Stealing With Style

by Emyl Jenkins

  Jane's garish appearance, her guarded demeanor, and the hodgepodge assortment of things in her house just didn't jive. I remembered then what my friend, Cyndee Moore, once told me. "One's shoes are the windows to your soul." I had laughed at the time. Now I stole a quick look at Jane Finn's feet. She wore clunky heeled, open-toed, baby blue sandals with ankle straps. (How could I have missed them?) Her stockings were the reinforced-toe type that, like her choice in foundation, were two shades too dark for her complexion. Summer shoes. A fake tan. Good lord! It was a cold, damp twenty-eight degrees outside. Who was she trying to fool?

  With a little more time, I could have analyzed the dickens out of the situation. Right now there were pressing questions and I needed answers. Fast. This was a one-shot chance.

  Jane Finn just sat and stared straight at me. I dug in and resorted to the sort of chatter I'd always complained about hearing from my clients and moved into territory I felt more comfortable in than shoe analysis.

  "My grandmother had a pretty candlestick like that one," I offered.

  Jane Finn, the orphaned-as-a-child, widowed-as-a-youngwoman, now past-middle-age sitter for the sick elderly, nervously brushed at some speck on her navy blue slacks. Watching her I didn't notice the bracelet that had set Ed Pavich off, but her diamond ring caught my eye. The center diamond was at least a carat, but it looked even larger, thanks to the sparkling diamond baguettes set in a circle surrounding it. The setting and its era were unmistakable. Daddy had given Mother a ring exactly like it when I was horn in 1954. Well, not exactly like it. Mother's center stone was closer to a half carat than a carat, and instead of fully cut baguettes her diamond was surrounded by deep blue sapphire chips, my birthstone. I filed the information, especially the era of the ring, away.

  "Was the candlestick your grandmother's, too?" I asked.

  Jane Finn clearly had reverted back to her quiet self. She only half-smiled at me with those lips of hers. The silent implication was yes.

  "You're so lucky to still have yours," I chattered on, fighting off the temptation to steal another glance at her feet. "Isn't it funny how something as simple as a candlestick can mean so much? I don't know what happened to my grandmother's. The last time I saw it, it was on the top shelf on the whatnot in the front hall. Those family pieces mean so much."

  I searched for something more to say.

  "I remember one night we had a storm and the electricity went out," I fibbed. "Mamma, that's what I called my grandmother, lit all the candles in the house. Yes, that was the last time I remember seeing it. You are so lucky to have yours. I've looked around in some antiques shops. There are plenty around, but they're getting more and more expensive."

  Jane Finn finally responded. "I wouldn't think that would be a problem for you," she said.

  After a moment or two she asked, "When do you think you'll be bringing your aunt to Leemont, Mrs. Glass?" punctuating first the "Mrs.," then "Glass."

  When was the last time I'd been called Mrs. Glass?

  "Of course I have to convince Aunt Dorothy," I said, "hut they just had another nine inches of snow earlier this week. I think Mother Nature may have done my job for me." I was trying to keep the conversation light, but Jane Finn was all business.

  "This spring, then? I have other clients, you know, so I'll need to know when you might need me."

  "Yes. I understand."

  I thought fast. Flattery almost always worked; it did on me. It had on Richie. It ought to work on Jane Finn. But she was a mighty tough cookie. I tried anyway.

  "That's why I was so eager to see you, Mrs. Finn." I was careful to make her "Mrs." as clear as she had made mine. "To find out when you would have free time. You're awfully popular. Everyone says such nice things about you. Howard Creighton speaks so highly of you. I know Alzheimer's patients take special attention. He especially admires your patience with his wife."

  If the Creighton name set off any warning bells, Jane didn't acknowledge them. We chatted a little longer about Aunt Dorothy, our general time frame, Jane's wages, and, as I rose to leave, the porcelain soup tureen that Ed Pavich had so astutely noticed.

  "What a gorgeous Meissen soup tureen!" I said, meaning every word of it. The body was gracefully shaped, and on the lid a playful putto sat astride a cornucopia overflowing with exquisitely painted, hand-modeled flowers. In a fancy shop it would have sold for four or five thousand, or more.

  "Thank you."

  I gave it yet another try.

  "Yes, nineteenth-century Meissen is getting harder to find. The Onion pattern, isn't it? The red and gold overlay is what makes your piece so unusual." The appraiser in me came out. "Why a piece like this is worth thousands of dollars. People search all over to find porcelain of this quality and beauty."

  "It was one of my grandmother's things."

  "Your grandmother had wonderful taste!"

  "Thank you," was all Jane Finn said, moving toward the front door.

  "Do you know anything about when she got it? Where?"

  Jane Finn smiled weakly and gave a little shrug. Her body language said what her silence didn't.

  "Oh well. You probably got off easy," I said casually. "My grandmother talked her head off about her things. I remember being so bored at the time. It was always this had come from there, and that used to be your great-great-grandmother's. Or I got this from such and such an antiques shop. Or I remember buying that when I would go shopping with Mrs. Easley on Saturdays. You know, come to think of it, Mrs. Easley was Mamma's age, and I don't even know what her first name was. Mamma just always called her Mrs. Easley. Of course, now I wish I had listened to all those stories," I rattled on.

  I swallowed hard. I knew what I wanted to say next. But I'm no Kinsey Millhone or Stephanie Plum. Did I dare? Saying the wrong thing could blow my cover. On the other hand, if I didn't get some answers, I would have wasted my time and let Ed and Peter and maybe Matt down ... possibly even Roy Madison ... and what about Sarah Rose Wilkins? I had to get her talking somehow.

  Damn it, I thought. Most people talked their heads off about their grandmothers, and now when I needed somebody to, this lady was clamming up. Then again, Jane wasn't telling any grandmother stories because she didn't have any-at least not from the grandmother, or grandmothers, who had once owned these things sitting all around her. She didn't even know who they were. They sure weren't any kin to her.

  "Even if I did have to listen to my grandmother's stories," I said, "at least you have these wonderful things. Oh well. You can't have everything in life. But your things are so valuable these days. In fact ..."

  I heaved a long, long sigh and tried to hide my excitement. I decided to push just one more time.

  I hung my head as if sharing a deep-kept secret. Which I was, one I wouldn't have wanted even the Glasses to know. "The truth is, I'm afraid my family had to sell some things. You understand that ... being orphaned and all yourself. When times get hard, well, the best things are the first to go. Can't even give the lower-end things away. That's why Mother always told me to buy the best I could. I should have listened to her."

  That's enough, Sterling. Back off! Mother commanded. True. I always told you to buy the best, but don't overdo it. This hard-boiled egg of a woman is starting to get suspicious. You can't pull off the I'm-a-little-rich-girl-but-I'm-so-pitiful act but so well. After all, she knows your last name is Glass and she knows where you live.

  When Jane Finn didn't flinch a fake eyelash-didn't say one word, but just continued staring at me-I took Mother's advice and zipped it. The woman's silence had told me enough.

  "Oh well. So much for the past," I said. "You're a mighty lucky woman, Mrs. Finn, that's all I've got to say. Enjoy your pretty things. Now, let's see." I fiddled around in my pocketbook for a pen and a slip of paper. "I have your number and you have mine. I'm going to talk to Aunt Dorothy tonight. Let's hope they have another big New Hampshire snow this week!"

  I gathered my coat around me and said good-bye as Jane Finn closed t
he door to her house that was like she was. A bundle of contradictions.

  I scooted into the cold January night. In my car, I fought the urge to call Peter or Ed on my cell phone. Jane Finn was probably peeping out of her window, watching me. Then again, she might have slipped back into the dining room to examine her soup tureen. She didn't have a clue what Meissen was or just how valuable it was. Of that I was certain.

  But not knowing exactly what she was doing, I didn't dare look back. In my state of nervous excitement, I pulled my car away from the curb first, then looked in my side-view mirror to see if anything was coming. This wasn't exactly a main thoroughfare. The mirror was at a catawampus angle. Instead of a view of the street and any oncoming cars, all I could see was some oversized pickup truck just a couple of spaces behind me protruding far out into the narrow residential street. It was one of those new designs that you couldn't see around when one parked next to you. From the front or back, the blown-out wheel fenders made it look like a fat mamma with a big rump and bulging tits. In this neighborhood it didn't surprise me.

  What did surprise me was what I saw. In the darkness I couldn't tell for sure, but I thought I saw a head in the passenger seat suddenly duck down.

  Chapter 20

  Dear Antiques Expert: I hear so much about Meissen china. What makes it so special?

  Until trade with the Orient was established, Western countries didn't know about fine china and porcelain. Even during the Middle Ages, wood or metal was used for plates and bowls. The Meissen factory, established by the German king Augustus the Strong in the early 1700s, became Europe's first true porcelain manufacturer. Ever since, the Meissen name has been associated with fine quality, and its pieces, both old and new, are highly sought after.

  IF I HAD KNOWN what to do, I would have done it. But since I didn't, I drove around for a while.

  After such a busy day, I should have been tired. A fresh rush of adrenaline after I left Jane Finn's had taken care of that. I had a wild desire to go to an antiques shop, the way I had in Manhattan on Saturday. If only I could wander through aisles of beautiful treasures, maybe I could think more clearly, figure things out. Things might not be able to talk, but sometimes they did speak to me. But going antiquing was not an option at 6 P.m. on a Monday night in Leemont, Virginia.

  For lack of anything better to do, I drove home.

  Arbor Hills seemed to go to bed around 7 P.M. in the wintertime. My house was pitch-dark. I'd forgotten to turn the lights on in my anxious state when I'd left to drive out to Jane Finn's.

  Inside I checked my phone messages. There was one of those damn hang-ups from Mr. Unavailable that I hate so much and a quick call from a friend in my garden club reminding me of the upcoming meeting-a bus trip to Prestwould, Lady Skipwith's grand eighteenth-century home just outside of Clarksville-but nothing else. I didn't even have any new e-mails.

  If I couldn't go antiquing, I'd do the next best thing. I went into my office. During the day, I could stare out of the bay window and let my thoughts wander among the branches of the azalea and camellia bushes and dogwood trees. At night, especially in the wintertime, I could peer far into the distance and just barely see the lights of Leemont's downtown. In addition to the usual desk and chair and the bookcases that lined the wall from floor to ceiling, in the corner I had a small, 1920s overstuffed chair that was just my size, and an old, fifteen-inch TV that Lily had taken off to college only to bring home again. I gathered up the catalogs I had picked up at Layton's and headed for the chair. I'd brush up some more on the Art Deco figurines that I had pretty successfully put to one side since returning home.

  It's good to let ideas ferment in your mind, Mother always said when I was stumped while writing a paper for my high school senior English class. The body can heal itself, and the mind can figure things out on its own.

  The more I thought about Jane Finn, Sarah Rose Wilkins, and Dwayne Sloggins-plus the urn and the pin, the silver vase, Meissen tureen, beehive candlestick, and the diamond ring, just to stir the pot-the more confused I became. The time definitely had come to put this situation out of my mind, to give it a rest.

  And it all seemed so simple on the TV shows. Why, Poirot made it look downright easy. He just thought about the problem at hand while drinking tea from fine bone china and then figured it all out. James Rockford cunningly smiled his way through his adventures. His dimples won everyone over to the point that they confessed. Matlock raised an eyebrow and looked confused. In the bumbling process of trying to get the story straight, the solution came drifting to the top. In truth, this detective stuff was hard work. I felt more like Columbofretting, sulking about, and worrying the problem. No wonder he was always so disheveled.

  And if you don't stop all this fretting and carrying on, you're going to look like dowdy and wrinkled Miss Marple, Mother whispered in my ear.

  I laughed out loud. A glass of wine and a little TV. That would help.

  I picked up an auction catalog in one hand and the remote control in the other. I flipped through the channels and settled on a rerun of Green Acres. It was the best thing on. So much for the glories of cable TV. I glanced down. The catalog I was holding in my lap was the one that Nigel Rhodes had given me of an upcoming general sale, not from Richie's past Art Deco sales. Oh well.

  Fatigue was starting to settle in. I thumbed through a few pages. I was ready to switch catalogs when two things happened. The phone rang, and I came to a page showing two pieces of fine Meissen china in the same Onion pattern as the soup tureen. I was so taken by the Meissen that I didn't even glance at the black box to see who was calling.

  "Hello?"

  "Sorry 'bout calling you at home. Pavich here."

  He didn't have to tell me who he was. Ed Pavich's scratchy voice was as unmistakable as Sol's Brooklynized European accent.

  "Am I interrupting your dinner or anything?"

  "I wish," I said. "I'm just working. Actually, I may have just found something important."

  "What's that?"

  "Well, it's too early to know for positive. It may be a point of reference about the tureen in Jane Finn's dining room. Ed, you were absolutely right," I said with renewed vigor. "That tureen is absolutely grand. And it is totally out of character with-" An image of Jane Finn's home furnished out of a Sears Roebuck catalog, yet decorated with valuable antiques, flashed before my eyes. "Well, let's say it's out of character with most of the things in her house."

  "So I didn't send you on a wild-goose chase?"

  "Not hardly. There are lots of things in that house that can't be explained." Including Jane Finn herself, I almost added, but didn't. "I just hope I didn't blow everything by asking the questions I did."

  He flipped off my comment in his harmlessly gruff manner. "I'm sure you were fine. So what do you think? Can we get together tomorrow morning? You tell me what to do. I want to move quickly, though. These scam people are like gypsies. They pack up and leave in the dead of night. Move on to the next town."

  "Is-oh, what is his name? Sloggins. Is Sloggins in jail?"

  "I wish," Ed said. "He made hail. That's the had news. But it seems he crossed state lines doing his roofing work-if you can call it work-so there's a restraining order and he's not going anywhere. But now Jane Finn. That's another story. So did you get enough on her so we can move in?"

  "Whoa! I'm an appraiser, not a lawyer or a detective, especially not a PI. All I can tell you is what I saw and how she acted. Other than that-"

  "Ten thirty? Eleven? What suits you?"

  "Tomorrow. Not tonight? Right?" I asked just to be sure.

  He laughed.

  I blushed.

  "Yes ma'am. Tomorrow A.M."

  "And Peter? Should he meet with us?" I asked.

  "Can't say that he's essential to what's going on, but if you'd like for him to be there, sure."

  "If you don't mind."

  I was treading uncharted waters. Knowing that Peter could be there was instantly reassuring.

 
"Sure. Will you call him? Or should I?" Ed volunteered.

  "Well, where will we meet?" I asked.

  "Your place is fine. You could come here, but parking is rough with the construction work downtown. I spend most of the day out in the field, anyway. Your place will be easier. Or how about at the Salvation Army? Does the Rev work there on Tuesdays?"

  Rev. I chuckled to myself. I could see Peter's face grimacing at the name.

  "I'll call him. Let's say eleven, at my place, if that's okay. Do you know how to get here? Bittersweet Trail. It's in-"

  "I know it well," Pavich interrupted.

  His answer took me by surprise, not because I didn't think he would know my neighbors-You snob! Mother said unforgivingly, momentarily interrupting my thoughts-but because of what Ed said next.

  "You'd be surprised what brings me into Arbor Hills," he said, his sandpapery voice mysteriously full of innuendo. "Crime doesn't stop at Main Street or Stuart's Ridge. Vice and corruption know no social boundaries. I've seen it all, believe me.

  "And I guess I'm just starting to."

  "Till tomorrow then. Get a good night's rest," he said cheerfully.

  "Ha!" I scoffed after I'd hung up.

  I called Peter, then turned back to the page with the Meissen china on it, glass of wine in hand.

  Lot 68. Meissen platter in the Onion pattern with iron red and gold overlays, circa 1880, width 19 inches. Estimate $1,200- 1,600.

  Lot 69. Meissen sauceboat with attached underplate in the Onion pattern, matching the preceding lot. Estimate $400600.

  I turned back a page or two to see if there might be any mention of their owner. Sometimes when several pieces came from one estate there would be an entry such as "Property of a lady" or "Deaccessioned from such-and-such a museum." Not a clue.