Shell Game – Chapter 4 – Treasure Hunt
Gabe knocked off early to get ready for his rendezvous with Jason Charles and Molly Brandt, which left Evan alone staring out his grimy window, wondering what had come of his life. His marriage was a wreck, the landlord and bank were breathing down his neck for money he didn’t have, and he worked with a guy who was a terrible person but who breezed through life as if nothing could touch him. With all the energy he’d launched into life, this was a very disappointing picture he’d painted.
For the thousandth time, he looked at his watch; four o’clock. The crawl of time had been excruciating, and suddenly the office seemed so confining and the air still and heavy. Evan raked his fingers through his hair, smoothed it back down with his pocket comb, and stood up.
He grabbed his coat and hat and exited his office for the first time since Gabe went home. “I’m going out,” he mumbled to Sophie on his way past her desk.
Sophie seemed to be enjoying the relaxed pace of not having as much work coming in and had occupied herself by reading The Athens Gazette.
“Anything good?” Evan asked, not wanting an answer.
“No,” Sophie sighed, not taking her nose out of the paper. “Just some more nonsense about Marilyn’s overdose and somebody in Washington seems overly concerned with soccer fields in Cuba.”
Evan stopped cold. There was something that never sat right in his mind about Marylin’s drug overdose.
“What about Marylin?”
Sophie dog-eared the paper and looked at Evan. “Look, I know she was a looker and all that, but seriously Evan, you’re going to have to come to grips with the truth that you will never meet her.”
“It’s not that. Just something about it.”
“You ain’t wrong about that. Sad is what it is. Just sad that someone would get to that point,” Sophie said.
“You know what they say,” Evan mused.
“What’s that?” Sophie looked at him with I-dare-you eyes.
“If money were the answer to life, Hollywood would be the happiest place on earth,” Evan said and rapt Sophie’s desk twice with his knuckles.
“Is that what they say?” Sophie smirked.
“I’ve heard it before, yes,” Evan said, and then he spied something on the back page of the newspaper. The monthly bazaar was in town. “How about that,” Evan said to himself and then shooting a wink to Sophie. “I’m out. Going to do some treasure hunting.”
“Is that mess back in town?” Sophie flipped the paper over to discover the ad.
“You should come out with me sometime,” Evan said.
“I’d rather get my hair set,” Sophie said.
“Suit yourself.” Evan placed his hat on his head and tilted the brim to the right before saying, “Catch you tomorrow, Soph.”
“Take care of yourself, Evan,” Sophie said.
“Don’t I always?” he said and walked out of the office.
One week a month, Commercial Street, between 6th and 12th Avenues, was shut down to traffic and was filled with junk traders from all over the area. Other than a double feature at the Bijou, this was the highest entertainment in all of Athens. People came out to buy, sell, or trade trinkets and oddities and catch up with one another. It was a traveling menagerie and made a circuit in the border states. Evan suspected a lot of the merchandise came from the Missouri side of Kansas City and violated interstate commerce laws. Still, it didn’t stop him from perusing the artifacts and, more enjoyably for him, haggling over the junk.
As he walked past the different tables and booths offering such exotic items as large wooden splinters presumably from Ford’s Theater the night Booth shot Lincoln, to rather ordinary shell casings from France and unused ration books. There were cheap oil paintings, hand-painted china, homespun fabric, and even a candy maker or two. Evan figured these war relics and farming implements were still common in the attics, basements, and sheds of many in Athens and wouldn’t sell for much.
Evan was not interested in most of this stuff anyway. Maybe it was because of his last name or the gambler that resides in every man’s heart, but he fancied himself a bit of an expert in gold, specifically, jewelry and coins. He was drawn to the stuff like a moth and held a deep hope that at one of these flea markets, he would find some overlooked piece of something from the palace of Marie Antoinette and buy it up for a song.
It had already happened once, or so he thought. At such a bazaar, he happened upon the ring that he gave to Katherine when he proposed to her. Maybe, he thought, if he found something like that, it would be a sign that things were not as dire as they seemed.
Just then, a booth caught Evan’s eye. It displayed an untidy assortment of rings, necklaces, brooches, and combs. He ran his fingers through the variety of trinkets like a gold prospector looking for a glint in a pan full of silt. Not worth the effort, he thought. He had the notion of buying the lot and seeing what he could uncover once he was back at his apartment.
His eye stopped on a particular pendant. It looked to be an oversized pearl and hung artlessly on the chain. He held it closer. The gold work was crude like a novice had done it, instead of a jeweler.
“I can tell you have a good eye, sir,” the lady behind the table said. She wore a thin cotton dress and covered her graying hair with a fraying straw hat. “That there is some rare pieces,” she said.
“Is that right?” Evan said without feeling. Flattery was standard at the bazaar, and Evan had developed an ear to know how to haggle a reasonable price by how extravagantly the compliment. The higher the flattery, the more worthless the merchandise.
“Indeed,” the woman continued. She moved her hands like a magician about to tell a whopper of a story. “That lot there,” she pointed to the pile of necklaces from where Evan had fished out the pearl pendant. The strands looked to him like a den of hibernating snakes “were purchased by me on a recent voyage to Arabia.”
“Is that so?” Evan said.
The woman raised her right hand and swore, “I cannot tell a lie. Well, not exactly Arabia, more like France, but the people who sold this to me were from there. Morocco, I think.”
Evan looked again at the oversized pearl. It was rare to find a pearl this large and would be worth a lot if it was natural. Even a cultured pearl of this size might be worth something. Then he asked himself if he could sell it for more than would buy him out of his financial troubles. Then he wondered if this was the sign of the good tidings he’d hoped for. Would Katherine like a pearl pendant?
“How much?” Evan asked.
“For the lot?” asked the merchant, pushing an unruly lock of hair into another bobby pin.
“For just this piece,” Evan said.
“It’s all or nothing,” the woman countered.
“You can’t just sell me the one piece?”
“Can I be frank with you?” The woman asked. Evan nodded.
“Most of this stuff is junk. We make our money on volume. If we had to nickel and dime our way through the inventory, well, it’s just not worth our time. So, you like the necklace, that’s nice. You got a girl?”
Evan hesitated before saying he had a wife.
“Good. Buy the lot. Give her the necklace. She’ll be thrilled. Give her the rest of the stuff over time, and she’ll be happy a long time. Everybody wins.
Evan sighed. Whatever he offered, he knew it would be a terrible deal. He thought long and hard about walking away. Something was not right about this whole transaction. But something was alluring about the pearl that kept him at the table.
“Let’s say you give me twenty for the lot, and we call it even?” the woman offered.
“Twenty?” Evan winced, “You just said all this stuff was junk.”
“I said most of it was junk. That piece in your hand is worth the twenty all by itself.”
“Five,” Evan counter-offered.
The woman looked at Evan like he said something in a different language. “Sir, be reasonable. I have a business to run. I can’t just hand stuff away. I can’t take less than fifteen.”
“Ten,” Evan shot back.
“I like your spirit,” the woman said. “You know a good deal when you see it. Let’s see. For you,” she said, “for the lot,” she paused and considered her options a moment as if her merchant’s mind didn’t have the price already on the tip of her tongue, “Sold!” she said finally.
Evan pulled out his billfold and opened it. He handed her a ten-dollar bill, and the merchant snatched it from his hands as fast as lightning. So fast that Evan wondered if even then he’d paid too much.
The woman scooped up the items and placed them in a small flour sack before handing them to Evan with a bright smile on her face. “What a wise purchase, sir,” she said, “I could tell I was not dealing with an amateur.”
Evan took the bag and sighed to himself. He would go back to his apartment and spend the evening seeing if anything was even good enough to give back to a pawnbroker.
He took two steps away from the booth when a man, out of breath, ran by and clipped Evan’s shoulder before stopping at the woman’s table. “Where is it?” he asked.
“Where is what?” asked the woman, and then a look of recognition washed over her face, “No, you get out of here. This ain’t no place for men who drink before supper.”
The man persisted. “There was a certain… I lost…” the man stumbled over his words. Evan marked him carefully. He certainly had the look of a man who drank before supper; red face, lots of sweat rolling down his nose. He was a big man, and Evan assessed that this man was not a local whoever he was. A man of his size and brashness would stick out in Evan’s line of work.
“I have money. I can buy it back. I have to get it back.” The man’s stubby finger thumped the table where Evan’s purchase had just been.
“Well, let that be a lesson to you. I may not be able to stop my husband from his gambling game, but I certainly don’t have to obey the poor saps who lose at his table.” The woman folded her arms and looked scoldingly at the pathetic hulk of a man.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.
“They’re sold.”
“What’s sold?” the man pleaded.
“Everything my husband took off everyone at the table. You lot should be ashamed of yourselves.”
“When?” the man panted.
“What?
“When did you sell it?”
“Just now,” she said.
“To who?” came the man.
“Now, I don’t go around telling my business to any…” she started, but the man slammed his hand on the table, separating him from the merchant, “To who, woman!”
She leaned into his threat with fire in her voice, “No need to be rude, sir. If you must know, it was him,” and she pointed at Evan.
The man quickly turned his focus on Evan and looked at the bulging flour sack. The sweaty man spun his attention to Evan. “How much for the bag?” he asked, already digging out his wallet. “Whatever you want. I need that bag.”
Evan knew this was a great time to negotiate. After all, he’d probably bought a bag of duds, and this pathetic creature was in a frenzy. Evan figured he could get his money back with interest if he took the opportunity. But there was something about the man’s desperation that gave Evan pause. Maybe he had something in the bag that was worth something, and the man in front of him knew it. Because of that old gambler in Evan’s heart, he looked at this man in front of him and said, “It’s not for sale.”
The man wiped the growing sweat from his brow, “Be reasonable, pal,” he said. “I’ll double it. Whatever you paid.”
“Are you kidding me?” the woman complained.
“I’m afraid you’re barking up the wrong tree, fella,” Evan said and started to walk away.
The man placed a hand on Evan’s shoulder, quickly turning Evan back around. Evan instinctively repositioned his feet in case this was the start of a fight, which wouldn’t have been the worst way to end his day, he thought.
“Fine,” he said. “How much? Money is no object.”
“Money is no object?” the merchant lady moaned. “Do you know how long I’ve waited to hear those words? I was this close!”
“You don’t understand,” the sweaty man persisted in keeping Evan’s focus. “My employer is a rancher in Arizona. The bank where he kept all his gold was robbed, and I tracked it here. I have to have it back,” the man pleaded.
Evan leaned forward slightly. “First of all, she says you gambled it all away, so I’m inclined to think you’re lying. So, when you get me something that proves what you’re saying is true and we stand in a court of law to dispute your claim, then I’ll consider it. Until then, better luck next time,” Evan said and turned to leave.
The man ran around Evan to block his retreat. “Look, okay, you got me. I don’t have a boss in Arizona. But you don’t know what you’re involved in, chum,” the man said to Evan.
“I’ll take my chances,” Evan replied and tried to push past the man. The man looked to Evan like he wanted a fight, but the setting was too public.
“Fine,” he said, pointing at Evan’s heart, “but I’m warning you. Get rid of it as soon as possible. If they find you with it, you’ll wish you had, but then it’ll be too late.” Then the man looked around as if he suspected a ghost to be there, turned back to Evan, and said, “This is not over between you and me.” Then the sweaty, barrel-shaped man pushed past Evan and disappeared into the crowd.
Evan looked back at the merchant and gave his shoulders an apologetic shrug before taking a couple more steps away. He was suddenly eager to see what in this sack was worth all this trouble.
Halfway between the flea market and his apartment, Evan wondered if he had been followed out of the market, and decided he was better protected at his office if the crazed man decided to follow him or jump him. So, he expertly checked his surroundings before ducking down an alley and doubling back to his home away from home.
