S is for Silence (Kinsey Millhone 19)

Julia Wilcox, by the terms of her will, also signed and dated December 21, 1949, left everything to her husband or, in the event that he predeceased her, to her son, Calvin. The remaining provisions of both wills spelled out the attendant clerical details: inventory valuation, the payment of funeral expenses, debts, Federal and California taxes, and any claims made against the estate. Clearly Violet had been denied any expectation of money (save that one surly dollar) by reason of her indifference, lack of compassion, or abundant bad character. Chet Cramer had implied that Calvin stood to profit by her death, but since both wills predated her disappearance, Calvin was already in line to inherit everything and therefore had nothing to gain by killing her. He might have disliked her, but I couldn’t see why he’d risk his life or his freedom to get her out of his hair. Violet was a nuisance, but that was about it.

Hairl Tanner’s will was the eye-popper. He’d apparently drawn up a new one on July 6, 1953, thereby revoking all previous wills and codicils. He named a trust officer at his bank to be executor and established two trusts, one for Steve Ottweiler and one for Tannie. The trusts were to accumulate all income, with no distributions whatsoever, until the two reached twenty-five years of age. He further specified that his tangible personal property was to be similarly held in trust until each was twenty-five years old. I had to go back and read that provision again. Essentially what he was saying was that Steve wouldn’t have access to the money in his trust until 1962 and Tannie wouldn’t be eligible for her portion until 1969. The valuation of his personal property-art, silver, and antiques-was estimated at six hundred thousand dollars, but neither grandchild could sell, borrow against, or enjoy ownership for years. What was that about? At first I thought he was being punitive toward his two grandchildren, but then it occurred to me that Jake Ottweiler was the object of his wrath. Old man Tanner apparently wanted to make sure Jake couldn’t collect one red cent of his money even in support of his own two kids. Given the terms of Tanner’s will, Jake would have been forced to dig into his own pockets to cover his children’s expenses in addition to his own. Had Hairl made Jake the executor or a trustee, he might have at least petitioned for reasonable sums of money related to their health, welfare, and education. So how had Jake come up with his share of the purchase price of the Blue Moon?

While I was at the courthouse, I asked about DBAs, those being a record of applications for fictitious business names, hoping to pick up a tidbit or two about how they’d taken ownership. Unfortunately, an application expires five years from the date it’s filed and those files are purged after ten years; 1953 had long been relegated to the shredder. I tried the tax assessor’s office across the street, again hoping for information related to the Blue Moon, but the clerk told me the basement of the courthouse had flooded and any records prior to 1962 were lost. Some guys have all the luck. Here I was trying to pry into Jake’s business and I was having no success.

I left the courthouse and returned to the title company, where I picked up a manila envelope full of photocopied documents. I went back to my car and sat in the parking lot, leafing through my little pile of treasures. I started with the information related to Tom Padgett. There was an Affidavit-Death of Joint Tenant, in which Cora’s name was removed from the deed to the house. Over the next several years, Tom Padgett had bought numerous properties on money borrowed from a Santa Maria bank, but most had been paid off according to the Full Reconveyances on file.

I gave a cursory look at the grant deeds in the names of Calvin and Rachel Wilcox, all of which seemed unremarkable, and then moved on to Jake Ottweiler. He and BW McPhee had purchased the property on which the Blue Moon was situated on December 12, 1953, for the sum of twenty-two thousand dollars, a figure I calculated from the line of tax stamps pasted along the left margin. I remembered BW mentioning the “couple thousand dollars” he’d thrown into the pot, which meant that Jake had come up with roughly twenty thousand dollars. There had to have been a hefty additional sum to cover the liquor license, expansion, and remodeling they’d done.

I sat and thought about what I’d found, then started the car and backed out of the slot. Time to hit the road.

29

As soon as I reached Santa Maria, I pulled into a gas station and filled my tank, then parked to one side of the service bay and used the pay phone. I put a call through to the hospital where Daisy worked and asked for the Medical Records Department. Once she was on the line, I told her I was back in town. “Is there any way I can park myself at your place? I’ve got notes to type up and some calls I want to make.”