Sweet Masterpiece - The First Sweet’s Sweets Bakery Mystery

  Chapter 31

  Sam gave herself the luxury of doing absolutely nothing the next day. She slept through Kelly’s leaving for Beau’s house that morning, drank tea and read a book until Zoe stopped by to see if she wanted to go out for lunch. They ate quiche and salads at a little café on Bent Street, lingering at the table until mid-afternoon. By four o’clock Sam began to feel impatient with the unaccustomed leisure so she went home and sat at the kitchen table, making a to-do list.

  The quinceañera cake was the only large order on the horizon, so she had some spare time for fall housecleaning and smaller projects. She wrote down everything she wished to accomplish, knowing that she’d be doing well to get half of it done. Closets, drawers and pantry could all use cleanout and organization. Bedding should be laundered. Windows washed. Garden trimmed and mulched. Garage—she almost didn’t even want to go there.

  As she toured the house, remembering each little task, her gaze fell on the wooden box. Would it hurt to call upon its power? The extra energy she drew from it could be used to her advantage . . . No. She stopped herself. Somehow it didn’t seem wise to count on the box for every little thing. Starting to use its power for mundane chores like housework didn’t feel right. She turned her back on it.

  Thursday morning Sam awoke full of vigor, without the need for help from the wooden box. After a quick breakfast she baked the tiers for the quinceañera cake and set them to cool. While the cakes were in the oven she whipped up buttercream frosting and tinted it in batches. Those set aside, she went into her room, stripped the bedding and started a load of laundry.

  While I’m at it I might as well turn the mattress, she decided. She’d upended the queen-size piece when she realized there was something under it.

  Cantone’s sketchbook. She’d forgotten all about placing it there for safe keeping.

  She took it out, rearranged the mattress and sat down. The crisp pages contained small vignettes that she recognized from some of his work. A gazebo that he’d rendered in gray and white; a wicker chair, done in green and dappled with sunlight in another painting. Sam flipped through the sketches, admiring them with a new perspective. Who owned all this? she wondered. Now that Carolyn had admitted to faking the will Sam found at Bart’s house, and if Bart went to prison for his role . . .

  The answer fell, literally, into her lap.

  The sheaf of legal-sized sheets were stapled at the top with a blue cover sheet. Atop that, a business card. A New York telephone number. She glanced at it quickly then lifted the cover sheet.

  The Last Will and Testament of Pierre Cantone . . .

  Sam read quickly, scanning back over occasional passages couched in legalese. It was all here—legal and airtight—dated ten years ago. Cantone had set up a trust, leaving all his possessions to the Etheridge, a small New York museum. His stated reason for the choice was that he felt his work would receive the attention it deserved with the personal care of the museum director, rather than being entrusted to one of the larger places that vied for the works of great numbers of artists.

  Sam remembered Rupert telling her that Cantone’s reputation had been hard-won. Too many of the large museums and the critics of his early years had been harsh with him. Perhaps that was the real reason he shunned them at the end of his life.

  How close they’d come to never knowing this will existed. Cantone must have hidden the sketchbook inside the wall when he began to suspect that Bart was trying to raid the estate. He could have simply called his attorney and made the contents public in order to thwart his nephew, but who knew how muddled his thinking might have become as he got sicker and sicker.

  She ran her hand over one of the small color sketches in his book, feeling a connection with the man who’d worked so hard to please the art world while remaining true to his soul as an artist. She felt a prickle at her eyelids.

  Now she needed to know what to do. With a sigh she closed the sketchbook and carried the legal document to the kitchen. She dialed the attorney’s number.

  Chapter 32