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“You think he was being conned,” Lucas said.
“I think the board would have put up a half million dollars, or a million dollars, including a hundred or a hundred fifty thousand from Alex, and they’d use that to campaign for more, maybe up to a million or so, from local people,” Burston said. “That seed money would pull in something between five and ten million in grants, and in the end, you’d have three or four million dollars’ worth of housing. And misters Heath and Dahl would be driving around South Florida, or someplace else that was warm and out of sight, in new Porsches.”
“You’re saying they’re criminals?” Virgil asked.
“I’m saying that I went along with Alex for the original pitch for Home Streets... you know about Home Streets?” Burston asked.
“Yes.”
“The people running Heart/Twin Cities aren’t financial experts or real estate experts or even nonprofit experts. They’re hustlers. I can smell them. You expect some of that particular stink with people whose job is to raise money from rich people, but this was different. They’re con men. They’re the type of con men who take care of number one before they take care of anyone else. Alex couldn’t feel that. Couldn’t smell it.”
“You’ve got no proof.”
“No. I advise on stock investments for a living, and I’m good at it. In that milieu, you don’t ask for proof, because there isn’t any. You do your research and then you trust your sense of smell,” Burston said. “During the little cocktail party after Heath and Dahl made their pitch, I heard Heath talking about the joys of driving a classic car. I made a point of watching him leave the meeting. He’s driving a ten-year-old Mercedes S-Class. That’s not a classic car—that’s an old one. He’s a bullshitter.”
Virgil: “Okay. We will look into that...”
“You should,” Burston said. “Even if they didn’t kill Alex, there’s something serious going on with their so-called charities.”
They sat back and looked at each other for a moment, then Lucas said, “We understand from Ms. Cooper, Maggie, that you are tennis partners.”
“Yes. We’re good,” Burston said. “Mixed doubles. Not on the national level, quite, but we rule Minnesota amateurs.”
“She told us you’re gay,” Virgil said.
“Yes.”
Lucas: “Did you and Alex ever have a physical relationship?”
Burston leaned back in his chair, an amused smile flashing across his face. He said, “No. He was an attractive man, but he was... very, very straight. Something else: I made a little more than three hundred thousand dollars last year. If I were to have a sexual relationship with a client, and word got out, that would be the end of my job. I’d be out the door the next day. I like what I do; I wouldn’t risk it.”
Virgil: “You didn’t murder Alex.”
“No.”
Lucas tilted his head: “Who did?”
Burston looked surprised by the question. He had three small terra-cotta flower pots on his desk, each with a selection of stone plants, lithops, that resembled pebbles. He reached out and touched one, and then another, his face down, studying the plants for a moment.
Then he looked up and said, “That’s the question that plagues me. Frankly... This stays strictly between us?”
“It will,” Lucas said.
“Frankly, I wondered if Margaret... but that’s impossible. Why did it even occur to me? Because Maggie and Alex had quite different ideas about the money in the family—he wanted to preserve it and send it down to another three generations of Sands,” Burston said. “She wanted to spend it. Some of it, anyway. She wanted a house in LA, or Malibu, or Santa Barbara, away from Minnesota winters. And maybe a pied-à-terre on Manhattan’s West Side, walking distance from the Theater District. Maybe both. But like I said, she’s not a killer. That’s impossible. She loved Alex, and she lovedher kids. She would have worn him down, eventually. She knew that. She’d have had her pied-à-terre. Also, she’s a... kind person.”
Lucas asked again: “If she didn’t, then who did?”
Burston stuck a finger in one ear, wiggled it, turned and looked out the window, turned back and said, “Everything I have to say about that seems kind of stupid, in my own ears. It must be something Alex did, or maybe wouldn’t do, as a judge. It didn’t involve his money. Not directly, anyway. But the judge thing, I guess that’s been seriously reviewed by the FBI, the BCA, everybody. I can’t think of anything else. Unless... it was a walk-in-the-door madman. There’s so much hostility in America... it could have been a crazy man.”
Virgil: “Do you own any property or have any clients who own property around that rail yard that Home Streets wants to buy?”
Burston frowned, shook his head. “No. Not me. I don’t own any real estate at all, except my condo. As far as clients go, I doubt it, but it’s possible. I don’t deal with my clients’ real estate positions, unless it’s in the stock markets, or REITs. But, I doubt it.”
“Why?” Lucas asked.
“Because there’s not much money to be made in that part of town. Not unless you’re a building contractor who’s overcharging and kicking the excess back to the developer.”
“You think that happens?”
