Young Napoleon Bonaparte. Seven feet tall, wearing a grungy Seattle flannel shirt and his famous bicorn admiral hat.
“But... I thought he sold that for you?” I said. “For a crap-ton of money.”
“Oh, hesaidhe did, but now I think I’ve figured it out,” she said. “See, he had a thing for this painting. He’d hounded me about selling it to him before he finally agreed to display it in his main gallery. It hung for months with no offers or interest, and I was about to give up hope when a ‘private’ buyer came forward to take it off Sharkie’s hands—only, he’d offered half the asking price, which Sharkie claimed was hugely inflated anyway.”
Aunt Mona was desperate to sell and took the offer.
“Don’t you see?” she said, gesturing wildly toward the painting.
I shook my head. Daniel just glanced back and forth between the painting and Mona, wide-eyed. Probably wondering why in the double hockey sticks he got involved with a weird girl and her crazy family, no doubt. I wouldn’t blame him for thinking that. Not one bit.
Mona groaned in frustration. “Sharkie didn’t sell this painting to an outside buyer. He kept it for himself and paid me half the asking price. He ripped me off!”
“Jesus,” Daniel whispered.
“Jesus is fucking right,” she mumbled. “And if Sharkie thinks he’s getting away with this, he can think again. Help me get it off the wall.”
“What? You can’t be serious!” I whispered. “That’s stealing.”
“All right, Eleanor Lindberg,” she chided.
I resented that. It also made me doubt myself. I didnotwant to be like my grandmother.
“Look, Birdie. The bastard cheated me. I painted this. Me! It’s mine. He swindled me out of thousands of dollars. So now I’m getting it back,” she said. “Are you helping me, or not?”
Oh God. She was serious. The last time she got this fired up, I had to play lookout while she stole an American flag from the front of city hall and replaced it with one that readFASCISTS.
“You were supposed to be helping us with our case!” I whispered. “We didn’t come out here to help you seek vengeance.”
“No one plans vengeance,” she argued.
“Yes! They do!” I said, exasperated. “It’s a planned act of revenge.”
“For you maybe. For me vengeance just happens.”
“Did you know about this painting when you suggested we consult him about the spreadsheet?”
She squeezed one eye shut. “Maybe I suspected it? Two birds, one stone?”
“I’m so angry at you right now!”
“That’s fair,” she whispered. “But are you going to help me, or what?”
I started to tell her no, but Daniel spoke up.
“I’m in,” he said. “Why not? That guy’s an asshole.”
“Oh God,” I whispered, glancing down the hallway to the stairwell.
Cool and calm as could be, Daniel pushed his hair back over one shoulder and got on the opposite side of the painting. “It’s on hooks,” he told Aunt Mona. “We can lift it off if we go straight up. On three...”
With dueling grunts, they pushed the painting up and off the hooks. Then they argued in whispers about the best way to get it out of the room. It had to be turned sideways—even I could see that. And at this point, it was too late to keep my hands clean. So I helped them flip it around and guide it on its side out of the bedroom. Itbarelycleared the top of the doorframe. Getting it over the stairwell railing and down the last flight of stairs was even trickier. But we managed.
When we guided it down the final step, a small noise startled me. I turned around to find the housekeeper, holding a stack of towels in both arms.
“What are you doing?” she asked, eyes wide. But she didn’t wait for an answer. She just trotted around the painting and called up the stairwell, “Mr. Sharkie! Mr. Sharkie!”
“Go, go, go!” Aunt Mona shouted.
