The Curse of the Holy Pail #2 (8 page)

"Thanks. Always enjoy the meetings. By the way, who's that new girl, the one with the long, curly, red hair?"

I thought a minute, then turned to study the people gathered in the main patio area until I focused on who he was speaking about. I smiled. Joe had good taste.

"Her name's Sharon. She's twenty-four, a graduate of UC Irvine, and currently lives in Laguna Beach, where she's an artist. Pottery, I believe. This is only her second meeting."

"You got all that in just her first meeting?" he asked, teasing, but I could tell he was thankful for the information. I watched him as he studied the pretty woman. His look was appreciative of her ample charms, but not vulgar. He had a slightly silly grin plastered on his face when he turned his attention back to me.

"Is it true, Odelia, that the Holy Pail is missing?" he asked.

"That's what I understand."

He whistled. "Wow, it's worth a lot of money to someone."

"Joe," I asked, forming my question as I spoke, "how easy would it be for someone to resell something like that? I mean, especially since it's not rightfully theirs and is well known to collectors?"

He took a sip of his drink and leaned back in his chair to think about my question.

"Depends on how fast someone wants to dump it, I suppose. The quicker the sale, the less bidding there'll be, the lower the price," he explained. "It's stolen, so it's not likely to show up on eBay or be associated with a well-known auction house. The major collectors may already know about Price's death. News like that spreads fast in such a tight and specialized community. For sure, they'll be on the lookout for it and will take note of who's selling it if anyone does try."

"So why would someone buy it, knowing it's stolen? They can't display it or show it off."

"Why do collectors buy stolen art masterpieces?" he countered, answering my question with a question. Joe took a drink and cast another glance at the cute redhead before continuing. "It's an ego trip," he explained, "the pride of secret ownership. For some, it doesn't matter that they can't tell anyone. It's more titillating that they can't-like a private joke played on the world. It's quite possible that the Holy Pail is already in the hands of a collector."

"That fast?" I asked, surprised.

"That fast," he answered with a snap of his fingers. "It's one of a kind and irreplaceable. When the rich want something, they usually get it."

I thought about that as I turned my eyes back to the glowing, blue water. "The police think Price might have been murdered," I said to Joe as I continued to stare into the water. I turned to look at him and saw his small eyes bulging at the news. "You don't think anyone would kill him for a lunchbox, do you?"

Recovering quickly from his shock, he shot me an amused look. "People have killed for a lot less than that."

I shook my head sadly. He was right. People killed for senseless reasons every day. The daily news bore witness of that.

I thought about Carmen Sepulveda and how outraged she had been at the idea of someone wanting to poison Sterling Price. What was it she had said? "Who in God's name would want to poison that dear man?" Let's see, for starters: a cast-off fiancee, a moneyhungry family, environmentalists, lunchbox connoisseurs. It was beginning to look like a ticket holder's line at a sold-out performance.

Zee was calling out that the Reality Check meeting was about to start. Joe and I both got up and started toward the others. I put a hand on his arm and stopped him.

"Joe, I know this was before your time, but what do you know about Chappy Wheeler and the Holy Pail? Anything beyond the fact that the box is valuable?"

He smiled at the question and looked down at the ground. Something told me he knew a lot about the subject.

"I'm a bit of a TV historian," he said, blushing. "I know that sounds kind of geeky, but it's a hobby of mine."

"It's not geeky, lots of people follow TV and film," I said reassuringly. "Was The Chappy Wheeler Show on the air long?"

"Nope, only about a year and a half, I think. But it was very popular. First show of its kind. It ended when Wheeler was murdered. I don't think they ever found his killer."

That was pretty much what Sterling Price had told me. "Do you have any information on him and the show?"

He lit up like a hundred-watt bulb at my interest. "Sure I do. I have articles, posters, stuff like that. And I can get you more, if you like. In fact, just today there was a small article in the L.A. Times about lunchboxes. I'll get you a copy of that, as well."

We started walking in the direction of the meeting. "That would be great, Joe. Thanks."

After a few steps, Joe stopped again. I halted with him. He seemed to be making up his mind about something.

"Be careful, Odelia," he finally said in a hushed voice. "The Holy Pail really is cursed."

A chill ran up my spine like a squirrel scurrying up a tree. "You don't really believe that, do you?" I said with a nervous giggle, trying to shake the creepy feeling off.

"Listen to me," he said, looking straight at me, his shyness gone. "Every owner of the Holy Pail has died."

"Joe," I said in a plea of frustration, "it's just a damn lunchbox!"

CURSED OR NOT, JOE came through with the information about the Holy Pail and Chappy Wheeler. I found a box of stuff over a halffoot high in the middle of my desk when I arrived at the office the next morning. On the very top were printouts from websites devoted to collecting lunchboxes. The sites that included the history of the hobby all mentioned Chappy Wheeler and the Holy Pail. Just under the loose papers was a magazine with a yellow sticky note on the front. O-Please read the article on page 23! Joe had printed precisely on the Post-It. The items under the magazine were about Chappy Wheeler, aka Charles Borden, mostly articles and promos designed to feed the active fan base of his heyday. The magazine was a past copy of American Executive. I leafed through it until I found page twenty-three, then I blessed Joe. Here in my hands was the article about Sterling Price and his lunchbox collection. There was even a photo of him proudly holding the Chappy Wheeler lunchbox. Price's mischievous eyes twinkled out at me from the glossy pages. He looked more like an aging boy than an elderly, big-business tycoon.

It made me sad. Then it made me mad. Four days ago, this man was alive and was a small part of my life. Someone had wanted him dead and had carried it out. It was probably none of my business, but I wanted to know who and why.

I looked at my watch. It was nine fifteen in the morning. Greg would be back this afternoon. His parents were picking him up at the airport and taking him home. The plan was for him to come down to my place to pick up Wainwright and take me to dinner. I'm sure he hoped it would be a celebration dinner. My phone rang and I was glad for the interruption, even if the display did show the caller was Mike Steele.

"Yes?" I said into the receiver in a voice that even I thought was a bit too edgy.

"Grey?" he asked.

"Who'd you expect?"

"Gawd, you sound like you're hung over. Have a bad night?"

"Is it any of your business if I did?" I knew this was not the tone I should be taking with a superior, but I didn't care. I looked down again at the magazine. Sterling Price's inner child leaped out from the slick paper. Senseless deaths make me cranky.

"Only if it affects your work, Grey." Steele paused, waiting for a smart-ass volley from my side of the net. When he did not get one, he continued, but sounded disappointed. "Hold off on that Sterling Homes document review job."

"Okay. Haven't started it yet," I told him, trying to even out my tone of voice. "I was going to this weekend."

"Nah, don't do anything for now," Steele said. "I just heard from Jackson Blake, Sterling's senior VP. No further work is to be done on anything until he reviews all of the company's outstanding projects and gives a summary to the board."

Steele was on his speakerphone. I could hear his chair squeaking in a steady pattern and knew he was sitting and swinging it from side to side like a little kid. It was a habit of his when he was lost in thought.

"Just sit tight until you hear otherwise."

"Sounds good to me," I answered, glad to have some of my work put on hold. "I was planning on attending Sterling Price's funeral this afternoon, if you don't mind."

Of course he would mind. Steele always minded anything that unshackled me from my desk and took me out of his reach. After the service, I planned on heading straight home. It would give me a chance to pull myself together before I saw Greg. I was semi-seriously considering flipping a coin to arrive at my decision about his proposal.

"Good idea. I was going to go to the service on behalf of the firm, but you can go in my place." Squeak ... squeak... "I hate funerals. Don't even plan on going to my own, if I can help it."

I filed that tidbit of information away, thinking that if he kept that promise, Steele's funeral might be one worth attending.

"Besides," he continued, "your old buddy Wendell Wallace will be there. The firm will be well represented."

"I probably won't come back to the office after the funeral," I said casually, hoping to slip it by him.

The squeaking stopped abruptly, followed by silence. I braced myself. If Steele crabbed even one tiny bit about billable hours, I was going to remind him loudly that mine were among some of the highest in the firm. The squeaking started up again, and I breathed easier.

"No problem, Grey. I'll see you tomorrow morning. Bright and early."

I almost fell over. No problem? Did he really say no problem?

Stunned, I replaced the receiver and turned my attention back to the magazine article. I skimmed it casually. It was unremarkable in both the writing and the content, basically restating what Sterling Price had told me a few days ago about how he started collecting lunchboxes, how many he owned, and how he had recently acquired the Holy Pail. However, two-thirds of the way through the piece, I froze. I read several paragraphs over and over before picking up a pen and jotting a few names from the article down on a legal pad. I circled them.

Jasper Kellogg

Ivan Fisher

William Proctor

They were the names of some of the prior owners of the Chappy Wheeler lunchbox, and they all had something in commonthey were all dead. More importantly, according to the article, they had all died while still in possession of the Holy Pail. I thought Joe had been kidding, trying to scare me like a Halloween goblin.

I picked up my phone and punched in another extension at the firm.

"Joe?" I said into the phone, the magazine shaking in my hands. "What else do you have on these dead guys?"

SEVEN

STERLING PRICE'S FUNERAL WAS remarkable only by its brevity. The eulogy was given by Price's good friend and my former boss, Wendell Wallace. He stood straight and regal at the podium as he spoke of his many years of friendship with the deceased and of Price's accomplishments and loving family.

While I did want to pay my last respects to Sterling Price, the urge to check out the cast of characters that made up his life loomed large in my mind. From my seat about midway on the left- hand side of the filled chapel, I craned my neck to get a glimpse of the family, but it was useless. They were seated in a special area along the left wall, shielded by a dark one-way screen for privacy. I had never met any of Sterling Price's family and wanted to put faces to some of the names I knew. I did spot Carmen Sepulveda seated in the second pew on the right. Her head dropped down every so often during the service and I assumed she was wiping her eyes with tissue.

The graveside portion of the service was just as brief. When it was over, I made my way over to the Price home for the recep tion. It was located in Newport Coast, a very expensive housing development in Newport Beach featuring meandering streets, manicured lawns, and celebrity neighbors. Perched on the hillside, many residents had spectacular views of the Pacific Ocean. It was not a Sterling Homes development.

The home was elegant and large, with a design that reminded me of a Mediterranean villa. I had barely stepped inside when someone gently took my elbow. It was Mr. Wallace. Standing next to him was his lovely wife of forty-seven years, Hilda. Mr. Wallace smiled down at me from his six-foot-three frame, which was unbent by time. Mrs. Wallace leaned in and gave me an affectionate hug. I had last seen them at my birthday party a few days prior. They had popped in for a few moments before another engagement, and I was touched both by their attendance and by Greg's thoughtfulness in inviting them.

"Glad to see you here, Odelia," Mr. Wallace said. "Sterling always liked you." His voice vibrated slightly in grief and I saw his wife place a hand warmly on his arm.

"I wanted to be here," I said, and felt my own voice shake a bit at seeing Mr. Wallace's loss etched into his face. "Did you know that I saw him the day he died?"

"Yes, Mike Steele told me." Mr. Wallace looked around. "Where is Mike? Thought he'd be here."

"He decided not to come since both you and I would be here," I said. When I saw Mr. Wallace shake his head slowly in disapproval, I quickly added, "Steele was pretty shaken up by this, Mr. Wallace. I'm not sure he does funerals very well."