Richard Stevenson - Death Vows

The ninth book in the Donald Strachey Mistery series, 2008

Mr. Strachey, may I ask, are you licensed to conduct investigations in the state of Massachusetts?

I am. New York and Massachusetts have reciprocal agreements on the licensing of private investigators.

Im delighted to hear it. I have every reason to believe that you are just the man to help me and Steven out. A dear friend of ours, Bill Moore, is planning to make a horrible blunder. He intends to marry a young man who is plainly not who he says he is, and who we are convinced is up to no good. I take it you are familiar with the rather socially advanced practice of same-sex marriage that the commonwealth of Massachusetts has pioneered?

The man on my office phone had a voice that sounded as if it was wearing an ascot. Jim Sturdivant had apparently retained the plummy tones long associated with the American WASP upper classes but which now existed mainly in re-runs of eighties nighttime TV soaps.

I said, My partner, Timothy Callahan, and I would do it ourselves if we lived over there in the Berkshires. Here in New York State we continue to be deprived of the well-known enduring features of legal marriage adultery, divorce, excess kitchenware, perpetuating the patriarchy, and so on.

There was a pause Timmys voice was in the back of my head making little mewing noises over my driving away a potential client and then Sturdivant said, Steven and I have not taken the plunge either, much as we would love to. Our nuptials would entail certain family difficulties, which we would much prefer to avoid.

Like losing a major inheritance, for instance? One of you is waiting for Grams to bite the dust?

Another pause. Why was I doing this? Maybe because I had worked nonstop through the hot, wet summer on four cases that had been both grueling and decently remunerative. One was the discreet involuntary relocation to Rochester of a blackmailer whose sexual peccadilloes turned out to be even stranger than those of my client, a used-car dealer who liked to hire hustlers in Washington Park, take them home to his garage, and spray them with new-car aroma from an aerosol can. It had been a rigorous July and August, and now, the Tuesday after Labor Day, it would have been lovely to take it easy for a week or so. But why the passive-aggressive needling of this inoffensive man who had called me at the recommendation of a mutual acquaintance?

A patient Jim Sturdivant said, You are a keen observer of human nature, Mr. Strachey. And I was warned by Preston Morley something of a wiseacre.

Thank you.

It is not, however, Grams who is the family obstacle. All four of my grandparents have long since passed on. In any event, thats another story. I am most concerned just now about our friend Bill, who is about to marry foolishly. More than foolishly recklessly, stupidly, self-destructively. None of those terms is putting it too strongly. Barry Fields is a dangerous young man, and Bill is so smitten with him that he is utterly blind to everything but Barrys pleasant personality and physical charms. Which I have to recognize are both appealing, but that is neither here nor there. The man is plainly a cunning fraud.

I had the window propped open with an upended 1985 Albany phone book, and an invigorating cocktail of fresh late-summer air and diesel fumes wafted up from Central Avenue. The mid-morning traffic was heavy but moving in an orderly fashion, and the winos and crack dealers werent hassling the nice people coming and going at the public radio station across the street.

I said, What makes you think the guy is a fraud?

He tells this story of being from Colorado, Sturdivant said. But what Barry doesnt know is, Steven has a brother in Denver and knows the state rather well. Barry said he was from Lamar and his father was a corn farmer. But Steven has a nephew in Lamar, which is wheat country. Steven let it go when Barry told the story, but it was the first obvious lie that roused our suspicions.

Couldnt somebody in that town grow corn too? I asked. Timmys Aunt Moira in Poughkeepsie is well known for her peonies, but she keeps a few petunias.

There are just too many gaping holes in Barrys story, Sturdivant said. Such as who his parents are and why they arent coming to the wedding. First he said they had had a bad year on the farm with the drought out west and they couldnt afford to come. When I offered to fly them here as a wedding gift a gesture that I must confess was more of a trap than a sincere offer suddenly Barrys story changed. He said they were too ill to travel. When I asked what their illnesses were, Barry became confused and said he wasnt sure; it was something internal. Thats all he could remember, that it was internal. Steven said he was relieved to hear that the senior Fields family members didnt have an external disease.

He said that to Barry?

No, just to me. Weve tried not to challenge Barry directly, out of deference to Bill.

And what does Bill say about these inconsistencies in Barrys bio? I take it youve discussed this with him.

Well, weve tried, Sturdivant said. He shrugs it all off. Bill says Barry had a very difficult time with his unsympathetic family when he came out, and it pains him to have to talk about his earlier life. Steven and I both told Bill that reticence is one thing and fabrications are quite another. But Bill is so bedazzled by those red lips and those baby-blue eyes that he is unwilling to see the obvious.

So Barry is a hot number?

Hes attractive, and he is also smart and able. Hes the assistant manager of the movie theater in Great Barrington, and hes expected to take over when the manager retires next year.

Barry Fields sounds like a fairly solid citizen to me, I told Sturdivant. You said hes dangerous. In what way?

I could hear Sturdivant take a sip of something, maybe his mid-morning latte. My own espresso machine had been out of order for some decades, but I had picked up a cardboard cup of the exceptional brew from the Subway franchise up the block, and I watched two flies carioca around the rim.

Well, Sturdivant said, dangerous may or may not be going too far. But Steven and I have our well-grounded suspicions. Barrys last boyfriend, Tom Weed, also an older man, died under mysterious circumstances. And I know its outrageous to think that The thing is, Tom was wealthy. And his strange death, combined with all of Barrys lies I guess you can see what Im getting at.

Yeah, I see it. How did Weed die?

Carbon monoxide poisoning. In his BMW. Three years ago last March, Tom arrived home in Sheffield after a dinner put on by the Supper Club, an agreeable mens potluck group we all belong to. He passed out in his garage with the engine running, supposedly. Barry had worked until nine oclock that night at the Triplex and was home when Tom arrived around ten-thirty. The question is, why didnt Barry hear Tom drive in, and why did he not check to see what had become of him?

A fair question. Whats Barrys explanation?

He says he dozed off in bed watching My Favorite Wife and woke up in the middle of the night with all the lights on. He went downstairs to see what had become of Tom and discovered him dead in the garage. Thats Barrys story, at any rate. And the state police bought it.

Why doubt it? Awful accidents like that happen, I said. How much had Tom had to drink when he drove home? How far away was the dinner party?