Seeing Double
by
Sheri Cobb South
(When identical twins show up at the reading of the will both claiming to be the widow of the not-so-dearly departed Malcolm Fortescue, it's up to lawyer Charles Brady to identify the imposter. But how?)
Charles Brady, attorney at law, studied the papers spread across his client's desk, then looked up at the woman seated before him. She was about thirty-five, elegantly attired in a black silk suit, with a tiny hat atop her smoothly coiffed blond hair.
"Everything seems to be in order, Mrs. Fortescue," he told her. "Your husband's will states that, except for a few small personal bequests, his entire fortune passes to you."
"Oh, that is good news, Mr. Brady. Not," she added quickly, "that any amount of money can take the place of my dear husband, but--well, one must eat."
An apologetic smile robbed the words of any callousness, and Charles decided that much could be forgiven a beautiful woman. By all reports, the late Malcolm Fortescue had not been an easy man to live with, besides being 20 years older than his wife.
"I understand, Mrs. Fortescue," he assured her. "Now, if you'll just sign--"
The study door was flung open. In the doorway stood a tall, blond woman. She too was wearing a black suit and hat.
"Hello, Sister," she addressed the bereaved woman. "I might have known you'd be here!"
Charles, taken aback by the appearance of a woman who was his client's mirror image, recollected his wits and rose from his chair. "Good afternoon. And you are...?"
Her lip curled contemptuously. "Who else? I'm Mrs. Malcolm Fortescue."
Mrs. Fortescue gasped, but the latecomer took no notice. "Sorry I'm late," she said, stripping off her gloves and tossing them onto the desk. "I had an urgent message saying there was a problem with the house in West Palm Beach requiring my attention. It wasn't until the plane was halfway to Florida that I remembered Malcolm's will was to be read today, and put two and two together. I was always better at math than you," she reminded the widow.
"Elizabeth is my twin," murmured Charles's client. "She always envied me my marriage to Malcolm, because her own ended in divorce. Now, you said something about signing a paper?"
"In a moment," Charles said. "First, I'm afraid I must ask you both for some identification."
Each of the women produced a driver's license with a photograph declaring its owner to be Mrs. Caroline Fortescue. Charles examined them, struggling to find some way to determine which woman was entitled to Fortescue's millions. The photograph on Mr. Fortescue's desk offered no clue, as its subject might have been either of the women.
Shuffling through a sheaf of papers in an attempt to look busy, he spied a marriage license dated eight years earlier and signed by the bride, Caroline Monroe, in a large, looping script. He withdrew two sheets of paper and gave them to the women.
"If you will sign your names, please?"
"Really, Mr. Brady, is this necessary?" pleaded his original client, her eyes troubled. "Poor Malcolm is barely cold in his grave!"
Her sister had no such scruples. "Give me a pen, and I'll sign! I lived with that wretched man for eight long years. I earned every penny of that money, and I won't be cheated out of it now!"
She scrawled her name on the page. The handwriting was not quite identical to that on the marriage license, but Charles would not have expected it to be. Only a forger would sign his name exactly the same way every time.
"Really, Elizabeth, how can you be so heartless?" asked the first Mrs. Fortescue. "I may not have been in love with Malcolm, but I was fond of him. I miss him so!"
She dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief, and Charles resisted the urge to comfort her. If she was not Fortescue's widow, he thought, then she was a consummate actress. Or was her show of grief an excuse to avoid putting pen to paper? As she returned the handkerchief to her purse, sunlight from the window sparkled off a large, pear-shaped diamond on the fourth finger of her left hand. Charles noticed an identical ring on her sister's hand.
"That is a beautiful stone, Mrs. Fortescue," he said. "I have an amateur's interest in gemology. Would you mind if I took a closer look?"
"Of course not, Mr. Brady," she said, slipping the ring from her finger.
Her sister did likewise at his request, and Charles studied the two diamonds, then turned to the woman who had arrived second.
"My apologies, Mrs. Fortescue," he told her. "If you will sign here, I will see that your husband's assets are transferred to you."
"What?" shrieked the first widow. "I was told an expert would have trouble telling those diamonds apart! How did you know?"
"It wasn't the diamond. It was your hand. Or, rather, it was your sister's. She and Malcolm Fortescue spent a good deal of time in West Palm Beach. When you both removed your rings, I noticed her finger had a white stripe where the skin beneath the ring hadn't tanned. Your finger had no stripe because you, being divorced, don't wear a ring."
The imposter snatched her ring and stalked from the room in an angry huff.
Charles turned to Caroline. "She's guilty of fraud, you know. Will you press charges?"
"No. Her own jealousy will punish her enough. Although one would think that, knowing Malcolm the way she did, she would be less inclined to envy me."
"If you were so unhappy, why did you never think of divorce?"
"I did, until I considered that my sister had come away from her divorce with nothing. No, Mr. Brady, I knew my marriage would be 'til death do us part.'" Her lips twisted in a wry smile. "Will you be shocked if I say I'm thankful the parting came sooner than expected?"
"My dear Mrs. Fortescue, I am a lawyer. Nothing shocks me anymore," he boasted. "Although I was a bit surprised at your sister's attempt to cheat you. How could she possibly feel she had any right to it?"
"Oh, did we not mention it? I thought surely we had. You see, Elizabeth was Malcolm's first wife."
(This story first appeared in Woman's World magazine, July 22, 1997.)