The Magnolia Palace

Chapter Eight

1966

Veronica checked her watch. She’d wasted more time than she’d thought up in that room with the organ pipes, reading through the pages of clues, and the train carrying Barnaby and the models had already pulled out of Penn Station. Surely, this blackout was only temporary. If she could just get downtown, she could catch the next train before the storm worsened.

She tried the French doors throughout the ground floor—in the reception area, the living hall—but all were locked.

What were they thinking, leaving her behind? Then again, everyone had probably assumed that she’d left already, walked out on the whole shoot. Which she would never do. She imagined the irate phone call to Sabrina from Vogue, with the vow to never work with Veronica again. Her career would be over. She’d spent a good deal of her wages from the past few months on shoes and scarves and girdles, and she’d been counting on this paycheck to start a savings account for Polly. She had a return ticket home, but nothing else to show for all her trouble. What if the agency made her reimburse the magazine for the hotel room? Or the plane ticket? She’d be in a bigger hole than when she’d started.

The shadows were lengthening, and soon it would be hard to see. Veronica remembered seeing a couple of candles in the room where she got dressed, and took the stairs up one flight. Back in the fancy bedroom, she grabbed a book of matches from the fireplace mantel and lit a tapered candle on a brass holder. It cast a golden, unsteady glow around the room. Above her, sparkling reflections from the crystal chandelier danced across the ceiling.

The administrative offices she’d stumbled into earlier would have phones, she realized. Unfortunately, only a couple were unlocked, and neither phone had a dial tone. She hit 0 for the operator several times before finally slamming down the handset. There was no way of contacting anyone for help, not until the lines were restored.

Someone else must be here, a security guard, maybe. She walked out into the hallway. “Hello!” she yelled. “Is anyone here? I’m up on the second floor. Hello?”

Her voice echoed down the corridor, but there was no response.

The silence was unnerving. Since she’d first arrived in New York City, she’d been overwhelmed by the unceasing cacophony of horns, sirens, and people shouting. Now, between the power outage and the snowfall, everything was muffled, as if the grand Frick residence had been picked up and dropped into a thick woolen sock.

But any moment the lights would come on, the phones would be restored. They had to be. Then she’d call the police, have them come and rescue her. For now, she retreated to the bedroom, finding comfort in the familiar room.

She placed the candle on the small table next to the chaise longue and sat, hugging her knees. The clues in her pocket gave a crinkle, and she carefully drew them out and studied them in the flickering light. She might as well examine them while she waited, a way to keep from dwelling on the fact that she was trapped and all alone.

Each had a series of numbers at the top right corner, 1/20, 2/20, up to 11/20. She placed them in order on the side table and read the first line of the first clue: Get set for a quest to find the magnificent magnolia treasure.

The magnolia treasure.

The archivist had mentioned that a valuable pink diamond had gone missing way back when, but that a police report had never been filed. The Magnolia diamond, he’d called it.

What if the person who’d written the clues had hidden the diamond somewhere in the house, and then forgotten all about it, or died, and no one had been able to find it? If there were twenty clues in total, and only eleven here, it meant that the “magnificent magnolia treasure” had never been found. The clues obviously hadn’t been moved in some time, gathering dust all these years.

No, her imagination was getting ahead of her, visions of pink diamonds dancing in her head.

Still, she picked up the last clue of the series, number eleven:

A natural beauty came from naught

Yet this blushing lady was quite sought

Out. A lover of Horatio

Holding a hound

Off you go

Take a good look around.

A ghastly poem, but something in it triggered a memory of a painting of a girl holding a dog. Veronica was sure she’d seen something like that during the day’s shoot. She tucked the clues back in her sweater pocket and gathered her courage, curious to see if her memory was correct. She poked her head out of the doorway; the hallway was still and quiet.

She studied the paintings on the walls, using her candle to illuminate them, then headed downstairs to the room with the romantic panels. In one, a pretty spaniel sat at the feet of two lovers, staring back out at the viewer. The woman in the painting wasn’t holding the dog, so it couldn’t be that one. Veronica made her way from room to room along the first floor. No paintings with dogs.

The wind howled outside, but she found that staying focused on the task at hand kept her claustrophobia at bay. For the moment.

In the library, she stood in the center of the room, looking slowly around. There was a portrait of a flushed George Washington looking like he’d downed a few too many, an oil of a sailboat on rocky seas, and a series of ravishingly beautiful women wearing puffy wigs. Above the fireplace was one of a gruff-looking man with thinning gray hair looking off to the side as if he were about to bark out an order to an unseen underling. Mr. Henry Clay Frick himself, according to the nameplate.

But there, in the corner, was the painting she remembered. It was of a young woman in a simple red dress, her cheeks a maidenly pink, holding a spaniel.

This had to be it.

But then where was the next clue? When she’d constructed a scavenger hunt for Polly, the clue was always nearby, easy to spot. The Frick house had been perfectly preserved, so maybe it was still around.

Even though she knew she shouldn’t touch anything—this was a museum after all—she very carefully lifted one corner of the frame away from the wall and peered behind it, in case a clue had been tucked back there. Nothing.

The painting hung just above a small bookcase with a vase on top. There was no note inside the vase nor underneath it. She sat cross-legged on the floor, pulled out a book from the shelf, and carefully leafed through it. Nothing. Same with the volume next to it. She was about to give up until she spotted a familiar square of white tucked in the binding of the fifth book.

She’d been right.

Her thoughts raced ahead with the possibilities. Her father had always said she had a mind like a steel trap, that her memory was excellent. What if she was able to follow the rest of the clues and find the treasure? The magnificent magnolia treasure. The lost Magnolia diamond.

If she found it, there might be a reward.

Or, on the other hand, the people who ran the Frick Collection might be angry at her for nosing about where she shouldn’t. The American laws might be harsh about that sort of thing, and she’d end up in jail.

The missing diamond was never reported to the police, and no one knew for sure what had happened to it. Say she found it—who would know? A prick of mischievous delight surged through her at the possibilities, as far-fetched as they were. No one would miss it. It was the perfect crime, really. Veronica had all the right connections if, in fact, a pricey gem did one day fall into her lap. Uncle Donny ran a discreet side business handling items with dodgy provenances—it was one of the reasons her father had quit to drive a cab, as he didn’t approve. Uncle Donny would know not to ask questions, as long as he got his cut. A pink diamond, worth who knew how much, would most definitely spring Polly from Kent House.

Veronica shivered. For God’s sake, the cold and dark were getting to her, affecting her judgment. She was astonished at herself for even entertaining such a thought. She was no crook.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Veronica let out a squawk, slamming the book shut and banging into the bookshelf as she straightened up. The vase on top teetered but didn’t fall over, thank God.

Shaken, she looked up to see the figure of a man filling the doorway. It was the archivist who Barnaby had insulted. Joshua.

Her relief at having been found was replaced by horror at the fact that she’d nearly knocked over what was probably a very expensive vase.

“Joshua? Oh, my goodness, what a fright you gave me!”

“You were at the shoot earlier, right?” he asked, coming closer.

“Yes. I’m Veronica, one of the models.” She slid the book back into the bookshelf and rose to her feet. “I’m so glad to see you, you have no idea.”

“What are you still doing here?”

“They all left without me. I got locked inside.” All was not lost. Once Joshua let her out of here, she could hop on the next train and catch up with Barnaby in Newport by the morning. “Look, I need to dash, my suitcases are still upstairs. I’ll grab them and meet you by the front door.”

He walked over to a corner table where an old-fashioned gas lamp sat, struck a match, and lit the lamp, taking an inordinate amount of time to adjust the flame, showing no sign of urgency. After studying her for a moment, his gaze drifted around the room. He was checking to see if she’d damaged or stolen anything, for certain.

“What time is it?” he asked.

She checked her watch. “A little past eight.”

“No luck, then.”

“What do you mean, no luck?”

“I don’t have a set of keys.”

“But you work here.”

“I’m a part-timer. Part-timers don’t get keys.”

“You said you were an archivist.”

“I’m a part-time archivist. Well, officially, I’m an intern.”

This quibbling rankled. “I have to get out. Can I climb out a window?”

He shook his head. “If you do that, the alarm system will go off. Tommy the security guard sets it before he leaves for the night, and there’s no way you can get out without triggering the intrusion sensors.”

“Then how were you planning on leaving?”

“I was just wondering that myself.”

The man made no sense, and meanwhile the clock was ticking. “I’m sorry, what?”

He gave an embarrassed shrug. “I was trying to catch up on all the work I missed while the photo shoot was going on, and I fell asleep at my desk.” Indeed, his shirt was wrinkled, his eyes red. “I’m as stuck as you are.”

“Fine. Then we trigger the alarm. I’ll explain to the police what happened. I can’t stay here all night, it’ll be too late.”

He took a deep breath. “I have three things to say to that proposal.”

The urgency of her situation seemed to elude him. “Go ahead.”

“First of all, if we open a window, the cold, wet air will rush in and damage the artwork. Second, if the city is in a blizzard-induced blackout, which it appears to be, you won’t be able to get to the train station anyway, especially wearing those on your feet.”

She looked down at the kitten heels. He had a point. Two points.

“And thirdly?” She had the distinct impression that this was a man who enjoyed hearing himself talk.

“Thirdly, if I am here when the police show up, I may as well cancel all of my plans for the next three days, until my parents can get me out of jail.”

“What?” But it slowly dawned on her what he was saying. A Black man standing beside an open window of a Fifth Avenue museum, the alarm blaring—the situation would not end well.

While she’d only read about the protests in America in the papers, she’d witnessed firsthand the effects of the clashes between Blacks and whites in the UK. Several years ago in Notting Hill, a group of white teenagers had attacked a mixed-race couple, resulting in a week of violence. She and Polly had watched tearfully from their bedroom window as hundreds of whites gathered out in the street after dark, targeting Black men and sometimes even Black women, beating them bloody as the police stood by and egged the hooligans on. The situation in the United States was equally charged, if not more so.

A new idea hit her. “But if the power is out, won’t the alarm be turned off?”

“The system has its own backup generator. State-of-the-art security here at the Frick. Just installed last month. We wouldn’t want any strangers coming in and ransacking the place.” He eyed the vase and bookcase once more. “What were you just doing?”

“Trying to pass the time.” It wasn’t a lie.

“I see. Please don’t touch anything else. I was headed to the kitchen to see if there’s anything left over to eat. We should probably stick together. You coming?”

With that, all hope of escape deflated. She was stuck in a cold, dark house with this kid who was of no use whatsoever, who wasn’t even a proper employee. With no way of getting out.

She gave one last glance at the bookshelf and followed Joshua out of the room.

Two tired-looking sandwiches sat on a plastic tray in the basement kitchen; everything else had been piled up in the trash can. Joshua went to a cabinet and took down two plates, setting a sandwich on each one. “This looks like roast beef, and this one, ham. Do you have a preference?”

She pointed to the ham. “That one, I guess.”

“Would you like some water to go with it?”

“God, what I wouldn’t do for a cup of tea.”

He looked about, hands on his hips. “They have a catering kitchen down here, let me see what I can find. Stay here.”

He was gone before she could say anything further. A few minutes later, after she’d devoured half her sandwich, unable to wait any longer, he walked into the room with two steaming cups of tea on a tray.

“The catering kitchen is full of the basics, so we won’t starve.”

“That’s good to know, thank you.” The tea was warm and comforting, and made her forget for a quick moment what a mess she’d gotten herself into. On the table was an oversized book, and she pulled it toward her. The cover showed the same garden off the side of the house where she and the other models had squirmed in the snow, but in the spring. The snowdrifts were replaced by a wide expanse of green lawn, and the trio of French doors that led into the living hall were bracketed by two enormous magnolia trees in full bloom.

“It’s a history of the Frick Collection,” said Joshua. “I left one on each table for the photo shoot, in case anyone was interested.”

Veronica felt bad that she hadn’t even glanced at it during her lunch with Tangerine, nor had any of the others, she was sure. “Those trees are splendid.”

“They’re some of the largest magnolia trees in the New York area. Planted in 1939 by the board, and chosen because they represent transience, as the blossoms emerge and then drop away every spring.” This bloke was a walking advert for the place.

“Like the way this was a house and then a museum. The way the family was here and now they’re not.”

“Exactly.”

Same with the diamond: a family heirloom and then an unsolved mystery. But she didn’t say that out loud. Instead, they ate their sandwiches in an awkward silence.

Once Joshua was finished, he sat back and placed his hands on his thighs. “While we may not be able to get out, one thing I know we can do, because they did it during a holiday party in December, is light the fireplace in the living hall. I don’t know how much wood there is, but at least that way we won’t freeze to death before dawn.”

Up in the living hall, Joshua arranged some kindling and logs from the rack beside the fireplace while Veronica stood watching.

He placed a log on the fire and turned halfway around to look at her. “Do you want to take a seat or something?”

“I wasn’t sure if I should. If it was allowed.”

“As long as you don’t break it, I think we’ll be okay. Your girlfriends didn’t seem to have any awareness of how to sit in a chair this morning.”

He was thinking of Gigi, with her leg slung over the arm. “They’re not my friends.” She carefully settled on the sofa, the cushions overly soft from years of use. “To think this was all the rage, once. Green velvet with a fringe.”

“Not your style?”

“Not really.” The fire soon sprang to life, warming her toes. She settled back and studied the three portraits on the wall in front of them. “Not that I have a style. I mean, I still live at home. But I don’t think I’d want those three old men hanging in my living room, if I had a living room.”

Joshua pointed out each one, from left to right. “Sir Thomas More, St. Jerome, and Thomas Cromwell.”

“Funny how they’re positioned so it appears as if More and Cromwell are giving each other the evil eye. Makes sense, considering they were enemies in real life. Your Mr. Frick must have had a wicked sense of humor.”

“I like to think he did. I particularly love the one of More, with those rich velvet sleeves and the five-o’clock shadow on his face.”

Veronica had to admit that it grew on her, especially once he’d pointed out the technical artistry. “How did you end up working here?”

“My mother’s an artist, and we used to visit the Frick regularly when I was a kid. She was the one who suggested I apply for an internship, insisting it would be a good use of my art history major, not to mention a stepping-stone to a career in the arts.”

“Where do you go to university?”

“I’m a senior at Brooklyn College, where my father is a history professor. My mom and dad like to joke that this internship is the perfect mix of their two professions.”

“Huh.”

“Huh what?”

“That would make me a taxicab driver who takes steno.”

“I’d hate to be a passenger in your cab, then.”

“True. Might make for a bumpy ride.”

When Veronica next opened her eyes, she was stretched out on the couch, covered by a thick quilt that she recognized from the bedroom upstairs. Between the jet lag and the long day, she’d completely zonked out in the living hall of the Frick.

She sat up and looked about. It was no longer night, but instead of a bright sun streaming through the windows, a wretched wind shook the panes while sleet battered the glass like hundreds of fingernails tapping away. The storm was worse than when it had started. Her watch read nine o’clock in the morning.

Joshua entered, holding two mugs of coffee, and handed one to Veronica. “I was listening to the radio in the kitchen, and the mayor’s declared a state of emergency due to the snowstorm. The city’s shut down through tomorrow morning,”

“You mean we’re stuck here until Wednesday?”

“I’m afraid so.”

Her modeling career was lost for good, then. She had no way of reaching anyone to tell them where she was, or what had happened. Veronica had been given one opportunity to turn things around for her family, and gone and mucked it all up. It would be back to her uncle’s pawnshop, back to her old life of worry and loss. Poor Polly, she deserved so much better than that. While some of the other residents of Kent House had no idea where they were, or why, Polly knew exactly what was going on, that she’d been put away because they couldn’t afford to keep her anymore, like some child’s pony bought on a whim.

Something had to be done.

The treasure was still out there. Whereas last night the idea of taking something that was not hers seemed more theoretical than real to Veronica, today something had shifted. She could not return to England with nothing to show for all this. Polly was counting on her.

Maybe this extra day was a sign, a gift of sorts. She wouldn’t let these next twenty-four hours go to waste.

“You said you’d fallen asleep last night, before we found each other,” she said. “Where do you work?”

“I’m down in the basement, in the old bowling alley. There are no windows, no light, so sometimes I lose track of time.”

“There’s a bowling alley in here?”

“The Fricks had it installed with the very latest in 1914 bowling alley technology. Works like a charm, still. If we get bored enough, I’ll take you down and you can try it out.” He seemed less suspicious of her than he’d been last night, or maybe the fact that they were stuck for longer than expected had tempered his distrust.

“Entertainment. I like that. Why did they put you in the bowling alley?”

“When they were putting in the alarm system, the workers discovered several boxes of files and letters down there. They’d been tucked away in a closet and forgotten all these years, so I’m going through and cataloguing them, finding connections.”

His eyes danced as he spoke; this was a man who enjoyed his work. She felt flashes of that sometimes at the pawnshop, like the day she was unpacking boxes from an estate sale and came upon a pile of old letters. Uncle Donny said to just toss them in the bin, but she’d saved them for when the shop was slow and read through each one, imagining what the letter writers might have looked like, where they might have lived, who they had loved.

“Intriguing,” she said. “What have you found so far?”

“Lots of things, including a series of correspondence between Henry Clay Frick’s children, Childs and Helen.”

“How do they feel about the discovery?”

“Childs died last year. I’m not sure if Helen Frick, or ‘Miss Helen,’ as she’s referred to by the staff, knows. I’m guessing that’s why they have me down in the basement, working in secret. She’s difficult, you see.”

“How old is she?”

“Almost eighty, I believe.”

“It would be hard, I suppose, to have your home ripped away from you and opened up to the public as a museum. Tossed out into the streets.”

“She moved to a six-hundred-acre farm upstate, so I wouldn’t say she was tossed into the streets. As for being difficult, well, she has strong feelings against certain types of people.”

Veronica paused, trying to figure out what he meant. “You mean she’s racist?”

He laughed. “Not quite. She hates Germans. For years, she wouldn’t let anyone with a German surname work for her in any capacity, or even enter the art reference library she runs next door. Refused to have German-made equipment on her farm. Something to do with World War I, apparently.”

“She sounds beastly.”

“I don’t think she cares what people think.”

“What’s your last name?” Veronica asked.

“Lawrence. So I’m safe from her wrath. And yours?”

She swallowed. “Weber.”

“Dear God, girl. That won’t do at all. I have to say, the reversal is refreshing.” In the firelight, his face looked almost smug. “This must be what it’s like to be white.”

She suppressed her laughter, not sure if it was appropriate or not.

“That was meant to be funny.”

“Sorry. I thought it was. But then I thought I oughtn’t think that.”

“Oughtn’t? Now, that’s a ridiculous contraction. Very British.”

He was taking the piss. “Why is it ridiculous?”

“I don’t know. Very fancy, upper-crust.”

That was rich, coming from a man with university education and a posh internship. “Not what a model would say?”

“No, I didn’t mean that.”

The fire emitted a large snap, a welcome interruption. Joshua got up and used one of the irons to maneuver the logs around.

Veronica hadn’t meant to sound so harsh. The conversation had gotten away from her, and she reminded herself of why she’d brought up his work in the first place. “If you like, you can catch up on whatever you need to do today. Why waste the time if you’re here anyway, right?”

He looked over at her, wary. “Are you sure?”

“Sure. I’ll be fine. Off you go.”

She waited five minutes after he left before heading to the adjacent library and opening up the book with the clue inside. It lay exactly where she’d left it.

I’m fifty-two

Feeling quite blue

Although I look like a king

I’ve got absolutely no-thing

to my name.

Whereas the previous clue had triggered a memory of the painting it referred to, this one drew a blank. The trail was going to be much harder to follow than Veronica had expected, she realized with a thud of disappointment.

Just then, she heard Joshua coming up the back stairs. That was fast. She slammed the book shut with the clue still inside, shoved it back on the shelf, and raced to the couch in front of the living hall fireplace just as Joshua entered carrying two Danishes. “I came upon these in the back of the fridge. It’s not much, but it’ll keep us going.”

There was no way Veronica was going to be able to solve the mystery of the magnolia treasure, even with the extra day of searching. Not with Joshua checking in on her every five minutes, and also because she simply didn’t know where else to look. The house was enormous. If she was going to figure this out, she’d need his help.

If there was a reward, it would certainly be worth the risk. And by working with Joshua, she couldn’t be accused of theft or meddling.

She took a deep breath. “The reason I missed everyone leaving yesterday was that I found something in that strange room with the pipes behind the main stairway. I got lost in examining it, and then they left without me.”

“You were in the organ chamber? What on earth were you doing back there?”

“Hiding. The shoot didn’t go as well as I’d hoped, and I needed a break from them all.” She didn’t want to admit what a disaster the day had been, and luckily, he didn’t follow that line of questioning further.

He wiped each of his fingers with his napkin, not taking his eyes off her. “What was it you found? Music or something?”

“No.” She extracted the notes from the wide pocket in the front of her sweater and handed them over. “Do you know what they’re talking about?”

He moved closer to the window to study them. “I think they describe the works of art here. You found these in the organ room?”

“I meant to mention them last night, but then I fell asleep. Sorry about that.”

He waited a beat before turning back to the notes. He clearly wasn’t sure whether to believe her.

“I think it’s a scavenger hunt,” she volunteered. “I used to do the same for my sister, when we were young.”

“And these were just sitting in the organ chamber?”

She shrugged. “They were on the floor, deep amongst the pipes, as if they’d fallen.”

Joshua held them carefully by the edges and ran through them one more time. “These are incredible. Just incredible.”

His voice rose with excitement. “And I think I know who wrote them.”