Ben Reach and Sam Nixon MD were saddened when they learned on entering Millie’s Diner for breakfast that Frank Phillips had died of a heart attack the previous afternoon while shooting a covey rise on his Red Hills Ridge Plantation. Saddened, but not morosely so, for they had often discussed how sudden death while enjoying one’s favorite sport was not a bad (indeed was an ideal) way to “shuffle off this mortal coil,” to paraphrase the Bard in Hamlet’s “to be or not to be” soliloquy.
Sure enough, when Ben reached his office a call from Frank’s widow Molly was awaiting return by him. Frank had been a friend and client for thirty years, and Ben and Sam had enjoyed many a dove shoot and quail hunt with Frank and Molly on Red Hills Ridge Plantation.
Ben returned Molly’s call and she answered, a surprise to Ben who expected the voice answering to be a servant’s.
“I am so sorry Molly, I just heard the news at Millie’s,” Ben said.
“Thank you, Ben, but don’t be sad. Frank died just as he hoped he might, no suffering, no long decline. I would have changed places with him, but it was not my call. Is there anything I need to do right away?” Molly asked.
“No, I’ll call the insurance agency, let them know and be sure the casualty and liability coverage stays in place. You know he wanted just a graveside service at Red Hills Ridge,” Ben said.
“Yes, we were discussing that last week. I think he had a premonition.”
“Just call me when you want to talk about anything and I will come out,” Ben said.
Ben and Sam were pallbearers but there was no casket for Frank had chosen cremation. His ashes were buried in advance of the service in the graveyard beneath ancient live oaks and close by the burial grounds of many pointing dogs, retrievers, horses and mules Frank often described as “my true friends.” The service was all from the Episcopal Prayer Book, no eulogy, as Frank had planned.
Lunch was served outdoors and with a full bar as Frank had instructed. Attending were many members of the Georgia-Florida Field Trial Club and their employees, Black and Cracker, plus Yankee Brahmins with whom Frank had been in business before retirement to Thomasville.
Frank’s legal affairs were all in order and Molly and the children would have no financial worries. Frank had made provisions through a separate trust established by gift before his death for a female Frank described to Ben as “an old friend of the family.” He had asked Ben if there was any way Molly might learn of this trust after his death. Ben had said yes, she might if she enquired specifically about prior gift tax returns, and that there was no way to hide the trust if Molly or a lawyer for her made specific enquiries about prior gifts. Frank was not happy with Ben’s answer. This was Ben’s only worry when he undertook handling Frank’s estate.
A month after Frank’s death Ben received a call from Molly inviting him to have lunch with her at Red Hills Ridge. She sounded very cheerful, which surprised him. Then she closed with, “I have a happy story to tell you and a question to ask you.”
Ben was intrigued. A week later as he drove the live oak lined lane into Red Hills Ridge, he mused, I wonder what’s the story she will tell me and what her question will be.
Molly had always been a first class hostess, and meals or parties at Red Hills Ridge a treat. This would be no exception. On the sun porch overlooking one of Ben’s favorite bream fishing lakes, studded with ancient moss-hung cypress, Molly’s butler served a superb shrimp salad, one of Ben’s favorite dishes, Molly had remembered.
After the salad had been eased down with a superb Pino Grigio, and the butler was preparing a surprise desert in the kitchen, Molly told Ben the story she had promised.
“Two weeks ago I noticed a dead animal odor in the coat closet off the gun room where Frank hung his hunting jackets and vests. I figured it was likely a dead mouse. But on checking I found a quail in the game pocket of one of Frank’s jackets.” (Ben thought, that has happened to every quail hunter).
“I got latex gloves and removed the quail, already petrified. Then I noticed two envelopes in the left side pocket of the jacket. One was addressed to Frank at a Thomasville post office box whose number was strange to me. It was open with a note inside addressed to ‘Dearest F’ and signed ‘Your M.’ I knew M was not for Mother.” (Ben had always loved Molly’s wicked sense of humor).
“The second letter, unopened and unaddressed, was sealed. I opened it and found inside a note in Frank’s handwriting addressed ‘Dear M’ and ending ‘ Your F.’ I won’t describe the messages, but they overjoyed me.
“You see, after Frank’s death I was overcome with guilt. For more years than I can remember, I have had a lover. We saw each other only a few times a year—he lives and works in New York City, is also happily married, as were Frank and I.
“Finding Frank’s notes in his hunting coat told me he had a similar arrangement, I am going to assume. Knowing Frank was a generous person and from those notes that his M is not well-to-do, I am betting Frank made some provision for her. If you can I hope you will tell me the amount, I don’t need to know more than that. I intend to leave a like amount of Frank’s money to a special charity that looks out for impecunious young women who find themselves pregnant and unmarried.”
Molly fairly glowed with happiness when she finished her message to Ben.
The butler arrived with their desserts of raspberry sorbet and poured coffees.
When desserts and coffees were finished Ben excused himself to a powder room. Then Molly walked him to the front door. There Ben handed her one of his business cards on the back of which he had written when he went to the powder room: “$1,000,000.00.”
Molly read it and smiled.