WE LOOK FOR THE RIGHT DROVER

 

 

Helen Delaporte

While Elizabeth Wheeler was taking care of her sister-in-law in Bluefield and working up the Drover genealogy by means of an interview with Mrs. Fisk and no telling how many hours in the library, life went on for the Old Orchard Fort Chapter, NSDAR; that is to say, we had our regular March meeting.

Elizabeth Wheeler’s report on the Adoniram Philipson project was read by Martha Doans as though the entire chapter had not been fully informed on all developments through the Banner-Democrat, Station WXZ-TV, and the United Telephone System. But the ladies enjoyed hearing about it all over again, and there was general sensation, which of course was to be expected and which accounted for the large attendance. The daughters agreed that now that the grave had been located and Adoniram had been fully authenticated, and the marker, ordered in February, had arrived, we should proceed as soon as possible in placing it and holding the ceremony. The weather was now promising to be pleasant, and Margaret Chalmers said that she thought she could get a man to mix the cement into which we have to set the bronze marker. Consequently it was moved, seconded, discussed, and passed that the appropriate ceremony should be held on April 6, just two weeks before our April meeting.

Personally, since I had got the Holy Week services out of the way, the ladies could have scheduled anything on any day in April and it would have been all right with me.

When Elizabeth brought me her beautifully detailed genealogy of the Drover family on the Tuesday after our meeting, I sat down and studied it very carefully. Quite apart from its connection with our mystery, I was fascinated by what it said about human history. The Drovers—that is, the ones that do not come down from Quinby Drover—are widely scattered through the hollows and coves of our mountains. And they are reported not infrequently in our papers for murder, theft, moonshining, and sundry other peccadillos.

Considering that Quin’s brood died of suicide, drowning, a car accident, and enemy action, the family of old Quin Drover, like their cousins, experienced more violence than we like to admit is normal for the general run of Americans. Most of them died rather young.

All told, the main difference between the respectable Drovers and the disreputable cousins was money. And I wondered if perhaps money had not kept some of Quin’s own clan out of jail.

Interesting as I found the genealogy of the Drover family, it was of value in solving the mystery only because it gave us some names—probably the only names we would have—of people in our area in whom Luis Garcia was likely to have had any interest. And though Garcia might have come to Borderville to see somebody else, it was highly unlikely—in fact unquestionably so. One thing proved this; the fact that neither Allen Comming nor Duncan Yardley nor Anthony Hancock nor Dorothy Green nor Bettye VanDyne had come forward when the corpse was identified. Thus Elizabeth’s chart furnished us with a perfect list of suspects.

On the face of it, I was prepared to see complicity in the whole family. But I realized that only one could have struck the blow that killed.

A cast of characters to be thoroughly investigated! I told myself. And I was going to investigate quite thoroughly.

When Henry came home, I had him sit down immediately and look at Elizabeth’s work.

He was impressed and said he would be sure to put Elizabeth on his payroll next time he had an involved estate to settle.

“Now this first Quinby Drover—” Henry observed, “I believe his will was not probated in Virginia.”

Elizabeth had already told me about that. “He was living in Collinwood, New Jersey, when he died,” I said.

“Yes,” Henry replied. “However, the estate is a legal curiosity of interest in the Commonwealth of Virginia.”

“How so?”

“I understand that each of the descendants received an undivided interest. That happens sometimes, although in this case the repercussions continued for an unusually long period and generated quite a bit of legal business from time to time. Let’s see. Nineteen seventeen to nineteen eighty-nine—that is seventy-two years. The mischievous effects of that will have probably been felt by each of these people Miss Elizabeth has so neatly listed here.”

“But, Henry, how complicated that must be!”

“Well, no, not necessarily. Do you recall a slot in the ten forty form that calls for income from an estate? That slot was made for just such people as the Drovers. For that matter, you and your brother get some money from your mother’s estate and there have been no legal problems yet. But if you wanted to sell your mother’s apartment house in Harrisburg and Bert, let’s say, didn’t want to sell, there could be some real unpleasantness and perhaps a series of lawsuits. Usually joint ownership becomes either burdensome or unprofitable and an agreement is reached so that the property can be managed in an economical manner.”

“How much do you suppose could be involved in this undivided estate?”

“I don’t know,” Henry said, “I never heard that Allen Comming did a great deal of business. If there is no more than that transfer business, he would probably have to divide the profit with the living heirs. But of course there is likely to be other capital invested that we don’t know about—possibly land or coal leases. But I would think that had been mined out long ago.

“If you want to find out about the Drover wealth, I’d say the best person to ask would be Angus Redloch.”

“Is that old man still alive?” I asked. I remembered that when we first moved to Borderville, Mr. Redloch was generally conceded to be a museum piece—an attorney who had “read law” and practiced in a dingy little office over a store on Crowder Street.

“I think he says he is ninety-nine years old.”

“In a rest home, I suppose.”

“Not at all. He still goes to his office every day. And he handles the business of two or three old ladies. Once in a great while I see him in the courthouse.”

There is something about our mountains that makes people live and live and live—at least some people.

The very next day I made up my mind to see Mr. Redloch. I conceived of him as so fragile that he might die at any minute and take his knowledge with him.

Crowder Street is one of the narrow cross streets down town on the Virginia side. It is lined with old, two-story brick buildings, many of them with tatty zinc cornices. Officesupply stores, offset printing places, and newsstands tend to occupy the lower floors, while one or two of the buildings are vacant. Between any two shops, expect to find a wooden door repainted so many times that its surface is lumpy with coats of pigment applied as early as the last century.

Mr. Redloch was not listed in the phone book, but I remembered pretty well where his office was and found it easily enough by the gold letters ANGUS REDLOCH, ATTY. AT LAW still gleaming through the grime of an upstairs window.

Inside the street door, a rickety stair led steeply to the upper level. Every step announced my approach with varied creaks and groans. The pine floor was bare. Frosted glass in the door at the end of a narrow hall boasted letters that echoed the proclamation I had seen in the window: ANGUS REDLOCH, ATTY. AT LAW—this time in black.

I knocked, heard a swivel chair give up its burden, and saw through the frosted glass the shadow of Mr. Redloch as he approached. The door opened and there was the man himself.

He is an elf—a very old one—but an elf. Pale gray eyes, pink skin, totally bald, he has just the shred of a white moustache. There was also just a stroke of white stubble on his left cheek that his razor had missed.

The elf bowed in a courtly manner and asked me to come in. He tugged at the client’s chair enough to indicate that he was placing it in a convenient position and asked me to be seated.

I would like to call Mr. Redloch spry, but that is hardly correct. He reminded me of a marionette—suspended. It would surprise me if he weighs as much in pounds as his age in years.

Mr. Redloch himself was very neat, though I cannot say the same for his office. There were dusty papers everywhere. Cabinets and shelves were piled high with envelopes. To my left was an inner door, the upper part consisting of frosted glass. His law library, I thought—and no doubt it was in as great disarray as the room in which we sat.

He was saying something about assisting me.

“I am Helen Delaporte,” I replied, “I am sure you know my husband, Henry.”

“Ah, yes,” he said. “We were associated in some legal work back in the early sixties. As I recall, there were three parties in the suit growing out of an accident, and each of the parties chose to employ a different attorney. It could all have been handled much more expeditiously by one lawyer. But, then, people have their whims. Arthur Smith was my client, F. D. Simmons was your husband’s client, and Mrs. Sidney Young employed Chuck Benfield. He’s dead now.”

“You have a very clear memory,” I observed.

“Well, ma’am,” he said, “the secret of success in the law is details.”

Immediately I knew that I had found someone who knew things and that I had made an acquaintance that I would enjoy. Quickly I explained to him what I wanted to know and why I wanted to know it.

“Ah, yes,” he said, “the DAR murder case. I read of your discovery in the Banner-Democrat, and I admire your courage and cleverness in identifying the corpus delicti. I did not, however, know until this very moment that Mr. García was related to the Drover family. Fancy that!”

He hastened to add, “Although I am certainly at your service and happy to supply you with any reminiscences I may be able to recall from what is to me not a very distant past, I must warn you first. If this is murder—and I do not see how it can be anything else—you would do well to let it alone.”

Mr. Redloch gave me a very serious look that would have been perhaps alarming except that I could not get away from my first impression—that I was talking to a wondrously fey spirit that was somehow not quite real. He gave me a little lecture on the dangers of meddling with criminal matters and continued to look at me ominously; but because I maintained my silence, he soon went on.

“Well, I see that the ladies are the same as they have always been and that you will have your own way. But I beg of you that you be careful and confine such information as you discover to yourselves and to the commonwealth attorney. You must not let it be widely known that you are engaged in any sort of inquiry that might endanger those who perpetrated the murder, or you will in all probability find that they will endanger you.

“Now, as to the Drover estate, I do recall off hand a number of things that may be of interest or even of some profit to you. My late partner, Colonel Harvey Boyd, under whom I read law and with whom I began my practice, handled quite a number of matters for old Quinby Drover himself. This would be back in the nineties—possibly the eighties—long, of course, before my time.

“You see, I came into the office when I was seventeen years old. That was in nineteen ten. I remained in the office reading law until I was old enough to take the bar examination. Then I was admitted to the firm as a junior partner. Then when I was mustered out in nineteen nineteen, Colonel Boyd as a patriotic gesture made me a full partner. (He, of course has served in the war of sixty-one.)

“I first saw Quinby Drover about nineteen eleven or nineteen twelve. He had mined some coal property, for which he had not secured a proper lease. The land, it turned out, was not in fact the property of the individuals with whom he had exercised an agreement; and the actual owners sued him for three-quarters of a million dollars. It was fought up to the supreme court in Richmond, where old Quin lost his case.

“I have heard the rumor that Quin had spent over one hundred thousand dollars on high-powered lawyers from New York as well as some of Virginia’s most brilliant attorneys.

“We were employed in a minor way on the other side. But the thing that is interesting is that when the verdict was handed down, within five minutes’ time, Quin discharged the judgment with a check for the full amount drawn on the Morgan Bank in New York City.

“Now, in those days that was something! The fact is that I am still impressed.”

I murmured some encouraging inanity to fill in a pause. Mr. Redloch seemed momentarily to have escaped into the distant scene.

“Well,” he came back briskly to the present, “that will give you some idea of the wealth the Drovers had at one time. But a great deal of it evaporated quite suddenly with the Eighteenth Amendment.

“Oh, yes, Quin’s original fortune was made with Dixie Rose Whiskey. It was good stuff too. In making whiskey, the water is as important as the technique, and Quin certainly had both. It would be hard to say whether Quin made more out of his coal or out of his whiskey.

“Be that as may be, the whiskey distillery closed and the business came to an abrupt halt when the Volstead Act was passed. Indeed, indeed!

“It was a great joke, you see. Quin had made the fortune while his moonshining relatives back in the hills worked just as hard at making whiskey but made little money from it. When Prohibition came in, the tables were turned. There was no way by which Quin could continue distilling in a clandestine way, supplying bootleggers and so on. He was too well known, you see.”

Once more Mr. Redloch retreated into the past. I opened my purse and took out the genealogy Elizabeth had made for us.

“I have here,” I said, “a genealogical table of the family. Perhaps it will call something to mind that might prove helpful.”

Mr. Redloch took the paper, felt around in a drawer, and produced a large reading glass. I noticed for the first time that there was a tremor in his hand.

“Tut, tut, tut,” he said as he perused the genealogy.

“Denny Drover! I hadn’t thought of him for many a long year.

“He was a very good-looking boy—had golden curls and blue eyes. All the ladies felt maternal toward him.

“Denny’s aunt, Mrs. Baker Comming—oh, she was something! Had a place at Big Branch. I suppose you know about Big Branch. It’s all under the lake now, and there was a good deal of bad feeling toward TVA for destroying such a desirable area. Big Branch was quite the resort in its day. There were cabins along the branch and near it on the Holston—nice places, summer homes, you understand. There was a trolley from Borderville, and the best families would move out there as soon as school was over and stay until school took up again in September.

“Baker Comming was president of the Borderville National Bank, which was Quin’s bank here; and of course they had a lovely place out there with wide porches all around it. There were young people of all ages, so to speak, out there all summer long. It had everything one could expect of Asheville or any of the better-known resorts.

“Well, Denny’s mother always came for a month, usually August, with her sister-in-law, who was of course old Quin’s daughter. And as Denny grew older, he was quite a buck.

“He got a young lady in a family way when he was about nineteen. When the girl’s father expected him to do something about it, Denny took the train back north in a hurry. The girl’s parents threatened suit for breach of promise. At that point it developed that there was another young woman in a family way, also courtesy of Denny Drover. The second family—not people of consequence at all—took a great notion to make a big thing of it and sue the Drovers for a great sum. One of the suits was actually filed.

“Abner, Denny’s father, was the youngest of old Quin’s children. And in that family, the younger the children were, the more pretense of social standing was maintained. It was one of those things that are talked about out of all proportion. I have heard the figure of fifty thousand dollars for both girls. I feel sure that Denny’s father settled the matter for less than that—out of court, of course. Nevertheless the two girls are said to have come out of it very well financially. One now lives in Knoxville, and I do not know what happened to the other. Denny was always in scrapes—drank quite a bit. I’ve no idea how much was spent, all told, on getting him out of trouble.”

During this discourse Mr. Redloch had put down his reading glass. Now he picked it up again and waved it over the page trying to find the place where he had seen the name of Denny Drover. At last he found it.

“Now, Abner Drover,” he said, taking up his discourse again, “that’s Denny’s father—he had the worst head for business of any of the three sons, and he was the only one who lived long enough to have an effect on the estate.”

Once more the reading glass went down.

“That estate is very interesting—you know the will was probated in New Jersey. There was quite a thing about it too. The Commonwealth of Virginia was very eager to reap a whopping big tax in that matter, and the residency of old Quin was not finally adjudicated until about ten years after Quin died.

“Old Quin was a proud man,” Mr. Redloch said with a conspiratorial lowering of his voice. “Yes, he wanted his family to rank with the best, and he did not have very excellent material to work with there. Well, he figured that if he could keep the family industries together—because there was the whiskey, timber, coal, the railroad, and banking, in addition to things like his holdings in such items as AT&T, Pullman, and Waters Pierce—if he could just keep them dependent on those industries and keep the industries going after his death, don’t you see, they would all still be dependent on the central empire he had set up—and it would all be a monument to his genius. Somehow he thought it would work.

“The will, as I recall, more or less left a certain sum, say seven hundred fifty thousand dollars, to each of the children, a huge sum then, with each child receiving an undivided interest in the residue, that is, the various businesses—the bulk of the estate—which might have worked if he had set up a trust in such a way that none of the heirs, they being such as they were, could in any way control the businesses.”

I said that Henry had explained that the undivided interest would go on as long as all parties were satisfied, but that there would be major trouble if they did not.

“Yes, indeed,” Mr. Redloch said. “I am sure that all of Quin’s legal advice was against what he did. But some people prefer their own opinions. And indeed there would still be litigation about that estate except for the fact that by the time the third generation became involved, the estate was severely diminished.

“First there went the liquor. Then the mines played out, and without Quin to direct the company, leases that Drover Coal might have expected to secure had a way of going to other people; and then there were so many leases that either lapsed or proved unprofitable. Let’s not forget trouble with the unions.

“And there was the crash in nineteen twenty-nine. I have no doubt that the stocks in those wonderful industries like AT&T and so on had been sold to make cash distribution to the individual heirs. In the thirties it was the easiest thing in the world to lose money in any business.

“They lost the railroad, and the banks went under. The transfer business—that was the only thing left. That was a kind of adjunct to the rail line. It’s still going—Borderville Transfer it’s called now. There are possibly some other properties that make a return, but I doubt if there is much besides what I have mentioned.”

I thanked Mr. Redloch and made the proper noises about being pleased to make his acquaintance. He was, however, scanning Elizabeth’s genealogical chart through his reading glass again.

“Now here’s a thing.” he said. “Kenneth Raebon!”

Mr. Redloch went into suspended animation for two or three seconds.

“Yes,” I said.

“Kenneth Raebon,” he began again. “Of course all that we have been saying is in strictest confidence; but this one is still alive. I have had experience with him—oh, not in connection with the Drover estate. But I assure you that he is a very slippery customer indeed.”

Once more there was the suspended animation. When at last Mr. Redloch began again, his voice was conspiratorial. “Kenneth Raebon grew up in Hogg’s Gap; and when he got out of law school, he went into practice with Cornfield Simmons. (He was called Cornfield because he was fond of telling the jury that he was a simple boy who learned his law in the cornfield.) By the time Raebon joined the firm, Cornfield was like I am now, mostly retired; but he would tell Kenneth what to do, and Kenneth would do it.

“Well, Simmons and Raebon were somehow involved with the Drover estate—mostly because they were the only legal firm in Hogg’s Gap. So one time, old Kenneth went up to New Jersey on estate business and saw Sarah Drover’s only girl, Dorothy. Kenneth Raebon didn’t need Cornfield to tell him what to do in a case like that.

“They tell me that Dorothy is none too bright; but that didn’t stop Raebon from marrying her and getting himself made principal attorney for the estate. I imagine he has been drawing a good income from handling and mishandling what’s left of the estate, but don’t ever tell anybody I said it.”

“Mr. Redloch,” I said, “do you suppose there could still be enough of the Drover money left to be the cause of Luis García’s murder?”

A curious little chuckle rattled about in the old gentleman’s weasand. “Money,” he said, “or the lack of it, my dear young lady, is the cause of most things.”

The root of all evil! Certainly if the criminal lacks it and the victim has it. But I didn’t see how anyone would profit by the death of a concert artist.

“I have no idea how much Drover money is left. But I am sure your husband will bear me out that we are often surprised to find a source of money in an estate after we have supposed the till has long been empty.”

I thanked Mr. Redloch again for his time and kindness.

“As the remainder of my life becomes shorter and shorter,” he said as he got up from his chair, “I find that fewer and fewer people want my time.”

He saw me to the door and bowed me out.

I went right home and jotted down notes on all that Mr. Redloch had said. Then I combed my notes carefully to see if there was anything of value in them.

I had a far better picture of the Drover family and the wealth old Quin had heaped up. And I knew also that the wealth was for the most part gone. Old Quin was undoubtedly a rascal, who seemed to furnish the moral lesson that the success of this world is fleeting. How my grandmother would have gloried in such an outcome!

I studied the genealogical chart again. Martha and Jane could not be expected in their day to manage involved properties because they were mere women. On the other hand, neither Martha nor Jane seemed to have excelled in the things that wealthy women of that generation were expected to do. Franklin, whose children had a talent for coming to unfortunate ends, seems not to have had it in him to take hold of the family affairs. And the offspring of Abner could hardly have been expected to handle responsibility. As for young Quinby—well, he died before his father. It really looked as though Allen Comming and the Borderville Transfer were the core of whatever Drover estate might remain.

Of course, I knew where the place was—on the Tennessee side across the freeway from the bluff. It was a group of buildings at the foot of a steep slope. And then I seemed to remember something on top of the hill. It was kept painted and in good repair, but as to the amount of business that went on there, I had no notion.

On Elizabeth’s chart I ran a line under the living descendants and others who might be considered their heirs. They were:

Allen Comming, Jr.
Duncan Yardley
Dr. Anthony Hancock
Dorothy and Kenneth Raebon
Bettye VanDyne

Of the same generation had been the late Luis Garcia Valera. The list seemed to represent six shares of the estate if Garcia was included. Whether the six received equal or unequal shares from whatever income came from the remaining estate, there wouldn’t be much there. And I couldn’t believe that such a division of the profits from Borderville Transfer would amount to very much.

Just to see how it might work, I tried to imagine how the business went on. I assumed that the services of the Borderville Transfer were engaged one hundred times a year. I assumed further that transfer charges averaged $40,000 per job, though that seemed excessive. Then I estimated salaries for loaders and drivers, taxes, upkeep on the trucks—just a guess, of course—but the best I could make of it was that there might be $60,000 a year from it, and part of that would have to go to the heirs. Perhaps Allen Comming paid himself $50,000. Impossible! I knew very well that Allen and Marti Comming had a life-style that would require more than that. It couldn’t possibly be derived altogether from Borderville Transfer.

So what were the other Drovers living on? I thought it would be very interesting to know.

As I was searching my desk a few days ago, I found again a scrap of paper upon which on that afternoon I had jotted down the names of each surviving member of the Drover clan and added such addresses as I could find in the telephone book.

Allen Comming, Jr.	713 Deer Run, Borderville, VA
Duncan Yardley	131 Turner’s Hill Drive, Borderville, TN
Dr. Anthony Hancock	?
Dorothy and Kenneth Raebon	Hogg’s Gap Rt. 3, Mason’s Forge,
Bettye VanDyne	TN

Mason’s Forge is a crossroad about four miles from the airport.

After my interesting tête-à-tête with Mr. Redloch, I decided Henry Delaporte could take me out to dinner that evening because I was going to spend the afternoon driving around investigating the scale of living of Allen Comming, Duncan Yardley, and Bettye VanDyne and would not have time to prepare a meal.

I lunched on a sandwich and a gulp of instant and drove out to Deer Run in the Pontiac.

Deer Run is a wandering trail of asphalt that continues Hoffman Boulevard, which is quite an impressive avenue and formerly the best area in which to live on the Tennessee side. Some forty years ago a few venturesome souls moved beyond the corporation limits to build expansive dwellings along a farm road that had just been paved.

We have several friends on Deer Run, but they aren’t close friends, and we do not see them very often. Consequently I have a general idea of the houses out there, but I did not recognize the Comming house from its number. Nevertheless the Comming address sounded like money to me, and I intended to secure what Henry calls “eyeball evidence.”

It is beautiful out that way. Our famed Appalachian spring was now upon us. The dogwoods were blooming everywhere. Their blossoms floated in the pale sunlight like great clouds of snowflakes that had somehow forgotten how to fall. It made me glad that I had been forced at the Baldwin School to memorize:

Blow, trumpets, blow.
The world is white with may.

Deer Run winds considerably and crosses the “run” itself several times so that one who drives along it sees very little of the road ahead at any one time. Consequently I wasn’t really aware that I had arrived at 713 until I was actually there.

I stopped and looked.

“So that’s it!” I said.

It was the old Dr. Caswell house. I say “old”—it was built just before the Second World War when the best materials were to be had at little expense. Dr. Caswell and his wife were much beloved and are said to have entertained, not lavishly but graciously. Mrs. Caswell was a widow when we came to Borderville, and I have been in the house a few times.

After Mrs. Caswell died, the house changed hands now and then. The last time I had seen it, it was looking quite run down.

But not now!

It had become an absolutely beautiful house.

The lawn sweeps up from the road with dogwoods here and there toward the sides. A long gravel drive climbs the hill and curves in front of the house to disappear around behind on the left.

The material is tapestry brick in shades of red and brown. The main body of the house runs parallel to the road, but in the middle is a tremendous gable featuring an impressive chimney surmounted by three magnificent chimney pots. There is a stone entry arch over the front door, and to the right of that there is an oriel window of stone. The effect is Tudor—just architecturally correct enough to be right but still a house decidedly of the twentieth century.

“Eyeballing the evidence” was getting to be a very pleasant outing. I next went to investigate Bettye VanDyne’s place. Her quarters were on a wholly different scale from those of her cousin. I found that it was a horse farm—neither an extensive nor a well-kept one. Horse fences that had not been painted in many years went here and there, not always in the soberest manner.

Since the road is high along there, I got a good view of the whole layout. Although I do not know much about such things, there seemed to be a barn and all sorts of pens, and the house was small and a bit decayed. There was an old, old sign painted on the barn that said: AT STUD: DONIVAN’S STRAIGHT-AWAY. From the fact that there was a sulky tilted against a fence near the barn, I gathered that Bettye VanDyne was in the business of breeding trotting horses as well, perhaps, as saddle horses.

There were a few very beautiful horses in the pasture. But, then, I am no judge of horses. There was nothing about the place to suggest that Bettye was making a great deal of money from the horse-breeding business.

Well, thought I, Bettye is one of the Drover have-nots.

I turned around and came back through Mason’s Forge to State Road 49, which brought me back to town. I crossed over to the Virginia side and took Maple Street to Turner’s Hill Drive. Duncan’s place was easily found. It is on a rise and can be seen from all parts of Arley Meadows, which itself is quite an affluent development.

Duncan’s house is not to my taste, but it is impressive. It very clearly states: This is an expensive house. No two slopes of the roof seem to be at the same pitch. Rough boards, pickled a rather pleasant gray, cover the sides. All the windows are unusual in shape and size. Although the planting was new, it was thoroughly complementary to the house. I would say that he found his landscaper somewhere other than in Borderville.

I was forced to conclude that Duncan was doing quite well by himself.

After I had done my sleuthing at some length, I got home about five-thirty and practiced on the Kranich and Bach until Henry came home.

We ate at Ted’s Greek Restaurant. The back booth at Ted’s is about as private as anything in a public place is likely to be. Henry ordered moussaka and I ordered dolmas. We both had the Grecian salad, and Mrs. Micopolis came over and chatted. (In the absence of a Greek church in Borderville, Ted and Mrs. Micopolis attend Saint Luke’s.) I am very fond of Ilena, but this time I could hardly wait for her to leave our table so that I could talk with Henry.

I told him everything: Mr. Redloch—what I had thought about the probable income of the Borderville Transfer—what I had seen at the residences of our three local Drover heirs.

Henry listened. One of his great assets is that when he sets his mind to it, he listens well. It is flattering and wins him great favor with his clients, although I have caught him at times when he appeared to be listening while his mind was somewhere else. This time, however, he listened very attentively to my whole story before he began talking.

“You’ve been busy,” he said.

“Yes, I just told you so.”

“Hmm—I really should put you on the payroll and get you to do all my investigative work.”

He is always saying he is going to put someone on his payroll. Our children have taken the expression up, and it has become the family joke.

“Well, now,” he began, “let’s take a look at it. Without having read the Quinby Drover will, I gather that the provisions in it pretty well ensured that all descendants would be bound together in their common interest in the coal mines, the railroad line, and whatever else there was as long as these enterprises remained viable. It appears that the transfer company alone of old Quinby’s varied enterprises remains. We do not know that all the surviving descendants have an interest in that company, but the fact that Garcia came somewhat out of his way to visit Borderville would lead us to believe that he had a financial interest here that had gone so sour that he had to look into it personally. We may thus explain his visit here as something of a business trip. His death may or may not be related to the business. But we have to wonder what business could have demanded a side trip on the part of a concert artist about to begin a European tour. It is pretty evident also that Duncan Yardley and Allen Comming are living on a very comfortable level, while Bettye VanDyne is on the low end of the economic scale.

“Incidentally, I have learned that the Yardley boy managed a nightclub in Florida before he came back here—which undoubtedly explains the source of some of his wealth. He is said to be about to open a club in town here. That will require considerable capital. So chalk up lots of ready cash for Duncan.”

“A nightclub?” I broke in. “Where?”

“On Division Street.”

“I guess that would be out on the west end.”

“No, on the corner of Seventh,” Henry replied.

“You don’t mean it!” That would be right in the middle of our little business district. Then I realized where it was. “That’s the old bank building,” I said. “Why, that’s the old Borderville National Bank building. Do you suppose that the building could still belong to the Drovers?”

“Well,” Henry said, “perhaps so. I have always understood that the Borderville National Bank was one of the banks that went under at the time of Roosevelt’s Bank Holiday. That would mean that all assets of the bank would have been taken to satisfy claims of the depositors. But the bank building itself may not have belonged to the bank. And if it belonged to one of the family independently of the estate, there is no reason why it might not still belong to a Drover. What was the name of the Drover daughter that your friend says used to live here?”

There were so many names on Elizabeth’s list that I had to think a moment before I could reply.

“That would be Jane, I guess. She’s the one who married the Ainesworth. And that would make her”—I had to count it up on my fingers—“That would make her Duncan Yardley’s great-grandmother.”

It hadn’t occurred to me to ask about the old building, and Angus Redloch had not thought of telling me about it. It was rather a disgrace to Division Street. Just since we have lived here, there has been an insurance office upstairs part of the time and a dress shop downstairs for a few years. Then there was actually an army surplus store, and that was really very tacky. For the last couple of years the building had been vacant with dirty windows on which obscene words had been traced by juvenile fingers.

More’s the pity! It is basically a very good-looking building faced with marble at the street level and two floors above of gauged brick. All it needed was a good steam cleaning and it would have been quite handsome. But a nightclub among all that carved oak and the other signs of opulence that used to characterize the decor of self-respecting banks! The club might use a theme of Roman baths … .

“Well,” I said, “that’s very interesting.”

Just then the food came—excellent, as always at Ted’s. Munching on my dolmas, I realized that Duncan Yardley would stand considerable looking into, and Florida would be a place to look. But I didn’t really see how I could do it.

“I should think,” I said, “that Yardley and Allen Comming are front-runners for the role of the villain in this piece. They obviously have the money; and if Garcia Valera came to Borderville to complain about the way the money was divided, it would be one of them that he would complain to. Still, the money obviously comes from somewhere other than the transfer business.”

“Oh, you can count on it,” Henry agreed.

“The one I feel sorry for is Bettye,” I said.

“Perhaps,” Henry said. “Horse-breeding may prosper without impressive stables and white fences, though I would say that we would know about it if she were successful.

“If you were a writer of detective stories,” he continued, “I would say that the three younger heirs are prime suspects with adjuncts in the older two—that is, if the murder was committed over something having to do with the activities of the whole Drover clan.”

“Yes,” I said, “if you mean that the youngsters are still kicking and the others aren’t. Dr. Hancock is an invalid. I guess he is not kicking any longer.”

Henry smiled. “Yes—that would seem to take him out of the picture unless there is something we don’t know.”

We went home, and I practiced while Henry worked chess problems.

After I went to bed, I kept thinking about what I had learned and what I hadn’t learned and wondered where I could find out more. Perhaps if I found out where Dr. Hancock was, there would be a way to approach him. But, again, if I did talk with Dr. Hancock, he would quite likely alert the others that I was snooping.

There must be someone who knew Duncan Yardley in Florida. Kenneth Raebon, in his seventies, was my oldest suspect, and perhaps the craftiest. Both Mr. Redloch and Henry gave him credit for cleverness. Meanwhile, we were about to have our ceremony at the marking of the Philipson grave. Since Margaret Chalmers made all the arrangements for the ceremony and got Mr. Hilliard to pour the concrete for anchoring the marker, it is only right that she should tell what happened there.