Free Murder.com by Haughton Murphy

said to her husband.
    â€œYes. With a very comfortable trust fund,” Reuben answered.
    Reuben and Cynthia sat down over drinks once they reached home—a martini this time, not the Café Treviso’s “so-called Merlot,” as Reuben put it.
    â€œAnother interesting downtown evening,” Reuben said. “But more important than the artistry, what did you think of Signor Facini?”
    â€œHe’s a clever young man,” she responded. “Not that it takes much inventiveness to wear a bedsheet and stick a carrot where it doesn’t belong. But he’s got the skills of an actor.”
    â€œHow do you mean?”
    â€œLet me get us something to eat and I’ll tell you. Sandwiches all right?”
    â€œDon’t have much choice, I expect.”
    Then, over grilled cheese sandwiches and non-merlot, Cynthia explained herself.
    â€œStart with the proposition that young Mr. Facini is supposed to be difficult, with a chip on his shoulder and a bad temper. At least that’s the way both his stepfather and Eskill Lander describe him. And we saw evidence of that the way he was abusing his lighting man. He was prepared to treat us in the same rude way until he found out who you were. Then it was pretty much charm and sweetness.”
    â€œSo? Where does that get us?”
    â€œProbably nowhere, but he was eager to make a good impression.”
    â€œSo we wouldn’t think he’d murdered his half-sister in a jealous fit of rage? And driven her in that blue Jaguar out to the edge of the East River?”
    â€œMaybe.”

Eleven
    A Surprise
    Monday morning, the receptionist at Chase & Ward called to Reuben when he stepped off the elevator and told him that Russell Townley, the firm’s new Executive Partner, wanted to see him “immediately.”
    â€œIt’s an awful shock, Mr. Frost,” she said.
    â€œWhat’s a shock?”
    â€œYoung Mr. Joyner’s death.”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œYou know, our associate, Mr. Joyner.”
    â€œI don’t know anything about it.”
    â€œHe was found dead in his apartment last night. At least that’s the word going around.”
    â€œHow terrible,” Reuben told her as he went off to Townley’s office as ordered, even before his morning coffee. A feeling of dread came over him as he walked down the corridor; if there had been foul play within the Chase & Ward family, the purpose of the Executive Partner’s summons was surely to get him caught up in dealing with it.
    He vaguely recalled Joyner—Edward Joyner he believed his name was—from one of the firm’s annual outings for partners and associates. He guessed that he had met the fellow, but he had left no strong impression. If Reuben had the correct person, Joyner was a three- or four-year associate in the corporate department, too young to have been discussed for promotion at a partners’ meeting.
    Frost reached Townley’s magnificent corner office—the traditional quarters for the firm’s Executive Partner—and went in without knocking. He was amused, as he had been on previous visits, by the way the office had been redecorated to Townley’s specifications—staid, proper, and uninteresting furniture and prints of Olde New York on the walls. Perhaps, Reuben thought impishly, to make clear to the world that Townley was of Olde New York stock. Boring was the word that came to Reuben’s mind; the decor was totally unlike the sleek, Italian-modern furniture in his own office when he had been an active partner; the grandfather clock in the corner would never have been found in his quarters.
    Townley, a rather small man in his late fifties, wearing a vest despite the balmy spring weather, jumped up from his desk to greet Frost.
    â€œThank God, you’re here, Reuben,” he said. Since assuming the post of Executive Partner from Charlie Parkes, the previous incumbent, three months