FORGET ME NOT (Mark Kane Mysteries Book One) by John Hemmings

Gloria would have made Susan the major
beneficiary of her will until she had at least got to know her
better, so it’s likely that the will was written sometime later,
after Gloria started to show obvious signs of dementia.”
    I ran through the matters that had gone
through my mind after leaving Philips’ house; the possibility of
forgery, duress, and lack of mental capacity. Lucy was in the
kitchen tidying up. She likes tidying up. It’s a kind of therapy
for her. She likes tidying up my place even more than she likes
tidying up her own place, which is fine by me.
    “As far as I’m concerned,” said Lucy, as she
scraped what was left of our meal into the trash can, “the
strangest thing is the amount of the bequest. Why would she leave
such a large portion of her estate to Susan when she had two other
children and a husband too?”
    “I agree, particularly in view of the fact
that by all accounts the inter-family relationship was very good;
and it’s also puzzling why Gloria would not have discussed the
matter with Greg. They were very close, you know.”
    “Something’s definitely not right,” Lucy
said, as she came back into the living room and plonked herself
down on the sofa next to me, tucking her feet beneath her. “Even if
Susan really is Gloria’s daughter there must have been some kind of
manipulation by her.”
    Well, all women are manipulative, I thought,
but I didn’t dare say so, particularly as I wasn’t even in my own
home.
    “Duress seems unlikely though, because the
will had to be witnessed,” I said. “I don’t know yet who the
witnesses were, but obviously Susan couldn’t be one or she would be
unable to benefit from the will. I also don’t know where the
signing took place. It could have been at home, in which case Susan
could conceivably have been present, but it’s difficult to see how
she could have exerted any undue influence in the presence of the
witnesses.”
    “It seems most likely to me,” Lucy said,
“that Gloria wasn’t fully compos mentis when she signed. And
that could be why she never mentioned it to her husband, because
maybe she forgot she’d done it. That’s one of the symptoms of
Alzheimer’s isn’t it, forgetfulness?”
    “I don’t remember,” I said. Lucy gave me a
withering look. “No, seriously, you may well be right; which means
the will might not be valid even if no undue pressure was brought
to bear, in which case Susan’s blood relationship with Gloria might
not matter at all.”
    It was food for thought, but the actual food
having been eaten I decided to head home, which involved a journey
of about two or three hundred feet.
     

Chapter Six
Susan
    The journey to Concord was dull and
uneventful. The weather had changed completely and the entire trip
was under heavy cloud and through driving rain. The wipers
valiantly slapped and sloshed against the windscreen trying to give
me something to look at. In the interest of punctuality I had set
off early. I had arranged to see Susan at her workplace which was a
restaurant just off the main street. It was either that or wait
until late evening, which I didn’t want to do, or wait until she
was off on Saturday which, given my retainer, I couldn’t afford to
do. After leaving Philips house yesterday I had waited for him to
confirm my instructions from Gloria’s attorney and then I had some
new business cards printed while I waited. My new cards proclaimed
that I was a ‘Probate Consultant’, which I imagined would sound a
lot less intimidating than private investigator. I was like a
chameleon; I had more business descriptions on my cards than most
people had cards. I didn’t want Susan to know that I had any
special concerns or suspicions about her. Instead I hoped to pass
my visit off as something strictly routine. I’d be polite and
congenial and yet cunning. I’d be crafty Kane today.
    Susan had told me that she got a forty five
minute break at one thirty. I arrived well ahead of time,