Part 3 — Sewn Into The Cover
Moms note ended at the edge of the page, but I knew where it pointed. I had bought her machine back from a church lady for forty dollars, and in the box with it was the quilted dust cover Mom made in 1974. I had never once thought to check the lining.
Mr. Varner called a recess, and Rick sat very still while Royce and I drove to the shed where the machine was stored. We carried the cover into the kitchen and laid it under the lamp.
One seam was stitched newer than the rest, small even stitches in cream thread. Moms. I opened four inches with a seam ripper from her tin. Between two layers of batting lay a bank envelope.
It held photocopies of eleven savings bond stubs, each with a date and the name of the teller who cashed it. Beside them were slips from a Manitowoc branch, one side with her real signature and the other with a forged one, and a notarized statement in her hand dated the Friday before she fell.
She had gone to Mr. Varners office that week, but he was out, so she made her own record. A retired judge next door, Mr. Olsen, notarized it. He remembered her coming over in her good coat with a covered dish.
Mr. Varner reviewed everything and called the sheriff and the banks fraud unit. The Manitowoc branch pulled security footage. There was Rick at the counter, eleven times in eleven months, signing Moms name in a slow, practiced hand.
Then the sheriff gave me the news I dreaded. His detective had examined the stairs, the neighbors statements, and the timestamps. On the afternoon Mom fell, Rick stood at that Manitowoc counter, forty minutes away, caught on camera at 2:10.
Mom had fallen on her own steps, the way she always feared she might. Her note about not tripping came from a woman afraid of her son-in-law, but the truth was kinder. She was never harmed by anyone that day, only cheated by one for a year. I sat down in the hallway and cried with relief.
Rick was arrested for forgery, theft, and financial exploitation of an elderly person. His fingerprints were on every counterfeit slip. Before Judge Anders he pleaded guilty and received probation, restitution, and a strict order to stay away from family accounts forever.
Linda answered every question. She brought the rings to Mr. Varner herself, crying so hard she could hardly speak. She had believed Rick when he said Mom wanted her to have them, and she had never known about the bonds.
The bank repaid the cashed bonds in full, and the court named me executor. Linda and I split everything evenly, as Mom intended, and we sold the house with a hug on the front step. The cream-colored machine sits in my sewing room now, wearing its quilted cover at night.
