The Treasure Hunters (2 page)

She found her glass of Champagne and
began walking through the lovely home, watching the people. She was aware that
many male glances turned her way, but she wasn’t interested in any of them, ever.
She was looking for something her father had once told her: that she’d know her
true love as soon as she saw him. There would be an instantaneous connection
that made everything around seem small and insignificant. It had happened with
her parents, her grandparents and her great-grandparents. In fact, finding
their one true love was sort of legendary in her family, but so far, in all the
men she’d met––nothing.

Ruby stopped at the top of the
stairs and looked over the railing down to the partygoers below. The chandelier
emitted a yellowish glow, upon everyone who danced and drank mindlessly. The
music blared from a side room and obscured any sound except for bubbling
drunken laughter. There were couples openly engaging in displays of affection,
not that she shunned that. If she found her true love, maybe she’d be doing the
same thing. Even though many had a
live
like you’re dying
mentality, she just couldn’t fathom having sex with just
anyone.

Suddenly, the party lost its
appeal. Everything seemed to hold a thread of desperation. The music, the
laughter––she was tired of the extreme endlessness of it all, and wished there
was something else. Something more, although she hadn’t the foggiest notion
what it was she wanted.

It was sometime close to two when
the party began to wind down, and although Ruby had wanted to leave earlier,
she had come with Merridie. Men and women were stumbling out of the house
finding their cars and driving away, weaving all over the road. Merridie, whose
arms were folded in annoyance, looked around for her car in the drunken mess. No
doubt she’d had another fight with Robert.

“I knew we should’ve parked down
the street,” she muttered. “It’s going to be forever until the Rolls
is
able to get out of this backup!”

Behind her, Beau sang off-key as
Eden accompanied him with giggles.

Merridie rolled her eyes at them.

“I’m walking home,” she declared,
heading down the lane. Ruby and Eden glanced at each other before hurrying
after her, leaving Beau to croon to no one.

“Hey, wait up!” she called.

“
Merri
,
we can’t walk home,” Eden said. “I’m not dressed for a stroll.”

“I’m not waiting for the car,”
Merridie huffed. “Let Robert take it home, wherever he ended up, the pill.”

“Oh, I saw him dancing with Joyce––ouch!”
Ruby hit Eden’s shoulder to shut her up when she saw Merridie’s dark look.

Unfortunately, New York City was a
big place to walk home, and after about twenty minutes her feet were killing
her. They were forever getting in trouble because of
Merri’s
bad temper, so her feet should be used to situations like this. They turned a
corner and it suddenly dawned on Ruby that she didn’t know where they were.

“Wait,” she said, pointing to the
street sign. “Where are we?”

Merridie threw her hands into the
air. “Great! I knew we had to turn left back there.”

Ruby rubbed her forehead,
exasperated. “Shut up,
Merri
––you’re not helping. Now,
we can’t be that lost, because I don’t live too far from Joyce.”

“We’ve been walking for ages!” Eden
whined.

Merridie threw her a dark look. “We’ve
only been walking fifteen, twenty minutes, Eden. And Ruby, please don’t mention
that gold digger’s name to me.”

Just then a snide laugh came from
behind them, and the three spun to see two men, dressed in scruffy, dirty
clothes, standing with smirks on their faces. Their hair hung in greasy waves
and they reeked with an unpleasant odor. Ruby did not like how they kept
looking them up and down.

“Lost, ladies?” asked one thug with
a leering sneer. “Lucky we came by to help out.”

“Why, yes,” Eden said with a bright
smile. “We’re looking for––”

Merridie slapped a hand over Eden’s
mouth, shutting her up.

“Come on, now. We won’t bite,” said
the second man. “We won’t bite, much.”

They started to snicker and Ruby
held up a hand to hold them off. “It’d be wise to just walk away. We know how
to defend ourselves.”

The two men laughed even harder.

“Really?” asked the first man. “Three
spoiled rich bitches, such as
yourselves
, know how to
fight?”

“This I have to see,” said the
second.

Eden removed Merridie’s hand. “We
are not spoiled!”

“Yeah,” Merridie said. “She’s not
bright enough to be spoiled, but you got the second part right. I’m in a real
bitchy mood right now.”

She spat at them and her wad of
spit landed next to the first man’s shoe. Ruby had to admit: the girl knew how
to hock a
loogie
. The two men growled and took a
menacing step toward them, but Merridie didn’t even waste time. She charged
them, brought her foot back and kicked the bigger thug right between his legs. He
bent over, his hands grabbing what had to be a very sore penis, and slid to his
knees on a whimper. Seeing his friend hurt, the second man took a step toward
Merridie, but Ruby pulled her gun out of her handbag and held it steady. He stopped
and blinked, as if not quite sure what he was looking at.

“1920 Star Pistol,” Ruby told him
grimly.
“Popular in Europe, particularly in Spain among the
radical union anarchists.
Point thirty-two
caliber
,
and yes, I do know how to use it.”

The man hesitated and then held up
his hands in surrender. He helped his friend to his feet and the two hurried away
as fast as they could, disappearing into the long shadows between buildings. Ruby
waited a second more and then calmly replaced the gun into her bag.

“I could’ve handled the other one
too,” Merridie muttered.

“Were you picturing Robert when you
killed off any hope that man had of having children?” Ruby asked with a smirk.

Merridie turned away, pretending to
study the street sign. Through the whole encounter, Eden had been busy
inspecting her dress, trying to get rid of a smudge of dirt.

“Oh, I hate it when I get dirty,”
she huffed.

“Come on,” Ruby said. “We’ll double
back. Let’s take that left turn Merridie keeps harping about.”

They left the street corner and retraced
their steps.

“When are you going to realize I’m
the master at navigation?” Merridie
asked,
a touch of
smugness in her voice.

“I’m never going to hear the end of
this, am I?” Ruby asked her back, ignoring the question.

“Next time, remind me not to wear
white,” Eden spoke up. “I really liked this dress!”

Chapter Two

The next morning, Ruby stood at the
tall windows, staring blindly at the street below. Behind her sat Alford
Densey
, President of Talcott Shipping, with fingers pleated
together as he waited patiently for her to gather her wits,
which
was proving very difficult to do.

“How could you sell all the
shares?”

“Miss Talcott, the market lost
eleven percent of its value at the opening bell. It was a mutual decision of
the shareholders,” he explained, yet again. She must have asked that question a
dozen different ways, but she still couldn’t quite understand the shareholders’
massive betrayal. “It was the only thing we could do to break even.”

Ruby spun around angrily, her hands
clenched in tight fists. “You panicked over an unsteady market that would have
righted itself!”

“You don’t know that.”

“I own this company!”

Mr.
Densey
only shook his head sadly. “You never owned this company. And now you don’t
belong here.”

Ruby marched up to him and bent,
staring at him nose to nose. “My father
branched
this
company into a thriving corporation when investors laughed at him. I know more
about shipping than any of you and I’ll be damned if I let it rot!”

He looked at her so calmly she
wanted to hit him.

“What can you do, Miss Talcott? You’re
a woman. It’s out of your hands now.”

Ruby felt seething frustration
flash through her and wished she could wrap her hands around his neck and
squeeze. How dare he sell it? She wasn’t the majority shareholder, which meant
her father’s legacy had been pulled out from under her, so basically she had no
recourse.
Nothing.
It was all gone in a flash. Before
she could inflict bodily harm, she turned and marched out the door, letting it
slam shut behind her.

****

The remainder of Thursday and
Friday, Ruby visited everyone she could think of to try to salvage what Alford
Densey
had done to her father’s company, but it was no use.
The Exchange had begun a steady decline that was looking more and
more grim
as the week progressed. It was like a leak in a dam
that couldn’t be stopped. The cracks kept getting wider and wider, until everything
she once knew was swept away.

On the following Monday, the
temporary respite didn’t work as more investors pulled out. By Tuesday, about
sixteen million shares had been traded. The ticker didn’t stop, and by the end
of the day the market had lost over fourteen billion dollars in one day. People
lost everything, including Merridie.

Her friend had called her late in
the evening, and Ruby had gone straight over. Merridie had been in a state of
incomprehension, and all Ruby could do was comfort her friend as she came to
grips with the new reality before them.

It was toward evening when Robert
finally made an appearance. Ruby sat holding Merridie’s hand as she watched him
come to an abrupt halt, the moment his gaze landed upon his pale fiancée.

“Why didn’t your butler answer the
door?” he demanded. “And why are you crying? Really, Merridie . .
.I’m
playing poker this evening over at the
Thorngates
, and I don’t want to be late.”

“The lawyers just left,” she
whispered.

He frowned.
“This
late at night?
What did they say?”

“My entire fortune was invested in
the Exchange,” she said, still sounding a bit dazed. Ruby squeezed her hand. “The
bank had been seeing some difficulty in my accounts, but they never thought to
warn me.”

Robert leaned down to grab her
arms, giving her a shake to snap her out of her disassociation. “What’s left,
Merri
? What do you still have?”

“Stop it!” Ruby yelled at him. “Let
her go!”

“Nothing,” Merridie whispered.
“Nothing at all.”

Robert abruptly let her go and she
sank back onto the sofa. Ruby stepped in between them, ready to defend her
friend. Clearly, Robert was in a state of shock as well, because he took a step
back and looked at them as if they were too dirty to touch.

“The creditors have already
called,” Merridie continued in a pain-filled voice. “Robert, my credit has come
due and I’ve got nothing to pay with. They’re going to take my house.”

“You have nothing saved? No ready
cash?”

Suddenly, Merridie got angry and
she surged to her feet. Ruby stepped back to let her deal with Robert. She
hoped Merridie would kick him in the balls.

“Why would I have needed anything
else but my credit, Robert? No, I didn’t have anything saved. I didn’t have
ready cash. It’s gone, Robert.”

They stared into each other’s eyes
for a long moment before he stuck out his hand.

“My ring, please,” he said, voice
toneless. “I’m going to need it back.”

Ruby took a step toward him, ready
to follow through on her mental castration, when Merridie pulled the big
diamond off her ring finger. She flung it at him, and he scrambled to catch it.
He pocketed it quickly and without another word, turned and left the same way
he came in.

“Including you,” Merridie said softly,
sadness in her voice.

Ruby put her arms around her just
as Merridie burst into tears.

****

“I’m so glad you’ve both come
over,” Eden said as she clipped a few roses from the bushes surrounding the
patio. She laid down the sheers on the table and arranged the red flowers in a
vase.

“Merridie is going to live with me
now,” Ruby said. Merridie gazed down in her cup. She was worried about her
friend.

“That’ll be
swell
,”
Eden replied. “Or you can live with me, Merrie. Or you can take turns, one week
with me and one week with Ruby.”

“Eden,” Ruby warned but the other
girl just blinked blankly at her. She loved Eden so much, but sometimes the
attic was empty.

“Why don’t I ask Papa if I can
come
stay with you as well?” Eden clapped her hands with
delight. “We could play cards. Dance.
Charades.
Why,
we’ll have so much fun that Merridie will forget all about the bastard.”

Hearing Eden swear shocked them so
much that Merridie glanced up from her cup, a reluctant smile tugging at the
corners of her mouth.

“All right, Eden,” Ruby said. “That
actually does sound nice after what’s been happening. Let’s go talk to your
father.”

Eden grabbed the vase of roses and
led the way back into the house. November had dawned to the horror of the world
changing. Every day the Dow Jones continued to fall, and somewhere along the
way people began to realize there was no going back up. Newspapers told horror
stories of people who chose to kill themselves rather than face the future
penniless.

Eden’s home was big and lovely, and
everything was white, her signature color: White walls, white furniture, and
white rugs. Even growing up, she’d cry if she got dirt on her pristine white
clothes. The patio led to the den with her father’s office door off to one side.
Eden put the vase on the white marble fireplace mantel and knocked on the door.
A loud
click
emanated from inside,
and Ruby’s eyes widened in horror. She rushed forward, just as Merridie did,
trying to keep Eden from opening the door.