The Ming and I Page 2

  “Greg and I have a date,” I lied. “We’re going out to dinner.”

  That was a mistake. Mama adores Greg, and she is the world’s best cook, bar none. As for Greg, sometimes I think he would rather accept food from Mama than anything from me.

  “Why don’t the two of you come here instead?” Mama asked. “Say, about seven? I’m making saddle of lamb, new potatoes, and fresh asparagus.”

  Mama is a widow who usually eats alone, but you would never know it by the way she dines. Fresh flowers, a linen tablecloth, and real silver are daily accoutrements at her table. Leave it to Mama to make saddle of lamb for one.

  “Greg doesn’t like lamb,” I said honestly.

  Mama was unflappable. “Well, then, how does a nice, medium-rare beef Wellington sound? Of course we’d skip the potatoes then. Maybe an artichoke salad instead. But the asparagus stays. I have a new recipe for hollandaise sauce.”

  “Artichoke hearts?” I asked hopefully. Mama’s menus had mellowed me. I no longer remembered being miffed.

  “Of course,” Mama said. “You can’t put artichoke leaves in a salad.”

  “All right, we’ll be there. But only if we get to do the dishes.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Mama said, and hung up.

  It took me just a second to switch from menus to Ming. I scurried back to The Nook. Rob and Bob were still there, and so was the vase. Rob was gently patting it dry with one of his silk shirttails. Paper towels, he told me, were too rough.

  I had been there at the beginning of the transformation; still, I could hardly believe the end product. Just looking at it brought tears of joy to my eyes.

  “How much is it worth?” I asked sensibly.

  “Five thousand minimum at a dealer’s auction,” Bob said. “Retail between ten and fifteen.”

  The tears of joy streamed down my cheeks.

  “If you don’t mind my asking,” Rob said, “how much did you pay for it?”

  “Well, uh—actually I didn’t. I’m not sure, but I think it might have been put here by Ms. Troyan, that poor woman who was hit by the car yesterday.”

  “Then of course the Ming’s value is only an academic question,” Bob said, looking pointedly at me.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Well, it isn’t rightfully yours. You just said so yourself.”

  “But I found it in my shop,” I wailed. “What about finders keepers? Isn’t there such a law?”

  “Well, you have to notify the police, don’t you? Then they have to track down Ms. Troyan’s heirs, assuming she has any.”

  “Assuming she doesn’t?”

  “That’s another story, of course. Eventually the vase might end up yours. Unless…”

  I reverently took the vase from Rob. It was much lighter than I had expected. “Unless what?”

  “Well, unless the vase didn’t belong to Ms. Troyan in the first place.”

  The tears slowed. “Who then?”

  Bob shrugged. “Maybe it was stolen. Or smuggled into the country. In either case it might take years to sort it all out, and in the end this beauty would probably go up for sale at public auction.”

  I stared at him with eyes as dry as cotton balls.

  “Don’t listen to him,” Rob said, tucking his wet shirttail back in. “It was all those Toledo winters that made him so negative. He was just giving you one scenario.”

  “Oh?”

  “You could just keep it, you know. Not tell the police. After all, maybe you did buy it at an auction along with some other stuff, and just never noticed it before.”

  Bob gave his partner a reproachful look. “That wouldn’t be right, Robert.”

  “But we have no proof that the vase doesn’t belong to her,” Rob protested.

  I smiled at him gratefully.

  Bob shook his head. It was clear he was disappointed in both of us.

  “Anyway, Abby would never do such a thing.” He looked at me pointedly. “Would you?”

  I shook my head reluctantly. I would never steal anything, of course. Even we Episcopalians still have that commandment on the books. But I wanted to think of this situation as falling under one of those gray areas of ethics, the kind you can debate for hours in a college dorm with a bottle of Boones Farm wine.

  Unfortunately my brain is two and a half decades older, and I now drink chardonnay. While it was possible I might have bought the vase as part of a lot, I never would have set it out for display in The Nook. Besides, I had seen Ms. Troyan holding a vase that looked similar to this one while it was yet in its ugly duckling state, and the odds of two ugly ducklings showing up in my shop were not good. Or so I’d like to think.

  “All settled then?” Bob asked gently. “I’ll make the call for you, if you like.”

  “No,” I said quickly. “It’s my responsibility, so I’ll call.”

  He gave me a questioning look.

  “I promise,” I snapped.

  “Let’s go,” Rob said, taking Bob by the arm.

  I meant what I said. I would call Greg, but only to invite him to dinner that night. News about the vase could keep until then. In the meantime I would keep the beauty with me behind the counter. Between customers I could at least fantasize that it was mine.

  I put the vase in all its shining glory on a small table against the wall behind the counter that I use as a desk. Then I stepped around the counter to admire the Ming for a few precious seconds before flinging my door open to the public.

  In retrospect, I will acknowledge that displaying the Ming, no matter how briefly, was not one of my brightest moves. While it is true that my taste buds prefer chardonnay, on occasion I still think with a Boones Farm brain.

  I had just finished ringing up the sale of an Art Deco mirrored console when the phone rang.

  “Den of Antiquity,” I said cheerily. The console had sold for full price.

  “Is this the owner?” someone of indeterminate sex asked in a muffled voice.

  “Yes. How may I help you?”

  “This is Lock, Stock, and Barrel Security Services,” the androgynous voice said. “We’re offering a special this week—”

  “Thanks, but no thanks,” I said politely.

  “You’ll want to hear this special.”

  “I bet I won’t.”

  There followed a long and delightful silence. “Hey lady, I’m just trying to make a living,” the caller said at last.

  “Tell you what. I’m with a customer right now, but give me your number and I’ll call you right back.”

  I felt for the tablet of notepaper I keep by the phone. Unfortunately it was missing. Not that I would have called right back, mind you, but I would have called. I know, it is absolutely puerile of me—perhaps even unchristian—but I enjoy calling phone solicitors at home in the middle of the night. I don’t set my alarm especially for that, mind you. I just do it whenever I wake up to use the bathroom.

  “It’s against company regulations to give out our phone number,” the caller said.

  “Well, it’s against my regulations to talk to companies that won’t.” I hung up.

  Immediately the phone rang again. I let it ring five times before answering. When you are in a retail business, you shouldn’t rely on an answering machine during business hours. There are still folks out there who hang up on canned voices.

  “Hello?”

  “You shouldn’t be so rude,” my previous caller said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I have to make a living, too, you know.”

  “I know. So give me your home phone number and I’ll call you this evening,” I said. That almost always works like a charm.

  The caller paused only a microsecond, if at all. “I can’t. My roommate works night shift. But this will only take a moment, I promise.”

  “No—”

  “Please. Just one minute. Then I get credit for the call.”

  “One minute,” I said crisply. It would be my one good deed of the day.r />
  The salesperson took a deep breath. “We at Lock, Stock, and Barrel Security Services guarantee that we can upgrade your existing security system, and offer you continued protection at half the cost of your current system, or you get a check from us for five hundred dollars for your trouble. Whose system are you currently using?”

  “I’m not using any,” I said triumphantly. “Will you be sending my check by registered mail?”

  This time the party on the other end hung up.

  3

  “What do you mean Greg couldn’t come?” Mama demanded, wiping her hands on a starched white apron dotted with eyelets.

  To my knowledge Mama has never even flirted with Greg, but I would bet the Ming—if it were mine—that she has a crush on him. But an innocent crush, I’m sure, like the one I had on Ricky Nelson in the fifth grade. My mama would never step out of line, even in the privacy of her own mind.

  “Greg called just before he was due to pick me up at six. There’s been a double homicide in Myers Park. Apparently some banker went berserk.”

  “I thought that was the post office’s job,” Mama said, and held the door open for me. I was, after all, bearing gifts—a bottle of chardonnay and a pecan pie, both of which I had picked up at the new Hannaford’s on Ebeneezer Road in Rock Hill.

  I was born and raised in Rock Hill, South Carolina, which is just a stone’s throw from Charlotte, North Carolina. Mama still lives there, on shady, dignified Eden Terrace. It is the same house I grew up in. Nothing has changed, not even the mint green drapes hanging desolately from the cornice. Although she would hotly deny it, Mama has kept the house as a shrine to Daddy, who died in a water-skiing accident on nearby Lake Wylie seventeen years ago.

  At four foot ten, Mama is only an inch taller than me, but we both have healthy appetites and managed to make a sizable dent in her delicious dinner. In fact, had Greg come there wouldn’t have been enough artichoke salad for him. Mama claimed that the Harris Teeter where she shops was plum out except for the one jar.

  “Then you should try Hannaford’s,” I said.

  The corners of Mama’s mouth twitched, which is as close to a grimace as a true southern lady is capable of making.

  “I can’t stand the traffic on Ebeneezer Road,” she said. “Rock Hill is getting so big. It’s growing by leaps and bounds.”

  “Growth is supposed to be good,” I said, but I was obviously not an expert on the subject.

  “New stores are popping up all the time.”

  “Like Hannaford’s,” I said.

  Her mouth twitched. “Other stores, too. All kinds.”

  “Yeah.”

  Mama gave me a long, hard look. “Other stores, Abby, if you know what I mean.”

  I didn’t and said so.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure. Would you like to split another piece of pie?”

  Mama shook her head and sighed deeply. Her fingers drifted absentmindedly up to her pearls, a gift from my father.

  “I’m glad we have this chance to talk alone, dear. There’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you.”

  She had me spooked. “Mama, it’s not cancer, is it?”

  “Oh no, nothing like that.” She sighed again. “I’m just not sure it’s something I should tell you. You might think less of me.”

  I patted her arm. “You can tell me anything, Mama.”

  Mama leaned toward me. “I’m going to finally get one.”

  I had no idea what she meant. It could have been anything from a pet parakeet to a jogging machine. Didn’t both of those things come in avocado green? No, it had to be more personal than that, like maybe an electric razor or one of those depilatory kits.

  “You’re going to have to be more specific,” I said gently.

  Mama’s face turned the color of pickled ginger. “I’m going to get a tattoo.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t ask me why, but I’ve always wanted a tattoo, Abby. Ever since I was a little girl.”

  “Why?” I wailed.

  “Because I’m seventy-five years old, and I want to have a tattoo before I die, that’s why.”

  “You just turned seventy, Mama.” My mother is one of six women in this world who actually pad their ages, rather than shave a few years off. That way they are always complimented on their relative states of preservation, rather than given sympathetic looks. In Mama’s case, however, this ruse is totally unwarranted, since Mama looks young enough to be my sister, and I must habitually maintain an artificial gray streak in my chestnut brown hair so as not to be mistaken for a teenager.

  I stared at her. Her color was back to normal, and she appeared surprisingly composed. Too composed. Mama is a Monroe, and her chin was set in that peculiar Monroe position that could only mean one thing—she was hunkering down to be stubborn.

  “Well, I don’t see what this has to do with me.”

  “I want you to go with me. You know, in case I’m too uncomfortable to drive myself home.”

  “Can’t one of your friends go with you?”

  Mama gave me a horrified look. “Gracious, no! They must never find out. Promise me you won’t tell them, Abby.”

  “I promise.” Of course I meant it. Far be it from me to start rumors that my mother was fast slipping into her dotage.

  “Good. I’d just die if they found out.”

  Something terrible occurred to me. Mama’s friends have eagle eyes to go with their rabbit ears. They were going to see the bloody thing unless…

  “Mama, where are you getting this tattoo?”

  “Tiny Tim’s Tattoo Palace. It’s that new place on Cherry Road I was trying to tell you about.”

  “Not where in Rock Hill,” I practically screamed. “Where on your body?”

  She looked away and mumbled something.

  “What?”

  She turned reluctantly to face me. “Okay, if you must know, I was thinking of getting it where the sun doesn’t shine. After all, I still swim when we go to Pawleys Island. It has to be someplace it doesn’t show.”

  I stared at her, seeing a stranger. “What if the tattoo artist is a man?”

  She sighed. “That’s why I really need you to go with me, Abby.”

  “Let me get this straight, Mama. You want me to go with you to some sleazy tattoo shop to safeguard your virtue?”

  Mercifully the phone rang.

  Mama answered it in the kitchen and was back a minute later to get me. “It’s Greg, for you,” she said. “Just think about it, dear.”

  The double homicide in Myers Park had not taken as long as expected to deal with. It turned out that the berserk banker was bogus—there were bodies all right, but they belonged to two store mannequins that someone had dumped in the front yard of a banker’s house. Probably just a teenage prank. Would it be okay with me if he dropped by my house for a nightcap when I got home?

  I said it was. Don’t get me wrong. I am not sex crazed like my mama. Greg and I have been dating less than a year, and we’re building on our relationship slowly. I am not about to just jump into bed with a man because I feel lonely now and again.

  Once was enough. I got married right out of college to a snake named Buford Timberlake. I met him on the water slide of an area amusement park just days after I broke with my college sweetheart Delbert Dewimple. I suppose that I was your classic rebound case, whereas Buford no doubt was just horny. At any rate Buford had just finished his first year of law school, and he had the same glib tongue then that he has now. By that I mean he could talk a politician into telling the truth—even a Republican.

  I found myself walking down the aisle with Buford in less time than it took to go down the water slide. Unfortunately our sex life was like that, too. On the plus side, it did produce two lovely children: Susan, now twenty and in college, and eighteen-year-old Charlie, who is a senior in high school. Susan lives in a dorm; Charlie lives with Buford and his new wife, Tweetie.

  As for me, I live in a newly acquired h
ouse in south Charlotte, alone, except for the company of my yellow tomcat, Dmitri. All in all, I am very happy living alone. Of course I miss the children, and there are times it would be nice to have a man around, but I don’t need a man in my life, as I did on that water slide.

  Greg was waiting for me in the double carport. I pulled up beside him, got out, and we kissed hello. I was, of course, standing on my tiptoes. Greg is six feet tall, and I’m afraid that one of these days he’s going to wrench his back bending down so far.

  “You missed a great dinner,” I said.

  “I’m sure I did, so I brought this.” He held up a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Creme whiskey, my favorite after dinner drink. “To help me forget the taste of that burger I had. McDonald’s is trying to market a new flavor.”

  We went inside to the den—as we call our family rooms in these parts—and Greg poured us each a drink. We took off our shoes and settled onto my oversize Federal Period sofa, me with my legs across his lap. Incidentally the sofa isn’t nearly as comfortable as it is attractive, but since I wear high heels regularly, who am I to complain?

  “Tell me about your evening,” Greg said, just as comfortably as if we were happily married.

  Despite a fairly active sex life, Buford and I were never as intimate as that.

  “Well, Mama—no, you go first this time. Tell me all about the bogus bodies on the banker’s lawn.”

  Greg took a sip of Bailey’s and licked his lips appreciatively. “First let me tell you about a real body.”

  “Do tell.” Because of his line of work, Greg has some fascinating stories.

  “I just saw the lab report on the Troyan woman. You were right, Abigail. She was hit by a blue vehicle.”

  I sat up quickly and almost knocked the glass out of Greg’s hand. “A van?”

  He chuckled. “I can’t tell that from just the paint. I’m not Columbo. But I can tell you a little bit about Ms. Troyan.”

  “Please do.” You might think that my interest was macabre, but just you wait until a body comes hurtling through your window. Then you’ll whistle a different tune.

  “For starters, her full name was June Gibbons Troyan. She was originally from Indiana, but lived in Lake City, Florida, until two years ago. Moved here shortly after the death of her husband. Mr. Troyan died of natural causes. Some kind of heart trouble.”