out of this.”

Todd returned with the waiters, who quickly cleared the table and poured coffee. One of them then went to the sideboard and brought over the cigar service and a bottle of Willet Pot Still Reserve bourbon and three snifters. Scarne and Tierney declined the cigars, but not the bourbon. Todd made the usual show of picking out a cigar, a Canario D’oro Rothchild Robusto, which the server expertly clipped and lighted for him. Todd took a few serious puffs, which imparted the room with what Scarne thought was a pleasant odor, although in a non-private venue elsewhere in New York City it would have probably attracted a SWAT team led by the city’s fanatic anti-smoking billionaire Mayor. The waiters left.

“Listen, Winston,” Scarne said, “I appreciate your confidence in my alleged abilities. But it sounds to me that this woman needs another kind of help. Psychiatric. Surely, a good grief counselor. How old is she? Perhaps she’s become demented. And I’m not being flip.”

“Katherine is a young woman, many years Bryan’s junior. I can assure you that she is all there mentally. In fact, she is an extraordinarily intelligent individual.”

“Trophy wife?”

“Not in the traditional sense. I mean, she was quite a catch and all, but she was his first wife. Bryan was a bit of a playboy into his 40’s before putting his nose to the grindstone at BVM. I know that in recent years there were several potential Mrs. Vallances, but he was a bit of a slippery devil, at least until Katherine came along.”

“So, she’s lost her meal ticket.”

“That would be a cynical conclusion, my friend. And a wrong one. I don’t believe Katherine’s quest has anything to do with money. Bryan left her very well off. Property, corporate stock, insurance, jewelry. None of that will change substantially whether she’s right or wrong about his death.”

“Children?”

Todd shook his head sadly.

“Katherine was three months pregnant when Bryan was killed. The shock of his death and the media circus surrounding it was too much for her. She lost the baby.”

“That’s really tough,” Scarne said, a bit chagrined at his censorious comment about the woman’s potential gold-digging motivation. “I’m sorry. I really am. The woman lost her husband, and then miscarried. I’m not surprised she is obsessing on all of this, even if she has all her marbles. But I don’t see what I can do. I’m not your man.”

“Perhaps this will change your mind,” Todd said, blowing a smoke ring before putting down his cigar. “Don, kindly pass me my briefcase.” He pulled out a folder and passed a document to Tierney. “Standard contract. Of course, you and Don should read it before you sign, but I’ll give you the gist.”

Scarne was somewhat miffed at the man’s presumption.

“Winston, I just told you I’m not interested.”

Todd ignored him, with the air of a man who made a lot of money ignoring things he didn’t consider important.

“Your normal rates don’t concern my client,” he said. “If you sign, you will be paid a retainer of $100,000. Non-refundable and subject to adjustment higher, if necessary.”

Tierney and Scarne both stared at the old lawyer in astonishment. It was an absurd amount of money.

“I don’t do assassinations,” Scarne finally said, only half in jest.

“The $100,000 is yours, no matter what you find out,” Todd continued in his attorney’s voice. “You do not have to provide an accounting of your time or your methods. Mrs. Vallance is only interested in the results of your investigation, whatever they may be. You get to keep the retainer even if you prove her wrong. She trusts you implicitly.”

Scarne couldn’t believe his ears.

“That proves it. She has to be crazy, Winston. I don’t even know Katherine Vallance.”

“This is where it may get dicey, Jake,” Todd said. “You do know her.” He paused. “Her full name is Katherine Ellenson Vallance.”

“Oh, shit,” Tierney said.

“I understand Katherine left you at the altar, Jake” Todd said, not unkindly.

“Not quite,” Scarne said, recovering. He took a belt of his bourbon. “We hadn’t yet decided on wedding invitations.”

CHAPTER 5 - FRANKENSTEIN STUFF

“You should have told me about this, Todd,” Tierney said. Scarne could tell from his tone that he was angry. “Jake is my friend, as well as client. I would have discussed this with him so he wasn’t blindsided.”

“I’m sorry, Don.” Todd didn’t sound sorry. “But I had my instructions from my client. “Mrs. Vallance wanted Jake to hear her story unencumbered by any past prejudices or emotions. One
other thing. The $100,000 fee is non-negotiable. If Jake takes the case, he must take the fee. Katherine doesn’t want this to be pro bono. She realizes that he might feel conflicted, but she wants to keep this as businesslike as possible.”

“Do I have to be here for this meeting?” Scarne said. “Or don’t I have any say in any of this?”

Todd looked at his watch.

“I have a flight out of JFK at 4:10. You two will probably want to discuss this. I’ll leave the contract with you, Don. Call and tell me what Jake wants to do. If he signs it, just overnight it to me with bank instructions on where to deposit the retainer. Then I’ll arrange a meeting with Mrs. Vallance.”

He stood, as did the others.

“It was a pleasure to meet you, Jake,” Todd said, putting out his hand. “I’m sorry if I’ve been a bit brusque and mysterious, but Katherine didn’t leave me much choice
in the matter. Please don’t shoot the messenger. She really is a wonderful woman. If you decide to help her, I know you can put her mind to rest, no matter what you find out. But I certainly understand that this is not an easy decision.”

He then shook Tierney’s hand and left.

***

“Kate.”

Scarne let the name hang in the air.

“It’s a hair ball,” Tierney said. They were lingering in the Mahogany Room over coffee. “How do you feel about her now?”

“I don’t know. She’s been out of my life for a long time, but I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t think about her. Often. But you know what I’ve been doing since she left. It’s not as if I planned on tracking her down. I had basically closed the door on that chapter of my life. We were young. Dudley said she was like a poison in my blood, but I’ve found a few antidotes in the last few years.”

Tierney knew that Dudley Mack, Scarne’s quasi-mobster best friend, had introduced Kate Ellenson to Scarne. He also knew that one of the “antidotes” Scarne alluded to, a woman named Alana Loeb, might have scarred the private investigator more deeply than anyone, including Kate.

“It’s an awful lot of money, Jake.” Tierney had finished reading the proposed contract. “This is a solid offer. No strings attached.”

“I don’t want her money.”

“Why? The rents in Rockefeller Center drop? You have a staff to consider. If you take this on, take the money. Maybe it will give you some perspective.”

Scarne drummed his fingers on the table.

“A faint heart never won the chorus girl.”

“What’s that?” Tierney asked.

Scarne smiled.

“It’s a favorite saying of George Mack, Dudley’s old man. He said it was the women who drove you crazy that matter in the long run. Kate certainly fit the bill. She was always
a bit of a loose cannon. Unpredictable. Even volatile. Sure drove me nuts.”

“You’re going to do it, aren’t you?”

“The thing is, Don, Kate was a lot of things, but she was nobody’s fool. If she thinks there is something suspicious about her husband’s death, she might be right.”

Scarne picked up the contract and took out a pen.

“You know my bank info. You can call Todd.”

***

Back in his office, Scarne told Evelyn and Sealth what had transpired.

“I bet you’re sorry now you instituted a profit-sharing plan,” Evelyn said.

Scarne laughed.

“Hell, I never expected profits. See what you can find out about Vallance and BVM. And get me everything on his death. And the guy who killed him. Names of the cops involved, witnesses, the whole shebang. You know the drill.”

Evelyn was a marvel putting together reams of information on Scarne’s cases. He turned to Sealth.

“Noah, you have any contacts in Hawaii?”

“A couple. Had a couple of cases in common with the Honolulu P.D.”

“I love
Hawaii 5-0
,” Evelyn said. “
Book them, Dano
.”

“Those are fictional state cops,” Sealth said. “Hawaii doesn’t have state police.”

“Really? Why not?”

“This is all very fascinating,” Scarne said. “Maybe you can discuss TV trivia and Hawaiian law enforcement history somewhere else. I want to call Huber at the
Times
. Noah, see if you can get me the name of a Honolulu cop who actually exists. Someone who won’t throw me off Diamond Head when I show up.”

“Fly coach,” Evelyn said. “Remember the profit sharing.”

“Get out of here.”

***

“Is this going to be one of those conversations where you bend me over a fence and I tell you everything I know? Then, in return, all I get is a bagel to be named later after the poop hits the lawn mower?”

“Probably,” Scarne said. “Maybe two bagels.”

“Such a deal,” Bob Huber said.

“I might also keep my print subscription to the Old Gray Lady, although the digital-only price is very tempting.”

Robert Emmett Huber, the acerbic business reporter at
The New York Times,
had often helped Scarne in the past. And despite his protestations that the relationship was one-sided, Huber knew that Scarne, if he could, would give him the inside track on any stories that resulted from his investigations. Indeed, one of them, involving the Chinese and New York real estate, had recently earned Huber another George Polk Award for business reporting.

“What do you need?”

“Anything you can tell me about the BVM Corporation that I can’t get off the web or a corporate report.”

“What makes you think I know anything about them?”

“Because I just Googled the company and your name. You’ve written a half dozen articles about them, including a Sunday magazine piece.”

“Trapped again. I suppose it would be useless to ask why you are looking at BVM. You’ll just lie and say you are just doing research for a security consulting job. Then it will turn out that there is a hydrogen bomb planted in a tub of margarine.”

“Margarine?”

“BVM produces one third of all the margarine in the United States, or the world, I forget which.”

“Gee, now I really hope I get the security consulting gig.”

“Point is, the company is huge. More than $90 billion in sales, and
it churns out profits like a technology company, which, and most people don’t know this, it basically is.”

“The
y make high-tech margarine?”

“Just listen and learn, wise guy. BVM stands for Barker Vallance Macgruder, the names of the three founding Illinois families. Personally, I liked the old name, which is what the company was called for a hundred years before some Wall Street genius thought it would sound better as a bunch of initials.”

So, Bryan Vallance was not just an employee. He was related to whoever the Vallances were. Scarne decided to play it coy.

“BVM is based in Illinois?”

“Yeah. The headquarters and all the major American facilities are in Boone City, about 150 miles south of Chicago. Damn place should be named Boondocks. I spent a week there one day when I was researching a story a few years back. Ever have a soy burger?”

“No.

“Don’t.”

“Is BVM still a family business?”

“Not anymore. The Vallance family bought out the Barkers and Magruders during the Depression when the company was balls to the wall. BVM started out as a Midwest agricultural operation and got hammered by the collapse of farm prices. Half their holdings blew away and wound up in New Jersey during the dust storms.”

“But the Vallance family held on?”

“Yeah. Until Bryan Vallance was killed in that skydiving fuck-up. You must know about that.”

“Sure. It was all over the media. He was murdered by some nut job with a gripe against corporate America.”

Scarne hoped he wasn’t laying it on too thickly. Huber could smell a story under a skunk.

“I never could understand,” Huber continued, “why anyone would participate in a sport where one of the pieces of equipment is called a shroud line. Makes no sense. You’re only asking for trouble. Anyway, Bryan was the great grandson of Bartholomew Vallance, who founded the original company back in 1890 something with Clarence Barker and Angus Macgruder. He was the last of the Vallances.”

“Sounds like one of
The Leatherstocking Tales,”
Scarne said. “How did the company survive the Depression?”

“By the skin of their teeth. If it wasn’t for Bryan’s father, they never would have made it. He built up a relationship with the Soviet Union and wound up feeding half of Russia when the war came.”

“Was he a Communist?”

“Hell, no. Aaron Vallance was just a good businessman. He didn’t see why he couldn’t sell wheat, corn and soybeans to the Reds when other American companies were selling steel to the Japs that they later used in bombs at Pearl Harbor. I heard he was a favorite of Joe Stalin, even after the war ended. He kept his Russian contacts during the Cold War, which didn’t make him too popular in D.C., but he never gave a
rat’s ass. He had bigger fish to fry. He didn’t want Barker Vallance Macgruder to be vulnerable to commodity prices, so he transformed it into an agribusiness giant that controls much of the nation’s food supply, as well as the means to move it to market. Bought trucking companies and took big positions in the railroads. The Mississippi was, and probably to a great extent, still is, the company’s lifeblood. BVM owns or operates probably half the barges that sail the river. The guy was a visionary, and Bryan was a chip off the old block. Cornell, M.I.T., Wharton School of Economics. Realized that there was more to grains than just corn flakes. What his father built, he reorganized. Instituted efficiencies of scale. Cut some dead-wood divisions and made savvy acquisitions, mostly high-tech. BVM is now one of the world’s leading producers of chemicals, vaccines, vitamins, health care products, food supplements, genetically-altered crops and animals, you name it. Some of it is Frankenstein stuff. He created some of the best research labs in the country. Pity, really.”

“What?”

“Well, a lot of family businesses suffer from generation to generation. The genes get thinner, or something. But not the Vallances. They seemed to get smarter. Didn’t seem to be anything they couldn’t do.”

“Except fly.”

“Yeah. There’s that. Company’s stock took a nose dive when he did.”

“Who replaced him?”

“Well, with no one in the family left, the board opted to reassure the big institutional investors who own most of the company’s shares, so they picked Roland Lenzer. Dr. Roland Lenzer. German. Another whiz-kid type who was the head of BVM’s research division. Wall Street liked the move. Stock has recovered nicely.”

“Isn’t it unusual for a researcher to get the top managerial position at a corporation?”

“It happens. Especially in companies that are now more dependent on science than in the past, such as BVM. Lenzer is a brilliant guy. He’s more than a scientist, anyway. Has plenty of managerial experience. He ran one of BVM’s subsidiaries in Europe before he came to the States. He was the obvious choice. Some would say the only choice.”

“What do you think of him?

“I interviewed him after Vallance died. Bit of a cold fish, I thought. I mean, he said all the right things. Bryan was a wonderful man and a friend. Real tragedy. Hard to replace. That sort of stuff. But he’s a typical German. I couldn’t help but get the impression he thought he could do a better job than his predecessor. Look, I might be overly critical. I only met or spoke to Bryan Vallance a couple of times but I kind of liked him. He was a warmer person than Lenzer seems to be. But that doesn’t mean Lenzer isn’t the right man for the job. He’s dumped some of Vallance’s loyalists. That’s his prerogative, of course. Probably a smart move. And they all were well taken care of, with lucrative golden parachutes.”

Huber chuckled.

“Hell, I bet Bryan would have preferred a golden parachute to the one he got.”