Antiques Maul: A Trash 'n' Treasures Mystery

by Barbara Allan

  “Twenty-five dollars each,” she said.

  I showed disappointment in my face.

  She held her ground.

  I stood mine.

  Then she must have taken pity on me—anyway, on my dripping wet hair and shivering body—because the woman said, “I…I do have one other fur that I didn’t put out because I’m sure it wouldn’t sell….”

  “How much?”

  “Oh, you can have it.”

  I brightened. “I’ll take it! Whatever it is….”

  The lady bent and rummaged under the table and then dragged out the freebie: a ratty raccoon coat, bald-patched, moth-eaten, and nearly identical to Mother’s.

  I reached for my karma gratefully and thanked her.

  It wasn’t until two hours later that I finally crossed paths with Mother. She was standing by a table of old toys and memorabilia, multiple bags of her flea market finds dangling from each arm while she chatted with a pudgy middle-aged man wearing a plaid coat.

  As I approached, it became clear, however, that their exchange was more confrontational than conversational.

  Mother was saying, “That book of Mr. Yeager’s is worth far more than one hundred dollars! That’s a famous title and it’s a first edition. Clearly, he didn’t know what he had, and you are simply out to take advantage of him.”

  Mr. Yeager, I deduced, was the elderly frail-looking gentleman in a black parka, seated behind the table, and looking increasingly uncomfortable at the unfolding drama. On stage and off, Mother was famous for creating memorable scenes.

  Pudgy tightened his grip on the item in dispute—a hardcover book that said Tarzan of the Apes on its dust jacket, and featured its branch-swinging hero in silhouette.

  “It’s marked one hundred dollars,” he snapped at Mother, “and that’s what I’m going to pay for it!” Then he looked pointedly at Mr. Yeager, saying, “There are certain rules that dealers have to abide, you know.”

  I butted in. “Just a moment…has Mr. Yeager accepted any money yet?”

  Mother turned to see me, gave my raccoon coat a double take, but wasn’t thrown enough to stop her performance. (Once, when Mother was doing The Vagina Monologues, some unfortunate woman in the front row was so rude as to have a heart attack and keel over, and the paramedics came, performed CPR, then carried the revived lady out of the theater on a stretcher, while Mother never missed a line.)

  “My daughter has a point,” Mother snapped back at Pudgy. “The transaction has not yet been completed, and therefore can be taken off the table, so to speak, if the dealer wishes it.”

  All eyes turned to the elderly Mr. Yeager, who said in a frail voice, “I…I…do want to withdraw the book.”

  “Well!” huffed Pudgy, his fat fingers still clutching the object of his desire. “This is quite unheard of, and I feel compelled to report your conduct, sir, to the organizers of this flea market.”

  Now might be a good time to mention that Mr. Yeager had a helper seated beside him behind the table. She was about twenty, wearing all black, which extended from her jeans and leather jacket to her short, spiky hair. Her elfin features were not unattractive, though certainly not helped by multiple piercing (ears, eyebrows, nose) and a tattoo of barbed wire that encircled her neck.

  At the threat of discrediting the old man, Goth Girl bolted out of her folding chair and flew around the table to face Pudgy.

  “Oy!” she shouted in a thick Brit accent, her dark tinted lips peeled back revealing the metal grillwork on her front teeth. “You ’eard me, Grandad! ’E don’t wanna sell it!”

  And she snatched the book out of Pudgy’s hands.

  Pudgy’s mouth dropped open, closed, then opened again. “I…I’m going to report you both!”

  Goth Girl, who was a good foot shorter than the portly man, shouted up into his red face, “That’s a load of bullocks, you dodgy ol’ punter! Now piss off!”

  Pudgy backed away, turned, and fled, pushing his way through a number of folks who had gathered in the aisle drawn by the impromptu skit.

  Impressed by Goth Girl’s moxie, I stuck out my hand. “Hi. My name’s Brandy.”

  She extended one black nailed hand. “Chaz.”

  Mother beamed royally at the young woman, and said, “And I’m Vivian, my dear, Brandy’s mother. You handle yourself quite well…. Have you ever heeded the siren song of the footlights?”

  Chaz screwed up her face. “Put me foot where?”

  “Theater,” Mother explained, pronouncing it thee-ah-tah. “I’m the current director of the Playhouse and wish to know if you’ve ever acted.”

  “Oh, yeah, sure,” Chaz nodded. “This one time, I did the Artful Dodger at Holloway’s, innit?”

  Mother frowned curiously. “Holloway’s? I’m not familiar with that theater…. Is it in the West End?”

  “Naw,” Chaz said, “Islington.” She made a face like she’d sucked on a lemon. “Place is a pile of piss, man…full of rats and cockroaches.”

  Mother gave a short laugh. “Well, many of the older buildings are like that…but still, they do have their charm.”

  Chaz made the face again. “Eh? Wha’ you on about?”

  I intervened. “I believe Holloway is a women’s prison, Mother—isn’t that right, Chaz?” It pays to watch BBC America.

  Chaz smiled, showing the metal grillwork. “That’s right, Bran…. Mind if I call you that, luv?”

  Chaz didn’t wait for my reply before going on, “Anyway, when I got outta that dump, I come straight to the States to find me granddad, yeah?” She beamed back at Mr. Yeager, who had remained seated behind the table.

  Mr. Yeager nodded, smiling shyly. “That was three months ago,” the old gent said softly, “and Chaz has been living with me ever since.”

  The gawkers had moved on, now that the conflict had ended, except for a man Mother’s age named Ivan Wright, who had once been mayor of Serenity, and was among the many old boys in town who Mother was convinced had the hots for her—or anyway, the warms.

  Ivan interjected himself into the conversation. “Wasn’t that quite a shock, Walter?” the ex-mayor asked Mr. Yeager, his friendly tone taking the edge off his words. “I mean, having this young lady show up on your doorstep claiming to be your granddaughter? How did that happen, exactly?”

  Chaz, annoyed by the intrusion—and perhaps the negative content of what Ivan said—snapped, “Well, ’e shagged me grandmum exac’ly, didn’t ’e? That’s ’ow it ’appened, innit?”

  I stifled a smile. Mother didn’t, letting a grin blossom; she had something like admiration in her big eyes.

  “Very succinctly put, my dear,” Mother told our newfound friend.

  Walter Yeager said proudly, “My granddaughter may be blunt, Ivan, but she’s also correct. I met Elsie, her grandmother, when I was stationed in England during the Second World War. After I came back home, she wrote me that we had a son…but since I’d married, and Elsie had also found someone, we decided to keep our love child a secret.” He paused, then added, “She and I stayed in touch for a while, through the mail…but, well, as they say, time marches on….”

  Chaz had gone back around the table to stand next to her grandfather; she put one black-nailed hand on his slight shoulder. “I located Granddad from some old letters in a trunk, yeah?”

  Yeager looked up adoringly at the girl. “Now that my wife has passed on,” he said, “I’m thankful Chaz and I—a couple of lost souls—have found each other.” He gave her arm a squeeze. “And I’m relieved that the secret I’ve carried with me for so many years is finally out.”

  Ivan smirked, just a bit. “Well, in your case it worked out, but sometimes secrets are best kept secrets…especially when nothing good can come of it.”

  The remark reminded me of something that had been troubling me for weeks on end, thanks to an anonymous letter that had questioned my own parentage. I sneaked a glance at Mother. Was she keeping a secret from me? But her face looked placid, even serene.

  Walter
shook his head. “I used to think that way, Ivan…but not anymore…not since this little bundle from Britain appeared on my doorstep. Now I want to make it up to her, give her things I couldn’t before…and that takes money. That’s why I’m selling all my old collectibles—memories, if you will.”

  Ivan’s smirk morphed into a smile. “Well, hell, I’ll buy this Hopalong Cassidy coffee mug, Walter…if that will help. A friend of mine has a son who grew up on Hoppy who’ll get a kick out of this.”

  Yeager smiled, “It’s a start….”

  The ex-mayor brought out his wallet, but the transaction was interrupted by a commotion nearby, punctuated by shouts of “Thief!” and “Stop him!”

  Sprinting toward me came a young man in torn jeans, a navy sweatshirt, and with a stocking cap pulled down low to right above wild wide eyes. While everyone else jumped out of the young man’s way, I positioned myself so I could, at just the right moment, stick out my foot and trip him.

  But the second I lifted my leg, Chaz whispered out sharply, “Bran!” and I hesitated just long enough to miss my chance.

  The thief whisked by, shoving patrons out of his way, some clearing the path on their own volition—and no other would-be heroes (or heroines, either) risked tripping the kid or tackling him or otherwise keeping him from bolting out the front door. Which he did.

  I frowned at Chaz, more in confusion than irritation.

  She shrugged. “Sorry, Bran…thought ’e might ’urt you, mate.”

  Or that I might hurt him?

  In short order, the floor manager had called the police, and in less than ten minutes, a uniformed officer arrived. I wasn’t surprised that the representative of Serenity’s finest who answered the call was none other than my boyfriend, Brian Lawson, who worked the Serenity PD night shift.

  As soon as Brian stepped inside, he spotted me and Mother, and shook his head as he approached us down the aisle.

  “I might have known,” he said with a tiny, wry smile forming on that handsome mug. “If the Borne girls aren’t in the middle of trouble, they’re bound to be somewhere on the fringes….”

  Among those who stood shivering in the blast of cold air that had come in with Officer Lawson were Chaz and the dealer who had been robbed—a gray-bearded, potbellied guy in a plaid shirt and jeans who ran a local antiques shop. Mr. Yeager remained back at his table, and Ivan had moved along.

  Brian asked our group, “Who’s making the complaint?”

  “Complaint, my foot!” the dealer fumed. “I want to make a charge! And I want you to actually do something about it!”

  Complaint, his foot? Funny he should say that, because I’d never seen this guy on his feet before. Whenever you entered his shop, he was sitting in a rocker, reading a newspaper and letting his wife handle the customers. I figured he was more irritated about having to exert himself than getting robbed.

  “All right, settle down,” Brian said, not unkindly, patting the air with a hand, “I’m here to help.” He withdrew a small tape recorder from his jacket pocket. “Let’s start with your name, and then tell me what happened.”

  The dealer took a deep breath. “I’m Claude Anderson and I have one of the dealers’ tables over there…” He pointed. “…and I’d just turned my back for a second when that punk stole my money!”

  Brian asked, “He came around behind the table?”

  “Yes! I had the money in a plastic zipper bag—you know, like the bank gives you….”

  “And where was the bag?”

  “On the seat of my folding chair. I’d gotten up to make change for a customer…”

  Wow, the guy was going all out all tonight.

  “…and then put the bag down on it while I wrapped the purchase…and the next thing I know this thief is running off with it.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  Anderson said in frustration, “I only saw the back of him!” He pointed an accusatory finger at me—apparently the front of my face resembled the back of the thief’s head. “But that girl must’ve gotten a good look! He ran right past her!”

  I started to say something, but shut my mouth because Chaz had moved close to me and surreptitiously took hold of my hand at my side and squeezed it. Hard.

  Brian looked at me. “Well?”

  “I really didn’t get that good a look,” I said. “He went by so fast—dark jeans, sweatshirt, stocking cap—that’s all I remember.”

  Brian asked Chaz. “How about you?”

  Chaz made an exaggerated frown and shook her head. “Seen one bloke you seen ’em all, innit?”

  He turned to Mother. “What about you, Mrs. Borne? You’re generally observant.”

  Mother gestured to her thick glasses, “Oh, well, I appreciate the compliment, Officer Lawson…but honestly, I didn’t see a thing…not with these poor old peepers.”

  Brian sighed, hit the stop button on the recorder.

  Mother added, “However, I do have one important question….”

  Officer Lawson raised his eyebrows. “Which is?”

  “Is there any truth to the rumor that you’re going to stop using the ten-codes like some other police departments?”

  Brian gaped at Mother at this non sequitur; I stifled a groan and faded back behind Chaz.

  “No, Mrs. Borne, we haven’t dispensed with them yet.”

  “Good,” Mother said approvingly, tossing her head back. “It’s a most efficient system—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”

  Why did Mother care? Because Vivian Borne had her very own code number unofficially assigned by the Serenity PD; when the police radioed “ten-one-hundred” it meant that Mother was on the scene and to proceed with extreme caution.

  Anderson said irritably, “Look, can we get back to my stolen money?”

  Brian nodded, and told our little group, “All right, you can all go except for Mr. Anderson.” Then he took the dealer by the arm and walked him over to his table to finish the interview, leaving Mother, me, and Chaz.

  Mother said to me cheerily, “Well, wasn’t that exciting? We haven’t been involved with a crime for months!”

  “We’re not involved.”

  “We’re witnesses, aren’t we?” She leaned close and whispered theatrically: “Incidentally, why are we covering up, dear?”

  “What?”

  “Why aren’t we telling your nice young officer what we saw? I was simply following your lead, dear.”

  “Follow this lead,” I said, and made a “zip” gesture across my mouth.

  I told Mother to wait while I went to fetch the car, then turned to Chaz with a forced smile. “Can I see you outside for a moment?”

  She swallowed and nodded and we stepped out into the cold and stood under the scant protection of the tin awning, our breaths pluming.

  Chaz spoke first. “Thanks for keeping your gob shut, Bran, and not grassing.”

  I said testily, “I know you’re involved somehow in that theft.”

  “Wha’? No way, man!”

  I ignored her. “And if you don’t want me to ‘grass,’ that money better be returned to me tomorrow, or I’m gonna suddenly remember all kinds of details about that boy, and no doubt so will Mother—including the spider tattoo on the side of his neck.”

  Chaz spat, “Bloody hell! I told ’im to cover up that bugger!” She sighed resignedly. “You win, mate. I’ll make ’im give back the money. He just did it for me because—”

  “I don’t want to know,” I snapped. “I’ve already lied once to my boyfriend, and I don’t want to do it again.”

  Her eyes widened. “That screw’s your bloke?”

  That sounded backward somehow.

  But I said, “That’s right…so you know I mean business, ‘mate.’ I’ll come to your house tomorrow, around noon, and you’d better have that cash—every bleeding quid! Where do you live?”

  “Grandad ’as a caravan at Happy Trails Trailer Court…Number 21. But I don’t want me grandad to know!”

  “Don�
��t worry…I’ll bring some information on the value of that Tarzan book along, as an excuse.”

  “Okay.” She cast her eyes downward. “Thanks, luv.”

  “Why don’t you find some nice friends?”

  Chaz looked up again. “Wha’? A ex-con with a funny accent like me? Who’s gonna wanna be mates with me?”

  “Well…me, for one. If that money’s returned…and if you stay out of trouble, Chaz.”

  “A posh lady like you?”

  I snorted. “I’m not posh. Far from it. Take a closer look at this raccoon coat.” We were both shivering, so I said, “Remember, Chaz…noon tomorrow.”

  She said, “I won’t let you down,” and her smile had a shyness at odds with the spiky hair, multiple piercings, and public theft.

  She slipped inside.

  I trudged into the snow to get the car, wondering if I’d done the right thing.

  On the drive home Mother was a chatterbox, carrying on about her fabulous finds, interspersed with melodramatic rambling about poor Walter Yeager having to sell all his childhood memories. I concentrated on keeping the car on the snowy road, grunting every now and then to show I was listening, even though I wasn’t, really.

  As we pulled the Audi into the garage, Mother suddenly asked, “Why did you cover up for Chaz, dear?”

  I’d hoped we wouldn’t be returning to this subject, that I’d ignored her sufficiently to put it out of her mind. Out of her mind was right.

  Mother sighed. “Well, I’m sure you have your reasons, and you know I’m never one to pry…. By the way, where did you get that wonderful coat? We could be twins.”

  I shut off the engine and smiled nastily. “Yes, Mother, I feel like your twin…. And from no won, whenever I wear this coat, you should be afraid…you should be very, very afraid.”

  Mother frowned and opened her car door. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you lately, Brandy…but I’m glad we’re both seeing our therapists tomorrow.”

  “Me, too,” I said, meaning it.

  Because Mother was keeping something from me that was way more important than withholding a little information from the police.

  And Mother had been keeping her secret a whole lot longer.