Death Benefits Read online

  Winters was angry and desperate, his eyes bulging. “No. It’s not okay. Twelve million is too much blame for one person to take. The excess spills over on everyone. We have to get some of it back.”

  “By holding back eight million from the legitimate beneficiary?”

  “By negotiating!”

  “It’s not right, and it won’t even work.”

  “We’ll see,” said Winters. He stepped toward the conference room and reached for the door handle, while Walker took a deep breath.

  “No,” he said sharply. “We won’t.”

  Winters turned toward him. “What did you say?”

  “Excuse me,” said Walker. He opened the conference room door. “Mr. Stillman?”

  Stillman’s eyes rose from the spot on his belly that he seemed to be looking at. He silently pointed at his chest: Me? Then he stood and joined them in the hallway.

  Walker kept his eyes on Winters. “Mr. Stillman, can you get Mr. McClaren on the phone for me, please?”

  Winters’s face began to turn pale, but he let his features show no sign of surprise.

  Stillman said, “Sure. I’ll get him.” He took his cell phone out of his coat pocket, turned it on, and listened for a dial tone, then punched in the numbers. His face showed no emotion. He kept the phone at his ear. “Hello. This is Stillman. Yes. Could you get Mr. McClaren for me, please?”

  Winters made a grab for the telephone, but Stillman seemed to know it was coming. He half-turned his body quickly so that Winters’s involuntary lunge was stopped when it hit Stillman’s shoulder. Winters’s breath came out in a huff, and he stood gasping, clutching the space under his ribs.

  Stillman’s voice was even and affable. “Wait, I think you’d better cancel that. I’m on a cell phone, and I seem to be getting interference. Tell him I may call later.” He switched off the telephone and turned to face Winters.

  Winters’s own action had shocked him. His eyes were on Walker, but they seemed to be looking inward.

  Walker said quietly, “Can you get somebody here to cut him a check?”

  “All right,” said Winters.

  “I’ll wait here.” He watched Winters walking toward the rear office, then noticed that Stillman had already moved off to the front of the building, where the support staff was working.

  When Winters returned, Walker opened the conference room door. Walker sat down beside Daphne Pool and waited for Winters to speak. Werfel was up, staring out the window with his hands in his pockets, but Walker could see from the way the beautiful suit hung that the hands must be clenched fists.

  Winters said, “Mr. Werfel, we apologize for the delay, and we thank you for your patience while we worked our way through the bureaucratic difficulties. We’ve received permission to let you have your full payment today.”

  Werfel spun around, stared at Walker, and grinned. Walker didn’t smile back.

  7

  Stillman walked out to the car carrying an armload of papers in files and binders, put them into the trunk, and got into the driver’s seat. He had already started the car before Walker could slip in beside him. Then Stillman drove, maintaining his mysterious, peaceful expression.

  “Aren’t you going to say anything about it?” Walker demanded.

  Stillman seemed to consider the question for a few seconds, as though he were deciding not how to answer it, but whether it had been addressed to him.

  Walker persisted. “Did you know about that—that Werfel was going to be there? Did you set me up to take a fall?”

  Stillman’s eyes were cold when he turned toward Walker. “I don’t see anything wrong with having you all together in one room. You’re the insurance company, and he’s your client. If you end up taking a fall, it’s your fall.”

  Walker was silent for ten minutes while Stillman drove along surface streets, accelerating at the start of each block, then coasting to a stop to wait for each interminable red light. His mind vacillated between hating Stillman and wondering why what he had said seemed perfectly true.

  After a long time, Stillman said, “Don’t be so gloomy. What you got was worth the tuition.”

  “It was?” said Walker bitterly.

  “Sure. One day out in the real world and you got your freedom.”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Walker. “They used to call it ‘at liberty,’ didn’t they?”

  “Look at the dark side, then,” Stillman said. “Say in ten minutes McClaren calls. He’s got my cell phone number. He just heard you bluffed Winters into giving Werfel twelve million, and you’re fired. No, let’s make it good. You’re fired, he’s already having his secretary call other companies to make sure you never work in that business again, and he’s going to sue your ass to recover the twelve. You don’t have it, of course, but the story will be in the papers and you’ll never work anywhere again.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  Walker thought for a few seconds. “Let’s see. I guess I’d lose the lawsuit, and go bankrupt. Then I’d learn to live without credit cards and try to start over someplace where all that doesn’t matter. Maybe I’d learn to do something—I know—I could go back to college for a year or two to pick up a credential, and try to teach. By then nobody in schools would remember I got sued, and they wouldn’t care whether I lost twelve million or twelve cents.” He paused for a moment, then said, “I wouldn’t make as much money, but at the end of my life I’d probably feel better than I do right now.”

  “I doubt it,” said Stillman. “At the end of your life you’re dying. Probably feels like shit.”

  “In the larger sense.”

  “Not scared of it, are you?” asked Stillman.

  Walker hesitated. “Not that I can detect, other than the dying part.”

  “That’s freedom,” Stillman said. “You’ve set yourself free. If you’re doubting the value of that, go back and take a look at Winters—heart pumping, cold sweat, the taste of metal in his mouth. You should celebrate.”

  “I don’t think I can afford it,” said Walker. He was quiet for a moment. “But I think you’re right. Maybe I’ll quit before they fire me.”

  “Don’t be too hasty,” Stillman mumbled uncomfortably.

  “I went to work at McClaren’s because it had a famous name and they wanted me. I went along doing my reports, and after a while, I thought I knew more than I did. McClaren’s is a fraud.”

  Stillman frowned at him for a second, then said reluctantly, “Well, not entirely.” He looked at him again, then said, “I didn’t want to tell you this right away, because it might cloud the issue and deprive you of your full measure of freedom. But you aren’t going to get fired for what you did in there.”

  “I’m not?” He felt the unmistakable jolt of a parachute opening and jerking him to a near stop. He floated down in amazement.

  “No,” said Stillman. “They may even add five inches to your pen back in the stable.”

  “How do you know?”

  “McClaren’s is a peculiar operation. There are lots of bigger companies. They’re probably more efficient and their rates are cheaper. What gets people to do business with McClaren’s is the same thing that got you to work for them. It’s the name. If McClaren’s refused to pay that Werfel character on his father’s insurance policy—for any reason, legal or illegal—it would be the beginning of the end.”

  “If enough people heard about it, maybe, but—”

  “Of course they would. Rich people know other rich people. They go to the same two hundred private schools, then the same twenty-five colleges. They take vacations—more of them than other people do—in the same seventy-five spots on the earth, where they stay at the same seventy-five hotels. I’ll bet it’s sometimes hard for them to believe that the world contains six billion people, because they spend their whole lives bumping into the same six thousand. They won’t talk to anybody but each other. And they file lawsuits. If Werfel v. McClaren got filed, McClaren’s would have to settle quick and throw
in a few million extra to soothe Werfel’s ego and reassure everybody else.”

  “I saved them money?”

  “Lots. Also probably Winters’s ass. They wouldn’t fire him for being fooled; they might for being dishonest.”

  Walker scowled. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me that?”

  Stillman shrugged. “It wouldn’t count if you had known the right thing was also the smart thing. You had to say to yourself, ‘If this job means I have to stiff this guy, then they can stick the job in their ear.’ Now you’ll never have to wonder.”

  “What if I’d made the wrong decision?”

  “The wrong decision?”

  “What if I had looked at those two and said to myself, ‘Alan Werfel is just a rich asshole who is going to get richer, and Winters is probably a decent, hard-working man who started with nothing and isn’t all that much better off now, and will probably lose his job. He’s fighting for his life, and I should let him take his shot at it?’ ”

  “You wouldn’t be much of an analyst if you couldn’t figure out that much.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question. What would you have done?”

  “Nothing,” said Stillman. “I’m not in the insurance business.”

  Stillman was gliding along Colorado Boulevard when, without warning, he braked and swung quickly into a driveway. Walker made a grab for the dashboard, but his seat belt tightened across his chest and held him, his hands grasping nothing. “What?” he gasped. “What’s wrong?” He held the door handle, not knowing whether to get out or clutch it in case Stillman accelerated out again. Walker was vaguely aware that they were in a large parking lot.

  “Not a thing,” said Stillman. “I just happened to see a vacancy sign, and we ought to get a place. There aren’t many of them in this part of town.”

  Walker’s breathing slowed to normal while Stillman eased the car into a parking space near the entrance to the lobby. “What happened to the other place on Wilshire?”

  “Why? Did you leave something in your room?”

  “No,” said Walker. “I just—”

  “It’s not smart to get too attached to hotels on a case like this,” said Stillman. “You get too predictable, you’re liable to get popped.”

  “Popped?” repeated Walker. “You mean those two guys would kill us?”

  Stillman said, “Unfortunately, Pasadena’s finest showed up before I could ask them about that. But somebody stole twelve million bucks. You shouldn’t let that slip your mind.”

  “That doesn’t mean they’d kill us.”

  Stillman sighed. “There’s no reason to get all sentimental about it. There are people within a block of here who would kill you for the change in your pockets. I’m pretty sure I’m one of them.” He got out of the car and waited while Walker joined him.

  “Then what’s the difference between you and them?”

  Stillman smiled peacefully. “If I have enough to stay alive you’re safe from me. No matter how much a thief has, he still wants yours.”

  8

  Walker found his room and unlocked the door, then realized that Stillman was following him inside. Stillman tossed his pile of files on the bed, sat down, and opened one. He looked up. “You weren’t planning an afternoon nap, were you?”

  “No . . . ”

  “Good. Then let’s get started.”

  Walker set his suitcase down and stood still. “Doing what?”

  “Figuring,” Stillman said. “It’s been three weeks since Andrew Werfel died. He was in New Mexico, and the cause of death was congestive heart failure.” He looked up. “I suppose you read that on the death certificate.”

  “Yes,” said Walker. “They always say that. Or pneumonia.”

  “Yep. It’s always heart or lungs. I checked with an acquaintance in Santa Fe, who checked with the coroner’s office. The cause was verified. No foul play, as they’re fond of saying. Then, after about a week, when the certificate was issued, the bogus Alan Werfel showed up in Pasadena with a copy. He also had Alan Werfel’s real ID, and collected a check. Your friend Ellen seems to have handled everything.”

  “I saw that too,” said Walker. “Her signature is on every piece of paper.”

  “Another week passes, and who calls the Pasadena office but the real Alan Werfel? He wants to know the procedure for collecting on his father’s insurance policy.”

  “Did he talk to Ellen too?”

  “No, Winters. He asked for the manager, so that’s who he got. Winters thought it was somebody trying to pull a scam, so he told him what he would need to bring, set up an appointment, and called the cops.”

  “What happened?”

  “There were two plainclothes cops sitting at those desks out front when he got there. They waited until he had presented his claim, signed some papers, then showed their badges and dragged him downtown. After a couple of hours they managed to get his prints run and realized an apology was in order. They issued a bulletin for a guy who looks just like Werfel and uses Werfel’s name.” Stillman smiled. “I wonder how long it’s going to take for Werfel to realize what they’ve done to him.”

  “Is that when McClaren’s called you in?”

  “Not yet,” said Stillman. “The company traces the check it issued to the first Alan Werfel a week earlier. It was drawn on Wells Fargo in San Francisco. It was endorsed by the artistic but fake Alan Werfel and deposited in an account at Bank of America.” He nodded to himself. “This is, not surprisingly, a new account. But it’s a different branch of the same bank that Alan Werfel uses, and the check is to Alan Werfel from McClaren’s, so it won’t bounce. This keeps them calm, and they only put a hold on the three million they can’t cover with his other accounts.”

  “Where is the money now?”

  “It traveled. On day two, the fake Alan Werfel starts moving it fast. He gets a check to a real estate company for a new house. This is one of those certified, guaranteed, immediate-pay cashier’s checks for closing escrow. This one is for seven million, six hundred thousand. He gets another check to an insurance company on the same basis: who wants to accept ownership of a seven-million-dollar house with no fire insurance? It’s expensive. A hundred grand. Another hundred for earthquake. He also pays two hundred to a contractor as an initial payment for remodeling, four hundred to an interior decorator for antique furniture and shipping, two-forty to a landscape architect. On day five, he pays a million six to an art dealer for paintings. In fact, this guy manages to move ten million, two hundred and forty thousand before noon on day five. Then he takes a one-year lease on another house to live in while his is being fixed up: ten thousand a month for a total of one hundred twenty. He pays a probate lawyer three hundred thousand for settling his father’s estate. He even pays for the funeral—twenty grand, plus twenty-five for the caterer.”

  “For a funeral?”

  “An imaginary one, sure. Why be cheap? That must be the going rate, because it didn’t raise any flags. That left the account with a million two ninety-five. He transferred a million two to an account at Union Bank with a notation on the check that it was for the rest of the remodeling, and closed the B. of A. account with ninety-five grand in cash. Presumably for tips.”

  “That’s it, isn’t it?”

  “That’s it. All before McClaren’s knew enough to stop payment on the first check. Of course, each of the imaginary companies had its own account at a different bank. That bought them more time to move it before it could be tracked down.” He paused. “What I’m interested in is this money at Union Bank.”

  “Why?”

  “For one thing, it hasn’t been pulled out as checks to businesses that don’t exist. It’s set up as a checking account owned by a woman named Lydia King.”

  “So?”

  “The original amount was twelve million. The account was a million, two hundred thousand. It’s ten percent.” He glanced at Walker. “The account was set up after all the other money had been successfully moved, as though they were w
aiting for that to happen before they paid Lydia King.”

  “Are you saying it was a bribe to Ellen Snyder? That she’s off somewhere living as Lydia King?”

  “I’m not ready to make any bald pronouncements just yet,” said Stillman. He opened another folder and paged through it. “She didn’t go into the bank and get herself on the security tapes, so I can’t tell you who Lydia King is. She just wrote checks and converted them all over creation. She wrote small checks to other women, who took the money in cash, and she used checks to buy things that can be converted: gold coins, some good jewelry, traveler’s checks, money orders, foreign currency.”

  “So what makes this money different? They made up businesses, and they made up a person.”

  “The person paid for things I think are overhead: Hermès luggage at fifteen hundred dollars a bag, human-hair wigs, women’s clothes, a few plane tickets to other cities where she was converting the money. It goes on and on, in a dozen different names.”

  “How do you even know it’s one woman?”

  “I don’t. I’m guessing. The theory is, it doesn’t matter if she calls herself Lydia King or Georgia Fatwood or Helen Highwater, if the money comes from one account, chances are it’s one woman wearing those wigs and new clothes.”

  “It’s still just moving stolen money around. Is the reason you think this account is different just that you know it was a woman who laundered it?”

  “It’s got a different feel to it, a different smell. A lot of the other money, the ten point eight, goes into some of the same stuff: cash, traveler’s checks, gold, money orders, foreign currency, and so on. But none of it goes to overhead. Not a dime so far. What it feels like is that this is her money, and she’s got the problem of washing it separately. She has to buy clothes, luggage, makeup, travel. That’s all stuff that gives us leads, so it’s dangerous. The other person—or persons, since this is a hell of a lot of work to do this quickly—are buying zero that isn’t some substitute for cash.”