Hot Mahogany (19 page)

“Hello, Mildred?” Barton was saying. “How are you? Yes, it’s been a few years. I hope you’re well. I’m very well, thank you. I’m in New York, at the moment, but I’ll be driving to Newport in a few minutes, and I thought that, if you’re amenable, I might drop by Bristol and call on you.” Barton consulted his watch. “Lunch would be delightful. Would it be all right if I brought a friend?” He pointed at Stone and mouthed YOU.

Stone shrugged and nodded.

“You’re sure we won’t be putting you out? Fine, I’ll see you at one o’clock. Good-bye.” He hung up the phone, smiling. “That was easier than I expected,” he said. “She sounded very happy to hear from me.”

“You’re off to a good start, then.”

“I suppose I am. We better get moving, I guess.”

“I’ll open the garage door for you,” Stone said. He got up and pressed the button, then opened the inside door to the garage. “Just let me speak to Joan for a moment, then I’ll be right with you.” He walked into Joan’s office. “Please give me Carla’s number.” She did. “I’m going to drive up to Rhode Island with Barton. I should be back tonight.”

“Have a nice trip,” Joan said.

Stone went back to the garage. “I’d better follow you in my car,” he said to Barton. “You don’t want to have to drive me back to New York.”

“Good idea,” Barton said.

Stone hung his jacket in the backseat and got his car started. A moment later, they were headed to the East River Drive and thence to I-95.

When they were well under way, Stone called Carla.

“Hello?” Her voice was low and sexy. Stone repressed his thoughts.

“Hi, it’s Stone. I’m sorry; I was in a meeting when you called.”

“Are you out of your meeting, now? Would you like to come at… to lunch?”

Stone chuckled. “Love to, but I’m on the road. I have to drive up to Rhode Island for a meeting with a client.”

“Oh, shit,” she said.

“It’s just as well; Harlan Deal could still be having you watched. We had a meeting yesterday, and I think I threw him off the track, but you never know.”

“You mean we can’t get together at all?”

“Let’s give him time to lose interest,” Stone replied. “How did you and Barton get on?”

“Exactly how you thought we would,” she said with a little petulance.

“My congratulations to you both,” Stone said.

“Oh, go fuck yourself,” she said.

“That seems to be my only alternative.”

“Call me next week.” She hung up.

Stone tried redirecting his thoughts to eighteenth-century American furniture but did not entirely succeed.

43

Stone followed Barton up I-95, all the way through Providence, then they left the interstate and drove down the Bristol Peninsula to the town of Bristol.

Eleven Water Street turned out to be a large brick and limestone house in the Federal style, perhaps even the period. The door was answered by a middle-aged woman in a black housemaid’s uniform. They gave their names and were escorted into a spacious ground-floor drawing room.

“Mrs. Strong will be down directly,” the woman said, then left them.

Stone had expected the house to be something elegant but seedy, but there was no peeling paint or worn upholstery. The room was immaculate and beautifully furnished. Stone took a chair and watched Barton roam the room like a panther, looking closely at a piece here, a piece there.

Barton then joined Stone, taking the sofa next to him. “It’s a treasure trove,” he half whispered. “There’s at least ten million dollars at auction in this room.”

A door opened, and a tall, slender, beautifully dressed woman swept into the room, moving like someone half her age. She was perfectly coiffed and made up, and Stone wouldn’t have thought she was a day over seventy. He and Barton were immediately on their feet.

“Mildred! How good to see you!” Barton said.

She allowed herself to be kissed on both cheeks. “Barton, you look well.”

“May I present my friend, Stone Barrington?”

She extended a hand. “How do you do, Mr. Barrington.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you,” Stone replied, receiving a firm handshake.

“Would you like a glass of sherry, or shall we go straight in to lunch?” she asked.

“Whatever is convenient,” Barton said.

“Let’s have lunch,” Mildred said, leading the way toward the rear of the house, outside through French doors and down a staircase into a garden, looking south over Narragansett Bay, where a table had been set for three.

Barton held her chair for her, and they sat.

“Mr. Barrington, would you pour the wine?” Mildred asked.

“Certainly,” he replied, “and please call me Stone.”

“And I’m Mildred.”

Stone took the bottle from the ice bucket next to him and glanced at the label. It read Montrachet 1955. Good God! he thought. He poured a little for Mildred Strong.

She tasted it. “Oh, very nice,” she said. “Caleb was an avid collector of wine. I’ve hardly been able to put a dent in his cellar since he died, twenty-five years ago.”

Stone sipped the wine. It was a deep golden color and tasted of honey and pears. “This is perfectly wonderful, Mildred.”

“Are you a collector of wines, Stone?”

“I have a very nice cellar in my house in New York, but only a few good cases, I’m afraid.”

“It is so nice not to have to shop for wine,” she said. “Caleb has already done it for me.”

The maid appeared with bowls of chilled asparagus soup.

“So, Barton,” Mildred said, “what brings you to Rhode Island?”

“It occurred to me that I haven’t done the shops in Newport for a couple of years, and I thought I’d see what I could pick up for my own place.”

“From what I hear, you don’t spend much time in your shop,” she said.

“That’s perfectly true; I have a woman who runs it for me, while I scour the countryside for good pieces.”

“And that’s why you’ve come to see me, isn’t it?”

“My first impulse was to see you, Mildred, but it is a treat to see your beautiful house.”

“Yes, it is beautiful, isn’t it? In the daylight hours all I have to do with myself is to keep it that way, and the garden, too, and to write thank-you notes to my hostesses.”

“Do you still buy things?”

“Never. I haven’t bought a piece in thirty years. Caleb’s family collected so much over the centuries, that I haven’t had to shop. If I’m redoing a room and need something, I have no farther to look than my attic. There are dealers about who would pay a pretty penny for what I have in that attic.”

“Have you ever sold anything?” Barton asked.

“Not a th… well, nothing until… recently.”

Charlie Crow, Stone thought.

“Have you decided to finally begin selling?”

“Oh, no, there was just this one… thing.”

“May I ask what you sold?”

“Oh, I don’t want to talk about that. Did you come to buy my things?”

“I came to make you a proposition,” Barton said.

“I’ll just
bet
you did.”

“But I don’t want to take a single piece from your house… not anytime soon, at least.”

“What, exactly, do you mean by, ‘anytime soon’?”

“Not for as long as you live.”

Mildred chuckled. “I intend to make it to a hundred and fifty,” she said.

Stone believed she could do it.

“I hope you do,” Barton said, “but I’m prepared to make you what I hope you’ll think is a proposition worth considering.”

“Make your proposition, and I’ll consider it,” Mildred replied, “but probably not for very long.”

“I understand your attachment to your beautiful things and your reluctance to part with any of them,” Barton said, “and I will not ask you to do so. What I will do is this: I will make you an offer for a large group of specific pieces. Since I am not a very rich man, I will pay you a substantial part of my offer each year for the rest of your life. Upon your death, I will remit the unpaid balance to your executor, then take possession of the pieces.”

“And then you will auction everything and quadruple your money?”

“No, I would not like to auction such a collection and have it dispersed. What I had in mind is to interest a major museum in taking everything and, perhaps, re-creating some of your rooms to house a permanent collection.”

“Now
that
is an interesting idea, Barton,” Mildred said, looking thoughtful. “But why shouldn’t I just leave it all to a museum?”

“Because then you would realize nothing from the transfer of your possessions. You would lose a large annual income. Also, you would find yourself haggling with half a dozen museums over where the collection would go and how it would be displayed.”

Mildred frowned. “God knows I would hate doing that,” she said.

Stone watched as she sat perfectly still, soup spoon in midair for so long that he thought she had had a stroke and become catatonic. Then, suddenly, she spoke. “All right, Barton, I’ll do it,” she said, “in principle, contingent upon the details of your offer. You may have the run of the house this afternoon, or for as long as it takes, to put together your proposal.”

Barton nearly choked on his soup.

Stone had trouble not laughing out loud.

44

When they had finished their Dover sole and drunk their wine, Mildred went upstairs for a nap while Stone sat in a living room chair and wrote down descriptions of pieces and prices as Barton dictated them.

Three hours later, Mildred appeared, just as they were finishing the living room list. “Would you like to see my attic now?” she asked.

“Oh, yes,” Barton said.

She led them to an elevator in the hall, they rode it to the top floor of the house, then walked up a flight of stairs. Mildred unlocked the attic door with a very old key, and they stepped inside. “Have a good time,” she said. “Drinks are at six-thirty, dinner at seven. You’ll be staying the night.” It wasn’t a question. She left them.

Barton switched on all the lights, and he and Stone looked around. The attic was as well arranged as a gallery in a museum, except the pieces were closer together. Everything was dusted and polished, and there was none of the clutter one associated with attics. “Stone, I don’t know if you realize this, but you are witnessing something that may never be seen again: the first cataloguing of what is, without doubt, the most important collection of American furniture in existence outside a museum, and only one or two museums might match it.”

“I understand,” Stone replied. He also understood that Barton was beginning the process of making himself the richest antiques dealer in the country.

Barton began moving slowly about the room, dictating to Stone. They were not interrupted until six o’clock, when the maid came into the attic.

“Drinks are in half an hour,” she said. “May I show you to your rooms?”

Barton retrieved his bag from his car, and Stone the small bag containing a couple of fresh shirts, underwear, socks and toiletries that he kept in the trunk of his car for unexpected occasions. They were taken to the third floor of the house and installed in bedrooms.

Stone’s room contained a mahogany secretary that, although smaller than Barton’s piece, seemed just as beautiful, and his bath was a wonderland of Edwardian plumbing. He took a quick shower and changed, then joined Barton downstairs.

Mildred Strong appeared moments later. “Well, gentlemen, how did your afternoon go?”

“Mildred,” Barton said, “you were right about your attic; it’s very impressive.”

“Tomorrow you can do the study, the library and the bedrooms.”

“I look forward to it,” Barton said.

“So do I,” Stone added. “This has been an education for me.”

They dined on cold lobster salad, followed by an expertly prepared chicken breast in a tarragon cream sauce, with
haricots verts
and
pomme soufflé
. The wines were a 1959 Puligny-Montrachet Clos des Perrières and a 1945 Lafite Rothschild, something Stone never thought he would taste. He decanted it for Mildred, and there was an inch or so of sediment left in the bottle. It was in perfect condition.

The conversation never touched on Mildred’s possessions but ranged over Newport gossip, sports (Mildred was a big Red Sox fan) and jazz. Stone had little to say; he preferred listening on this occasion.

They talked over coffee until ten o’clock, when Mildred excused herself and retired.

“You must be very happy,” Stone said to Barton when she had gone.

“I’m stunned, frankly,” Barton replied. “I have been since I walked into this house. I’m going to have to sell or mortgage everything I own to make this deal work; that’s if I can sell my banker on a long-term investment.”

“She may outlive you, Barton.”

“That has occurred to me, I assure you.”

“You haven’t asked her about Charlie Crow. That transaction she mentioned must have been with him.”

“I’m afraid to bring it up,” Barton replied. “But after tomorrow, she’ll be protected from his like.”

“She doesn’t seem to need much in the way of protection,” Stone pointed out. “She’s very much in command of herself.”

“She certainly is,” Barton agreed.

They finished their brandy and went upstairs to bed.

The following morning they breakfasted at seven and went to work at seven-thirty, doing the library and the study. They broke for lunch, then went to work on the bedrooms.

At four o’clock they had finished their work and were summoned to tea.

“Well, Barton,” Mildred said, “make me your offer.”

Barton handed her his list and waited while she read it. When she had finished, he said, “Mildred, I will offer you eighteen million dollars for everything on the list, and payments of eight hundred thousand dollars a year.”

Without hesitating, Mildred said, “Make it twenty million and a million a year; I’m fond of round numbers. Shall I call my lawyer?”

“Done, Mildred. Call him.”

The man, apparently alerted, appeared ten minutes later, and Mildred introduced him as Creighton Adams. Stone gave him a copy of the proposed contract, with the blanks filled in, and Barton gave him the list.

“Mrs. Strong,” the man said when he had read everything, “I see no problems with the contract. Are you satisfied with the numbers in it?”