Antiques Disposal by Barbara Allan Page B

“Such as?”
    Such as a white utility van. But I didn’t say it.
    â€œBrandy, are you holding something back?”
    I just shrugged.
    A guy Brian’s age shouldn’t have been able to summon such a weight-of-the-world sigh. “Brandy, for God’s sake ... for your own sake ... please, please stop playing detective. Let the professionals handle it. Please?”
    He was begging. This is a place where Tony wouldn’t have gone, and it wasn’t particularly attractive, cutie-pie or not.
    But it worked on me, at least a little.
    â€œOkay,” I surrendered. “I’ll try.” Then, “Is there anything else?”
    â€œNo, Brandy.” Another sigh. Merely weight-of-Serenity this time. “That’s all.”
    I stood.
    Brian left his chair, came around the desk, and faced me.
    â€œActually,” he said, “there is one other thing... .”
    I raised my eyebrows.
    He gave me that boyish smile—the one with the dimples. “What would you think about having dinner with me sometime?”
    I thought it over.
    â€œHow about it, Brandy? Old times’ sake?”
    â€œJust dinner? Nothing more?”
    â€œNothing more.”
    But I knew what would happen. I’d drink too much wine, and then we’d go back to his place, where I wouldn’t be able to resist those dimples, and ...
    â€œWhen?” I asked.
    Â 
    I got home around noon, finding Mother in the kitchen making egg-salad sandwiches.
    I sat on a red 1950s step stool and told her about my meeting with Brian (but not our as yet unspecified dinner date, knowing she would view that primarily as an opportunity for me to wheedle info out of the acting chief).
    Mother said thoughtfully, “You were correct to wonder about Big Jim Bob’s past, my dear. Why did he come back to Serenity? Perhaps he was running from something.”
    â€œOr someone. Maybe someone who caught up with him.”
    Wiping her hands on a dish towel, Mother said, “Come ... I want to show you what I found.”
    I followed Mother to the music room, where in my absence she had repacked the storage unit items, except for the stack of correspondence, which she now held in her hands like a devout churchgoer with a hymnal.
    â€œYour instincts were correct, dear,” she said, underplaying for once. “These have proved most interesting reading.”
    â€œReally? What are they, letters?”
    â€œGot it in one, dear. Mostly love letters, yes—written during the Vietnam war ... to ‘Anna’ from ‘Stephen.’ But that’s not the most important discovery.”
    She wanted me to ask.
    So I did. “Okay, Mother, what was the most important discovery?”
    â€œThank you for asking, dear. Among the missives was a contract for a storage unit.”
    That perked me up. “A storage unit? Her storage unit? Our storage unit?”
    She nodded, smiling in that cat-that-ate-the-canary way of hers.
    â€œSo do we have a last name, to go with Anna?”
    Mother nodded again, eyes and nostrils flaring. “ And an address.”
    â€œIn Serenity?”
    â€œNo. But nearby.”
    â€œWhere?”
    Why was she dragging this out? But I knew—Mother was an unbridled ham, and I was her audience.
    â€œThe Quad Cities, dear. We’ll leave right after lunch.”
    Â 
    Anna Armstrong’s address was in Davenport—one of the five large burgs that made up the Quad Cities (don’t ask). Specifically, we were heading to an area just east of the downtown, known as the Gold Coast.
    On the half-hour ride, Mother gave me chapter and verse regarding this historic neighborhood of once-grand homes with magnificent views of the Mississippi River, established during the Civil War by wealthy German immigrants who had played such a large part in shaping the city.
    During the 1970s, this fabled area began to lose its luster as the wealthy moved to greener pastures in the