Free War and Peas by Jill Churchill

incompetent."
    “But he didn't succeed." Jane had never even met Daisy Snellen, but was appalled nevertheless.
    “Of course not. Jumper, who was already working for Daisy, really did a number on him. Let him get clear into a court hearing and showed Caspar up as a greedy fool. Not that it was hard. Caspar's so stupid, really. I'm trying to remember some of the things. .”
    She frowned into the now scummy, cold coffee cup and suddenly grinned. "Oh, yes. My favorite! Caspar's stooge took a photo of Daisy with her hair tied up in rags. Now, I'll admit a woman who curls her hair that old-fashioned way looks pretty crazy — like those medieval monarchs who went mad and stuck straws in their hair. Wild bits sticking out every which way, you know. But when Caspar's sleazy attorney produced this picture with a flourish, Jumper calmly supplied a copy of a ladies' magazine from the 1920s that Regina had found that illustrated how to tie up your hair in rags. And, by sheer good luck, the judge said he remembered his own grandmother looking like that every Saturday night so she'd have curly hair for church on Sunday.”
    Babs laughed like a schoolgirl for a second, then turned serious again. "Daisy treasured the memory of that moment, but was humiliated by the whole experience. Humiliated and deeply hurt."
    “She must have been," Jane said. "How awful for her. Where was Georgia during all this incompetency thing?"
    “Hiding. Trying to pretend she knew nothing about it so she could ally herself with whoever won. That evening, after the judge had thrown Caspar out of court and given him a verbal drubbing, Georgia turned up with flowers and candy to congratulate Daisy — as if Daisy really
were
too dotty to notice what Georgia was about. Her behavior really made Daisy even more angry.”
    Babs got up and poured the coffee into the little sink in a corner of the room, rinsed out the cup, and tossed it in the trash. "After that," she said as she came back to the table, "Daisy changed her will. Originally she'd left a third to the museum and a third each to Caspar and Georgia. She altered it to give each of them a million dollars, which she felt was generous enough to satisfy her obligation to the Snellen name, and the rest to the museum. She said, and I believe she was quite right, that they were going to come to bad ends anyway, and the more money they had, the sooner it would happen. So Caspar — who's never been able to admit that he was at fault for anything — decided that Regina had 'conned' Daisy into rewriting the will. He's spent the last two years getting one ambulance chaser after another to contest the will. I imagine he's already gone through all the money he did receive and—”
    The door opened rather suddenly and a biker strode into the room.
    Shelley and Jane drew back in alarm. The man had on a tie-dyed T-shirt under a black leather jacket festooned with chains. He wore a bandanna with a flame design low on his forehead. Reflecting sunglasses, black leather pants, and thigh-high boots almost completed his look.
    He also carried a briefcase.
    “Jumper!" Babs exclaimed. "I thought you'd forgotten the meeting!”
     
    Nine
    Since Babs found nothing strange about Jumper Cable's appearance, Jane and Shelley didn't comment, either. Jumper took off the shades and jacket, sat down at the table after greeting them affably, and started removing papers from the beat-up brown briefcase.
    “Are you having a meeting here?" Jane asked. "Do you want us to leave?"
    “Board meetings are open to the public," Babs said, but she sounded hesitant.
    “No, no. We'll go fill some of the forms instead," Jane said. "We have plenty to do elsewhere.”
    Jumper and Babs looked relieved.
    Shelley gave Jane a bunch of blank forms and a pencil and they left the boardroom. "Where shall we start?" Jane asked.
    “I've been working in a room on the second floor, but—"
    “Isn't there somewhere more private where we could make ourselves useful?"