Becky started to pull out the paper and then stopped. If Karl wasn’t going to bother with specifics, then she wouldn’t either. “Drinks,” she typed firmly. “$60 for wine and beer.” That would do it. Would be a little over, in fact. Next she listed dollar amounts for dinner (appetizers, entrées, dessert) and a fifteen percent tip. Make that twenty. She totaled the sum and created two lines for signature: Karl’s and the office manager’s, Mrs. Shinner’s.
Then her phone rang, and Becky hurried to answer. The form she’d typed for reimbursement got stuffed into the worn plastic expandable labeled “Karl to Sign” and she forgot all about it until the check showed up in her mail slot: $425 for client entertainment reimbursement, payable to Accounting General. For Becky to deposit and reassign and withdraw, no one the wiser. Temporarily. The money would come out of Town Hall for a bit, and then go back in. It’s borrowing, plain and simple.
It had gotten harder and harder to bring Hank anywhere, but the problem was, he still loved being out and about. So Becky took to driving him around the outskirts of town after church on Sundays to find that most regular harbinger of autumn: garage sales. Hank loved these; he’d putter through the tables, picking up items and setting them down, maybe manage a few words with neighbors or friends, or simply be able to wave back genially when someone called out to him. Often Becky would set him up near whatever appliances were out for sale: blenders, toasters, beat-up motorbikes, so that Hank could finger their gears and wires, take them apart with the big hands that never lost their dexterity. Mostly, though, they’d end each visit with Hank offered a seat in a lawn chair and a glass of iced tea while Becky browsed the tables herself.
Amazing, she thought, how people took literal junk from their homes and had the audacity to charge money for others to pick it up and take it away! The worst were the clothing racks and shoe trees. Becky thought other people’s worn-out robes and jeans and bathing suits—yes, bathing suits!—so awful she made sure never to even look in their direction.
On September 22 the Langleys’ house was the third they’d stopped at. It had a good selection, because the two Langley girls—Marissa and Joan, both married and moved away now—were serious about emptying out the home they’d grown up in before downsizing their elderly parents into a smaller place closer to one of them. Becky had set Hank up in a shady spot under an elm and left him listening to a Cubs game playing on the radio near the cash register while she flipped through albums, idly handled some china and cookware, and wished they could go home soon so she could change out of her church dress and scratchiest nylons.
“What about this?” a woman called from over by the side of the garage. “For that wall in the dining room.”
“What’s it of?” her husband called back.
“I don’t know. Come look. They got lots of pictures and stuff over here.”
Becky followed the man without any real excitement or interest. She watched as the couple discussed and dismissed a gaudily framed portrait of a woman in a light-green dress. When they left, she moved in and reached past that painting, and a leaning stack of six others, to pick up a small oil of a boy holding a book, a cat twined around the legs of his chair.
She couldn’t have explained it to herself in words even if she’d wanted to. But she couldn’t ignore the instinct that was screaming inside her like a heat-seeking missile.
The cash register was being manned by a bored dad more interested in the Cubs game than any merchandise. Becky grabbed a handful of kitchen tools—a scuffed plastic spatula, two wooden spoons, a pair of tongs—and set them next to the small oil near the register. “What’s the score?”
“You don’t want to know.”
Her breathing accelerated while the man slowly added up her purchases, and she tried not to flinch as he turned the painting this way and that, looking for the price sticker. Squinting, he handed it back to her. “Can you read that?”
Becky pretended nonchalance. “It says ten, but I can go compare it to the others if you—” She waved back at the garage.
“Nah. Let’s call it fifteen with the other stuff.”
“Okay. I just have to . . . Dad, can I see your wallet for a second?” She could feel the man’s eyes flicking to them, and away, as she maneuvered to get at the wallet Hank was sitting on. Finally she was able to hand over a ten (from her purse) and five crumpled ones.
“Bag? Receipt?” His tone said there was nothing he’d like to do less, and even though her nerves were tingling, urging her to get away with the painting under her arm, Becky stood her ground. Sure, why not. Yes, please. All right, Dad, we’ll catch the last innings at home.
For the rest of the afternoon and evening she didn’t have time to examine the little painting, or maybe she put it off on purpose. There was vacuuming to do, and potatoes to boil and mash, and towels forgotten in the washer that smelled moldy and had to be done again. Then Hank had an accident so she had to clean that up too.
But all her instincts at the garage sale were confirmed when the phone rang at 8:30: Marissa Langley, brisk and apologetic, sorry she’d missed them when they’d stopped by earlier, her husband had said how nice it was to catch up.
Uh huh.
Then Marissa explained, all in a rush, the mistake: a few items hadn’t been meant for the sale. Some furnishings, some art, you know, nothing spectacular, but things that had held personal meaning for her family. Including, oh, that small picture Becky had taken home. She was sure Becky would understand. A friend of the family’s had found it in a charming place in Europe. She’d always meant to get it appraised, but— Actually, she just needed it back.
“That’s too bad,” Becky said slowly. Gripping the handset.
Yes, Marissa agreed quickly. She could just kill her sister for putting it out with the other things. She’d be happy to run over now, if it wasn’t inconvenient.
“No,” Becky said.
“No?”
“I’d like to keep it,” Becky said. “That is, it’s mine now. I’d be happy to show you a copy of my receipt. I think it was your—or your sister’s?—husband who made the sale and wrote it out for me.”
“Oh, him,” Marissa said. “He doesn’t know anything about anything. That painting wasn’t for sale.”
“Well, I don’t think you’re suggesting this, but of course we could take it to small claims.” Becky let that hang, then added, “I’m sure that this receipt states it all pretty clearly though.”
The dishwasher gurgled and sloshed.
“You always did think you’re so great, didn’t you? No wonder you never had any friends in this town. Think you’re so much better than—”
“Goodbye, Marissa,” Becky said cheerfully, and hung up the phone. Hank had shuffled into the kitchen at the sound of Marissa’s raised voice, audible right through the receiver. Becky gave him a big hug. “What do you say about ice cream? I think I’m in the mood.”
It took careful sleuthing through the yellow pages and asking the right people at work (Mrs. Deedham, who was known to go antique hunting) to find out what an appraiser was and did, and how much one would cost. Nothing, as it turned out. Unless you wanted him to make a sale, and then he took a cut.