I had almost finished putting all the pieces together when I heard a click and clunk from the front of the apartment—Jen’s key struggling in our ancient lock. It always took some fiddling and made a lot of noise, so I was already in the front hall by the time she opened the door.
“The vulture scum are still out there,” she said, turning the deadbolt, hooking the chain latch, and pulling the shade over the front window.
“Don’t tell Mom. When she heard there were thirty- seven messages on the machine, she looked like she wanted to smash it with a hammer.”
“Where is she now?”
“In her room. With the door shut.”
“Poor thing. She’s really strung out. Those reporters were the last straw.”
“Come see my picture,” I said.
Jen put down her purse. She looked tired and I saw her glance over at my mom’s door. I could tell she really wanted to go in there and comfort her, acting more like my mother’s mother than her best friend.
“Please? It’ll just take a second.”
“All right, sweet thing,” she said, rumpling my hair, which I mostly hated because hair rumpling was something you did to little kids, and I was almost twelve. But it also felt good because there was love in it, and I needed some love just then.
“What’s this?” Jen said when I led her to my desk.
I still had some work to do on the design around the edges, but the scene was completely finished. There was a pond with lots of trees around it, their branches swaying in the wind. The sky was full of fluffy clouds, and there was a windmill off in the distance. But front and center was a girl standing beside the pond with a little flock of geese. She had a sweet face and pale hair that she wore in braids.
The artist had painted her very carefully, like a portrait. I felt as though I’d know her if I passed her on the street.
“Isn’t it pretty?” I said.
“It’s wonderful,” she agreed.
“I’m not sure what it is. Some kind of really big plate.”
“It’s a platter, hon—like what you’d put the turkey on at Christmas.” She leaned over and studied it more carefully. “Wow, Joplin. This is very fine work.”
“I’m going to glue it back together.”
“Horrors! Don’t you dare!”
“Why?”
“You’ll make a hash of it—so would I—and it’s a valuable antique. It needs to be done by an expert. If you want, I can take you to this shop I know on Bedford Street. They repair all kinds of old treasures.”
“Can we go tomorrow?”
“Sure. We’ll do it first thing. Now I need to go look in on your mom.”
She went to Mom’s door, leaned against the jamb, and gave a quick little double knock with her left hand. “Annie?” she said.
Mom peered out, looking gray and kind of feeble.
“I have some instructions for you.” Jen made herself sound like the bossy teacher everybody hates.
“And what might they be?”
“You are to draw a nice hot bath and add a few drops of lavender oil. Then you are to find a really mindless, trashy book, get in the aforementioned bath, and read till you’re wrinkled like a prune. Am I clear?”
“Bath. Oil. Book. Prune. Got it.”
“While you’re doing that, I’ll play the phone messages and delete all the garbage. I’ll make a list of any that apply to you and save them if appropriate. Then Joplin and I will go into the kitchen and scrounge up some dinner. Okay?”
“You’re an angel.”
“I know. I get that all the time.”
3
Some Rather Unpleasant Stuff
I SPRAWLED OUT ON THE couch, eyes closed, and listened while Jen went through the messages. I’ll admit I held out the faint, foolish hope that one of the calls might be for me. But mostly I was there because I didn’t want to be alone.
A lot of the messages were hang-ups—probably reporters trying to catch my mom at home. A few of them even left messages.
“Why, of course Mrs. Danforth will call you right back,” Jen would say as she hit erase, cutting them off in midsentence.
Then there were the usual reminders from the dentist and the hair salon. And sandwiched in between them were condolence calls from friends. All very nice, all pretty much the same: They were sorry for our loss.
I was almost asleep when I heard my dad’s voice.
“Anne—it’s Tom. I just heard about your father. I can only imagine how hard this must be for you.” In the background I could hear the shrieking of children: Harrison and Judith, the Feral Twins.
“You’re probably up in Maine now, so I won’t bother you on your cell. I’ll try again next week. I just wanted to say it in person—you know, how sorry I am. Bye now. Be strong.”
Jen scribbled on her pad.
Three more messages followed: two hang-ups and a squealy-voiced robo-woman announcing that we’d won a free trip to Florida.
We won that trip a lot. Jen assured me it wasn’t something we ever wanted to do. She said they fly you there for free, then put you in a room and talk to you nonstop until you’re so worn down and hungry and tired that you agree to buy a time-share.
Bored, I got up and headed for my room. I was just about to close the door when I heard Dad’s voice again.
“Hi, it’s me. Sorry to call you back so soon, but I wanted to warn you, in case you’ve been too busy to follow the news. There’s some . . . rather unpleasant stuff about your father online. I hope you’ll make sure that Joplin doesn’t see it. You probably don’t want to see it either. Anyway, I thought I’d better give you the heads-up. Hang in there. Talk to you later.”
I slipped into my room, had my computer open on my lap, and was already Googling Martin J. Camrath when Jen suddenly appeared. She plopped down beside me on the bed and shut the laptop, practically crushing my fingers.
“Ow! Could you at least let me get my hands out first?”
“Serves you right,” she snapped. “Your dad calls to warn your mom about cruel and hurtful trash online—and says he particularly doesn’t want you to look at it. So the first thing you do is come in here and start searching the internet?”
“The kids at school will’ve seen it and I’ll have to deal with it. I need to know.”
“That’s ridiculous. They’re fifth graders. They’ve never even heard of Martin J. Camrath.”
“His obituary was in all the papers. Mom said.”
“Your friends read the obituaries in the New York Times?”
“No. But their parents do, especially if it’s somebody famous. And one of them is sure to recognize our names. Then the mom or dad will say, ‘Hey, Brittany! Does the name Joplin Danforth ring a bell? Isn’t she that really weird girl in your class?’ And Brittany will say, ‘Yes, Mom or Dad, I totally despise her. Why?’ And Mom or Dad will say, ‘She’s Martin J. Camrath’s granddaughter!’ Then Brittany will say, ‘Who’s that?’ and—”
“I get it, Joplin.”
“—and Brittany will call Kimberly and say, ‘Guess what!’”
“Stop!”
“I just need to find out, okay? I know he was strange, the way he never left the house and all. But from what my dad said, this is a lot worse. Was he crazy or something?”
“No, Joplin, he was not crazy. Your grandfather was a brilliant writer who was . . . a little eccentric.”
“Like Einstein?”
“Exactly! Einstein didn’t wear socks, he was always rumpled, and his hair was a mess. But he was also a great genius. Just like your grandfather. You might use that analogy if the kids tease you at school.”
“Oh, right. Like that’ll really impress them.”
“Suit yourself. But whatever you do—” Jen stopped suddenly, blinked, and went to look out the window. Two guys in business clothes were walking in the garden, which was totally weird.
“Joplin, have you ever seen those men before? You’re out in the garden all the time.”
&
nbsp; “No. I’m usually the only person there. Sometimes there are nannies with little kids. But those two—they’re definitely suspicious.”
“They must live in one of the brownstones. How else could they have gotten in?”
This was true. The garden was private, an enormous, block-long green space shielded from the streets on all four sides by rows of town houses, plus the Episcopal church across the way.
The men were coming closer now, following a gravel path between low boxwood hedges that ran parallel to our block. They stopped for half a minute to admire one of the fountains, then took a right turn and strolled casually in the direction of our back door.
“That is so fake!” I said just as one of the men held a pocket-size camera up to his face and snapped.
“Oh!” Jen gasped. Then she was off like a flash, out of my room and into hers. I heard her scrabbling around in her closet, then the sound of the back door opening. And suddenly there she was, in the garden, running at the two men like a maniac, a golf club in her right hand raised like a weapon.
Their reaction was pretty hilarious.
First there was this startled expression, like whaaaaa?
Then they locked glances, as in yikes!
And then they were off like a couple of rockets, dashing toward the church’s back door, leaping over hedges, nearly colliding with a stone lion. They made it inside with inches to spare.
But if they thought that was the end of it, they were seriously mistaken. Jen went right in after them. Five minutes later she reappeared, merrily swinging her golf club and looking very smug.
She can be totally adorable sometimes.
“Had a few words with the church secretary,” she said when she came back, somewhat out of breath. “She’ll be keeping the garden door locked from now on.” She put her golf club away in its bag and led me back to my room. Once again we sat side by side on my bed.
“Where were we? Oh yes. Brittany and Kimberly.”
“You think it’s funny, but you don’t know how mean kids can be. And if I go back to school totally clueless—”
“I do know how mean kids can be. Adults too. We’re a mean species. Which is why your father, and your mother, and your dear auntie Jen are trying to protect you.”
“I need to know.”
“Okay, listen—it’s probably just some unflattering photos. Like, someone snuck onto his property and waited around in the bushes for Martin to take out the trash. Maybe one time he went out in his skivvies. And while he was out there, let’s say the wind blew his hair up so it looked really wild. And maybe he heard a rustling in the bushes, and saw the photographer, and yelled at him. And that’s when the guy snapped his picture. Now they’re running the photo with a story saying he was crazy. I’m making this up, but I’m probably close.”
I nodded. That’s what paparazzi did. They took embarrassing pictures of famous people and made money selling them.
“So here’s what I suggest. You promise not to go looking on your own. I’ll do some research. Then I’ll give you a full report. Okay? Is that a deal?”
I nodded again.
“Good girl. Now, we don’t want to make things any worse for your mom than they already are. I’ll talk to her about this later. Can you please not bring this up over dinner?”
“All right.”
“Oh, Joplin—don’t you go crying on me now!”
“I’m not crying.” I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and sniffed.
“Of course not. My mistake. What’s say we go grill some cheese?”
We ate on our laps in the living room, Mom in her nightgown and robe, Otis Redding on the stereo. We were all mellow and into the ice cream before Mom thought to ask about the messages.
Jen shot me a warning glance. “Tom called. He just wanted to say he was sorry. Said he’d call back.”
“That was nice.”
“He’s a nice man. Always was.”
Mom didn’t respond. Whatever went wrong between them, she never bad-mouthed him in front of me.
“The rest was the usual. I saved the reminders and condolence calls. Nothing urgent.”
“Good.” She pressed her lips together, a nervous habit when she was thinking. “Jen, I called Jackson Sloan about the papers. He was wonderful.”
“Of course he was. If there’s anything in those boxes that even remotely resembles a novel, it’ll sell a million copies. If it’s any good, it’ll sell twenty million. You could have held an auction, you know. Then Jackson would’ve had to bid for it.”
“Why would I do that? Sloan, Hart was always Daddy’s publisher. And Jackson is an old friend. I want him to publish the books if there’s anything of value. He’ll do it right. And honestly, Jen—I can’t handle this alone. I need to be involved, but it would take me years to read and organize it all.”
“I know.”
“Also, I want Dad’s papers out of here. They need to be someplace safe. Jackson’s coming over at ten tomorrow to pick them up. He’s hiring an armored truck, if you can believe it. And people to carry the boxes.”
“Awesome!” I said. “Can I tell Upstairs Chloe?”
“I told him about the reporters,” Mom went on, as if I hadn’t just asked a question. “He said he was going to call a security company and get some agents out here to watch our apartment. Just for a while, till things cool down.”
“Don’t you think they’ll leave us alone once they see that the papers are gone?”
“I doubt it. They still want to interview me.”
“Of course. Modern journalism at its best: ‘Mrs. Danforth, how did you feel when you heard that your father had died?’” She shoved an imaginary microphone in Mom’s direction and did a fake-Mom voice. “‘I felt really crappy.’” Then both arms wide like a banner headline: “Breaking News! Daughter of Martin J. Camrath Feels Sad!”
Jen could usually make people laugh, and she was trying really hard this time. But Mom just sighed. “Anyway, Jackson thought we should have some protection.”
“What’s it going to cost us?”
“Nothing. He’s paying for it.”
“You mean Sloan, Hart is paying.”
“No, Jackson himself, out of his own pocket. He said to think of it as a gift.”
“My, my!” Jen flashed a wicked grin. “He sure knows how to woo a girl—armored trucks, box schleppers, security guards!”
“Nonsense,” Mom said. “This is just business.”
“Oh, right. Business.”
“Anyway, I really hate to ask this after everything you’ve already done, but are you working tomorrow?”
“Not till Monday, why?”
“Well, once they’ve picked up the boxes, I need to go up to the Sloan, Hart offices. Jackson’s rounding up a team of editorial assistants as we speak, to organize and catalog the papers. They’ll all be on hand and I need to approve the storage space and set the ground rules. No taking anything out of the room, no one ever alone in there, that sort of thing.”
“Sounds like a caper movie,” I said. And once again my mind went to ninjas on ropes, only this time the scene involved a sixty-story building and crashing through a plate-glass window. “Can I call Chloe now?”
“It’ll take me most of the day, I’m afraid.”
“Not to worry,” Jen said. “As it happens, Joplin and I were just planning an all-day excursion to—where was it again, sweetie?”
“Paris?”
“Right. Paris.”
“Ah. Well, bon voyage then.”
4
Lucius Doyle, Antiques
IT WAS A QUARTER TO ten. I sat with Chloe on the front stoop while she took pictures of the reporters across the street, zooming in on individual faces.
“They look so bored,” she muttered (click, click). “And I am irritating them so much. They keep giving me dirty looks.”
“Good,” I said.
Jackson Sloan pulled up in a little blue car, arousing the photographers’ interest. He had
on pressed jeans and a crisp white shirt. His loafers were really shiny. He reminded me of the guy in that magazine ad—you know, the handsome older man who wants to pass his Rolex down to his son? Or probably it was his grandson.
Mom came out to meet him and they stood together on the sidewalk. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he put his hand on her shoulder while they talked.
“Jen thinks he likes my mom.”
“Really?” Chloe put her camera down. “You mean likes as in likes?”
“Yeah.”
“She could do a lot worse. Cute guy. Nice car.”
“Yeah. His family owns a publishing company.”
“Better still.”
Jen came out to join them just as Jackson’s cell phone rang. He held it to his ear and nodded. Then moments later a boxy white truck turned a corner and headed our way. It looked like a military vehicle. Probably had bulletproof glass.
“That is so awesome!” Chloe said, behind her camera again, clicking away. Across the street, the press had parted like the Red Sea, scattering in both directions in hopes of getting an angle where the truck wouldn’t block their view.
Chloe and I had the best seats of all.
Two guards hopped out of the truck. They wore dark blue uniforms with gold buttons and official-looking badges. I knew they weren’t real police, just fancy rent-a-cops, but they had guns and looked plenty intimidating. They even shot suspicious looks in our direction.
“It’s okay,” Jen said. “They’re family.” I saw Chloe grin at that from behind her camera.
Next came the box schleppers, four pumped-up guys in a Toyota van. They scurried over to Jackson Sloan, who gave them their instructions. Then, with the guards protecting the perimeter and Jen inside the apartment showing them what to take, they cleared all the boxes from our living room and loaded them into the truck. It took them half the time it had taken us to carry them in—maybe fifteen minutes from start to finish.
The guards locked up, which was something of a production, then hopped into the cab and drove away. The box schleppers followed in their van. Mom and Jackson Sloan brought up the rear, following the procession uptown to the publishing office.
Joplin, Wishing Page 2