Mercury Rising

“Not quite,” Jane said dryly. “My guess is that this is the real thing.”

“The real thing. How so?”

Jane gestured toward the gazing balls that gleamed among the cosmos along her front walk. “Those you can find in just about any garden shop. They’re made of a single layer of glass treated with some sort of transparent opalescent paint.”

“And this?”

“It’s an old technique. They would flow real mercury between two layers of glass. They don’t make them like that anymore, though. They haven’t in decades.” Jane had read about such treasures in the various books on rare glassware she kept in her store. She couldn’t resist. She had to know for certain. “Here. Hold these a minute, will you?” She handed her mother her keys and her small purse. Then she knelt and oh-so-carefully slipped her fingers beneath the vase.

“Yes.” She grinned.

“Yes, what?” Virginia demanded.

“I can feel the stopper underneath. They would have to use a stopper, to hold in the mercury.” She lifted it. “And it’s heavy. Mercury is heavy. That means it still has its original filling.”

Her mother was frowning at her. “It’s filled with real mercury?”

“That’s right. And that’s very rare. Most of the old pieces like this have been drained, with reflective paint injected in the mercury’s place.”

“Better not drop it,” her mother said warily. “Just what we need. Mercury all over the place.”

“I’m not going to drop it.” So beautiful, Jane thought. She stood again, carefully, cradling the precious vase close to her body.

“Who could have left it here, do you think?” Virginia was intrigued—and suspicious, too.

Jane shrugged and made a noncommittal noise, evading her mother’s question, coming perilously close to telling a lie.

Because she knew very well who had left it there. If she closed her eyes, she could see him now, walking backward down the walk, the sun gleaming golden in his hair, reaching out to brush those long fingers across one of the shining globes tucked among the flowers.

“Jane?” her mother prompted. “I asked who would leave something like this on your front porch.”

Jane considered telling her mother the truth. But it would only be inviting more questions—not to mention an excess of outraged noises at the very idea that Cade Bravo would dare to offer expensive gifts to Virginia Elliott’s only daughter.

She settled for shrugging again. “Open the door, Mom. Let’s go inside and I’ll make our lunch.”

Chapter Five

J ane set the golden vase carefully on the narrow table near the front door.

“It must be valuable,” Virginia said.

“Yes, I’m sure it is.”

They both stood back for a moment, admiring it. It reflected light so beautifully, with the shiny golden surface—veined in places, after years and years—and that layer of quicksilver trapped beneath. It seemed almost magical, managing somehow to be opaque and transparent and reflecting all at once. It was all curves, too, distorting in a fascinating way what it mirrored, so that, staring into it, Jane’s entry hall became a strange and fantastical otherworldly place.

“And you don’t know who left it on the front mat?” Her mother sent her a quizzing, narrow-eyed look.

Jane made another noncommittal sound.

“That means you know, but you’re not telling,” said Virginia, her tone accusing now.

Jane gave her mother a smile. “Lunch will only take a few minutes. Let’s go on in the kitchen.”

They ate at the oak table by the bay window. Twice more, Virginia tried to pry from her daughter the name of the person Jane believed had left the vase. Finally Jane decided she’d had enough.

“Mom, by now you must have gotten the message that I don’t want to go into this. I’d appreciate it if you’d just leave the subject alone.”

“Well, but why wouldn’t you want to talk about it? It makes no sense that you’d be so touchy about something like this.”

“If I’m touchy, it’s because I’ve asked you to let the subject drop—and you haven’t.”

“But—” Virginia began, and then had the grace to cut herself off. She shook her head and conceded in a thoroughly wounded tone, “Well, all right. I won’t say another word about it.”

“Thank you. More iced tea?”

“Yes. I suppose. One more glass.”

Virginia left about a half hour later, with a bouquet of blood-red roses and three grocery bags, one each of tomatoes, string beans and zucchini. Jane felt marginally guilty loading her poor mother up with all those vegetables. There were only the two of them, her mother and her father, at home now, after all. And her father rarely showed up to sit down to dinner with his wife.

Clifford Elliott was district judge and he sat on the boards of various trusts and charities. And then there were all the organizations he belonged to, the Masons and the Knights of Columbus, to name just two. Both he and Virginia liked to say that he “kept very busy.” The fact that he was away so much and didn’t share his wife’s bed when he finally did come home was one of those things that simply wasn’t talked about.

Virginia said, “Belinda’s coming Wednesday.” Belinda was her housekeeper. “I can share some of these beautiful vegetables with her. And I’ll make some zucchini bread. It freezes well.” Jane helped her mother carry it all out to the car.

The Porsche was back again. Cade must be home. Good. She had a thing or two to say to him. She kissed her mother’s cheek and stood waving as Virginia drove off.

Once the Lincoln turned the corner, Jane headed for her house again. She marched up the walk, mounted the steps and went inside. The outer door closed automatically behind her.

Leaving the heavy oak inner door standing open, she went for the vase, which gleamed, breathtakingly beautiful, on her entry hall table to the right of the door. She paused, caught again by the absolute perfection of it as a gift meant specifically for her, for Jane Elizabeth Elliott.