Ty listens with his chin propped in his hands. “What do they got to sell?”
“All the important art and antiques have already been auctioned off. We would just handle what’s left. But, oh. My. God.” I close my eyes to conjure up a clearer mental picture. “Ten grand of china, crystal and artwork in the dining room, a cool two thou of high-end kitchenware, an easy fifteen in mirrors, lamps, and vases. And people will overpay just to say they own something from Willowby. Rugs, books, small furniture….” The numbers flash through my brain. “I figure a hundred twenty to a hundred fifty thousand. Easy.” This one job could solve all my financial problems in one fell swoop.
Ty whistles. “When do we start?”
“We don’t have the job yet. Elizabeth, the woman who’s the property manager for the family who owns the house, said she’d call me with her answer in a week. She’s also considering Jameson’s Sales.”
Ty snorts. “That guy’s an asshole.”
“I know. And Elizabeth and I had a great conversation about English creamware pottery and first edition books by mid-twentieth century authors. I feel like we really hit it off.”
“Nothing in the email yet, Audrey,” Jill reports.
“Guess she doesn’t work over the weekend. Maybe we’ll hear by the end of the day. So, what’s the other job you said came in?”
Jill swivels in her desk chair and starts rooting through her file drawer. “Well, that one’s not so….fancy. But it’s for someone we know, so I knew you’d want to do it.”
I wait. Nothing. Jill ducks her head and begins filing as if she were competing in some secretarial triathlon.
“And that someone is…?"
“Harold.”
“Herald? Who are the Heralds? I’m drawing a blank.”
“Not the Herald family,” Ty explains. “Harold the Hoarder. Now we get to resell everything we ever sold to him.”
“Absolutely not! Jill, what were you thinking?”
“We have to help him, Audrey.” Jill looks like she does when she sees those ASPCA dog rescue commercials. “His niece called. The neighbors have been complaining to the health department that the house is a hazard. The town is going to condemn it and toss Harold out on the street if he doesn’t clear out some of his junk.”
“Harold doesn’t need an estate sale organizer. He needs a trash hauler.”
“Yeah,” Ty chimes in. “Just call Palumbo’s. They’ll drop a Dumpster right in front of his door. They got guys in HazMat suits who’ll drag everything outta there.”
“No! His niece says Harold won’t allow that. What they need is help separating the trash from what’s valuable.”
“Define valuable,” I say. “I’m not spending days wading through his crap looking for some trinkets worth a few hundred bucks.”
“But Audrey, he’ll be homeless if we don’t help him.”
“I’m an estate sale organizer, Jill, not a social worker. We simply can’t afford to take on jobs that use up more in labor than they produce in revenue.”
Ty nods. “See, that’s why Audge is the boss. We be belly up if you was runnin’ this outfit.”
“Shut up, Ty. No, I think he’s got some seriously valuable stuff. Like maybe…well, I can’t remember exactly what Nora said. Just talk to Harold’s niece, Audrey. I told her you’d meet her around two, right after your appointment on Peyton Road.”
Sometimes I suspect that Jill doesn’t fully grasp that what we do here is not a giant game of playing store. “Look at me, Jill. The goal of Another Man’s Treasure is to make money. Money to pay your salary, and Ty’s and mine. I’m not going to Harold’s house.”
“But I pro-o-o-omised her!” Jill’s wail ascends an entire octave.
“You should have cleared it with me first.”
“But you’re always telling me to just go ahead and make a decision. And now I did and you say I should have asked first.”
She’s got me there. I heave a big sigh. “All right. I’ll talk to her. But I’m not committing to doing the sale.”
While Jill is clapping her hands, the phone rings.
“Good morning. Another Man’s Treasure. How may I help you?”
Jill has been binge watching Mad Men, channeling the sexy receptionist character. All she needs is a tight skirt and bouffant hairdo.
She winces at what she hears. “Let me see if Ms. Nealon is available.” I can practically see a cloud of frost coming out of her mouth. She puts the call on hold when normally she would just hold the receiver against her chest and yell.
“It’s Martha Wainwright, Audrey. Should I tell her you’re not here?”
“Don’t be silly. Of course I’ll talk to her.”
As I reach for the phone I see Ty’s face fade from warm brown to ashy gray. “I got shit to do,” he says, and darts out the door.
Chapter 8
I take a deep breath. The last time I traded texts with Martha was to assure her I was working on locating Ramon. The news about the murder on Filmore Street has broken, but the police reports have been low on details—she won’t know that crime concerns her. Now I’m going to have to tell her that her money is either in the possession of a missing Honduran immigrant or a murderer on the lam.
“Hi, Martha,” I begin. “I’m afraid some, er, complications have arisen. We’ve found the cans—”
“You have!”
“But not the money.” Then I spit out the whole story in a rush, trying hard to be precise but entirely undramatic, as if witnessing a murder is just a minor speed bump in the process of recovering her cash. “So the police are investigating very intensively. I’m sure they’ll have some answers for us soon.”
Dead silence.
“Hello? Martha?”
The stream of profanity pouring into my ear makes me feel like I’ve stumbled into an NBA locker room after a big loss. This from a woman who teaches gym at a Catholic elementary school. I steady my nerves by mentally chanting “the customer is always right” as I wait for a break in the onslaught.
When she pauses for a breath, I continue. “Martha, I understand you’re upset, but having the police on the trail of the money is a good thing. I’m sure they’ll track these guys down quickly.”
I’m whistling in the wind here.
“You were supposed to give the unsold goods to a registered charity. If you had done what our contract stated, none of this would have happened.” Martha speaks with such steely precision that I almost wish she’d go back to cursing.
“I know that Martha. And I take full responsibility for my staff member’s mistake. But please understand—Ty simply thought he was giving the soup to a poor person who could use it.”
“I don’t believe that for a minute.” Martha’s voice sinks to a low snarl. “You stole my family’s money, and now your crooked accomplice has stolen it from you.”
My hand tightens on the receiver. I swivel away from Jill’s concerned face. “Martha, please—that’s simply not true.”
She doesn’t bother to argue, just switches direction. “You said they found the cans. How many contained cash?”
Damn! Finding that out will require a call to Coughlin. “I’m not sure. I have to check back with the lead detective. I’ll call you as soon as I know.”
“Don’t bother. I’ll have my lawyer contact the police directly. You just remember one thing, Audrey Nealon. You stole my inheritance and I’m not letting you get away with that. You will pay.”
I sit with my eyes closed and the dead receiver in my hand. How can I fix this? I can’t simply wait around for the police. I need to take control and get this solved, fast.
“Is she, like, really mad?” Jill asks in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Like, furious.”
“What are you gonna do?”
I speak with my eyes closed, taking deep breaths between sentences. “Call Coughlin and find out how many cans held money. Call my lawyer. Call my insurance agent.”
I learned in college to always tackle t
he most onerous homework first. Write the essay on the poetry of Keats before solving three pages of differential equations. So I prepare to call Sean Coughlin. I’ve noticed when I think of the controlling, know-it-all cop, I call him Coughlin. And when I think of the funny guy who likes my dog and talks antiques and blushes, I call him Sean. Who will the man be today?
He picks up on the first ring. “Calling about your cans?”
Coughlin, clearly. I feel my back go up even though that’s exactly why I called. Typical Coughlin that he has to let me know he’s one step ahead of me. But in an algebraic flash of clarity, it dawns on me that I don’t have to respond to Coughlin. I could respond to Sean.
“Hey, guess where I went last night?”
Hesitation. Suspicion. “Where?”
“The Short Hills Mall. With my father. He wanted to buy a gift for this woman he met at the Parks Center. Natalie Renfrew. You know her?”
“Uhm, yeah.” His voice softens. “She’s a good person. The kids love her. Attractive, too. In a, you know, older woman kinda way.”
“So you approve of them getting together? I don’t want my dad chasing after some bimbo.”
He chuckles. “No danger of that.”
“Well, thanks for putting my fears to rest.”
Now he’s laughing. “You did not call just to ask me that.”
“I called because we parted on bad terms. I want you to know that I’ve calmed down. I know you were doing your job, but I was doing my job too.”
“I should know you didn’t call to apologize, but I’ll take what I can get. And by the way, ten of the cans were clean inside, with traces of solder on the lids. Five had soup residue.”
So, a hundred thousand dollars–if each can had a wad of hundreds–not a hundred fifty thou. Not exactly a game changer for me.
“Thank you, Sean. I appreciate—” I hear loud voices in the background and someone shouting his name.
“Gotta go, Audrey.”
I’m left with the dial tone. I never got to ask him what he’s found out about the boy who died.
Next, I place a call to Emil Swenson. Mr. Swenson has been my lawyer since I picked his name out of the phone book to help me incorporate Another Man’s Treasure ten years ago. Fussy, meticulous and an endless worrywart, he runs a solo practice out of a tiny office above a dry cleaners on Washington Street.
To Mr. Swenson, liability lurks everywhere. If it were up to him, I would have no employees, no van, no office. I dread troubling him with this news.
“Emil Swenson, attorney at law.”
He always answers his own phone, always precisely in this way. I’m convinced that even when caller ID tells him it’s his wife calling, he still says, “Emil Swenson, attorney at law.”
I spit the whole sorry story out in one breathless rush. His only response is a sharp intake of breath. “You violated the terms of your contract.”
I know he would prefer to hear that I robbed a liquor store at gunpoint. “I’m afraid I did, Mr. Swenson. Inadvertently.”
“That’s hardly relevant. And you say that ten of the cans were tampered with. But, of course, one cannot be certain that each altered can contained ten thousand dollars.”
“No, but that’s what my client believes. So, what’s my liability? What should I tell my insurance company?”
“Don’t notify them yet.” I can hear him tsk-ing. “This is highly irregular. It necessitates some research. I will call you back later today.” And he’s gone. No “don’t worry.” No, “we can work this out.”
By mid-afternoon, I’ve slipped further into a funk. The momentary rush I got from coaxing a laugh out of Sean has passed, and I’m back to worrying about money I’ve lost and money I haven’t earned. I’ve gone to scope out the job at the house on Peyton Road. As I predicted, the proceeds from that sale won’t put a dent into my problem. Everything in the house is too old to be in fashion, but not old enough to have come back into fashion.
Now, back in my car, I check my email and voicemail for a message from Elizabeth Haverford on the job at Willowby. I sent her a follow-up email, but I don’t want to be too pushy.
Nothing yet. I remember what Elizabeth said to me as I left Willowby last week, “I’ve done my research. You come very highly recommended, Audrey. The Bulmers, The Fischmanns–they spoke glowingly of your work.” I’m sure I’ll get the job. So why can’t she call and put me out of my suspense?
I glance at the dashboard clock. I’m supposed to be meeting Harold’s niece in ten minutes. I didn’t want this appointment in the first place, and now I really want to blow it off. As if by telepathy, my phone rings: Jill. “Harold’s niece just called, Audrey. She’s waiting for you at the house. She’s in the red Prius.”
Handling the Willowby sale will require all our resources, plus some freelance assistance, but I know it’s pointless to argue. Simpler to just meet the woman and tell her we can’t take the job. “I’m on my way,” I tell Jill. After I hang up, I wonder why she told me about the red Prius. It’s 25 degrees out—why would she be in her car?”
Harold’s house is across town in the Summit Oaks neighborhood, a development built in the 1960s when Palmyrton was bursting with baby boom families. The houses are mostly four-bedroom colonials and expanded ranches. Nothing extraordinary, but the location—close to the train, but safe and secluded—has made the houses increase in value over the decades. I’ve done a few sales here—original owners clearing out to make way for a new generation of young families with kids. I never realized that Harold lived in such a respectable neighborhood.
I pull into the neighborhood on Pin Oak Drive, and follow my GPS through several labyrinthine turns. Every house I pass is nicely landscaped, with the requisite play structure in the back yard, and color-coordinated shutters on every window. I finally turn onto Acorn Lane—more very nice houses that scream upper-middle-class prosperity. Ahead, I see a red car parked at the curb—the only car parked out on the street. As I pull up, I see why.
Twelve Acorn Lane bears no resemblance to any other home in the neighborhood. It’s as if the sky opened up and dropped a meteor of mess into the serene suburban landscape. In the front yard, rusting appliances share space with scores of birdfeeders, an entire flock of pink plastic flamingos, and several birdbaths and fountains filled with scummy green water. A nearly life-sized copy of Michaelangelo’s David, executed in plaster, stands next to a plastic Mary and Joseph whose features have been scoured off by the weather. They kneel beside an empty manger, and across from a six-foot totem pole. The driveway holds three rusted cars, all with flat tires, all filled so full of papers, boxes, and clothing that there would be no room for a driver even if the cars would start. The house itself is a standard center hall colonial, once blue, but now a faded grey with the cedar shakes sprouting moss. The shutters dangle, the gutters droop, the roof sags.
But most extraordinary of all, the windows have no curtains and through every dirty pane I can see stuff: stuff in stacks and stuff in towers, stuff that must extend all the way to the ceiling.
I get out of my car just as a trim woman with short hair comes down the artistically curved front walk of the lovely house next to Harold’s. She’s headed to put a letter in her mailbox when she sees me and changes course. “Excuse me, excuse me,” she waves and shouts as she comes closer. “You must be from the health department.”
Before I can deny this, she rattles on, “Have you finalized the decision to condemn the house? When are you going to bulldoze it?”
Such lust for destruction coming from an otherwise kindly-looking soccer mom! I’m certainly not going to admit my reason for being there.
But I don’t need to explain myself. She’s more than willing to keep up both ends of the conversation. “All of us in the neighborhood are just praying for this eyesore to be gone.”
“Uh-huh. Well, the final decision’s not mine.”
“Oh, I understand. You can’t say anything yet.” She winks. “Nice talking to you!�
��
Only after the nosey neighbor is gone does a woman emerge from the Prius. She’s in her late thirties—just a little older than me—nicely but casually dressed. Despite the fact that Harold looks crazy and she looks perfectly normal, I can see a family resemblance: the same deep-set blue eyes, the same high cheekbones.
I walk toward her and she waves, turning her collar up against the wind as she gazes at the house. “I’m Harold’s niece, Nora Phieffer, and this—” She turns and looks me in the eye. “This is my childhood home.”
Chapter 9
Before I can say a word, she starts talking. “We have to go around to the back. The front door doesn’t open anymore.” Nimble as a gymnast, she picks her way through the obstacle course of the front yard, challenging me to follow. I’m more certain than ever that I want no part of this job, but I have to admit to a perverse curiosity about what the inside of the house looks like. Rubbernecking a car crash has nothing on this.
Nora keeps up a steady monologue as she guides me to the back door. “My uncle was a petroleum engineer. He worked in the oil industry for years—overseas, mostly. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait.”
“Really?”
She hears the surprise in my voice and pauses while I catch up. “Harold is quite brilliant. Everyone on my mother’s side of the family is smart and crazy. I take after my dad—dumb and normal.”
There’s a statement with no good response.
Finally, we climb over the dilapidated grills (five—two gas, three charcoal) on the patio, and Nora yanks open the back door. Apparently, they don’t keep the house locked.
As soon as the door swings open, I understand why. The stench emanating from the back hall deters thieves better than a pack of pit bulls.
I reel backward. “My God!”
“Sorry,” Nora says. “I forget how bad it is the first time.”
Towers of junk line the walls of the laundry room, but no wash is done here because the appliances are covered with stacked boxes and the sink is overflowing with shopping bags. Still, there’s a narrow Sherpa’s trail winding among the Himalayan peaks of rubble.
Treasure of Darkness: a romantic thriller (Palmyrton Estate Sale Mystery Series Book 2) Page 6