And we scream together. Long and loud.
Chapter 14
“BackupBackupBackup!”
Defying physics in his attempt to rescue us, Ty has managed to squeeze his big self into the narrow pathway in the upper hall, but all he’s doing is blocking our escape, which we’re desperate to make. Ty slides down the banister to get out of my way while Jill and I stagger down the steps and charge for the front door. I lean over the front porch railing and lose my breakfast into the bare shrubbery.
Jill is dancing around waving her hands over her head. “I touched it! Ohmigod, I touched it!”
“What? What” Ty shouts to be heard over Jill’s shrieking.
“A cat. A dead orange and white cat, totally flattened, stiff as a board.” Jill rubs her hands on her coverall trying to erase the sensation of hard feline.
“A tom.” I wipe my mouth and sit on the stoop with my head in my hands. “I knew I smelled something big and dead in there. He must’ve been crushed months ago and he was mummified under all those records.”
“This is messed up, big time,” Ty says. “You gotta leave this place alone, Jill. That cat was buried alive, and Harold was willing to let the same thing happen to you. He kept telling us you weren’t here.”
I know it’s unkind to pounce on Jill in this moment of distress, but I feel like I have to take advantage of this prime opportunity to persuade her to quit. “Jill, honey—this house is toxic. It’s very kind of you to want to help Harold, but he’s not just eccentric, he’s dangerously ill. He let those poor cats live in terrible conditions, and look what happened. There are probably more dead ones in there.”
Jill’s face is pale and sweaty even in the cold air, and I see her swallow hard to fight down a wave of nausea. “I know,” she whispers. “He keeps putting food out to attract more, to replace the ones the ASPCA took away. He knows he’s not supposed to, but he does it anyway. Nora and I throw the food away whenever we catch him.”
“Don’t that prove he’s nuts?” Ty spreads his hands. “You gonna do all this work cleaning out the house, and he be right back at fillin’ it up as soon as you finish. It’s like that story we read in English class once, ‘bout a dude rollin’ a rock up a hill, and it would roll right down again.”
“Sisyphus.”
Ty points a long finger at me. “That’s the guy.”
Jill finds a crumpled Dunkin’ Donuts napkin in one of her pockets and blows her nose. “But what about the Civil War stuff?”
“You only got the word of a wack-job that it’s even in there.”
“No,” Jill protests. “Nora has seen the documents. They’re real.”
“Maybe he had them at one point in his life, but you have no way of knowing they’re still in the house. Nora hasn’t seen this stuff in twenty years,” I say.
“Maybe you’re right.” Her voice shakes. “I don’t know how I’ll break it to Nora that we’re quitting.”
“Shit, I’ll tell her for you.” Ty thumps his chest. “ ‘Jill is through with your crazy ass brother and his crazy ass’—”
“Shhh.” She slaps Ty’s arm and I look up to see a tall, lean man in running gear coming up the walk.
“Morning all.” He extends his hand to Ty. “I’m Ed Brandt. Live across the way at number fifteen. I’ve seen all the activity over here. Just thought I’d pop over and say hi.”
We all stare at him like drunken teenagers trying to look sober. He’s in great shape, but now that I’m looking at his face I can see that he’s older than I first thought—in his sixties, judging by the laugh lines and hair that’s cropped close to minimize the baldness.
He leans against a big oak and starts doing some stretches. “Who am I kidding? Everyone on the street has been dying of curiosity and they nominated me to come over and find out what’s going on. Is poor old Harold finally going to move out?”
Ty looks from me to Jill. He’s not sure who’s handling this, but he knows it’s not him.
Jill tries to muster some dignity, which is not easy given that she’s covered in the dust of a hundred record collections and has only momentarily stopped crying. “Harold has no plans to move. We’re just helping him, uhm, get the house in order.”
“Hmmm.” Ed rolls his neck and his vertebrae crack loudly. “I think it may be too late for that. Harold’s made attempts to clean up before, but he can never make it last. The town says his time is up.” Ed surveys the house and yard. “What we all want to know is, will they come in here with a bulldozer and just plow it under, or—”
“I can’t listen to this!” Jill runs into the house, letting the door slam behind her.
“Say, I didn’t mean to upset her.” Ed looks from me to Ty and back again. “Is she…are you…Harold’s relatives?”
“My family’s crazy, but they ain’t that crazy,” Ty mutters.
I’m not so eager to reveal my professional identity to this guy. Thank goodness we came in my car, not the company van. “Her name is Jill. She’s …uh…taken an interest in Harold and Nora, in trying to help them out of this, uh…”
“Hell hole?” Ed offers cheerfully.
“Predicament. That’s the word.”
“If you say so. All I can tell you is, this predicament has been getting worse and worse for years, and the neighbors are really sick of it. Some of them chipped in to hire a lawyer to force the town to evict him.”
“Not you?”
“Nah. Lawyers make everything worse. I’ve known poor old Harold for thirty years. He’s a brilliant guy. I don’t wish him ill—none of us do, really. But the house.” Ed shakes his head. “The house is a health hazard.”
Ty opens his mouth to chime in, but I shoot him a silencing look. I want Ed to move along so I can get back inside to Jill. “Thanks for dropping by. I’ve got to get going.”
Ed offers a jaunty wave and trots down the walk. At the curb, he turns and shouts back to me. “Harold and his sister should tear the house down and sell the lot. A lot in this neighborhood is worth a lot of money. Tell Nora that’s her best option.”
Back in the house, Jill is nowhere to be seen. I hear a noise overhead–surely she hasn’t gone back up into the cat tomb?
I start up the stairs following the faint sound of crying. “Where are you?”
At the end of the upstairs hall in the space we’ve cleared of records, I see Harold, not Jill. He’s sitting cross-legged on the floor, one hand extended behind him, tears slipping from his eyes into his scruffy gray beard. I don’t care to get too close.
“Harold, are you all right?”
“It’s Petey,” he says, coughing to clear his throat. The desiccated cat corpse is in his lap. “I knew he would never run away. I knew he was still here with me. Oh, Petey!”
“Harold, stop! You shouldn’t touch that.” My voice comes out harsher than I intended.
He turns his head toward me, his pale green-gold eyes open wide. “Don’t wake the babies,” he whispers. “Don’t wake the babies.”
I back away, seriously creeped out. “Jill! Come on, right now. We’re leaving!”
“I’m down in the living room. I’ll be out in a minute.”
Her voice has lost its weepy tone. Down in the foyer, Ty notices that too, and his brow furrows. He picks his way along a channel of small appliances—the theme of the living room seems to be “items with cords.” Soon I hear his voice. “Whoa! That’s amazing.”
Oh God, now what?
“Am I right?”
“I think so. Audge’ll know.”
“Know what?” I call from the landing.
The two of them appear at the door of the living room carrying something between them.
“It’s a Tiffany lamp.” Jill’s face is flushed with triumph. “See for yourself!”
Chapter 15
“Bring it over here. You know there are millions of reproduction Tiffany lamps floating around.”
Jill lets Ty carry it, running ahead clearing a path so he won’t trip and
drop the precious load. “It says ‘Tiffany Studios' on the base,” she says.
“All that proves is that the reproducers did a good job,” I answer. The Presbyterian Church in Palmyrton is famous for having a genuine Tiffany window. Last year, during the Palmyrton Pride Festival, the three of us were returning from a sale and got caught in festival traffic. Jill and I decided to take the church tour to kill time, and we dragged a protesting Ty with us. The lady giving the tour was a fount of Tiffany knowledge, and Ty ended up asking more questions than anyone. So now we’re all Tiffany quasi-experts.
Ty sets the lamp on a table in the foyer and gently taps the leaded glass shade. “Hear that? It rattles because the lead is so old, it’s loose. A new fake wouldn’t do that.”
He’s right—that’s exactly what the lady told us. I’ve never understood why Ty had problems in school because he’s got an encyclopedic memory. Now he turns on the flashlight function on his cellphone and shines it up through the glass. Even through the thick layer of dust, the colors jump to vivid life. The shade features a garden of irises, their petals delicately drooping, their leaves standing tall.
“There it is,” Ty shouts. “The confetti colors—the green in the leaves isn’t solid green, it’s all mixed with beige and yellow. The purple in the flowers has some gold and blue running through it.”
I study the base—it’s definitely bronze, not painted wood or plastic. The lamp is looking more and more genuine. Even without research, I know that if the lamp is a real Tiffany, we’re looking at a six-figure sale.
“We’ll have to take pictures and send them off to the Tiffany expert at Christie's. The fact that the lamp came from a hoarder’s stash and has no provenance is a strike against it. Don’t get your hopes up too high.” But even as I say this I feel the familiar flush of joy that accompanies the discovery of unexpected treasure.
“Now we have proof there are valuable things in this house.” Jill squeals. “This means we have to keep working.”
“No!” Ty and I sound like the woofer and tweeter of a cheap car stereo.
“All this means is if the lamp is real, you’ll actually get paid for all the work you’ve put in here so far.” I turn my back on her pleading face. “And Harold will have enough money to find a small place to live.”
“No, Audrey! This means there could be all sorts of priceless art and history in here. We can’t let the town bulldoze the house! Think of what might be lost!”
Ty glances toward the living room. “Three hundred fifty-nine greasy toaster ovens.”
“Jill, you agreed just ten minutes ago that working here isn’t safe. That hasn’t changed.”
“But Audrey, that was before—”
My phone starts to ring and I’m eager for this interruption in the cascade of Jill’s pleading. When I see the number on the screen, I’m even more eager. “Stop! This is Elizabeth Haverford, the property manager at Willowby. Once we get her job, I’m going to need both of you working full-time.”
“Hello, Elizabeth. How are you today?” I hope I sound relaxed and casual, as if I’m sipping green tea in my sleek office, not sneezing out decomposing cat particles at Harold’s. Ty and Jill are frozen in silence, trying to hear the conversation with their eyes.
I listen to her velvety voice with a smile on my face, so confident am I of what she is saying. A good thirty seconds pass before I process that the sentences flowing into my brain contain the words “regret” and “sorry” and “under the circumstances.” She’s seen the Better Business Bureau complaint. The Yelp reviews. I reach my hand back to find the support of the newel post. The green tendrils on the grimy wallpaper writhe before my eyes. My mind goes blank. Finally I stammer, “Really, the problem with the Wainwrights will have no impact—”
She cuts me off, her voice smooth but firm. “Willowby’s owner has made his decision. The job is going to Jameson Sales.”
The dead phone dangles from my weak fingers. We lost the Willowby job because my reputation has been ruined by the Wainwrights’ missing money and my unsavory connection to a murdered immigrant. I can’t bear to make eye contact with Ty or Jill.
My throat constricts. I wait for it to pass before I speak. “Let’s get ourselves some good quality respirators, kids. We’d better hope the Gettysburg Address, Part Two is up in that bathroom.”
Chapter 16
I strip off my work clothes in my garage and dive into the shower as soon as I get home, but even after twenty minutes of scalding water and floral body wash, I still can smell piss and rot. It’s not on my limbs; it’s imprinted in the scent receptors of my brain. I may smell this in my grave.
So this is my life: the only person willing to hire me is a mentally ill hoarder, and even he is not enthusiastic about my services. I am clearing out his filthy home in a quest for uncertain treasure. My reputation is ruined—as the final kick delivered to a woman already on the mat, the family in the dinky split-level on Peyton Road called to cancel their sale. I owe an unknowable amount of money to a vengeful client. And I’ve looked directly into the eyes of a stone-cold killer who may, or may not, remember me more clearly than I remember him.
I feel a dangerous pressure in my chest, a prickling in my eyes.
I will not cry.
I look around my empty condo. I suppose I could cry. There’s no one here but Ethel to see me.
And that thought makes a few tears spill over. Ethel climbs up on the sofa beside me and rests her head on my thigh. Deep in her throat she makes a sound that’s a cross between a whine and a moan.
“Exactly.” I stroke her silky ears. I wish I had someone in my life who would just listen, not give me advice I don’t want. Like my father—Close the business and go back to graduate school. Or Coughlin—Take a long vacation until all the arrests are made. Or Mr. Swenson—Follow the letter of the law and let your employee be prosecuted.
“Maybe we should wallow in a good tearjerker, Ethel.”
Anxiety fills her big brown eyes.
“Don’t worry. Not Marley and Me.” I reach for my laptop. “The Notebook? Titantic?”
When my phone begins to vibrate sometime after Leo DeCaprio dances with Kate Winslet, I consider ignoring it. But Ethel digs frantically at the pocket of my flannel pants, so I relent.
When I see the name on the screen I bolt upright. Maura! “Hey! Where are you?” My best friend has been working in London for the past six months, and traveling to European hotspots between meetings and sales pitches.
“On West Carson Avenue. You’ve got exactly seven minutes to change out of your pajamas and put on some heels. We’re going to that new jazz bar.”
Is this divine intervention? “You’re in Palmyrton? When did you get back?”
“Last night, but I’ve been asleep for twelve hours. Now I’m ready to rock. Are you up off your couch?”
How well she knows me! I shrug off my What’s your Sine t-shirt as I head into my bedroom. Maura will not be amused. “I’m getting dressed, but we can’t go to the jazz place—there’s a line around the block every night.”
“We’ll get in. I know the doorman.”
How can she know the doorman? How can she even know about the new jazz club if she’s only been back in town for eighteen hours, and most of those asleep? But that’s Maura.
I open my closet door. Every outing with Maura involves a fashion crisis. As I flip through my sedate slacks and proper sweaters, I’m pretty sure I haven’t bought a single new article of clothing since Maura dragged me to the mall before she left. I hear Ethel going crazy. Maura has the key to my condo and she’s let herself in. I run to greet her.
The reunion is a big weepy, doggie, squealing lovefest.
“I’ve missed you so much!”
“I’ve missed you more,” Maura says.
I don’t know how that can be because Mara has never met a stranger. She makes friends wherever she goes. She’s a classic extrovert, energized by her many social engagements. And I, I’m a classic math nerd
. Slow to warm up, exhausted by parties. But we’ve been best friends since our freshman year at UVA. I tutored her through Intro to Statistics and held her hand when her first college boyfriend dumped her. She dragged me out of the library and introduced me to the kinds of people she knew I’d like, both male and female. We don’t try to change each other. We know the very thing that drives us crazy about each other is actually the thing we love most about each other. She livens me up; I calm her down.
Maura steps back and sizes me up. “You’re so skinny! Love the new haircut, but you need some product. Is that a training bra? Go put on something that gives you some lift.”
As I knew she would, Maura heads to my closet. “Didn’t I tell you to get rid of this awful gray sweater?” She tosses it on the floor where Ethel curls up on top of it. I guess my favorite cardigan is a dog bed now. “Are these the same– Hey, what’s this?”
Maura holds a padded hanger in her hand. Suspended from it is a sleek black dress. THE black dress.
“Outstanding! Put this on.”
I take a step backward. “I can’t.”
Maura cocks her head. “Now don’t start that ‘It’s too sexy’ thing. You own this. No tags—you must’ve worn it before.”
Ridiculously, I feel my eyes well with tears.
“Honey, what’s wrong?”
“It’s the dress I wore on my first date with Cal. To Spencer Finneran’s birthday party.”
Maura opens her arms and I let her hold me and rock me. It feels good to cry with a woman who truly appreciates the healing properties of tears. Jill is frightened when I cry and my father is disgusted. And Coughlin, well, Coughlin would indulge my tears, just not tears shed over Cal. When I’m done, Maura wipes my face with a cold washcloth and shakes her head over the state of my red eyes and blotchy skin. She produces eye drops and concealer from her bag, and repairs the damage. Then she says, “Put on the dress.”
“No! I can’t.”
“You can. You need to feel beautiful again.”
Treasure of Darkness: a romantic thriller (Palmyrton Estate Sale Mystery Series Book 2) Page 10