Chapter 5: The Price of Silence
Attorney Nora Walsh arrived within an hour.
She read the order at the dining table while Mom sat between Rose and me.
“This does not make Brad your guardian,” Nora said.
“It freezes major decisions until the hearing.”
“Can he keep my money?” Mom asked.
“He can claim he moved it to protect you.”
Brad entered with a gray-haired attorney named Martin Cole.
“That’s exactly what I did.”
Nora closed the petition.
“You filed this before the surgery.”
“I knew strangers might exploit her.”
Rose stood.
“You mean you knew the surgeon might find June’s marker.”
Martin raised one hand.
“My client will not respond to accusations about events from 1978.”
Mom pushed herself upright.
“Your client is my husband.”
“Then perhaps you should speak privately,” Martin said.
“No,” Mom replied.
“For forty-six years, everything important happened privately.”
Brad placed a document in front of her.
“Sign this, reject Rose’s claim, and I’ll withdraw the petition.”
Nora pulled the paper away.
“You’re asking her to confirm her identity while claiming she lacks the capacity to manage it.”
Brad’s smile disappeared.
“I’m offering my wife peace.”
“What happens to the transferred money?” I asked.
“It remains safe.”
“In your account?”
“Claire, you should be careful.
The deposit on your home came from the family trust.”
I stared at him.
“You told me it came from your retirement fund.”
“A court might see it differently.”
Mom’s chair scraped back.
“Do not threaten my daughter.”
“Then sign.”
Rose stepped between them.
“You blamed June in 1978, and now you’re using Claire.”
Brad leaned toward her.
“Walk away, and I’ll give you fifty thousand dollars.”
Martin touched his arm.
“Brad.”
“No,” Rose said.
“Let him finish.”
“One hundred thousand,” Brad replied.
“You disappear, Claire keeps her house, and Rose—whatever she wants to call herself—keeps believing the life I gave her.”
Mom removed her wedding ring and set it on the document.
“You gave me someone else’s name.”
The doorbell rang again.
A small woman in a navy coat stood outside with a battered case in both hands.
“My name is Agnes Bell,” she said.
“I worked at St.
Catherine’s Hospital in 1978.”
Brad’s face changed.
“You have no business here.”
Agnes stepped past him.
“I had no courage then.
I have business now.”
She opened the case on the dining table.
Inside were carbon copies of two admission forms, nursing notes, and a reel of magnetic tape.
Rose covered her mouth.
“You kept them?”
“I was ordered to destroy them.”
Brad grabbed for the papers, but Nora swept them into her folder.
Agnes faced Mom.
“You were admitted as June Mercer.
Your sister was admitted as Rose.
The bracelets were correct when I prepared them.”
“Who changed them?” Mom asked.
Agnes looked at Brad.
“He did.”
“That’s a lie,” Brad said.
“She was dismissed for stealing hospital property.”
“I took the records because your uncle ordered me to burn them.”
Martin closed his briefcase.
“I advise everyone to stop talking.”
Agnes placed an old cassette recorder on the table.
“Brad visited the records room the night before I was dismissed.
I left this running inside my desk.”
Brad picked up a glass and hurled it toward the recorder.
Dr.
Patel knocked his arm aside, and the glass shattered against the wall.
Agnes pressed the play button.
Static filled the room.
Then a younger version of Brad’s voice spoke clearly.
May you like
“Put June’s bracelet on the woman who can’t remember.
From tonight onward, she answers to Rose.”
