So Right By FireWire

Story No. 18

A young woman is searching through the booths at an antique show hoping to find bargains she can take back to her antique shop. Her strategy is to start making offers a couple of hours before closing on the last night of a show. She has found that sellers will discount prices on what they have left rather than pack it up and take it with them. Money is tight.

Everything in this show is overpriced. Even the bad stuff is overpriced. It’s an upscale show, but still there must be at least one bargain. The thunder is getting closer. I had better get a move on before the rain comes, and everybody heads out.

She comes to the last booth. Nothing

She sits down on a bench outside the booth for a rest before she goes back to her truck. As she stares at the empty, dark room beside the booth across from her, her eyes become accustomed to the dark, and she becomes aware of something large in a back wall corner of the room. She stands up and walks over for a closer look.

This is a big stoneware container. I would say it’s about six feet tall and covered with at least an inch of dust. I’ll get some paper towels from the bathroom to clean the dust off.

She takes the paper towels from the women’s bathroom, sticks her head in the men’s bathroom, yells “Anybody in here!” takes the paper towels from the men’s bathroom, cleans the dust off the container, and takes the dirty towels back to the bathroom.

She returns and walks around the container shining her pocket flashlight on it. Interesting mix of colors. The main colors remind me of the wall in Bosley’s Looking at Prints. With the red running down the side, it becomes an abstract painting. I wonder who it belongs to. I’ll ask Colby. It’s his show, so he should know.

She finds Colby, staring at the ceiling, a couple of aisles away.

“Colby.”

He turns and looks at her. “Oh, hi Aileen.”

“Colby, there is a large stoneware container beside the East exit. Would you be able to take a look at it with me before the rain comes?”

He chuckles. “Of course. You know no red-blooded male could say no to you.”

When they get to the container, Aileen asks, “Do you know who this belongs to? It was covered with dust, and I cleaned it up.”

“No, I don’t remember it at all. I would have remembered it because it’s an unusually large size for a stoneware container. Let me check with my wife. She may have seen it.”

Colby calls his wife on his cellphone. “Sandra, come over to the East exit for a minute. I have Aileen Richardson with me, and we are trying to figure out who owns a large stoneware container.”

He turns to Aileen. “I just checked the weather. We’re in for a heavy storm. I want to close up before it comes. There are still a few vendors who have not cleared their booths.”

After several minutes Sandra arrives. “Hey Aileen.”

“Hi Sandra.”

Colby points to the container. “Sandra, have you seen this before?”

“No.”

“Would you like to buy it Aileen?” Colby asks. “All merchandise left behind belongs to me. It will also allow you to establish the container’s provenance.”

“Sure.”

“Have you checked the inside of the container?” Sandra asks. “There may be something of value inside it.”

Aileen hands Colby her flashlight. He lowers the container down and shines the flashlight around the inside.

“Nothing inside,” he says.

He pushes the container upright. “One thousand dollars, and you’ll have to get it out of here before I turn off the lights which will be in an hour or so. An auction house has this space in the morning, and I want be certain nothing is left behind.”

“One hundred dollars . . . cash,” Aileen says.

“We’ll take it,” Sandra answers.

Aileen gives one hundred dollars to Sandra.

Colby writes out a receipt and hands it to Aileen. “Don’t forget. Before the lights are out.”

Aileen nods and puts the receipt in the pocket with the flashlight.

Aileen goes to the parking lot and gets her truck. It’s raining hard. She backs up to the East exit. She gets out of her truck and finds two young boys standing at one the doors looking out at the rain.

“Watch it,” she says to the boys. “I’m going to open this door.”

After she opens the door and backs the truck into building, she gets out and asks, “Are you guys lost?”

“No mam. We are just waiting for Uncle Martin. He said to meet him at the East exit when the show closed,” one of the boys says.

“OK,” Aileen says and walks to the container. She lowers the container so she can rotate it along its bottom edge to the truck.

This thing weights more than I do. I’m not going to be able to get it to the truck. I’ll back the truck up to container. Maybe I can get it up on the bed somehow.

She backs the truck up to the container, drops the tailgate, and puts a thick drop cloth over the edge of the truck so she won’t damage the container.

As she is trying to figure out how to get the heavy container on to the back of the truck, one of the boys asks, “Do you need help, mam?”

She turns and looks at the boys.

The boy says, “My name is Joe and I’m twelve. This is my brother Henry. He’s ten. We’re super strong.”

Aileen smiles and shakes her head. “This stoneware container weighs too much I’m afraid.”

Henry walks over to the door to watch the rain. “Man, this is a real thunderstorm,” he says.

The lights go out and the security lights come on.

A man, walking rapidly, comes down the corridor.

“Uncle Martin. You got here just in time,” Joe says. “This lady needs help loading her container into the truck.”

“My name is Martin Rogers,” he says to Aileen.

“I’m Aileen Richardson, and I do need help in loading this heavy container into my truck.”

“Sure no problem. First let me take a look at it.”

He takes a flashlight out of his pocket, turns it on, and steps up close to the container.

“Too much glare,” he says and turns off his flashlight.

“I have one that is not as bright; would you like to try it?”

“Sure.”

She takes it out of her pocket and hands it to him.

“Thanks,” he says.

“I had to clean the dust off,” Aileen says. “It was finger deep.”

He slowly scans the container before suddenly stopping.

He looking for something, Aileen thinks. I wonder what it is.

He steps back with the flashlight shining on a certain spot and pauses for a moment before handing the flashlight to Aileen.

She puts it back in her pocket.

“What were you looking for?” she asks.

“A pattern in the design, in the colors.”

“A pattern?”

“Yes. Where are you taking the container?”

“To my shop in New Hope, Pennsylvania.”

“Do you have a business card? I’d like to examine the container in the daylight. I may be interested in buying it.”

Aileen takes a business card out of her pocket and hands it to him.

“Before you can view it in my shop, we have to load it on my truck.”

Martin chuckles. “Let’s get it loaded. You have quite a long drive ahead of you.”

“Joe and Henry, you boys get on the truck,” Martin says. “You two will grab the container by the rim and pull it into the truck. Aileen and I will push from the bottom.”

He reaches over to the drop cloth and runs his fingers along both sides. “This should protect it,” he says.

He tips the container over so it is leaning against the back of the truck bed.

When everybody is in position, Martin says, “On the count of three. One . . . Two . . . Three.”

Once the container is in the truck, Henry shouts, “We did it!”

Aileen closes the truck’s tailgate and turns to Martin. “Thank you so very much. If you and the boys had not been here, I would not have been able to get it on to the truck. I don’t know what I was thinking when I bought it from Colby. I guess I just wasn’t thinking.”

The only sound in the dimly lit building is the thunder and rain outside. As they stand looking at each other, their faces lit by the frequent lightning, a strong emotional message passes between them. One neither had ever felt before. One neither was prepared for. Their eyes and hearts are sharing the same vision of what the future could be; what they both want it to be.

“Uncle Martin, are you OK?” Joe asks.

Aileen smiles. “I must be on my way. Thanks again for everything.”

She gets in the truck and drives into the rain.

The spell was broken, but the message remained in each heart.

When Aileen returns home, she goes to bed, but she can’t sleep. The events of the evening keep turning over and over in her mind. Finally, she takes the blanket and pillow off the bed, goes into the living room, lies down on the sofa, and goes to sleep.

In the morning, she drives to her shop. She climbs onto the back of the truck and examines the stoneware container looking for a pattern. She doesn’t see anything, gets out of the truck, and goes into the shop.

She walks over to Joyce, her assistant. “Good morning Joyce.”

“Good morning Aileen.”

“There was absolutely nothing at Colby’s last night. Everything was so overpriced. But as I was sitting outside the last booth getting up the energy to drive home, I saw a large stoneware container across the aisle sitting in the empty space between the exit and the last booth. Colby had no idea where it had come from, but since he owned the show and any unclaimed items left at show’s end, he legally owns. He sold it to me for $100. Do you think your husband could help us load it onto the hydraulic lift? It will take three people.”

“Of course. I’ll ask him to come over at lunch.”

Later that morning, Martin and the two boys arrive at Aileen’s shop.

“Well, that was certainly quick,” Aileen says.

Martin laughs. “I thought you might need help unloading.”

“Uncle Martin, can we go outside and take a look around?” Joe asks.

“OK, but don’t go too far.”

“This is Martin Rogers,” Aileen says to Joyce. “He and his two nephews helped me get the container on the truck last night.”

“This is Joyce Andrews my assistant,” she says to Martin.

“Nice to meet you Joyce.”

“Do you always bring your nephews with you?” Aileen asks. “Not that there is anything wrong with that. They are polite, personable, and helpful. Very nice boys.”

“Well, actually they aren’t my nephews. I had an older sister who died two years ago. Nobody wanted the boys, so I adopted them. We use uncle and nephew because that is what they are used to and are comfortable with. During the school year, I leave them with my housekeeper when I travel. Not an ideal situation of course.”

“And their father didn’t want them?”

“No. He and Susan divorced right after Henry was born. He has a family of his own and didn’t want the boys.”

There is a moment of silence before Aileen says, “Let’s unload the container.”

They slide the container onto the lift and lower it to the ground. Joyce goes back into the shop.

While Martin is inspecting the container, Aileen says, “It has nice color.”

“Yes it does. It has a nice variety of color. Colors not normally found on stoneware. They are more like the colors in a painting. One of Bosley’s paintings comes to mind.”

“Bosley’s Looking at Prints.”

Astonished, Martin says, “That’s it. How did you know that was the one?”

She smiles. “I know these things.”

Martin laughs.

After inspecting the container, Martin asks, “How much do you want for it?”

“Five thousand dollars.”

“That’s a bit steep considering you only paid one hundred for it.”

He takes Colby’s receipt out of his pocket and hands it to her. “You dropped this last night.”

“Thanks. Anyway, my discovery of the container was an unexpected nuisance to Colby. He was glad to off-load it to me for one hundred dollars, so he could close up. Five thousand is what I think I can sell it for.”

“Still, I don’t think five thousand is a fair price.”

“Why are you buying it?” Aileen asks. “Are you a dealer?”

“No, I’m an architect. From time to time, I’ll sell something to make room for something new, but that’s the extent of it.”

“I’ll sell it to you for three thousand, and that’s the lowest I’ll go,” Aileen says. “You’ll have to pay the two percent credit card charge.”

When they are at the shop’s cash register, Aileen says, “That will be three thousand sixty dollars.”

“Let’s make that fifteen thousand three hundred. That is what I think the container is worth and includes the credit card charge.”

Is this guy crazy? “Are you sure you want to pay that much? We had a deal for three thousand.”

He nods.

She shrugs, “OK. It’s up to you.” and writes him a receipt.

“Could I please have Colby’s receipt? It will make the kind of backstory buyers love to hear if I ever decide to sell it.”

“Sure. Here you go.” and hands him the receipt. “Joyce and I will help you put the container on your truck.”

“My tailgate is a hydraulic lift. You and I can do it.”

Martin takes out his cell phone and presses a number. After a few seconds he says, “Joe, it’s time for you and Henry to come back to the truck.”

As Martin is closing the tailgate, Aileen says, “This lift makes things a lot easier.”

“It does.”

They stand there without speaking until Aileen asks, “Will I see you again?”

“I have a pending matter to take care of first, but I made you a promise last night, and I’ll be back to keep it.”

Aileen smiles. He felt the same emotions last night that I did.

For the past several weeks, Martin has been preparing a presentation on visual distortions for a client. One of the examples he is using is a 1901 Library of Congress color picture of Samuel Reynard, a ceramic artist, sitting in a room, smiling, with his hand on a stoneware container. Reynard is unusual because he signed his stoneware with a pseudonym, The Maker, blended into the colors of his stoneware as a distortion, so if you weren’t looking for the pseudonym, it would be impossible to see it.

Martin recognized Aileen’s stoneware container as the one in the picture. After buying it from Aileen, he sends a letter to Pavloy Auctioneers’ Works of Art specialist, Miss McGuffin, along with a copy of the Library of Congress picture, and asks if Pavloy’s would sell it for him.

Two days after sending the letter to Miss McGuffin, Martin receives a telephone call from Miss McGuffin asking him to bring the stoneware container to Pavloy’s for a visual inspection. When he arrives, he calls Miss McGuffin, and she comes out to his truck.

Miss McGuffin extends her hand to Martin and says, “Martin, I’m Paula McGuffin. Thank you for choosing Pavloy’s to auction your Reynard’s stoneware.”

Martin takes her hand and says, “Pavloy’s has a reputation as the leader in in the auction of fine art. I’m happy to be working with you. I’ll let the container down from my truck, so you can take a look at it.”

Martin climbs up to the bed of the truck, pushes the container on to the hydraulic lift, and lowers it to the ground.

“It’s so unusual! So unique!” Paula says. “The colors are alive! They shine as if they were glazed yesterday.”

Martin turns the container around.

“The Maker!” Paula says. “It’s there. Samuel Reynard’s signature. His seal of authenticity. Proof that he was the maker of this stoneware. I’ll call Neil and ask him to come and see what you have.”

In a few minutes, a man comes out of the building and walks to the truck.

Paula says, “Martin Rogers this is Neil Pavloy.”

The two men shake hands. Neil looks at the container and says, “This stoneware container is heads and shoulders above the Reynard containers we have sold in the past. What is its provenance?”

“I have the information in my truck.”

Martin walks to his truck, takes a document size envelope out of the truck, and walks back.

Martin hands a picture to Neil. “This is a 1901 color picture of Samuel Reynard sitting in a room with the container beside him. It’s from the Library of Congress. The Library of Congress reference number is on the back.”

Neil takes the picture, turns it over briefly, then walks over to the container. He looks back and forth between the container and the picture before saying, “The container certainly looks like the one in the picture. What else do you have?”

Martin hands him the bill of sale between Colby and Aileen. “This is the original bill of sale between the owner of the antique show and the woman who found the container. The container was covered finger deep in dust in a vacant room where the show was being held.”

“One hundred dollars? She bought a ten million dollar, Samuel Reynard stoneware container for one hundred dollars?”

“Neither one of them knew it was a Reynard container. Reynard’s distorted pseudonym, The Maker, was not apparent to either of them.”

Martin hands Neil the bill of sale between Aileen and him. “This is the bill of sale between the woman who had purchased the container for one hundred dollars and me.”

“You knew it was a Reynard container, and you paid $15 thousand for it?”

Martin shrugs his shoulders. “Arm’s length transaction.”

“So where was the container between 1901 and just a few weeks ago?”

“That I can’t answer. It will be up to your company to determine if an earlier claim exists.”

“You will have to consign it to us before we can do the due diligence,” Neil says. “We will also need to have physical possession of the container during the due diligence process.”

“I understand why you want physical possession it, but like Reynard, I’m going to keep the container in my living room and enjoy its beauty and the memory that goes with it until it’s gone. Feel free to take pictures and make measurements while I’m here, however it will be going back with me.”

“Very well,” Neil says. “The process to verify this container is a Reynard container and there are no competing ownership claims will take up to six months. Do not discuss this container or how you came to own it with anyone, otherwise our due diligence process will be compromised. There will be no end to the number of competing claims that will step forward, in which case, we will not auction the container.”

As the weeks turn into months and Aileen doesn’t hear from Martin, she tells herself she will never see him again, but her heart won’t let him go. She searches for him on the internet and finds only that he owns an architectural firm in Philadelphia. At least he was honest about that, she thinks. But apparently it wasn’t love at first sight after all.

Aileen and Joyce are in the shop, when Joyce says, “Hey Aileen, look at what’s in this week’s Antiques and The Arts.”

Aileen walks to the counter where Joyce has the newspaper lying flat.

Joyce points to a picture. “Isn’t that the same stoneware container you and I and that good-looking guy, I can’t remember his name, unloaded from your truck a few months ago? It just sold at auction for $13.7 million.”

Aileen studies the picture and reads the caption. “Sure looks like it, but it doesn’t say who sold it. All it says is that it was sold by a private collector to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC after an intense bidding competition.”

“I like this part,” Joyce says. “The container was found in a storage room of a public mart covered in an inch of dust.”

“Oh, now this is funny,” she says. “It was sold by the owner of a show at the mart for $100 and then sold to the current owner for $15 thousand.”

There is a moment of silence before Joyce asks, “Was that you Aileen?”

“Yeah.”

“That was a sneaky thing for him to do.”

“Yeah, it sure was.”

Joyce folds the paper up and throws it in the trash can.

Several more weeks pass.

Aileen arrives at work and is surprised to see Martin sitting on a sidewalk bench beside her shop.

I wonder what he wants. I won’t tell him I know about the auction. I’ll tell him I have to prepare for a buyer’s meeting and don’t have time to talk. He had his chance, and he threw it away.

As she approaches the shop, Martin stands up and says, “I have something for you,” and hands her an envelope.

“What’s in it?” she asks.

“Open it and find out.”

Aileen opens the unsealed envelope. Inside is a check for $6,850 thousand, exactly half of the auction price of the stoneware container. It’s made out to her and signed by Martin.

She looks at him. “What’s this for?”

“I sold the container at a Pavloy auction for $13.7 million. This is you half.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you giving it to me?”

“It’s simple. It’s only money. It doesn’t have the value of what we shared on the first night we met. The message that passed between us right before you said good-by is what has value. Those shared emotions mean more to me than anything money can buy.”

After a moment, she says, “You are so right!”

She tears the check in half, then tears it in half again, and lets the pieces flutter to the ground.

She takes his hand, looks into his eyes, and smiles. The message is growing stronger and stronger . . . and stronger.

https://firewire-connects.com

https://firewire-fiction.com

Copyright © 2025 by FireWire

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this story or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

is a registered trademark of FireWire.