Fixing To Die

CHAPTER 9

An’gel stared at the retreating backs of Serenity Foster and her lawyer. If she had been Mary Turner, she would have not-so-politely shown the two of them the door, custody battle or no custody battle.

Dickce’s elbow dug into her side. “Did you hear that?”

An’gel regarded her sister with a frown. “The threat, you mean? Yes, I heard it. What of it?”

“Doesn’t it worry you a little?” Dickce asked. “The last thing we need is to be involved in another murder.”

An’gel resisted the temptation to roll her eyes at Dickce. “I seriously doubt that petulant young woman is going to do anything of the kind. Don’t let your imagination run away with you, Sister.”

“We’ll see.” Dickce shook her head. “I’m getting a bad feeling about all this.”

“That’s probably the extra piece of carrot cake you ate at lunch.” An’gel was in no mood to deal with Dickce’s feelings. She had them far too often, and most of the time they were wrong. Just figments of Dickce’s frequently overactive imagination.

“Do you have any idea, Sister, how often I long to slap your smug face?” Dickce looked annoyed.

An’gel paid no attention to this little sally. She badly wanted to talk to Mary Turner in private, but at the moment she didn’t see much hope of that. Mary Turner would be bound to engage in conversation with her cousin and her lawyer. She certainly wouldn’t leave them alone in the parlor if she were their hostess, and not necessarily because of good manners. That lawyer looked more than a little seedy to her.

Mary Turner returned pushing a tea cart. She paused a moment to speak to An’gel and Dickce. “I’m so sorry about all this,” she said. “I’m sure you don’t want to have anything to do with this mess, but would you come in with me? I have a hard time dealing with Serenity.”

“Certainly, my dear,” An’gel said. “You shouldn’t have to face this by yourself. Where is Henry Howard?” She thought it odd that he wasn’t here during a situation of this kind, when his wife obviously needed support.

Mary Turner frowned. “He’s gone into town to the library to do some research, and then he’s meeting later on with his critique group.”

“I didn’t know he was a writer,” Dickce said.

“Yes,” Mary Turner replied. “He’s been working on an epic fantasy novel for several years now.”

“I hope he’s successful with it,” Dickce said. “I mostly read mysteries and nonfiction, but I’d read his fantasy novel since I know him.”

“He really wants to be able to write full-time,” Mary Turner said, “but of course, we can’t afford for him to. I can’t run this place by myself, and we don’t have the money to hire someone full-time to do all the things he does. If he ever manages to sell this thing and it takes off, well, that would be different.” She shrugged. “I’d better take this into my guests before the coffee gets cold.”

“Of course,” An’gel said. “We’ll be right behind you.”

Mary Turner resumed her progress with the tea cart, and the sisters followed. When An’gel entered the room, she caught a glimpse of Serenity Foster and Wilbanks, apparently oblivious to the fact that they had company, engaged in making out on one of the sofas. An’gel cleared her throat loudly, and the two sprang apart. Wilbanks got hastily to his feet, his face red.

“Here’s the coffee,” Mary Turner said. “Plus some of Marcelline’s wonderful oatmeal raisin cookies.” She placed the cart near the end of the sofa where Serenity Foster still sat.

She didn’t look in the least embarrassed at having been caught in a clinch, An’gel thought. At least the lawyer had the grace to look abashed. Girls these days simply had no sense of proper behavior. Carrying on like that with a man who looked to be old enough to be her father, or almost. And her lawyer to boot. An’gel’s opinion of the girl, not high to begin with, sank even lower.

While she and Dickce found seats on the other sofa, facing Serenity Foster and Wilbanks, Mary Turner served the coffee as if she had not observed the behavior of her two most recent guests. After passing around plates and then the cookies, Mary Turner took a seat in a chair placed perpendicular to the sofas.

“Did Nathan give you any idea of what time he planned to arrive here?” Mary Turner took a sip of her coffee while she waited for an answer.

Serenity Foster put down the cookie she had been about to sample and frowned at her cousin. “Not exactly,” she said. “He said midafternoon, but the way he keeps track of time, who knows? Could be ten o’clock tonight before he shows up.”

Mary Turner did not reply to this, and a brief silence ensued. Wilbanks ended it. “These are great cookies,” he said. “I’d forgotten how good a cook Marcelline is.”

“I’ll be sure to tell her that,” Mary Turner said. “Tell me, Truss, when did you become Serenity’s lawyer? I didn’t realize you two knew each other.”

“A couple of months ago,” he said. “Actually we’ve known each other for several years, but only recently did Serenity ask me to take over her case. Her previous attorney couldn’t seem to make any headway on the custody issue, and she thought a fresh approach might make a difference.”

An’gel followed the conversation with interest, and she knew Dickce was an intrigued as she was. Wilbanks had a smooth manner, and he had an excellent voice, though roughened by his smoking. She could imagine him addressing a jury or a judge. She did wonder how successful he was, however, because the suit he had on looked at least ten years old and rather worn in places, like the cuffs of the jacket. There appeared to be a button missing from one sleeve as well.

Or maybe he spends all his money on liquor and cigars, she thought.

“I hope you’ll be able to help her,” Mary Turner said. “I can only imagine how you must feel, Serenity, not being able to see the children as much as you’d like.”

“It’s horrible,” Serenity responded. “That jerk is doing his best to turn them against me.” She stared at An’gel and Dickce. “Don’t you think that’s a terrible thing to do to a mother?”

Depends on the mother, An’gel thought but did not express this aloud. Instead she said, “I’m sure it must be trying for you.”

“Yes, it must be,” Dickce said.

“My brother knows all this, and he’s too cheap to help me out.” Serenity stuffed half a cookie into her mouth and chewed. She hadn’t quite finished it when she spoke again. “He keeps going on about depleting my capital and crap like that, when I know there’s more than enough money for me to pay what I owe on the mortgage if only he’d turn loose some of it.”

An’gel did not care to see people talking while they chewed their food, and she glanced away until Serenity finished speaking. When the words ceased, she looked back again.

Mary Turner said, “For your sake, I hope you can come to some sort of compromise. Would anyone like more coffee?”

Everyone declined, and conversation lagged again. An’gel did not feel impelled to contribute, because she and Dickce didn’t know these people. An’gel remained curious, however, to see whether there was any connection between the Gambles and the goings-on at Cliffwood. The more she and Dickce learned about the family and their claims on the Turner estate, the better.

“I don’t know what Nathan thinks he can accomplish by coming here,” Mary Turner said. “Nothing’s going to change the fact that the alleged will has never turned up. There’s no written documentation, in fact, that the story is true. That’s all it is, a story.”

“A story passed down through several generations, as I understand it,” Wilbanks said. “Isn’t that right?”

Serenity nodded. “Yes, it is, and I don’t care what you say, Mary Turner, it all really happened.”

Mary Turner glanced at An’gel and Dickce. “I know this is confusing for you, because you have no idea what we’re talking about.”

“No, we don’t,” An’gel said, “but we don’t have to know, if you think it’s none of our business.”

“You might as well hear the whole thing,” Mary Turner said. “Once Nathan gets here, that’s all he will talk about. He’s obsessed with it.”

“What is the story that’s been handed down?” Dickce asked.

“It goes all the way back to my fourth great-grandfather.” Mary Turner paused and counted silently on her fingers. “Yes, that’s right, fourth great-grandfather on the Turner side. He was the one who rebuilt Cliffwood after it was destroyed in that fire. Once the house was rebuilt, he and his wife started to refurnish it because they had lost almost everything in the fire. At the time his youngest sister, another Mary, lived here, and she evidently loved everything French. So he imported all the furniture for her room from France and decorated it with mostly French things like those Baccarat vases.”

“So that’s how the French room got its name,” An’gel said. “Now that you’ve told us, I remember your grandmother telling us this story years ago.”

“Yes, that’s it,” Serenity said. “But the important part is that this baby sister of his was my fourth great-grandmother. She married a man from Vicksburg named Jedediah Gamble. Her brother had told her she could take everything in the room with her, but his wife pitched a fit because she was horribly jealous of my great-grandmother. So he backed out on his promise but he swore he would leave it all to her in his will, and if she died before him, to her heirs.”

Mary Turner took up the story once again.

“She lived to be quite old and outlived him, as it turned out, but this will—if it ever existed—never turned up. The will that he did leave made no mention of any legacy to his sister. He hadn’t wanted her to marry Jedediah Gamble.” She stared hard at Serenity. “You left out that part.”

“Because it doesn’t really matter,” Serenity said.

“Why did your great-grandfather not want his sister to marry Mr. Gamble?” Dickce asked. “Was he a poor man?”

“No, he was not,” Serenity said. “His family lost a lot during the war, like most people did, but he was smart and ended up restoring the family’s wealth before he married my great-grandmother.”

“Then what was the issue about the marriage?” An’gel asked. “Is it really pertinent to the story?”

“Yes,” Mary Turner said. “I think it explains why there was no will leaving the contents of the French room to my four times great-aunt. I know this will probably sound ridiculous to you, but it was because he was from Vicksburg. After the war, there was a lot of dissension between the people of Natchez and the people of Vicksburg.”

“Whatever for?” An’gel asked. “I suppose it had something to do with the war.”

“It sure did,” Serenity said, her tone becoming increasingly heated as she talked. “The people of Vicksburg stood up to the Union Army. They refused to give in, but the traitors in Natchez let them in. They didn’t want anyone to hurt their precious houses.”

“Seriously?” Dickce asked.

“I’m afraid so,” Mary Turner replied. “Families, particularly in Vicksburg, refused to have anything to do with their relations in Natchez for years afterwards. There was a tremendous amount of resentment. Naturally, people in Natchez didn’t like the attitudes of the people in Vicksburg.” She paused for a moment. “Supposedly, Jedediah Gamble had been pretty outspoken about all this because his family lost their home while Cliffwood wasn’t really harmed. But he fell in love with Great-Aunt Mary and was determined to have her.”

“If I understand all this correctly,” An’gel said, “the reason that your great-grandfather didn’t leave his sister the contents of the room in his will is because he disliked his brother-in-law so much, he didn’t want even his sister’s children to have it.”

“Basically, that’s it,” Mary Turner said. “And that’s why the Turners are sure there never was a will leaving anything to Great-Aunt Mary.”

A voice from the doorway startled them all. “That’s a damn filthy lie, and you know it.”