Free Bernadine Fagan - Nora Lassiter 01 - Murder by the Old Maine Stream by Bernadine Fagan

tried not to smirk.
    Or cry.
    So far, this had not been a banner day. Crappy. It had been crappy. I tried to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and almost cut my finger. I smelled my sleeve again while it was up there. Not too bad. Hannah’s nose must be ultra sensitive. Or maybe I was getting used to the smell?
    I closed my eyes. I was so tired. If I were lying down I’d be asleep in minutes. The lawyer was reading about some land. I drifted mentally. Who cared? Everyone knew Ida got everything, house and land. She deserved it, earned it. For years Ida had taken care of Great-grandma Evie. She had cooked and cleaned, taken her to doctors’ offices and on visits to relatives and friends. Ida was a good woman and deserved the security of the house and property, even if she was getting on in years and would probably not be here much longer.
    “Nora Lassiter,” the lawyer said aloud. All heads swiveled in my direction.
    What?
    I knew I should have been paying attention. This used to happen in school. All of a sudden the teacher would call on me, and I had no idea of what the question was.
    “Nora,” Hannah said gleefully. “I’m so happy for you.”
    Before I could respond to Hannah, the lawyer said, “You can remain and we’ll go over the paperwork. I wish your brother Howard had been able to make it today, Nora.”
    What had we inherited?
    “You can do so much with the property,” Ida said, smiling. “Build a house, tap the maples and make syrup.”
    “You could tap the maple trees and make syrup,” Agnes said.
    “I just said that,” Ida told her. “Plug in your hearing aid.”
    Ignoring the comment, Agnes said, “Many years back Grandma Evie was famous, at least in the family, for her maple syrup. No one’s bothered since she stopped. More’s the pity. But someone could show you how it’s done. You can even make maple candy. That’s one of my favorites. Maple candy.”
    Holy crap! Land. Howie and I had inherited some land, a section of Ida’s property? Me, Nora Lassiter, a landowner. A maker of maple syrup? Hard to picture.
    I looked at Ida and she didn’t seem upset. Surprisingly, neither did any other members of the family. Had they known? And approved? Strange. With all the nodding and smiling, they seemed to. I wondered how much the property was worth. I’d be able to pay the American Express bill, for sure.
    “Why me?” I asked the lawyer after everyone left.
    “Evelyn ‘Evie’ Lassiter and her husband Charles, who died five years ago, decided they wanted you and your family back in Silver Stream, Nora. Even your mother, if she would come. They felt this would be a draw.”
    The lawyer held out an envelope. “I was to give you this. Evie said it explained what she wanted to explain.”
    I took the envelope with my name and Howie’s written in flowing, old-fashioned script across the front. More than anything I wanted to rip it open and read it immediately, but caution, which I believe runs only surface-deep in me most of the time, urged me to hold off until I was alone.
    “Thank you,” I said to the lawyer as I slipped the envelope into my purse. “Can I sell this land, or hand it over to Ida?”
    “Both, I suppose. Ask the family if any of them want to buy it. Or you could live there, as your great-grandmother wanted. Perhaps a trailer to start out. Later, a house. I did not read the letter she wrote to you. It was sealed by her, kept private, the way she wanted it. She considered it extremely important. She did tell me there was something she wanted you to do.”
    He seemed to leave the last sentence hanging, implying I should do what Grandma Evie wanted before I returned to New York.
    “One more thing.”
    He hesitated, and I realized he was going to say something he felt uneasy about, which, of course, made me uneasy, too.
    “Several years back, when your great-grandmother was ninety-one, but in full control of her faculties, she was very troubled about something. Maybe she