"Silica gel! Silica gel! Silica gel, you idiot!"
Charlie felt as if he should shout the name of some arcane stuff back at him: Well, symethicone! Symethicone! Symethicone, you butt-nugget! Instead he said, "The stuff fake breasts are made of? She ate that?" The image of a well-dressed older woman macking on a goopish spoonful of artificial boob spooge was running across the lobes of his brain like a stuttering nightmare.
Mainheart pushed himself to his feet on the vanity. "No, the little packets of stuff they pack in with electronic equipment and cameras. "
"The 'Do Not Eat' stuff?"
"Exactly. "
"But it says right on the packet - she ate that?"
"Yes. The furrier put packets of it in with her furs when he installed that cabinet. " Mainheart pointed.
Charlie turned, and behind the large closet door where they had entered was a lighted glass cabinet - inside hung a dozen or so fur coats. The cabinet probably had its own air-conditioning unit to control the humidity, but that wasn't what Charlie was noticing. Even under the recessed fluorescent light inside the cabinet, one of the coats was clearly glowing red and pulsating. He turned back to Mainheart slowly, trying not to overreact, not sure, in fact, what would constitute an overreaction in this case, so he tried to sound calm, but not willing to take any shit.
"Mr. Mainheart, I appreciate your loss, but is there something more going on here than you've told me?"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand what you mean. "
"I mean," Charlie said, "why, of all the used-clothing dealers in the Bay Area, did you decide to call me? There are people who are much more qualified to deal with a collection of this size and quality. " Charlie stormed over to the fur cabinet and pulled open the door. It made a floof-tha sound that the seal on a refrigerator door makes when opened. He grabbed the glowing jacket - fox fur, it appeared to be. "Or was it this? Did the call have something to do with this?" Charlie brandished the jacket like he was holding a murder weapon before the accused. In short, he thought about adding, are you fucking with me?
"You were the first used-clothing dealer in the phone book. "
Charlie let the jacket drop. "Asher's Secondhand?"
"Starts with an A," Mainheart said, slowly, carefully - obviously resisting the urge to call Charlie an idiot again.
"So it has nothing to do with this jacket?"
"Well, it has something to do with that jacket. I'd like you to take it away with all the rest of it. "
"Oh," Charlie said, trying to recover. "Mr. Mainheart, I appreciate the call, and this is certainly a beautiful collection, amazing, really, but I'm not equipped to take on this kind of inventory. And I'll be honest with you, even though my father would be spinning in his grave for telling you this, there is probably a million dollars' worth of clothes in this closet. Maybe more. And given the time and space to resell it, it's probably worth a quarter of that. I just don't have that kind of money. "
"We can work something out," Mainheart said. "Just to get it out of the house - "
"I could take some of it on consignment, I suppose - "
"Five hundred dollars. "
"What?"
"Give me five hundred dollars and get it out of here by tomorrow and it's yours. "
Charlie started to object, but he could feel what felt like the ghost of his father rising up to bonk him on the head with a spittoon if he didn't stop himself. We provide a valuable service, son. We are like an orphanage to art and artifact, because we are willing to handle the unwanted, we give them value.
"I couldn't do that, Mr. Mainheart, I feel as if I'd be taking advantage of your grief. "
Oh for Christ's sake, you fucking loser, you are no son of mine. I have no son. Was that the ghost of Charlie's father, rattling chains in his head? Why, then, did it have the voice and vocabulary of Lily? Can a conscience be greedy?
"You would be doing me a favor, Mr. Asher. A huge favor. If you don't take it, my next call is to the Goodwill. I promised Emily that if something ever happened to her that I wouldn't just give her things away. Please. "
And there was so much pain in the old man's voice that Charlie had to look away. Charlie felt for the old man because he did understand. He couldn't do anything to help, couldn't say, It will get better, like everyone kept saying to him. It wasn't getting better. Different, but not better. And this fellow had fifty more years in which to pack his hopes, or in his case, his history.
"Let me think about it. Check into storage. If I can handle it, I'll call you tomorrow, would that be all right?"
"I'd be grateful," Mainheart said.
Then, for no reason that he could think of, Charlie said, "May I take this jacket with me? As an example of the quality of the collection, in case I have to divide it among other dealers. "