Winter Moon

soon be attending. She was killed instantly. Events unfold in uncanny

sequences. Long-forgotten acquaintances turn up again with news that

changes lives. A stranger appears and speaks a few words of wisdom,

solving a previously insoluble problem, or something in a recent dream

transpires in reality. Suddenly the existence of God seems

confirmed.

On the afternoon of August eighteenth, as Heather stood in the kitchen,

waiting for the Mr. Coffee machine to brew a fresh pot and sorting

through mail that had just arrived, she came across a letter from Paul

Youngblood, an attorney-at-law from Eagle's Roost, Montana. The

envelope was heavy, as if it contained not merely a letter but a

document. According to the postmark, it had been sent on the sixth of

the month, which led her to wonder about the gypseian route by which

the postal service had chosen to deliver it. She knew she'd heard of

Eagle's Roost. She could not recall when or why. Because she shared a

nearly universal aversion to attorneys and associated all

correspondence from law firms with trouble, she put the letter on the

bottom of the stack, choosing to deal with it last. After throwing

away advertisements, she found that the four other remaining items were

bills. When she finally read the letter from Paul Youngblood, it

proved to be so utterly different from the bad news she had

expected--and so astonishing--that immediately after finishing it, she

sat down at the kitchen table and read it again from the top. Eduardo

Fernandez, a client of Youngblood's, had died on the fourth or fifth of

July. He had been the father of Sometimes, life seems to have a higher

meaning. lthe late Thomas Fernandez.

That was Tommy--murdered at Jack's side eleven months before the events

at Hassam Arkadian's service station. Eduardo Fernandez had named Jack

Mcgarvey of Los Angeles, California, as his sole heir. Serving as

executor of Mr. Fernandez's estate, Youngblood had tried to notify

Jack by phone, only to discover that his number was no longer listed.

The estate included an insurance policy that would cover the fifty-five

percent federal inheritance tax, leaving Jack the unencumbered

six-hundred-acre Quartermass Ranch, the four-bedroom main house with

furnishings, the caretaker's house, the ten-horse stable, various tools

and equipment, and "a substantial amount of cash." Instead of a legal

document, six photographs were included with the single-page letter.

With shaky hands, Heather spread them in two rows on the table in front

of her. The modified-Victorian main house was charming, with just

enough decorative millwork to enchant without descending into Gothic

oppressiveness. It appeared to be twice as large as the house in which

they now lived. The mountain and valley views in every direction were

breathtaking. Heather had never been filled with such mixed emotions

as she experienced at that moment. In their hour of desperation, they

had been given salvation, a way out of darkness, escape from despair.

She had no idea what a Montana attorney would regard as a "substantial

amount of cash," but she figured the ranch alone, if liquidated, must

be worth enough to pay off all their bills and their current mortgage,

with money left hadn't known since she had been a small child and had

still believed in fairy tales, miracles. On the other hand, their good

fortune would have been Tommy Fernandez's good fortune if he had not

been murdered. That dark and inescapable fact tainted the gift and

dampened her pleasure in it. For a while she brooded, torn between

delight and guilt, and at last decided she was responding too much -.

like a Beckerman and too little like a Mcgarvey. She would have done

anything to bring Tommy Fernandez back to life, even if it meant that

this inheritance would never have been hers and Jack's, but the cold

truth was that Tommy was dead, in the ground over sixteen months now,

and beyond the help of anyone. Fate was too often malicious, too

seldom generous. She would be a fool to greet this staggering

beneficence with a frown. Her first thought was to call Jack at

work.

She went to the wall phone, dialed part of the number, then hung up.

This was once-in-a-lifetime news. She would never have another

opportunity to spring something this deliriously wonderful on him, and

she must not screw it up. For one thing, she wanted to see his face

when he heard about the inheritance. She took the notepad and pencil

from the holder beside the phone and returned to the table, where she

read the letter again. She wrote out a list of questions for Paul

Youngblood, then returned to the phone and called him in Eagle's Roost,

Montana. When Heather identified herself to the attorney's secretary

and then to the man himself, her voice was tremil she was half afraid

he would tell her there had been a mistake. Maybe someone had

contested the will. Or maybe a more recent will had been found, which

negated the one naming Jack as the sole heir. A thousand maybes.

Rush-hour traffic was even worse than usual. Dinner was delayed