Antiques Bizarre (8 page)

“Is she being charged?” Mother demanded indignantly. “Is she a material witness?” To me she said, “Dear, don’t answer any questions without talking to our lawyer.”

Our attorney happened to be around ninety, and most likely was in bed asleep right now. If he wasn’t in bed, he was still likely to be asleep.

Chief Cassato opened the back door of the vehicle, saying over his shoulder to Mother, “She’ll be back in a few hours.”

Then he deposited me inside.

Just another confused perp.

A Trash ‘n’ Treasures Tip

Charity bazaars can turn up unexpected treasures, like the time Mother bought a coat, and found a hundred-dollar bill in one pocket. The Christian thing would have been to return the money to its rightful owner, but in Mother’s mind “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is trumped by “Finders keepers, losers weepers.”

C
hief Cassato’s unmarked car lacked the mesh screen separating front and back that squad cars have, so it wasn’t like I was a prisoner, right? I mean, on TV and in movies, you see bad guys in back with no door handles and no way to roll windows down or anything, making escape impossible (or anyway hard, because—on TV and in movies—they often do find a way to escape).

Not that I was thinking of escaping. But if this wasn’t official, if I wasn’t some kind of witness if not suspect, why had he deposited me in back? We were friends, weren’t we? Why wasn’t I sitting up front with Daddy?

I was just telling myself there was nothing sinister about my backseat banishment when we drove past the police station, and before long were heading out the river road.

I leaned forward. “Ah…Chief? Tony? Where exactly are we going?”

He eyed me in the rearview mirror. “You just sit tight, young lady.”

Young lady! Normally, a thirty-one-year-old woman being called “young lady” might be viewed as a compliment of sorts, left-handed maybe but reassuring on some level. But there was nothing reassuring going on in my Prozac-free
mind. The chief might not have been speeding, but my brain was shifting into overdrive, concocting all sorts of scenarios—none of them good.

Good Lord, what if Serenity’s top cop was actually involved in either the murder of Louis Martinette or the theft of the Fabergé egg? Did he think that I had seen, or heard, something that could implicate him in one or both of those crimes?

All of this was ludicrous, of course, and such thoughts would never have gone running wild in the canyon between my ears if I hadn’t shared DNA with Vivian Borne. And the silly paranoia was not aided by the chief turning off the scenic blacktop highway onto a secondary country road, the tires kicking up gravel and dust.

I leaned up. “
Where
are you taking me?”

But this time he didn’t even reply. Not even a glance from his steel-gray eyes!

“Look, you can’t just throw somebody in the back of your car and go riding off without explanation. This is America! This is Iowa! Just because you’re the chief of police—”

“Relax,” he cut in gruffly. “I’m not going to bury you in the woods or anything.”

Good to know!

And over the next fifteen minutes or so, the car twisted and turned along remote backroads, making my fantasies of jumping out a door and rolling to freedom seem as silly as they sounded, and then suddenly the vehicle veered into the mouth of a private lane, nearly obscured by a row of thick bushes.

We bumped down a long narrow strip of gravel before coming to an abrupt stop in front of a rustic structure, a slightly oversized log cabin, as dust settled around us like smog.

What
was
this place, and why were we here? Was this the backwoods equivalent of a dank secret cell in the basement of the Serenity police station, where suspects and uncooperative witnesses were given the Third Degree? And what were the First and Second Degrees, anyway?

Maybe Mother was right—maybe I did need to get back on the Prozac….

Chief Cassato got out of the car, then came around and opened my door in a gentlemanly fashion.

When I didn’t budge, he leaned in. “What’s the problem?”

“What’s the idea of throwing me in the backseat and doing whatever you want with me?”

That came out a little wrong….

“If I’d put you in front,” he said, his tone bland, “your mother would have thought this was a date. Needed to make it look official, Brandy.”

“Is
that
what this is? Your idea of a date? Drive me in the country and scare the daylights out of me?”

“If I’d told you what I had in mind,” he said, “you might have said no.” Then he frowned, as
that
had also come out a little wrong….

Finally I got out of the car, then stood with hands on hips and worked up a little indignation. “Do you
mind
telling me why I’m here?”

He gestured to the cabin. “This is where I live. I don’t bring just anybody out here.”

My eyes swept over the rustic home, finding nothing at all sinister about it. “You don’t?”

“No. I keep kind of a low profile.”

I knew that already—Cassato was Serenity’s resident Man of Mystery, which is partly why my paranoia got out of hand on the drive out here.

“Then you
weren’t
trying to throw a scare into me….”

His smile was small but wicked. “Maybe a little.”

I pounded on his chest, once, with a fist. Not hard. “What did I do to deserve that?”

“How about, help your annoying mother interfere in countless police matters over the past year? How about, put your own welfare and life itself stupidly at risk, any number of times?”

“Well…besides that.”

He chuckled, gave up half a grin. “You seem a little surprised by the Cassato homestead. What did you expect?”

“I guess a condo, maybe—in a gated community, so you’d have a little privacy. And to keep Mother out.”

He waved a hand at his place. “This is just as safe—unless you tell her where it is. I’m trusting you, Brandy.”

“Yeah, I guess Batman doesn’t just show every chick the Bat Cave.”

Everyone in Serenity knew Tony Cassato protected his private life—both past and present—like a bulldog does a ham bone.

And speaking of dogs, a snarling canine with teeth bared was rounding the side of the cabin and making straight for yours truly. I grabbed on to the chief’s nearest arm as if I’d fallen from a cliff and needed a branch to cling to.

The chief moved me behind him, stepping protectively in the path of the barking hound, then barked his own warning, stopping the animal in its oversized tracks.

“Sit!”
the chief said.

“You talking to me or the mutt?”

But the mutt—and it was a mixed breed critter, white and black and coming up to about his master’s knee—was sitting there dutifully, slobbering and wagging his tail (the dog, not the master).

“I guess even a watchdog needs a watchdog,” I said.

“He’s a good boy. Stays in his doghouse and gives trespassers hell. But he’s all bark and no bite.”

Like his master, I wondered?

“So what’s his name?”

“Rocky.”

“After the flying squirrel or Italian stallion?”

“Stallone. I love the first of those movies.”

“Me, too.” I pointed, gingerly, at the dog, not moving too quickly. “It does look like he got K.O.’d.”

Rocky had a black circle around one eye.

“You ever see
The Little Rascals
on TV?” he asked. “Or are you too young?”

Loving the sound of seeming “too young,” I said, “Mother used to show us tapes of them—Spanky and Alfalfa and a dog who looked like Rocky, but smaller.”

“Right. Go ahead and call to him. He’s friendly.”

I’d had a taste of his friendliness already, but I called to the dog, and he trotted over for a sniff, his stump of a tail starting to wag once he’d gotten a whiff of Sushi on my clothes.

Soon I was following the chief up a few wooden steps, and across a small porch where a log-wood rocker with a green cushion kept company with a few potted plants. He unlocked the front door, then stepped aside for me to enter, which I did, an impatient Rocky pushing past me (and letting me know who rated first around here), nails clicking on the floorboards.

Inside, the cabin had a predictably pleasant, woodsy aroma—like pinecone-scented freshener, only the real deal—and was roomier than it had appeared from the outside. To my left was a cozy area with fireplace and overstuffed brown couch, along with a matching recliner; to the right, a four-chair round oak table shared space with a small china hutch. A hallway led to a few other rooms—
bed, bath, and beyond. The place had a nicely masculine feel.

Tony hung his sport coat on one of several wooden pegs in the entryway, exposing a shoulder holster on his white short-sleeve shirt with blue tie. He undid the apparatus and slung it over another of the pegs. When he turned and realized I’d been watching the procedure, somewhat awed frankly by the whole shoulder-holster gun rigamarole, he twitched a smile, loosened his tie, and motioned me over to the sofa.

I sat and watched silently as he bent before the fireplace, putting a match to crumpled papers beneath the logs and flames danced upward, bringing a soft yellow glow to the room, and chasing the chill away. This homey side of city-boy Tony was brand-new to me.

He straightened and pointed. “Stay put.”

Again, I wasn’t sure if the command was for me, or Rocky, who had plopped down with a world-weary sigh near my feet. Maybe he meant both of us.

Then the chief disappeared into a side room, where soon came sounds of pans banging, and utensils clanking, as if he were ransacking his own kitchen.

Now
what?

Oh, well, like Rocky, I’d had my orders—mine was not to reason why, mine was but to…stay put.

I began to make mental notes about my surroundings, knowing that Mother would grill me over every single detail of my visit to the chief’s secret hideaway. Tony might want me to protect his privacy, and the whereabouts of the cabin were safe with me, but Mother’s questions would no doubt wear me down. She’d seen me ride off with the chief, and I didn’t have the imagination to create a fake scene for her about being grilled at the station, or believably come up with a story about the chief taking me out dancing or dining or whatever.

And, I have to admit, part of my curiosity was personal. I longed to learn more about the mysterious chief of police, who had come from the East three years ago to take over the top cop job.

Since then, a myriad of stories had circulated around town about his untold history, ranging from the scurrilous (he had been a bent cop in New York and got relegated to the boonies) to the ridiculous (he was in the witness protection plan after ratting on the mob, and used to look like a young Cary Grant before surgery). I was pretty sure Mother spread most of the stories, attempting (without success) to flush out the truth.

My eyes traveled to a pair of antique rifles hanging above the fireplace, then to an assortment of fishing gear piled in one corner (creels, poles, hip boots, nets), to a collection of snowshoes (arranged haphazardly on one wall), and to framed photos displayed here and there, of fishermen and hunters, sepia shots of days long gone by.

My shrewd Nancy Drew-like detective’s mind quickly deduced that a) the chief was a man’s man, b) he used to live somewhere where the snow got even deeper than around here, and c) he preferred fake, sepia memories to real ones.

A crash came from the kitchen—a plate dropping, possibly shattering—followed by cursing.

“Everything okay?” I called.

“I’m on it!” Tony called back, gruffly.

Rocky’s shrewd Rin Tin Tin—like detective’s mind quickly deduced an opportunity for fallen food, and he abandoned his warm place by the fire to investigate.

Yummy smells were emanating from the kitchen—freshly baked bread, and apple pie….

Now
I
went to investigate.

“Okay, what is this?” I asked from the kitchen doorway.

The chief, looking no more frazzled than he might have after running down a bank robber (on foot), stood at the stove, swathed in steam, stirring the contents of a saucepan. The only thing that would have made him look more comic was a zany backyard chef’s apron.

“Out,” he said, gesturing with the ladle, sending an arc of orange across the floor.

Rocky, finished with whatever had been on the broken plate, pounced on the new spill.

I grinned at my host. “Are you
sure
you don’t need help? I’m pretty good at accident scenes. Or is this a crime scene?”

“Go!”

“Anywhere special?”

“Sit at the table.”

“Yes, sir.”

And I gave him a crisp salute.

Retreating to the outer room, I pulled out a chair at the table, only now noticing (some detective!) the two place settings.

Maybe he
had
taken me out dining….

A few minutes later the chief—or was that
chef?
—emerged from the kitchen like a harried waiter, carrying two steaming bowls of soup, then hurried back, returning with freshly baked bread on a wooden platter, which he placed in the center of the table.

He pulled out the chair across from me, making a fingernails-on-blackboard screech, sat, picked up a spoon, and dipped it into his soup.

When I didn’t move, he looked up.

“It is a little hot. You may want to blow on it.”

I just stared at him.

“Oh…sorry—did you, uh, want to say grace or something?”

I laughed.

“What’s funny?”

He’d reminded me of when I was a little tyke, when Mother would help me put my hands together, and do her best to teach me the Danish table prayer she’d said as a child.

But I’d mangled the words so badly, Mother had in desperation taught me the simplest of prayers.

Around age ten, I finally realized that it wasn’t “food-wich” (apparently a kind of sandwich), and that I need not fear a food-stealing creature called “Snoughy” (
now we take
), or that we weren’t meant to “make a sign” (
make us thine
)…for Jesus’ sake!

I said to Tony, “You brought me out here to…feed me?”

“Well, it’s not a kidnapping.”

“Now he tells me.”

He shrugged a shoulder. “Your mother said that if you didn’t start gaining weight, you were going to the hospital.”

Mother’s meddling knew no bounds.

“You have been talking to my mother?”

“Not because I want to,” he assured me. The chief’s steely eyes softened with concern. “Well?
Do
you have a weight problem?”