Trusts, Wills, And Codicils - A Wealthy Renegade Goes Rogue And Spends Every Last Dime Of His Children's Inheritance

Harrington Parsons did justice to his name.  Parsimony had been the byword of generations of Parsons since the Revolutionary War where his great forbear, Hiram Parsons led the 3rd Connecticut militia into battle against the Redcoats in Winchester; or since the Civil War when General Harrison Parsons fought Lee's Georgia Division at the battle of Macon; or since the World Wars where ancestors on both sides of the family fought valiantly for God and for country.  

 

None of these Parsons ever spent more than what something was worth, and all were guided by a sense of inherent value. Ezekiel Parsons, shipbuilder and owner of a fleet of sailing ships plying the Three Cornered Trade, made millions from the lucrative business of carrying African slaves, molasses, and rum; and was famous for his oft-repeated adage, 'Not a penny more'. 

This of course was how the Parsons made, invested, traded, and profited from their hard work. Why pay more? was heard from Beacon Hill to Nantucket, and the flinty old New Englanders were admired for their careful, practicality but never particularly liked or loved - their rock-ribbed thrift seemed to be a personal trait as well as a financial one, and every Parsons was thrifty about their acquaintances and few friendships.

Pictures of Cotton Mather hung on the walls of Ezekiel Parsons' home as a constant reminder that God took offense at indiscipline and intemperance.  Money was not simply a currency but a symbol of earning - the rewards of hard work, faith, and obedience.  To waste it was ignorant and wrong. 

The Parsons homestead - an 18th Century colonial frame house in Wellesley - had been the home to generations of Parsons, kept up, kept simply, and provided the necessities of shelter.  Beyond that, nothing decorated the parlor, the halls, the library, or the bedrooms - nothing except the portrait of Cotton Mather, an original, bought in the early days and affixed on the north wall of the house as a permanent reminder of duty, honor, and above all parsimony. 

The house was not far from Hawthorne's house of the seven gables in Salem, a home the reader will remember was the residence of many generations of Pyncheons, and a portrait of the patriarch of the clan hung, as that of Cotton Mather did in the Parsons' house, prominently on the north wall of the parlor.  Why north walls were favored by the old Puritans remained a mystery, perhaps something to do with the New England cold, and a reminder that fires were only temporary respite from the harsh  realities of life.

Along with the family Bible, old accounting books  passed were passed on to succeeding generations as part of their legacy.  They were both central to the life of the family - faith and frugality - and their physical presence gave permanent, perennial notice to anyone living in the house of their duty to both. 

Harrington (Harry) Parsons was the last of the Parsons line and as such was considered by extant, distant relatives to be a keeper of the flame, the repository of legacy, history, and fame; and yet there had always been something about the famous Parsons parsimony that nettled and irritated him.  While his friends, colleagues, and classmates were careful with their resources, modest in their tastes, and quite sensible about money, they were not the lock-and-key variety.  They enjoyed a good dinner, a winter week in the Bahamas, a summer on Lake Geneva, and God knows paramours and trysts on every continent. 

Yet all Harry could do, so immured in his own hidebound family traditions, was watch in envy and a growing resentment.  He had considerable wealth, but none of it was to be spent - all was carefully husbanded, tended, and kept safely away from the IRS to be passed on untouched to his children.  He had done this, no one else, for it was part of the family ritual.  Money was not for spending. 

His children, however, were wealthy in their own right - not fabulously so like many of their forbears, but well-off enough never to have to worry.  They were not expecting nor hoping for the inheritance coming to them from Harry and his wife, all of which gave Harry pause. Time and time again, his lawyers met with his accountants to tighten up the many trusts set up long ago to shelter his assets.  They added addenda, codicils, and caveats to make sure they were airtight, untouchable by hungry probate courts. 

One day, Harry was on his way to coffee in his old Corolla beater, a twenty-five year old relic which had served him well but was rattling and sputtering more than usual, and fearful that it would die on the Beltway, he prepared for the inevitable - buying a new car.  

Now, in the past, a new car purchase like any other was done meticulously and carefully down to the penny - not one cent more than was absolutely necessary was to be spent on transportation.  Let others waste their money on precipitous buys, his mother had always said, but not a Parsons; but this time was different, walked into the Porsche dealership, plunked down his money for a new, bright red Carrera and drove it off the lot.  The junkman came for the Corolla, he booked First Class seats to St. Bart's, cancelled his doctors' appointments, cleared his desk, sat by the fire, sipped his Lagavulin, and lit a Cuban.  He was a happy man. 

He made an offer on a Biscayne Bay condominium, got fitted for an Armani ensemble, made reservations at La Table Ronde, a five-star Michelin restaurant, and bought a twenty-foot catamaran and a slip on the Severn River for it. 

His wife was buggered and nonplussed by this sudden change, but there was nothing she could do.  While their money was jointly held, each had signatory, withdrawal powers; so she watched as untold thousands of dollars - her children's carefully husbanded, shielded, and protected inheritance - went down the drain, spent without cause, without reason by a man she thought she knew. 

'And just where have you been?', she asked after he wandered in at five in the morning looking happy but a bit disheveled after delightful hours with Claudette, one of Mme. de Rochambeau's prized girls.  She cost thousands, but was worth every penny, so adept was she at seduction that he could imagine that she was his and his alone.  In fact he could not stay away, and despite the now hundreds of thousands spent on her and their weekends together, he watched with delight as the bottom line sank.  

He was drawing down on his wealth, enjoying the last few decades of his life, turning his back on the famous Parsons parsimony, and looking forward to nothing but good times.  

His wife sputtered and fumed, but so intricately tied was she to all the trusts and financial instruments the lawyers and accountants had set up, that she could do nothing but watch the holdings of their portfolio diminish day by day. 

'Sorry, Sweetheart', Harry said on his way out the door. 'Got a date with God', one of his new apocryphal statements which as much as she parsed and disassembled, she couldn't make heads nor tails of.  That was because she was a Lancaster, not far removed from the historical Parsons and no stranger to parsimony herself, so she couldn't understand that her husband had finally released himself from the tethers of parsimony, and planned to meet God with no baggage whatsoever. 

'Hallelujah', he said, tipping his hat.