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'If I make a million out of it,' I told her, as she expertly wrapped it up, ‘I’ll cut you in for five percent.'

'Fifty percent or nothing, you rascal,' she laughed.

I left the auction-rooms with the painting under my arm. The remaining pictures I had bought — etchings and aquatints and a small collection of steel engravings — would be delivered to me later in the week. I only wished I had been able to afford the Shaw.

Outside, as I crossed the steps in front of Endicott's, the sun was already eating away at the rooftops of the elegant old Federal mansions on Chestnut Street, and a low cold wind had got up. Oddly, the same pale-faced secretary I had seen in Red's Sandwich Shop walked past, in a long black coat and a gray scarf. She turned and looked at me but she didn't smile.

Down by the curb, I caught sight of Ian Herbert, the proprietor of one of Salem's most distinctive antique shops, talking to one of the directors of Endicott's. Ian Herbert's shop was all soft carpeting and hushed discussion and artistically-positioned spot-lights. He didn't even call it a shop: it was a 'resource'. But he wasn't snobbish when it came to talking trade, and he gave me a casual wave as I approached.

'John,' he said, slapping me on the shoulder. 'You must know Dan Yokes, sales director of Endicott's.'

'How do you do,' said Dan Yokes. 'Seems like you've been making me marginally richer.' He nodded towards the package under my arm.

'It's nothing special,' I told him. 'Just an old watercolour of the shoreline where I live. I got it for fifty dollars flat.'

'As long as you're satisfied with it,' smiled Dan Yokes.

'By the way,' said Ian, 'you might be interested to know that they're selling off some of the old maritime collection up at Newburyport museum. Interesting artifacts; magical, some of them. For instance, did you know that most of the old Salem ships used to carry a little brass cage on board, with a dish of oats inside, to trap goblins and demons?'

'I could use a couple of those in my accounts department,' said Dan Yokes.

'I'm going to have to get back to Granitehead,' I told them, and I was about to walk away when my arm was snatched violently from behind, so hard that I was spun around, and almost lost my balance. I found myself face-to-face with a young bearded man in a gray tweed jacket, panting and agitated and wild-haired from running.

'What the hell goes on?' I snapped at him.

'I'm sorry,' he gasped. 'Really, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you. Are you Mr Trenton — Mr John Trenton of Granitehead?'

That's me. Who the hell are you?'

'Please,' the young man said, 'I really didn't mean to upset you. But I didn't want you to get away.'

'Listen, friend, take a walk,' said Dan Yokes, stepping closer. 'You're lucky I don't call a cop.'

'Mr Trenton, I have to talk to you privately,' the young man urged me. 'It's very important.'

'Are you leaving or do I call a cop?' said Dan Yokes. 'This gentleman is a personal friend of mine and I'm telling you to get out of here.'

'It's all right, Mr Yokes,' I told him. ‘I’ll talk to him. I'll let out a falsetto scream if he tries anything funny.'

Ian Herbert laughed, and said, ‘I’ll see you around, John. Drop into the store one day.'

'You mean the "resource",' I ribbed him.

The young man in the tweed jacket waited for me impatiently while I said my goodbyes. Then, as I tucked my painting more securely under my arm, and started to walk towards the Riley Plaza parking-lot, where I had left my car, he fell into step beside me, occasionally skipping to keep up.

This is very embarrassing,' he said.

'What's very embarrassing?' I asked him. 'I'm not embarrassed.'

Td better introduce myself,' he told me. 'My name's Edward Wardwell. I work for the Peabody Museum, in the archives department.'

'Well, how do you do.'

Edward Wardwell scratched anxiously at his beard. He was one of those young American men who look like throwbacks to the 1860s; preachers or pioneers or harmonium-players. He wore crumpled corduroy pants and his hair looked as if it hadn't entertained a comb in months. You could see young men like him in the background of almost every frontier photograph ever taken, from Muncie to Black River Falls to Junction City.

He suddenly took my arm again, arresting us both, and leaned forward so that I could smell the aniseed candy on his breath. The embarrassing thing is, Mr Trenton, I was specifically instructed to acquire that painting you just bought for the Peabody archives.'

'This painting? You mean the view of Granitehead shoreline?'

He nodded. 'I lost track of the time. I meant to get to the auction-rooms by three. They told me the painting wouldn't be put up till three. Well, I thought that would give me plenty of time. But I guess I lost track. There's a girl I know who's just opened a new fashion store on East India Square, and I went down to help her out a little, and that's what happened. I lost track.'

I started walking again. 'So,' I said, 'you were supposed to acquire the painting for the Peabody archives.'

'That's right. It's very unusual.'

'Well, I'm glad about that,' I told him. 'I only bought it because it shows a view of my home. Fifty dollars.'

'You bought it tot fifty dollars?'

'You heard me.'

'Don't you know that it's worth a whole lot more? I mean, $50 is a complete steal.'

'In that case, I'm even gladder. I'm a dealer, did you know that? I'm in business to make a profit. If I can buy it for $50 and sell it for $250, that's fine by me.'

'Mr Trenton,' said Edward Wardwell, as we turned from Holyoke Square into Gedney Street, 'that painting has rarity value. It really is a very rare painting.'

'Good,' I told him.

'Mr Trenton, I'll offer you $275 for that painting. Right here and now. Cash.'

I stopped where I was, and stared at him. 'Two hundred seventy-five, cash? For this?'

‘I’ll make it a round $300.'

'What's so damned important about this painting?' I asked him. 'It's nothing more than a pretty inept water-colour of the Granitehead coast. They don't even know who the artist is.'

Edward Wardwell propped his hands on his hips and blew out his cheeks like an exasperated parent trying to explain himself to a particularly obtuse child. 'Mr Trenton,' he said, 'the painting happens to be rare because it shows a view of Salem Harbour that no other painter recorded at the time. It fills in a topographical picture that has been incomplete for centuries; it enables us to pinpoint where certain buildings actually stood; and where certain roads ran, and where specific trees grew. I know it's inept, as a work of art, but from what I've seen of it, it's unusually accurate as far as landmarks are concerned. And that's exactly what the Peabody is interested in.'

I thought about it for a moment, and then said, 'I'm not selling. Not yet. Not until I find out what this is all about.'

I crossed Gedney Street and Edward Wardwell tried to follow me, but a passing taxicab gave him an irritated blast on its horn. 'Mr Trenton!' he called, dodging in front of a bus. 'Mr Trenton, wait! I don't think you understand!'

'I don't think I want to understand,' I told him.

He caught up with me again, and walked along beside me, short of wind, glancing from time to time at the package under my arm as if he were actually thinking of snatching it away from me.

'Mr Trenton, if I don't go back to the Peabody with that painting, I may very well get the sack.'

'So, you may very well get the sack. I'm sorry for you. But the answer to your problem was to turn up at the auction on time, and put in your bid. If you'd have bid, you would have got it. But you didn't, so you haven't. Now the painting's mine and for the time being I don't want to sell it. Especially not on the corner of Gedney and Margin, on a cold and windy afternoon, if you don't mind.'