A Comedy of Heirs Read Free Page B

front porch dead. She was unaware that the gunfire had been that close and that anybody was on her front porch.
    That totally undid the first article, which said the family was “trapped inside.” Strange, though, that the journalist did not mention that.
    Goosebumps traveled down my arms and back. How could this be? My great-grandpa Keith died in a hunting accident. Everybody knew that.
    I took a sip of my tea and tried to remember how I knew that. I received Nathaniel Keith’s death certificate back in the eighties. The cause of death said gunshot wound. I remember that clearly because for a moment I was stunned. Who did I call? Who had I called the first time and asked how Great-Grandpa Keith died?
    Who had told me the lie?
    It wasn’t my father, although I do know that I discussed this “hunting accident” with more than one person in the family and with my father on occasion. I think it was Aunt Ruth that I called first and she had said, yes, he died of a gunshot wound during a hunting accident. I never questioned her story. Why would I? She was my aunt. I never expected her to lie to me. It never occurred to me that the man was murdered and that she’d need to lie to me. But why would she need to lie to me? Why the secrecy? Why hadn’t this information been part of our family folklore? Why had all my aunts and uncles, and my father included, gone along with her story?
    I couldn’t help but wonder, sitting there in my favorite restaurant, did Aunt Ruth actually lie to me or was this what she was told too? She would have been twenty-four years old when this happened. Was it possible that she didn’t know the truth?
    I drank the last of my tea and browsed through the other articles. The last one said that six months later the case was closed unsolved.
    This was not possible. Maybe somebody was playing a really ugly prank. I would, first chance, go and look at the original newspapers. There was always the chance that for whatever sick reason I couldn’t even dream of coming up with, somebody made these up to look real. That had to be what it was, even though any logical reason escaped me. I didn’t have enemies. Not like this anyway. Eleanore Murdoch liked to get the best of me whenever she could, but she wouldn’t stoop to something like this. The coincidence of the timing of this “present” did not escape me. My dad’s entire family would be here sometime this week.
    I scrounged around in my change purse for a couple of bucks in change and set it on the table next to the salt and pepper shakers.
    I sat there for a minute unable to move. If these articles were real, this was a betrayal unlike any I had ever known. To suddenly realize that I’d been lied to by the people I loved and trusted was too much to comprehend. Maybe they figured that it was none of my business, and who’s to say they aren’t correct, but to out and out lie to me when I asked how the man died?
    First I would find out if the articles were genuine and then I’d ask my father about it. Maybe I’d ask my mother what to do, since my father could get really riled up about things. I looked at my watch. Three-fifteen. Rachel and Mary would be home in about fifteen minutes. I got up and left Fräulein Krista’s with the manila envelope clutched to my breast.

Three
    About thirty people wandered in and out of the rooms of my house. It was Monday, the official kick-off day, and the people who were here today would help me decorate our Christmas tree. Just as soon as Uncle Jed, my father and Uncle Melvin got back with the Christmas tree. Poor Rudy couldn’t go with them to chop down a tree because he was outside braving the cold, barbecuing.
    Rachel sat in a green velvet dress on the corner of the piano bench separating the red Christmas bulbs from the blue ones. She felt that this was important. She looked up at me and smiled automatically, changing the features on her