A Fatal Appraisal
J. B. STANLEY
Table of Contents
Copyright Information
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Fredericksburg, Virginia 1778
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Fredericksburg, Virginia 1778
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Richmond, Virginia 2006
A Brief Note on Secret Hiding Places in Antique Furniture
About the Author
Copyright Information
A Fatal Appraisal
Copyright © 2011 by J. B. Stanley
Original Copyright © 2006; Published by Berkley Prime Crime
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously—and any resemblance to actual persons, business establishments, events, or locales is purely coincidental.
License Notes:
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For My Grandfather, Louis C. Winters
It's been over twenty years since I sat on your lap and we wrote a story together on that old typewriter, but I still feel your hands beneath mine each time I reach for the keys.
Indeed there can be no more important branch of art than that which regulates the forms of the furniture among which our children grow up, for such forms, according to their good or bad taste, their harmonious or their crude lines, their satisfying or their poor proportions, their skillful or their careless craftsmanship, must inevitably leave their impress on the minds of the young people who develop under their silent, but nonetheless eloquent, influence.
—Arthur De Bles, Genuine Antique Furniture
Prologue
Williamsburg, Virginia 1776
Thomas Fleming was bent over, robustly sanding a long yellow pine board with a piece of sharkskin until his forearms were flecked with wood dust. The boards were neatly joined using animal glue and thin wooden dowels until they had formed a perfect rectangle. This box would become the bottom case of Captain Tarling's new slant-front desk. Thomas ran his hands over the smooth wood. He loved the large knots and the shadows of dark grain within the yellow pine. It was a wonderful material to build with, subtle and malleable, unlike the inflexible and short-tempered man who had commissioned the desk.
As if summoned by Thomas's thoughts, the silhouette of Captain Edward Tarling suddenly filled the doorway of Samuel Chauncey's cabinetmakers shop.
"Mr. Chauncey?" Captain Tarling called in his abrasive voice as he swept a white-gloved hand in an arc as if leading a parade. "How is my cupboard coming?"
Samuel put down the plane he was using to even out a thick plank of mahogany and turned to greet his client.
"Coming along very well, sir," Samuel answered amiably. "I've placed it first above all my other orders. The carcass is done and I am working on the doors myself."
Captain Tarling seemed mollified by this explanation. Samuel was the most sought after cabinetmaker in Williamsburg, and only colonists desiring fine furniture made in the latest styles placed their orders with Samuel Chauncey.
"That is well indeed, but I need my desk completed now—even before the cupboard," the captain announced with authority. "My wife and her china can wait. My business requires the desk most urgently."
"Yes, sir. I will see that it is finished by the week's end." Samuel offered a slight bow and the captain responded with a grunt, after which he swept from the workshop and climbed ungracefully into his open carriage, pausing long enough for the carpenters to note the run in his fine silk stockings. A stunning pair of gray mares with braided manes and tails pulled the carriage forward in a cloud of dust, but not before a young lady with honey hair turned her fair face toward the workshop and smiled demurely.
"His wig was crooked," Samuel mused to himself as he tugged on his gray beard. Then he turned to Thomas, who was rooted to the ground gazing after the captain's carriage.
"Lad, never you mind that pretty face. Miss Tarling is well out of your reach. Now, as we have discussed, your apprenticeship has come to its end. I have nothing more to teach you, but before I let you go, I shall have you complete Captain Tarling's desk. This is a rare opportunity, my boy, to illustrate your talents. You see, the captain has requested certain, ah, novelties be added to this desk."
"Novelties?" Thomas asked, uncomprehending.
"He wants three secret compartments built large enough to hide—now what did he say?—ah yes, big enough to hide a handkerchief within."
Thomas raised his brows. "Three secret compartments to hold handkerchiefs? How odd. I’d wager that dandy of a man is only concerned with the cut of his coat. How can a man who grows rich trading in molasses instead of picking up a musket against the redcoats have any secrets worth hiding?"
Samuel took up his plane and resumed his work on the mahogany. "People fight in different ways against the Crown, Thomas. Keep in mind how much we depend on our sea trade for life's little luxuries. The captain has gotten ships through more than one blockade, providing our town with much-needed supplies."
"If I didn't have this crippled leg," Thomas muttered angrily for the hundredth time, "I'd do more than run some blockade! The captain could be attacking the British with his ships, not running to the West Indies for sugar cane and indigo. And it strikes me as odd that his are the only ships that return unharmed."
Samuel's weatherworn face wrinkled sternly. "Mind what you say about Captain Tarling. His hat may be worth more than my entire shop, but his finery conceals a sharp mind and a long memory for those who insult him. And he's a patriot, else he'd have run back to England with the rest of the cursed Loyalists."
"Not all of them went back," Thomas muttered under his breath and returned to his sanding. He worked long after the others had gone home, as he was a bachelor whose only love was for the wood he crafted. The weak light of two candles set in shallow bowls allowed him to work in blissful solitude.
"You're the last piece I shall make beneath another man's sign," Thomas whispered to the desk case. He retied his loose ponytail of ginger-red hair with a leather string and began to place the dadoes inside the case. Using a hacksaw, chisel, and molding plane, Thomas spent several peaceful hours attaching the bearer rails and drawer runners. He tightly clamped the pieces of glued wood and then straightened, examining his work. Today's labors had created the frame for the four graduated drawers, which Thomas would fashion tomorrow out of black walnut.
Flipping through the book containing Mr. Chippendale 's most popular designs, Thomas decided to replace the desk's typical ball and claw foot with a simpler style. Captain Tarling had asked for an unadorned, functional desk and, despite his dislike of the wealthy patron, Thomas approved of the captain's willingness to allow the beauty of the wood to speak for itself without gaudy carving.
As Thomas sketched the plain curve of what he thought the foot should look like, he found his eye wandering to Chippendale's drawings of pigeonholes. The possibilities for adding hiding places among the pigeonholes were numerous. What did Captain Tarling have to hide? And fr
om whose eyes?
Thomas shrugged aside such aimless musings and prepared to leave for the night. First he would head home to the boardinghouse for supper and then perhaps grab a pint in the tavern afterwards. After all, there was cause for celebration. In a fortnight, he would be the proprietor of his own shop in Fredericksburg and men the likes of Captain Tarling would become an insignificant memory.
~~~~~~~~~~
Chapter 1
Fewer and fewer Americans possess objects that have a patina, old furniture, grandparents' pots and pans—the used things, warm with generations of human touch . . .
—Susan Sontag, On Photography
It wasn’t everyday that Molly Appleby found herself driving behind a dilapidated brown pickup with a bumper sticker reading EAT MY GRITS. A minefield of rust patches on the truck's body gave it a diseased look as it rattled noisily forward. The rear window of the old Chevy was covered with the washed-out design of a Confederate flag. Molly had spent the last two hours on Interstate 85 heading north for Richmond while staring straight through the faded film of red and blue at the back of the heads of two men in baseball caps. In between them perched a large dog with long, floppy ears who occasionally stepped over the man in the passenger seat so that he could stick a furry head out the window, his pink tongue wagging ecstatically in the wind.
Molly glanced down at her speedometer. She was doing eighty, fifteen miles over the speed limit. Apprehensively, she slowed down to seventy-five, craning her neck to see if the gap in the trees would reveal a state trooper, waiting to pounce upon unsuspecting speeders. The highway stretching from the North Carolina border to Petersburg, Virginia, was a notorious speed trap. The niche in the trees was fortuitously empty, so Molly picked up speed again, unable to resist getting closer to her canine friend in the pickup.
Molly turned up the radio and sang along to "Son of a Preacher Man." Unlike most thirty-year-olds, she loved oldies and knew the lyrics to almost every song that came on her favorite station. As Molly bobbed her head in time to the music, she wondered what her trip to Richmond would be like. She was driving the two and a half hours north of her home base in Durham, North Carolina, in order to spend a week documenting the hit TV show, Hidden Treasures.
As a staff writer for Collector's Weekly, Molly regularly covered the auction beat, visited tag and estate sales with high-quality items, and interviewed collectors living mostly in Virginia and North Carolina, but she sometimes traveled to Tennessee or South Carolina as well. Her region covered a triangular area. Nashville was the western point, Alexandria, Virginia, Matted the northern border, and Charleston, South Carolina, formed the southern point.
Molly felt as though she had spent the last month in her car. First, she had driven to Charlottesville for a well-established antique show featuring country furniture. The exhibit on loan at this year's show had been called, "Southern Quilts: Stories in Thread." Molly had interviewed booth dealers, customers, and the show promoter before paying a visit to an elderly woman named Nancy Coleridge who had loaned a portion of her quilt collection to the show. In addition to her generous loan of fifty quilts, Mrs. Coleridge still had over two hundred vintage southern quilts as well as numerous coverlets displayed in her mansion on the outskirts of the city.
Molly had spent a pleasant afternoon sipping powerfully strong mint juleps on Mrs. Coleridge's veranda as the older woman told tales of the different places she had purchased her quilts. From garage sales to some of the most distinctive auction houses throughout the country, Nancy Coleridge's hunting ground reached far and wide.
After filling up the last line in her small notebook with the woman's stories, Molly finally excused herself and wobbled back to her hotel room, where she collapsed in a heap on the creaky bed. The two articles she had planned to begin that evening, one on the show followed by a second article about Mrs. Coleridge's breathtaking collection, remained unwritten.
She had only been home in Durham for a few days before her boss, a cantankerous, overweight man named Carl Swanson, called her into the office to send her packing to cover an auction in Charleston, South Carolina.
"Can't anyone else cover it?" Molly had pleaded. "I still have to write up the two Charlottesville pieces. I'm only halfway through the southern quilts article."
Swanson, irascible as ever, chewed frantically on his nicotine gum and howled, "No! You're going and you're going now."
Molly beat a hasty retreat, grateful to get away from Swanson's fetid breath and crimson face. Ever since her boss had decided to quit smoking, he was more intolerable than ever, yelling at anyone who crossed his path and snacking feverishly on Krispy Kreme donuts, cheese crackers, or beef jerky followed by a several squares of nicotine gum. His temper was intimidating, but the odor of his sweat-stained clothes and foul breath was almost deadly.
After her escape, Molly barely had time to pop her head into Marketing Director Matt Harrison's office and explain that she was leaving town again. Matt had just returned from a sales conference and they had plans to spend the weekend together. Since June, their schedules had only allowed for three dates, two of which were wonderful, romantic dinners and the third, a quick lunch before Molly hit the road again. Now, autumn was upon them and Molly felt that despite her efforts to call Matt nightly from the road, their relationship wasn't developing the intimacy that either of them sought.
After entering his office, Molly immediately closed the door. Though some of the Collector's Weekly staff knew about the romantic nature of her relationship with Matt, Molly preferred to be discreet. She'd rather not have Carl Swanson making cynical remarks about her love life. Molly seated herself in one of the two chairs facing Matt's desk, nervously smoothed her long cotton skirt, and quietly told him that she was leaving for Charleston and would have to cancel their plans for dinner and a movie.
"We can't seem to get a break," Matt had sighed, running his fingers through his sandy brown hair. His light blue eyes showed only a moment's disappointment before his customary shy, and utterly charming smile returned. "Don't worry," he stood and enveloped Molly in a quick but tender hug, "I'll be here when you get back."
Molly gazed up at him as he tucked a strand of her shoulder-length, dark brown hair behind her ear. She felt a sense of desperation welling up inside of her. How long could they put their relationship on hold?
Instead of clinging to Matt and professing how much she longed to stay with him, Molly smiled weakly and fumbled for something to say. She wanted to ease the tension, to exchange some light banter and coax a laugh from the man standing before her.
Matt searched Molly's slate gray eyes, which were framed with a sweep of dark lashes, for any indication of what was going on in her mind. He longed to kiss her lush, pouting lips, but they were at work, so he unwillingly released his hold on her.
Yet she was clearly reluctant to let go. With her hand resting on his arm, she sensed his desire to kiss her and her body responded in kind. But she knew that if she kissed him now, she’d never want to leave.
"Okay, then," Molly had finally blurted, her heart thudding like a drum in her chest. "I'd better get going. I’ll ... I'll call you."
Conscious of Matt's eyes on her as she walked out of his office, Molly wished for the millionth time that she was a slim size six instead of a full-figured size fourteen. Her cheeks grew warm and she felt as though every staff member was staring at her curvy hips, full breasts, and thick legs as she hastened around the cubicles and out to the lobby. The sensation made her long for the comfort of an iced cappuccino and a plate of shortbread cookies.
~~~~~
During the weekend in Charleston, where the muggy weather had necessitated three changes of clothes per day, Molly sat under a stifling tent taking notes through two days of lot after lot of Chinese export porcelain and heavily ornamented oak furniture until she thought she would swoon.
Molly left Charleston as soon as the hammer fell on the final lot. Driving well over the speed limit on the way back to Durham,
Molly had called Matt at home, hoping to make a last minute Sunday night dinner date. His answering machine picked up and after listening wistfully to his soft, mellifluous voice, Molly left a hasty and slightly stilted message saying that she had missed him and to call her soon.
The next day, his office remained empty and Molly received no communication from him at all. Reluctant to ask Swanson to explain Matt's absence, Molly approached the only person who catalogued every detail about each employee's life, both personal and professional, and wouldn't hesitate to share. Clayton, the self-titled "Queen of Classifieds," was the staff's most flamboyant dresser and was cattier than a sorority girt. He imbibed copious amount of coffee and though he was constantly eating, never gained an additional ounce. Molly adored him.
"Darling," Clayton cooed, smoothing down a wave of his carefully styled salt and pepper hair as he sat opposite Molly in the break room. He flung the tail of a pink and white checked scarf around his neck and reached for her hand, "Where have you been?"
"Miss me?" Molly asked, her flawless complexion lighting up with pleasure. But her delight was short-lived. The image of Matt’s empty office and the lack of messages on her answering machine prompted a glum sigh. "I've been everywhere but where I want to be," she moaned, letting her head sink onto the white laminate surface of the table.
"You mean, you'd rather be in the arms of that dashing man down the hall?" Clayton gestured in the direction of Matt's office.
"Kind of hard to date a guy when you never see each other. Matt hasn't even shown up for work today. Do you know where he is, Clayton?" Molly asked.
Clayton examined his neat nails and pretended not to hear her question. "Do you think clear nail polish is gay?" he asked.
"No. And if it is, so what? You are gay," Molly snapped, narrowing her gray eyes at her friend. "Are you hiding something from me?"
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