A Killer Collection (22 page)

"Maybe that's it." Molly
turned to her helper, thinking about the news stories she’d seen on TV about
the serious conditions people in the country faced during those two weeks.
"What about that storm could have changed Jack Graham's life? A friend of
mine told me that the family had had some trouble. Did they ... did he lose
someone in that storm?"

The librarian didn't answer. She
seemed lost in thought.

"Ma'am?"

"Oh," the woman said and
flashed her a smile. "I was just trying to remember. And call me Harriet,
dear. There's something scratching at my brain but I can't figure out what it
is. We can check the obituaries for the months before Graham was supposed to
have his opening. He had one in the spring and one in the fall, correct?"
Molly nodded. "But we've got to shake a tail feather because it's almost
closing time," the librarian added.

Molly looked at her watch in
alarm. She only had twenty minutes left. If she didn't find something today,
she'd have to make the hour and a half trip again after the auction this
weekend.

"Don't fret." Harriet
held out two rolls of fresh film. "You check the months you have and I'll
look back in the October and November obituaries."

"Thank you, that's very
kind."

The two women fell silent,
scanning the names of those who had died between October and April, looking for
a familiar name or face to jump out from where it was buried in positives and
negatives within the screen. Graham's openings were regularly held in September
and April, early in the morning on vibrant, crisp days. Molly was loading in
the film for February when Harriet gasped beside her.

"What is it?" Molly
asked.

"I'm remembering." The
blue eyes shifted slowly from the screen to the sinking sun out the window.
"There was something about one of his children."

"I read in a biographical
piece that he had two."

"Something terrible,"
Harriet said mournfully as she turned back to her machine and began hastily
loading in the October film. "There was something about his little
girt."

Molly abandoned her machine and
slid her chair closer to Harriet's, comforted by her vanilla scent and the
fruity perfumes of her hair.

In the silent room, Molly felt a
strong foreboding grip her. They were about to uncover something horrible,
something that shouldn't be rifled through by a complete stranger.

Molly found she no longer wanted
to know what happened to disturb the balance of this man's life. He was a
gifted potter, a husband, and a father. What was she doing here, searching for
his secrets? It was his life; his reasons for taking a season off of pottery
making were his own. She was no tabloid journalist.

Shaken, she reached out to tell
Harriet to stop, that it didn't matter, that there were others to interview,
that she had been wrong to come. Her hand reached out, touched the soft fabric
of Harriet's cotton blouse, and rested there.

"Here!" Harriet
breathed, arresting the words on Molly's lips.

She pointed to an obituary toward
the middle of the first column. Hesitating, Molly looked at the photograph of a
smiling little girl with long pigtail braids tied with gingham bows. She was
missing one of her front teeth and large dimples dented her shiny cheeks. She
wore overalls over a T-shirt and looked impatient to be on the move again yet
too good-natured not to smile sweetly for what must have been a school picture.
Molly read:

Graham

Lilly Ann Graham, age 9, departed this
life Saturday, October 3rd to join the Lord. She is survived by her loving
parents, Jack and Leslie Graham and by her brother, Jack Junior, age 7. Lilly
Ann was in the third grade at Seagrove Elementary School where she excelled in
art and science classes. She played competitive soccer and recently starred in
her class play, Many Moons. Lilly Ann will be remembered for her loving,
generous spirit. Memorial services will be held Monday, October 5th from noon
until one p.m. at the Piney Hollow Methodist Church, 1500 North Bramble Drive.
Interment will be at the Seagrove Memorial Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, the family
suggests contributions to be made to The Girl Scouts of America, of which Lilly
Ann was an enthusiastic member.

Molly sat back in her chair, her
hand covering her mouth. What had happened to Graham's little girl?

"How horrible," she
muttered, blinking back tears as she stared at Lilly Ann's face. "That
poor family."

Harriet turned to her, blue eyes
liquid as they reflected the light from the screen. "Now I remember,"
she whispered, then turned back to the machine and went back to the front page
of the same edition. "Look."

Molly felt a shiver ripple up her
arms. One of the bold headlines read, "
Seagrove Girl Killed By
Hit-and-Run
."

"They found her in the
road," Harriet began, speaking so softly that Molly could barely hear her.
"She was already dead. She had been riding her bike ... I remember that.
Here's a picture of it, see?" Molly unwillingly leaned forward to see the
crushed and twisted metal remains. Harriet continued, "I remember her
mother telling a reporter that she never let Lilly Ann go too far from home.
She had some kind of medical condition. She was allowed to ride down to the
creek in one direction and to the neighbor's in the other. That day, she was
going to the creek to sail some paper boats she'd made at school. They were
still in her backpack."

"How unbelievably
awful," Molly said with deep sorrow.

"They never caught the
driver. He hit her and drove off. There were no witnesses. Back where most of
those potters live, there aren't too many other folks around."

Harriet sighed, turning away from
the tragic headline. "That was the worst of it... that whoever killed this
sweet little girl probably never stopped, never even pulled over to see if she
was alive."

"And no one was ever
arrested?" Molly asked in disbelief.

"No one." Harriet closed
her eyes for a moment. "He got away. But his time will come. That's the
way things work in this world."

Molly was stunned. As Harriet
pressed the "print" button and noiselessly moved off to begin her
closing tasks, she remained immobile in her wooden chair. Finally, as the
humming of the machines clicked off to silence, Molly let her head sink into
her hands, her eyes straying to the window.

At last, all of the pieces of the
puzzle about George- Bradley's death fell together. Molly now knew who his
killer was and the murderer was not Susan Black. What should have been a
triumphant moment filled her with a heavy weariness. And she would still need
to prove herself right before mentioning what she knew to anyone else.

The surrendering sun had
disappeared behind the blue-black line of trees and long snakelike shadows
crept like tendrils across the library floor. The other people who had been
quietly reading or typing at computers had departed. The fluorescent lights
fizzled and strained to make up for the departure of natural light. Molly
turned full circle before her stack of paper and note cards, searching for a
sign of life.

But she was alone with no comfort
left in the dying day.

~~~~~~~~~~

Potters have always catered to children—in part, because children
have always been drawn to their shops to witness the magical growth of a jug on
the wheel or to take part in the excitement of kiln burning.

—CHARLES G. ZUG III, from
Turners and Burners

Jack Graham’s kiln opening for kiln number 50 took place
under a rented tent in his backyard at the reasonable hour of ten o'clock on a
fine, late summer morning. Two picnic tables held the seventy-five
extraordinary pieces of pottery to be sold before lunch.

Riding to Seagrove with Clara and
Donald, Molly kept opening the shoebox on her lap to gaze sadly upon the face
of her little rabbit. She planned to return him to the Grahams, the

rightful owners, and hopefully put
an end to all the mystery that had begun just a few weeks ago at another kiln
opening.

"So tell Donald why Susan
Black killed Bunny. He hasn't heard the whole story," Clara prompted from
the front seat.

Molly took a sip of creamy
hazelnut coffee. "One of my coworkers, Clayton, worms the best tidbits
from a friend of his from the Times. This reporter interviewed Susan right
after her arrest. Apparently, Susan knew all about the bearer bonds
George-Bradley had stashed away and was waiting for the right time to steal
them from the Staunton’s house. Her plan was to grab the certificates and leave
the state. That's why she never called me back to schedule an interview."

"I take it Bunny didn't
oblige her," Donald stated.

"I guess not. Susan claimed
that George-Bradley had been saving that money so that once he and Bunny were
divorced, he could start a new life with her. He told Susan about his hiding
place in the wall but Susan hadn’t counted on Bunny being home. That was
Bunny's regular day to play bridge at her sister's house, but she had changed
her schedule in order to meet Lex’s employee. Of course, it was me who came to
collect the rabbit and not someone from the auction gallery."

"But Susan showed up at the
Stauntons carrying a gun!" Clara exclaimed.

"Yes, and when the police
picked her up she was loading a box of pottery into her car. She had fake
identification papers and was planning to live a quiet life of ease in the
Caymans. She also showed no signs of remorse. She felt she was owed those
bonds, and she was going to get them no matter what."

Donald shook his head. "But
they broke up two years ago, so why did she decide to go after this money
now?"

Molly shrugged. "I guess she
figured with George Bradley dead, she could take the bonds and no one would be
the wiser. Susan knew where the bearer bonds were hidden and she must have
assumed that Bunny knew nothing about the secret panel. So she took a chance
and went to get them without thinking about the consequences of getting caught.
However, Susan did not seem like a stable person in the police station. I mean,
who attacks an enemy with a stapler?"

"I'm glad you can be so
flippant about that" Clara complained. "As for your poor mother...
the images I have from your recent events! How can you get yourself in the
middle of such a mess? If you were at home with a few children to keep you
busy—"

"Anyway," Molly
interrupted as Donald winked at her in the rearview mirror. "It looks like
Bunny's estate, which is worth over three million dollars, will be divided
between her sister and Emmanuel." She paused and smiled, thinking of
Emmanuel's kind, weathered face. "When I last talked to Officer Bennett,
he told me that Susan confessed to killing Bunny but refused to admit that she
left me a threatening voice mail message."

"Ah well." Clara’s tone
was dismissive. "You said yourself she wasn't stable. Look at all that
rage she kept inside."

"Well that's that,"
Donald pronounced. "Now, what about our friend, Hillary? Any news on that
front?"

"Actually, Clayton told me
that Mr. Keane is facing a long jail sentence. Apparently he has been stealing
pottery from both potters and collectors for years and selling it to buyers up
north. He was dashing off to a rendezvous in Hendersonville to sell a huge
inventory of stolen pieces when he almost hit that jogger."

"What?" Clara shrieked.
"I thought he was only taking pieces from George-Bradley every now and
then."

"No, he has been stealing
pottery for years. He even lifted pieces from three area museums during special
exhibits. The FBI's Antiquity Recovery Division is very pleased to have him in
jail. Keane still had the museum pieces in his garage, and now they are proudly
back on display in their rightful homes."

"But that still doesn't
explain his motives," Clara said.

"Pure greed, Ma. You know how
it is in the world of collecting. Keane wanted the big house, the period furniture,
and a prime pottery collection, but his salary working as a small town
pharmacist couldn't finance his dreams. In fact, he has a famous nickname on
the Internet."

"What was that?" Donald
asked expectantly.

"The Pirate of Pottery,"
Molly said.

"I just can't believe
it," Clara muttered. "You think you know someone. He seemed the very
portrait of a gentleman on the outside. All that time envy was burning a hole
in him on the inside. Who would have thought?"

Molly looked down at the rabbit.
"Some people are really good at hiding their true feelings."

~~~~~

Jack Graham was stocky, muscular, and completely bald.
One weathered hand rhythmically stroked his short brown beard as he waited for
everyone to take his or her seats. Molly noticed that there were more people
present than there were pieces of pottery. Folks had come to welcome the
Grahams back to their former lifestyle. One that included public kiln openings.
It had been over two years since they had had an open sale. Molly recognized
several local potters as well as a member of the local press.

"Thank y'all for
comin'." Jack hushed the crowd with a soft commanding voice. "Just so
there's no question of cheatin', Jack Junior is gonna pass the 'Numbers Hat'
today. When you hear your number called, go on up and pick your piece. We've
got some folks to help you wrap it when you're ready to go. Please help
yourself to some fried chicken and biscuits too. Leslie's been cooking all
morning."

The crowd applauded as Jack's wife
Leslie blushed at the attention. Molly recognized her from C. C.'s kiln
opening. She had helped Eileen serve the sweet tea and cookies.

With a clear view of Mrs. Graham,
Molly could now see that Leslie was well into her second trimester of
pregnancy. Her long, auburn hair was shiny with good health and her freckled
face glowed with anticipation. How happy she must be to see her husband back at
work and to be expecting another child.