A Place of Hiding

And now...? She was left with the aftermath of what she’d done. Ruth knew she had to make reparation for this somehow. Margaret would have her think that wresting Adrian’s rightful inheritance from the legal quagmire Guy had created to keep the young man from it would be an appropriate form of restitution. But that was because Margaret wanted a quick solution to a problem that had been years in the making. As if, Ruth thought, an infusion of money into Adrian’s veins would ever be the answer to what had long ailed him.

In the Admiral de Saumarez Inn, Ruth finished the last of her coffee and dropped the necessary money onto the table. She worked her way back into her coat with some difficulty and fumbled with the buttons and her scarf. Outside, the rain was falling softly, but a streak of light sky in the direction of France made a promise that the weather might improve as the day wore on. Ruth hoped that would be the case. She’d come to town without her umbrella.

She had to ascend the incline of Berthelot Street, and she found this difficult. She wondered how long she’d be able to manage and how many months or even weeks she had before she would be forced to her bed for the final countdown. Not long, she hoped.

Near the top of her climb, New Street veered off to the right in the general direction of the Royal Court House. In this vicinity, Dominic Forrest had his office.

Ruth entered to find that the advocate had just returned from making a few morning calls. He could see her if she didn’t mind waiting for fifteen minutes or so. He had to return two phone calls that were most important. Would she like a coffee?

Ruth demurred. She didn’t sit because she wasn’t sure if she would be able to rise again without assistance. Instead, she found a copy of CountryLife, and she looked at the photos without actually seeing them. Mr. Forrest came to fetch her within the promised fifteen minutes. He looked grave when he called her name, and she wondered if he’d been standing at the doorway to his office, watching her and making an assessment of how much longer she’d be able to go on. It seemed to Ruth that a greater part of her world observed her that way now. The more she did to appear normal and unaffected by disease, the more people seemed to watch her as if waiting for the lie to be flushed out. Ruth took a seat in Forrest’s office, knowing how odd it would look if she remained standing throughout their meeting. The advocate asked if she would mind if he had a coffee...? He’d been up for hours, getting an early start on the day, and he found he needed a jolt of caffeine right now. Would she take a slice of gache at least?

Ruth said no, she was really quite fine, as she’d just come from her own cup of coffee at Admiral de Saumarez. She waited till Mr. Forrest had his cup and his slice of the island bread, though, before she launched into the reason for her visit.

She told the advocate of her confusion regarding Guy’s will. She’d been witness to his previous wills, as Mr. Forrest knew, and it had been something of a shock to her to hear the changes he’d made in the legacies: nothing for Ana?s Abbott and her children, the wartime museum forgotten, the Duffys ignored. And to see less money left to Guy’s own children than to his two...She struggled for words and settled on local protégés...It was a most bewildering situation.

Dominic Forrest nodded solemnly. He had wondered what was going on, he admitted, when he’d been asked to go over the will in front of individuals who were not beneficiaries of it. That was irregular—Well, the whole reading of the will in such a meeting in this day and age was a bit irregular, wasn’t it?—but he’d thought perhaps Ruth was surrounding herself with friends and loved ones during a troubling time. Now he saw that Ruth herself had been left in the dark as to her brother’s final testament. That explained much about the oddity of the formal reading. “I did wonder when you didn’t come with him the day he signed the documents. You’d always done before. I thought perhaps you weren’t feeling well, but I didn’t ask at the time. Because...” He shrugged, looking both sympathetic and embarrassed. He, too, knew, Ruth realised. So Guy had probably known as well. But like most people, he didn’t know what to say. I’msorry you’re dying seemed too vulgar.

“But you see, he always told me before,” Ruth said. “Every will. Every time. I’m trying to understand why he kept this final version a secret.”

“Perhaps he believed it would upset you,” Forrest said. “Perhaps he knew you’d disagree with the changes in the bequests. Moving part of the money out of the family.”

“No. It can’t be that,” Ruth said. “The other wills did the same.”

“But not a fifty-fifty split. And in earlier versions his children each inherited more than the other beneficiaries. Perhaps Guy thought you might pounce on this. He knew you’d understand what the terms of his will meant the moment you heard them.”

“I would have protested,” Ruth admitted. “But that wouldn’t have changed things. My protests never counted with Guy.”