Power of Attorney

Nothing had been taken from the apartment — nothing we could find, anyway, though I spent that whole night convinced someone had been in every drawer, every closet, breathing our air.

"It's a message," Georgia said, sitting on the floor with her back against the couch, too rattled to sit properly in it. "Not a robbery. A message."

We changed the locks before we did anything else. Then we went back to what we actually had, which was a forged signature, a missing pen, and a cousin who'd been suspiciously certain, in that lawyer's office, that we'd get nothing.

It was Mrs. Pruitt, three days later, who filled in the piece we hadn't known to ask about.

"Priscilla had power of attorney," she told us, back in her kitchen, this time with the curtains drawn even though it was noon. "Last eighteen months of Solange's life. Set it up herself, told your aunt it was for convenience — banking, doctor's appointments, that sort of thing. Solange trusted her. Family's family, she used to say."

"We didn't know that," I said. "Nobody told us that."

"Why would they. It's not the kind of thing that goes in a Christmas card." Mrs. Pruitt's hands twisted the dish towel she was holding. "But I'll tell you what I saw. Priscilla in and out of that house constantly those last months. Going through drawers I never saw her go through before. And once — just once — I found her in the study with your aunt's stationery box open, practicing something on a scrap of paper. When I walked in, she covered it with her hand so fast she knocked over the inkwell."

"Practicing what?"

"I didn't think anything of it at the time. Thought maybe she was writing a letter, embarrassed I'd caught her doodling like a schoolgirl." Mrs. Pruitt's eyes were wet now. "I think about that scrap of paper every single day. I think I watched her rehearse it and didn't understand what I was looking at."

Georgia's voice was very quiet. "Rehearse a signature."

"I can't prove it," Mrs. Pruitt said. "I've got no piece of paper, no photograph. Just an old woman's memory of another woman's hand covering something up."

"It might be enough," I said, "added to everything else."

Mrs. Pruitt shook her head slowly, like she wished she could believe that as easily as I'd said it. "Priscilla's clever, girls. She's had eighteen months of access and a cousin's trust and a family that's always looked the other way when it came to her. Don't you underestimate how far someone like that will go to keep what she thinks she's finally earned."

As if summoned by the words, Mrs. Pruitt's landline rang — an old rotary thing mounted on the kitchen wall, the sound sharp enough to make all three of us jump. She answered, listened, and her face drained of color before she'd said a single word back.

She hung up without speaking to us. "That was my niece," she said, hands shaking. "Someone's just offered to buy this house. Cash, no viewing needed, triple what it's worth. She said the offer came in an hour after I left a voicemail for your lawyer this morning."