I'd targeted and be back at Antonelli's by six-thirty or seven. If the place was open—and if I knew Tony, as soon as MacGregor was through with him and MacGregor's boys were through with his cellar, he'd be open—maybe Tony would talk to me.
If he wouldn't, maybe the Navy would let Chuck Warren talk to me.
Either way, at least I'd get a drink.
Chapter 6
One of the antique shops on my list was in Schoharie, down Main Street from the Park View A wooden sign in the shape of a sheep hung over the sidewalk. The proprietress, a thin, quick woman, was very nice, but as far as Eve Colgate's silver, I came up dry. I gave her the number at Antonelli's, asked her to call me if anything like what I'd described turned up, and left.
I decided to hit the farthest of the other shops first and then work my way back across the county. I U-turned in the middle of Main Street, went south where Main turns into 30 and 30 turns into a four-lane highway. Down here in the valley there was nothing dramatic about this road, but it was fast. Even where it was only two lanes, it had been widened and straightened, something they did to the old roads around here when they didn't build new ones to bypass them entirely. Now 30 cut right through some of the farms that had looked so timeless and sure from the hills. Not a few farmers had retired to Florida on what the state had paid for the fields I was driving through. Asphalt was a cash crop, up here.
I turned off 30 onto a narrow road that lead up into the hills past Breakabeen. The shop I was headed for was a few miles outside town. Town was a post office, a bar, a grocery, a Mr. Softee, and a dozen houses strung out along a crossroads.
Just beyond the point where the last of the houses disappeared behind me there was a road leading up to the right—probably a driveway masquerading as a road, like mine. Faded script letters on an arrow-shaped sign told anyone who cared to know that The Antiques Barn was a half mile up.
The first hundred yards was respectable, but after that the road was badly kept, full of potholes and mud. The Acura had good suspension—the old ones did—but I wouldn't cut a diamond in it, even on the highway. I was glad to get out of the car onto ground that wasn't moving.
The Antiques Barn was a real barn, big, with flaking red paint and double square doors wide enough to drive a combine through. Those doors weren't open. Neither was the person-sized door cut into one of them, but it gave when I turned the knob. As it opened, it rang a set of sleigh bells hung on the jamb.
I stepped over the high wooden threshold into a dusky, dank room where plates and pitchers, candlesticks and jewelry, walking canes, hats, boots, and thousands of books lay in piles on wooden furniture of every description. The piles had an air of having been undisturbed since time began. Each piece, including the furniture, bore a square ivory-colored tag with a number written on it in a spidery hand.
The room went on forever, disappearing into the dusk, and it seemed I was alone in it. "Hello!" I called into the aged air. Nothing happened. Maybe in here nothing ever happened. I called "Hello!" again, louder; then went back to the door and rattled it, ringing the sleigh bells again and again.
I stopped because I thought I heard a voice. I listened, ready to go back to my sleigh bells; but I was right. Faintly, from somewhere beyond a clutch of stuffed chairs in the center of the room, came words, and with the sound came movement, a figure shuffling toward me out of the primordial twilight.
"Yes, yes!" it muttered as it inched along, placing objects from a pile in its arms onto bureaus and bookcases like a glacier depositing rocks. "My, my!" The figure came very, very slowly to stand before me. It was the figure of a man, round for the most part. His age was unguessable, as was the actual color of his hair, now a thick dust gray.
He squinted up at me over dusty glasses that seemed to have been
If he wouldn't, maybe the Navy would let Chuck Warren talk to me.
Either way, at least I'd get a drink.
Chapter 6
One of the antique shops on my list was in Schoharie, down Main Street from the Park View A wooden sign in the shape of a sheep hung over the sidewalk. The proprietress, a thin, quick woman, was very nice, but as far as Eve Colgate's silver, I came up dry. I gave her the number at Antonelli's, asked her to call me if anything like what I'd described turned up, and left.
I decided to hit the farthest of the other shops first and then work my way back across the county. I U-turned in the middle of Main Street, went south where Main turns into 30 and 30 turns into a four-lane highway. Down here in the valley there was nothing dramatic about this road, but it was fast. Even where it was only two lanes, it had been widened and straightened, something they did to the old roads around here when they didn't build new ones to bypass them entirely. Now 30 cut right through some of the farms that had looked so timeless and sure from the hills. Not a few farmers had retired to Florida on what the state had paid for the fields I was driving through. Asphalt was a cash crop, up here.
I turned off 30 onto a narrow road that lead up into the hills past Breakabeen. The shop I was headed for was a few miles outside town. Town was a post office, a bar, a grocery, a Mr. Softee, and a dozen houses strung out along a crossroads.
Just beyond the point where the last of the houses disappeared behind me there was a road leading up to the right—probably a driveway masquerading as a road, like mine. Faded script letters on an arrow-shaped sign told anyone who cared to know that The Antiques Barn was a half mile up.
The first hundred yards was respectable, but after that the road was badly kept, full of potholes and mud. The Acura had good suspension—the old ones did—but I wouldn't cut a diamond in it, even on the highway. I was glad to get out of the car onto ground that wasn't moving.
The Antiques Barn was a real barn, big, with flaking red paint and double square doors wide enough to drive a combine through. Those doors weren't open. Neither was the person-sized door cut into one of them, but it gave when I turned the knob. As it opened, it rang a set of sleigh bells hung on the jamb.
I stepped over the high wooden threshold into a dusky, dank room where plates and pitchers, candlesticks and jewelry, walking canes, hats, boots, and thousands of books lay in piles on wooden furniture of every description. The piles had an air of having been undisturbed since time began. Each piece, including the furniture, bore a square ivory-colored tag with a number written on it in a spidery hand.
The room went on forever, disappearing into the dusk, and it seemed I was alone in it. "Hello!" I called into the aged air. Nothing happened. Maybe in here nothing ever happened. I called "Hello!" again, louder; then went back to the door and rattled it, ringing the sleigh bells again and again.
I stopped because I thought I heard a voice. I listened, ready to go back to my sleigh bells; but I was right. Faintly, from somewhere beyond a clutch of stuffed chairs in the center of the room, came words, and with the sound came movement, a figure shuffling toward me out of the primordial twilight.
"Yes, yes!" it muttered as it inched along, placing objects from a pile in its arms onto bureaus and bookcases like a glacier depositing rocks. "My, my!" The figure came very, very slowly to stand before me. It was the figure of a man, round for the most part. His age was unguessable, as was the actual color of his hair, now a thick dust gray.
He squinted up at me over dusty glasses that seemed to have been
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