Part 11 (2/2)
Jack let out a long unhappy whistle. ”That would be a mess. If Jaine bought it, then they'd have to sort out whether it was a gift or just a loan. And if it was a gift, Kevin should have reported it to the Franciscans.”
”What do you mean?”
”Technically everything Kevin owned when he was alive belonged to the Franciscans. He took a vow of poverty, just like I did, just like all religious orders do. Only diocesan priests don't take that vow, so they can have personal wealth.” He added in a dark voice, ”There is a third messy possibility. Maybe Kevin didn't get around to reporting the book so the Franciscans were unaware he had it in his possession.”
”And if he didn't do that?”
”Cue the lawyers.”
”Seriously? Would the religious order of St. Francis of a.s.sisi, founded on poverty and humility, actually go to court over something like that?”
”I wouldn't bet against it,” Jack said. ”There are only three things G.o.d doesn't know: how much money the Franciscans really have, how many communities of nuns there are, and what any Jesuit is thinking at any given time.”
I burst out laughing. ”You're joking . . . aren't you?”
”Only about two of the three. We Jesuits are real enigmas.”
”No fooling.” I smiled. ”But I wish I knew what Kevin and Jaine were arguing about at the Austrian amba.s.sador's the other night.”
”Even if it had something to do with the book, I seriously doubt Edward Jaine trashed Kevin's study room at the Library of Congress looking for it,” Jack said. ”He doesn't really fit the profile for breaking-and-entering, you know?”
”Maybe someone did it for him?”
”That still seems like a stretch.”
”At some point Father Xavier needs to know about all this,” I said. ”The book, Asquith's, the room at the library . . . all of it.”
”I called the monastery yesterday. They're totally swamped. Every news organization in the world wants an interview. Plus they're still trying to process Kevin's death, right in their own garden. I think you can wait a few days, Soph, to contact Xavier and add one more thing to his plate. Nothing's going to change, especially since the book is safe and sound at Asquith's.”
”All right. It's probably just as well, because I'm going to London for a week with Harry.” I told him about Chappy, my mother's trip to Connecticut, and her plans to move my grandfather into a.s.sisted living.
”Chap would hate that,” Jack said. ”He's always been so independent. I'll keep you all in my prayers. Maybe there's some other explanation for what happened. There are a lot of reasons people get confused, especially the elderly.”
”I hope you're right.”
”I have connections in high places. I'll do what I can. And if I don't talk to you before you leave, have a great trip.”
”Thanks. Hey, I just remembered something. Kevin was supposed to drop by the Library of Congress on Wednesday after he met me and then he said he had a meeting with someone. He wasn't happy about it and said it was something he had to say now because it would be worse later if he didn't speak up. He didn't tell me who he was meeting, of course, but what if it was a follow-up conversation with Edward Jaine at the monastery?”
”You really have that guy on the brain, don't you? And then Jaine killed Kevin?”
”It could have been an accident, or an argument that got out of hand.” I knew I sounded defensive, but for some reason that I couldn't explain, I didn't care for Edward Jaine. ”It's not so impossible.”
”Except I happen to know who Kevin was really meeting with,” Jack said. ”Yasmin.”
”Yasmin? Why?”
He didn't answer right away and, knowing Jack, he was doing mental jujitsu about the ethics of telling me what was going on. ”I suppose I'm not betraying any confidences now that Kevin's dead,” he said at last, ”but we had a quick chat at the party. One of the things I noticed-and you probably did, too, since you were photographing everyone-was that Yasmin and Victor were never together, almost like they weren't a couple. Then there was an incident Kevin and I happened to witness that made us wonder if Yasmin's ready for this marriage.”
”You mean when Yasmin almost spilled her drink on her dress because of the guy who was ogling her?”
”You saw that?”
”His name is David Arista. Thea Stavros told me about him, and then coincidentally I met him the next day when I was at the Smithsonian. Olivia, my editor at Museum Press, says he's got a reputation among the female employees. Now he's working with Yasmin on the Smithsonian Creativity Council. Olivia says they're very close.”
Jack groaned. ”Kevin noticed little things here and there on other occasions when he'd been with Yasmin and Victor. He told me he finally decided to talk to her, caution her not to rush into anything, especially marriage, if she wasn't one hundred percent sure it was the right thing to do. Afterward he was going to call me and, if his talk didn't go well, we were considering taking a page out of St. Matthew's gospel.”
”Pardon?”
”Then the two of us would join forces and have the 'come to Jesus' talk with her,” he said. ”Yasmin shouldn't be marrying Victor if she's got feelings she hasn't sorted out for David Arista, or anybody else, for that matter. Everyone's going to get hurt if she goes through with it. And in our business, you're morally obliged to say something if you see that kind of train wreck coming.”
”So what happens now?”
”Well, right now I think the most immediate concern is Kevin's funeral at the monastery once the medical examiner releases his body. After that, maybe I can try to talk to Yasmin.”
By the time Jack hung up, I'd reached the outskirts of Charlottesville and 29 had widened again into a multilane highway lined with ugly strip shopping plazas and modern commercial sprawl spreading like a stain toward a sweet little university town that had been founded in 1762. The weather had changed again overnight, back to a raw, gray chill that was more late winter than nearly the beginning of spring. As I made the long corkscrew drive through a fog-shrouded forest up Thomas Jefferson's mountain, I finally realized what had been nagging at me for the last few miles since my conversation with Jack.
If Kevin's talk with Yasmin hadn't gone well and she suddenly realized he had doubts about her marriage to Victor, then she could have been in quite a panic, worrying whether he might also share his thoughts with her fiance. When I saw her at the monastery on Wednesday, she'd been early for our five o'clock meeting. Though the parking lot had been empty, that didn't mean she hadn't already arrived and left her car elsewhere before I'd seen her, maybe to seek out Kevin and urge him not to do anything that could interfere with her wedding or ruin her plans. Though she had seemed stunned at the news he was dead, maybe she was a good actress.
I'd just told Jack I thought Edward Jaine had a motive for murder.
Now I wondered if maybe Yasmin did as well.
Someone buzzed me in at the security gate after I drove past the visitors' parking lot at Monticello and told me it wasn't much farther up the mountain to the small private lot near the mansion where Ryan Velis had told me to park. The gardens and grounds staff had their offices in a long rustic shed that included storage barns and a nursery. The low structure was so well tucked into the side of a steep hill I nearly walked past it until two men standing next to a tractor directed me where to go.
”End of the building, last door,” one of them said. ”He's in.”
Dr. Ryan Velis was tall and lanky, probably around my age, with sandy hair just beginning to gray, an open freckled face that was tanned and weathered from years outdoors, and an engaging smile. He was dressed for gardening work in old jeans, a heavy dark green sweater, and a quilted vest. He rubbed his palms together before reaching across the desk and sticking out his right hand.
”How do you do? Sorry, I know it's like shaking hands with a block of ice. I'm out and about in the gardens so much I hate to heat this barn up and waste the electricity. Unless of course it's the dead of winter.” He spoke with a folksy drawl as if I were an old friend who'd come a-calling, but he'd given me a sharp-eyed going over.
”I'd tell you to take off your coat and make yourself comfortable, but better not because it is a mite chilly. Do have a seat, though. And I can offer you coffee. Brewed fresh and it's hot. Warm your hands right up.”
”Thanks. Milk and sugar, if you don't mind. And thank you for taking the time to see me.”
His office looked like he was losing the war on paperwork, with files, magazines, doc.u.ments, and books piled on every surface and overflowing a bookshelf. At least half a dozen moving boxes were stacked behind his desk in a long, low wall. He poured two coffees from a coffeemaker on a table near the window and handed me a mug with a scuffed silk-screened picture of Monticello. The milk came powdered and in a can along with the sugar.
”So,” he said, wrapping his hands around his mug and leaning back in his chair, ”you knew Kevin, G.o.d rest his soul. What a loss. I'll miss him.”
”Me, too. It's still such an awful shock.”
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