Houses of Stone by KATHY (booksvooks .TXT) 📕

have to feign an expression of distaste as she dropped to her knees. Not only was the floor far from clean, but the contents of the boxes were thick with grime.

There were—she counted—thirty-seven cartons under the tables. She had finished inspecting them and moved on to another pile of boxes when she felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Ready to take a break?" Peggy asked. "It's eleven-thirty."

"So late?" Karen carefully replaced a collection of soft-drink bottles and rose to her feet. "This was a wasted morning. You wouldn't believe the junk! Why on earth would anyone buy a stained, chipped, ceramic bedpan?"

"I hear people use them for planters," Peggy said, and grinned at Karen's horrified expression. "Chacun a son gout. Come on. There's a powder room of sorts; we'll wash up and then have a spot of lunch. The food's usually good—homemade soup and pie and sandwiches."

They had to wait for service; several others had decided on an early lunch in order to avoid the crowd that would appear at one o'clock, when the viewing opened to the public. Seating herself in one of a row of chairs that lined the wall, Peggy unwrapped a country ham sandwich and took an enormous bite.

Karen sipped her soup and looked around the room. "There are more people here now. I don't see any familiar faces, though."

"Bill will turn up, never fear. And you are going to be very sweet and polite."

"Oh, right. Do you suppose Dorothea will have the gall to make an appearance?"

"If she does, you'll be polite to her too," Peggy said firmly.

"I'll distract her with witty conversation while you inspect her for cat scratches." Karen laughed. "I don't know why, but I'm beginning to enjoy this."

"I thought it would get to you."

"It has a weird fascination," Karen admitted. "The treasure-hunting instinct, I suppose."

"Mmm-hmmm. One never knows what gem may lie buried under the dreck. There are stories—most of them apocryphal, I admit, but some true—of people who've found a diamond bracelet in a box of costume jewelry, or a rare bit of porcelain jumbled in with cheap cups and saucers."

"There wasn't any rare porcelain among that lot," Karen said decidedly. "How about you? Any luck?"

"Some of the furniture is rather nice. A cherry lowboy, with original brasses, a carved fruitwood buffet with a marble top—"

"You haven't got room in your house for any more furniture."

"No." Peggy's eyes took on a faraway look and she murmured the phrase that, as Karen was to learn, is the motto and the heartfelt prayer of the dedicated auction buff. "But if it goes cheap ..."

"Is furniture all you looked at? There's a hell of a lot of stuff here, Peggy, and we don't have time—"

"I looked in every drawer and opened every door, kiddo. People sometimes overlook small objects. But no, that wasn't all I looked at. Finished? Come on, then, I want to show you something. And keep your face under control!"

She led Karen behind the podium. The wall was hung with paintings, many of them in ornate gilded frames. "I may bid on a few of these," she said, without troubling to lower her voice. "Isn't the lady in the bonnet divine?"

She glowered at them from the canvas, her lined, unsmiling face framed by white frills. The fingers of the hands folded on her knee looked odd; there appeared to be more of them than there ought to be.

" 'Divine' is hardly the word," Karen said dubiously. "How could you stand to have that face glaring at you? The artist's knowledge of anatomy wasn't exactly ..." She stopped with a catch of breath, and Peggy jabbed her hard in the ribs.

"The dog's anatomy is even more peculiar," Peggy said. "But I love him. Look at his imbecile expression. These are primitives, you ignoramus, and they'll probably fetch high prices. Too high for me, though I'll take a crack at them. Did you see the frames?"

She drew Karen behind the podium, where a stack of frames stood leaning against the wall. "If you can't do better than that I'll leave you home tomorrow," she whispered, stooping. "Didn't you even think about family portraits?"

"I never dared hope for anything like that," Karen whispered back. "God, wouldn't it be wonderful? A frontispiece for the book—a jacket cover . . . But the portraits don't seem to be labeled, and we don't even know her real name!"

"So we acquire everything from the right period," Peggy said cheerfully.

"That nasty-looking old woman can't be she."

"Oh, God give me patience! We'll discuss your romantic prejudices tonight, in private." Lowering her voice even more, she continued to sort through the frames. "Get ready for this. If you so much as gasp, I'll slug you."

The frame she extracted from deep in the pile was a cheap, mass-produced affair, of a type that can be still purchased in any drug or department store—narrow strips of light wood in a standard eight-and-a-half-by-ten size. It was not new; the grain of the wood was stained with grime and the nails at one corner had come loose. The picture it enclosed was defaced by straight lines, one perpendicular and one vertical, and it was so dark Karen couldn't make out the subject.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Does it remind you of anything? Keep looking."

As she stared, shapes emerged from the background. Human figures, or the upper parts of them. Two people? Husband and wife, perhaps? A pity about those defacing lines . . . Then the connection Peggy had tried to evoke struck her, and she understood the meaning of the lines across the painting. It was an oil painting, not a print or a watercolor. The old paint had cracked off when the picture was folded.

"Branwell Bronte's portrait of his sisters," she whispered. "It was folded too. I can't make out who—"

"I've already had it out in the light, and I don't want to draw any more attention to it. You'll have to take my word for it—there are two women, not the usual portrait