That Christmas Feeling by Catherine Palmer, Gail Gaymer Martin Page B

her cats following the hem of their owner’s ratty pink bathrobe. “Bunch of old pine branches…I never did understand the point of such nonsense. But I guess it’s all right. Got the fool thing out of the house, anyhow. It stank to high heaven.”
    “You thought the wreath smelled bad? Aunt Flossie, your house still reeks after all those cats. I’m beginning to wonder if we’ll ever get rid of the odor. I imagine the curtains will have to go. And certainly what’s left of the wallpaper has to come down.”
    “Sure, take everything. Leave me with nothing. I know that’s what you want anyhow.”
    Smiling at the now familiar refrain, Claire set the gold-wrapped gift on a lovely mahogany table with a polished marble top. One of the volunteers had taken on the table as a special project, and tonight it fairly gleamed in the firelight that warmed the room with a golden glow. Homer and Virgil resumed their positions on a new rug that someone had bought at the local discount store, and Flossie settled into a chair that had been draped with a thick wool bedspread.
    “Well, sit down, girl,” the woman said. “What are you planning to do, stand there all night?”
    “I just wanted to absorb everything for a moment,” Claire explained as she seated herself on the edge of a settee that still needed to be reupholstered. “People have worked so hard here, Aunt Flossie. Your house is really beginning to look like a home again.”
    “I guess so. It’s a bother, though, folks dropping by morning and night. People hammering and sawing. And you—you’re the one who took away all my paintings! Why’d you do that? I liked those pictures! They’re mine, and I don’t want anyone to—”
    “I already told you, Aunt Flossie,” Claire cut in, taking her gift from the table and handing it to her aunt. “I’ve sent them to a preservation service for analysis. We need to find out who the artists are, when the pictures were painted and whether they’re salvageable.”
    “Whether they’re worth anything is what you mean.” She cast her niece a glance of reproach. “Don’t think I’m ignorant. I’m not too old to know what you’re up to. You want all this for yourself!”
    “Now, Aunt Flossie, we’ve been over this several times already.” Claire pulled a sheet of paper from her purse and set it on the table beside Flossie’s chair. “Here’s the paper for you to sign. A lawyer in town was nice enough to draw it up. It’s not a proper will—you’ll have to have her help with that. But it does allow you to specify what you want to happen to the house and all its possessions after you’re gone. This is a legal document, and all you have to do is fill in the blank here, and sign it.”
    “Well,” Flossie said, crossing her arms. “Sounds like trickery to me.”
    “It’s not a trick. After I leave, you read it over and sign it if you want. Even if you don’t sign it, I won’t inherit any of your possessions, Aunt Flossie. I’m not your next of kin. My parents and their siblings have that role.”
    “They all deeded this house over to me. It’s mine.”
    “That’s right, and you get to decide what happens to it.”
    Claire sighed and leaned back on the settee. How many times had she tried to explain this to her aunt? Nothing seemed to dent Flossie’s certainty that everyone was out to get her. She was skeptical of the hard work that had gone into making her house fit to live in. She distrusted the people who had given so much of their time and labor without expecting anything in return. And she still believed her niece was conspiring behind her back.
    Perhaps this was all part of the mental illness that had plagued Aunt Flossie since the death of her husband. Claire had made appointments with both a medical doctor and a psychiatrist in the nearby city of Springfield, but those examinations would have to wait until after the holidays. She certainly hoped the professionals could come up with a way to ease