by Kathy
The effect was hypnotic. She had to force her eyes away, and as she started to reach inside the case she saw Riley's hands, tight-clenched and white around the knuckles, and realized that he was as rigid as the statue to which she had mentally compared him. Then she knew—and wondered only why it had taken her so long to comprehend the truth.
Without comment she took the necklace from the case. Her loupe was already in her hand; but instead of examining the piece as she had intended, she found she had hung it around her neck. It was heavy, but surprisingly comfortable; the linked segments were joined in a manner that distributed the weight evenly across the neck and shoulders, and balanced so that each segment automatically dropped into place, giving the impression of a single rigid piece.
Meg turned to the mirror. The open neckline of her tailored white shirt didn't do the collar justice, but she could easily imagine its effect against an unbroken expanse of black silk, or bare, tanned skin. Not the milky-pale skin of an Edwardian beauty; the piece was warm and aggressive, it demanded an assurance as great as its own. The pattern was clearer now; she almost had it, it was sunset clouds, it was a swirl of giant wings. . . .
It was gone again. Meg lowered her hands; the flexible links collapsed into a shimmer of color.
"I can see why it hasn't sold," she said, returning it to the case. "It's unnerving. Mesmerizing. Did you do that on purpose?"
"It just came out that way." He didn't deny her assumption or ask how she had known.
"Did you do the rest of these too?" Carefully Meg lowered the necklace onto the black velvet display square and reached for the silver pendant. The design curving around the oval base was typical Art Nouveau, the body of a slim naked girl, her raised arms holding a spray of flowers. But there was a subtle difference in the modeling of the slender body, a suggestion of something not quite human, and the arms weren't lifting the flowery branch, they were the branch. The change from silvery flesh to silver wood was so gradual it was impossible to say precisely where one ended and the other began.
She didn't need Riley's mutter of assent to know he had designed and executed this piece as well. The others were more conventional, skillful copies of various antique pieces. He must have been experimenting with different techniques: the incredibly difficult process of granulation, lost for centuries; filigree and intaglio; the fine wire technique called cannetille; pique and champleve enameling. All the pieces bore what must be his personal mark—an open, broadened Y, stamped aggressively into the body of the piece. That wasn't necessarily vanity, it was meant to prevent a future seller from passing the pieces off as antiques. Not that any trained eye could mistake them for the genuine article; Riley was probably incapable of making a literal copy. His style was so individualistic it affected everything he touched.
It took her quite a while to inspect all of them. Riley didn't say a word. If she hadn't seen those white-knuckled fists—now thrust into his pockets—Meg would have thought him as inhuman as his silver dryad. No matter how little he valued her opinion, he must be aching to hear it. Any artist would. He probably interpreted her silence as a deliberate attempt to increase the suspense, but in fact she simply couldn't think what to say.
She rearranged the jewelry in the case, except for the necklace, which she gathered into her hands. "You forgot to show me where you keep the boxes."
"What do you. . . ." He caught himself, on a quick intake of breath. "Under that counter."
Meg found a box of the proper size, lined it with cotton and laid the necklace in it. The silence echoed with the words neither of them was willing or able to say. Riley cracked first.
"What are you doing?"
"Buying this necklace."
"But you hate it. You said it was—"
"Unnerving. It is. It is also . . . astonishing."
She deliberately avoided words like beautiful, stunning, wonderful. Riley hadn't been aiming at those effects.
For a moment neither of them moved. Then Riley shifted position and took his hands out of his pockets. When they fell to his sides the curve of his fingers reminded Meg of the great hand in Dan's stained-glass window. "Well," he said awkwardly. "Guess I better get back to work. Unless there's something else you want to know about the stock."
Meg shook her head.
Slowly and deliberately Riley walked to the door of the shop and opened it. He didn't look at her again.
He walks like an emperor, Meg thought. Like Caesar striding to the podium in the Forum, at the head of a victory parade.
He had the right.
Her eyes returned to the necklace. Nothing Dan had said about his new designer could have prepared her for this; Dan never gushed, his idea of high praise was a grumbled "Not bad." And even if he had tried to tell her—how could he, when she herself was still groping for words? She felt shaken and overmastered by the strength of her emotions: humility in the face of a talent far beyond anything she could ever hope to achieve, triumph at having found it, excitement at the prospect of being allowed to nurture and develop it. The same emotions, beyond words, that Dan must have felt. . . .
As he had felt about her father. Meg clenched cold, sweating hands and struggled to control her breathing, as her father's betrayal came home to her for the first time in its full enormity.
It took less than an hour for the news of her presence in the store to spread. Meg had known what she was letting herself in for and she never doubted it was worth it—especially after her incredible discovery—but some of the "customers" demanded all the self-control she possessed. As she had predicted, none of them came to buy. Some made a pretense of looking at rings or stickpins, making her take out tray after tray for examination, obviously enjoying being served by Daniel Mignot's snooty heiress granddaughter. One woman, a little more inventive, brought a rhinestone necklace for appraisal and possible sale. After Meg had politely informed her they didn't buy costume jewelry, the woman settled herself more firmly on the chair and told Meg how much they would all miss Dan and how glad they were that a member of the family intended to manage the store.
She wasn't the only one to imply that "they" didn't approve of Riley; several were even more direct. One man, who introduced himself as "an old buddy of your granddad's," coolly informed her that Dan had gone soft in the head and let himself be taken in by a smooth-talking confidence man. The description was so wildly inappropriate when applied to the taciturn Riley that Meg couldn't help smiling, but her sorely tried patience snapped when another customer, who kept waving his finger under her nose, suggested that she ought to have Dan "dug up," as he gracefully put it. "I seen him a couple of days before he died and he was in the pink. Murder's been done for less than what that Riley got, and I'll give you any odds you want they'll find poor old Dan's stuffed full of arsenic."
Meg sent him on his way with a few well-chosen words. Flushed with righteous indignation, he tried to slam the door but it refused to oblige.
Meg was still seething when the door opened again, but the sight of Mike Potter turned her scowl to a smile. "Don't tell me, let me guess. You want a pinky ring, or a diamond stickpin."
He grinned and put his hands on the counter—square, competent workman's hands, unadorned except for his wife's plain gold wedding band, which he had worn on his little finger since she died. "You got it. A real big flashy diamond."
"Ten carats minimum," Meg agreed. "Come on, Mike, 'fess up—you didn't really believe I was here, did you? You came to check up on me."
"I knew you'd do it sooner or later," Mike said. "I just didn't expect it would be so soon. You've had so many other things on your mind. . . . Dan would be proud of you, honey."
Meg hadn't expected the simple grace of that tribute—or the enormity of the guilt that swamped her. Mike wouldn't be so pleased and proud if he knew she was not taking up the charge Dan had left her, but spying on her new partner. At least that had been her motive before she saw Riley's work. . . . She turned her head away, and as she hoped, Mike mistook her conf
usion for embarrassment, and considerately changed the subject.
"How's it going? Lots of business?"
"Well. . . ." She still felt too much anger to hold it in. After she had finished talking Mike shook his grizzled head. "Ken Masterson is the worst gossip in town, honey. Got a mind like a sewer. You didn't take him seriously, I hope."
"No, of course not." Riley, she knew, could hear every word—just as he had heard the vicious accusations. "What's the matter with this town, Mike?"
"It's not the town, honey, just a few of the people in it. They get bored, you know, and pass on everything they hear."
"Yes, but where do they hear it? Where does it start?"
"Where does any wild story start? Ever wonder who makes up the dirty jokes that get handed on?"
Mike knew about the intercom; his sidelong glance was a little too casual. Meg smiled and shrugged, accepting his dismissal of the subject; but Masterson's accusation had left a stain on her mind, like a slimy snail track. Riley's surprising legacy would be enough to set an imagination like Masterson's diving into the dirt—but Frances had talked of murder before the will was read.
"So I guess I better get back to work," Mike went on. "Just stopped by to say hello."
Meg blew him a kiss. She knew he hadn't stopped by to say hello; the only thing about which she was uncertain was whether he had come on his own or been sent by the rest of the old gang. One of these days she would have to have a heart-to-heart with Mike Potter.
She was vigorously polishing the top of the glass cases when Riley reappeared. He made no reference to the conversations he must have overhead, but Meg noticed a raw red line of burning across the back of his hand, as if the soldering iron had slipped.
"You ready to call it a day?"
Meg felt her smile congeal, like cooling gravy. It wasn't so much his curt tone as the insulting implication that she was only playing at tending store, and would walk out as soon she got bored. And after her spirited defense of him! She reminded herself that just because a man was a bloody genius didn't mean he couldn't also be an A-number-one bastard. Most geniuses were, now that she thought about it.
"I'm ready for lunch," she said, her voice as brusque as his had been. "Unless you want to go first."
"I brought a sandwich."
"I didn't." She put the bottle and cloth neatly away under the counter and reached for her purse. "Back in an hour."
He didn't say okay or right or fine or take your time. He just stood there. Meg wrenched the door open. "There's something wrong with the chimes," she snapped.
"They sound okay to me."
"Then you must be tone-deaf."
The door still wouldn't slam.
Mike hadn't gone back to work. He was having lunch. All four of them were there, even Kate—heads together, elbows on the table. Meg suspected they were talking about her, and she was sure of it when the sight of her brought a sudden end to the conversation. She pulled out a chair and waved the two men back into theirs. Ed subsided thankfully, but Mike went on unfolding his long legs.
"I just stopped by to pick up a sandwich. I'm short-handed today and business is picking up. Tourist season, you know."
"Oh, yeah? I haven't seen any of them. Just a lot of evil-minded busybodies."
She didn't bother to lower her voice. Ed looked guilty, Kate shook her head disapprovingly and Barby murmured, "Now, Meg, honey, you don't want to say things like that." .
Mike Potter's long face creased into a smile. "Yes, she does. Sounds just like Dan. He never gave a hoot what people thought either."
He had not lied about the sandwich. The waitress brought it, neatly wrapped in waxed paper—one of Kate's three-inch-thick masterpieces, bulging with cheese and paper-thin slices of country ham and a dozen other ingredients.
After he had gone, and Meg had ordered a chefs salad and iced-tea, a self-conscious silence ensued. Meg studied the downcast faces with an inner amusement she managed to keep under wraps. Bless their hearts, they thought they were so sly. . . .
"Am I interrupting a private conversation?" she asked. "I'll leave if you want to go on talking about me."
Ed looked guilty—he always looked guilty when he wasn't sure what was going on; Barby looked shocked—she did it very well; but Kate leaned back in her chair and burst out laughing.
"Can't put much over on this gal, can we? Sure we were talking about you, honey. The whole town's talking about you."
"And Riley."
Kate's face didn't change. "And Riley. Hell's bells, girl, you can't blame people for wondering why Dan would do such a weird thing. And—before you can ask—no, we don't know why he did it. We didn't even know he'd done it. It was as big a surprise to us as it was to everyone."
"We'd have warned you," Barby said softly. "So it wouldn't have come as such a shock. You believe that, don't you, Meg?"
Her faded blue eyes met Meg's. Mascara dragged the paper-thin skin of her eyelids into fragile folds. "I believe you, Barby," Meg said. "And I love you—all of you."
Kate cleared her throat. "So we're no better than the rest of the busybodies," she said gruffly. "When you went in this morning we thought maybe you'd just stopped by, the way you did the other day with Cliff; and then you stayed, and stayed, and you didn't come out, and—and so. . . ."
"So you sent Mike over to find out what was going on?" Meg couldn't control her amusement any longer. "That was a dirty trick, Kate, he hates anything that isn't open and aboveboard."
Kate returned her grin with one even broader and unashamed. "We had a bet—whether Riley would quit before you fired him."
"I couldn't fire him if I wanted to," Meg said. "I may kill him someday, but I can't fire him."
"Mike wouldn't bet," Barby chirped. "He kept insisting you were just helping out, what with Candy being gone and Riley all alone. Like Dan would have wanted you to."
The ambiguous response Meg intended to make stuck in her throat. A certain ironic gleam in Kate's eye suggested that Kate, at least, didn't believe Mike's interpretation and wouldn't have believed it if Meg had sworn a legal oath.
Ed had been pondering, a heavy frown wrinkling his pink face. His face cleared, and he looked at Meg with a pleased smile. "I guess that's right. You couldn't fire him, could you? Since he's half-owner."
Meg patted his hand. "Absolutely right, Ed. But that's not the only reason. I saw some of Riley's work this morning. The man's brilliant. It would be like firing Cellini."
She wasn't sure Ed knew who Cellini was, but her general meaning was clear. The threesome nodded solemnly, in unison. "That's what Dan said," Ed murmured in an awed voice. "Exactly what he said. It's uncanny how you're getting to sound just like him, Meg."
It cost Meg something of an effort to keep her smile in place. She wouldn't have hurt Ed's feelings for all the jewels in the Smithsonian, but she was finding that comparison increasingly hard to take.
She didn't raise the subject of Riley again. Instead she admired the photos of Ed's grandchildren, meekly accepted Barby's affectionate criticism of her appearance—"I know you've been too rushed to bother, sweetie, but it would only take an hour for me to give you a nice shampoo and set"—and smiled at Kate's acerbic comments on the clientele and staff as she rushed from table to kitchen to cash register.
It would have been hard to determine precisely when she realized that her original intention of telling the old people about her problems could not be carried out. They would have resented the adjective, and fought to help her if they believed she needed help—and that was precisely why she couldn't ask for it. Ed's asthmatic breathing, Barby's delicate bones draped in withered skin—they were so vulnerable, so frail. Kate played tough, but she wasn't a young woman. Meg didn't doubt their goodwill. If they had known anything that could be viewed as threatening, surely they would have told her.
Yet there was something wrong, something slightly off-key, like the chimes at the store, and Meg couldn't suppress a suspicion that, despite their apparent can
dor, Dan's old buddies knew something she didn't know. It might be something completely harmless and irrelevant. It might be something they believed was irrelevant. Pumping them without betraying her reason for doing so would be tricky and difficult. Had she the right even to try?
After she had paid the check she started back to the store. I'll talk to them separately, she decided. And very, very carefully. Starting with Mike. He'd been Dan's best friend. Dan trusted him—as much as he trusted anyone.
Absorbed in thought, she spent several seconds rattling the doorknob before she realized the door was locked and that a sign reading "Out to Lunch" was on display. Before she could locate her keys, which had sunk to the bottom of her purse, she had time to compose several new descriptions of Riley. If he had intended all along to close up and go out to lunch, why the hell hadn't he said so? Afraid she'd suggest they go together? That, of course, would have been unendurable.
The delay gave the man who had followed her across the street his opportunity. When the warm, moist hand closed over her arm Meg whirled around, her fingers clenching over the bunch of keys.
"Scared you, huh? Sorry about that." Applegate didn't look sorry, he looked pleased as punch.
Now that he was no longer listing and buckling at the knees, he was taller than she had thought. He was also too close, crowding her against the door. Though he was neatly dressed, the effect was not so much one of good taste as of a failed attempt at it; the pink stripes in his shirt were too wide and too bright, the shoulders of the coat too heavily padded in a vain attempt to disguise the amplitude of waist and belly. Meg would not have been surprised to find that the underside of his tie sported a painting of a naked woman.
She couldn't think of any reason why she should be polite. "What do you want?" she demanded.
Her frosty tone and unfriendly stare only scratched the surface of his complacency. "I was going to apologize. For being—a little . . . uh—under the weather yesterday. I had a good reason, you know. Figured I'd explain—"