all ready for you, but — ” Her voice cracked, but then, with a visible effort, she pulled herself back together. “It hasn’t been the easiest day for any of us, has it?”
“If you’d like to do this another day — ” Trip began, but Joan shook her head.
“I don’t think there’s any point in putting it off, is there?” she sighed. “Matt and my mother are in the den.” Suddenly, she looked uncertain. “Should they be part of this?”
“Actually, I’d like Matt to be there,” Wainwright replied. “As for your mother,” he went on, shrugging, “that’s really up to you.” He hesitated, then: “How is she today?”
Joan’s hands spread helplessly. “Right now she seems almost like herself. But this morning — ” She shook her head, shuddering. “You don’t want to know. I keep thinking that Bill was right, that I should have found someplace for her.”
The lawyer shook his head. “She’s your mother. If it had been Eloise Hapgood, Bill never would have heard of her being put anywhere. He would have hired whatever staff she needed, and she would have stayed right here, where she belonged.”
“That’s what I keep trying to tell myself,” Joan said as they moved into the den. Emily Moore, a shawl wrapped around her knees, was almost lost in a corner of the sofa in front of the fireplace. Matt, his face pale and his eyes anxious, stood next to the big globe that was suspended in a mahogany stand. He seemed unaware that he was nervously spinning it.
“Are you here to see Cynthia?” Emily Moore asked, peering up at Wainwright. “Call your sister, Joan.”
Before Joan could speak, Wainwright took Emily Moore’s hand. “I’m here to see you,” he said. “And Joan and Matt too.”
The words seemed to mollify the old woman, and she relaxed back onto the sofa. For the next fifteen minutes the lawyer went over the terms of the will. “Basically, it’s a trust,” he explained to Joan. “In the short term, you’re in charge. You’re the sole trustee, with very broad powers. You can liquidate anything you want, including the business, but in the end, Matt inherits.”
Matt’s eyes widened. “Me?”
Trip Wainwright had been deliberately watching Matt as he uttered the last two words, and he was sure the surprise in the boy’s face — and his voice — was genuine.
“Why would Dad have done that?” he asked. “Why didn’t he leave everything to Mom?”
“He said he wanted to make certain you knew he didn’t think of you as a stepchild,” Wainwright replied. “When he had me draw up the papers, he told me it was his way of letting you know he truly thought of you as his son.” Matt’s eyes glistened, and Wainwright could see him struggling to control his emotions.
When Matt finally spoke, his voice was barely audible. “Everybody thinks — ” he began, then fell silent, unable to finish.
“What everybody thinks doesn’t matter,” Wainwright said. His eyes shifted to Joan, and his voice dropped. “I’ve been talking to Dan Pullman,” he said. “They think they’ve found the casings of the bullets Matt fired. There are three of them, and they’re the right caliber. It’ll take a lab to match them to Matt’s rifle, but I suspect that will happen.”
Joan’s eyes widened, and the color drained from Matt’s face. “Are they going to arrest — ” Joan began, but Wainwright quickly shook his head.
“Of course not. They haven’t found the bullet that killed Bill, and I suspect that if they haven’t found it yet, they’re not going to. But even if they find it, it doesn’t mean anything. Matt was shooting at the deer, not at Bill. There was no way Matt even could have seen him — not through that thicket.”
“But everyone thinks I did it on purpose,” Matt whispered.
Wainwright’s voice hardened. “It doesn’t matter a whit what people think, Matt. The only thing that matters is what they can prove. And at this point, there’s no way they can prove you even shot him, let alone shot him on purpose. Dan Pullman says that even if he finds the bullet and can prove it came from your gun, he doesn’t think anyone would charge you. Not unless they want to go back and charge everyone who’s accidentally shot someone during hunting season.”
Suddenly, Emily Moore spoke again. “It wasn’t an accident,” she said, her voice crackling as she peered at Trip Wainwright.
The lawyer frowned, his eyes fixing on the old woman. “I beg your pardon, Mrs. Moore?”
“I said it wasn’t an accident,” Emily piped. Her flinty eyes darted toward her grandson. “He did it on purpose.”
“Mother, how can you say that?” Joan protested.
“Because it’s true,” the old woman insisted. “Cynthia told me. She told me exactly what happened.”
Trip Wainwright felt the tension drain out of his body as quickly as the old woman’s accusation had brought it, and his gaze shifted sympathetically to Joan. “If there’s anything I can do…” he said, and deliberately let his voice trail off.
Reading his meaning perfectly, Joan shook her head. But as she walked him to the front door a few moments later, she sighed. “I wish I knew what to do,” she admitted. “I’m not sure how much longer I can keep her here.”
“If you need help…” Wainwright offered again, and this time Joan smiled at him.
“If I need help, I’ll call you,” she promised him.
As she started to close the door behind the lawyer, they both heard Emily’s voice rising. “He never loved you,” the old woman raved. “The only person he ever loved was your aunt! Don’t you understand? It was Cynthia he loved! Not you, and certainly not your mother!”
Taking a deep breath, Joan quickly closed the door behind Trip Wainwright and hurried back to the den.
Her mother still sat in the corner of the sofa.
Matt was gone.
* * *
The voice was barely a whisper, no more than a breeze that might be drifting through the open window, but still Emily Moore stirred restlessly in her bed and her clawlike fingers tugged at the sheet as if to shield herself from a draft.
The voice was louder now, as if the breeze had strengthened.
Emily’s lips worked, and an unintelligible sound escaped her lips. Once again she stirred, turning from her side onto her back. Her right arm rose up, as if to fend off a mosquito.
This time the voice cracked like a whip, jerking Emily from her restless slumber into instant wakefulness. Her whole body convulsed, and a cry of pain burst from her throat as the arthritis in her joints protested against the sudden movement.
But even though she was wide-awake, her mind was still fogged with age and her disease, and for a few moments she couldn’t quite remember where she was. Then, slowly, it started coming back to her.
Joan’s house.
She was in Joan’s house, in her room, in bed. But what had awakened her? She strained her ears, but heard nothing; the silence of the night was almost complete. Yet even in the silence, there was the faintest echo of a memory.
A memory of a voice.
A voice calling out to her.
Her heart fluttered, and once more she strained her ears.
Still hearing nothing, she left her bed, slipped her feet into her slippers, and shuffled slowly toward the window, steadying herself first on the bed, then on a chair, and finally on the table that stood in front of the window. She gazed out into the night, but age and the darkness hid anything that might be outside.
Emily’s breath caught as she heard the word. There was no mistaking it this time — she would know her
