“I see. Well, there was or is an Ingstrom Shipwrights in Seattle.”
“Excellent to start. I must go. Leave me message of your progress.”
And I was holding a dead line.
“Quinton!” I barked. “What are you doing to my phones?”
Quinton’s head emerged above the desktop with the headphones half off. “I just spliced in the components. Your lines should be just fine now.”
“Now, yes. What about thirty seconds ago?”
“Out of commission.”
“Well, the phone line worked just fine.”
He shrugged. “Huh… should have been dead. Doesn’t matter, though. The automatic sender is on the modem line, anyhow.”
“Can I use the phone now without getting cut off?” I asked.
“Sure. I’m going to run a quick electrical test, but it shouldn’t affect your call.” He vanished back to his station on the floor in front of the desk and I picked up the phone.
I called Ingstrom Shipwrights of Seattle.
A very young male voice answered. “Hello? Can I help you?”
“I’m trying to reach Ingstrom Shipwrights. This used to be their number,” I said.
“Oh, yeah, of course. The company’s out of business. I’m helping out with the auctions. I think all the business records are with the family and the lawyers.”
“Actually, I’m trying to track a piece of furniture. What’s this about auctions?”
“Business and the estate, both. McCain Antiques and Auctions.”
“Estate auctions? Someone died?”
“Yeah. The owner and his son died in a boat accident. Kind of creepy, huh? They fix boats and their boat sinks. Gives you the chills.”
“That’s pretty ironic. Umm… hey, I don’t want to be crass, but I need to talk to someone about the furniture.”
He hesitated. “We’re pretty hectic right now… If you come down for the preview, you could ask Will or Brandon in person. That would probably work. Preview started at three and closes at seven.”
I got the address and said I’d be there. I glanced at my watch. It was a quarter to six.
“Quinton. I have to get going. Are you almost done?”
He hummed as he stood up and came around to my side of the desk.
“Yep. Almost done.” He poked a floppy into the computer’s disk drive. “Let me just load this software.”
The machine hummed and grunted a bit, then blinked up a message. Quinton typed in a string of commands and watched it respond.
“OK. Looks good. Should run just fine. Now, to arm the door and window circuits, you just go to your menu bar and pull down this new menu here…” He ran me through the arming and disarming routine and explained the function and parameters of the new system.
He pointed at the underside of my desktop. “See this red LED I installed under the lip? It will flash slowly at you if something disturbs the motion detectors, like someone trying to sneak up on you. You’ll get the nine-nine-nine code on your pager if any of the sensors are set off when the active system is armed. There’s also a passive component to the system and a panic button. When you enter the remote panic code, or hit the button, here”—he pointed at another thing under the desk—“all hell will break loose. You can also call your computer and look at the office via that remote fiber-optic camera I installed over the door. And there’s a red switch on your safe door that will let you know if anyone has opened it. You like?”
“Oh, yes. I like very much. What do I owe you?”
He waved that off. “I don’t have my bill printed up yet. I’ll drop it off another time, OK?”
“All right. Now I’ve got to run. Can I drop you off anywhere?”
“No, thanks. I thought I’d catch a movie or something. Would you…?” He raised his eyebrows.
I was already gathering my stuff and heading for the door. “Can’t tonight, thanks. I’ll see you when you drop off the bill, though.”
He hesitated, then grabbed his pack and came through the door in a rush. “No problem. You can always try the library if you need me.” He shouldered his backpack and sauntered off.
I stopped and watched him go. I just didn’t get him. Sometimes he seemed like a friend I’d known for years; then he flipped right back into being a stranger. It bugged me, but not enough to keep worrying at. I had to get moving; I was going to find out what had happened to Ingstrom Shipwrights and Sergeyev’s heirloom. I hoped.
Chapter Nine
I drove up around Lake Union and found the Ingstrom Shipwrights warehouse on the north end of the lake, east of Gas-works Park. I had to cruise for a parking space. The small, graveled parking lot was full, and a misty rain was starting to patter harder as I circled. A generic sedan was also hunting for a parking space. I pulled into a tight spot and ran for the warehouse doors, huddling my leather jacket closer around me. I wished I’d had the foresight to wear my raincoat instead.
I skittered into the warehouse and shook myself off like a dog. A teenage boy stared at me from his post behind a laptop computer on top of a long, collapsible table.
“Hi,” I said. “I’d like to talk to Will or Brandon.” He perked up. “You’re the lady who called, aren’t you? Brandon took off. But Will’s in the office with the family. He’ll be out soon. You want to walk around and see if you spot the furniture?”
“Sure, though I’d think it would be pretty obvious…” I looked out at the packed stacks of goods and crates under cones of dusty light. The masts of a wooden sailboat reached for the ceiling near the back. “Or maybe not. That’s a lot of stuff. You don’t know if there’s a parlor organ in this mess, do you?”
He shook his head. “You’d have to talk to Will. There’s a lot of cool stuff, though—there’s even a whole boat! Want to register to bid?” He must have seen the auction-junkie gleam in my eye. I like getting neat old stuff cheap, like my Rover. My reaction against my mother’s insistence on all-new everything, maybe, I prefer good, solid, old things, even if I have to fix them up myself. That kid knew he was looking at a sucker the moment I came in.
“Sure,” I said.
He entered my name and office phone number into the database and gave me a printed catalog and a cardboard paddle with a number on it.
“Don’t lose your paddle or I’ll have to register you again,” he warned.
I tucked it into my bag. “I won’t. Now, how can I catch up to Will?”
“Oh, just wait and watch for him. Hell be out in a minute and he usually does a walk-through before we close up in a place like this. You can’t miss him. He’s tall and he has white hair. I’ll point him in your direction.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for him.”
The kid nodded and went back to something on his computer. I strolled off into the aisles of stuff.
I did not spot anything that looked like it could be a parlor organ. Among the piles of rope and wood, crates of boat parts, woodworking and machine tools, there were a lot of desks and drawing tables, filing cabinets, chairs, objects of use, and even a few objects of beauty. And a boat, as promised: a complicated little thing with two short masts and a lot of carved woodwork. There was also a great collection of model ships—some of which appeared to be Ingstrom design models—and a lot of yacht furniture from the 1920s. There was also some antique furniture that must have come from the executive offices, including a table you could land a Boeing on.
Deep in the piles, I spotted a small cabinet jostled in between two much larger pieces. It wasn’t a parlor organ, but it pulled at my attention. So I pushed my way to it, chiding myself against buying another piece of needy furniture when I was a bit needy myself.
The cabinet was old, short, narrow, painted a ghastly red, and in terrible condition. It didn’t need a home as much as it needed a trip to the dump, but I marked the lot number in my catalog anyway. It might turn out to be wonderful under the grunge. I’ve always had good luck with oddball items.
The rattle of the wareho
use door coming down made me turn. It was five to seven, according to a big clock on the wall.
High over the stacks of stuff and ranks of file cabinets, passing quickly under the dim cones of light that sliced the aisles, flashes of silver and black caught my eye. Someone quite tall and slim moved toward me with a long stride that painted white arcs in the air where the light reflected off silvery hair. This had to be Will. From a distance, I guessed he was fifty.
He corrected his course and strolled up the aisle I was standing in. Then he stopped in front of me and I stood there, poleaxed. Not fifty. Two-hundred-watt smile. “Hi. Michael said you were looking for me.”
My heart did a little changeup and my stomach turned a sympathetic flip. I just wanted to stand and stare at him. Angular face and hazel eyes behind rimless spectacles, shades of freakishly premature silver, white, and gray in his glimmering hair. The black turtleneck and jeans he wore didn’t obscure the flow of muscle and limb beneath them. Worth watching in action. A crooked grin full of slightly crooked, very white teeth. I got a hold of myself just in time to correct an imminent stammer.
I put out my hand, dazed. “I’m Harper Blaine. I’m a private investigator.”
He wrapped my hand in one of his. “William Novak. Pleased to meet you. What can I do for you?” His hand was so big it could have gone around my own good-sized paw twice. I’m five ten in my socks; not many men tower over me. Even fewer make me like it.
I wet my throat and coughed. “I’m trying to locate a parlor organ that may have come into the possession of Ingstrom in the late seventies or early eighties. Is there a parlor organ in this sale?”
“Early-twentieth-century grot? Curlicues and bad reeds? Normally, I’d be thrilled to say ‘No such item here,’ but you make me wish there was one.”
I felt the prickling heat of a blush. “It belonged to my client’s family. Do you think anyone else might know anything about it? Is there someplace else it might be stored?”
“Possibly at the house, or it might have been sold already, privately. Have you met Mrs. Ingstrom and asked her? The senior Mrs. Ingstrom, that is.”
I had to shake my head. “Neither Mrs. Ingstrom,” I replied.
“Hmmm… well, I could introduce you at the auction. I assume you will be coming back for the auction,” he added, eyeing the paddle peeking out of my bag.
“I was planning on it. I thought I might bid on a few things for myself.”
“Like what?”
I pointed over my shoulder. “That silly cabinet over there, lot 893.”
He crinkled his brow and strode over to it. “This one? Kind of an ugly little thing, isn’t it? Surgeon’s cabinet. Doctors and dentists used to keep their instruments in them, in the good old days before scrubbing and autoclaves. Nasty concept, isn’t it? Still, you could find a treasure in there, if you can break it free of all that paint. A ten-dollar gold piece or one of Doc Holliday’s own teeth,” he added with a wink.
“With my luck it’ll turn out to be just the right size to fit between the toilet and the sink. It’s ugly, but it sort of… talks to me.”
“Didn’t your mother tell you not to talk to strangers? And I doubt they come much stranger than this bit.”
“Talking to strangers is what I do, and the stranger the better.”
He laughed, and the round, brandy-rich tones rolled over me like velvet blankets, sending an electric jolt of lust down my spine. His eyes sparkled as he laughed, deepening the sketch of wrinkles at their corners. I revised my mental estimate of his age to between thirty-five and forty. I also added, sexy. And I was in trouble.
“Well, you’re certainly standing in the right place for strange.” He chuckled. “I’ll talk to Mrs. Ingstrom and look for you tomorrow. All right?”
“That would be great. I appreciate it.”
He gazed down at me with a half smile, then shook himself. “Mind’s wandering, I guess. I’d better finish locking up. Would you like a guide to the door or can you blaze your own trail through the maritime wilderness?”
I blushed again, for some reason. “I can manage.”
He grinned. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
I started walking backward, smiling like an idiot, before common sense reminded me that eyes should be pointed in the direction of travel. I shrugged the jacket up around my neck and turned, hurrying toward the front.
I heard Novak call out behind me. “Hey, Mikey! Unlock for this lady, will ya?”
An answering shout: “Michael! Not Mikey, you attenuated stick insect! No waffles for you!”
As I got to the desk, I saw that Michael was grinning the same grin as William Novak. He unlocked the walk-door in the larger rollaway door for me. “See you tomorrow, right?”
“You bet,” I answered as I stepped through.
He waved to me as I started across the gravel.
The rain was taking a breather, as it often does, now coming down as just a fine drizzle, wetter and fresher than the dry, uncanny mist with its accompanying vertigo and unpleasant reek of dead things. The moist, uneven ground slithered under my feet as I made my way across the now mostly empty lot. All the cars were gone except my Rover, a bland sedan, and a recent-model pickup. The car was just starting to pull out of the lot as I got near my truck. Headlights swept over me and I put my head down to avoid the glare.
The gravel crushed and clattered under the sedan’s tires with a screech from the clutch and a roar of the engine. It was loud. And getting louder. I glanced toward it, blinded by the headlights, but neither deaf nor stupid. The car hurtled toward me.
Chapter Ten
Screwed, big-time. The car was a blur of headlights in motion toward me, safety just too far away. My fingers, under my jacket, hooked round the pistol grips. I pushed myself sideways, through thickened air… through fear, with a runaway-elevator sensation as I dropped… dropped… and fell… through coiling fog stinking of rot… and landed rolling. A hot gust, like the breath of a monster, blasted into my face and body, shoving against me as the car churned past. Wet gravel slashed my leather jacket, stung my cheek. I dug my toes in and crouched, leveling the pistol. No safe, clear shot. The car fishtailed out of the lot and turned onto the access road. I spun, lunging to my feet, slamming the gun back into the holster, snatching truck keys from my pocket. I dashed to the Rover, fumbled the lock. By the time I was in the driver’s seat, the sedan was out of sight… last seen joining the stream of head-lights on Aurora Avenue North
.
I yelled and pounded the steering wheel. “Damn it! Damn it!”
I slumped back into the seat, shoved my hand through my hair, and vibrated for a minute or so as the adrenaline dispersed. Then I got back out of the Rover and went to retrieve my bag. I felt like I’d had too much to drink or not enough, shaking a little and shuddery in the knees. I stuffed spilled items into the bag and trudged back to the Rover.
At 7:34, William Novak came out of the warehouse. I was still trying to reengage my brain. He started toward the lonely pickup truck, then changed direction, coming toward me through the drizzle. He tapped on my window.
I rolled the window down and he asked, “Problem?”
“Not now.”
“Sure? You’ve got blood on your cheek.”
“Yeah, well. Somebody tried to run me down.”
“And that’s not a problem?”
“Not at the moment. I’m still alive and he’s long gone. But I didn’t get the license number. And I really want a drink.”
“There’s a decent Italian place nearby that’s open until ten. They serve drinks, but their bar’s the size of a French provincial commode. I was going to get a little supper myself. I’d be glad to take you.”
I hesitated. My innards were still jumping in syncopation with my nerves. “What about your youthful assistant?”
“Mikey? He’s got some work to do and he knows how to forage. See, there he goes.” He pointed toward the warehouse.
A small motorcycle gr
umbled out from the building’s shadow. The slender, helmeted figure on the back waved to us and went slowly out the gate. The machine whining and coughing, the unsteady firefly of the taillight jounced away. We watched it until it vanished into a curve.
“So, you coming with me or you prefer to follow?” Novak asked.
I sighed. “I’ll follow.”
He grinned. “You shouldn’t have any trouble—I give great signal.”
I had to roll my eyes. “You’d better.”
I followed him around the perimeter of the lake to a scruffy-looking little building just off the lakefront industrial area. The rents are affordable and so was the food. If we leaned our heads a bit, we could still see the lake in all its famous nighttime beauty. The water looked like polished obsidian, reflecting the lights of the city and the boats. I could just glimpse the Space Needle pointing its green-glowing crown at the clouds.
The scent of food reminded me that I hadn’t eaten since lunch with RC, and that was mostly coffee.
As soon as we were seated, Novak ordered antipasto and then looked at me for my drink order. “Can I guess?” he asked.
“What I drink? Sure, give it a shot,” I allowed, leaning back on the padded bench.
“I’ll bet you used to drink white wine, but switched to something more interesting… Scotch?”
I made a face. “Irish. I don’t like peat smoke.”
He looked at the waitress who had one eyebrow raised and a cynical crook to her mouth. “Bushmills?”
“Double?” she shot back.
I just nodded. Novak ordered a local beer and the waitress stalked off.
He glanced at me and gave an embarrassed smile. “The service here stinks. Luckily you only pay for the food.”
“So long as she doesn’t put ice in my drink, I don’t care.”
“She won’t—that would be extra effort. Can I ask what happened?”
“Back at the warehouse?” I clarified, and he nodded. “Not much, really. Some jerk tried to run me down. I jumped. He missed. He fled. Pretty much the whole tale.”
“Not the first time, I suspect.”