According to Their Deeds (2 page)

She was.

“I do wonder who she was,” Charles said.

“Just as long as she’s not here to bid on anything I want. Not that I’m getting anything anyway. A hundred grand for a desk! It’s crazy.”

“I wonder what Derek would have thought,” Charles said.

Norman pointed at the next catalog page. “I bet that’s the lot you’re after.”

“Yes.”

“Number sixty-four. You got here just in time.”

“Going once, twice, sold. Lot sixty-two for five thousand six hundred dollars. Next will be lot sixty-three, two Windsor chairs. Bidding will open at five thousand. Do I see five thousand?”

“Those are nice,” Norman said. “I don’t do furniture, but those are nice. From Vermont, 1920, all handmade. The real things. It must have taken a long time to pull all this stuff together.”

“A lifetime.”

“And poof, here it’s all gone in three hours. Kind of funny, you know?”

The auctioneer’s voice stabbed the air, slicing and cutting, on and on, relentlessly.

“And his wife doesn’t want it.” Norman said. “It’s her selling it off, right?”

“I believe so.”

“She’s making a bundle. Especially after that desk! I wonder if she knew he was worth so much? His stuff, anyway. Did you get the list?”

“The catalog?” Charles asked, with it in his hand. “This?”

“No, the list from the police.”

“I don’t know of any list from the police.”

“It’s the stuff that got stolen, you know, that night he got killed.”

“Any other bid? Going once, twice, sold. Lot sixty-three for thirteen thousand dollars.”

“They want dealers to be looking for it,” Norman said.

“No, I didn’t get that list.”

“Next will be lot sixty-four, a set of thirteen antique books. Bidding will open at ten thousand. Do I see ten thousand?”

“This is you, right?”

Charles nodded.

“Good luck,” Norman said.

“Thanks.”

“I guess no books got stolen.”

“Ten thousand, thank you. Do I see eleven?”

Norman kept talking. “So that’s why they didn’t give you the list. Police and FBI, too. They’re all looking.”

Charles had his own paddle in his lap. He watched the bids increase.

“How much will it go for?” Norman said.

“Twenty-three, twenty-four for the set, maybe twenty-five.”

“Remember, it’s all going high. You sold them all to him in the first place?”

“Fifteen thousand. Do I see sixteen? Thank you, sixteen thousand.”

“Yes. A book at a time, over the last six years.”

Charles leaned forward, watching the different bidders.

“Do you know everyone bidding?” Norman said.

“So far.”

“From around here?”

“No. Briary Roberts in New York. Jacob Leatherman himself from San Francisco.”

“The old guy?”

“Yes.”

“Did you know he was coming?”

“We had dinner last night.”

His eyes were on the contest. The other bidders took turns, pushing the price up.

“Twenty thousand. Do I see twenty-one?”

Charles lifted his paddle. Now he was joined in the battle himself.

“Twenty-one thousand.”
For a moment, he owned the bid.
“Do I see twenty-two?”
And then he did not.
“Twenty-two, thank you. Do I see twenty-three?”

Suddenly the bidding intensified with quick jabs from Jacob Leather-man, and then New York again.

“Twenty-five? Thank you. Do I see twenty-six?”

Jacob Leatherman’s paddle quivered in the air.

“Twenty-six. Do I see twenty-seven?”

Charles signaled, quickly.

“Twenty-seven thousand. Do I see twenty-eight?”

Jacob was frowning from across the room, but his paddle was on the floor.

“Any other bid? The bid is twenty-seven thousand. Going once, twice, sold. Lot sixty-four sold for twenty-seven thousand dollars.”

“But I thought you said it was only worth twenty-four,” Norman said.

“Sentiment.”

“Next will be lot sixty-five, a wood inlay chess set. Bidding will open at two thousand dollars.”

“I don’t do books,” Norman said, “so what do I know. Oh, I sold this chess set. I’m just trying to get back what I sold him.”

Charles stood and took a deep breath and moved toward the door.

Charles stepped out from the building into very bright sunlight.

It took a moment to adjust.

Traffic was heavy. On the sidewalk, a dozen people were scattered over the length of the block. The gray stone and mirrored windows of the office building across the street were very bright.

A cardboard box was in front of him, tight in both hands.

He turned south toward Pennsylvania Avenue, three blocks away. The faces he passed were stern and silent against the world, or talking on cell phones, alive, animated, in other worlds. Charles stopped at the first corner.

He was being followed.

Across the street a young man had stayed even with him. He was in torn jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, and he had stopped on his opposite corner. A well-dressed woman, passing him, instinctively drew back, and hurried past.

Charles waited.

Abruptly the man sprang from the curb and sprinted, dodging cars. His eyes were on the box in Charles’s hands. A car squealed but the young man, lithe and quick, was already across.

Charles waited. The predator came to a halt, inches away.

“Hey, boss,” he said, in a low voice.

“Don’t cause a wreck, Angelo.”

He shrugged. “You got that?”

“Twenty-seven thousand.”

“For a little box.” His accent was urban Hispanic and so were his black hair and shadowy face.

“You take it,” Charles said.

“Back to the shop?”

Charles handed him the box.

“Take it to the shop. I’ll be right there.”

“Okay, boss, I’ll take it, it’s not any problem.”

“Be careful.”

“You are worrying for me, boss, or you are worrying for that box?”

“The box isn’t going to do anything foolish.”

Angelo smiled, a tiger showing its teeth. “I am smarter than that little box.”

“Try to be.”

With no other words he turned away, only walking but very quickly. Charles continued on his own way to a Metro station, and descended into the ground.

“King Street. Next stop Eisenhower Avenue.” The doors whirred and Charles was on the platform, looking out at the streets of Alexandria. The escalator took him down to them.

The pocket around the station was in giant twelve-story scale, of offices and plazas, tied to the rest of the city only by it being brick. Beyond, though, a few blocks of King Street brought Charles to the three-story scale of real west Alexandria, authentic and shabby from a century of pawn and secondhand existence, now getting better but still not good.

Then another five blocks east and the buildings were solid and many were very good, and rents were high and the shop windows cleaner and the doors were appealing instead of simply peeling.

Charles crossed noisy Washington Street and into the heart of crowds and crowds. At Market Square he turned right into quiet streets, then one more block, and finally up two steps, and into a place that was very, very quiet.

The first impression was always the quiet. It was the special calm silence of books aging, books that were very practiced at aging.

“Hello, Alice.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Beale.” Alice had a way of speaking that did not disturb the silence. “Mrs. Beale was just asking if I’d seen you.”

The second impression was the quiet of color. Only the part of any color that could last decades was left in the room. Even loud colors were quiet.

“Is she upstairs?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.”

Then the smell, which was faintest, half like a forest and half like old linen, but sharp.

“And have you seen Angelo?” he asked.

“No, sir.” Her dress was the russet of a bright red cover faded over forty years.

“I didn’t think he’d be back yet.” The counter stretched across the right side of the room and stairs went up the left side, and a rail ran across the back.

“And have we sold anything?”

“A 1940
Gone With the Wind
.”

“I can empathize with Scarlet,” he said. “I feel like I’ve just come from the burning of Atlanta.”

He opened the gate in the middle of the rail and climbed the steps.

“There you are.”

Her voice was quicksilver and light and everything peaceful.

“Here I am,” Charles said. “Dorothy, it was worse than I’d expected.”

“I’m sorry.” Her hair was slow silver, short and easy, and lovely. “Were you there long?”

“Twenty minutes. But I sat beside Norman Highberg.”

“Oh, dear.” She smiled, which was the moon at its brightest. “Did you get the books?”

“Yes, for twenty-seven. I had to outbid Jacob Leatherman just at the end. Oh, he scowled!”

“He’ll get over it, and you will, too. I’m glad you got them. It helps to close the circle with Derek.”

“It does help. And I have to tell you about Derek’s desk.” His own desk was at the front window, and he sat and pushed aside newspapers and magazines and catalogs to make space for an elbow.

“I suppose there was something special about it?” Anything would be special if she only spoke its name.

“Everything he had was special. But this was more than just ordinary special.”

“It was auctioned today?”

“Yes, and sensationally.” Now that he was sitting, he stretched his back, and put his hands behind his head. “I came in right in the middle of it. It should have gone twenty-five thousand, and it was about to go for thirty-four, and whoosh, two people bid it right up to a hundred and five thousand. There was a riot.”

“A very calm one, I’m sure.”

“People actually turned in their chairs and looked around. It was that drastic.”

Her blue eyes widened in her own calm amazement. “Why would it sell for so much?”

“It’s a complete mystery.” He stared out the window at the street. “Poof.”

“What?”

“A lifetime. Three hours and it’s gone.”

“Selling off all his things?”

“His world. Everything he was, all scattered.” With his hands behind his head, the space on his desk he’d cleared for his elbow was empty now, abandoned.

“Life is more than what you own,” Dorothy said. Her own desk was perfectly ordered, with a computer screen, a neat pile of papers, and two photographs. She put her elbows on the empty middle and looked at him.

“Oh, I know,” Charles said. “But that’s what’s left at the end.”

“He was an important person, wasn’t he?”

“He was a bureaucrat in the Justice Department. Yes, he was important.” He glanced at the newspaper. The first page was rancor in Congress, and the president refusing to cooperate, and officials denying any wrongdoing. “What would the
Post
print if there were no scandals?”

“Hollywood divorces, like everyone else.”

“I guess that would be worse. Every story on the front page is about someone’s failing.”

The sun was overhead, in the west, full on the townhouses across the street. The shadow of his own building was creeping toward them.

He read a paragraph. “This poor man,” he said. “A highly respected federal judge. Ten years on the bench. Then it comes out that he cheated on his exams back in law school. Over thirty years ago! First he was forced to resign, and now he’s being disbarred.”

“It does seem severe.”

“There is more to life than what you own. There’s also what you’ve done wrong.”

“And what you’ve done right. Charles, you’re getting moody. Did you bring the books home?”

“Angelo has them, speaking of lives lived questionably.”

“I didn’t know you took him.” The two pictures on her desk were of Charles and of a teenage boy.

“I just decided at the last minute.”

“Was he dressed all right?”

“No, he was not. There wasn’t time. He wouldn’t have come inside anyway.”

“We have a delivery for him to make this afternoon in Arlington. And I was thinking we should get him a suit for his next probation review.”

“His regular business clothes are fine.” He dropped the newspaper into the wastebasket. “Felons in suits annoy me.”

“Besides Angelo, how many felons do you know?”

“Aren’t we all?”

“Mr. Beale?” Alice had come up the steps. “Mr. Leatherman is here to see you.”

“Take a deep breath,” Dorothy said.

Charles did.

“Jacob!” Charles said from the stairs. “Welcome!”

“What did you do that for?” It would have been a growl, but from such a small and fragile man it was a yip.

Charles reached the floor, smiling all the way. “Let me get you a chair.” He swept through the gate and came to rest at his guest. “I’d invite you to the office but it’s up all those stairs.”

“I don’t need a chair.”

“I’m glad you could stop in. I was sorry you couldn’t after dinner last night.”

“I have time before my flight and I don’t like sitting in airports. I told the taxi to bring me here.”

“I’m so glad,” Charles said.

Jacob smacked the floor with his walking stick. “You’re glad? You’re gloating, that’s what it is, for outbidding me. What did you do that for?”

“You could have bid higher if you wanted them, Jacob.”

“That’s all they’re worth. Now I’m going back without anything.”

“I’m sorry your trip was a waste. I’ll sell them to you, if you want.”

“How much?”

“Thirty.”

“Thirty?” He smacked the floor again. “They’re not worth that. I’d have bid thirty if they were.”

“Then I guess I’ll keep them.”

“I didn’t come to have you gloat. I’ll give you twenty-three.”
Smack.

“Thirty-five. And you’re perfectly Dickensian when you do that.”

“Bah, humbug then. Dickensian?” He rubbed his nose. “I like that. And you said thirty.”

“You should have taken it while you could.”

“Whippersnapper! Mocking an old man! You’ll give me apoplexy, and I have all those airport lines to go through yet. You’ll send me to an early grave.”

“That’s no longer possible, Jacob.”