Free Ash Wednesday by Ralph McInerny Page A

If only Tetzel had claimed to learn of the will because it had been registered.
    After he had read the story, Tuttle took the paper to the outer office and dropped it casually on Hazel’s desk. He returned to hisown office and waited at his desk, tweed hat pulled over his eyes. Suddenly there was a great whoop from the outer office and then Hazel appeared in his doorway.
    “Prominent local attorney!” she cried. “Do you realize how often you’re mentioned in this story?”
    Tuttle tipped back his hat and tried to repress the foolish grin that spread across his face. “I tried to be of help to Tetzel.”
    “He’s the man who was here in the office, isn’t he?”
    “The same.”
    “How on earth did he hear about the new will?”
    A small cloud on the horizon, that. “You know how thorough investigative reporters can be.”
    “You told him!”
    Hazel had once worked for a large firm in Chicago, where she must have picked up some rudiments of legal ethics.
    “Nathaniel Green insisted that I register the will. That made it more or less public.”
    Hazel thought about it. It was a delicate moment. Would she go back to her normal contemptuous attitude toward him? Apparently she found her earlier elation more attractive.
    “I am going to clip this,” she said. “For the files.”
    “Good idea.”
    Tuttle was left to enjoy his ambiguous pleasure. It was annoying that she had made such a point of Nathaniel Green’s new will.

Jason was already at the Great Wall, sipping a Chinese beer, when Madeline arrived precisely at six. He pushed a copy of the
Tribune
toward her when she sat across from him.
    “What’s this?”
    “Read it.”
    It was a feature story on the return of Nathaniel Green written by Gearhart Tetzel. Madeline let her eye run through the story, her lips moving in disbelief.
    “Reopen the case?” she asked.
    Jason turned the page half toward himself and pointed at a paragraph.
    “Good Lord!” Madeline cried.
    According to Tetzel, Nathaniel had rewritten his will, leaving everything to Helen Burke.
    “Does he have anything to leave?”
    “Plenty.” Jason finished his beer. “You want one of these?”
    “I’ll have tea. Hot tea. How much is plenty?”
    “It’s not the amount.”
    “Have you talked to your mother?”
    Jason closed his eyes. “Not yet.”
    The waitress arrived, and Madeline folded the paper and set itaside. No need to consult the menu; she knew what she wanted. Jason took his time, considering the menu.
    “Could you bring the tea?” Madeline asked.
    “Another of these, too.” Jason flicked a finger at the empty bottle before him, his eye not leaving the menu. Madeline picked up the
Tribune
again, read a paragraph or two, then put it away.
    The waitress returned with the tea and another bottle of beer, and Jason ordered. Then he hunched toward Madeline.
    “Florence and my mother were the only beneficiaries of my grandfather’s will. Fifty-fifty.”
    “Of what?”
    Jason mouthed the amount, then said it aloud. “A couple of million. Apiece.”
    Madeline just stared.
    “Of course, a million now isn’t what it was then,” Jason said.
    Was Jason thinking of the mega-million-dollar lottery jackpots he dreamed of winning? Not only did he buy hundreds of dollars’ worth of lottery tickets, he was a member of Gamblers Anonymous. When Helen wasn’t financing Jason’s newest business venture, she was bailing him out of his gambling debts. He was always genuinely contrite when he had to take a maxed-out credit card to his mother. Madeline thought he found it easier to admit to his gambling than to his drinking. What is there about men like Jason? He brought out the mother in Madeline, too.
    Why should she be surprised to find that Helen was so well off? Jason had told her that his father’s money had increased exponentially under Carter interest rates and from that point had been coaxed to ever larger amounts. After all, Helen had always been able to rescue Jason from his