A Killer Collection
Read A Killer Collection Online
Authors: J. B. Stanley
Tags: #amateur sleuth, #antiques, #cozy mystery, #female detective, #J.B. Stanley, #southern, #mystery series, #antique pottery, #molly appleby, #Collectible mystery
Molly Appleby is a sharp-witted writer for Collector's
Weekly magazine. She has a keen knowledge of antiques, and a special fondness
for collectibles. And when a fellow collector is murdered, Molly quickly
develops an uncanny understanding of the criminal mind.
An
Antiques & Collectibles Mystery
By
J.B. Stanley
Copyright © 2006 Jennifer Stanley.
All rights reserved.
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or,
if real, used fictitiously.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by an electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying,
recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the
express written permission of the author.
Many thanks to Lorraine Bartlett for helping this book
have a second life. Not only is Lorraine a talented writer (check out her books
under the names L.L. Bartlett and Lorna Bartlett as well as Lorraine Bartlett)
but she is also a generous friend.
The Antiques
& Collectibles Mysteries
A Killer
Collection
Fatal Appraisal
A Deadly Dealer
An Antiques &
Collectibles Mystery
By J.B. Stanley
The potter's hands were wide with short, thick
fingers, gnarled and cracked from a lifetime of work. Small burn scars
crisscrossed the tough skin on the palms from feeding wood into the kiln. Dried
clay was wedged beneath the ragged fingernails. Specks of it dotted the
potter's apron and stuck like gray flies to his muscular forearms.
He reached under the cloth and
drew out a ball of brown clay, looking it over for any signs of obvious
impurities. He placed it on the scale and removed a few chunks from the ball
until the scale read five pounds. He lumped the leftovers together and returned
them to their shelter to wait under the wet cloth.
Slapping the ball on his wheel
so that it would hold fast and create the right amount of suction, he dipped
his fingers in a pail of cloudy water and drizzled it over the expectant clay.
He began pumping the foot pedal on the wheel, and as it spun around, he
moistened the clay until it became malleable beneath his hands.
As the potter centered the
bulk, it lurched sideways like an unsteady drunk, and then rose upward like a
giraffe craning its neck to reach a high branch. The wheel hummed softly as the
potter worked under the light of a single bulb, the sounds of bluegrass music
playing on the radio.
The clay was alive. Warm below
his arms, it moved, stretched, and twisted. He cupped his fingers around its
body, forcing the ripples to grow into a steady curve. He pressed more firmly
at the base, and hips appeared as the weight of the clay settled onto itself.
Around the rim, the potter pinched with one hand and smoothed the swelling
sides with the other. Then, he let the pace of the wheel slow as he curled his
hand around the neck of clay, pushing it upward in a gentle choking motion
until it was a symmetrical spout, obedient to his will.
With a knife, he cut off the
extra piece of neck and smoothed the insides of the opening. He stepped back
and examined the piece, looking at the base, the round sides, and back up to
the top where the centered spout emerged in perfect lines.
Satisfied, he slid a length of
wire beneath the jug and moved it gingerly onto a stone slab where it would
dry. This one would not get a face. It was too late in the evening and the
potter was tired He had made enough for today.
As he switched off the radio, he
noticed the little lump of leftover clay peeking out from beneath the damp
cloth. A new wedge awaited him tomorrow, and he didn't really want to unwrap
the whole thing just to save this small bit. Still, he hated to waste a piece
of clay. He paused, picked it up, held it, thinking.
His hands moved over it,
hesitating. They weren't sure what they were supposed to do. Without the wheel,
things were uncertain. Pieces could become anything—imperfect, irregular
The potter smoothed the lump
into a rounded body, and then applied pressure until he’d made a thick neck
with one hand, widening a round head with the other. He pinched out two long,
rounded ears, and pulled forward a small nose and cheeks. Dipping his hands
into the water, he smoothed the body and pushed out a swollen hump to become
the back and the hind leg, then pulled out two long, identical front legs from
the clay below the head With a wooden carving
stick, he traced an
upright cottontail on the base of the back leg, drew paws into the little feet,
and made a triangular nose, winking eyes, a grinning mouth, and six whiskers.
Lastly, he carved his initials and a number onto the base.
The potter smiled, flicking
away any flecks of clay from around the last piece of work he would do that
night. He hid it far back behind the other taller pieces where it could remain
a surprise until the moment was right.
The rabbit smiled back at him,
sharing his secret among the crocks and chums, the pitchers and bowls, and the
face jugs with their rows of crooked teeth. It waited for the time when the
potter's hands would reach out with his brush and glaze its naked body into a
cobalt the color of the deep sea. The clay was patient. It had waited hundreds
of years to be formed; it could wait a little longer to be burned blue by the
kiln fire.
It waited. But the gentle hands
of its creator would never come again.
~~~~~~~~~~
It was quick, it was ruthless, it was in-your-face
collecting . . . .
Did people really go this crap over pottery?
—ANDREW GLASGOW, from
Catawba
Clay: Contemporary
Southern
Face Jug Makers
"Time to get up!"
The call seeped into the dark
bedroom and murmured around antique woven coverlets and a turn-of-the-century
walnut blanket chest. It stared at the Dutch girl with the metal bucket in her
oil painting of snow, reflected the sheen on the porcelain curls of a pair of
Staffordshire dogs, and tickled the ecru page comers on a stack of
leather-bound books. Finding no response, it accepted defeat and melted into
the open mouth of a large cherry corner cupboard filled with row upon row of
white-glazed pottery glowing with life in the weak, first stripes of dawn
light.
"MADAM!" This call was
loud enough to stir the silence of the room and awaken the sleeping woman. The
gray tabby beside her burrowed a sharp claw into the woman's hand as punishment
for daring to move a body part.
The door was flung open without
ceremony and a rectangle of light from the kitchen burst into the room like an
uninvited guest.
"Who do you have in
there?" Molly's mother asked from the doorframe, and without waiting for
an answer, asked the groggy feline, "Sophie, would you like some
milk?"
The rotund tabby turned toward the
voice and issued a small chirp of assent. Molly, whose nickname was
"Madam" in her mother's house, turned over and buried her head
beneath the pillow.
In the kitchen, her mother sang
little ditties to her seven felines, cracked open cans, and distributed dry
food into bowls. Cats meowed, fridge and cupboard doors were opened and closed,
the microwave whirred and beeped. Then her mother was back, balancing something
carefully in one hand and turning on the lamp with the other.
"Get up, Molly. It's time to
go."
"I'm up, I'm up. What time is
it?"
"4:45."
"Four! This is insane."
Molly sat up and pushed a strand of dark hair out of her face. "You are
truly an evil woman," she mumbled.
"Get up. Sophie wants her
milk, and she doesn't like anyone on the bed when she's eating."
Molly looked at the porcelain
doll-sized teacup and saucer her mother held with as much disdain as she could
muster. Sophie glared accusingly at her in return.
"I hope you realize that I am
going to be crabby all day," Molly announced as she shuffled off to the
bathroom.
"Yes, dear. But I'm used to
you."
"Hrmphh."
It was a cool, predawn morning.
Molly shivered and wiped the condensation from the car windshield. Beneath
fading stars, she watched as her mother loaded some rubber bins stuffed with
bubble wrap into the trunk. It was hard to believe that this was the beginning
of what would become another stiflingly hot June day in North Carolina. Molly
rubbed the goose bumps on her arms and climbed into the driver's seat of her
mother's pearl-white Lexus.
By 5:30, they were merging onto
interstate 85 South toward Seagrove, home of the southern potters. As Molly
sipped her warm sweet coffee, her mother offered her a banana. Molly crossly
waved it away.
"I can't eat at this hour.
The truckers are the only people crazy enough to be on the road, and they're
probably getting paid much more than I am."
"The
other
collectors
are out here too."
"Oh," Molly moaned,
ignoring her mother, "I wish I hadn't volunteered to cover these pottery
fair things. I
hate
getting up when it's still dark."
"They're called kiln
openings. And once you've been to one, you'll be hooked for life. I know
you!"
"Well, it was your idea to
suggest these articles to
Collector's Weekly
, and now I'm driving
instead of sleeping. My editor thinks a series on pottery is a great idea, and
he never likes anything."
Her mother examined a minute stain
on her teal cardigan sweater. "The collecting world needs to be educated
about southern potters, and you're just the person to do it."
Molly had been an English teacher
at an exclusive private school for eight years when the job started to wear on her.
Though people assumed most teachers worked a short day and took summers off,
Molly worked long days, graded papers on weekends, and spent every summer
teaching extra classes in order to meet her mortgage payments. After eight
years, she felt that she had no time for herself.
Whenever she did have a few
moments to spare, she spent them attending auctions and browsing antique shops.
Soon she was submitting articles to
Collector's Weekly
for extra
spending money, and when a full-time staff position became available, she
jumped at the chance to get paid for doing what she loved most
She typically wrote on the
bigger-name antique auctions in her area, driving around Virginia, North
Carolina, and South Carolina to snap pictures and interview auctioneers and bidders.
Her articles featured detailed descriptions of the items that brought in the
highest prices as well as quotes from satisfied buyers.
After covering the auction beat
for a year, she noticed that more and more southern pottery was appearing on
the auction block and then disappearing at exorbitant prices. Knowing little
about the subject, she asked her mother for a quick course on the world of
southern pottery.
