Simply Lies, page 35
“At another hidey-hole of his, probably. Wait, what if the treasure is at one of those hidey-holes and this code is giving us the location?” suggested Francine.
Gibson glanced at the words with renewed interest. “If it is an address, it would probably be both numbers and letters.”
“Which complicates the unraveling even more, I know,” Francine mused. “Okay, let’s try the simplest first. Let’s take the first letter of each word and give it its alphabetical numerical equivalent. So breaking the phrase down, each first letter is N-Y-S-I-B-T-Y-D. Now give each letter the alphabetical equivalent.”
Gibson executed on this and looked at the line of numbers corresponding to their place in the alphabet: “Fourteen, twenty-five, nineteen, nine, two, twenty, twenty-five, and four. Anything strike you?” she asked.
“Yes, confusion,” said Francine.
“Could it be a hybrid?”
“Meaning?”
Gibson said, “Some substitution of numbers for letters, but then maybe some of the letters actually represent words.”
“Okay, which ones?”
“I don’t have a clue.”
“Let’s take Harry literally. The letters b and t from the words ‘but then’ are represented by the two and the twenty. Is that significant? Since it’s clear he added ‘but’ before ‘then’ to make it ‘but then.’ ”
Gibson looked at her notes. “Wait a minute, we forgot about the ‘take away the eight’ part.”
“Okay, but how do we do that?”
“Well, if we follow the same substitution cipher, eight represents the letter h.”
“So we take away the h in the word ‘then’?”
“So it becomes ‘ten,’ ” said Gibson.
“Which means it now reads, ‘Now you see it, but ten you don’t.’ ” She looked at Gibson. “What the hell does that mean?”
The blood slowly drained from Gibson’s face. “Oh my God.”
“What, what is it?” Francine said quickly.
“It’s all a convoluted mess, really, which I’m sure was intentional. ‘But then’ was really the key. I’m pretty sure that was a shortcut that Harry offered up because the word was so unusual in this context.”
“What word?”
She typed out something and then sat back for Francine to see.
“One ninety-nine Button Road, Yarden, New York. ‘Button’ equals ‘but ten.’ ” She glanced at Francine to see if she was following her logic. “You don’t know?” Gibson said. “It’s not in one of your notebooks?”
“What?”
“This is the address of the house where your father first lived.”
GIBSON STEERED THE RENTAL CAR down the street in Yarden, New York.
She and Francine had flown in and were now pulling up in front of the small house that Harry Langhorne had lived in as a child.
It looked exactly like the picture that Gibson had earlier pulled up on Google Maps.
A car was parked in front. Flowers were in the flower beds. Everything looked neat and trim. There were four other homes on the street. They all looked the same. Cars in front, flowers in the beds.
But what Gibson had subsequently found out was that each of these homes was owned by one corporation that she had finally tracked to one of Daniel Pottinger’s companies. And she had also found out that a management service had been hired to keep the outside of the homes in good order and to look after the vehicles. And that there was a housekeeping service to look after the interiors of the other homes. But they had not been given access to 199. No one apparently went in there.
They got out of the car and approached the house.
There was an alarm pad next to the front door.
“Little unusual being on the outside,” noted Francine.
“There’s no key lock on the front door, only a handle. My guess is this is where Harry lived for the most part. Now we need the code to get in.”
Francine opened her notebook and looked at the numbers she had written down there: 14, 25, 19, 9, 25, and 4. These represented the numerical equivalent of each first letter in the phrase Harry had left with his registered agent after leaving out the words “but then.”
“The leftovers for Sesame Street?” said Gibson.
“As in ‘open sesame,’ we hope.”
“Here goes nothing,” Gibson said, as she punched all these numbers into the alarm panel.
The red light on the pad turned green and they heard a click.
Francine gripped the handle and pulled the door open. “After you,” she said to Gibson.
The women walked in and Francine closed the door behind them.
The house was small, the rooms plain but spotless. The kitchen was functional, if rudimentary. They noticed that the windows were simply facades. There was no light coming in from them. The air was cool, and they could hear the hum of the HVAC system.
“The lights and HVAC must be on a program,” noted Gibson. They turned the corner and walked into what looked like the living room, which was the largest space thus far. There was track lighting on the ceilings and the lights were pointed at the walls.
And on the walls—
“Holy shit,” both women exclaimed at the same time.
Arrayed on all four walls were paintings. And not simply any paintings.
They drew closer to one of them. It was a simple depiction of a room: a tile floor, and part of a blue door. But the focus of the work was clearly a wooden chair with a straw seat that held what looked to be a pipe and cloth on it, and—
Francine pointed to the name that appeared on a wooden box sitting behind the chair that contained some vegetables.
“ ‘Vincent’?”
“As in . . . Van Gogh?” mumbled Gibson. “The NFTs were just misdirection, or maybe a digital sampling of the real thing?”
Francine took out her phone, did a search, and showed the screen to Gibson.
“Van Gogh signed his first name in odd places on the pieces he thought had some merit apparently. This one is entitled Vincent’s Chair. He painted it in December 1888.” She kept reading. “It was housed in the National Gallery in London.” She paused and then jerked her head up. “Until it was stolen eleven years ago.” She looked around. “It wouldn’t surprise me if all of these paintings had been stolen.”
“So Harry bought them from whoever stole them, and housed them here where he’s the only one who gets to enjoy them. And he bought NFTs of all of them and housed them in a metaverse room that is probably a duplicate of this one.” She looked around at what was clearly world-class artwork from a series of masters. “What a dick.”
“Who cares?” Francine leaned against the wall, closed her eyes, and let out a long, calming breath. She opened her eyes, looked at Gibson, and allowed herself an ear-to-ear smile. “We just found the treasure.”
THE VARIOUS MUSEUMS AND PRIVATE collectors whose works had been stolen were thrilled to have them back in their possession. So happy, in fact, that the finder’s fees paid to Gibson and Francine were quite generous.
On the flight back from meeting with one of the museums, which had had two of the paintings stolen from it, Francine turned to Gibson.
“That night at Stormfield?”
“Yeah?”
“You saved my life.”
“Well, you did the same for me. If you hadn’t warned me, I’d be dead.”
Francine slowly reached over and gripped Gibson’s hand. “Can I ask you a favor?”
Gibson looked at her curiously. “What?”
“Can I . . . ? Oh never mind.”
“What!”
Francine seemed nervous and unsure of herself. “I was just wondering, if I could meet . . . your kids.”
By Gibson’s expression, this was not what she was expecting. However, she said, “Sure, my parents have been watching them. You can meet them, too.”
* * *
“This is my friend, Francine,” said Gibson, introducing Francine to her parents. “She was at Temple when I was there.”
The Rogerses shook hands with Francine. Gibson’s father shot his daughter a glance and mouthed, Francine Langhorne?
She smiled but didn’t answer.
“So how did you know Mickey?” asked her mother.
Francine said, “Well, she was pretty famous on campus. But we were both involved in the theater program. Do you remember her in My Fair Lady? She was fantastic as Eliza Doolittle.”
Rick Rogers looked guiltily at his daughter. “I must’a missed that one. But I saw all her home basketball games.”
“Did you act in plays as well?” asked Dorothy Rogers.
Francine said, “Sometimes it seems like I’ve been acting my whole life.”
“Are you here on business?” asked Rick, with a sly look at Gibson.
“Actually, I am. In fact, I’m sort of in the same line of work Mickey is. Asset recovery.”
“And the kids?” asked Gibson. “Francine wanted to say hello.”
“Naptime is just about over,” said her mother.
Gibson led Francine upstairs and into her kids’ room.
Tommy’s eyes were open and he was looking sleepily around.
Darby’s eyes were still closed. Her thumb was in her mouth, and her other hand was clenched around her favorite stuffed animal, a Winnie the Pooh that had been so “loved” its button nose had worn off.
Francine knelt down next to Tommy and held out her hand. “Hi, Tommy, I’m Francine.”
Tommy glanced up at his mom, who nodded. Tommy put out his hand and the two shook.
“Hi,” he said in a small, uncertain voice.
“Did you have a good nap?”
He nodded.
“You look very strong. I bet you can throw a ball pretty far.”
He smiled and nodded.
“What’s that, I wonder?” said Francine. She reached behind his head and pulled out a Nerf ball and held it up.
Tommy’s eyes popped out as she handed it to him. “Okay, give it a whirl.” She backed up and squatted down like a catcher.
Tommy sat up, rubbed the sleep from his eyes, looked at his mom, who nodded encouragingly, and got to his feet.
He wound up and threw the ball to Francine, who caught it and then shook her hand, pretended it was stinging. “Wow, you really can throw.”
She tossed it back to a beaming Tommy, who neatly caught it.
“Who you?”
They all looked up to see Darby awake and staring at Francine.
She rose, went over to Darby, and knelt down. “I’m Francine. And you’re Darby, right?”
She nodded, her thumb back in her mouth.
“I had a Winnie the Pooh just like that one, and you know what?”
“What?” mumbled Darby.
“He lost his nose, too.” Francine laughed and Darby looked at her Pooh and giggled.
Darby took her thumb out and said, “Pooh can’t schmell.”
“That’s okay. He can still see and hear, right?”
Darby nodded energetically.
“And he won’t have to smell stinky things.”
“Tommy stinky,” said Darby.
“Am not,” protested her brother.
“Well,” said Gibson. “I think she has you there, buckaroo.”
“Can I shake Pooh’s hand?” asked Francine.
Darby held him out.
Francine reached out and shook the bear’s hand and said, “Well, look at that. Did you know Pooh had this?”
Darby quickly sat up. “What?”
Francine held up a locket shaped like a heart.
“What dat?” asked Darby.
“It’s a locket. Do you know what you can do with it?”
Darby shook her head so vigorously that her pigtails flew around.
Francine opened the locket to reveal the compartment. “You can put a picture in here.” She glanced at Gibson. “Maybe of your mommy? And when you get older you can put the locket on a necklace, here like mine.” She showed Darby the one she had on. “And anytime you want to see your mommy, you just open the locket and there she is.”
Darby slowly took the locket and looked at her mom with excited eyes.
“We can pick out a picture to put in there,” said Gibson. “Maybe the one of both of us at your birthday party?”
Darby nodded, then she lay down, closed her eyes, and went right back to sleep.
As they walked out of the house later, Francine said, “Your kids are beautiful. You must be really proud.”
“I am most days, except when they’re fighting, won’t eat, or puke on me.”
“Motherhood in all its glory.”
Gibson said, “And you didn’t have to do that, Francine. The gifts, I mean.”
“A Nerf ball and a locket. Not all that much, really.”
“You looked like you’ve played catcher before.”
Francine looked both wistful and sad. “My brother. Harry never let him do any sports. He never let him do anything. So I found some balls and gloves when we were kids, and he would pitch to me in the backyard.”
“That’s really nice.”
“Sometimes it’s the little things.” She paused and added, “The little things, actually, were all we had.”
“The locket was a sweet idea.”
Francine fingered hers.
“Whose picture is in it?” asked Gibson.
When Francine looked at her, Gibson had wished she hadn’t asked the question.
“I never had a picture in it.” She paused and then added, “But maybe one day I will.”
A MONTH LATER FRANCINE WAS back in Williamsburg, in Gibson’s backyard, where the two women were watching Darby and Tommy playing. Agnes Langhorne sat in a wheelchair with her oxygen tank and seemed delighted with the kids’ antics. Doug sat next to his mother and seemed in better spirits than he had been. He had scattered Rochelle’s ashes over the lake; Francine had gone with him to lend her support.
Gibson and Francine were sitting on swings on a brand-new play set that Gibson had purchased with some of her finder’s fee. Part of the money had gone to fund the kids’ college accounts, and the rest had gone into the bank, until she decided what to do with it.
Francine had given half her finder’s fee to her brother. They had decided that Agnes would live with her son and that she would have round-the-clock care until the end. Francine had also provided funds to the other victims of Earl Beckett. And she and Gibson had both given monies to Sullivan’s niece to help her with her challenges.
As they slowly swung back and forth Gibson said, “Beckett and Enders did plea deals. But they’ll both die of old age in prison.”
“Hopefully, sooner rather than later,” remarked Francine.
“Sullivan is doing well and his sister has been avenged. He can just go on being a cop now, without having to move all the time to keep up with Beckett.”
“Nothing wrong with not staying in one place too long.”
“So does that mean you’ll be heading on soon?”
Francine glanced at her. “Why?”
“Just wondering. I was . . . sort of getting used to having you around.”
“You can go do anything you want, Mickey. Buy a big house. Travel the world.”
“All a little heady for a Jersey girl.”
“You can pull it off. You really can.”
“Not if the desire isn’t there.”
“So what is your desire, then?”
“You go first.”
Francine looked embarrassed. “I . . . I got through an entire day without writing something down in a notebook.”
“Hey, that’s progress.”
“The notebooks were important to me. The shrinks have a lot of fancy names for it. But it just came down to being afraid of losing the little I had.”
“They were also a wall for you, Francine.”
“What?”
“Your notebooks were a way for you to build a wall around yourself. And the different personas you used? That way no one could ever get to know the real you. And if they never knew the real you?”
“They could never hurt the real me,” Francine finished.
“Trust me, you’re not the only one who built walls or played roles because they were scared, or to keep from being hurt. You just took it to another level. But you had good cause to do so.”
“That does make sense.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask—how did you end up at Temple?”
“I wanted to get as far away from New Mexico as I could. And I’d been to Philly before, when I was a kid, before we went into WITSEC. I liked it. So I went there, and I got a job at the university. In the cafeteria.”
“Did you really serve me food?”
“I really did. But I looked a lot different back then.” She paused. “I guess I really became obsessed with you at that point, basketball star and all, and a girl on top of it. And when I found out you were in the drama program, it was like it was an omen. I mean, I had always dreamed of being a famous actress. And here was my idol doing that very thing. I also went to all the home basketball games.” She shot Gibson a glance. “You were one vicious point guard.”
“Had to be. I was a lot shorter than most of the other gals. Did we interact at all in the theater?”
“I helped get you into costume, helped with the sets, that sort of thing. You were a great mentor to the other drama students. You just always seemed so put together. Never anxious about anything.”
“That was my best acting job because I was dying inside from nerves. Same on the basketball court.”
Francine shook her head. “Well, it never showed.” She paused. “And . . . you saved me once on campus.”
“What?”
“Some asshole attacked me late one night. Stupidly, I was there late by myself. The guy jumped me. He had my blouse halfway off when—”
“Oh my God. I drilled him in the face with a basketball. I was coming back from practicing three-pointers by myself in the gym. That was you? You ran off. And so did he.”
“I was scared and embarrassed and, I don’t know, just messed up. I left Temple right after that and reinvented myself, put those walls up, like you said. The intervening years sort of raced by.”
“Until you came back into my life.”
