Dark Rivers of the Heart

bother them to be living in a place with that reputation, so keeping their mouths shut has been easy."
        "But they opened up to you?"
        "Well, you know, people take FBI credentials and a few threats of criminal charges a lot more seriously than they should," Duvall said.
        "Anyway, until about a year and a half ago, they were paid by an attorney in Denver."
        "You've got his name?"
        "Bentley Lingerhold. But I don't think we'll need to bother with him.
        Until a year and a half ago, the Dresmunds' checks were issued from a trust fund, the Vail Memorial Trust, overseen by this attorney.
        I had my field computer with me, got on-line with Mama, had her track it down.
        It's a defunct entity, but there's still a record of it.
        Actually, it was managed by another trust that still exists-the Spencer Grant Living 'Trust."
        "Good God," Roy said.
        "Stunning, huh?"
        "The son still owns that property?"
        "Yeah, through other entities he controls. A year and a half ago, ownership was transferred from the Vail Memorial 'Trust, which was essentially owned by the son, to an offshore corporation on Grand Cayman Island. That's a tax-shelter haven in the Caribbean that-"
        "Yes, I know. Go on."
        "Since then, the Dresmunds have been getting their checks from something called Vanishment International. Through Mama, I got into the Grand Cayman bank where the account is located. I wasn't able to learn its value or call up any transaction records, but I was able to find out that Vanishment is controlled by a Swiss-based holding company: Amelia Earhart Enterprises."
        Roy fidgeted in his seat, wishing that he'd brought a pen and notebook to keep all these details straight.
        Duvall said, "The grandparents, George and Ethel Porth, formed the Vail Memorial Trust well over fifteen years ago, about six months after the Ackblom story exploded. They used it to manage the property at a one-step remove, to keep their names disassociated from it."
        "Why didn't they sell the place?"
        "Haven't a clue. Anyway, a year later they set up the Spencer Grant Living Trust for the boy, here in Denver, through this Bentley Lingerhold, just after the kid had his name legally changed. At the same time they put that trust in charge of the Vail Memorial Trust.
        But Vanishment International came into existence just a year and a half ago, long after both grandparents were dead, so you've got to figure that Grant himself set it up and that he's moved most of his assets out of the United States."
        "Starting at about the same time he began to eliminate his name from most public records," Roy mused. "Okay, tell me something… when you're talking trusts and offshore corporations, you're talking about big money, aren't you?"
        "Big," Duvall confirmed.
        "Where'd it come from? I mean, I know the father was famous… .
        "After the old man pleaded guilty to all those murders, you know what happened to him?"
        "Tell me."
        "He accepted a sentence of life imprisonment in an institution for the criminally insane. No possibility of parole. He made no arguments, no appeals. The guy was absolutely serene from the moment he was arrested, all the way through the final proceeding. Not one outburst, no expressions of regret."
        "No point. He knew he didn't have any defense. He wasn't crazy."
        "He wasn't?" Duvall said, surprised.
        "Well, not irrational, not babbling or raving or anything like that. He knew he couldn't get off. He was just being realistic."
        "I guess so. Anyway, then the grandparents moved to have the son declared the legal owner of Ackblom's assets. In fact, at the Porths' request, the court ultimately divided the liquidated assets-minus the ranch-beimm diate families of the victims in those cases where any spouses or children survived them. Want to guess how much they split?"
        "No," Roy said. He glanced out the porthole and saw a pair of local cops walking alongside the aircraft, looking it over.
        Duvall didn't even hesitate at Roy's "no," but poured out more details:
        "Well, the money came from selling paintings from Ackblom's personal collection of other artists' work, but mainly from the sale of some of his own paintings that he'd never been willing to put on the market. It totaled a little more than twenty-nine million