“And it all worked out, Sheriff. Two years after Malcolm left, I married a very nice man. We had a child together, a daughter. John was a great stepfather to Elliott during his growing up. While pretty much an absentee father, Malcolm seemed to be around for all the important events, didn’t interfere in between, and always met his financial obligations to Elliott and me.”
“Was Malcolm up here in the summer during those years?” probed Ray.
“That was the peculiar thing. I got the summer cottage in the divorce. Of course, I should have. By that time Malcolm could have bought a resort home almost anywhere in the country, but for some perverse reason he wanted a place up here. And it worked out because Elliott got to see his father more often, and Malcolm really didn’t intrude on my life.”
“The hyphenated name, Wudbine-Merone?”
“I did that for my children. Elliott had a mother who was a Wudbine, and Jenny, my daughter, had a mother who was a Merone. In our small town people got used to our hyphenated name.”
“From your description, the relationship with Malcolm remained amicable?”
“More or less. In recent years I’ve been concerned about how hard Malcolm worked Elliott. And I’m not always sure he was very nice to him. I sense he treated his son like just another member of his staff, someone at his beck and call 24-7. Then I would think I needed to back off. Elliott is an adult. He needed to fight his own battles. And I think the same goes for his wife, my daughter-in-law.”
“She’s the other Wudbine in the playbill…”
“Yes, Jill. She and Elliott married after she graduated from law school. Shortly thereafter she became Malcolm’s personal lawyer. I think these days most of her time and energy is devoted to looking after his foundation. You know she’s Richard Grubbs’ daughter?”
“No, he didn’t mention that.”
“Not surprising. They are not close. After Jill and Elliott were married, she bonded to Malcolm. In the beginning they seemed to have a father and daughter bond, later he seemed to treat her like a loyal servant. Strange marriage, Jill and Elliott, but I keep out of it.”
“Strange, how?”
“I don’t know how to explain it. She has no affect, like she has Asperger’s or something close to that.” She paused, glanced out the window, and looked back at Ray. “There’s another part of the story you should know.”
“What’s that?”
“Malcolm, the womanizer, the consummate Lothario. In the early days, after our divorce and before he remarried…how do I explain this…Malcolm just had a way with women. He would manage to seduce someone new every summer, mostly colony women. In addition to his wonderful cottage—the first building, not that cement bird—he always had a big boat, a cabin cruiser. And before the helicopter, he kept an airplane here…you know…with pontoons. He’d land on the lake and drive it right up on the beach. He did a lot of entertaining. I think that’s how he isolated his prey. Taking people out on the boat or for airplane rides. Veronica Grubbs—Richard’s wife, Jill’s mother, pretty woman—she was one of them. Richard seemed quite crushed, but somehow they got through it. And a year or two later she was dead, breast cancer. Very sad. I don’t know if Jill is aware…well, she must at least have heard rumors.
“I was surprised when Jill showed up to read for the play. She’s never done that before. I couldn’t imagine her acting. Like I said, the woman is without affect. But Sterling saw something that I certainly didn’t see. I must say, freed from who she is in real life, Jill is quite remarkable. On stage she is alive with warmth and emotion. I’ve never seen that before, never. It’s totally foreign to the Jill I’ve known for…well…since the time she was a little girl.”
“Could Richard or someone else who was cuckolded by Malcolm…?”
“I’ve wondered about that. But I don’t think so. That was so long ago. When he started bringing his own retinue of pretty women, he stopped hitting on colony wives. Now what he does around Chicago, that’s another story.
“Sheriff, we’re not killers, not here in the colony. That said, few tears will be shed as the result of his passing. If Malcolm’s demise had only happened some other way. A heart attack would have been perfectly acceptable. Or, perhaps, crashing in his beloved helicopter, taking that Amazon personal trainer and pilot with him. But murder, I can’t think of anyone who would commit murder.”
“When did you arrive at the theatre last night?”
“Just about everyone in the cast came together. I had to change into my costume and do makeup. I was in the first scene, so I wanted some time to settle into my role and go over my lines.”
“And after the first scene?”
“I checked my makeup and was sitting in the back corner of the green room. I was going over lines again. I have a big part in the second scene. I like to act out the part in my head before I go onstage. Although I’ve never had this happen, I’m so afraid of going blank. Maybe that’s a false fear, part of being 70.”
“That’s where you were when the lights went out?”
“Yes, I just stayed put.”
“Last night in the backstage area, was there anyone around who wasn’t a member of the cast or crew?”
“I don’t think so.”
“How about in the last few weeks. Anyone unfamiliar to you, not part of the colony?”
“I don’t think so, but it’s hard to say. There’s a lot of coming and going. People have guests and visitors. And there’re tradesmen in and out, carpenters, and whatever. But the people I know, I can’t see any of these people as killers. It doesn’t fit. I believe it’s got to be someone from the outside, maybe a team of people. Professionals. People who were trying to get even with Malcolm. God only knows how many people he’s screwed along the way: other billionaires, the Mafia, foreign potentates….”
“Why here, why during the play?”
“I thought about that. Usually Malcolm has one or more of his security people lurking about. It’s only up here that he feels comfortable enough not to have someone around all the time. Elliott says, though, that up at his father’s place,” she pointed in the general direction of Malcolm’s property, “he’s got all types of cameras, motion detectors, and what not. Looks like Fort Knox or the White House.”
“It has been alleged that Malcolm provided investment services to some of the residents of the colony. Do you know anything about that?”
“I’ve heard that over the years. What you need to know is I did everything in my power not to have conversations about Malcolm. My only connection to him for decades was about matters that concerned Elliott. People learned long ago not to talk about him in front of me.
“So, Sheriff, if I can go back to playing Miss Marple again, I don’t think you’re going to catch the killer by looking at the cast or crew, or anyone else in the colony. Like I said, I’d bet he’d made some big-time enemies. When it came to money, he’d be ruthless. And it’s public knowledge that he’d made billions, especially in the last ten years. He was frequently mentioned in Forbes and Bloomberg. Chicago Magazine did a big profile on him a few years back.
“I think you’re looking for some highly skilled professional killers. And they didn’t fly commercial. Send one of your minions over to the airport to check the log of private jets that have arrived and departed the last few days. I bet the killer is long gone. You’re spinning your wheels here. I don’t mean to be dismissive, but finding Malcolm’s killer is probably beyond the reach of a local sheriff. It’s going to take the FBI or Interpol to figure this one out.”