“Josephine would like to meet you. In person. On Talisa. To be honest, I don’t know what happens after that. She’s old and ornery, and she’s dying.”
“Is she rich?” Lizzie asked bluntly. “Because if she’s not, I have no interestin flying out to Georgia to meet some eccentric old crackpot. I’m on deadline for a crappy magazine story right now, and I can’t really afford to take time away from that, not to mention the cost of a plane ticket. So you tell her that. Tell her I’ll come if she’ll pay my way. All expenses, including airfare, meals, and hotel.”
“I’ll tell her, but there’s no hotel on Talisa. There’s hardly even cell phone service,” Brooke warned.
“Sounds dreamy,” Lizzie said.
***
Henry pounded on the plastic tray of the high chair with his sippy cup. “Milk! Milk! Milk!”
“Milk,please,” Brooke said.
“Milk, please, milk, please, milk, please,” he chanted.
She refilled the cup and called her mother.
Marie answered on the second ring. “Hi, sweetie. Is everything okay?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?” Brooke asked.
“Don’t be so sensitive,” Marie said. “You usually don’t call on weekdays while you’re working.”
“Actually, I am calling you about work. I need to ask you something about my new client.”
“Is it somebody I know?”
“Well, she seems to think she knowsyou. It’s Josephine Bettendorf Warrick.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m not. Do you know her?”
“In a roundabout way. She was your granny’s oldest friend. Does she still live down there in that creepy old mansion on that island?”
“Yep.”
“Good heavens. I had no idea she was even still alive. Let’s see. She must be in her nineties, right?”
“She turned ninety-nine in April,” Brooke said.
“How did you get mixed up with her?”
“She called me. Out of the blue. She’d seen those old newspaper stories about me trying to sue the Park Service, and she wants me to keep the state from condemning Talisa and taking it for a park. And that’s not all. She wants me to find the heirs of her oldest friends. I’ve already contacted one granddaughter, who lives in California. I’m trying to track down another woman and her niece. And that just leaves you.”
“Me? What’s she want with me? Or those other women?”
“She wants to meet with you. And then, if she likes what she sees, I think she intends for the three of you to inherit the island. And the mansion.”
“Really? Josephine Warrick hardly knows me. Why would she do something like that?”
“She says she wants to make it up to her oldest, dearest friends. But she hasn’t really told me what she’s trying to apologize for. It’s all pretty sketchy, to tell you the truth. I tried to talk her out of hiring me, but she’s absolutely adamant that she wants me and nobody else.”
Marie mulled that over for a moment. “You say she’s ninety-nine? Are you sure she’s not suffering from dementia?”
“Josephine is sharp as a tack. Most of the time. But she’s been diagnosed with lung cancer, so she tires easily. I gather she was a pretty heavy smoker for most of her life.”
“Funny you should mention that,” Marie said, “because that’s what I remember about her. Your father and I were at a party, years and years ago, at the Oglethorpe Club, and she was there too, and what I remember about her was that she had this long, jeweled cigarette holder, like something out ofBreakfast at Tiffany’s, you know? I thought she was quite exotic.”
