by Gerald Elias
‘Yeah,’ Jacobus said.
‘I know about Borlotti,’ a woman said. The voice was like the Macallan. Smooth but potent. All business.
‘Amadeo Borlotti?’ Jacobus asked.
‘You know another Borlotti?’
‘What about him?’
‘He’s gotten me in trouble.’
‘Who are you?’
‘I can’t tell you.’
‘Well, I don’t do anonymous accusations over the phone.’
After an indecisive silence, the caller hung up.
NINE
Tuesday, December 27
After breakfast they left Jacobus’s house for the colonial town of Sheffield. Light flurries blew like dust in a brisk breeze. Nathaniel had packed his bags and the mysterious parcel of wood in the trunk of Yumi’s car, because after their visit to the antique shop, Yumi would drive Nathaniel to the Metro North train station at Wassaic for the two-hour commute to Grand Central.
It was hard to know which had come first, Sheffield or antique stores. Among the many that lined the town’s main drag, Westerhauser Antiques stood out. With its white clapboard exterior and a pair of ferocious marble lions guarding its brick walkway, Westerhauser Antiques communicated am unmistakeable message: ‘If you’re not filthy rich, don’t even bother coming in.’
Jacobus waited impatiently in Yumi’s car, listening to a WAMC roundtable about the newest corruption scandal in the New York State legislature, while Nathaniel knocked on the store’s front door and received the same response as he had from his phone call the day before. None. Yumi, tramping through snow, wiped frost off the showroom window with her parka sleeve, revealing a gaudy collection of furniture that appeared to have just been delivered from Versailles. But there was no sign of human activity inside.
A banging on the car window interrupted Jacobus’s attention from the radio program.
‘What?’ Jacobus said. ‘Can’t I even listen to corruption in peace?’
‘What are you people doing here?’ a voice said. It was not a friendly voice.
‘Shopping. My Louis Quatorze bidet is busted. What’s it to you?’ Jacobus replied.
‘I’m security.’
Jacobus had trouble hearing the man’s voice with the radio on and through the window. He turned off the radio but couldn’t open the window without the key, which Yumi had with her, so he opened the door to the cold blast of winter.
‘And I’m freezing my ass off,’ Jacobus said, ‘so tell me where we can find Arnold Westerhauser and we can all go home.’
‘The store is closed for the season.’
‘No kidding. Shall we play twenty questions?’
‘Mr Westerhauser lives in New York City.’
‘Care to narrow that down?’
‘Sir, I am not at liberty to divulge his address.’
‘How about his phone number?’
‘Sir, I am not at liberty to divulge his private number.’
‘Well, if I divulge to you my private number, which can only be found in an obscure little book called the White Pages, would you be at liberty to divulge to Prince Westerhauser that a certain Daniel Jacobus is seeking information in regard to a possible criminal investigation?’
Jacobus held a five-dollar bill at arm’s length that flapped in the wind until it was plucked out of his hand.
‘I’ll see what I can do, sir.’
When Nathaniel and Yumi returned to the car, Nathaniel said, ‘I’m afraid we’ve struck out, Jake.’
‘Amateurs,’ Jacobus said.
Nathaniel hugged Yumi goodbye at the train station.
‘And thanks for being such a charming host, Jake,’ he said. ‘Best Christmas ever.’
‘If I didn’t know you better, I’d think you were telling the truth,’ Jacobus replied.
Nathaniel promised to call as soon as he found out anything from Boris Dedubian about the beguiling planks of wood.
After the train left, Yumi drove them back to Jacobus’s house. The sky had cleared and was a brilliant blue. The bright sun reflected off the snow, making it sparkle.
‘And when do you have to go back to New York?’ Jacobus asked her. ‘I thought you worked for a living.’
‘We’re on our winter break. Not enough people are in the mood to go to symphony concerts right after the holidays. I guess they have to recover from all the partying before they can digest Brahms again. But I can’t complain. I’ve got two more weeks of freedom.’
‘Plans?’
‘Other than to play duets with you?’
‘OK, cut the BS.’
‘I hoped I could spend the next few days here, and maybe do some shopping and antiquing –’ Jacobus laughed at that – ‘then go back to the city for New Year’s weekend, and then, whatever. Is that all right?’
‘Why not? Trotsky enjoys your company.’
Jacobus and Yumi returned to the Last Supper puzzle while listening to a Met performance of Handel’s Giulio Cesare on the radio. A supposedly renowned mezzo who Jacobus had neither heard of nor wished to hear again sang the florid eponymous role, originally composed for a castrato. As impressed as Jacobus was with Handel’s music, he had a hard time imagining that the real Julius Caesar could have had a voice in the same range as Tiny Tim.
‘Too bad the ides of March didn’t come sooner,’ he said, which was the moment the phone rang. It was Arnold Westerhauser, who seemed to want to atone for the brusque treatment Jacobus had received from his security guard.
‘This is the dead season for antiques in the Berkshires,’ Westerhauser said. ‘There’s no sense keeping the store open when no one’s around.’
‘If I may be so bold as to ask,’ Jacobus said, ‘why does a fancy outfit like yours bother to advertise in a working-class rag like the Shopper’s Guide?’
‘I ask myself that very question sometimes. But you see, in addition to our store we also do estate sales, and when you buy an entire estate you don’t always have consistent quality, so we have a lot of merchandise that we want to dispose of quickly. You know, some of the less expensive items like lamps, kitchenware, memorabilia. What my Jewish colleagues call schlock. You’d be surprised how many people respond to our ad in the Shopper’s Guide.’
‘Do those lesser expensive items include violins?’ Jacobus asked.
‘We don’t actively seek them out, but we do get them from time to time with the estate merchandise.’
‘Have you ever had any business dealings with a man named Amadeo Borlotti?’
Westerhauser chuckled.
‘Funny sounding name, huh?’ Jacobus said.
‘No, it’s not that,’ Westerhauser replied. ‘Yes, I’ve had dealings with Mr Borlotti. What I laugh at is that he only buys the lower end instruments that come our way. A few hundred dollars. Maybe a thousand, tops. It keeps spare change in our cash register. Though I’m no expert in this field by any means, I’ve offered to sell him a few better instruments at cost, but he always says it’s out of his price range and only takes the bargain basement items.’
‘Did you know that Borlotti is missing?’
‘No.’ Westerhauser sounded truly surprised. ‘That’s the first I’ve heard. But then again, he’s outside my circle.’
‘You have any idea where he might be?’
‘Certainly not.’
He sounded truly offended.
TEN
After the call from Westerhauser, it was time for dinner. Yumi decided that she’d had enough pork roast and stew to last a few years, so she drove off to K&J’s for a pizza. She asked what Jacobus wanted on it.
‘Anything but pineapple or barbecued chicken,’ he said. ‘They’d throw up in Italy if they saw those things on a pizza.’
‘You say so!’ she laughed, closing the door behind her.
Jacobus called Benson to report on their progress, or lack thereof. Benson decided he might question Westerhauser himself to find out what he was doing the night Borlotti’s house burned down, since Sheffield was j
ust over the hill from Egremont Falls.
‘Good luck getting his phone number,’ Jacobus said.
Jacobus asked Benson if he had learned anything more from his scant evidence. Benson informed him that the cleaver next to Borlotti’s bed was clean, but the knife by the kitchen door had traces of blood.
‘That’s not a big surprise, is it?’ Jacobus said.
‘Why not?’
‘It’s a kitchen.’
‘Oh, I should have mentioned. It’s human.’
‘That’s a big help. Chances are we could even narrow it down to North America.’
‘We don’t know Borlotti’s blood type yet, but we sent it to the experts at the lab. They’re working on it.’ Benson’s tone suggested that Jacobus lacked sufficient reverence for ‘the experts.’ It seemed he was capable of offending whole classes of people.
Jacobus asked about the one remaining item, or items, that were next to Borlotti’s bed. The letters.
‘As I said, they were illegible,’ Benson said, somewhat testily, as if repeating himself was a waste of his time.
‘Hey, Sigurd,’ Jacobus said, ‘Get something straight. I’m not doubting your competence. I’m just trying to help, and only because you asked me for my help. So take the stick out of your ass. There’s more to a letter than what’s written on it, or haven’t you read your Sherlock Holmes manual? The paper, the envelope, the glue sealing it, the stamp, whether it’s typed or handwritten. What can you tell me?’
‘Hold on,’ Benson said, his tone suggesting he grudgingly conceded the point. ‘I’ll get them.’
‘OK,’ he said when he returned to the phone. ‘As I said, you can’t read a word, but you can make out they were handwritten, and generally in pencil.’
‘Can you tell whether it’s a man’s or woman’s handwriting?’
‘Sorry, too far gone. The envelopes are all the same kind; cheap, letter-sized, like the ones that come in a box of a hundred at Kmart. The paper is equally cheap-looking. In fact, some of them look like they were written on the backs of scraps of sales receipts or something. No way to tell.’
‘So the author of the letters might have been working class or poor? Maybe writing from a workplace?’ Jacobus theorized.
‘Could be. The stamps are standard twenty-five-cents. That’s all there is. What else can I tell you?’
‘I assume the stamps have postmarks. Can you make out a date they were cancelled?’
‘Too blurry.’
‘How about where they were cancelled?’
‘Hard to say. I can only make out a letter or two on some of them. Let me try to piece them together.’
‘You do that,’ Jacobus said. ‘I’ll just read War and Peace until you’re finished.’
While he waited, he heard Yumi’s car come down the driveway. When she entered the house, the aroma of sausage, peppers, and onions made his stomach start to churn in anticipation. Trotsky, who started barking, shared his sentiment.
‘I think I’ve got it,’ Benson said finally.
‘Great. I only got up to chapter four.’
‘It’s either Sarasota … or Saratoga.’
Jacobus’s antenna shot up, but before he acted on it he needed to act on his appetite.
‘Let me chew on that, Benson. I’ve gotta go,’ he said.
‘But—’
‘Sorry. The pizza’s getting cold,’ Jacobus said and hung up.
He ate quickly, partly the result of his hunger but more in his eagerness to make yet one more phone call prompted by Benson’s disclosure. What they didn’t finish, Yumi put in the fridge for Jacobus to salvage sometime within the next year. Then she dialed a phone number for him and went upstairs to practice – even though the ceiling was so low she had to sit down to play – so that she’d be out of Jacobus’s hair.
‘You said Borlotti isn’t a wealthy man,’ Jacobus said to Jimmy Ubriaco.
‘Yes, that’s what I said.’
‘Yet,’ Jacobus pursued, ‘he does all these freebies and gives money away left and right.’
‘Your point being?’
‘How can a poor man afford to be so magnanimous?’
‘I’m not sure that those two things are mutually exclusive. He always says, “What’s money, after all? Just something to make you happy. And if you don’t spend it, how can it make you happy?” He has simple tastes so he has enough to get by. And, he’s got a generous soul.
‘I’ll give you a f’rinstance. One time he did a soundpost repair on a run-of-the-mill violin, but in writing out the bill he accidentally adds an extra zero and charges fifteen hundred dollars instead of one hundred and fifty, OK? He’s like that sometimes. You know, head in the clouds.
‘The violin’s owner doesn’t even look at the bill because she knows Amadeo’s an honest guy and just sends it off to the insurance company, which pays the claim. You know, even with the mistake in the bill, it wasn’t so much more than what the big New York City repairmen charge, which you and I both know is outrageous. A hundred fifty bucks! That’s nothing for that kind of job. When the check comes, Amadeo immediately sees his error and wants to send the difference back to the insurance company. But he’s not a rich man, and neither was she, so in the end I convince him to chalk one up to good luck. The two of them evenly split the thirteen hundred and fifty dollar mistake and Amadeo donated his half to the school music program.’
While Jacobus was listening to Ubriaco’s story he also heard Yumi practicing the first movement of the famous Mozart Sonata in E minor for violin and piano. It was hard for him to concentrate on one line of thought without losing the other thread, but did he sense there was a connection between the two? He listened to Yumi a little more before responding to Ubriaco.
‘So let me understand,’ he said. ‘Now you’re telling me Amadeo’s got a generous soul to go with the gentle soul you told us about the last time we talked to you. Anything else he’s got in his soul?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You see, so far I’ve got this image of the Little Old Violinmaker, Me, all by his lonesome, chiseling wood in his little elf shop, sipping nostalgic espressos at The Last Drop, and toddling off for Sunday Hail Marys. A piece of the puzzle is missing. What else is in the picture? What’s Borlotti saying in confession, Jimmy, that he doesn’t want the vast unwashed to hear? What’s spicing up his life other than bocce on the green? Is wood the only thing he’s chiseling?’
‘You’re making something out of nothing.’
‘Hey, who’s blind here? Someone turned generous Amadeo’s house and livelihood into a pile of stinking, smoldering ash! Someone made gentle Amadeo vanish in the night like the ghost of Christmas Yet to Come!’
‘I’ve told you everything I know!’
‘Really? Tell me about Saratoga, Jimmy.’
An abrupt silence. An answer in itself.
‘Ah, so it does ring a bell! Could it be Saint Amadeo has some less than savory associates at the racetrack?’
‘No doubt you’ll read too much into this, Mr Jacobus, which is why I hadn’t mentioned it, but, yes, Amadeo loves to go to the track. Maybe he’s even in Saratoga this very moment.’
‘Now? Watching the horses pull sleds?’
‘No, I suppose not. He mostly goes in the summer. During the season.’
‘A big-time gambler then? Hit the jackpot for a while, but then his luck ran out?’
‘He doesn’t bet.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘That’s what he says.’
‘That’s what he says? You mean you don’t you go with him, his bosom buddy from the old country who he sees every day?’
‘No, I’ve never gone with him. He says he loves to watch the animals run and wants to be all by himself.’
‘That reminds me of the constipated horse that came in last.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Lame horse shit.’
‘He’s never lied to me. Yet …’
‘Go ahead. I’m
on pins and needles.’
‘I’ve offered to go with him, you know, just for the hell of it, but he always refuses. And whenever I’ve asked him about it, he says it costs him a lot of money to go to the track. Then he gives me a little smile – kind of a sad smile – and says he puts all his money on his flower child.’
‘How touching. So he goes to the track and loses money on his flower child, but doesn’t bet.’
‘That’s what he says.’
‘Jimmy, has it ever occurred to you that My Flower Child might be the name of a horse?’
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr Jacobus. Gambling has nothing to do with this. And I resent the way you talk about my closest friend.’
‘Well, get this, Jimmy. Your pal is missing along with a lot of violins. His house is burned down, and ulterior motives are multiplying like rabbits. Somewhere there’s a reason and it seems to me like money might be a good place to start.’
‘Actually,’ said Ubriaco, ‘it’s a good place to finish.’
Ubriaco hung up on him, not unexpectedly. Jacobus was fully aware of his penchant for unpleasantness but felt justified when people stonewalled him. There were times, though, when he felt his inner rage about to explode, righteous though it may be. The dizziness, the pressure inside his head. The inability to exhibit restraint. So it was a sense of relief more than anything else when Ubriaco terminated their conversation.
He slumped back into his couch, breathing deeply to bring himself back down to his normal crustiness. Yumi was still practicing the Mozart. Focusing on the music helped him. He paid special attention to how she varied the nuance each time she played the plaintive melody. Though Mozart wrote the same melody four times during the movement in identical fashion for the violin – five if you count when it’s in B-Minor – the piano accompaniment is different every time, changing the atmospheric conditions and suggesting different meanings, different emotions, different directions. Yumi, practicing those eight measures over and over again, coloring them this way and that so they were never exactly the same twice in a row, pulled it off so effectively that Jacobus could intuit the underlying changing harmonies, even though there was no piano to be heard.