530 THE ADVOCATE
VOL. 80 PART 4 JULY 2022
William opened the file. “I don’t normally do a reading of the will, but
Miss Groves asked me to read the will in front of the family. She also
requested that I play a recorded last message.”
William began to summarize the will, paragraph by paragraph. Sabina
inched closer to the door. She wanted to see Louise’s face. When he got to
clause 9, regarding the Yew Street home, he glanced at Darren, who showed
no emotion when the news was broken. Louise’s mouth turned up in an
almost imperceptible smile.
“And the final clause is just the usual … ” William froze, as his face went
pale.
“Is there something wrong?” Louise’s voice was sharp.
“I don’t understand.” He was staring at the witness signature lines. Only
Vivian’s signature remained. William raised his head and made eye contact
with Sabina, who had dropped all pretense and stood in the doorway of the
conference room. “You.” He spat it out with venom.
Sabina knew this part would be hard, and that it would be her last day at
Smith, Smith, Smith and Smith.
“What have you done?”
Sabina squeezed her eyes shut and thought of Mary. “You need two signatures
for a will to be legal. There’s only one.”
“But you signed it—I saw you.”
“William, tell me you didn’t screw this up?” Louise stood and pointed at
him with a freshly manicured nail.
“I signed in disappearing ink.” She played her trump card with satisfaction.
“You bitch.” William’s lavender bowtie was as askew as his composure.
Louise lunged at her, but Gerald caught her arm.
“It won’t work, Sabina,” William said finally. “You still witnessed the will,
even if your signature isn’t there. And I suspect there will be chemical evidence
that you signed. We can have the defect cured under section 58. You
just caused a lot of bother and cost to this firm.” He paused. “And you can
forget about law school.”
Louise’s ire diminished with William’s explanations.
For the first time, Darren spoke. “Should we listen to Aunt Mary’s final
message?” He smiled politely at William.
“Yes, of course.”
William turned on the TV and cast the video there. Mary appeared,
dressed neatly in the same burgundy suit she had worn at the will-signing.
“Darren, is it recording?”
“Yes, Aunt Mary. Go ahead.”