when it's closing. At least…” He touched his chin. “Maybe they were in the next one.”
They stepped down to the next room. Several chairs, but not, Lash said, the two he was thinking of. They went back to the first room. “They were right here.”
“When did you last see them?”
Lash put a finger in his ear, rolled it for a moment, thinking, then said, “Well, it's been a while. I was cleaning this room out… gosh, Christmas vacation. Six months.”
“Two old chairs,” Lucas said.
“Yeah.”
“Maybe Mrs. Bucher got rid of them?”
Lash shrugged. “I suppose. She never said anything. 1 don't think she thought about them.”
“Really old, like French antiques or something?” Lucas asked.
“No, no,” Lash said. “More like my mom's age. Or maybe your age.”
“How do you know?”
“Because they were like… swoopy. Like one big swoop was the back and the other swoop was the seat. They were like, you know, what'd you see on old TV-Star Trek, like that. Or maybe chairs at the Goodwill store.”
“Huh. So you couldn't mistake them,” Lucas said.
“No. They're not here.”
As they went through the last few rooms, Lash said, finally, “You know, I'm not sure, but it seems like somebody's been poking around up here. Things are not quite like it was. It seems like stuff has been moved.”
“Like what?”
Lash pointed across the room, to a battered wooden rocking chair with a torn soft seat. Behind the rocker, four framed paintings were stacked against the wall. “Like somebody moved that rocker. When the old lady wanted something moved, she usually got me to do it.”
“Was there something back there?”
Lash had to think about it for a moment, then went and looked in another room, and came back and looked at the old rocker and said, “There might have been more pictures than that. Behind the rocker.”
“How many?” Lucas asked.
“I don't know, but the stack was thicker. Maybe six? Maybe five. Or maybe seven.
But the stack was thicker. One of the frames was gold colored, but all covered with dust. I don't see that one. Let me see, one said 'reckless' on the back…”
“Reckless?”
“Yeah, somebody had painted 'reckless' on it,” Lash said. “Just that one word. On the back of the painting, not the picture side. In dark gray paint. Big letters.”
“Portrait, landscape…?”
“I don't know. I didn't look at the front, I just remember that word on the back.
There are a couple of paintings gone. At least two.”
“There were some pictures down the hall in that third room, the one with the ironing boards,” Lucas said.
“No, no, I know about those,” Lash said. “These up here had frames that were, like, carved with flowers and grapes and stuff. And the gold one. Those other ones are just plain.”
“Chairs that weren't very old, and maybe some paintings,” Lucas said.
“Yeah.” They stood in silence for a moment, then Lash added, “I'll tell you what, Mr. Davenport, Weldon Godfrey didn't steal any chairs and paintings. Or maybe he'd take the chairs, because his house never had much furniture. But Weldon wouldn't give you a dollar for any painting I can think of. Unless it was like a blond woman with big boobs.”
They tramped back through the house, and on the way, Lash's pocket started to play a rock version of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” He took a cell phone out of his pocket, looked at it, pushed a button, and stuck it back in his pocket.
“You've got a cell phone,” Lucas said.
“Everybody's got a cell phone. Mom'n me, we don't have a regular phone anymore.”
Back ON the first floor, they ran into Smith again. Smith's left eyebrow went up, a question.
“Maybe something,” Lucas said. “Ronnie thinks a few things may have been taken. Can't nail it down, but stuff looks like it's been moved on the third floor. Couple of chairs may be missing, maybe a painting or two.”
“Tell him about the car,” Lash said.
“Oh yeah,” Lucas said. “They used a car to move the stuff. Or a van or a truck.”
Lucas explained and Smith said, “The Hill House has a security system with cameras looking out at the street. Maybe we'll see something on the tapes.”
“If they took those chairs, it'd have to be pretty good-sized,” Lash said. “Not a car. A truck.”
“Maybe they'll turn up on Antiques Roadshow?”
Smith said.
“Maybe. But we're not sure what's missing,” Lucas said. “Ronnie's not even sure that Bucher didn't get rid of the chairs herself.”
Mrs. Lash was sitting in the foyer, waiting for her son. When Lucas brought him back, she asked Ronnie, “Are you okay?”
“I'm fine. But just wait here for one minute, I want to look at something. I noticed it when the police brought us in…” He went back down the hall and into the music room, his feet cracking through bits and pieces of broken glass.
“He's been a big help,” Lucas said to Mrs. Lash. “We appreciate it.”
“I'm sure,” she said. Then, “I've seen you at Hennepin General. I used to work over there.”
“My wife's a surgeon, she's on staff at Hennepin,” Lucas said. “I'd hang out sometimes.”
“What's her name?” Lash asked.
“Weather Karkinnen.”
Lash brightened: “Oh, I know Dr. Karkinnen. She's really good.”
“Yeah, I know.” He touched a scar at his throat, made by Weather with a jackknife.
Ronnie came back, gestured toward the music room with his thumb.
“There's a cabinet in there with a glass front. It used to be full of old vases and dishes and bowls. One of them had Chinese coins in it. I'm not sure, because some of it's broken, but I don't think there are as many pieces as there used to be. It looks too… loose.”
“Could you identify any of it? If we came up with some stuff?”
Lash shook his head doubtfully. “I don't know anything about it. I never really looked at it, except, one time when Mrs. Bucher showed me the coins. It just looks too loose.
It used to be jammed with vases and bowls. Coins are all over the floor now, so they didn't take those.”
“Okay… Any other last thoughts?”
Ronnie said to Lucas, “ The love of money is the root of all evils.' Timothy, six-ten.”
The little asshole was getting on top of him.
Lucas said, “ 'Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.' Woody Allen.”
His mother cracked a smile, but Ronnie said, “I'll go with Timothy.”
As the Lashes left, Smith and another cop came rolling down the hall, picking up their feet, in a jacket- flapping, gun-flashing hurry.
“Got a break,” Smith said, coming up to Lucas. “Let's go.”
Lucas started walking. “What happened?”
“Guy showed up at Rhodes's with some jewelry in a jewelry box. Jewelry was cheap but the box was terrific. Our guys turned it over, it's inscribed 'Bucher' on the back.”
Rhodes's was a pawnshop. Lucas asked, “Do they know who brought it in?”
“That's the weird thing,” Smith said. “They do.”
“Where're we going?” Lucas asked. “Six-twelve Hay. It's off Payne, nine blocks north of Seventh. SWAT is setting up in the parking lot behind the Minnesota Music Cafe.”
“See you there.”
