Poison Ivory (12 page)

B
ravo!” Wynnell cried, clapping vigorously.

There were, in fact, many “Bravos,” and even some “Encores.” By then it was with pure pleasure that I watched Phillip Canary sing “Old Man River” from the musical
Showboat,
and a couple of gospel numbers that got a bunch of folks clapping and tapping their feet. At this point news of his performances must have traveled via the famous “Charleston phone line,” because my store was packed.

“Who is this guy?” Wynnell whispered loudly in my ear.

“He does the velvet paintings in the market,” I said.

“Oh, I thought he looked familiar. He’s the one who donated fifty thousand dollars of his own money for new playground equipment for his neighborhood elementary school.”

“That’s
him
? Then why is he selling velvet paintings of Madonna and Elvis in the same one-person kayak?”

“Abby, that’s what made his story so newsworthy—he made the money for the playground by selling those paintings. Mr. Canary is a very generous man—and cute too.” She’d stopped whispering now.

“I hadn’t noticed.”

“Liar.”

“Wynnell, I’m a happily married woman.”

“So am I. I’m also postmenopausal, yet my heart’s going pitty-pat-pat. I could just eat that young man up with a spoon.”

Unhappily for Wynnell, the young man in question finished his song a second or two before her brain could react, and thus recall her licentious words. This was also during that narrow window of time before the crowd had a chance to cheer and whoop their approval of Phillip Canary’s stellar performance.

Instead, there was a smattering of applause, and then a roar of laughter that shook the dust mites from the highest tiers of nineteenth century chandeliers. Poor Wynnell’s face turned Shiraz red and she fled into the storage room. I felt my face turn at least a champagne pink as I followed suit.

Neither of us had expected Phillip Canary to follow us. Nor did I ever in all my born days imagine that I would witness a celebrity fight back fans at the door of my stockroom, but that’s exactly what happened. Although I do use the word fighting in the most general sort of way, for after sign
ing a few autographs on road maps and paper towels from the restroom, Mr. Canary was able to convince the assemblage to stay in the showroom and do some shopping for his sake. Of course that meant that one of us had to be there—and since C.J. was still nowhere to be found, that meant it had to be Wynnell.

You can bet that she protested mightily, but a bear hug from Mr. Canary got her as far as the door, and another hug and a few pitty-pats (sans spoon) eventually got her out on the floor. As soon as she was gone, he turned to me.

“Well, you did sort of challenge me,” he said with a laugh.

“Indeed I did. Well sung, Mr. Canary. Are you a professional?”

“In fact, I am. I did
Porgy
in a touring company—but not the lead—
Showboat
at dinner theaters, and I sing in the church choir. I don’t get paid for that. My dream is to get a starring role on Broadway.”

“With that voice, I’m sure you could.”

“Yeah, maybe. I studied at Juilliard, you know. Six years. Full scholarship. Then just when I was starting to get me some parts, my daddy keeled over dead from a heart attack. Then just six months later Mama passed. I’d come home to be with her, which meant dropping out of Juilliard. Anyway, I’ve made Charleston my home base ever since.”

“How come?”

“My parents were my encouragement—the wind beneath my wings. With them gone, I didn’t
much feel like beating my head against the walls in New York City. That’s why I do these gigs closer to home; they’re easier to get. And, of course, I paint my pictures.”

“You’re a very talented young man, Mr. Canary. I read somewhere that people who are talented in one of the arts are often talented in another. Supposedly that’s why you find so many actors who paint, or authors who play in bands, etcetera. Is it true that your author friend, Ramat Sreym, paints, draws,
and
plays the piano beautifully?”

He laughed while shaking his head. “Look, I’m not here to talk about her.”

“That’s right; the ivory. What do you want to do with all this ivory, Mr. Canary?”

He recoiled slightly, the smile replaced by a frown. “I can’t believe that you’re asking me this. What if I was buying a cupboard or a chair? Would you be giving me the third degree then?”

I reached out and lightly touched his forearm. It felt surprisingly hot.

“No. And I’m sorry; I was just being nosy. Some of these ivory pieces are exquisite, and I wanted to imagine them in their new home—unless, of course, you planned to resell them. But that’s your business; it certainly isn’t mine.”

“Miss Timberlake, I find it very strange that you’re wanting to imagine the ivory pieces in their new setting when I’m trying to figure out if these dang things even exist.”

The little voice that sometimes speaks to me in the back of my head had been screaming at me for some time now.
This crazy idea of C.J.’s is going to blow up in your face,
she said (my little voice is female, of course).
Drop this nonsense before you use up your remaining life; I can’t keep on protecting you forever.

“Please shut up,” I said. I said it sweetly, because a Southern lady must treat everyone kindly, including herself.

“What the hell did you say?” Phillip Canary’s eyes were flashing and the veins at his temples bulged.

“Uh-oh. I’m sorry, Mr. Canary. That just popped out; I really wasn’t talking to you.”

“Is that supposed to be your so-called turret’s syndrome again?”

“Something like that, yes. But I don’t blame you for being mad enough to chew nails and spit out rivets.”

His frown was again transformed into a smile. “Sometimes Mama used to say she was mad enough to spit tacks. Between the two of us, we could have opened a hardware store.”

I laughed. I laughed far too long, and far too loud. Meanwhile my poor brain was trying desperately to figure out a way to get my big fat mouth out of trouble.

“Just because I shared something my mama—”

“Ooh, Abby!” C.J. said, bursting into my office. “You won’t believe what happened to me.”

“Deus ex machina,” I said quietly.

C.J.’s stories are always fantastic, in every sense of the word. I used to think that she pulled them straight from the pages of supermarket tabloids, but—and this is almost too creepy to contemplate—I’ve come to discover that most of them have more than a kernel of truth to them. Some might even have a large ear of truth.

Without being asked to share, and before any introductions could be made, C.J. launched into a strange tale of alien abduction. (These were aliens from outer space, by the way,
not
amigos from south of the border.) At some point during the night she’d awakened to find four small beings gathered around her, as she lay on a platform of some kind, and these strange beings were probing her with index fingers that were over a foot long. C.J. got the distinct impression that they were on a spaceship. When I asked her to describe the aliens further, she said that they had large smooth heads, huge almond-shaped eyes, and they were all about my size.

“Just think, Abby,” she said, “if you ever get abducted, you’ll have no problem finding clothes that fit you.”

According to the big galoot, the aliens performed all manner of medical tests on her, and were particularly interested in her problematic DNA. Apparently it had shown up on some of their monitors.

“When I told them that I might be part goat, they got real excited,” she said, breathless from
her recitation. “They made a beeline back to earth and to a pasture I told them about near Shelby where this couple raises a huge flock of Nubians. The next thing I know, I’m back in bed in Charleston, and it’s the middle of the afternoon. After I got dressed I came straight over here. Sorry again for being late.”

I glanced at Phillip Canary. He was not only staring wide-eyed at the poor gal, I could tell by his posture that every muscle in his body was on standby for the fight or flight command. Frankly, I was tempted to shout
Boo!

Instead I said, “C.J., this is Mr. Canary. Mr. Canary, this is Mrs. Washburn, my sister-in-law.”

“Soon to be ex-sister-in-law,” C.J. said, and giggled.

“Nice seeing you ladies. ’Bye.” With that the talented artist (as well as supertalented singer) fled my office like palmetto bugs when lights get turned on.

A good friend is someone who will listen to your troubles. A true friend is someone who loves you enough to set you straight, even if it means straining the friendship. As C.J. and Wynnell were already up to their armpits in the trap I’d set for the importer of illegal ivory, I decided to come clean to Bob Steuben.

Bob is like a gay priest who came out of the closet but never sought the holy orders, and never abused anyone. That is to say, he walks as straight and narrow a path—so to speak—as any man I
know. Bob doesn’t gossip, Bob doesn’t lie, Bob doesn’t cheat (not even on his taxes), Bob doesn’t wish anyone ill will (not even his partner’s mother), Bob is slow to anger, Bob doesn’t judge—well, the list goes on and on. And although the Rob half of the Rob-Bobs is really my best friend, I know that when it comes to unvarnished truth, Bob Steuben is my man.

Just as I was fixing to mash the doorbell on The Finer Things, the man with the oversized head and steady moral compass came stumbling out into bright Charleston sunlight. He slapped himself around his pigeon chest until he located the sunglasses in his pocket and put them on.

“Abby!” He said it as if suddenly surprised to see me. “What are you doing here?”

“I was about to come in and see you?”

“What about?”

“I need to talk?”

“Does it involve What’s-his-name?”

“Who?”

“You know, that tall, dark, and handsome half of the duo—the one who is immensely more popular than I?”

“Bob! You shouldn’t say that.”

“But it’s true, isn’t it?”

“That is beneath comment.”

“I know what everyone calls us: the Rob-Bobs. Am I right?”

My face burned. “It’s just an affectionate nickname.”

“Ah, but whose name comes first?”

“Yes, but Bob-Robs wouldn’t sound right, would it?”

“At this point it would be impossible to tell, your ears are so used to hearing it the other way around.”

We were standing on the sidewalk, where God, tourists, and whoever else might be passing down King Street could see us, and possibly overhear us. This was not the cozy sort of confession I had in mind.

“Can we go someplace more private? How about the bar at the Charleston Place Hotel? I’ll buy you a drink.”

“You’re serious? You really want to see just me?”

I nodded. “I need to run something buy a non-related person with a mature perspective. I pick you.”

Even the most homely person takes on a modicum of attractiveness when they smile. “Abby, I’d love to stay and have a drink with you, but I have to drive out to Folly Beach to measure a client’s dining room. So far she’s given me three sets of dimensions over the phone. I’d send one of our interns out to do the job, but this is potentially a huge sale, involving not only a table and twelve chairs, but two credenzas and a corner cupboard—all part of a suite.”

“Wow. I didn’t know there were any houses that big on the island.”

“Say, if you’ve got the time, why don’t you ride along? I can always use someone to hold the other
end of the tape measure; someone other than this mathematically challenged woman.”

“Okay,” I said, needing no further prompting. It was, after all, a beautiful afternoon for a drive.

When God made Charleston, He blessed it with water and declared it “good.” It seems as if you can’t go a hundred yards in any direction without getting a glimpse of a river, a marsh, or even the open ocean. We left the peninsula via the James Island Expressway, and although it was indeed a sunny day, a stiff breeze was blowing, bringing the sailboats out in force.

“Isn’t it to die for beautiful?” Bob said.

“I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, could you?”

“No,” Bob said. “Not really.”

“Wait a minute; I heard hesitation in your voice.”

“Well, I do miss Toledo.”

“Toledo?”

“Abby, it’s not a swear word.”

“But it’s cold and industrial, and you yourself said that at this time of the year it’s as brown as a pair of old shoes.”

“Yes, but it’s where I spent my formative years—like in those old Wonder Bread commercials. I’ll always feel connected. Don’t you feel that way about Rock Hill, South Carolina? Or should I pronounce it ‘Raw Kill,’ the way the locals do?”

I laughed. “Watch it buster.”

We crossed over Wappoo Creek, which is part
of the Intracoastal Waterway. From the elevated roadway we had a fabulous view of the marsh and the Country Club of Charleston.

“Okay, Abby,” Rob said, “maybe now would be a good time to get down to brass tacks.”

W
as it my imagination, or did a cloud suddenly obscure the sun? I swallowed hard but barely made a dent in my pride.

“Bob, I may have done a stupid thing: I put a bogus ad in the paper—”

“We saw that.”

“You
did
?”

“Darling, we’re gay men. We’re antiques dealers. Of course we scan the ads for antiques and collectibles. And since you’re Rob’s best friend—after
moi
—you can bet we recognized your cell phone number. Did you stop to think that every other dealer in town recognized it as well?”

“Uh—”

“But don’t let me stop you, darling. This is your story, not mine.”

“Well, as dumb an idea as it seems, I thought that if I advertised a large stash of ivory, I could draw the attention of whoever is smuggling ivory into Charleston.”

“How so?”

“Like maybe I was competition—either that or a new source for them.”

Bob is a very careful driver and didn’t comment until we had safely turned left onto Folly Road. “Did this strategy work?” he asked.

“Not entirely.” I filled him in on the particulars of each of my encounters, and he was suitably horrified, or disgusted, by my stories.

“You’re lucky you didn’t get hurt by some crazed stranger or sex maniac. And you’re lucky the real smugglers are too lazy or stupid to read the
Post and Courier
. Abby, somebody who is in the business of smuggling large quantities of ivory into this country via the ports is not going to fall for a newspaper ad. Frankly, we all think it wasn’t the best idea you’ve ever had.”

“Wait a minute! Who is ‘we all’? Are you saying that everyone’s been talking about me?”

“Abby, we all love you. I haven’t heard a single negative word—not about you personally.”

“Just that my ideas suck. Which means—” I sucked in a mouthful of pluff-mud-scented air. “—that I don’t have a cotton-pickin’ brain in this little ol’ head of mine.”

Bob’s hearty guffaws sounded like a base drum at a high school band practice. “Abby, whatever am I going to do with you?
I’m
supposed to be the one with the self-esteem issues, remember? Besides, I can’t think of anyone in the antiques community who is more respected and beloved than you.”

“Oh yeah? What about What’s-his-name?”

“So it’s a tie in the respect department, but you win hands down in the beloved department. Didn’t Mozella teach you not to be greedy?”

“Can one really teach a lesson that she hasn’t learned herself?” Believe me, I instantly felt guilty for saying that.

“Touché,” Bob said. “Now tell me, Abby, if you could redo the last couple of days, what’s the first thing you would do differently? Not place that silly ad?”

I stiffened. “Heck no! I would place that darn ad all over again in a heartbeat. I don’t care what everyone thinks. I seem to have sunk my hoe into a nest of baby rattlesnakes, and I aim to find the mama. The only reason I came to you, Bob, is because I thought you might offer a shoulder to cry on.” At that, I actually started to cry, and I mean
really
cry.

I boo-hooed, I blubbered, I wailed, I sobbed, I gnashed a few teeth, and plain old just had me a good old-fashioned snot-producing crying marathon. Trust me, there isn’t a man alive, gay or straight, that can stand up to a Wiggins woman’s meltdown. Poor Bob had to pull to the side of the road so he could gesticulate nervously with both hands.

“Abby, stop,
please
! I’m begging you. Besides, you didn’t give me a chance to tell you that I totally agree with you.”

Momentum is a hard thing to overcome. I couldn’t help but snuffle a few times before I could achieve something that even approached speech.
And of course I had to blow my nose a million times, and the only thing either of us had that came close to being a tissue substitute was an old AAA car map that Bob found under his seat. And then when I did finally speak, every other word or so was punctuated by a hiccup.

But Bob was patient and kind. He was also very firm.

“I meant it when I said that I’m behind you on this. Do you know why I am? Because you have good instincts. Trust your gut, Abby. I do.”

“B-B-Bob,” I blubbered.

He put his gangly arms gingerly around me. “Oh Abby, it breaks my heart to see you like this.”

“B-Bob, c-can I ask you a-another q-question?”

“Anything.”

“H-How b-badly is my m-mascara smeared?”

“You look like a drunken raccoon, darling.”

I must say that I was pleasantly surprised by Wynnell’s skills as a makeup artist. She met me at my office with what looked like a large fishing tackle box full of pencils, tubes, brushes, and small jars. In a plastic shopping bag she carried an assortment of wigs and hair extensions, and in a canvas tote bag that she’d toted (what else?), bottles of spray-on color and fixative.

We had a few tense moments, but only until I turned myself totally over to her control, which is exactly the way it should have been. This was a lesson I learned from watching
Project Runway
on
TV, and should have remembered from the onset, instead of wasting valuable time. The gist of it is this: compromise is not always a good thing, so give the artist her head. Her vision is bound to be better than whatever hybrid the two of you can finally cobble together.

When Wynnell pronounced me “finished,” I wouldn’t have recognized myself. No kidding, I would have walked right past myself on the street and not given me a second thought. How creepy is that? Besides looking like a totally different woman, I looked convincingly older—no make that
disturbingly
older. If I asked for a senior discount made up like this, no one would have batted an eye—which might tempt me to punch him or her in the eye. But gently, of course, like a proper Southern sexagenarian.

“Well, what do think?” Wynnell said.

“You did a fantastic job, you really did, which makes it kind of creepy.”

“It’s my Aunt Marietta.”

“She’s a beautiful woman, Wynnell—far prettier than I…You made her prettier and older at the same time. How did you do that?”

Wynnell shrugged, but she didn’t deny that her creation was prettier than her model. Oh well, she was still a good friend. Once, on a camping trip, I had to rely on her to remove a tick from my buttocks. Friends don’t come any better than that.

“Abby,” she said, “I know you think I see a conspiracy behind every tree. But why do you think
the public saw almost nothing of Vice President Cheney during the last six months he was in office?”

“Why don’t you just save us both time, darling, and tell me.”

“Because his popularity ratings were so low. The Secret Service told him that since he was a lame duck, there was no point in him hanging around Washington anymore, given the security risks.”

“No offense, Wynnell, but that’s one theory of yours that just doesn’t fly. Cheney may not have been as much in the news those last six months, but he was still visible.”

“And all because of makeup!”

“Say what?”

She nodded vigorously. “My cousin Charlene owns a beauty shop in Washington, D.C., and—”

“Wynnell, darling,” I interrupted gently, “we have a live performance to put on. We need to hustle if we’re going to hit our marks on time.”

“Whatever you say, Abby.” But she was all grins.

I knew for sure that Wynnell had been a success when Bob stopped us as we were getting into my car. “Good morning, ladies,” he said in that basso profundo voice of his that weakens the knees of many an unsuspecting lady of a certain age—the Liberace crowd, he calls them.

“Good morning, Robert,” Wynnell said.

Bob looked expectantly at me, then at her, wait
ing for an introduction. When none was forthcoming, he proffered a hand. “I’m Bob Steuben. I see that you know my friend, Wynnell.”

I shrugged and shook my head. “No Eengleesh.”

“This is Fatima, Abby’s second cousin from Lisbon,” Wynnell said, having only missed a couple of beats.

“Would that be Lisbon, North Carolina?” Bob said. I could tell by his tone that he was deadly serious.

“Portugal,” I snapped and started the engine.

“Welcome to this country, miss.”

“Tank you.”

“Wynnell,” Bob persisted, “where’s Abby?”

“The little minx stayed home to do the jumpy-jump again. She asked me to show Fatima around.”

“Does she have a license?”

“Why don’t you ask her yourself?”

Bob turned to me.
“Voce tem uma licenca?”

“Holy crap, Bob,” I moaned. “You’re not supposed to be able to speak Portuguese.”

The poor man had turned the color of cigarette ash and was swaying like a pine in gale force winds. I jumped out of the car and helped him sit on the curb.

“It’s only me—Abby.” I put a warning finger to my lips. “Don’t say anything about this to anyone.
Please
.”

“Darn if you don’t look like—well, someone other than yourself.”

“Why thank you,” Wynnell said. She’d joined us at the curb and was all grins again.

Thanks to her deft hand there was no way my scheme in Mount Pleasant was going to backfire.

Dora was equally fooled by my appearance, and doubly delighted. She clapped her hands with glee and made touching chortling sounds. After an embarrassingly long time she turned to Wynnell.

“Who are you, dear?”

“This is my friend, Wynnell. She’ll be coming along to keep an eye on my makeup. Is that all right,
Mother
?”

“The more the merrier!”

And quite a merry gathering it was. Of course one might imagine that a free catered breakfast in the middle of the week would be a festive occasion for your average retiree, but Lady Bowfrey’s generosity knew no bounds. An enormous white tent occupied her entire backyard, and uniformed caterers scurried back and forth between two long white trucks.

Inside the tent, chatting and stuffing their faces, was the happiest cross section of Mount Pleasant faces I had ever seen. And why not? At one end of the three long rows of dining tables was the buffet table, which looked close to collapse due to the weight of food that it bore. At the other end of the tent a string quartet was softly playing light classical pieces.

Directly in front of the musicians, seated at her
own table, was the formidable aristocrat herself. Although her hooded eyes gave the impression that she might be asleep, Lady Bowfrey proved to have the vision of an osprey. With some effort she raised a massive arm and pointed a pudgy, but bejeweled finger, our way. The music stopped on cue.

“I see some new faces,” our benefactress said. “Dora, be a dear and introduce our guests.”

The moment had finally come for Dora to put to bed a few rumors. The fact that it would create a lot more (what if childhood friends of her daughter were present?) had either not occurred to her or else she didn’t give a darn. In any case, the dear woman gave me a squeeze and cleared her throat.

“Lady Bowfrey—everyone—I want y’all to meet my daughter, Clara van Aswegen. Clara, this is Lady Bowfrey, our hostess, and these are my neighbors.”

There was a smattering of applause, and a surprisingly large number of people said “Welcome”—considering that most of them had food in their mouths. To be honest, it was terribly embarrassing for me until I glanced at Dora’s face; she looked like my mama at the moment she’d held her first grandchild. From that second on I threw myself into the role of being Dora’s daughter.

Lady Bowfrey tried to get everyone’s attention by clapping, but getting gossipers to shut up is like corralling greased pigs. Finally she resorted to saying something to the base viol player behind
her, who in turn raked his bow across his instrument. The vile noise stunned the crowd into silence.

“Who is your other guest?” Lady Bowfrey inquired.

“My name is Wynnell Crawford,” my pal said.

“Do I know you from somewhere? You look familiar.”

“I own the Den of Antiquity, an antiques store downtown.”

“Ah, that must be it. Welcome.”

She clapped again and the merrymaking continued. Wynnell, however, was not going to be quite as ebullient as the others—not when I got through with her. After helping Dora fill her plate and answering a few relatively benign questions, I steered my friend and employee outside by a pinch-grip to her triceps. It’s a move every mother knows whose school-age child has had a complete meltdown in aisle five of Harris Teeter and on whom reasoning, psychology, and threats of an overnight stay at Guantanamo hasn’t worked. Okay, so there are mothers who would never pinch their children, and they are right not to do so, and I salute them. Nonetheless, not only did I pinch Wynnell, I pinched her
hard
.

“Wynnell, that was a boldface lie!”

“And pretending to be an old lady’s missing daughter
isn’t
a lie?”

“I was doing it for
her
sake. Did you see how happy that made her?”

“Her sake, my eye! You were doing it—”

“Shhh! Okay, I’ll go along with this nonsense for now, but what if one of these folks comes into the shop and asks to speak to the owner? What will you say then?”

“Abby, I’m not a fool. I wouldn’t dare—”

I felt myself being gently nudged aside by a tall thin man in a green plaid sport coat. He was, by the way, addressing Wynnell, not me.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” he said. “I was in your shop the other day and noticed a long case clock in the corner—the far left rear corner, I believe.”

Wynnell’s infamous unibrow appeared as she recreated
my
shop in her mind. “It’s actually on the right-hand side.”

“Ah yes. Is it for sale?”

“Everything is—for the right price.”

Dang it! Wynnell had the nerve to steal one of my best lines. Even the tall thin man liked it, because he laughed annoyingly loud.

“Tell me,” he said, “is it German?”

Wynnell massaged her chin while she forced her unibrow into a brush-filled vee. “Hmm. Carla, I showed the long case clock to you, didn’t I?”

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”