"You are Clara Bellamy Vance?" she asked.
"I am the governing trustee of the Bellamy Covenant," I replied. "And the sole signatory registered with the state surrogate since my father's death."
Victoria let out a short, ragged breath that ended in a sharp click of her teeth. She stood up, her fingers gripping the edge of the table to steady her weight. "Investigator, this woman was found trespassing on retail premises forty minutes ago. She has no fixed office, she refuses to attend board reviews, and she has allowed the physical plant of this house to deteriorate to the point of insolvency. My family entered this transaction in good faith on the basis of a certified petition filed by the firm's own legal counsel."
"The firm's legal counsel is currently locked in the sub-basement archive," I said evenly. "He has an open bottle of Scotch on the sorting table and two million dollars in unearned wire transfers recorded in his personal register from a holding company registered to your father's personal accountant in George Town."
Calderon didn't write anything down. She turned to the second investigator standing by the threshold. "Take the freight lift down to the mechanical level. Bring Mr. Sterling up here with whatever books are on the desk. If he resists, invoke the immediate custody order under the municipal trust statutes."
The second investigator turned and left, his rubber heels squeaking against the wet terrazzo in the hallway.
Henderson, the Whitmores' transactional attorney, finally found his voice. He had spent the last twenty minutes packing his accordion folders, trying to reduce the presence of his firm to a single leather valise. "My client was not a party to any private arrangements between Mr. Sterling and his offshore accounts, Investigator. Whitmore Textiles acted strictly upon the representations delivered by counsel of record. If Mr. Sterling acted ultra vires, that is a matter for the civil surrogate, not an emergency criminal referral."
"Your signature is on the second-stage rider, Mr. Henderson," Calderon replied without looking up from the escrow log. "You countersigned an affidavit claiming you personally witnessed the execution of the trustee transfer at nine-fifteen this morning in Midtown. Miss Vance was on the retail floor of this boutique at nine-fifteen. We have the internal security cameras from the alteration department showing her verifying wool inventory at seven-thirty, eight-fifteen, and nine-twenty."
Henderson’s mouth opened slightly, but no sound came out. He looked down at his own leather case, then set it back onto the walnut table and took two steps away from Victoria, as if the space between them could physically separate his license from her father’s ambitions.
Victoria stared at him, her lips trembling with sudden, uncontrolled disgust. "You pathetic little coward," she hissed. "My father pays your partnership six hundred thousand dollars a year to handle our filings."
"Your father pays our partnership to file valid instruments, Miss Whitmore," Henderson said, his voice dropping into a tight, defensive whisper. "He does not pay us to commit second-degree document fraud in front of a federal escrow officer."
Ten minutes later, the freight elevator groaned in its shaft, and the iron scissor-gate rattled back against its stop.
Arthur Sterling was brought into the boardroom between two uniformed patrolmen. The rain had soaked through his camel-hair overcoat, and he walked without his ebony cane, his right hand clutching the arm of the younger officer for support. His eyes were bloodshot, his silver hair plastered across his forehead in damp, gray streaks, and he refused to look toward the table where his green leather notary ledger lay open beneath the lamps.
Behind him, the second investigator carried Arthur’s leather medical bag, now swollen with the bank dispatch manifests and the six certified cashier's drafts he had tried to press into my hand in the darkness of the basement.
Calderon did not offer him a chair. She pointed to the open ledger. "Mr. Sterling, is this your official notary stamp on the closing rider?"
Arthur looked at the vellum. His chin quivered, a small, involuntary spasm that dragged down the corner of his mouth. "I had promissory notes, Calderon," he whispered, his voice cracking so thin it barely carried across the walnut. "Julian bought the notes. He bought the mortgage on my practice. He told me if I didn't sign the transfer before the quarter closed, he would execute the demand clauses and put my wife out on the lawn."
"Did you receive two million dollars from an offshore subsidiary of Whitmore Commercial?" Calderon asked.
Arthur didn't answer with words. He simply closed his eyes and let his head drop toward his chest, his shoulders shaking beneath the wet wool of his coat.