Blood Guilt. Lindy Cameron
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you?'
'Debts? Is he a gambler?'
'Only with my goodwill - as far as I know. Geoffrey married me for money Katherine. He had enough before, now he has more than enough.'
'Is it enough to him though?' Kit asked.
'Good question,' she gave a short laugh. 'Yes, perhaps it is a truth that a man in possession of a fortune must be in want of - more.'
Kit smiled as Celia seemed so delighted with her little twist of classic Jane Austen. Downing the rest of her coffee Celia reached for the pot. 'He already has a wife. I suspect he also has a mistress and that is not acceptable.'
'I don't imagine it is,' Kit said, holding her own cup out to the offered pot.
'Don't get me wrong Katherine. I don't actually care if he's being unfaithful,' she said, emphasising the 'un'. 'What I don't want to have to bother with, at any time, is a scandal. Or blackmail. I know how sordid these things can get. Men just can't seem to help themselves when it comes to sex, can they?' she asked, looking expectantly at Kit, who nodded - as expected.
'Maybe that is exactly what is happening,' Kit suggested. 'He may already be paying off a blackmailer.'
'Well the sooner we find out the better then,' Celia stated.
'There's no chance he is trying to take over OHP?' Kit asked. She realised this was a bit far-fetched but suddenly remembered that while doing her limited reading into Celia and OHP she'd come across an article about the clever take-over of Milson-Carter in Sydney. That company, publishers of coffee-table books for the armchair traveller and a range of home decorating magazines, had been literally taken apart and put back together by two very minor shareholders. While there had been speculation that the acquisition of shares had been achieved by coercion rather than free enterprise, nothing was ever proved. Rumours had been rife about some pretty weird skeletons in the closets of the Milson and Carter families but their minders had closed the wrought iron gates firmly in the face of the press to keep the old money in and the scandal-mongers out. Maybe that was what Celia feared. An unfaithful husband and a conniving mistress could do a great deal of damage if they set their minds to it.
'No my dear, I seriously doubt it,' Celia was saying. 'There is no way as far as Orlando House is concerned that my husband can get more than what he has.'
'What about the other shareholders? Could he buy them out? I was thinking of the Milson-Carter thing in Sydney,' Kit suggested hesitantly.
Celia laughed. 'My husband, though co-director, is only a junior partner. Granted so were the upstarts at Milson, but that company had a hundred or so shareholders. I am the majority shareholder of Orlando House and I do not expect that to change. I own seventy per cent, the remaining thirty is split equally between only three other people: Geoffrey, my daughter Elizabeth, and our publisher Miles Denning.
'So it is an unlikely scenario. I trust Miles implicitly, and hold him in the highest regard. And my daughter, well, Elizabeth is not much interested in the business at the moment. She has been living in England on and off for the last five years. She's trying to find herself, or something, away from the family influence or as she calls it 'interference'. She's been gone six months this time.'
'If she's not interested in the business...' Kit said vaguely. She regretted the implication immediately. Celia, on the other hand, didn't seem to find it inappropriate.
'Elizabeth would not sell her shares any more than I would, Katherine. They are her father's legacy and that means a lot to her. She may be stubborn, selfish and wayward but she would not abandon Orlando House and would certainly give nothing to Geoffrey. She does not approve of her step-father.'
Kit thought that 'abandon' was a pretty strange word to use. It appeared Celia Robinson didn't have much luck with those close to her. She wondered what Carl Orlando had been like. Kit started to apologise for her lack of tact but Celia interrupted with a wave of her hand.
'I have deliberated long on all of this. The questions you have raised give me confidence in your ability to deal with this matter efficiently and intelligently. That is all I ask. If my husband is having an affair I wish to be able to deal with him efficiently and intelligently. I shall probably want to kill him, though castration would be more fitting, but I will no doubt just manage to muzzle him for a while. If he's not having an affair then the answers to our questions lie elsewhere. One step at a time though. We begin with what I think is the most obvious.'
Celia pulled herself up from the chair and motioned to Kit to follow her. She stopped by a set of shelves, inset into the low wall that bordered one edge of the patio near the door, and rummaged amongst the large collection of shoes that filled all the available space. Slipping a pair of high-heels onto her tiny bare feet, she then opened the door and ushered Kit into the cool dark hallway. They made their way up a flight of stairs to a cedar-lined study furnished with two huge desks, a wall of books, several armchairs around an empty fireplace and the ghoulish Byron tapping away on a computer keyboard. His breathing was uneasy. Kit guessed he had just dashed up the stairs ahead of them.
'Is this your first husband, Celia?' Kit asked indicating the large oil portrait hanging over the unbelievably ornate mantelpiece. Even if Kit hadn't already known what Geoffrey Robinson looked like she would never have assumed the debonair, gentle-faced man staring down on her was the current man of the manor. Carl Orlando had been handsome indeed, his eyes showing a strength and integrity that could not have been simply imposed by the artist.
'It is,' she said gently, placing a hand on Kit's arm. Discounting the exaggerated hairdo, which tended to make her larger than life, Celia was a short person. Kit was five-seven and Celia didn't even reach her shoulder. And she was round. Not fat, just round, though she could have been any shape at all under the tent she was wearing. Kit looked up at the painting again and wondered what the two of them would have looked like together.
'I painted this in 1969, five years before he died,' she was saying.
'I'm impressed,' said Kit honestly, returning her attention to this surprising woman who still had hold of her arm.
'By Carl?' she asked, pleased.
'And your skill Celia.' There had been love in this house at one time then, Kit thought, wondering why it should matter to her. It did though, and she felt strangely pleased that that love was still here, watching over this room at least, captured in the warm intelligent eyes of a long-dead man.
'Come, have a seat Katherine. Let's get this tedious business out of the way.'
Kit seated herself in an ox-blood leather chair opposite Celia who pushed a manilla folder across the coffee table that separated them.
'Byron has provided you with a copy of my husband's social calendar for the next fortnight,' she said tapping the top sheet of paper. 'Geoffrey works till at least 7 p.m. every day except Friday. The dates marked with asterisks indicate the evenings when I know he will be home or at a social function with me. So you will have some nights free,' she smiled at Kit. 'The other evenings, of which there are four, he could be anywhere. Sometimes he comes home for dinner and then goes out to his club, sometimes he dines out with clients, colleagues, business associates or god knows who. I've never asked him. On three occasions he will be attending official dinners; what he does afterwards is also a mystery. As you will see there are also several times during the day when it may be necessary to keep an eye on him.'
'Well, it certainly looks like I'll be busy,' Kit said. And earning my money, she thought.
'I don't expect you to follow him day in day out, Katherine. Geoffrey is nothing if not organised. The periods marked will do for a start. We can decide in two weeks whether or not we need to change our tactics or even if we need to continue. Now I would like your first report in seven days. Perhaps we could meet again for lunch at noon on Friday. I would prefer that all information is exchanged in person. If you need to ask me anything and I'm not available you may talk to my personal secretary, Byron, and no one else, to arrange a meeting.'
'Friday will be fine Celia and I can't foresee any need for contact before then.'
'Good. Now, we have