“The idea for you to work at the museum. I never told you, did I?”
“I guess not.” He was intent on the ad. The place was near where he lived.
“I didn’t want to make you feel bad.”
“About what?” And it was open all night. He’d call as soon as he got home.
“Uncle Willie.”
“What about him?”
“It seems that when he was a little kid he used to work for Mrs. Fox-Nugent. He was a stableboy. And one day she fired him for something he didn’t do.”
Simon sat so still and stared so hard at Volanda that he was afraid she’d ask what was the matter. But she was sipping her coffee and still looking out the window.
“He said he never told his parents because he was scared about something, I didn’t catch what, so he just said Mrs. Fox-Nugent didn’t need him any more. I guess it was a real blow to the family, losing the money and all. It happened around Christmastime, which made it worse. Poor guy. I guess he never got over it. He couldn’t have been more than nine or ten when it happened.”
“What did happen?” Simon kept his voice steady.
“I think he was accused of stealing something.”
Simon, his heart pounding, put the newspaper down and leaned across the table. He said, “Tell me everything Uncle Willie told you.”
Volanda looked surprised. “It’s not important now, Si, just kind of sad.”
“It’s important to me. Believe me, it’s important to me.”
She folded her arms on the table. “Well, let me think...”
This was one of the things Simon liked about Volanda. She never told you to “forget it.” If you told her something was important to you, she believed you. And man, was this important.
“I was giving him his bath one day—” Volanda smiled. “—and we got talking about you. I said I thought you were going to be a really good artist and Willie said he used to pay for your drawing lessons when you were a little kid because he’d always loved to draw too. ‘Si gets it from me,’ he said, real proud. Then all of a sudden he said, ‘Maybe some day he’ll paint a picture that’ll hang in Mrs. Fox-Nugent’s place, and he can tell her I wasn’t a thief!’ and he began to cry. That’s when I got the idea that if you could sneak in there and copy that picture you like, well, you’d kind of get even with her for — Si! What’s the matter?”
His chair had gone over backward as he leaped to his feet. “I gotta see Uncle Willie!”
“Sure, but what’s the rush?”
“Come on!” Simon pulled Volanda across the cafeteria and halfway down the hall before she managed to yank her hand away.
“Simon Judson, what is this?”
“I’ll explain later.”
“You’ll explain now.” When Volanda stood like that with her arms folded you didn’t mess around. Simon leaned against the wall, wanting to beat his fists into it. That arrogant, high and mighty hunk of mist telling him that Uncle Willie was a thief! But he had to stay cool, had to come up with something Volanda would buy.
“A guy from some magazine came in this morning. He’s doing a story on the museum, and he was asking us if we knew any, well, out of the way facts about the place. I could tell him my uncle used to work there and if Willie can give me—”
“But you’re quitting.”
“No way!” Simon grabbed her hand again. “And I’m going back there tonight to paint!”
“Si,” Volanda whispered as they went into the darkened room, “you’re crazy. First you say it’s too risky, then just because some writer—”
“Shh.” He put his finger on her lips and they walked toward the bed beside the window. In one of the others a man sat up weakly and called to Volanda and she laid him gently down again. Simon couldn’t tell at first if Uncle Willie was asleep. He was lying very still and in the dim light seemed tiny. He’d never been big; when Simon was twelve he was taller than Willie. But tonight the figure in the bed looked like a little kid. He seemed to have shrunk just in the last week.
Now Simon could see that the dim old eyes were open. Volanda went to the other side of the bed and leaned over. She said softly, “Your favorite person to see you, honey.”
“Si?” The skinny little hand moved on the sheet. “That you, Si?”
“How you doin’, Unc?”
“Doin’ fine. I got Voley.” He looked up at her the way you’d look up at an angel. Then his eyes moved and fastened on Simon. “What’d you paint today?”
“Oh, a couple of masterpieces.” Simon sat on the bed and took the frail old hand.
“That’s right!” Uncle Willie nodded with amazing vigor. “You just keep paintin’ them masterpieces.”
“But I’m mad at you.”
“Mad at me? You mad at me, Si?” It was a distressed, cracked whisper and Volanda frowned and shook her head. Simon said quickly, keeping his voice low, “Not really mad — just kind of surprised. You’ve been telling Voley stuff you never told me. You been holding back on me, Unc.”
Simon made his voice light and kidding and was relieved to see Willie smile a little. He said, “What I hold back?”
“Well, like how you used to be a stableboy for Mrs. Fox-Nugent.”
The change in the old face was instant and awful. The eyes widened and there was a feeble effort to sit up. “But I never done it! I never stole it! I just took the rolls that was already in the garbage pail!”
Simon’s mouth went bone dry. Volanda gave him a mad look and gently pushed Willie’s head back on the pillow. She said, “Don’t think about it, dear. Simon’s leaving now.”
“What did Mrs. Fox-Nugent say you stole?” Simon held tight to the calloused little hand and didn’t look at Volanda.
“He say I stole it. He tell her that!”
“Who? Who?”
“The big fella! Scared me to death! Say he cut my tongue out if I tell on him!”
“Who? Who was the big fella?”
“Simon!” Volanda started around the bed. Willie’s head was turning back and forth on the pillow. He murmured, “That waiter. Fella came in to help at the dinner party.”
Volanda grabbed Simon’s shoulder and turned him around. “Are you nuts, making a disturbance in here at this hour? If I’d thought you were going to...”
But Simon did not hear the rest. He was striding to the door and now he was out of the place and running down the street. There were people on the sidewalk and he knew they turned and looked at him but he didn’t care. He was madder than he’d ever been in his life. His mind was empty of everything but the sound of the quavering old voice and the words, “I never done it! I never stole it.”
He reached the house on the corner where Volanda lived with her mother and two little brothers. As he pulled open the garage doors one of the little brothers called from an upstairs window, “You taking your bike, Si?”
“Sure am. What are you doing up at this hour, Tyrone?”
Volanda’s mother came to the window and shooed the boy away. She said, “I only just dragged him out of that garage half an hour ago. He’s been sitting in there all day looking at that motorbike like it was something holy.”
“I was guarding it for you, Si,” came Tyrone’s voice from the depths of his room.
“You shush and go to bed,” Volanda’s mother said. “Simon, where’s Voley?”
“Still at work. I dropped in there. Thanks for guarding the bike, Ty.”
He rolled it to the street, then got on and gunned it. He told himself not to go too fast. He didn’t want to be stopped, no sir, not tonight. When he got back to Sapphire Drive he drove slowly to the museum entrance. Would his luck hold? The area was deathly quiet and nice big clouds sailed over the moon. Simon ran the bike up the slope and along in the shadow of the wall to the crown of Neptune. He put down the stand and muttered, “Be a good guy, Nep, and guard it for me like Tyrone.”