It distresses his friends, disappoints his enemies, and disconcerts the statistics-keepers. It also has a way of throwing a monkey wrench into other people’s plans. The television blithered away while I sat there alternating between cloud-nine ecstasy and snake-pit panic. Amos Speer was dead; that was the main thing. I could show up at the gallery Monday morning and go on as if Speer had never had me walking the plank at all. My aborted attempt to buy the Duprée chair for myself would not come to light, no tall man in a blue uniform would be reading me my rights, and my reputation in the antiques world would shine as pristine as ever. A definite plus, I’d say. But then there was the other side of the ledger. Where the hell was Charlie Bates? What had happened? Charlie had pulled off the main stunt, which was getting Speer off my back. But then what? Had he looked at the blood flowing out of Amos Speer’s right temple and thought Ugh, there’s got to be a better way to go than that?
