My Sister-in-Law Took My Late Husband’s Pension for 28 Years. I Let Her Think I Didn’t Know

Living under Lorna’s roof was harder than I expected. She was polite at breakfast and polite at supper, but she never let her guard down. She asked about my sleep and my appetite as if I were a patient. Every time the phone rang, she was up from her chair before the second ring.

Dale was kinder to me, in his way. He was a retired mail carrier, and he still got up every morning with his coffee in a thermos. One evening he sat across from me on the porch and said, “Pearl, I know you’re not here just to help with the boxes.”

Then he went back inside before I could answer him.

I kept a small spiral notebook in my purse. Every envelope that came to the house, I wrote down the sender and the date. Every phone call I could hear through the wall, I wrote down the time and whether Lorna sounded worried or pleased. I had used the same habit for thirty-one years at the junior high library, where I learned that children and grown-ups both leave a trail if you watch the sign-out cards long enough.

Teddy called from Indianapolis almost every night. He was forty-four now, a good man with a good job, and he had his father’s stubborn streak. “Mom, you need to call a lawyer tomorrow,” he said. “Somebody stole from Dad’s pension for twenty-eight years. Why are you sitting in her house being polite about it?”

“Because I want to be sure, honey,” I told him. “If I make a scene now, she’ll have a story ready by the time I get to the courthouse. Give me a little more time.”

He sighed the way he did when he was a boy and didn’t like the answer. “Okay. But don’t wait too long.”

On Sunday, October 12, Lorna and Dale drove to the grocery store on Kilgore Avenue. I told them I had a headache and would stay home. As soon as the car backed out of the driveway, I went straight to the hall closet. Behind a box of Christmas lights and a stack of old church bulletins, I found a shoebox wrapped in a plastic grocery bag.

Inside was a copy of the power of attorney, dated March 3, 1998, with Walt’s name signed at the bottom. The signature looked like his on the surface, but I knew the way he made his capital W, with a little hook at the end. This W had no hook.

Beneath the form was a photocopy of a page from a notary’s record book. The handwriting at the top said the notary was Harold Pruitt, Delaware County. The entry for that date read: “Ruhl, Lorna, present; Dunaway, Walter, NOT present; witness L. Ruhl.”

I sat down on the closet floor with the page in my lap. I read the line three times, and each time it said the same thing. My husband had been gone for four weeks, and someone had been spending his name for twenty-eight years. My stomach turned slowly, the way it does on a boat.

I folded the photocopy in half and slid it into the pocket of my cardigan. My hands were shaking, but I put the shoebox back exactly where I had found it.

Then I heard tires on the gravel and a car door slam. Before I could stand, I heard Lorna’s voice on the front porch, sharp and puzzled. “Who left the storm door open?”