by John Grisham
around him, and the three shrinks—Zadel, Flowe, and Theishen—directly across the table. He’d been declared sane on the spot, and seconds later had taken a thick will prepared by Stafford and one of his associates, declared it to be his, and signed it.
There was no dispute about this.
“Oh my God,” Hark Gettys said, under his breath but loud enough for everyone to hear.
“When did he sign it?” Wycliff asked.
“Moments before he jumped to his death.”
“Is it handwritten?”
“It is.”
“Did he sign it in your presence?”
“He did. There were other witnesses. The signing was also videotaped.”
“Please hand me the will.”
Josh deliberately withdrew a single envelope from the file and passed it up to His Honor. It looked awfully small. There was no way it contained enough language to convey to the Phelans what was rightfully theirs.
“What the hell is this?” Troy Junior hissed at the nearest lawyer. But the lawyer couldn’t respond.
The envelope held only one sheet of yellow paper. Wycliff removed it slowly for all to see, unfolded it carefully, then studied it for a moment.
Panic seized the Phelans, but there was nothing they could do. Had the old man screwed them one last time? Was the money slipping away? Maybe he had changed his mind and given them even more. Around the tables they nudged and elbowed their lawyers, all of whom were remarkably quiet.
Wycliff cleared his throat and leaned a bit closer to the microphone. “I’m holding here a one-page document purporting to be a will handwritten by Troy Phelan. I will read it straight through:
“ ‘The last testament of Troy L. Phelan. I, Troy L. Phelan, being of sound and disposing mind and memory, do hereby expressly revoke all former wills and codicils executed by me, and dispose of my estate as follows:
“ ‘To my children, Troy Phelan, Jr., Rex Phelan, Libbigail Jeter, Mary Ross Jackman, Geena Strong, and Ramble Phelan, I give each a sum of money necessary to pay off all the debts of each as of today. Any debts incurred after today will not be covered by this gift. If any of these children attempt to contest this will, then this gift shall be nullified as to that child.’ ”
Even Ramble heard the words, and understood them. Geena and Cody started crying softly. Rex leaned forward, elbows on the table, face buried in his hands, his mind numb. Libbigail looked past Bright to Spike and said, “That son of a bitch.” Spike concurred. Mary Ross covered her eyes as her lawyer rubbed her knee. Her husband rubbed the other one. Only Troy Junior managed a poker face, but not for much longer.
There was more damage yet to come. Wycliff wasn’t finished. “ ‘To my ex-wives, Lillian, Janie, and Tira, I give nothing. They were adequately provided for in the divorces.’ ”
At that moment, Lillian, Janie, and Tira were wondering what the hell they were doing in the courtroom. Had they really expected to receive more cash from a man they hated? They felt the stares and tried to hide among their lawyers.
The reporters and journalists were downright giddy. They wanted to take notes, but they were afraid of missing a single word. Some couldn’t help but grin.
“ ‘The remainder of my estate I give to my daughter Rachel Lane, born on November 2, 1954, at Catholic Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana, to a woman named Evelyn Cunningham, now deceased.’ ”
Wycliff paused, though not for dramatic effect. With only two small paragraphs left, the damage was done. The eleven billion had been given to an illegitimate heir he’d not read about. The Phelans sitting before him had been stripped. He couldn’t help but look at them.
“ ‘I appoint my trusted lawyer, Joshua Stafford, as executor of this will, and grant unto him broad discretionary powers in its administration.’ ”
For the moment they had forgotten about Josh. But there he sat, in the box like the innocent witness of a car wreck, and they glared at him with as much hatred as possible. How much had he known? Was he a conspirator? No doubt he could’ve done something to prevent this.
Josh fought to keep a straight face.
“ ‘This document is intended to be a holographic will. Every word has been written by my hand, and I hereby sign it.’ ” Wycliff lowered it and said, “The testament was signed by Troy L. Phelan at three P.M. on December 9, 1996.”
He laid it down, and looked around the courtroom, the epicenter. The quake was ending and now it was time for the aftershocks. The Phelans sat low in their seats, some rubbing eyes and foreheads, others staring wildly at the walls. For the moment, all twenty-two lawyers were incapable of speech.
The shocks rippled through the rows of spectators, where, oddly, a few smiles could be seen. Ah, it was the media, suddenly anxious to race from the room and start reporting.
Amber sobbed loudly, then caught herself. She’d met Troy only once, and he’d made a crude advance. Her grief was not for the loss of a loved one. Geena cried quietly, as did Mary Ross. Libbigail and Spike chose to curse instead. “Don’t worry,” Bright said, waving them off as if he could remedy this injustice in a matter of days.
Biff glared at Troy Junior, and the seeds of a divorce were planted. Since the suicide, he’d been especially arrogant and condescending to her. She’d tolerated it for obvious reasons, but no longer. She relished the first fight, one that would no doubt begin just a few feet outside the courtroom doors.
Other seeds were planted. For the thick-skinned lawyers, the surprise was received, absorbed, then shaken off as instinctively as a duck shakes off water. They were about to get rich. Their clients were heavily in debt with no relief in sight. They had no choice but to contest the will. Litigation would rage for years.
“When do you anticipate probating the will?” Wycliff asked Josh.
“Within a week.”
“Very well. You may step down.”
Josh returned to his seat, triumphant, as the lawyers began shuffling papers and pretending everything was fine.
“We are adjourned.”
NINETEEN
_____________
THERE WERE three fights in the hallway after adjournment. Fortunately, none involved Phelans fighting Phelans. Those would come later.
A mob of reporters waited outside the courtroom doors as the Phelans were consoled inside by their lawyers. Troy Junior was the first to exit, and he was immediately surrounded by a pack of wolves, several with microphones in the attack position. He was hungover to begin with, and now that he was half a billion dollars poorer he was in no mood to talk about his father.
“Are you surprised?” some idiot asked, from behind a microphone.
“Damned right,” he said, trying to walk through the group.
“Who is Rachel Lane?” asked another.
“I guess she’s my sister,” he snapped.
A skinny little boy with stupid eyes and a bad complexion stopped directly in front of him, thrust a tape recorder in his face, and asked, “How many illegitimate children did your father have?”
Troy Junior instinctively shoved the tape recorder back at him. It landed sharply just above his nose, and as he fell back Troy Junior launched a wild left hook that popped him in the ear and knocked him down. In the commotion, a deputy pushed Troy Junior in another direction and they made a quick escape.
Ramble spit on another reporter, who had to be restrained by a colleague who reminded him the kid was underage.
The third skirmish happened when Libbigail and Spike lumbered out of the courtroom behind Wally Bright. “No comment!” Bright yelled at the horde closing ranks around them. “No comment! Please get out of the way!”
Libbigail, who was crying, tripped over a TV cable and tumbled into a reporter, who also fell. There were shouts and curses, and as the reporter was on all fours and getting to his feet, Spike kicked him in the ribs. He squealed and fell flat again, and as he was thrashing about trying to get up, his foot caught the edge of Libbigail’s dress, and she slapped him for good measure.
Spike was about to slaughter him when a deputy intervened.
Deputies broke up each fight, always siding with the Phelans over the reporters. They helped rush the beleaguered heirs and their lawyers down the stairs, through the lobby, and out of the building.
Lawyer Grit, who represented Mary Ross Phelan Jackman, was overcome by the sight of so many reporters. The First Amendment seized him, or at least his own rudimentary understanding of it, and he felt compelled to speak freely. With his arm around his distraught client, he grimly offered their reaction to the surprise will. It was obviously the work of a demented man. How else could you explain the passing of such a great fortune to an unknown heir? His client adored her father, loved him deeply, worshiped him, and as Grit babbled on and on about the incredible love between father and daughter, Mary Ross finally took the hint and began crying. Grit himself appeared on the verge of tears. Yes, they would fight. They would battle this grave injustice to the U.S. Supreme Court. Why? Because this was not the work of the Troy Phelan they knew. Bless his heart. He loved his children, and they loved him. Theirs was an incredible bond, forged through tragedy and hardship. They would fight because their beloved father was not himself when he scribbled this ghastly document.
Josh Stafford was in no hurry to leave. He spoke quietly to Hark Gettys and some of the attorneys from the other tables. He promised to send them copies of the hideous will. Things were initially cordial but hostilities were growing by the minute. A reporter he knew from the Post was waiting in the hall, and Josh spent ten minutes with him while saying nothing. Of particular interest was Rachel Lane; her history and whereabouts. There were lots of questions, but Josh had no answers.
Surely Nate would find her before anyone else.
________
THE STORY grew. It shot from the courthouse on the waves of the latest telecommunications gadgets and hi-tech hardware. The reporters scrambled with cell phones and laptops and pagers, talking without thinking.
The major wires began running the news twenty minutes after adjournment, and an hour later the first round-the-clock news-gab-a-thon broke into its running series of repetitive stories to go live to a reporter in front of a camera outside the courthouse. “Stunning news here …” she began and then told the story, getting most of it right.
Seated in the rear of the courtroom was Pat Solomon, the last person selected by Troy to run The Phelan Group. He’d been CEO for six years, six very uneventful and very profitable years.
He left the courthouse without being recognized by any reporter. As he rode away, in the back of his limo, Solomon attempted to analyze Troy’s last bombshell. He was not shocked by it. After working for Troy for twenty years nothing surprised him. The reaction of his idiot children and their lawyers was comforting. Solomon had once been assigned the impossible task of finding within the company a job that Troy Junior could perform without causing a dip in quarterly profits. It had been a nightmare. Spoiled, immature, badly educated, and lacking basic management skills, Troy Junior had run roughshod through an entire division in Minerals before Solomon was given the green light from above to sack him.
A few years later, a similar episode involved Rex and his pursuit of his father’s approval and money. In the end, Rex had gone to Troy in an effort to remove Solomon.
The wives and other children had butted in for years, but Troy had held fast. His private life was a fiasco, but nothing hampered his beloved company.
Solomon and Troy had never been close. In fact, no one, perhaps with the exception of Josh Stafford, had ever managed to become a confidant. The parade of blondes had shared the obvious intimacies, but Troy had no friends. And as he withdrew and declined both physically and mentally, those who ran the company sometimes whispered about its ownership. Surely Troy would not leave it to his children.
He hadn’t, at least not the usual suspects.
The board was waiting, on the fourteenth floor, in the same conference room where Troy had produced his testament, then taken flight. Solomon described the scene in the courtroom, and his colorful narrative became humorous. Thoughts of the heirs gaining control had caused great discomfort among the board. Troy Junior had let it be known that he and his siblings had the votes to seize a majority, and that he planned to clean house and show some real profits.
They wanted to know about Janie, wife number two. She’d worked for the company as a secretary until her promotion to mistress, then to wife, and after reaching the top she had been particularly abusive to many of the employees. Troy banned her from the corporate headquarters.
“When she left she was crying,” Solomon said happily.
“And Rex?” asked a director, the chief financial officer who had once been fired by Rex in an elevator.
“Not a happy boy. He’s under investigation, you know.”
They talked about most of the children and all of the wives, and the meeting grew festive.
“I counted twenty-two lawyers,” Solomon said with a smile. “Talk about a sad bunch.”
Since it was an informal board meeting, Josh’s absence was of no consequence. The head of Legal declared the will to be a stroke of great luck after all. They had to worry about only one unknown heir, as opposed to six idiots.
“Any idea where this woman is?”
“None,” answered Solomon. “Maybe Josh knows.”
________
BY LATE afternoon, Josh had been forced from his office and had retreated to a small library in the basement of his building. His secretary stopped counting phone messages at a hundred and twenty. The lobby off the main entrance had been crammed with reporters since late morning. He’d left behind strict instructions with his secretaries that no one should disturb him for an hour. So the knock on the door was especially aggravating.
“Who is it?” he shot at the door.
“It’s an emergency, sir,” answered a secretary.
“Come in.”
Her head entered just far enough to look him in the face and say, “It’s Mr. O’Riley.” Josh stopped rubbing his temples and actually smiled. He glanced around the room and remembered there were no phones. She took two steps and placed a portable on the table, then disappeared.
“Nate,” he said into the receiver.
“That you, Josh?” came the reply. The volume was fine but the words were a little scratchy. The reception was better than most car phones.
“Yes, can you hear me, Nate?”
“Yes.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m on the satellite, on the back of my little yacht, floating down the Paraguay River. Can you hear me?”
“Yes, fine. Are you okay, Nate?”
“I’m wonderful, having a ball, just a little boat trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“Well, the propeller snagged a line of old rope, and the engine choked down. My crew is attempting to unravel it. I’m supervising.”
“You sound great.”
“It’s an adventure, right, Josh?”
“Of course. Any sign of the girl?”
“Not a chance. We’re a couple of days away at best, and now we’re floating backward. I’m not sure we’ll ever get there.”
“You have to, Nate. We read the will this morning in open court. The whole world will soon be looking for Rachel Lane.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that. She’s safe.”
“I wish I were with you.”
The edge of a cloud nipped the signal. “What did you say?” Nate asked, louder.
“Nothing. So you’ll see her in a couple of days, huh?”
“If we’re lucky. The boat runs around the clock, but we’re going upriver, and it’s the rainy season so the rivers are full and the currents are strong. Plus, we’re not exactly sure where we’re going. Two days is very optimistic, assuming we get the damned propeller fixed.”
“So the weather’s bad,” Josh said, almost at random. There wasn’t much to discuss. Nate was alive and well and moving in th
e general direction of the target.
“It’s hot as hell and it rains five times a day. Other than that it’s lovely.”
“Any snakes?”
“A couple. Anacondas longer than the boat. Lots of alligators. Rats as big as dogs. They call them capivaras. They live at the edge of the rivers among the alligators, and when these people get hungry enough they kill them and eat them.”
“But you have plenty of food?”
“Oh yes. Our cargo is black beans and rice. Welly cooks them for me three times a day.”
Nate’s voice was sharp and filled with adventure.
“Who’s Welly?”
“My deckhand. Right now he’s under the boat in twelve feet of water, holding his breath and cutting rope from the prop. Like I said, I’m supervising.”
“Stay out of the water, Nate.”
“Are you kidding? I’m on the upper deck. Look, I gotta run. I’m using juice and I haven’t found a way to recharge these batteries.”
“When will you call again?”
“I’ll try and wait until after I find Rachel Lane.”
“Good idea. But call if you have trouble.”
“Trouble? Why would I call you, Josh? There’s not a damned thing in the world you can do.”
“You’re right. Don’t call.”
TWENTY
_____________
THE STORM hit at dusk, as Welly was boiling rice in the kitchen and Jevy was watching the river grow dark. The wind woke Nate, a sudden howling blast that shook the hammock and snapped him to his feet. Thunder and lightning followed. He walked to Jevy’s side and looked north into a vast blackness. “A big storm,” Jevy said, seemingly indifferent.
Shouldn’t we park this thing? Nate thought. At least find shallow water? Jevy didn’t appear concerned; his nonchalance was somewhat comforting. When the rain started, Nate went below for his rice and beans. He ate in silence with Welly in the corner of the cabin. The bulb above them swayed as the wind rocked the boat. Heavy raindrops battered the windows.
On the bridge, Jevy put on a yellow poncho stained with grease and fought the rain hitting him sharply in the face. The tiny wheelhouse had no windows. The two floodlights attempted to show the way through the darkness, but revealed no more than fifty feet of churning water in front of them. Jevy knew the river well, and he’d been through worse storms.
Reading was difficult with the boat swaying and rolling. After a few minutes of it, Nate felt sick. In his bag he found a knee-length poncho with a hood. Josh had thought of everything. Clutching the railings, he slowly made his way up the stairs where Welly sat huddled next to the wheelhouse, drenched.
The river bent to the east, toward the heart of the Pantanal, and when they turned, the wind caught them broadside. The boat rocked and threw Nate and Welly hard into the railings. Jevy braced himself with the door of the wheelhouse, his thick arms holding himself in place and maintaining control.
The gusts became relentless, one after the other, only seconds apart, and the Santa Loura stopped moving upstream. The storm shoved it toward shore. The rain pellets were hard and cold now, and poured down upon them in sheets. Jevy found a long flashlight in a box beside the wheel, and gave it to Welly.
“Find the bank!” he yelled, his voice struggling over the howling wind and heavy rain.
Nate grappled along the railings to a spot next to Welly because he too wanted to see where they might be headed. But the beam caught nothing but rain, rain so thick it looked like fog swirling above the water.
Then lightning came to their aid. A flash, and they saw the dense black growth of the riverbank not far away. The wind was pushing them toward it. Welly shouted and Jevy yelled something back just as another gust slammed into the boat and tipped it violently to its starboard side. The sudden jolt knocked the flashlight out of Welly’s hand and they watched it disappear into the water.
Crouched on the walkway, clutching the railing, soaked and shivering, it occurred to Nate that one of two things was about to happen. And neither was within their control. First, the boat was going to capsize. If it didn’t, then