PART 4
I didn’t tell anyone about the key.
Not Dale.
Not Alan.
Not Pam.
Not even my sons.
By the time I pulled out of Grandpa’s driveway, I had already made one decision.
Whatever was inside Box 114, I would find it before the estate sale.
The problem was that the key had a name on it that no longer existed.
Moberly First National.
I drove there anyway.
The old bank building stood three blocks from the courthouse, squeezed between a barber shop and a hardware store. The sign above the entrance had changed years ago.
Now it belonged to a regional bank.
I sat in my car for almost ten minutes, staring at the building.
Then I took the key from my purse.
It felt ridiculous.
A thirty-year-old key to a bank that had changed names.
But Grandpa had kept it.
And Grandpa had been many things in my life, but careless wasn’t one of them.
I walked inside.
A woman at the reception desk looked up.
“Can I help you?”
“I need to ask about an old safe-deposit box.”
She smiled politely.
“Do you have the box number?”
I showed her the key.
She looked at it.
Then her smile disappeared.
“Where did you get this?”
“My grandfather.”
“Name?”
“Henry J. Harper.”
She typed.
Then she frowned.
“I’m going to get my manager.”
Five minutes later, a gray-haired man came out.
He introduced himself as Mr. Benton.
He looked at the key.
Then at me.
“Are you Nancy Harper?”
My heart stopped.
“Yes.”
He nodded as if he’d expected that answer.
“Your grandfather left instructions.”
I couldn’t speak.
“What instructions?”
He glanced toward the lobby.
“Come with me.”
The vault was colder than I expected.
The door closed behind us with a heavy metallic sound.
Mr. Benton walked to a wall of small boxes.
He ran his finger along the numbers.
Then stopped.
“114.”
My breath caught.
He inserted his own key.
“Unfortunately, I can’t open this with your key alone.”
“Why?”
“Because the box is still registered under two names.”
“Whose?”
He looked at the record.
“Henry J. Harper.”
I waited.
“And Nancy Lee Harper.”
My knees nearly weakened.
“That’s me.”
“Yes.”
“Then open it.”
He shook his head.
“There is another requirement.”
“What?”
He handed me a photocopy.
At the bottom was a signature.
Mine.
Or what looked like mine.
I stared at it.
“I’ve never signed this.”
Mr. Benton studied my face.
“That’s what I thought.”
The document was dated September 2001.
I was living in Kansas City then.
I remembered that year clearly.
My youngest son had started kindergarten.
I was working two jobs.
I had not been anywhere near Moberly.
The document said:
Authorization to restrict access to Safe Deposit Box 114 until the death of Henry J. Harper.
Underneath was my name.
And a signature.
Someone had forged it.
“Who submitted this?” I asked.
“We don’t know.”
“You have to know.”
“Mrs. Ellis, this box was transferred during a bank merger. Some records are incomplete.”
“Who signed as witness?”
He looked down.
Then back at me.
“Alan Harper.”
My brother.
I stepped away from the box.
For a few seconds, I couldn’t think.
Alan had told me he didn’t know anything.
He had told me to stop asking questions.
And now his signature was on a document designed to keep me from accessing something Grandpa had left me.
“What is in the box?”
Mr. Benton shook his head.
“I can’t tell you.”
“Then why did you bring me down here?”
“Because your grandfather left a second instruction.”
He reached into a folder.
“This one was attached to the original lease.”
He handed it to me.
The handwriting was Grandpa’s.
I knew it immediately.
It said:
When Nancy comes with the key, open the box. If anyone else comes first, deny access.
Below that was one more sentence.
If Nancy arrives after my death, tell her to read the letter before opening anything.
I looked at him.
“Where is the letter?”
Mr. Benton pointed to the box.
“Inside.”
My hands were shaking when he inserted the second key.
The lock clicked.
The box opened.
Inside was not money.
Not jewelry.
Not a stack of property deeds.
There was a brown leather folder.
Three envelopes.
A small cassette tape.
And a photograph.
I picked up the photograph first.
It showed Grandpa standing beside my mother.
She was young.
Maybe twenty-five.
And standing between them was a man I had never seen before.
I turned the photograph over.
Grandpa had written:
Nancy — this is where everything began.
I looked at the man again.
There was something familiar about him.
The shape of his eyes.
The way he stood.
Then I noticed something on his left hand.
A small scar across his thumb.
I had seen that scar before.
On Alan.
My brother.
I put the photograph down.
“Who is that man?”
Mr. Benton looked at it.
Then he looked at me.
