All That's Missing (35 page)

“Then what happened?” asked the sheriff.

“When the stock market crashed in 1929, Weiderman lost everything. He died of a heart attack in 1930. When his estate was settled, a European collector tried to buy the painting, but no one could find it. The Brokenberry canvas had disappeared.”

“The famous
lost painting,
” the sheriff said.

“Exactly,” Mama Reel said.

“How valuable is it?” the sheriff asked.

“It's a museum piece,” Mama Reel said. “I don't know what kind of price you would put on it, but it would be a high one. I can guarantee that.”

The sheriff stared at the painting. Then he looked all around the room. He walked over and inspected the bottles on the racks along the walls. “You ever hear any talk about Slocum's Uncle Malachy being a bootlegger?” he asked.

Mama Reel stared at the bottles. Then she glanced up at the sheriff. A look of understanding passed between them. “That would explain things, wouldn't it?”

The sheriff stroked his chin. “I suppose a bootlegger wouldn't mind taking a valuable painting in payment for his whiskey,” the sheriff said. “Especially after the Crash.” He whipped out his cell phone and punched in some numbers. “Karen,” he said, “this is Sheriff McMillan. I'm here at Ida's house and there's something I need to speak to her about right away. Is she there with Nathan?”

Ida arrived ten minutes later. Her hands shook as she leaned forward to inspect the painting.

“Slocum never breathed a word about a secret room,” she said. “Or bootlegging or a painting or anything like that.”

“I doubt he ever knew,” the sheriff said. “It was Mr. Garringer and Mr. Wolfe who led Arlo and Maywood here.”

Ida's knees wobbled.

“Maybe we'd better help you upstairs,” the sheriff said.

Ida nodded. She held on to his arm as the sheriff guided her to the staircase.

“What's a bootlegger?” Maywood asked her father an hour later when they were all gathered in the living room.

“That's someone who sold illegal liquor back during Prohibition,” Lucius said.

“What's Prohibition?” Arlo asked.

Lucius shook his head. “Don't they teach you American history in school?”

“We're only up to the Boston Tea Party,” Maywood said.

Lucius sighed. “In 1919, there was an amendment to the Constitution that made it illegal to manufacture, sell, or transport liquor in the United States. It lasted until 1933, when the Constitution was amended again. During that time, a lot of people smuggled wine and beer and whiskey into the U.S. from other countries.”

“That's what those bottles in the basement are?” Arlo asked.

“Sure looks like it,” Lucius said.

“So my great-great-uncle was a bootlegger?”

Lucius rolled his shoulders in an apologetic gesture. “I'm afraid it looks that way.”

“What will happen to Mr. Garringer now?” Maywood asked.

“For starters, they've got him for breaking and entering. And then there's the fact that he was clearly trying to steal that painting.”

“Does that mean he won't buy Ida's house?”

Lucius smiled. “I think that's a safe bet,” he said.

“Not that he had any intention of buying it in the first place,” Ida said.

Everyone turned to watch her coming down the stairs.

“Well, it's obvious, isn't it?” she said. “All he wanted was the opportunity to get inside and look for the painting. He never had any interest in the house.”

“That explains a lot, doesn't it?” Lucius said.

Arlo looked around the room. In three days, he would turn twelve. He'd never expected to spend his birthday with his grandmother Jones. It was hard to believe how much had happened since he'd sneaked into that bus station in Marshboro. He checked his pocket for the wood carving, and when he held it in his hand, he was sure he felt something coming back at him.

It wasn't until Mr. Garringer, on the advice of his lawyer, agreed to plead guilty to a lesser charge that the whole story came out. That was all anyone could talk about when Ida invited Lucius and Delia and Maywood and Mama Reel and Matthew and Augusta and Nathan Tretheway and even the sheriff to dinner at her house on Thursday.

“It's the famous lost painting, all right,” Mama Reel said. “Delia talked to the lady from the Smithsonian. They're verifying a few details, but she said she's ninety percent certain it's the real thing.”

“Hard to believe, isn't it?” Ida said. “All these years no one ever guessed Uncle Malachy was a bootlegger.”

“And Mr. Weiderman was one of his best customers,” the sheriff said.

“That's how he got the painting,” Delia added.

“And that's why he hid it under the house,” Lucius said. “No way to explain buying something like that in the middle of the Depression.”

“But why didn't he tell somebody before he died?” Maywood asked.

“Most likely, he meant to,” Mr. Tretheway said. “It's not uncommon for people to carry secrets to the grave.”

“Uncle Malachy died in 1936,” Ida said. “Prohibition had just ended a few years before. He probably felt like it was too soon to tell anyone about what he had hidden.”

“So how did Mr. Garringer know to look for the painting in Ida's house?” Maywood asked.

“He didn't exactly
know
it was here,” Mama Reel said. “He came looking for it. Isn't that right, Sheriff?”

“That's a fact, Aurelia. It turns out Garringer's a dealer himself. Recently he bought up all the inventory and the records that belonged to Brokenberry's old dealer. Among the papers was a letter saying that if someone wanted to find the lost painting, they ought to ‘ask Mr. Weiderman's bootlegger about it.'”

“Did the letter say who that bootlegger was?”

“According to Mr. Garringer, the letter said there was a man named Malachy Jones who lived in the Tidewater area and who might know something about the painting. It was all very sketchy.”

“So that's why he was snooping around the cemetery,” Maywood said.

“Somehow he discovered there was a Malachy Jones who had died in Edgewater. He came looking for his grave so he could verify if that man had been alive during Prohibition. He needed to be sure that the Malachy Jones he'd found could have been the bootlegger in question. Once he confirmed that, he needed to find out where he had lived.”

“So that's where Hafer and Boyle came in,” Maywood said.

“Exactly,” the sheriff said. “Garringer didn't want to call too much attention to himself by snooping around the cemetery, so he told Hafer and Boyle what he was looking for. They led him straight to the grave.”

“So what was in the envelopes he gave them?” Arlo asked.

Maywood rolled her eyes. “Money, of course,” she said.

Arlo blushed.

“Garringer paid them for information,” the sheriff went on. “They told him where Malachy Jones's house was.”

Ida moved forward in her chair. “So all that tapping on the walls was those two men searching for a secret hiding place?” she said.

“That's right,” the sheriff said.

“So what happens next?” Matthew asked.

“Well, we won't be worrying about Mr. Garringer moving to Edgewater. That's for sure,” the sheriff said.

“And that painting will bring a tidy sum,” Mama Reel said. “Ought to put Arlo through college.”

Ida closed her eyes. “I never would have believed life could turn around so quickly,” she said.

“Pass the potato salad, would you, Sheriff?” Nathan Tretheway asked.

“Sure thing.” The sheriff passed the bowl to Delia, who passed it to Mama Reel, who passed it to Lucius, who handed it to Ida, who dolloped a scoop of potato salad onto Mr. Tretheway's plate.

“What about the painting?” Arlo asked.

“Ida plans to loan it to the museum in Richmond for the exhibit,” Mr. Tretheway said. “We hope they'll buy it.”

“That's enough talk about business,” Delia said. “This is a party.” She sent a look in Lucius's direction.

Lucius got up from the table and went over to turn out the lights. At the same moment, Ida gave Matthew a nod. Matthew and Maywood went to the kitchen. Someone struck a match, and a sharp sulfur odor burned Arlo's nostrils. Next thing he knew, Maywood was carrying a cake with twelve candles toward his place at the table. Everyone started singing. Steamboat tilted his head and howled.

Ida carried a stack of cake plates to the table and set them alongside Arlo's place.

“You knew it was my birthday?”

Ida put her hand on Arlo's shoulder. “I've always known when your birthday was,” she said. She handed Arlo an envelope with a card in it. “And Albert remembered, too.”

“You need to make a wish,” Maywood said.

Arlo took a deep breath. He concentrated on the wish as he blew out every single candle. Then he looked around the table. Could it really have been only a month since he'd arrived in Edgewater? Already the people sitting around the table felt like family.

That evening, Arlo and Ida sat on the back porch drinking lemonade and watching boats on the river. Shadows climbed the trunks of the pine trees as the sun sank lower in the sky. It was around seven when the phone rang. Ida rose to answer it and then called Arlo inside.

“It's Albert,” she said.

Arlo gave her a worried look.

“It's all right,” she said. “He sounds perfectly . . . clearheaded.”

Arlo took the phone. After Poppo had asked him how he was, and after Arlo had asked Poppo how
he
was, Poppo said he had an important question to ask.

“The truth is, I don't know exactly how to say this,” Poppo said.

Arlo's heart pumped faster.

“But Eldon thinks you'll understand.”

“Thinks I'll understand what?”

Poppo sighed. “Ida tells me the two of you are getting along pretty good,” he said.

“That's true,” Arlo said.

“She says you've made a friend there. That girl you told me about.”

“Maywood,” Arlo said.

“That's right.” Poppo cleared his throat. “She says you ride bikes and do a lot of exploring and read books.”

“Yeah?” Arlo waited.

Poppo cleared his throat. “You know,” he said, “I'm doing a whole lot better than I was when you left, but the fact is . . .” Poppo coughed. “The thing is, the doctors tell me, I'm always going to have a little trouble with my memory. In fact, they say it's going to get worse.”

Arlo's heart dropped lower in his chest.

“But you already knew that, didn't you?” Poppo said.

“Yes,” Arlo said, in a quiet voice.

“So you know we can't really go back to living in the house together the way we were doing before. Don't you?”

Arlo took a long time to answer. “I guess so,” he said.

Poppo's voice cracked. “Not that I wouldn't love to do that, you understand.”

“I know,” Arlo said. The knot that had formed in his throat made it hard to speak.

Poppo blew his nose at the other end. “We've had some good times, haven't we?”

“Really good,” Arlo said.

“And we'll have some more,” Poppo said. His voice was growing strong again. “They'll just be . . . different.”

“I know,” Arlo said.

“If you and I were out on the road somewhere and I had one of those memory spells . . .”

“It's OK,” Arlo said.

Poppo took a deep breath. “You remember me telling you there might be an apartment in the complex where Eldon lives?”

“Yes?”

“Turns out it's going to be available in a couple of weeks. And my doctor thinks it would be a perfect place for me. The only problem is, it's just for old folks. You know what I mean?”

Arlo knew exactly what Poppo meant.

“'Course, we can have guests. There's plenty of room for someone to come and spend the night every now and then.”