Treasure in Exile

by S. W. Hubbard

  Crisis averted.

  And just in time. Ty and Donna return and we review our positions for the sale. Then Ty opens the door, and we’re off and running.

  An exhausted looking young Asian man in green hospital scrubs is first through the door. Probably a resident at Palmyrton Hospital saddled with medical school debt. His hugely pregnant wife plops down on Birdie’s white sofa with pink flowers and beams with satisfaction. No doubt a year from now, the pink roses on the upholstery will intertwine with apple juice and baby puke stains, but I’m not here to find the ideal owners for Birdie’s furniture. I take their cash, and the first of Birdie’s possessions walks out the door.

  A novice caterer buys the best of Birdie’s kitchen equipment, ensuring her pots and pans will be working harder than they ever did in this house. And a sad-eyed divorced dad takes a chest of drawers. That’s right, buddy—time to stop storing your clothes in cardboard boxes. This purchase is the first step to moving on.

  Soon it gets too busy for me to philosophize over every sale, and the first two hours fly by.

  At ten, the garden club ladies descend en masse. They spread throughout the first floor, snatching up floral prints, floral needlepoint pillows, floral china.

  Soon a middle-aged lady in a madras plaid skirt and navy espadrilles appears at the checkout holding a pedestal cake plate bordered in purple and blue violets. Her eyes water as she hands over ten dollars. “Birdie always served her famous blueberry Bundt cake on this plate. I want it as a little memento even though I never bake cakes.” She shakes her head and dabs at the corner of her eyes with a crumpled tissue. “She was my friend. I’ll miss her.”

  Since this lady seems nicer than the flock of vultures she came in with, I enquire, “Have you been to visit her at the nursing home?”

  The woman nods. “She didn’t remember my name, but she did seem glad to see me. Going there”—she takes a shuddering breath—“it’s not easy.”

  Some of the other garden club ladies don’t seem so cut up. There’s a cluster of them in the living room. I can hear excited female voices, but can’t follow what they’re saying.

  “....you can’t do that...”

  “...waste...”

  “...maybe a cutting...”

  I hope I’m not going to have to referee a fight.

  Finally a determined looking old gal with short iron gray hair and sensible lace-up walking shoes marches up to me. “What about the plants?”

  “George took all Birdie’s houseplants to the nursing home so she could enjoy them there.”

  “Of course, I know that. I’ve been there to visit her. I moved her African violets out of the direct sun so they wouldn’t get scorched. I’m talking about the garden plants. Birdie had some rare and valuable specimen plants out there.” She gestures to the back garden. “They should be part of the sale.”

  I thought I’d heard it all in this business, but this is a first. “You want to dig up her garden?”

  “Not the entire garden. I have no interest in her asters or her coreopsis. I’m talking about the purple spotted toad lily and the Triteleia Rudy bicolor....and the Schizopetalus hibiscus, of course.”

  I’m momentarily struck dumb, so she keeps talking. “I’ll dig them out and move some of her phlox to cover the hole. They’re overcrowded anyway. I warned Birdie that Cabot Pink and Bright Eyes would go crazy in that exposure. And I’ll pay a fair price. Of course, transplanting something so delicate is always risky, so there should be allowances for that.”

  I find my voice and choke out a reply. “This is highly unusual. I’d have to ask the owner.”

  The old bat scowls. “I talked to George about it at the country club last week. That man is always so vague. Hard to get a straight answer from him.”

  I know in that moment that I’m certainly not going to call George and ruin his golf game with an upsetting question from this determined old bag. So I must decide: forbid her access to the garden, or grant her wish?

  She senses my wavering and goes in for the kill. “New owners won’t know how to take care of those heirloom plants. They’ll die, and that’s a terrible waste.”

  This is a strange echo of George’s concerns when he called this morning. Apart from the nice friend who bought the cake plate, I haven’t felt that any of Birdie’s things have found the ideal homes I fantasized about with George. Maybe knowing that some of the plants will live on in good hands would be comforting to him.

  “All right. Show me what you’re interested in. I can’t have you making a mess back there. The house will be going on the market soon.”

  We strike a deal: a hundred dollars for five rare perennials and she’ll make the garden look perfect. I go back to work.

  In half an hour, I remember to check on them. “Look out the window, Donna. Are they tearing up the entire garden?”

  “They’ve got one big bushy thing and three smaller leafy things in plastic pots, and now she’s digging up some of those pink flowers and putting them in the hole where the bush was. It looks okay.” Donna cranes her neck for a better view. “What’s that on the sidewalk? It looks like they found a box buried in the garden.”

  “A box?” I finish my transaction and dart away from the checkout to take a look. I’m anticipating some big, decaying thing, but what I see on the walk is a small metal strongbox, a little smaller than the cashbox I use at sales. It’s dirty, but it doesn’t look old and rusty. Leaving Donna at the checkout, I head outside to investigate.

  The flock of garden clubbers intercepts me on the patio. The ringleader is carrying the box. “We found this buried under the hibiscus.”

  “Evelyn broke the lock when she hit it with her shovel,” a nervous lady explains.

  “Just an old photo inside—a couple holding a baby. No reason to hide that.” Evelyn taps her temple with a dirty forefinger. “Poor Birdie. Guess you’d better give it to George.” She hands the box over to me and hoists the heaviest of the pots. The other ladies carry the smaller pots, and they depart down the driveway—a mother duck and her brood.

  Chapter 22

  WHEN THE LAST CUSTOMER leaves, Birdie Armentrout’s house has been picked as clean as the turkey at the Coughlin family Thanksgiving. All that remains are a fussy floral print chair, a couple of lamps, some random knick-knacks, a toaster and some kitchenware, and a box of linens.

  “We’ll donate this stuff to charity.” I push the chair closer to the front door. “Ty will be coming soon to help you load it all into the van to take to Sister Alice.”

  “Ooo, I want to meet that nun after all you guys have said about her.” Donna begins sweeping. “Hey, what about this?” She hands me a small trophy.

  First Prize, Hybrid Dahlia Competition, 2012 Palmer County Garden Show.

  “I’m going over to George Armentrout’s to give him his check from the sale. I’ll take it to him. Maybe he’ll want to keep it, or give it to Birdie in the nursing home.”

  Normally, I wouldn’t offer personal delivery, but I have to admit, I’m curious to see his reaction. I’ve looked at the sepia-tinted photo in the box. It shows a rather somber couple—he in a suit and tie, she in a big hat and dress that stops above her ankles—holding an infant so it faces the camera. The baby’s face is barely discernable inside a long, lacy white gown. Behind the couple is an ornate marble font.

  A baptismal photo.

  There’s no date, but from the style of the clothes it seems to be from the early 20th century.

  And the box contains one other thing: a credit card receipt from Staples for $10.98, the price of the box. The receipt is signed with a dramatic flourish ending in a small squiggle.

  I take the box and the trophy and head out. “I’ll be back in an hour to lock up.”

  After I start the engine, I pause and look at the box. Someone bought it specifically to hold that photo. I wonder why?

  And then for no reason that’s rational, I open the box, pull out my phone, and snap a picture of the old photo.
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  George is still in his golf clothes when I arrive. His condo is just what I expected: upscale, but bachelor-barren. He’s clutching a scotch on the rocks and offers me a cocktail. I spy a bottle of Hendricks gin on his bar. Why not enjoy the best after a long day?

  While George mixes my G&T, I report on the success of the sale and tell him about the Garden Club ladies. “I hope you don’t mind that I sold them the plants, but I figured they’d take good care of them. And honestly, that woman Evelyn is hard to argue with.”

  “Ha! Don’t I know it.” George sets the drink down in front of me and notices the box I’ve pulled from my tote bag.

  “The ladies found this buried in Birdie’s garden. Evelyn broke it open with her shovel. I figured you’d want it.”

  “Birdie was behaving very strangely in the months before her diagnosis,” George says as he sips from his drink. “Who knows why she would have buried that box.” He slides the dirty box towards himself and lifts out the photo. His brow furrows. “I have no idea who these people are. They’re certainly not our grandparents. Maybe some distant relatives that Birdie tracked down.” He moves to return the photo to the box and his face spasms.

  He pulls out the credit card receipt. “Oh, my! This is Loretta’s handwriting. I’d know it anywhere.” He’s so surprised, it’s as if he’s forgotten my presence. “Loretta bought this box and gave it to Birdie? Who could these people be?” He’s murmuring to himself, not expecting an answer from me.

  I try to be helpful. “When is the receipt dated?”

  George holds the receipt close to his eyes. “March 21.”

  His hand drops into his lap.

  “George, you told me Loretta had been tense, not herself. Did that date back as far as March? Could this have something to do with her ...death?”

  I hesitate to use the word “murder.”

  “No...no, how could it?” He takes a big swallow of his drink. “You say Evelyn opened up the box? Did she see the receipt?”

  “I don’t think she took the photo out. Her hands were dirty from digging.”

  “Hmmm.” The furrow in George’s brow deepens. “Let’s hope so.”

  When I get back to Birdie’s house, Ty is loading the van. I walk inside and find Donna on her phone with her back to me.

  “I have to go. It’s part of my job,” I hear her say. I don’t think she knows I’m in the room.

  “Anthony, please. I love this job. And we can’t afford for me to lose it.”

  They seem to be arguing about Another Man’s Treasure. I can’t imagine why. There’s a long pause on her end as she listens to her husband.

  “You’re being—Anthony? Anthony!”

  Clearly, he’s hung up on her. I cough to let Donna know I’m here. She spins around, her face tear-streaked.

  “What’s the matter?”

  I can see she wants to say ‘nothing” but knows that will never fly. She offers a shaky smile. “Husbands. You know how unreasonable they can be.”

  Sometimes...when they’re complaining that you forgot to buy mushrooms. But mine never reduces me to tears. “I don’t mean to pry, but you seemed to be arguing over your job. Is there something wrong? Because I’ve been very happy with your work.”

  Now the tears flow freely. “Thank you for saying that, Audrey. I’ve been trying so hard. I really love working with you guys. Anthony, he just doesn’t understand my new responsibilities.”

  “He’s mad about you working weekends?” That better not be the problem, because we made the hours clear in the interview.

  She shakes her head. “I’m so dumb. I mentioned to Anthony that I was going to get to meet Sister Alice, and he freaked out. He doesn’t want me driving to Newark...alone...with Ty.”

  Donna looks at me through watery red eyes. “He’s just a little, er, overprotective.”

  More like a little controlling, jealous, racist. Donna’s marriage is not my problem, but now that I’ve found a great assistant, I don’t want to lose her. “Look, maybe next week you could invite Anthony to the office so he can meet us both and see there’s nothing to worry about. I’ll go to Newark with Ty today.”

  “Oh, Audrey—I’m so sorry! You shouldn’t have to do that. You have more important stuff to do.”

  I really don’t like indulging Anthony’s ridiculous fears, but I don’t want this marital strife to put me on the hunt for yet another assistant. I need Donna for the Tate job.

  “It’s okay. I haven’t seen Sister Alice in a while.”

  Donna has cleaned the house to hypoallergenic perfection, so we send her home and Ty and I head out to Newark.

  “I’m not surprised,” Ty says when I explain the situation. “Little things she says, sounds like the dude is kind of a dick.”

  “Like what?”

  “Since today is Saturday, she hadda leave him his lunch in marked containers in the fridge. Like he can’t make himself his own ham sandwich. And he’s paranoid about crime. Got the motion-detector lights and a home security system and he keeps a gun in the nightstand drawer.” Ty shakes his head. “They live in Florham Park, not the South Bronx.”

  I laugh. “Yeah, Sean says it’s a crime wave in Florham Park when two people make an illegal left out of the Trader Joe’s parking lot on the same day. So Donna might not be ready for Sister Alice’s block.”

  “Yeah, she need more than vinegar and water to clean up all the gang tags spray-painted on the buildings.”

  “But none of those punks bother Sister Alice.”

  “They leave her be. They know she’s good people.”

  Ty weaves through the traffic already heading to New York for Saturday night fun. He frowns. “Lotta airport traffic, too. I wanna get in and out before this road gets too nasty.”

  In another ten minutes, we take the exit for Newark. We bypass the high-rise office buildings and glittering performing arts center downtown, and start jolting along the neighborhood streets lined with fast food restaurants, laundromats and pawn shops. Soon we turn onto the block where Sister Alice’s Resource Center is tucked between low-rise apartment buildings and crumbling brick houses. A young mother pushes a baby in a stroller. Some kids jump rope on the sidewalk under the watchful eye of a grandmother in a porch chair.

  Ty glances in the side-view mirror and squints.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “That car was behind us on Route 78. Now he’s here on Sullivan Street.”

  I look in the mirror on my side and can barely make out a nondescript gray sedan behind us. “What makes you think it’s the same car? There must be thousands of cars like that between here and Palmyrton.”

  “Yeah. Prob’ly.” Still, Ty seems hyper-alert. Maybe all this talk of crime has made him edgy.

  I text Sister Alice that we’ve arrived as we turn into the alley that runs behind her building. The gray car continues down Sullivan Street.

  We park the van, scaring off a scrawny calico cat, and Sister Alice emerges through the scratched metal back door. She wears sensible walking shoes and khaki pants. The only sign of her religious calling is a carved wooden cross on a leather thong around her neck. “Hello, my angels! What a joy it is to see you.”

  Ty leans over to embrace the short, stocky nun. “Yo, sister—how you doin’?”

  “Full of blessings.” She turns to hug me. “Audrey! How wonderful that you’ve come with Ty today.”

  We chat briefly, but I know Ty is eager to unload and get back on the road. He unlocks the rear doors of the van. The load has shifted during the bumpy ride, and Ty deftly catches a floral lamp from Birdie’s bedroom before it crashes to the street.

  “Lovely!” Sister Alice says as she takes the lamp from Ty. “I know a young mother who just moved out of a shelter who can use this.” She trots inside happily with her prize. Ty hands me a box full of linens and takes a heavier box loaded with random kitchenware. Locking the rear cargo door requires a key and two hands, so we leave it unlocked. We’ll be right back out for the next load. An
d anyone from the neighborhood who wants to steal our sale leftovers probably needs them even more than Sister Alice. The nun stays inside rearranging her storage room while we return to the van for a second load.

  Ty strides up to the van talking to me over his shoulder. “I wonder if—”

  The sound of something being dragged and toppling comes from the van.

  Ty freezes.

  A black-gloved hand emerges from the van.

  It holds a gun.

  Ty jumps back and raises his hands. “Whoa, easy man. Ain’t no need for that.”

  I’m stunned. We’re being robbed at gunpoint? At four-thirty in the afternoon? Nothing like this has ever happened on any of our hundreds of drop-offs to Sister Alice.

  The man jumps out of the van. He’s thin, dressed in a long-sleeved black shirt and jeans, his face completely covered by a black ski mask. He keeps the gun aimed at Ty, but his hand trembles. “Give me the keys.” The voice sounds young, panicky.

  “Ain’t nuthin’ but old junk furniture in there,” Ty protests. “You can’t even sell—”

  “Shut up!” the robber glances over his shoulder at the end of the alley, then up to the door to the Resource Center. His movements are so twitchy, his arm so thin—I’m sure that he’s just a kid.

  A jumpy, impulsive teenager who might blow our heads off.

  Please don’t let Sister Alice come out now. “Give him the keys, Ty. We’re not getting shot over a ten year old van.”

  Ty makes a take-it-easy gesture. “Look man, we don’t want no trouble. You can jus’ take this whole van and keep everything that’s in it. I’ma reach in my pocket and get the keys.” Ty turns to show the kid the bulge of keys in his jeans. The kid nods and reaches out his hand for them.

  Thirty seconds later, Ty and I watch the AMT van careening down the alley.

  “Sorry, Audge. We prob’ly get the van back if he don’t crash it.” He shudders. “Amateurs with guns make me real nervous.”

  Shock is setting in. I’ve been robbed at gunpoint. Carjacked. “What just happened here?”

  “I shoulda listened to my gut. I told you I thought that car was following us.”