She had me there. I had to admit, I had known, at least as much as I’d wanted to know, which wasn’t much. Sure, I’d seen the society-page photos that Marty had mentioned, but I’d told myself those evenings out with other women were part of his job, an opportunity to charm new donors. Charles and I had even discussed them on a few occasions. The truth was, though, that I had deliberately ignored Charles’s other dates because I hadn’t wanted to believe that those relationships were anything other than social, unlike our more intimate association. But Marty had seen right through him. “Well,… We didn’t… I mean, we weren’t…”
“Right. No strings. Now wasn’t that convenient for Mr. Worthington?”
I didn’t know whether to cry or to rage-and I was damned glad we’d been careful about protection all along. I gave up and laughed. “You are so right. And I thought I was being so casual about the whole thing.”
“Do you care?” Marty asked carefully.
I considered that. “No, not about him. I think I was at least honest with myself about that. It’s my pride that’s suffering. I don’t like to be made a fool of. But, Marty, I still don’t understand why he did this. Okay, he stole so he could court women with even more money?”
“I think so, at least in the beginning. It takes money to woo the kind of woman he wants. You know, all those theater tickets, expensive meals. He’s got a great house-with a big mortgage. And he has high-dollar tastes. Maybe in the beginning he did it just enough to give him the ready cash to impress his targets. But maybe once he discovered how easy it was, he got hooked. I mean, come on-at the Society he must have felt like a kid in a candy shop, with so many easy pickings. Plus he could thumb his nose at the institution. You must’ve noticed that Charles thinks he’s smarter than everyone else? He kept proving it to himself, over and over.” Marty laughed. “Don’t beat yourself up. He’s very, very good at this. Just not quite good enough for us.” She had a wicked gleam in her eye.
“What do you mean?” I had to ask.
“You think we’re going to let him get away with this? Where’s your gumption, girl? He’s been using you, in more ways than one. As for me, when he went after the Terwilliger Collection, he made it personal. He thought I wouldn’t notice? And then he has the nerve to try to pin the rap on you and poor Alfred, who never hurt a fly and who’s dead so he can’t defend himself. Are you going to let him get away with that?”
“No way.”
Marty looked pleased. “All right, then, here’s the deal. Let Jimmy and the FBI track down the artifacts and the money. That’s what they get paid to do. But you and me, we can launch our own, sort of parallel, investigation.”
“What, snoop around and see what women he’s wooed? What’s the point?” The idea struck me as vaguely repellent.
“Motive. Okay, maybe the law doesn’t care about that, but without it, as you pointed out, Charles has no obvious reason to be stealing, and I’m sure the FBI has gone over his records by now. He’s got a good life by most people’s standards.”
“And,” I said slowly, “we’ll be sparing some other woman the embarrassment, right? Because he’s not going to stop now, is he? As long as he thinks he’s getting away with it?”
“Exactly.”
“How do we do this?”
“You can talk to your professional colleagues; I can talk to Philadelphia society. That should cover all the bases. He’s got to have been doing this for a while. And this is the kind of thing no woman is going to admit to the police or the FBI, even if they knew enough to ask.”
“Wow. Marty, I have seriously underestimated you. You have a devious mind-and I’m damn glad we’re on the same side. So what’s the plan?”
Marty grinned at me. “The FBI is operating under the assumption that Charles has been stealing documents and artifacts from the Society, and most likely selling them, or maybe holding them for a bit, waiting for the right buyer to come along, under the radar. So they’re going to set a trap for him. They’re going to create a phony collector who is willing to pay big money for something specific-something that we know can be found in the Society collections. Their collector will put the word out on the street that he’s in the market, and then the FBI will see who bites.”
I stared at her as though she had gone mad. “Marty, how do you know all of this? And wouldn’t Charles be crazy to try to take something else, now that everyone’s watching?”
“Jimmy told me all about it because he needed my help. He knows I know the collections, and he wanted to figure out what the best bait would be. It had to be something big enough to justify the risk. And this is Charles, remember? He’s arrogant, and he’s sure we’re not going to figure out what’s what. He’ll think he can get away with it-and the FBI will make sure the prize is tempting.”
I tried to visualize how this would work. Then a sudden thought struck me. “You didn’t say anything to James about the other thing-the women Charles has been seeing? Or his possible motive?”
“Nope. Jimmy’s really only interested in the thefts-the why doesn’t matter. You and I have a greater interest in the other part.”
“It’s not a crime to marry a rich woman, or at least try to. What’s the point?”
“Because the thefts are all tied up with his motive. Of course he can’t come to a prospective bride empty-handed, or he would look like a gold-digger-can a man be a gold-digger? Anyway, he’s got to be able to play the game, and that takes money. Real money.”
I could see the logic in that. “But how do you plan to prove that’s why he’s stealing?”
“I told you, I have an idea. If you’re up for it. The rough outline goes like this: we find a rich woman willing to string him along, until he attempts to seal the deal by wowing her with his impressive stock portfolio or whatever-and we listen in, maybe even record the conversation.”
I turned a quizzical eye toward Marty, and she laughed at my expression. “No, Nell, not me. Besides, he’s already rejected me as not rich enough. But”-she smiled wickedly-“I know who he’s cultivating at the moment.”
“Another relative?” I asked.
“No, Libby Farnsworth, someone I went to school with. Well, her brother is married to another cousin of mine. But she’s got the bucks, and the right profile. What’s more important is that she’s the type who’d love to play along. She’s been updating me on Charles’s current campaign, since she knows I know him and she knows I’m involved with the Society, and she’s just been keeping him around to squire her to social events, so her heart’s not going to get broken. Besides, she’s got a devilish sense of humor, and I think this might appeal to her.”
I pondered, for about three seconds. “I like it. We attack his ego from all sides in a pincer movement-he loses the girl and he gets nabbed as a thief. But-how long is this going to take?”
Marty laughed. “Oh, he’s ripe for the picking. I think we could turn up the heat over the next week or so and pump him for all he’s worth.”
I wasn’t so sure. “You think your friend can convince Charles that she’s head over heels about him all of a sudden? And then what? She asks him for his bank statement? But isn’t James keeping an eye on Charles’s bank accounts? If he’s got money, the FBI will find it.”
“Maybe, maybe not. Poor baby-you really don’t get it, do you? There’s nothing simpler than to convince Charles that he’s conquered another heart-who could resist him?-and besides, Libby’s bankroll is more than worth it to him. And he knows her well enough to believe that she’d want to check out the financial side of things before she committed, love or no love. I think he’d take the gamble-he’d have to show her the money, one way or another. Charles can’t imagine failing, because he thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. He fooled you, didn’t he? Didn’t he turn on that famous charm and make you think you were the only woman in the world, even if it was only for about fifteen minutes?”