The Case of the Angry Auctioneer (Auction House Mystery Series Book 1) (8 page)

Before she left the block, Grace whispered to her, “Where are Jimmy and Esteban?”

“Don’t know.” Jasper hurried down the steps and ran back to the table.

“Get back here,” Ted ordered her. “You’re Esteban.”

“Hi, Estie!” a gnarled man with a friendly, crooked smile said.

“We’re a few minutes behind the clock tonight, folks. But it’s business as usual from now on.” People wanted to know where Jimmy was, and Ted said that he was still on a call. There was friendly joshing among the bidders.
Maybe he’s taking a nap. Maybe he’s having a little lee-ay-zon!
There were snickers and chortles. Letting off steam. Jimmy wouldn’t like to hear those comments.

Ted cut them off. He quickly introduced the auction crew, saying that tonight the part of Esteban was being played by Jasper who was here studying up on how to walk in her Stepdaddy’s shoes, then gave the order of the sale followed by terms and conditions. “We’re gonna try to stick to the way we usually do things here at Biggs. This back table first. Then we’ll move up front for the purty stuff.” He told the crowd to use their bidder cards. “If we can’t see you, you’re not in,” he said. “There’s a 10 percent buyer’s fee on all purchases. Settle up tonight with the girls in the office. All items are sold As Is, Where Is.”

“What if we find a chip or a crack and you haven’t mentioned that?” a newcomer asked.

“Folks, we look everything over pretty careful before the auction. If we find a problem, we’re gonna call it. If we miss something, well, we’ve missed it. That’s what previews are for.”

Jasper caught the eye of the man in suspenders who’d asked the question. His face had flushed red. She smiled kindly. The man shrugged and turned his attention to the item Tony was holding over his head.

“Okay, let’s get started! Tony, what’ve you got there?”

“First item up! Monkey wrench, boys. They don’t make ‘em like that, anymore! Who’ll give me 25 and go? Now 25-25-25? Bid ‘em in at 25! Let’s go, folks!”

Kelly studied her stack of bidder cards. She held up five fingers.

Ted said, “Make it ten, and go!”

Kelly waved her card and nodded.

“I’ve got ten right here, with Kelly. Who’ll go 15 now? 15 there! Now 20, and 25. Bid 25-25-25? Sold it. Twenty dollars. Right there. Number 102 bought it, Grace. 102 for $20.” 102 was the man who’d embarrassed himself with the question about chips and cracks. Maybe, thought Jasper, he was winning back his self-respect by winning the first item of the auction.

The crowd stuck close as Ted walked his way down the table, the way Jasper had seen Jimmy do it the week before. Tony would pick up a flat full of license plates or a cast iron doorstop and hold them high, turning to show some of the people, mostly men. The bidding moved quickly. The doorstop brought $37.50 and a mason jar full of buttons went higher than Jasper could’ve imagined: $55 to a long-haired brunette named Hillary. “There you go, sweetheart,” Ted said before he handed her the jar himself.

Ready Teddy,
Jasper thought, remembering the words of his ex-squeeze, the pregnant waitress.

Jasper helped as much as she knew how, handing up items for a quick look-see by Ted before he launched his attack again. When Kelly won the bid for one of her absentees, Jasper took turns with Tony, running the item up to the storage room behind the auction block, scrawling a bidder number on one of the scraps of paper there and tucking it under the item, then racing back to the table to help catch bids with a hearty Yep! or run the next item back the way she’d come.

Ted raced through the back table items one after the other. Postcard albums. Old empty milk and medicine bottles. If he couldn’t get a bid, he’d say, “Put ‘em all together. OK, all for one money!”

Jasper was sweating. Her head was reeling. How could Ted keep up with all the bidders, and the objects that Tony or Kelly scooped up from the table, marbles, and calendars and rusty old tools? How could Grace up on the auction block possibly understand all this keep and type an accurate record of each winning amount and bidder amount into her keyboard?

And the question that most made Jasper sweat:
Where, oh were, was Jimmy?

Before she knew it, Ted had reached the end of the table. “Jasper’s gonna sell for a little while,” he announced. Then he pressed a button on the black box he wore on his belt. Unclipped it, and handed it to Jasper with the attached headset. “Put this on. Get up on the block. Switch the switch and sell a few things. I need a quick break.”

The crowd at the back table broke up, many of them going to chairs they’ve saved earlier with empty boxes on the seats or jackets or a copy of their bidder number taped on.

Jasper felt a hot hand on the back of her neck. Tony said in her ear, “Come on. I’ll tell you what we’re selling, and you just go through the motions.”

“My bid-calling stinks!” Jasper said.

“You’ll be fine.” Tony said. He hurried her up the aisle.

She climbed the steps, feeling as if she were ascending to her own hanging. She fumbled the headset on. Grace helped her snug it down for her smaller head size. It was moist with Ted’s sweat. Maybe I’ll get electrocuted and this nightmare will end, Jasper thought as she switched the button the little black box she’d tucked into her pocket. Unlike Ted, she wasn’t wearing a belt.

Since she didn’t instantly go up in smoke, she faced the expectant crowd spread out below her. “Okay, everybody, same terms and conditions,” she said.

Grace whispered, “Same auction. You don’t have to do that. Just sell. You can do it.”

Jasper had spoken from the pulpit before – only a couple rare times when Pastor Tim relinquished control – so she knew she could address the crowd.

“Let’s get started then. Tony, what do we have first?”

“Art glass!” Tony called out. “Choice off the table!” He gestured at the globular bowls and stalactite vases in oranges, yellows, bright blues that covered one of the front tables.

“Who’ll give me five to start?” Jasper asked.

Two different bidders raised their cards.

Jasper hesitated. What did she do now?

“You got five!” Tony called.

“Now seven-and-a-half?”

Both bidders raised their cards again. Jasper, not sure which one to pick, just pointed at one of them and kept going. “I have seven-and-a-half. Now ten. Okay, there’s ten. Now 15. Who’ll go 15? One of you ladies want back in at 15? 15? 15?”

“Sell it!” Tony yelled.

“Sold for – " Jasper turned to Grace who whispered, “Ten.” “Sold for $10 to buyer number 67.” The winning bidder got to her feet and walked up to the table. She picked up one of the bases and a bowl.

“Takes two!” Tony called. “Anybody else?”

“Say that,” Grace whispered.

“Anybody else?” Jasper echoed.

The other woman, the one who’d been outbid moved up to the table. With whispered instructions from Grace, Jasper announced, “Bidder 112 takes two. Anybody else?”

The crowd sat still. Some of them moved impatiently in their seats.

“All to go!” Tony yelled and punched the air.

“All to go!” Jasper called over the mike. “How about five for it all. There’s five! Now ten! Who’ll give me ten?”

Number 67 made a cutting motion across her throat with her bidding card.

“She’s cutting your bid. Seven-fifty,” whispered Grace.

“Do I take it?”

People in the crowd snickered. A few groaned.

“You have seven-fifty!” Tony yelled. “Go ten!”

“Ten, anybody, ten? There’s ten! Now 12…12-and-a-half! Got it! Now 15. 15, anybody? 15? Sold – twelve-and-a-half to number 67. Whew!” Jasper said on mike.

There was a smattering of applause, but Jasper knew she was supposed to keep the auction under control. Hadn’t the nice auctioneer teacher from WorldWide College of Auctioneering said just that on her study CD? So she looked to Tony down below. He’d moved over to the front table on the other side of the block.

“Got some nice quilts here, Jasper!” Tony shouted.

Poor Tony. His voice was growing hoarse. Jasper decided to try harder to take up the slack so he didn’t have to use himself up. She eyed the quilt that Tony was holding out to his full wingspan. “Show me!” she ordered Tony. He turned quickly with a sideways glance up at Jasper.

"Madame,” Tony said with a bow. Esteban hurried in the back doors and took his place by the other ringhand. He belched loudly.

"Nice of you to join us. Keep that quilt up off the floor,” Jasper ordered. “Show them now.”

“The lady’s got herself some new nards.” Esteban spoke quietly but Jasper caught his words. She shrugged them off. “Very nice quilts,” she told the crowd. “This one is wedding ring pattern. See the pink and rose colors intertwined? The background white is spotless, meaning that this quilt was cherished and protected.” Tony seemed to be taking in her words and stood straighter, held the quilt higher. Visible on either side of him, the crowd lifted its diverse heads as if it had become a single-minded entity.

Kelly, seated in the front row so the auctioneer would always see her holding up bidder cards for the absentees, got to her feet. She stood up on one side of the quilt and faced the crowd. “Let’s sell ‘em one at a time, Jasper!” she shouted. “These ain’t blankets, folks. These are some damn fine handmade quilts!” Kelly turned Jasper’s direction and mouthed the words, “What am I bid?”

Jasper took a deep breath. ”What am I bid for this one fine quilt?” she asked the crowd. Then she took off, her bid-calling growing stronger by the second. It was as if she were channeling the soul of Jimmy Biggs, Master Auctioneer. “One hun-hun-hundred dollar bid, now 125, and 150!” The bidding finally topped off at $225 and Jasper called, “Sold!” while Tony and Kelly called out a simultaneous, “Number 107.”

“One hundred and seven,” Esteban said.

“107 takes it,” Jasper said.

Kelly turned and winked at her. “My oh my,” Jasper thought to herself. She nodded gratefully at Kelly. “My oh my, we might become friends after all.”

“Good job, Jasper,” Grace whispered from the clerk’s spot next to Jasper.

Tony shouted, “Next quilt up, Jasper. We got another good one here!”

Jasper paused for a quick slurp of water from the bottle, and in those few seconds saw the entrance of the next real, hard, phase of her life.

Glenn Relerford dressed in somber brown marched up the central aisle. “Talk to you,” he said.

“Me?” asked Jasper on mike.

Glenn pointed at her and signaled that she come down off the auction stand. Estie stepped in his way and spread his arms wide like he was going to stop him.

“Don’t let him take Jasper!” a man in the crowd shouted.

“We’ll protect you!” a woman said.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Jasper said, still speaking into her headset microphone as she walked down the steps at the back of the platform and joined Glenn. She fiddled with the switches on the side of the microphone box at her waist. “It’s Jimmy, isn’t it?” she asked and her voice boomed throughout the auction house.

“I’ll take you to him,” Glenn said. He placed his hand lightly on her shoulder.

Ted stomped back into the room and rushed over to Jasper and Glenn. “What the hell is going on here?”

Jasper took off her microphone and handed it to him. “Sell something,” she said.

Jasper left the auction house in a squad car with Glenn and a uniformed officer who said to call her Sheila.

“Sheila,” Jasper said.

“You just relax back there.”

Deal with death much?
Panicked was how Jasper felt. All body parts that registered in her overwhelmed brain felt sweaty: hands, feet, face. Even her brain was sweating. Not only had something happened to Jimmy, but here she was on her first night of auctioneering sitting in the back of a police car. There was nothing like the smell of other people’s lies and fears and a bullet-proof window between police and prisoner section to heighten her already off-the-charts emotion. She fidgeted. Her knees bumped up against the back of the front seat.

“Got your seat belt on?” Glenn asked kindly.

“Uh-huh.”

“Would you like a pop or something? We could go through Mickey D's on the way over,” Officer Sheila offered. “There’s no real hurry here.”

“No hurry?”

Glenn turned to the other officer and said something in a low voice. Sheila whispered back.

Jasper pretended they were not talking about her.
Sticks and stone may break Jimmy’s bones...
She studied the lights in other people’s houses as they sped by. What were these other normal people doing this evening? Fixing the kids mac and cheese? Kicking back for a lazy evening on the sofa? Jasper would have killed for a big bowl of cheesy pasta and a remote control. She would even be happy if she could auctioneer for another round. Nothing like an emergency to put the rest of life in perspective.

There was no siren going, but when another vehicle slowed them down, Sheila would reach toward the console and jab a button that made that
wah-wah
sound she knew from TV cop shows. The civilian would clear out of the way. Glenn would step on the gas. Jasper was getting a little car sick.

The officers argued sotto voice.
You told her, didn’t you? Yeah. She knows. But just the same.

“Sorry,” said Officer Sheila.

“No, nothing for me, thanks. And there really is no hurry, is there? I mean, maybe we could take a drive around the park on our way. Hmm?” Jasper didn’t want the nice police officer to feel badly about anything.

“Which park?” Officer Sheila asked.

“I think that’s a line from an old movie,” Jasper said. “I guess I’m not very funny, am I?”

Sheila murmured to Glenn.

“Just sit back,” Glenn told Jasper. “We’re almost there.”

The back windows of the squad car were steamed up. Cars did that when the heat was high and the night was bone chill lonely. The Midwest knew how to do heart-breaking spring rains really well. But why wouldn’t a police car have special window de-steamers, she wondered. Of course if you thought about it, you realized that Forest Grove police cars were just Chevies refitted with the accoutrements of law enforcement – the prisoner barrier, the radios, the siren and light equipment. 

Jasper felt as if she were under arrest herself. She did yoga breathing to steady herself. She had never been in trouble. She was a good girl to a fault. A good woman. Girl. Sure, she got angry. But she didn’t rage like her stepfather Jimmy. No, her crimes, if any, were of the passive aggressive type. Could you be arrested for secretly spitting in her soon-to-be-legally-ex-husband's communion grape juice? Was there a law, an obscure law it would have to be, somewhere, one of those that state legislators had forgotten to erase from the books that forbade misplacing a minister’s last clean clerical collar so that he had to borrow one’s own white dickey? Probably pressing a dime into a bowl of December morning oatmeal and then claiming it was an old Norwegian custom when one’s then more-or-less-full-fledged husband bit into it and chipped a tooth bordered on criminal intent. But no, Scandinavians did do something like that – but maybe it was a gold coin or just an almond – and okay, she wasn’t Swedish, Danish or Norwegian although a lot of people around these parts were and heaven knows she could’ve picked it up from them, Your Honor.

The squad car pulled to a stop.

There was one second of silence. Then from somewhere came an indecisive noise– a whine. Like a chainsaw that can’t make up its mind or a ghost that’s new to haunting.

“Neighbors?” Jasper asked.

The whine started up again. A saw in somebody’s garage shop down the street, no doubt.

“The Camry belongs to the Austrings,” Glenn said.

“Aren’t they Japanese?” Jasper pulled Kelly’s borrowed sweater closer around her shoulders. Even though the squad car was toasty warm, her hands felt icy. They’d turned yellow and purple. Raynaud’s Disease. Nothing to worry about. Lots of women especially had it. Not her twin. But worry brought on the poor circulation and Jasper was prone to worry.

Glenn spoke slowly. “The Austrings. They’re the people who want to buy this house. They’re the ones who found your father.”

“Stepfather. Did you know we always called him Jimmy?”

“We’d better get inside.” He got out and came around to open her door.

Jasper sat. Then with a sudden longing for cold fresh air, she thought
Rise and walk
and stepped out into a puddle on the uneven sidewalk. “Sorry,” she said. Jasper was well practiced in apologizing for things not her fault.

It was a quiet street. A lone car drove by. Jasper heard the crunch of its tires against the gravel wash on the opposite side of the road. Glenn escorted her up the walk. The short march felt familiar. Ah. That old familiar processional. Jasper was well practiced in processionals – up and down the aisles of many churches in many towns.

Processionus Gravitatus.

The small house looked more worn out tonight than when Jasper had first viewed it alongside Jimmy two days earlier. Now it looked its age and its history. Generations of hard working factory folk had lived their lives here. Its wooden sides looked thin as if they provided little protection from the Midwest’s notorious cold and damp.

The detective’s brown and gold trainers seemed to lift him above the puddles. Her own sensible sneakers hit every small pond. They climbed three steps to the porch. Up close, the house breathed out a smell of rotting wood, a poor smell like nothing for dinner but bowls of thin soup. Glenn reached for the doorknob. Jasper hesitated, drops of water from the overhang torturing the back of her neck. Then she scraped her feet rightleftrightleftrightleft on the Beware of Dog unwelcome mat and followed him in.

Jasper shivered. She sneezed three times into the sleeve of her borrowed sweater. “Sorry.”

The lighting inside was indifferent. Jasper automatically reached for the light switch she remembered was on her left. Nothing. She looked up at Glenn’s face, almost invisible now except for his gleaming eyes and teeth.

“The old guy, the owner, had it cut off. We checked with the power company.”

“That wasn’t supposed to happen – not until we get the house sold, I think.” Jasper said, happy to think about a practical problem for a few minutes.

“Yeah, and it’s damn inconvenient!” said a male voice from the direction of the sofa.

Jasper turned. Her eyes were adjusting now to the half-light and the curtains stood open to let in the weird orange of the street lamp outside. The man, a stranger in his late twenties, sat by a woman of the same age next to him.

“Hush,” the woman said. “That’s her. You know.”

“Oh, yeah.”

Jasper stared at them wordlessly. Then something of her usually polite self resurfaced. “You’re the Austrians?” she asked.

“Austrings. Emily and Kiefer,” the young woman said. “We’re buying this house”

“You still want to?” Jasper asked.

“I knew it! I knew it!” Kiefer Austring said, starting to get to his feet. “There is something wrong with this place.”

Jasper glanced at Glenn.
Can you believe these people?

He shot them a professional policeman on the job look that pinned young Mr. Austring in place.

Jasper mustered her last remaining ounce of professional courtesy. “There’s nothing wrong with this house. The man who owns it is ….old and a little confused. He told Power & Light to switch off the electricity. It’ll be back on tomorrow. It works fine. OK?”

“Well,” the man began, still a little grumpy.

“Kiefer!” hissed his wife.

Officer Sheila stood keeping an eye on the young couple. She crouched in front of them and spoke in firm tones. Jasper supposed she would let them go when she finished taking their statements.

“Are you ready?” Glenn asked Jasper.

She nodded.

He led the way, directing his flashlight along the floor like a theater usher. Clutter lined the uneven path. Jasper had forgotten what piles of stuff this house contained. Ray Clippert was one major hoarder. The dust kept her sneezing. She wiped her nose on the sleeve. She’d have to wash Kelly’s sweater before she returned it. Jasper tripped over a toppled stack of old magazines. She righted herself by holding on to Glenn’s shoulder. She hoped he wouldn’t take it personally.

“There’s a lot to get hurt on in here, isn’t there?” Suddenly tired, she felt it could take all night to traverse the distance to her stepfather’s body. She stuck close to the detective until they reached the basement door in the kitchen.

He ducked and descended onto the landing. “Take your time.” He thunked the overhead beam with his palm so its location became apparent. “Watch your head now.” Jasper moved forward and he placed a hand atop her hair, as if she were a suspect being helped into the back of a squad car.

When she crossed that first threshold, she held her breath. She expected the stench of death, like the rotting sweet stench of a drawerful of mice, but when she breathed again, it was only the old tired smell of dust and mold that the whole house held plus an overlay of urine. Glenn said, “Put your hand on my belt and follow me nice and slow.” She did as she was told and inched her way down the steep stairs, illuminated by the detective’s flashlight. At the bottom she looked around warily, thinking maybe she wouldn’t even be able to recognize Jimmy in the gloomy light. But she saw him lying there on the ground and was surprised that even before she focused on his features, she would have known his slightly chubby shape, the length of his legs, his overall shortness, anywhere. His height, breadth, width. His very Jimminess.

She moved in closer. The clutter in here had been moved out toward the walls, piles of National Geographics, the bowling ball that had rolled downstairs when she and Jimmy had first viewed the basement, a broken pseudo Chippendale chair with only two legs, and lots of unrecognizable debris. Jimmy lay in a circle cleared of junk, like a fallen gladiator at the bottom of the amphitheater. Dizziness compelled her to sit on the cold floor. She eased herself to her knees and crawled over to Jimmy. She inhaled a hint of sweat and the strong aroma of some cologne she didn’t recognize. He was always helping himself to cologne found in auction clients’ houses. Jimmy had several bad habits. Jasper and her sister had long suspected that the perfumes he gave them birthday after birthday probably came out of housefuls of stuff destined for the auction. “Is it okay if I touch him?”

Glenn nodded. “Of course. Take your time.”

Having asked, Jasper suddenly felt awkward. Jimmy had never been much of a hugger. She touched his face. Cold. She drew her hand back, then reached forward and stroked his thinning hair. She patted him on the shoulder. “What was he doing here alone?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

Up close, Jasper could smell the flowery dryer sheets Jimmy was so fond of adding to his laundry. The rough-and-tumble auctioneer had always been a stickler for personal cleanliness. He wore his favorite watch, a Tag Heuer he’d gotten for a song at the auction. He had left a proxy bid, then did the bid-calling himself so he could control how the sale went. “What were you doing here, Jimmy?” she asked the dead man. A chill crept up her spine. Maybe Jimmy hadn’t been alone when he died. She turned to Glenn. “Did you check his pockets?

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Was anything there?” Jasper asked in a small voice.

“This was on the floor near him,” Glenn said. He handed her a Biggs Auction House key fob, one of the freebies they kept on the counter at work. He crouched down next to her. He pulled a wad of something from his own pocket and passed it over. He shone his flashlight on it. Jasper’s hands shook. It was a roll of bills that relaxed open to reveal Ben Franklin’s tight-lipped smile. Jasper spread them apart. Four hundred dollars plus a George Washington.

“Looks like you’ve been dealt a little gift hand there,” Glenn said.

“Cookie and I get to keep this?”

Glenn shrugged. “Later. You are his closest relatives. But why $401?”

Jasper smiled. She felt better knowing that he hadn’t died at the hands of a robber. “It was just one of those Jimmy things. For luck, I guess. Or maybe just out of habit. When we were girls, he used to take us out for ice cream sometimes. He made us splurge on triple-decker cones even if we weren’t hungry. I always got butter brickle. I think he liked to impress the people at Moo’nGoo when he whipped out a hundred doll bill.”

Glenn listened patiently.