Legend of the Gilded Saber Page 6

  She tapped a fingernail against her front tooth.

  "Let me buy you guys burgers and shakes," she said. "Let's talk."

  "Sure," Mike said. "Lunch was at least a half hour ago."

  As we walked away, Mike said to her, "Isn't that cool about the history of how the Yankee soldiers fed the people of Charleston?"

  "Huh?"

  "How they fired pieces of elephants at the—"

  Mike gasped as I elbowed him.

  "Could we start," I said to the reporter, "with what you know about the real-estate deal that is about to bankrupt Ted Emmett's corporation?"

  Chapter 19

  "This is what I know right now," she said. "Part of it is rumor, like the financial troubles with their real-estate development. Part of it has been confirmed. Once all of it is confirmed, we're going to run with it."

  We sat eating our burgers and shakes on a bench on the large pier near the aquarium. To my left was a high suspension bridge, built so that navy ships could pass underneath.

  "Run with it?" Mike repeated.

  "Yes. A big documentary. I'm thinking a story this big might be my break. I might be able to go from regional news to national news." Her eyes glistened as she dreamed out loud. "Can you see me now on ABC or NBC?"

  Her ambition was so obvious that I knew we'd be able to get information from her. As long as she thought it would help her get a bigger news story than the one she believed she already had.

  "The morning that Ted Emmett was arrested at the country club," I said. "You were there, weren't you? Waiting as the police took him away."

  She nodded.

  "Someone gave you a tip, right?"

  She nodded again.

  "Didn't you think that was strange?" I asked.

  "We get tips all the time."

  "I mean, didn't you think it was strange that the police knew to arrest Ted Emmett so quickly? And that someone else knew the arrest was going to happen?"

  She shrugged. "Never look a gift horse in the mouth."

  "I've always wondered what that meant," Mike said. "I bet horses have bad breath."

  "Mike," I sighed. "When people buy horses, they check the horses' teeth to see how old they are. If the horse is a gift, you don't need to worry about its condition, because you're not paying for it."

  "I get it." His face wrinkled as he frowned. "But what if they were giving you that horse for a reason that helps them more than you?"

  "Exactly!" I looked at the redheaded reporter. "Is there anyone you know that would be helped by Ted Emmett's arrest? His partner maybe, Thomas Stang?"

  "Don't know why it would help Stang," she said. "They run a stockbroker business together. Whatever hurts the reputation of one of them also hurts the reputation of their business."

  It was my turn to nod. "So aren't you curious why Stang called you with the second tip about Emmett's confession?"

  She nibbled on her lower lip. It put some of her thick lipstick on her front teeth. When she spoke, it was hard not to stare at the glob.

  "Generally," she said, "something like that happens because the person calling it in wants to shape the way we report it. It's known as spinning the news in a favorable direction. With Thomas Stang, we didn't give him the chance."

  "Did he try?" I asked.

  "Like I said, we didn't give him the chance. We just moved right along with the story."

  She didn't realize it, but her answers were very helpful. But we needed to know more.

  "Can you tell me about the real-estate project?" I asked.

  "It's a condominium project on the beach, about ten miles out of town. Built as second homes for people who live up north. The condominiums are very expensive. What we know for sure is that sales have been slow. The economy hit a downturn and too many of the condominiums have already been built but not sold. Which means that Ted Emmett and Thomas Stang owe the bank a lot of money, with not enough coming in right now to make payments."

  "What if the condominiums sold?" Mike asked.

  "Simple. The bank would be paid and the leftover money would be all profit. Lots of profit."

  "They'll sell eventually?" I asked.

  "Six months. A year. Maybe less, maybe longer. But until then, their reduced cash flow is almost enough to force them into bankruptcy."

  We all fell into silence. Huge white pelicans flew downriver. They looked so graceful and magnificent in the air, flapping their wings occasionally and cruising in formation like a squadron of bomber planes.

  "Maybe someone could lend them money," Mike said.

  "With one of the partners in jail for confessing the museum theft? Not likely. They'll be lucky to keep half of their clients."

  "Let me ask again," I said, "don't you think it's strange that Thomas Stang was willing to call you and give you a tip? I mean, if he was trying to spin the story, wouldn't he have called back?"

  I could see doubt in her eyes. Just a little, but enough to make me press on.

  "What if that's the real story?" I asked. "Thomas Stang."

  "Impossible to prove."

  "Maybe not if you found out a few answers for us."

  Her eyes narrowed. "Answers? What kind of answers?"

  I told her what we wanted. Just as I finished, her cell phone rang from her purse. She put up her hand to silence me as she lifted it out and answered. She listened intently, then said good-bye and put her cell back in her purse.

  "I'll help," she told us. "Something is going on. Maybe it's what it appears, that Ted Emmett did go temporarily insane and steal the museum pieces. Or maybe there's something more behind it. Because ..."

  She nibbled her lip, as if she were debating whether to tell us.

  "That was Stang again," she finally said. "With another tip. Later this afternoon, he's going to launch a lawsuit against Ted Emmett for destroying the reputation of their stockbroker firm."

  We finally had a chance to visit Mike's uncle Ted at three that afternoon. Although it had only been the morning of the day before that he'd been arrested, it seemed like it had happened a couple of weeks ago.

  Mike and I took a taxi to the jail, leaving Ralphy and Lisa behind at the mansion that over- looked the water.

  The jail cell was at the back of the police station; except for the officers in uniforms, the front of the station didn't seem any different than any regular office. It was the back half, however, that gave me shivers. There were about six holding cells on each side of a wide hallway. The thought of spending any time in those small concrete rooms was horrible. I couldn't imagine spending years inside.

  I looked for Devon as we walked by the empty cells but didn't see him. We found out later that he was down at the courthouse, facing a judge as they arraigned him for a future trial date.

  Chapter 20

  Theodore Emmett was in the final cell, still wearing the old-fashioned golf clothes that he'd been arrested in at the golf course.

  He looked up at our approach and smiled, but it was a tired smile. I told myself that I was imagining things, that he didn't look about twenty years older than he had the day before.

  "Good afternoon, gentlemen," he said. "Sorry to have spoiled your vacation."

  After the guard left, Ted spoke cheerfully, as if trying to pretend we weren't in a jail cell with him.

  "Well, boys, have you managed to find some fun things to do despite all of this?"

  Mike and I glanced at each other. Since morning, we'd watched Devon get arrested, spied on Tom Stang, and met with a television reporter for a second lunch. I wasn't sure all of it could be defined as fun.

  "Actually," Mike began, "we've been trying to figure a few things out."

  Ted's mouth tightened in mild disapproval. "If you're referring to why I'm here, I wish you would just drop it."

  I plunged ahead, knowing Mike would not want to offend his uncle.

  "Sir," I said, "is it true that you and Mr. Stang took a major portion of your stockbroker's business and signed it over to the bank to be ab
le to get a loan for a real-estate development that has accumulated some big debts?" This was something our redheaded reporter had also passed on to us.

  "Please," he answered. "I really don't want to talk about it."

  I spoke respectfully. "I just want to know that I understand this correctly. It's a beachfront condominium project about ten miles down the coast. It looks like all the condos will eventually sell, but in the short term, you and your partner, Tom Stang, have some big mortgage payments due within the next six months, and until the condos sell, you won't have the money to make the payments."

  "Yes, yes," he said impatiently. "You've read what the newspapers have to say about this. That's what would lead a person to a desperate act, like stealing museum pieces."

  "Pieces that you'd never be able to sell because they are unique and highly identifiable?" Mike asked.

  Ted didn't reply.

  "I think," Mike continued, "if you were going to steal something to make those payments, it would have been something much easier to sell. And I'm wondering if you would have spent all that money on our airplane tickets if you were so broke."

  "Sir," I said, "we've also heard that you have arranged a trust fund for a local church and its charities. Some people would wonder why you did that if there wasn't any money."

  "There isn't."

  "And in six months?" I asked.

  Ted looked at both of us and blinked. He looked down again. He had lost all of his fake cheerfulness.

  "In six months," he finally said, quietly and slowly, "none of this will matter. Everything will be taken care of. Including your college education, Mike. Can you just trust me on this and stop asking questions?"

  I wasn't sure what he meant by saying it would all be taken care of. But Mike and I did know something that might change Ted's confession.

  "Sir," I said, "did you know that Tom Stang is about to send a lawyer here?"

  Ted snorted. "My partner has been noticeably absent until now. His lawyer isn't going to do much good at this point."

  "Uncle Ted, I don't think you're going to like why he's sending a lawyer. He's serving papers on you. A lawsuit."

  We'd learned this from the reporter. Because Tom Stang had leaked it to her already.

  "What!" The life came back into Ted's face with a sudden burst of anger.

  "It's going to be on the news tonight. He is going to trigger a clause in your partnership agreement that allows him to purchase your half of the business at the value of the company right now."

  "But ... but..."

  "The company is worth next to nothing?" I asked. "Especially with the mortgage payments due soon?"

  "When the condos sell, it will be worth millions," Ted said. "In the meantime, I can assure you that in six months, those payments will be made in time to save the deal from collapsing."

  "Except right now?" Mike asked. "What will it cost him to buy out your half right now when it looks like the deal will collapse?"

  Ted's lack of response was enough answer. Then he straightened. "If I remember our partnership agreement, I also have the option of buying his half from him at the price he offers me. That's what I'll do."

  "A shotgun clause," I said. "Isn't that what it's called? To make sure that in a buyout one partner offers a fair price to the other."

  He frowned. "You know a lot more about this than I would expect."

  Two hours earlier I hadn't known anything about this stuff. But then the reporter had called back with some answers.

  "Sir, there's a small clause in your partnership agreement you might have forgotten. The morality clause. It states that because your reputations are so important in your stockbroker business ..."

  Ted buried his face in his hands and groaned.

  I didn't have to finish. He knew the rest. If one partner did something criminal that would hurt the company's reputation, the other partner would have the option of purchasing the offending partner's half of the company at its current value as determined by an independent accounting firm.

  "Either way," Ted said after he finished groaning, "Tom Stang is able to buy out my half of the company. For next to nothing."

  "Uncle Ted," Mike said, "does it now seem like Tom Stang would have every reason to be happy that those stolen museum pieces were found in the back of your car?"

  "I guess. But—"

  "But it also looks like Devon might be the one, doesn't it," I said quietly. "He worked at the museum. He would be an inside person able to find a way to steal things. And people know he has a record as a juvenile delinquent."

  Ted shook his head slowly. "I'm the one who stole everything. That's my confession and that's how it will stand."

  "Even if Tom Stang gets half your company for next to nothing?"

  "Better than seeing Devon get accused of the theft."

  "He wasn't driving your car that night," I said. "His girlfriend surprised him and took him to Savannah for an art festival. In her car."

  "Devon wasn't driving the Mercedes?" Ted was already gray with exhaustion, but his face went a few shades paler.

  "Her Mustang was fixed. They took that," I said.

  "Which meant that someone else could have put the stolen pieces in the trunk of your car," Mike continued. "The same person who tipped off the police. And made sure you would be arrested in a highly public place. Then called the media."

  "But... but..."

  Mike spoke. "Did Tom Stang suggest and arrange for Devon's job at the museum?"

  "Yes," Ted said after a brief pause. "As a matter of fact, he did. The director is one of Tom's clients."

  "We know," I said. I pulled some folded sheets of paper out of my pocket. "Here's a printout of the information that Devon was looking for when he broke into your office this morning."

  I handed the paper across to Ted. He unfolded it and glanced at it. Then he glanced at it again. Seconds later he was reading it carefully, as if Mike and I didn't even exist anymore.

  Ted finished reading it a few minutes later. He spoke with new life in his voice.

  "I now understand," he said. "This changes everything, doesn't it."

  Chapter 21

  It was midnight. I was on my stomach, hidden from Yankee soldiers who wanted to see me hanging by my neck from a rope. Strapped to my side was the legendary gilded saber, a sword that struck fear into the hearts of all soldiers who saw me. Above me was the bottom of a church pew, for that's where I was hidden.

  On a rough wooden floor. Beneath the pews. In St. Michael's church. With cannonballs whistling overhead, bombarding the town in the ghostly light of a full moon that hung in a clear sky.

  "Quit whispering to yourself," Lisa hissed beside me. "They could get here anytime."

  So much for my little fantasy.

  We were in St. Michael's church. We were beneath the pews, about five rows from the front.

  But we weren't, of course, hiding from soldiers. And the whistling of cannonballs was simply my imagination as I remembered again the story about the high white steeple of St. Michael's rising from the darkness of the city and the Yankee cannon fire from Sumter Island.

  Nor was it nighttime, but rather late afternoon, with thunderheads rising above Charleston. I could hear rising wind through one of the open church windows.

  Then I heard the creaking of a door as it opened into the sanctuary of the church.

  Then a set of footsteps.

  Headed right toward us.

  Then past us.

  The footsteps stopped at a pew second from the front.

  Then the owner of the footsteps settled in the pew and, unaware of a teddy bear taped to the underside of the pew bench beneath him, began reading a set of papers that Lisa and I had left there earlier.

  We hardly dared breathe as we hoped and waited for a second set of footsteps.

  Ted Emmett had thought all of this through for us. Half the reason he'd picked the church was because he knew the administrator, who cleared the use of the church for a meeting. Emme
tt had said he wanted a way to have proof that would stand up in court. That he needed Lisa and me as witnesses to the meeting.

  Trouble was, it wouldn't be a meeting unless the second person showed up.

  Five minutes later the door to the sanctuary opened again.

  Chapter 22

  "George?"

  From our hiding place only three pews back, Lisa and I heard Tom Stang's voice clearly. That was the other half of the reason that Ted Emmett had picked the sanctuary of the church. Because it was far more quiet than a restaurant or any other public place.

  This quiet and solitude was extremely important because we needed the conversation recorded. Hidden in the teddy bear was a voice-activated tape recorder. The only hope we had for proving Ted Emmett's innocence was a conversation between Tom Stang and George Reah, director of the Civil War museum. Lisa and I were here as backup witnesses, in case either man claimed in court that the tape had been made by a computer program that faked their voices.

  Still, there would be no conversation unless George Reah was angry enough to talk. And that's why we'd set a small stack of papers on the pew. And followed Ted Emmett's instructions and made the anonymous phone call telling George to look in the church for them.

  "Stang," George said back.

  I smiled. George Reah had called Ted Emmett's partner by his last name, not his first. To me, that was a good indication that Reah had read through the papers.

  "I'd like an explanation," Reah said. I heard a rustle of papers. George was probably waving the papers at Stang.

  "So would I," Stang answered. "I told you I don't like people knowing we are connected beyond our stockbroker- client relationship."

  "I'm not sure you're much of a stockbroker," Reah said, his voice growing more angry. "Especially after going through these papers."

  On the floor, I could see the shoes and pants of the lower legs of both men. They stood near the second pew from the front. Near the voice-activated tape recorder.

  So far, so good.

  "What kind of papers?" Stang asked.

  "Client reports. Tour clients. Including some who made money on the same stocks that almost wiped me out."