A Comedy of Heirs
Authors: Rett MacPherson
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Contents
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This book is dedicated to
my husband, Joe Lange.
For reasons beyond words.
The author wishes to acknowledge the people who helped bring this book to publication.
First of all, my editor, Kelley Ragland: I am most grateful for the fact that she always makes the final version of my manuscripts better than the first.
My writers group, the Alternate Historians: Tom Drennan, N. L. Drew, Gus Elliott, Laurell K. Hamilton, Debbie Millitello, Marella Sands, Mark (MC) Sumner, and Sharon Shinn. Thank you not just for professional advice but for all of the personal friendships, each one unique, that have developed among us.
Thank you to my husband, for all the times that I said, “Honey, can youâ¦?” and he, without hesitating, said, “Certainly.” Deadlines are a sure test of a marriage.
And the following people who really did a lot for me in 1998: The couple whose organizational skills have saved me more than once, Suzi and Matt Seeker. Jackie, Nickole, and Andrea, for their beautiful singing voices. Bekah and Ellie for smiling at me when I needed it. Joe Weir and Matt Steins, for their hard work on my Web page.
And last but not least, to all those twentysomething cousins of mine. Although the characters in this book are all creations from my imagination, the property on which the murder takes place is based on my grandparents' old farm. And even though the characters are not based on anybody real, thank you to my family for providing me with anecdotes and inspiration. You made my childhood rich.
December in New Kassel is the greatest. I walked along Jefferson Street on my way to the Gaheimer House. The handmade dresses that I give the tours in were on hangers, draped over my shoulders. All seven of them. I tried desperately to keep them from dragging on the ground, but when you're short that's an impossible task. My wrist ached from the strain on it and I tried not to slip on the icy sidewalk.
It hadn't snowed yet. Used to be when I was a kid we got our first snow before Thanksgiving. Now, I can't remember the last time it snowed before December. It rained last night, though, and little patches of ice had frozen to the low spots on the sidewalk.
All the homes and shops were decorated for Christmas as if there might never be a Christmas again. Some of it was really tacky plastic stuff, but some, like the Gaheimer House, were decorated as authentically as possible with live greenery, candles and antiques. I passed by the lace shop with its red lights strung through the low front window and the big green sign that said
CHRISTMAS SALE
.
The next building was the Gaheimer House, my point of destination and the place where I am employed. I stopped on the step and looked up at the sky. It was gray-white and heavy as if it were just waiting to dump ten feet of snow on Missouri. I took a deep, cleansing breath. Yup, there was snow in those clouds, I could smell it. People laugh at me when I tell them I can smell snow. I can smell rain, too. I smiled and entered the Gaheimer House with that peculiar contentment that I get when I am reminded how much I love winter and how happy I am with my life.
“Absolutely no!” I heard Sylvia scream.
“You're not God!” I heard a woman yell back.
“God or not, you're not wearing a conventional brassiere with historic costumes!”
I went through the ballroom as quickly as possible to get to my office where all the trouble seemed to be coming from. Wilma Pershing stood in the hallway, in a blue dress with tiny little Santa Claus's printed on it, wringing her hands. She was a nicely plump old woman in her nineties. Her nearly white hair hung down loose, rather than in the braids she usually wore. Her green eyes were wide and worried. “Oh dear,” she said. She covered her mouth and pointed into my office.
I turned the corner and stopped in my office doorway. Sylvia Pershing, Wilma's sister, stood behind my desk in a forest green pantsuit, shaking her finger at Helen Wickland who stood on the other side of the desk. Sylvia's hair was in its usual double braids wrapped around her head with not so much as one loose hair.
“Victory, thank goodness,” Sylvia said when she saw me. Only Sylvia and my mother call me Victory. Everybody else calls me Torie. “Tell Helen she cannot wear a conventional brassiere with the historic costumes. It is abominable.”
“Uh,” I said, standing in the doorway. “Helen, you cannot wear a conventional brassiere with the historic costumes.” The words sort of fell out of my mouth, without any great emotion.
“Thank you,” Sylvia said. She seemed happy that I had sided with her until she got a good look at me. “Get those costumes up! You're dragging the floor with them. I bet you dragged them on the ground outside, didn't you? Do you know how long it takes to make those? Do you know how much money they cost?”
“Which of those questions did you want me to answer first?” I asked.
Sylvia's face turned a purplish color. “Hang them out there on the coat rack,” she said. “No better yet, just give them to me. I'll take them,” she demanded and took the dresses from my hand.
I shook my wrist, trying to get the blood to flow back into it. Sylvia marched out into the hall and Wilma still stood at my doorway, still wringing her hands.
“Good morning, Wilma,” I said. “Your hair looks very pretty.”
She reached up and touched a strand of her hair and blushed. “Why, thank you,” she said, and left.
Helen stared at me from across my desk. Helen was forty-nine and fought turning fifty with every ounce of energy she had. Her frosted hair was cut short, and the frosting was so heavy that you couldn't tell which was gray and which was frosting. I think she did that on purpose. She owned the Lick-a-pot Candy Shoppe down on the corner of Hermann and Jefferson; it was her pride and joy.
“I can't thank you enough, Helen,” I began. I took my brown bomber jacket off and hung it on the coat rack by the door in my office. I was wearing beat-up jeans and my husband's big olive green sweater that hung almost to my knees. It seemed as though I never wore my own clothes if I didn't have to.
Helen just stared at me. I sat down. Helen glared at me from above. “Please, sit down,” I said. Helen had graciously agreed to take over giving my tours here at the Gaheimer House for the upcoming week because I was going on vacation. Being a tour guide for an old house in a historic river town is really a lot of fun. I also compile all of the genealogical data and land records and that sort of thing for the historical society. Sylvia is the president of the historical society and Wilma is the vice-president.
Helen sat down, although it seemed as if it were against her will. “I'm going to kill her,” she stated. “I'm going to kill her and then I'm going to go to jail.”
“She's really not that bad,” I said. “You were referring to Sylvia, I presume.”
“Who on God's green earth do you think I was talking about?”
“Oh,” I said. I smiled a big wide, fake smile. “Just pretend she's Wilma.”
Helen did not find me amusing. “Why do you have to take a week's vacation in December?” she asked. “Why do you have to take a vacation at all? Ever?”
“My dad's family gets together every December. Every year, somebody sets aside their house and their town for a whole week and all week long aunts, uncles, cousins and whoever come to visit. There are activities and stuff, like caroling, and of course the big dinner. Everybody tries to make it to the big dinner.”
Helen rolled her eyes.
“It's my turn to host it,” I said. “Actually, it's my dad's but you don't want him hosting something like this, or all they'd get is coffee, cigarettes, and pork rinds. So, I'm hosting it for him.”
“You sure you can't work and host this thing?” Helen asked, obviously still miffed at Sylvia. “She's gonna be on my case all week.”
“If I want to keep my sanity, I need to be free from work to host this thing,” I said. “Some of my family have really loose screws.”
“I'm going to kill her and then God's going to be mad at me,” Helen said. “And I think He was just starting to forgive me over the Woodstock thing.”
I laughed and tried to hide it as quickly as possible.
“Well, you're about ten pounds heavier and three inches shorter than me,” Helen stated, changing the subject.
“Gee thanks, Helen,” I said.
“I'm just saying that I think the costumes will fit, but I may have to let the hems down,” Helen said.
“Don't you even think about touching those costumes!” Sylvia yelled from the hallway as she was passing by. “Except to put them on!”
Helen and I looked at each other. Talk about Big Brother. We had Big Sylvia and that seemed to be far worse. “How does she do that?” Helen asked.
“I don't know,” I said.
Sylvia came to the door of my office. “You got a package over there on the computer table,” Sylvia said. “There's no return address.”
“Oh, thank you,” I said and got up to go get it.
“And need I remind you of what your family did to this town back in 1991, at the last Christmas reunion you hosted?” Sylvia asked.
“I was young then,” I said, trying to come up with whatever excuse I could to plead my innocence to Sylvia. I sat back down at my desk with the manila envelope that was addressed to me clutched in my hands.
Wilma walked by the office, smiling and carrying a white poinsettia. Sylvia saw her and raised an eyebrow. “What are you doing with your hair down?” she asked and headed in the direction that Wilma had gone. “A woman of your age should never have her hair down.” Her voice trailed off as she went farther down the hall, berating her sister over her loose hair. I wondered if there was ever a day in their lives that Sylvia hadn't berated Wilma over something.
“Really, Helen, I can't thank you enough,” I said. “I really really appreciate this. You will never know.”
Helen just stared at me.
“I'd offer you my firstborn, but I already promised her to Sylvia for putting the soda machine in. I hate to make you settle for second, but I only have one other childâ”
“I'll take her,” Helen said and laughed. The laughter told me that she would do the tours for me and she would forgive me for it.