It was Mr. Halsey, asking me to attend the reading of Eleanor’s will.
I didn’t know it yet, but Eleanor had left me one final surprise.
“She isn’t here to protect you anymore.”
When I entered Mr. Halsey’s office, I expected paperwork, maybe a letter or a small bequest from Eleanor.
Instead, Halsey set an old black sewing machine on his desk.
Next to it lay a sealed envelope. Eleanor’s handwriting curled across the front.
“What is this?” I asked.
“This,” Halsey said, “is what Eleanor wanted you to have first.”
Halsey set an old black sewing machine on his desk.
I reached for the letter.
His palm came down flat over it before my fingers closed.
“Not yet,” he said. “She left specific instructions, Daniel. The machine first. Then the letter.”
I sat back as he turned the base toward me, and somewhere inside the wood a soft metallic click answered the motion.
