Gemstones and Gravestones Read online

  Sal and Phyllis hurried to recover their stray friend, before entering the lawyer’s office. One of the rude people from the elevator was sitting in the waiting room. She pretended not to notice the elderly threesome as they checked in with the receptionist and sat near her.

  Sal leaned over to Phyllis and whispered, “Isn’t it amusing… how she was in such a rush to get here, only to sit and wait.”

  Phyllis gave Sal a wry smile. “Yes, like the drivers who cut in front of other cars so they can be first to reach the red light,” Phyllis whispered back.

  The rude lady was trying to read one of the magazines, but her eyeglasses were broken and wouldn’t stay on. She finally gave up and put the magazine and broken glasses on the coffee table with a sigh.

  Sal looked at the glasses on the table. “May I see those, young lady?” Sal asked her, pointing to them.

  The lady looked doubtfully at Sal, before reluctantly handing him the glasses. “I guess it can’t hurt…” she muttered.

  Sal inspected the glasses and saw that the hinge that held the earpiece was missing its tiny pin.

  “Phyllis, do you have a stapler in there?” Sal asked, pointing to her giant handbag.

  “I probably have several,” Phyllis said with a chuckle. As she reached for the bag, Teeny popped out, a stapler already in his jaws. “Good boy!” Phyllis said, taking the stapler from the tiny dog.

  “Here you go,” she said as she handed it to Sal.

  “Hey, you can’t fix my glasses with a stapler!” the rude lady protested in a condescending tone.

  “Just watch,” Phyllis told her. She knew Sal had a plan… he always did.

  Sal opened the stapler, selected a single staple from the chamber, and handed it back to Phyllis. He then bent the staple straight, and while holding the earpiece in place, he slid the staple into the hinge, and bent the ends so it wouldn’t slide back out.

  “That should hold them until you get to the eye doctor,” Sal said as he handed the lady the newly mended glasses.

  “Wow, thanks!” the lady said with surprise. She opened and closed the earpiece a couple of times before she put the glasses back on and picked up the magazine.

  Betty had a faraway look on her face as she watched Sal and Phyllis working together. But now she was talking to herself again.

  “Yes, of course they are… It’s so obvious, anyone could see it,” Betty agreed with the empty chair next to her. “They just don’t know it yet,” she added with a grin.

  The lady with the glasses raised her eyebrows when she saw Betty talking to the chair, before hiding her face behind her magazine.

  When they were called into the lawyer’s office, Mr. Mandate, who was Betty and Ernest’s attorney, patiently explained the proceedings.

  Well, it’s all pretty standard… everything goes to you, Betty, with the exception of some particular items that Ernest set aside for each of your children,” said the lawyer. “Oh, I almost forgot. Ernest wanted to add this to his Will.” Mr. Mandate slid an envelope across the table to Betty. “The timing was most unusual; he must have mailed it right before he died,” he added.

  Sal raised his bushy eyebrows, as this was not the only unusual event surrounding Ernest’s death.

  Ernest was found in a secluded corner of the Specter County Police Station parking lot, dead from an apparent heart attack. His reason for being the police station in the first place was a mystery. Also, Ernest’s pockets had been turned inside out, but his wallet had not been stolen.

  Mr. Mandate excused himself while Betty opened the envelope. Inside was a single video disc.

  The three seniors stared at it the disc, wondering why Ernest would have suddenly chosen, right before his death, to include it in his Will.

  “Sal, you have a DVD player, don’t you?” asked Phyllis.

  “Yes, shall we go watch it?” suggested Sal.

  So the little group left the lawyer’s office, their thoughts on the video disc, and what it might reveal.

  Chapter 14

  Reverend Smith liked his newspaper in the mail slot in his door. Not through the slot, mind you; just sticking out halfway so Reverend Smith would not have to bend down to pick it up.

  After carefully positioning the newspaper, Henry closed the storm door gently, so as not to bump the paper off its precarious perch. His heart sank when he turned to see Danny and his friends standing in the yard, waiting for him. Henry looked back at the house, hoping Reverend Smith would open the door and yell at Danny to get off his lawn.

  No such luck.

  As Henry made his way down the sidewalk, Danny stepped in front of him; blocking his way. When Henry tried walk around him, Danny reached into his satchel and grabbed one of his papers.

  “Hey, give that back!” Henry yelled. He had already counted his papers, so he knew he didn’t have any to spare.

  “I just want to read it- don’t get your panties in a twist,” Danny said scornfully, and opened the paper.

  “Panties…heh-heh.” reiterated Alex. Henry noticed Alex sported some new scabs and bruises from being pushed off his bike the day before.

  Meanwhile, Jason was playing with his saliva; allowing it to fall from his mouth in a long strand, then slurping it back up before it broke.

  Danny held the paper upside down and pretended to read. “It says here that kids who deliver newspapers are losers.”

  “Heh, losers…” echoed Alex.

  Jason’s string of spit brushed the ground; a bit of dirt clung to the end when he sucked it back into his mouth.

  Danny looked up from the paper; an offended look on his face. “Ya hear that, Henry? They called you a loser in the paper… That’s not fair! I like calling you a loser. I ought to rip this paper up.” Danny held the paper in his hands as if to tear it in two.

  “No, don’t!” begged Henry. If he was short a paper, he’d have to walk all the way to the newspaper office, explain why he needed another, and then make a separate trip to deliver it. It could take hours.

  A long line of spit glistened as it stretched from Jason’s lip to the ground.

  Henry felt a prickle on his neck right before a sudden gust of wind lifted the thick strand of saliva and blew it across Danny’s face.

  Danny turned to Jason, a scowl upon his dripping face.

  Eyes wide, Jason looked fearfully at the big, angry boy.

  “YOU SPAT ON ME?!” Danny screamed.

  “But… but the wind…” Jason stammered.

  “I’ll get you, you little punk!” Danny clenched his fists and moved toward Jason.

  Jason began to run. The bigger boy dropped the paper to chase after him.

  “Little punk…heh-heh,” Alex repeated as he walked away.

  As he put the newspaper back in his satchel, Henry wondered about the odd gust of wind… the air had been perfectly still all day.

  Chapter 15

  When the three seniors arrived at Sal’s house to watch the video, Phyllis frowned as she looked at the bleak surroundings.

  “Sal, you really need to cheer this place up… with some decorations or something,” Phyllis advised him.

  Sal looked around his living room and shrugged. He put the disc in the DVD player and turned on the TV.

  The three friends leaned forward and watched as a room lined with locking boxes appeared on the screen.

  “You can tell that this is a surveillance video, from the time stamp in the corner, and that looks like a safe deposit room at a bank,” Sal noted.

  As they watched, two men entered the room. The first man unlocked the boxes, and carefully began removing jewelry from them. Phyllis recognized him.

  “Hey Betty, isn’t that Mr. McShifty, from Specter County Bank?” Phyllis asked.

  Betty nodded and continued watching the screen.

  “That’s the same bank where Ernest played Santa,” Phyllis said.

  The second man began examining the jewels with a magnifying glass.

  Sal loo
ked closely at the man on the screen. He took off his hat and scratched his bald head.

  “I know I’ve seen that man before…but where?” he asked himself.

  Betty suddenly stopped watching the TV and looked toward Sal; her eyes seeming to focus on a spot just behind his shoulder.

  Sal felt a prickle on his neck, and something brushed against his side. A small piece of paper fell from Sal’s coat pocket onto the floor. Teeny barked, and jumped out of Phyllis’s purse to retrieve it. It was the invitation Agnes had given Sal at the diner.

  Sal looked at the photo on the invitation and exclaimed, “That’s Sterling Von Gemstone… the jeweler Agnes told us about! I knew I recognized that man from somewhere!”

  Betty turned back to the TV, wearing a mysterious smile.

  As they continued watching, the two men on the TV screen began replacing the jewels they had taken from the safe-deposit boxes with identical ones.

  “What on earth are they doing?” Phyllis asked. Then the TV screen abruptly went blank.

  Chapter 16

  On the ride back to Betty’s house, Sal and Phyllis discussed the video and what it might mean.

  “The video’s time stamp showed it was after closing time at the bank, so that alone tells us something fishy was going on,” Sal was saying. “And the date said it was Christmas Eve… Ernest was playing Santa at the bank that day, wasn’t he, Betty?” he called to the backseat.

  Betty didn’t answer. She was daydreaming, staring vacantly out of the foggy window.

  “Yes, he was,” Phyllis answered for Betty. By the time they arrived at Betty’s house, Sal had an idea of what might have happened to Ernest.

  As they opened the door to Betty’s house, Phyllis was saying “Well, I still think we should call the…” Phyllis stopped in mid-sentence.

  “Oh, dear,” she continued, a catch in her voice.

  The three friends stood in the doorway, stunned at what they saw.

  Betty’s house was in shambles. Furniture was overturned, cabinets and drawers were emptied, and there was broken glass on the floor where a window had been smashed.

  Betty’s mouth hung open as she stared at her beloved home. “Oh, Ernest, look what they’ve done!” she cried as she looked around in dismay.

  Phyllis put her arm around her friend. “Oh, Betty… this is just awful! Who could have done this? We’ll help you clean it up, won’t we, Sal?”

  Phyllis began picking up some of the overturned items, and found herself holding the photo of the four friends at Niagara Falls. The glass was shattered and the frame was cracked.

  “I have an empty frame at home that would fit this perfectly, Betty. I’ll bring it back as good as new,” Phyllis promised. As she began to put the photo in her giant handbag, Teeny peeked out, gently took the picture in his jaws, and slipped back inside with it.

  Sal looked around Betty’s house, his mouth set in a grim line. “It does not appear to be a robbery,” Sal observed. “The TV and the silverware are still here.”

  “I think we should call the police,” said Phyllis, picking up the phone and putting it to her ear. “That’s strange…there’s no dial tone.” Phyllis let Sal listen for a moment.

  Sal inspected the telephone and found the cord to the outlet had been cut. Phyllis looked at the frayed wire that dangled from his hand and felt a rising fear.

  “Come on Betty, we’re going to the police,” Phyllis said.

  Betty did not seem to hear her. She was staring at a chewed toothpick that sat on the table, a look of horror dawning on her wrinkled face.

  “Come on, Betty!” Phyllis repeated. She tried to stay calm as she and Sal hustled Betty toward the door. When they opened it, there were two men blocking the way.

  “You’re not going anywhere. Get back inside,” growled the smaller of the two.

  “I know you!” Phyllis shouted, pointing at him. “You’re the thief who took my bag!”

  The two men shoved Sal, Phyllis, and Betty back inside the house. Betty stared at the larger man. It was the same man she’d dreamt about, the one she’d seen at the diner.

  “And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for you, old man!” Joe said to Sal, poking him in the chest. “You got me in trouble with my boss, and I still owe you for that crack on the head!” He looked at the big man and pointed at Sal. “Get ‘im Lars!”

  Wordlessly, Lars rolled up his sleeves, clenched his meaty fist and punched Sal in the stomach.

  As Sal doubled over in pain, he glimpsed a small white blur. He saw Teeny jump from Phyllis’ handbag and quickly hide behind an overturned chair with the video disc in his mouth.

  Tears sprang from Phyllis’ eyes when she saw Sal clutching his stomach and gasping for breath. “Oh! You awful, awful man!” she sobbed.

  “Give him one more… just to be sure,” Joe told Lars.

  Lars smiled and adjusted his toothpick before striking the old man again.

  Betty watched in shock as another one of her dreams became reality.

  Sal hunched over his cane in agony. Joe smiled. “Now we’re even,” he said. “We won’t hurt nobody else, as long as you do as I say… and if you don’t,” Joe shrugged. “Lars will take care of you.”

  Lars pulled a long, wicked looking knife out of his coat pocket, and waved it threateningly at the frightened hostages.

  Betty shook her head in astonishment. Over and over, events were occurring just as her dreams had foretold.

  “We’re looking for a video disc, now just fork it over and no one gets hurt,” Joe said.

  Phyllis was about to tell him that the disc was in her handbag, when Sal caught her eye and shook his head ever so slightly.

  “What…what disc?” she stammered. Phyllis was not good at lying.

  “Look lady, if you don’t hand it over willingly, we’re just going to have to take it from you.” Joe grabbed Phyllis’ giant handbag from her walker and began searching inside.

  Phyllis’s heart was in her mouth. She had seen how Joe got revenge on Sal for hitting him with his cane. She wondered what would he do to Teeny, who had bitten his hands and peed on him?

  “Geez, lady… you got everything but the kitchen sink in here…” Joe commented as he searched through the giant handbag. “But no disc,” he said finally.

  Phyllis almost cried out with relief. But where was Teeny? Where was the disc? She wondered.

  Joe hoisted the bag back onto Phyllis’ walker, and she leaned over it protectively.

  “Well, one of ‘em must have the disc on ‘em,” said Joe. “Lars, hold the old man’s arms while I search him.”

  Lars cruelly twisted Sal’s arms behind his back while Joe checked his pockets and patted him down. Finding nothing, Joe grunted and said, “One of the old ladies must have it on them, then.”

  They frisked Phyllis, and still finding nothing, moved on to Betty.

  The moment the two thugs touched Betty, an angry wind began blowing through the broken window, whipping the curtains and sending papers flying madly around the room.

  “What the devil is going on here?” Joe yelled over the din of the uncanny windstorm.

  While Joe and Lars were distracted by the strange and sudden whirlwind, Sal saw Teeny discreetly slip back inside Phyllis’ handbag with the disc still in his mouth.

  Clever dog, thought Sal.

  When Joe finished his search and Lars released Betty, the ghostly gale stopped just as abruptly as it had begun.

  Joe and Lars looked around fearfully in the eerie silence. The sudden stillness in Betty’s house seemed to unnerve them even more than the mysterious storm had.

  “No video disc and no cell phones. What now, Lars? I say we take ‘em to Von Gemstone’s,” Joe said to the large man.

  Lars nodded mutely in agreement.

  “Come on, you three. Out to the car,” Joe ordered.

  Since the hoodlums rode motorcycles, they left their bikes behind, and everyone crammed into Sal’s car.
It was a tight fit; with Sal driving, Joe directing him from the passenger seat, and Betty and Phyllis sitting on either side of Lars in the backseat.

  As he drove, Sal thought about how they could possibly get away, but he didn’t dare try anything, knowing that Lars was in the backseat with Betty and Phyllis, with his knife at the ready.

  “You’ll turn here, old man, if you know what’s good for you,” Joe growled.

  They arrived at Sterling Von Gemstone’s jewelry store. The sign in the window read ‘Closed’. Joe directed Sal to drive around back, where they entered by the back door.

  *****

  In the back room of the store, Sterling Von Gemstone and Mr. McShifty were anxiously preparing for the big jewelry show. Sterling had spent the weeks since the jewel heist fashioning the precious stones into new jewelry pieces to auction off at the event. He wanted them to be unrecognizable, just in case one of the true owners happened to be there.

  “Just think, a few more hours and we’ll be on our way to Mexico, and this will all be over,” Mr. Mcshifty was saying to Sterling.

  Sterling grunted. Things were not going as planned, and Mr. McShifty and Sterling feared it was just a matter of time before their scheme was exposed. They just hoped that their luck would hold out until after the jewelry show, when they would be safely on a plane to Mexico.

  The jewelry thieves jumped nervously when Joe and Lars suddenly appeared with the hostages.

  Mr. Mcshifty breathed a sigh of relief when he recognized the two hired hooligans, but was shocked to see the three seniors being held at knifepoint.

  “Just what are they doing here?” Mr. McShifty demanded. “You were supposed to bring me a surveillance video, not a bunch of old folks! Can’t you blockheads tell the difference?”

  “Well Boss… since we still can’t find the disc, we decided to kidnap the old geezers. I figure if we lock ‘em up, we won’t have to worry about them rattin’ us out before the job’s done,” Joe explained.

  That actually makes sense, thought Mr. McShifty.

  “I guess we may as well add kidnapping to our list of crimes,” Mr. McShifty said in a resigned voice. “Put them in the closet and make sure they can’t get out.”

  Lars and Joe herded the three frightened old friends into a small storage room in the back of the jewelry store. Joe started to take Phyllis’ giant purse from her, but she begged him to let her keep it.

  “Please, Sir… Don’t take my bag! My friend’s medication is in there and she’ll need to take it soon,” Phyllis pleaded.