Chapter 6 - The Mausoleum
Vivienne laughed.
“Of course.”
Ronan didn't.
His father’s mausoleum was where everyone believed key had been buried.
Now chest itself hidden there?
They inspected with cemetery authority.
Behind memorial wall was maintenance cavity.
Inside:
No chest.
Only one broken leather strap.
Someone removed it.
Again.
Ronan turned on Ivy.
“You've moved it twice?”
“No.”
She looked genuinely horrified.
Then security records.
Mausoleum accessed three months earlier.
Authorized family visitor:
Vivienne Hale.
Ronan stared.
Vivienne didn't bother lying.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“My father left instructions.”
“What instructions?”
“To retrieve something Alexander stole from him.”
“The chest?”
“I didn’t know what.”
She opened cavity.
Found archive chest.
Couldn’t open.
So she moved it.
Where?
Hale estate vault.
Ronan nearly laughed.
Everyone kept “protecting” same object by stealing it from another hiding place.
Then Vivienne explained her father’s grievance.
Graham Hale had served as outside counsel during employee-share restructuring.
He believed original register falsely inflated employee beneficial interests.
Alexander wanted restitution out of guilt.
Graham believed doing so would hand billions? no, current could be hundreds millions. Let's say potentially $120m in claims.
Graham created alternate legal analysis reducing liability.
The chest held documents that could prove which interpretation right.
He wanted it secured after death.
Vivienne inherited mission.
Not just greed.
But she clearly preferred family control.
Then chest was produced.
Heavy black metal.
Three locks.
Ivy key fit one.
Vivienne key fit another.
Center lock untouched.
Alexander key required.
Supposedly buried.
Where was it?
Ronan remembered funeral photograph.
Key disappeared before burial.
Who removed?
Graham?
Eleanor?
Funeral director?
Then Lena spoke.
“My dad said Mr. Blackwood’s key wasn't buried.”
Everyone looked.
Michael told her one story as child:
“The richest man I ever met buried an empty box and kept the key in the poorest room in his house.”
Ronan frowned.
Poorest room?
Blackwood Manor had servants’ quarters.
Old gardener cottage.
Laundry.
Then Ivy’s face changed.
“The maid’s room.”
Her mother Marian had stayed in manor servants’ wing during overnight archive work.
Alexander may have hidden central key there.
Why give his key into custody of worker?
To prevent heirs.
Then they searched old maid’s room.
Renovated into storage years ago.
Behind baseboard:
small velvet pouch.
Empty.
Note:
RONAN ALREADY HAS IT.
Ronan stared.
He did not have key.
Or did he?
Then remembered something father gave him at twenty-first birthday.
An old brass cufflink with Blackwood crest.
He never wore.
Stored in personal safe.
Not cufflink.
A key head disguised.
Could be.
They retrieved.
Inside decorative casing:
third key.
Alexander had given it to Ronan without telling what it was.
So despite father’s distrust, final opening required heir after all.
Why?
Maybe test of collaboration.
Three people:
Ronan.
Ivy.
Vivienne.
All had to agree.
Then Vivienne smiled.
“Open it.”
Ivy shook head.
“Not until Lena’s father is found.”
Why?
May you like
Because Michael had left one warning:
If all three keys come together before I return, one of the three holders is lying.
