“I'll get back to her later,” Lucas said.
“She's pretty messed up,” Carol said.
Not a goddamn thing he could do about it, either. He snapped: 'Later. Okay?”
Quick through the bedroom closet, through the chest of drawers, under the bed; looked down the basement, called “Hello?” and got nothing but a muffled echo. Back up the stairs, into a ground-floor bedroom used as an office. He'd been inside a long time now- five, six minutes-and the pressure was growing.
The office had an ornate table used as a desk; everything expensive looked like mahogany to Lucas, and this looked like mahogany, with elaborately carved feet. He took a picture of it. The desk had one center drawer, full of junk: paper clips, envelopes, ticket stubs, a collection of old ballpoints, pencils, rubber bands. He had noticed with the upstairs closets that while the visible parts of the house were neatly kept, the out-of-sight areas were a mess.
The office had two file cabinets, both wooden. Neither looked expensive. He opened a drawer: papers, paid bills. Not enough time to check them. Another drawer: taxes, but only going back four years. He pulled them out, quickly, looked at the bottom numbers on the federal returns: all in the fifties. Two more drawers full of warranties, car-maintenance records-looked at the maintenance records, which covered three different cars, all small, no vans-employment stuff and medical records.
No time, no time, he thought.
He checked a series of personal photographs on the wall behind the desk. One showed a much younger Amity in a graduation gown with several other people, also in gowns, including a guy large enough to carry a $50,000 table. The guy looked familiar, somehow, but Lucas couldn't place him. He turned off the camera's flash, so that it wouldn't reflect off the protective glass, and took a picture of the photograph.
Inside too long.
Damn. If he could have half an hour with the desk drawers… But then, he had the sense that she was careful.
He took a last look around, and left, locking the door behind himself.
Back in the truck, he called Jenkins. “I drank about a gallon of coffee. If my heart quits, it's your fault,” Jenkins said. “I ain't seen her, but I called her office ten minutes ago, and she was in a conference. I told them I'd call back.”
“Don't want to make her curious,” Lucas said.
“I'll take care.”
Ten minutes to a Target store. He pulled the memory card out of the camera and at the Kodak kiosk, printed five-by-sevens of Amity Anderson's furniture. In the photos, it sure didn't look like much; but what'd he know? But he did know somebody who'd know what it was. He looked up John Smith's cell-phone number and called him: “I need to talk to the Widdlers about some furniture. Want to see if it's worth something.”
“On the case? Or personal?”
“Maybe semirelated to the case, but I don't know. I think they're done at Bucher's, right?”
“Yup. They're out in Edina. You need to see them right away?”
“I'm over on the airport strip, I can be there in ten minutes.”
“Let me get you the address…”
The Widdlers had a neat two-story building in old Edina, brown brick with one big display window in front. A transparent shade protected the window box from sunlight, and behind the window, a small oil painting in an elaborate wood frame sat on a desk something like Amity Anderson's, but this desk was smaller and better-looking. The desk, made from what Lucas guessed was mahogany, sat on a six-by-four-foot oriental carpet. The whole arrangement looked like a still-life painting.
Lucas pushed through the front door; a bell tinkled overhead. Inside, the place was jammed with artifacts. He couldn't think of another word for the stuff: bottles and pottery and bronze statues of naked girls with geese, lamps and chairs and tables and desks and busts. The walls were hung with paintings and rugs and quilts and framed maps.
He thought, quilts. Hum.
A stairway went up to the second floor, and looking up the stairwell, he could see even more stuff behind the second-floor railing. A severe-looking portrait of a woman, effective, though it was really nothing more than an arrangement in gray and black, hung on the first landing of the stairway. She was hatchet-faced, but broad through the shoulders, and as with the photograph he'd seen that morning, he had the feeling that he'd seen her before.
He was peering at it when a woman's voice said, “Can I help you?”
He jumped and turned. A motherly woman, white haired and six-tyish, had snuck up behind him from the back room, and was looking pleased with herself for having done it; or at least, amused that she'd startled him. He said, “Uh, jeez, is Leslie around? Or Jane?”
“No. They're in Minnetonka on an appraisal. They won't be back until after lunch, and they'll be in tomorrow… If there's anything I can help you with?”
“Oh, I had some questions about some furniture…” He looked back again at the painting. “That woman looks familiar, but I can't place her.”
“That's Leslie's mom,” the shop lady said. “Painted by quite a talented local artist, James Malone. Although I think he has since moved to New York City.”
A little click in the back of Lucas's mind.
Of course it was Leslie's mom. He could see Leslie's face in the woman's face, although the woman was much thinner than the Leslie that Lucas had met, who was running to fat.
But he hadn't always been fat, Lucas knew. Lucas knew that because Leslie wasn't fat in the picture in Amity Anderson's office. Amity Anderson and the Widdlers: and Leslie was easily big enough to carry a $50,000 table out of a house.
In fact, Leslie was a horse. You didn't see it, because of the bow ties and the fussy clothes and the fake antiquer-artsy accent he put on, but Leslie was a goddamn Minnesota farm boy, probably grew up humping heifers around the barn, or whatever you did with heifers.
The woman said, “So, uh…”
“I'll just come back tomorrow,” Lucas said. “If I have time. No big deal, I was passing by.”
“They should be in right at nine, because I'm off tomorrow,” the woman said.
“I'll talk to them then,” Lucas said. On the way out the door, he stopped, as with an afterthought: “Do you know, did they take the van?”
The woman was puzzled: “They don't have a van.”
“Oh.” Now Lucas put a look of puzzlement on his face. “Maybe I'm just remembering wrong, but I saw them at an auction and they were driving a van. A white van. I thought.”
“Just a rental. They rent when they need one, it's a lot cheaper than actually owning,” the woman said. “That's what I do, when I'm auctioning.”
Lucas nodded: “Hey. Thanks for the help.”
Outside in the parking lot, he sat in the truck for a moment, then got on the phone to John Smith: “If you happen to see them, don't tell the Widdlers I was going out to their place,” Lucas said.
After a moment of silence, Smith said, “You gotta be shittin' me.”
“Probably nothing, but I need to look them up,” Lucas said. “How did they get involved in assessing the Bucher place?”
“I called them,” Smith said. “I asked around, they were recommended. I called them and they took it on.”
“But you didn't call them because somebody suggested them specifically?” Lucas asked.
“Somebody at Bucher's?”
“Nope. I called a guy at the Minneapolis museum who knows about antiques, and he gave me two names. I looked them up in the Yellow Pages and picked the Widdlers because they were closer.”
“All right,” Lucas said. “So: if you talk to them, don't mention me.”
Next, he got Carol at the office: “Get somebody-not Sandy-and have him go out to all the local car-rental agencies and see if there's a record of a Leslie or Jane Widdler-W-I-D-D-L-E-R-renting a white van. Or any van.
“Then, Sandy is doing research on a woman named Amity Anderson. I want her to keep doing that, but put it on the back burner for today. Right now, I need to know everything about Leslie and Jane Widdler. They're married, they own an antique store in Edina. I think they went to college at Carleton. I want a bunch of stuff figured out by the time I get back there.”