“Miss Phillips, if you could join Mr. Turner and . . . Mr. Turner. We seem to be having some difficulty.” Napoleon broke into her thoughts and motioned her up the stairs.
Grace could hear the scratch of Elwyn Turner’s voice as she climbed.
“I told you I wanted a list, boy. Now do it. I won’t be leaving this earth tonight. I can wait for you.”
“Mr. Turner, it is not necessary to name them individually, sir.” The “sir” was spoken grudgingly. “You only need list your children by name and then indicate ‘and their descendants.’”
“I want to know their names. All of them. I want to know.” The old man was propped up in a huge four-poster bed in the large bedroom behind the sitting area where Little Gus Turner had climbed into the wheelchair with his great grandfather.
“Can I help, Anthony?” Grace stood near the foot of the bed and watched the exchange.
“Well, if you can’t get him to listen to me, you can start writing down names, I suppose. But Mr. Turner, I need to know that you’ve thought this through carefully. You’re certain you want to change the will that is currently in effect?”
“What did you say your name was, boy?” The air in the room grew very still. Anthony Turner stood stiff and flushed beside the bed and looked down, a legal pad and gold pen in his hand. “My name is Anthony Turner, sir. I’m your, that is, I’m—an attorney.” Anthony straightened his shoulders. “And right now I’m the only estate lawyer in town, so the Kinder firm asked me to speak with you.”
“Is Old Man Kinder dead then?”
“Yes sir. He passed away a few years ago.”
“It would be like Kinder to leave the preparation of my will to some young lawyer.” Elwyn Turner turned his frown back to his unknown great grandson. “I want those names.”
“Mr. Turner, it’s time for your medication, sir.” Napoleon entered, carrying a tea tray. Grace and Anthony went back down the wide staircase and into the library to begin working on the names of all the Turner family. Anthony pulled a laptop computer from his briefcase and tapped away while Grace wrote a list in longhand. After two phone calls to Anthony’s Aunt Judith, who assumed her nephew was working on a Christmas card list, and admonished him on the lateness of his task, they completed a two-page family tree, written in descending order for Elwyn Turner.
The invalid studied the list carefully, one long finger running down the page. Murmuring an occasional name as he read. “Another Meredith here. Franklin Turner. Who would think Judith would have a child that would have the name Franklin. Amazing.” A faintly cracking smile creased the lined, drawn face. “Leland Franklin was my uncle.” He handed the paper back to the young attorney.
“Young man, you have the look of Judith about you.” Anthony’s face betrayed no emotion.
“You’ll need to wait for these changes, Mr. Turner. I can’t draft this will as it stands. We’ll call the Goodland firm over in Columbia and get this back to you tomorrow or the next day.”
Elwyn gave directions while Grace waited with Napoleon in the library. Nearly an hour later, Anthony Turner stepped back into the room looking stunned.
“I’m sorry I brought you over here Miss—“ at her lifted hand he stopped. “Grace, I mean.” The young lawyer sank into a chair. His tie had been pulled down, collar open, his shirt was now a wrinkled mess.
“I can’t draft this will with the changes. It’s out of my hands. I’ll have to hand this over to another firm at this point.” Anthony blinked and looked at Napoleon, then ran a hand through his hair. “Did you know about this, Mr. Harker? He’s changed the whole thing. Everything. Is he . . . is he taking any medication that would change his outlook or alter his mental state?”
Napoleon poured a cup of tea for Anthony and swished a shot of brandy into the cup. He cleared his throat and looked toward Grace for assistance as he handed the cup to Anthony. “I can only think of one thing, ahhh . . . one medication, so to speak, that he’s had in the last few days.” Grace’s eyes danced as she shared silent laughter with the elderly valet.
They looked at the shell-shocked lawyer and spoke in one voice.
“Little Gus Turner.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Since the death of ReBarb Zimmerman, Alice Gerding Zimmerman had thrived. The extra forty pounds she had carried for over ten years was now gone. Color had returned to her cheeks and her sister commented that she looked ten years younger. It was easier to smile now, to laugh and enjoy every simple thing that happened in a day. It felt to Alice as though a burden she had carried with her day and night for nineteen years was gone. She rose every morning ready to face the day. She enjoyed going to the job she’d held for more than ten years in the title office on Main Street. Most of the women in the office didn’t bother to wear make-up or do anything special regarding their appearance, but to Alice, the world was new. She felt like the girl she had been before her marriage to ReBarb Zimmerman.
On occasion, when she lay in the quiet of her bedroom at night, she wondered in a removed fashion if she should feel guilty for the overwhelming relief of ReBarb’s death. The feeling was there, but when she examined the barest smidgen of guilt, it was there and it was a fact, but it didn’t ring true. She cared enough for her children to deny herself exuberant jubilation at the thought of his death. After the foolishness of being caught literally dancing on his grave she had returned to her normal quiet demeanor. Alice supposed she should have been embarrassed by her own behavior and the attention it had garnered in the local newspaper but she wasn’t. There wasn’t an ounce of mortification in her. She found it amusing that others had not thought she was capable of such outrageous actions. But it didn’t matter now, she thought sighing and smiling, remembering the look on the local grocer’s face when she had purchased the lone dusty magnum of champagne he stocked in his small liquor department. That was the night she had driven to Columbia, purchased a new red outfit, a color she loved and Rebarb hated. She’d also bought a pair of leather boots with three-inch heels and those same heels had made quite a mark in the fresh mud around ReBarb’s grave.
There was indeed no guilt for Alice in feeling relief at ReBarb’s death, no remote anxiety or feeling of compassion any longer existed for her. Alice remembered the nights she had fantasized that possibly ReBarb would lose control on slick roads or there would be an accident when he was hunting. For those glimmers of weakness during their marriage she had felt guilty and had gone to confession. The priest had tsked and prayed with her and then given her mild penance of Hail Marys and Our Fathers. She had performed the penance without hesitation, but still, the fact remained.
ReBarb Zimmerman had turned into a beast of a man and she had been married to that beast for nineteen very long years. If he had not become so careless and thoughtless, if she had not finally begun to notice the late and later hours and the strange late-night hang-up phone calls, his philandering and infidelity might never have become obvious to her.
The first baby came when she was eighteen years old and since that day, ReBarb had done exactly as he pleased. His own mother was terrified of him — of the raging bull that her son had become, a cursing and insulting braggart. He was insensitive to his young wife’s needs and then to the needs of his young family. ReBarb lost his factory job and then lounged in the comfort of the unemployment checks for as long as they lasted. For a year they lived with her aunt, her only relative in town. She had taken grocery money from the retired woman only until she could start back to work herself to earn enough to care for the baby.
Rebarb gave little consideration to Alice’s growing worry about how she would buy formula for a colicky newborn and then added insult to injury by taking his small state-sponsored income and spending it on a new fishing rod, a hunting rifle, a compound bow or a handgun. At last they found a cold, vacant apartment on a side street near the town square. A rabbit warren of old storefront rooms, the apartment was cavernous, huge and echoing with fifteen-foot ceilings. Their meager furnishings wer
e swallowed by the space. Anxiety consuming her, Alice fretted about everything, it seemed. How to keep the baby healthy, vaccinated, warm at night and in diapers; how to feed her ravenous husband on a grocery budget of fifty dollars a month, how to pay the utility bills and rent, how to keep the crumbling old building clean. One Thursday morning, eighteen months after their wedding, she woke up to the realization that she was expecting another child.
Every day the reality and responsibility of being an adult increased and every day Rebarb became more bitter and more restless. The purchase of the house on the edge of Franklin had satisfied his desire to show the small-town populace that he was a man of means. It was a monster of a bungalow, just like the old apartment, too expensive to heat and entirely too large for the young family. Alice had started to protest that it was not what she wanted but ReBarb’s scowl was so venomous she found herself backing away in fear of her husband.
And so they moved into the old house, the locals whispering that ReBarb’s mother had borrowed the money for the mortgage and then handed the property over to the couple. Small towns were not the place for secrets and Alice heard the talk. Slowly, by inches, she learned to resent the boy she had loved. It was a creeping, growing thing, like the poison ivy that twined around the dead elm tree in her front yard. Every month and every minute that ReBarb mistreated the children and then spoke to her as if she were the dirt under his feet, that vine grew and steadily squeezed the compassion out of her until even the resentment and the anger were gone. She simply did not want to live with the unconscionable animal that ReBarb had become.
After spending more than one night cowering in a corner, the children crying in their bedrooms while she waited for his fists to rain down on her, she finally shut off her ability to feel anything where ReBarb was concerned. But the church did not believe in divorce and so she stayed. She tolerated the screaming temper tantrums which he threw like a child when she drew his attention to an overdue bill that could no longer be avoided. She grew to expect the swagger in his step when he would stomp out to the front porch, light a cigarette, and then leave her to find her own way to pay another of the credit cards she didn’t know he had or an account at a local retailer which had grown beyond reason. But nonetheless, she found herself amazed and wounded when, answering the door one evening, dish towel in hand, she had been served with a petition for divorce.
It seemed ReBarb had found greener pastures with not only a younger woman, but a woman who would underwrite his expensive tastes. So he moved on, to give the town gossips more fuel for their fires as Alice suffered the additional degradation of a divorce. Then, in the last few years before his death, ReBarb’s recently acquired bride started to show signs of the emotional and physical beatings Alice herself had been subjected to. Attention now turned to her as a victim and the idea arose with those same town gossips that perhaps Barber Zimmerman, the charmer, former captain of the local football team, had lead a hidden life in the decrepit house with which he had burdened and then abandoned Alice and the children.
Her sister had told her it would happen. “Leopards don’t change their spots!” she’d said vehemently when Alice had been mortified at the public humiliation of ReBarb Zimmerman’s actions.
Leopards might not change their spots, but as Alice Gerding Zimmerman lay in bed that December night, she was determined to change her life. Never mind the series of blows that fate had dealt her. Moving one hand under her pillow, she touched the lottery ticket carefully. It was still there. The town of Franklin Hill only knew Alice Zimmerman as the quiet, unassuming, brow-beaten woman who had been married to the smooth-talking ReBarb Zimmerman. But that would soon change. She smiled again and sighed as she closed her eyes. Something good had finally happened. Her time had come. Tomorrow morning she would call Bernadine Turner about the children’s Christmas Fund and then get the phone number from her for Anthony Turner. Then she would speak to a real estate agent about the house. Or maybe she would just walk away and have them push the house over. She had always hated it, after all.
She gathered her thoughts again to her situation. Alice was going to need a lawyer and maybe even an accountant, she was sure. People with seven-figure incomes did that, she thought. They might even have maids. And Alice was now one of Those People.
Chapter Twenty-Six
On a Wednesday afternoon two weeks before the holiday, Grace had a burning urge to do some last-minute Christmas shopping. Gina and Derry Rodwell had been taken care of with some special articles of clothing. But what about toys? Gina wasn’t even in second grade, surely she still liked toys. Grace drove the short distance to Columbia to a packed shopping mall and joined the throngs milling amongst the stores. “O Come, All Ye Faithful” sang out over loudspeakers through the wide walkway. The mall had invested in garish decorations throughout the property. Life-sized stuffed elves hanging from the ceiling balancing Christmas packages, while posed in amazing (and in all likelihood anatomically impossible) gymnastic positions. While it didn’t compare to the mega-malls on the East Coast, it still urged Grace along in a festive shopping spirit.
After finding an adorable stuffed St. Bernard for Gina that wiggled its nose and would walk on a leash in a jogging motion, she realized not only was it too large to carry through the mall while she finished her shopping but every time she jolted it, it would give a piping bark, the “off" switch nowhere to be found. Grace slogged back across the parking lot to her car to deposit the barking nuisance, with a silent apology to Mrs. Rodwell. She was now determined to find something for the remaining Rodwells.
The crowds were descending in force, cars lined up around the mall and out to the highway. She shook her head and waved off an SUV loaded with a cheery mother and three children who were gathered like vultures near her parking place. She raised the hatch of the Toyota to place the huge package inside when another wandering shopper honked piercingly to hurry her into leaving the precious space. Grace started, her head connecting with the corner of the hatchback. Pain resonated, making her ears rings. She muffled a curse and turned to look sharply at the horn-wielding demon. Behind the wheel of a BMW was the gaping face of Lancelot Curtis. Grace brought her hand to her head briefly, checking to be certain it was still attached, then slammed the hatch down with a quietly outraged “Hmph!”
“Oh, Gracie, I’m so terribly sorry!” He had his window down, and called to her, pleading. Grace resisted the urge to scream like a banshee at the man “It’s GRACE to you, pal!”
“Please, let me buy you a cup of coffee! As soon as I find a spot!” He was wearing a red sweater with a carefully stitched row of Christmas trees across the chest. It looked like something her nephews had worn when they were four years old.
Grace slid her bag over her shoulder and walked away from the BMW at a rapid clip, turning a deaf ear to Lancelot Curtis, who was now officially making a fool of himself, calling to her across the parking lot.
“Hey Mister, move along! We’re all looking for a spot. Your sweetie doesn’t want you!” a rough-looking man in a large four-wheel-drive truck was behind the still-idling BMW, impatient.
“Good grief. Just let me get back in there without him.” She was talking to herself, legs covering as much ground as she could manage. Her head still swam and she was wondering if she needed to sit down. The Christmas spirit was rapidly dissipating with Lancelot Curtis in such close proximity. She was nearly to the entrance when the sound of rapid footsteps came up behind her. She groaned, breaking into a trot. She reached the door, breathless, her head now on fire, a burning sensation creeping down her forehead. One large hand reached in front of her and an arm came protectively around her shoulders. Grace yelped, thinking Lance Curtis had just grown ten inches and turned into a mugger built like a half back.
“Let’s go left and head for the coffee shop.” The quiet voice of the tall green-eyed veterinarian was in her ear as he slid a warm hand around her waist. She looked up, blinking. With horror, Grace realized that he probably had witnessed
that whole embarrassing scene in the parking lot. She was on the run from Lance Curtis and the good-looking vet knew it. All she wanted to do was collapse somewhere and put her aching head in her hands.
He swept her effortlessly through the crowd to the back corner of the small coffee house and to a pair of mercifully vacant, high-backed leather wing chairs. He handed her gently into the chair facing away from the door. While she was gasping for breath from the run, she noticed that he didn’t have so much as a hair out of place. He looked like he’d been out for a Sunday stroll. He retrieved two steaming whipped cream-covered drinks from the coffee bar while she caught her breath.
“So, you aren’t among the many admirers of Lance Curtis, I take it?” His eyes were even greener than she remembered. And as warm and friendly.
“Hardly.” She thought she sounded a bit prim, but the tall vet threw back his head and laughed.
He was wearing another field shirt, cuffs unbuttoned, and pushed up toward his elbows. It was dark blue, a sharp contrast to his eyes. They sipped for a moment. He made a murmuring sound when he drank as if it were the best thing he’d ever tasted, and then licked a smudge of whipped cream off one finger. Grace felt herself getting goosebumps. This guy was one dangerous package.
“You took a pretty good blow there.”
Grace grimaced then laughed, remembering the day she’d met him. “Okay, so we’re even.”
Feeling a strange itching sensation, Grace reached up involuntarily once again to investigate her painful wound. Gingerly moving aside the veil of hair that covered what was sure to be a purple lump, she was surprised to find it was wet. Her fingers came away red, and blood began to trickle down her forehead. It had hurt and now she understood why.
“Hey, now. You’ve got a laceration hidden in there. We need to get you taken care of.” The vet was stooping next to her, looking closely, pushing her hair away. “I think you’re going to need some stitches, Miss Phillips.” He had his handkerchief out, dabbing lightly. Grace understood why Comfort and Joy held still under his touch. He was very gentle for someone who looked positively brawny.
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