Very interesting.
• • •
Oren Kenyon came into the library about four thirty. Oren was in his midfifties, tall and lean like a farm-boy version of actor/director Clint Eastwood. He was quiet and thoughtful, a child musical prodigy who had chosen a quiet life working in Mayville Heights rather than the fame and fortune of a concert stage that certainly could have been his if he’d wanted it.
Mary was at the front desk. She beckoned Oren over. Some of the old photographs were spread across the counter.
“I think I’ve figured out where some of these were taken,” she said as I joined them. “There used to be a summer day camp out at Long Lake when I was a girl.” She held up one of the photos. “I think this one is some of the boys from the camp.” She pointed at a little boy with a crew cut, sitting cross-legged on the ground with half a dozen other kids about the same age, all of them squinting at the camera. “Oren, isn’t that your cousin Ira?”
Oren studied the old black-and-white image for a moment. Then he nodded slowly. “That’s Ira,” he said. “And I think that’s Thorsten’s brother behind him.” A small frown creased his forehead.
Ira Kenyon was a little . . . eccentric. Back when Kingsley-Pearson had planned to develop the area around Long Lake, before the company’s problems with the IRS and before Simon had bought the land, Ira had been camped out there, insisting the land really belonged to the Kenyons. One of the first things Simon had done was hire the man as a caretaker for the property, which seemed to settle the issue, at least for the moment.
Mary smiled. “Thank you.” She looked at me. “I’ll give Thorsten a call and get him to come take a look at these sometime in the next couple of days.”
“Perfect,” I said.
She looked over toward the computer area, where one of the older Justason boys was working at a terminal. He had one hand on top of the backward baseball cap on his head and he seemed to be squinting in confusion at the monitor.
Mary shook her head. “Excuse me,” she said. “I think Perry is having more problems formatting his bibliography.”
She made her way over to the computers and I turned to Oren. He was carrying a brown envelope and I hoped that meant he’d brought the drawings of the porch swing he was going to make as a wedding gift for Roma and Eddie from Marcus and me.
He had. He’d drawn a front view of the swing, a side perspective and a close-up of the detail along the arms. I spread the drawings out on the circulation desk.
“I hope you like it,” he said shyly.
“It’s beautiful,” I said, tracing the lines of the sketch with one finger.
“Thank you,” he said. “I think I have enough reclaimed black locust. It’s beautiful wood.”
“Whatever you decide will work is fine with me,” I said. “I trust your judgment.”
Abigail hung up the phone and leaned over to look at the drawing.
“It’s for Roma and Eddie,” I said. “Their wedding gift.”
“They’re going to love it,” she said.
“The arms are based on a design my father did for a rocking chair,” Oren said.
“Roma will love that,” I said. Roma and Oren were distant cousins.
I put the drawing back in the envelope and offered it to Oren.
He shook his head. “Those are for you,” he said. “I have another set.” He tapped his temple with one hand. “And the idea is here anyway.”
We started toward the entrance. Then Oren stopped and looked back over his shoulder at the circulation desk. “Kathleen, there’s something I need to ask you,” he said. His expression was serious.
“All right,” I said. “What is it?”
“I saw you over at the hotel with Simon Janes and a woman named Celia Hunter?”
“Yes,” I said, since he’d framed the sentence as a question.
Oren nodded. “I went to talk to the manager about restoring an old walnut desk that had been stored in the basement. It has some water damage. I thought it was her.” He looked down at his feet for a moment, then his blue eyes met mine. “I wasn’t sure if I should say anything or not, but maybe that old photo of Ira is a sign that I should.”
I had no idea what he was talking about.
“I don’t like to speak ill of people, but Celia is not someone who should be trusted.”
I knew that Oren never spoke ill of anyone, so I knew I could trust what he was saying even as I was surprised by the comment. “How do you know this?” I asked.
He had taken off his cap when he’d stepped inside the building and now he twisted the brim in his hands. “Ira and Celia went out when they were young. Celia broke up with him to go after Leo Janes, who had a lot more money.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said.
“I don’t think a lot of people do,” Oren replied. “It didn’t work. Leo was interested in Simon’s mother, and Celia didn’t get anywhere with him. She went after his brother, Victor, next but that didn’t work out, either.” Oren cleared his throat. “You’re friends with Simon, so maybe you could tell him he shouldn’t trust Celia. Before Leo Janes’s marriage broke up Ira insisted that Celia was telling Victor things about Meredith. Private things.”
I remembered Meredith Janes’s letter: He seemed to know what I was thinking in a way Leo didn’t, she had written. Could that have been because Celia Hunter had been feeding Victor information?
Oren’s expression was serious. “Kathleen, sometimes the things Ira says are just things he’s imagined, but sometimes, sometimes they aren’t.”
I thanked Oren for coming to talk to me, and he left. In the last two hours I’d learned that Elias Braeden had seen Leo the day before he died and Celia Hunter may not have been the friend to Leo’s ex-wife that she’d seemed. The problem was I had no idea how any of that could help me figure out who had killed Leo.
chapter 13
I couldn’t get what Oren had told me about Celia Hunter out of my mind. Was his cousin Ira right? Had Celia conspired with Victor Janes to end his brother’s marriage so she could have Leo for herself? The whole thing reminded me of a gothic romance. All we needed was a lonely mansion and a dark and stormy night. I had no idea how this new piece of information fit into the puzzle. Based on the letter from Meredith it seemed as though she hadn’t known about her best friend plotting to break up her marriage. Had Leo known? And did it have anything to do with his death?
I took the later supper break. I carried my bowl of vegetable soup back to my office instead of eating in the staff room. My mind was going in circles. I had all these pieces of information and no way to tie them all together or tie them to Leo’s killer.
I wished I knew a little more about blackjack. I’d played poker before, but all I knew about blackjack was the basic rules. On the other hand, I did know someone who knew a lot more about casinos and gambling than I did. My mother. My mother was primarily a stage actor, but she did take on small film and TV roles if the part captured her fancy.
For the past month Mom and Dad had been in Los Angles. They’d originally only planned to stay for two weeks while my mother did a brief guest stint on The Wild and Wonderful. She was incredibly popular with fans of the racy soap opera, who had been lobbying for a return performance since her last visit. On her second day on the set her visit had been extended by an additional three weeks.
Several years ago, Mom had had a small role in a movie set in a casino in Las Vegas. She’d flirted shamelessly—on camera—with Denzel Washington. The two of them had a chemistry that surprised everyone, except Dad and me. My mother had chemistry with everyone she worked with.