The rest home they were in today was quite a bit different from the one Burgess had been in. His had been clean and comfortable, homey even, but this one was plush. As Bailey looked up at the huge, double, curving staircase, she said, “And here I thought the Yankees had burned Twelve Oaks.”
“She’ll see you now,” the receptionist said; she was wearing a suit that Bailey knew had a designer label.
“Think Manville paid for this?” Matt whispered to Bailey.
“Excuse me,” Bailey said loudly to the young woman. “Who owns this place?”
“It’s owned by one of the late James Manville’s corporations,” she said, smiling as she stopped by a door.
As Bailey stepped past Matt, she raised her eyebrows as though to say, See?
Martha McCallum’s suite was beautiful, and Bailey recognized the hand of an interior designer. It was done in French country, and all the antiques were real.
“Well, well,” came a voice from a wooden-framed chair to their left. “So, Lillian, you finally found me.”
Bailey turned to look at a small woman wearing a perfectly pressed silk shirtwaist dress, discreet gold earrings, and a strand of pearls. She also had on a small gold watch and a gold bracelet. It was a simple costume, but Bailey knew that everything the woman was wearing was of the finest quality and had cost the earth. The woman’s face had few lines on it, and her long, blondish gray hair was softly pulled back to the nape of her neck and tied with a Hermes scarf. Bailey wondered if the same surgeon who had repaired Jimmie’s mouth had done this woman’s facelift.
“Yes,” Bailey said, then took a seat on the couch when the woman gestured.
“And who is this lovely man?”
“Matthew Longacre,” Bailey said, and the woman shook Matt’s hand before he sat down.
It was Bailey who began to talk. “You seem to have the advantage on us, since you know me, but I’ve never heard of you. I don’t mean to be rude, but we have a clock over our heads that is ticking, and when it goes off, it’s going to explode, so we need to know all that you can tell us as fast as you can tell us.”
“Yes, of course,” Martha said. “I heard about your sister this morning. I’m sorry, dear, for her death, but she never was much of a sister to you, was she? Luke detested her.” Martha waved her manicured hand. “Forgive me, but I’ve never been able to call him anything but Luke.”
“What did Jimmie . . . my husband tell you?” Bailey asked.
“Everything,” Martha said. “Absolutely everything. I don’t mean about business—he never talked to me about that—but he told me everything about you, and about Eva and Ralph and how your sister extorted money out of him, and—”
“My sister? How—”
Martha looked at Matt. “You know, don’t you? It took me a while to piece it all together, but you sent that beautiful young man to Dolores to find out about the permission slip, didn’t you? When I read that he was one of Roddy’s children, I can tell you that my heart nearly stopped. Did he find out everything you needed to know from Dolores?”
“Yes, I think so,” Matt said, studiously ignoring Bailey’s hard stare. He knew she was just realizing that Alex had told him a lot more than Matt had told Bailey.
“You found out about the car Luke had to give Dolores, and the yearly income, and all the other things?” Martha asked.
“Yes, ma’am, I did,” Matt said, still refusing to look at Bailey.
“And Lillian, dear, what did he tell you?”
“It seems that he told me very little,” Bailey said, her mouth a hard line.
Martha smiled. “Men do try to protect us, don’t they? By the way, I see you had your nose fixed, and you lost all that weight Luke kept on you.”
“Yes,” Bailey said, turning away from Matt. “And you? Jimmie’s surgeon?”
Martha’s smile grew broader. She had beautiful, expensive dental work. “Yes, the same man. He was used to keeping secrets.”
“And where did Jimmie get the money for all the surgery he must have had?” Bailey asked.
Martha hesitated. “Some money had unexpectedly come into my possession . . . a box full of money, so I gave it to Luke and told him to use it any way he wanted to.” She smiled. ?
?He used it wisely. He got his mouth fixed, then used the rest to start making what would become billions.” She smiled again, pride on her face.
“Do you have the signed permission for Lillian’s marriage?” Matt asked after a moment.