The Westing Game

it was about to magically disappear off the left edge of the moving screen. “Oh my, I’ve forgotten what that means.”
Turtle sighed. “It means five hundred shares of SEA was traded at $8.50 a share.”
“What did we pay?”
“Never mind, just write down the prices of our stocks as they cross the tape like I’m doing. Once school opens it’s all up to you.” Turtle did not tell her partner that they had bought two hundred shares of SEA at $15.25 a share. On that stock alone they had a loss of $1,350, not counting commissions. It took nerves of steel to play the stock market.
“THE MERCEDES IS wiped clean and shiny like new,” the doorman boasted. His face reddened around old scars as he rejected a folded five-dollar bill. “No tips, Judge, please, not after all you’ve done for the wife and me.” The judge had given him the entire ten thousand dollars.
J. J. Ford pocketed the bill and, to make amends for her thoughtless gesture, asked the doorman about his family.
Sandy perched on the edge of a straight-backed chair, adjusted his round wire-framed glasses, repaired at the bridge with adhesive tape, across his broken nose, and told about his children. “Two boys still in high school, one daughter married and expecting my third grandchild (her husband just lost his job so they all moved in with us), another daughter who works part-time as a typist (she plays the piano real good), and two sons who work in a brewery.”
“It must have been difficult supporting such a large family,” the judge said.
“Not so bad. I picked up odd jobs here and there after I got fired from the Westing plant for trying to organize the union, but mostly I boxed. I wasn’t no middleweight contender, but I wasn’t bad, either. Got my face smashed up a few times too many, though; still get some pretty bad headaches and my brain gets sort of fuzzy. Some dummy of a partner you got stuck with, huh, Judge?”
“We’ll do just fine, partner.” Judge Ford’s attempt at familiarity fell flat. “I did try to phone you, but your name was not listed.”
“We don’t have a phone no more; couldn’t afford it with the kids making so many calls. But I did make some headway on our clues. Want to see?” Sandy removed a paper from the inside of his cap and placed it on the desk. Judge Ford noticed a flask protruding from the back pocket of his uniform, but his breath smelled of peppermint.
The clues as figured out by Alexander McSouthers:
SKIES   AM   SHINING   BROTHER
SKIES—Sikes (Dr. Sikes witnessed the will)
AM BrothER—Amber (Otis Amber)
SHINing—Shin (the middle name of James Shin Hoo or what Turtle kicks)
BROTHER—Theo or Chris Theodorakis
“Remarkable,” the judge commented to Sandy’s delight. “However, we are looking for one name, not six.”
“Gee, Judge, I forgot,” Sandy said dejectedly.
Judge Ford told him about Theo’s proposal, but Sandy refused to go along. “It seems too easy, the clues adding up to one message, especially for a shrewd guy like Westing. Let’s stick it out together, just the two of us. After all, I got me the smartest partner of them all.”
Shallow flattery for the big tipper, the judge thought. McSouthers was not a stupid man; if only he was less obsequious—and less of a gossip.
The doorman scratched his head. “What I can’t figure out, Judge, is why I’m one of the heirs. Unless Sam Westing just up and died, and there is no murderer. Unless Sam Westing is out to get somebody from his grave.”
“I agree with you entirely, Mr. McSouthers. What we have to find out is who these sixteen heirs are, and which one, as you say, was Westing ‘out to get.’”
Sandy beamed. They were going to play it his way.
“WHAT YOU NEED is an advertising campaign.”
“What I need is my half of the ten thousand dollars.”
“Five thousand dollars is what I estimate the redecorating and the newspaper ads will cost.”
“Get out of here, get out!”
Grace stared at Hoo’s smooth, broad face, at the devilish tufts of eyebrow so high above those flashing eyes, then she turned her back and walked out. Sometimes she wondered about that man—no, he couldn’t be the murderer, he couldn’t even kill the waterbug in the sink this morning. Grace spun around to see if she was being followed on the footstep-hushing carpet in the third-floor hall. No one was there, but she heard voices. They were coming from her kitchen. It was nothing, just Otis Amber shouting at Crow, something about losing their clues.
“I remember them, Otis,” Crow replied in a soft voice. She felt strangely at peace. Just this morning she had been given the chance to hide her love in Angela’s bag, the big tapestry shoulder bag she carries next to her heart. Now she must pray that the boy comes back.
“I remember them, too, that’s not the point,” Otis Amber argued. “What if somebody else finds them? Crow? Are you listening to me, Crow?”
No, but Grace Wexler was listening. “Really, Mr. Amber, can’t you find another time to discuss your affairs with my cleaning woman. And where are you going, Crow?”
Crow was buttoned up in a black moth-eaten winter coat; a black shawl covered her head.
“It’s freezing in here.” Otis Amber shut the window.
Grace opened the window. “The last thing I need is a gas explosion,” she said peevishly.
“Boom!” he replied. The two women were so startled that the delivery boy sneaked up on the unsuspecting for the rest of the week, shouting “Boom!”
Besides shouting “Boom!” Otis Amber delivered groceries from the shopping center to Sunset Towers, back and forth, to and fro. Not only did the tenants have to restock their bare shelves, they had to add Westing Paper Products by the gross to their orders. “Idiots, just because the will said Buy Westing Paper Products,” he muttered, hefting a bulky bag from the compartment attached to his bike. Even Crow was using Westing Disposable Diapers to polish the silver