Poison Ivory

by Tamar Myers

  “Yeah, but I think they want to learn about something that has to do with the subject of the mystery. Let’s say it’s set in an antique store—kind of like yours—why the heck would they want to learn about bugs?”

  “No offense, Mr. Canary, but you can be a very contrary man. I was only making small talk.”

  “You were being sarcastic, and you well know it.”

  “I suppose right now sparks are flying off the page—so to speak.”

  “Don’t you be flattering yourself, Miss Timberlake.”

  “Aha! So at least you’ve got my name right this time. Sort of. I am, in fact, Mrs. Washburn. Miss Timberlake is merely my business name. You know, like a stage name. Or a nom de plume.”

  He scowled and put his hands on his hips. “If my wife used her divorced husband’s name just to make a few extra dollars, I’d tell her to keep it. Permanent-like.”

  “Well, what I do isn’t any of your darn business. Now, how can I help you?”

  “I want to see that ivory you advertised,” he said without missing a beat.

  “First, you tell me how you managed to track me down.”

  “There wasn’t any tracking needed. I didn’t recognize you because I’m working in the market all of the time, and I don’t ever shop on King Street, most especially not in fancy antiques stores. But after you stormed out of there—Wanda, she has the stall next to mine—told me all about you. Said that not only were you a big-time, up and up, antiques dealer, but that she’d seen your picture in the paper lots of times—on the society page. So I figured that you have too much to lose to be scamming anyone. As for finding you, heck, once Wanda told me the name of this shop, it was easier than finding my own big toe.”

  “You have such a charming, colloquial way of speaking, although a copyeditor would defecate a brick.”

  “What the heck is that supposed to mean?”

  “I don’t know—it just slipped out. I visited a lot of European castles last summer; maybe I contracted turret’s syndrome.”

  “Miss Timberlake, I may not be as educated as you, but I can tell when I’m being played for a fool. You don’t have any ivory to sell, do you?”

  I took a depth breath. The newspaper ad had been such a stupid ruse. It had been like throwing a chunk of bacon into the harbor and hoping to catch a tuna. Instead I was pulling up crabs. Not there’s anything wrong with crabs—but meanwhile the tuna was swimming free and would probably get away.

  “You’re right, Mr. Canary, I don’t have any ivory to sell. I apologize for wasting your time.”

  He looked stunned. “That’s it? That’s all you have to say?”

  “What else can I say? I didn’t ask you to come to my shop.”

  There, I felt immensely relieved. Now, if only he would go away. But Phillip Canary didn’t seem to want to let me off the hook that easily. His dark brown eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared.

  “Something doesn’t exactly smell right.”

  “Look, I said I was sorry; what more do you want?”

  “How about the truth?”

  That did it; that hiked my hackles. I’d barely taken any of this man’s time at the market; I surely didn’t owe him an explanation for my behavior, and I certainly didn’t owe him the truth.

  “How about you get out of my shop?”

  “Why? Aren’t I free to look around, and maybe buy something, just like anyone else?”

  I pasted on my best saleslady smile and drew on a remnant of holiday cheer. “How may I help you, Mr. Canary? Are you looking for anything in particular?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m looking to buy some ivory.”

  “Why I declare, Mr. Canary, you’re beginning to sound like a broken record. But with a name like yours, coming up with a new tune shouldn’t be all that difficult. Do you sing, Mr. Canary?”

  Much to my astonishment, he grinned. Then he threw back his head and sang, in a lovely baritone, a rousing rendition of “Bess, You Is My Woman Now” from the opera Porgy and Bess. As I watched open-mouthed, a small crowd gathered: first Wynnell; then customers who were browsing in my shop; then folks from off the street.

  17

  Bravo!” Wynnell cried, clapping vigorously.

  There were, in fact, many “Bravos,” and even some “Encores.” By then it was with pure pleasure that I watched Phillip Canary sing “Old Man River” from the musical Showboat, and a couple of gospel numbers that got a bunch of folks clapping and tapping their feet. At this point news of his performances must have traveled via the famous “Charleston phone line,” because my store was packed.

  “Who is this guy?” Wynnell whispered loudly in my ear.

  “He does the velvet paintings in the market,” I said.

  “Oh, I thought he looked familiar. He’s the one who donated fifty thousand dollars of his own money for new playground equipment for his neighborhood elementary school.”

  “That’s him? Then why is he selling velvet paintings of Madonna and Elvis in the same one-person kayak?”

  “Abby, that’s what made his story so newsworthy—he made the money for the playground by selling those paintings. Mr. Canary is a very generous man—and cute too.” She’d stopped whispering now.

  “I hadn’t noticed.”

  “Liar.”

  “Wynnell, I’m a happily married woman.”

  “So am I. I’m also postmenopausal, yet my heart’s going pitty-pat-pat. I could just eat that young man up with a spoon.”

  Unhappily for Wynnell, the young man in question finished his song a second or two before her brain could react, and thus recall her licentious words. This was also during that narrow window of time before the crowd had a chance to cheer and whoop their approval of Phillip Canary’s stellar performance.

  Instead, there was a smattering of applause, and then a roar of laughter that shook the dust mites from the highest tiers of nineteenth century chandeliers. Poor Wynnell’s face turned Shiraz red and she fled into the storage room. I felt my face turn at least a champagne pink as I followed suit.

  Neither of us had expected Phillip Canary to follow us. Nor did I ever in all my born days imagine that I would witness a celebrity fight back fans at the door of my stockroom, but that’s exactly what happened. Although I do use the word fighting in the most general sort of way, for after signing a few autographs on road maps and paper towels from the restroom, Mr. Canary was able to convince the assemblage to stay in the showroom and do some shopping for his sake. Of course that meant that one of us had to be there—and since C.J. was still nowhere to be found, that meant it had to be Wynnell.

  You can bet that she protested mightily, but a bear hug from Mr. Canary got her as far as the door, and another hug and a few pitty-pats (sans spoon) eventually got her out on the floor. As soon as she was gone, he turned to me.

  “Well, you did sort of challenge me,” he said with a laugh.

  “Indeed I did. Well sung, Mr. Canary. Are you a professional?”

  “In fact, I am. I did Porgy in a touring company—but not the lead—Showboat at dinner theaters, and I sing in the church choir. I don’t get paid for that. My dream is to get a starring role on Broadway.”

  “With that voice, I’m sure you could.”

  “Yeah, maybe. I studied at Juilliard, you know. Six years. Full scholarship. Then just when I was starting to get me some parts, my daddy keeled over dead from a heart attack. Then just six months later Mama passed. I’d come home to be with her, which meant dropping out of Juilliard. Anyway, I’ve made Charleston my home base ever since.”

  “How come?”

  “My parents were my encouragement—the wind beneath my wings. With them gone, I didn’t much feel like beating my head against the walls in New York City. That’s why I do these gigs closer to home; they’re easier to get. And, of course, I paint my pictures.”

  “You’re a very talented young man, Mr. Canary. I read somewhere that people who are talented in one of the arts are often talented in another. Suppo
sedly that’s why you find so many actors who paint, or authors who play in bands, etcetera. Is it true that your author friend, Ramat Sreym, paints, draws, and plays the piano beautifully?”

  He laughed while shaking his head. “Look, I’m not here to talk about her.”

  “That’s right; the ivory. What do you want to do with all this ivory, Mr. Canary?”

  He recoiled slightly, the smile replaced by a frown. “I can’t believe that you’re asking me this. What if I was buying a cupboard or a chair? Would you be giving me the third degree then?”

  I reached out and lightly touched his forearm. It felt surprisingly hot.

  “No. And I’m sorry; I was just being nosy. Some of these ivory pieces are exquisite, and I wanted to imagine them in their new home—unless, of course, you planned to resell them. But that’s your business; it certainly isn’t mine.”

  “Miss Timberlake, I find it very strange that you’re wanting to imagine the ivory pieces in their new setting when I’m trying to figure out if these dang things even exist.”

  The little voice that sometimes speaks to me in the back of my head had been screaming at me for some time now. This crazy idea of C.J.’s is going to blow up in your face, she said (my little voice is female, of course). Drop this nonsense before you use up your remaining life; I can’t keep on protecting you forever.

  “Please shut up,” I said. I said it sweetly, because a Southern lady must treat everyone kindly, including herself.

  “What the hell did you say?” Phillip Canary’s eyes were flashing and the veins at his temples bulged.

  “Uh-oh. I’m sorry, Mr. Canary. That just popped out; I really wasn’t talking to you.”

  “Is that supposed to be your so-called turret’s syndrome again?”

  “Something like that, yes. But I don’t blame you for being mad enough to chew nails and spit out rivets.”

  His frown was again transformed into a smile. “Sometimes Mama used to say she was mad enough to spit tacks. Between the two of us, we could have opened a hardware store.”

  I laughed. I laughed far too long, and far too loud. Meanwhile my poor brain was trying desperately to figure out a way to get my big fat mouth out of trouble.

  “Just because I shared something my mama—”

  “Ooh, Abby!” C.J. said, bursting into my office. “You won’t believe what happened to me.”

  “Deus ex machina,” I said quietly.

  C.J.’s stories are always fantastic, in every sense of the word. I used to think that she pulled them straight from the pages of supermarket tabloids, but—and this is almost too creepy to contemplate—I’ve come to discover that most of them have more than a kernel of truth to them. Some might even have a large ear of truth.

  Without being asked to share, and before any introductions could be made, C.J. launched into a strange tale of alien abduction. (These were aliens from outer space, by the way, not amigos from south of the border.) At some point during the night she’d awakened to find four small beings gathered around her, as she lay on a platform of some kind, and these strange beings were probing her with index fingers that were over a foot long. C.J. got the distinct impression that they were on a spaceship. When I asked her to describe the aliens further, she said that they had large smooth heads, huge almond-shaped eyes, and they were all about my size.

  “Just think, Abby,” she said, “if you ever get abducted, you’ll have no problem finding clothes that fit you.”

  According to the big galoot, the aliens performed all manner of medical tests on her, and were particularly interested in her problematic DNA. Apparently it had shown up on some of their monitors.

  “When I told them that I might be part goat, they got real excited,” she said, breathless from her recitation. “They made a beeline back to earth and to a pasture I told them about near Shelby where this couple raises a huge flock of Nubians. The next thing I know, I’m back in bed in Charleston, and it’s the middle of the afternoon. After I got dressed I came straight over here. Sorry again for being late.”

  I glanced at Phillip Canary. He was not only staring wide-eyed at the poor gal, I could tell by his posture that every muscle in his body was on standby for the fight or flight command. Frankly, I was tempted to shout Boo!

  Instead I said, “C.J., this is Mr. Canary. Mr. Canary, this is Mrs. Washburn, my sister-in-law.”

  “Soon to be ex-sister-in-law,” C.J. said, and giggled.

  “Nice seeing you ladies. ’Bye.” With that the talented artist (as well as supertalented singer) fled my office like palmetto bugs when lights get turned on.

  A good friend is someone who will listen to your troubles. A true friend is someone who loves you enough to set you straight, even if it means straining the friendship. As C.J. and Wynnell were already up to their armpits in the trap I’d set for the importer of illegal ivory, I decided to come clean to Bob Steuben.

  Bob is like a gay priest who came out of the closet but never sought the holy orders, and never abused anyone. That is to say, he walks as straight and narrow a path—so to speak—as any man I know. Bob doesn’t gossip, Bob doesn’t lie, Bob doesn’t cheat (not even on his taxes), Bob doesn’t wish anyone ill will (not even his partner’s mother), Bob is slow to anger, Bob doesn’t judge—well, the list goes on and on. And although the Rob half of the Rob-Bobs is really my best friend, I know that when it comes to unvarnished truth, Bob Steuben is my man.

  Just as I was fixing to mash the doorbell on The Finer Things, the man with the oversized head and steady moral compass came stumbling out into bright Charleston sunlight. He slapped himself around his pigeon chest until he located the sunglasses in his pocket and put them on.

  “Abby!” He said it as if suddenly surprised to see me. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was about to come in and see you?”

  “What about?”

  “I need to talk?”

  “Does it involve What’s-his-name?”

  “Who?”

  “You know, that tall, dark, and handsome half of the duo—the one who is immensely more popular than I?”

  “Bob! You shouldn’t say that.”

  “But it’s true, isn’t it?”

  “That is beneath comment.”

  “I know what everyone calls us: the Rob-Bobs. Am I right?”

  My face burned. “It’s just an affectionate nickname.”

  “Ah, but whose name comes first?”

  “Yes, but Bob-Robs wouldn’t sound right, would it?”

  “At this point it would be impossible to tell, your ears are so used to hearing it the other way around.”

  We were standing on the sidewalk, where God, tourists, and whoever else might be passing down King Street could see us, and possibly overhear us. This was not the cozy sort of confession I had in mind.

  “Can we go someplace more private? How about the bar at the Charleston Place Hotel? I’ll buy you a drink.”

  “You’re serious? You really want to see just me?”

  I nodded. “I need to run something buy a non-related person with a mature perspective. I pick you.”

  Even the most homely person takes on a modicum of attractiveness when they smile. “Abby, I’d love to stay and have a drink with you, but I have to drive out to Folly Beach to measure a client’s dining room. So far she’s given me three sets of dimensions over the phone. I’d send one of our interns out to do the job, but this is potentially a huge sale, involving not only a table and twelve chairs, but two credenzas and a corner cupboard—all part of a suite.”

  “Wow. I didn’t know there were any houses that big on the island.”

  “Say, if you’ve got the time, why don’t you ride along? I can always use someone to hold the other end of the tape measure; someone other than this mathematically challenged woman.”

  “Okay,” I said, needing no further prompting. It was, after all, a beautiful afternoon for a drive.

  When God made Charleston, He blessed it with water and decl
ared it “good.” It seems as if you can’t go a hundred yards in any direction without getting a glimpse of a river, a marsh, or even the open ocean. We left the peninsula via the James Island Expressway, and although it was indeed a sunny day, a stiff breeze was blowing, bringing the sailboats out in force.

  “Isn’t it to die for beautiful?” Bob said.

  “I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, could you?”

  “No,” Bob said. “Not really.”

  “Wait a minute; I heard hesitation in your voice.”

  “Well, I do miss Toledo.”

  “Toledo?”

  “Abby, it’s not a swear word.”

  “But it’s cold and industrial, and you yourself said that at this time of the year it’s as brown as a pair of old shoes.”

  “Yes, but it’s where I spent my formative years—like in those old Wonder Bread commercials. I’ll always feel connected. Don’t you feel that way about Rock Hill, South Carolina? Or should I pronounce it ‘Raw Kill,’ the way the locals do?”

  I laughed. “Watch it buster.”

  We crossed over Wappoo Creek, which is part of the Intracoastal Waterway. From the elevated roadway we had a fabulous view of the marsh and the Country Club of Charleston.

  “Okay, Abby,” Rob said, “maybe now would be a good time to get down to brass tacks.”

  18

  Was it my imagination, or did a cloud suddenly obscure the sun? I swallowed hard but barely made a dent in my pride.

  “Bob, I may have done a stupid thing: I put a bogus ad in the paper—”

  “We saw that.”

  “You did?”

  “Darling, we’re gay men. We’re antiques dealers. Of course we scan the ads for antiques and collectibles. And since you’re Rob’s best friend—after moi—you can bet we recognized your cell phone number. Did you stop to think that every other dealer in town recognized it as well?”

  “Uh—”

  “But don’t let me stop you, darling. This is your story, not mine.”