Marine Returns From Okinawa to Find Her Bungalow Already Sold
“The ink on a real stamp is even and consistent,” she said. “On this copy, the outer ring is slightly double-printed, like someone pressed down twice, or tried to paste a digital image onto a clean sheet of paper.”
“Could it be a bad copy machine?”
“Possibly,” Beverly said, looking up at me. “But look at the serial number on the stamp. It matches Clara’s old commission, but Clara was in the hospital with a broken hip the entire month of June. Her daughter was checking her mail.”
My collar felt tight again, and I reached up to straighten it.
“Who had access to her stamp?” I asked.
“Only Clara,” Beverly said, closing the blue book with a soft thud. “And whoever handled her office mail at the settlement agency where she used to work.”
“Which agency was that?”
“Benson Real Estate Services,” Beverly said, checking an index card in her drawer. “She worked there part-time for ten years.”
I took a slow breath, the name Gerald Benson ringing a faint bell from the county deed records I had looked at earlier.
