Chapter 6: The Accountant's Letter
Marcus's phone lay on the table between them like something that had already gone off.
Richard read it twice.
The second time he read it aloud, not loudly, but clearly enough that the people nearest the table could hear.
The letter was three paragraphs.
The first stated that the accountant, a man named Gerald Fitch, had served Thomas Calloway for nine years but could no longer do so in good conscience.
The second stated that he had, over the past nine years, processed a series of financial transfers he had been told were routine company restructuring.
He now had reason to believe they were not.
The third paragraph said he had retained independent legal counsel and would be cooperating fully with any inquiry.
Richard set the phone down.
"Gerald Fitch," he said to Thomas.
"You've had him for nine years."
"Richard—"
"He processed every transfer."
"He didn't know the full—"
"He knew enough." Richard stood up from the table.
Not in fury this time.
Deliberately, like a man who has decided something and is now simply following through.
"Marcus, call the family's legal counsel.
Not the company solicitors — I mean David Harte.
His personal line.
Tell him I need him here within the hour."
Marcus was already dialing.
Diane stood up too.
"This is not the place for this conversation."
"You chose the place," Richard said, without looking at her.
"You put the envelope on the table.
You pushed it across to me in front of forty people.
This is exactly the place you chose."
Diane's mouth thinned to a line.
"I want our guests to leave," she said.
"Whatever needs to be discussed can be discussed privately, with counsel present, like rational adults."
"Our guests," Richard said, "are welcome to stay or go as they choose.
But I'm not lowering my voice, and I'm not moving to another room."
Helen, Richard's sister, stood slowly.
"I'll ask people to give the family some space." She moved through the room quietly, and most of the guests followed her lead, gathering coats and bags and filing toward the far doors.
Not quickly.
Nobody wanted to miss the next sentence.
Within three minutes the room had thinned to Thomas, Diane, Richard, Claire, Marcus, and three guests who hadn't yet decided whether staying was appropriate.
"Out," Marcus said to them, not unkindly.
They went.
Thomas had not moved from his seat.
He had the look of a man calculating whether the exit was still available and deciding it probably wasn't.
He tried anyway.
"If Fitch is already talking," Thomas said, "then you need me.
I'm the only one who knows the full structure of those transfers.
You go at this without me, you'll end up with investigators pulling at threads that could damage the company in ways that go far beyond anything Diane and I—"
"Are you offering to help me," Richard said, "in exchange for what exactly?"
Thomas spread his hands.
"In exchange for handling this quietly.
Internally.
Without involving anyone outside this family."
"Gerald Fitch is already outside this family."
"I can talk to Gerald."
"Gerald retained independent counsel this evening," Richard said.
"You can't talk to Gerald."
Thomas's hands came back together.
"Then in exchange," Thomas said, his voice shifting into something low and careful, "for what I know about Claire."
The room went still again.
Claire, who had been standing near her chair, turned her head toward Thomas with an expression that did not change.
"What do you know about Claire?" Richard asked.
Thomas looked at her.
"The meeting with Marsh fourteen months ago wasn't the first one.
She's been in contact with him for almost three years.
Since before she came to this house that night with the letter." He leaned forward.
"She didn't find out about the clause from your father's original solicitor.
She found out because she went looking.
She hired Marsh herself, Richard.
She set out to find out what she was entitled to." He paused.
"Ask yourself why a woman who loves her husband spends three years quietly mapping out what she stands to inherit."
Silence.
Richard looked at Claire.
Claire looked at Thomas for a long moment.
When she turned to Richard, her voice was quiet and entirely steady.
"He's right," she said.
Richard's expression didn't shift.
He waited.
"I hired Geoffrey Marsh two years before that meeting," Claire said.
"I hired him three weeks after the first birthday dinner here, when Diane put a cake in my face for the first time, and your family laughed, and you told me later it was just her way and I should try to understand her." She paused.
"I didn't hire him because I wanted your money, Richard.
I hired him because I needed to understand what my options were.
What I had.
What I could leave with if I needed to leave." She held his gaze.
"I was trying to figure out if I had any power at all in this family, or if I was just someone who could be humiliated at every dinner table for the rest of her life with no recourse."
Richard was quiet for a long time.
Thomas opened his mouth.
"Don't," Richard said, without looking at him.
He was still looking at Claire.
"Don't say another word."
He walked around the table until he was standing beside Claire.
He picked up the copy of his father's amended will.
He looked at it for a moment, then he placed it carefully back in her hands.
"Keep that," he said.
Thomas made a sound that was not quite a word.
Richard turned to face his brother for the last time that evening.
"You just tried to use my wife's attempt to protect herself as a bargaining chip to avoid accountability for nine years of theft." His voice was low and precise.
"That tells me everything I need to know about who you are and who she is." He picked up his phone.
"David Harte is going to be here in forty minutes.
When he arrives, you are going to sit down, and you are going to answer every question he asks you.
If you leave this room before he arrives, I will call the police directly and skip the private process entirely."
Thomas looked at Diane.
May you like
Diane looked at the table.
Thomas sat back down.
