Shadows Reel (Joe Pickett #22)(61)

Joe tried to keep his face still. But inside, he felt a mild electric jolt.

“Did he say what the treasure was?”

John opened his mouth to answer, but Connie cut him off. “He found out John here used to be a gold coin and collectibles dealer back in Pennsylvania. That got Bert really excited that night and he asked John if there was a market in World War Two memorabilia. He said his dad brought home some stuff from the war.”

“Like what?” Joe asked.

John waved his thick hand in the air dismissively. “Most people think that crap is worth a lot. You know, medals, helmets, that kind of crap. But that stuff is a dime a dozen. Our boys brought back mountains of it and it isn’t exactly rare at all. I showed Bert where a German steel helmet was for sale on the internet for two hundred bucks, is all. Medals and that kind of memorabilia goes for even less. Hell, you might make more melting that stuff down than trying to sell it as is.”

Joe let him go on.

John said, “What I told him didn’t even faze Bert. He said what he had was special and worth a ton of money. He was convinced of it. He said he’d prove it to me. I told him there were swap meets and conventions where all that stuff gets exchanged, and that it was all low-rent even all these years later. People who collect Nazi memorabilia are a strange bunch, I’d say.

“So the next time we were in here drinking a lot, he pulls out a sheet of paper,” John said. “He’d been carrying it around with him for a while. I think he printed it off the internet. It was a news article saying that Hitler’s phone had sold at auction for a quarter-million dollars or something like that. I looked at the picture and said, ‘Bert, it has his name on it. Otherwise, it’s just an old phone.’ It was the name that was valuable, not the phone. I thought that would put Bert off, but it got him even more excited. He said that his ‘treasure’ had a name on it like that, but he wouldn’t tell me what it was.”

Joe knew what it was.

“Bert might have tried to contact some of those World War Two memorabilia places,” Connie said. “I think I heard him talk about it once. Like he was shopping this treasure around, maybe. But I never heard that it came to anything.”

“He sure never got rich,” John said. “He’s been adding to his tab the whole month.”

“Interesting,” Joe said, thinking about the implications of what he’d just heard. If Bert Kizer was contacting collectors, collectors might start reaching out to potential customers. And if the right customers had wanted the album desperately, perhaps they’d bypassed the dealer and come straight to the source.

He couldn’t wait to tell Marybeth.

“I thank you for your time,” Joe said to Connie and John. “But I better get going home.”

“Thank you for the beers,” Connie said. She reached out and caressed his shoulder. “Don’t be a stranger around here. I heard you were some kind of by-the-book Goody Two-Shoes, but you’re all right.”

“Connie . . .” John said, embarrassed.

“Thank you, I think,” Joe said. “Maybe I do need to get out more often.”

He handed them one of his cards. “If you think of anything else, please give me a call. My cell phone number is written on the back. I’ll pass any information you give me along to the sheriff for his investigation.”

“I don’t think that sheriff could find his ass with both hands,” John said.

Joe didn’t comment.

As he passed by the billy-goat man, Joe patted him on the shoulder. “Thanks.”

The man swiveled on his stool and leaned into Joe. He said, “If this is about that Nazi photo album Dick Kizer brought back, I seen it.”

“What?”

“I seen it.”

Joe froze. The man spoke in a low tone so that the Sheftics couldn’t overhear. As Joe leaned in, the stench of alcohol and fetid breath was almost overwhelming.

“I ain’t talking in here where certain people can hear me. Go outside and I’ll follow you.”

Joe agreed and went out the door. He lingered on the wooden sidewalk porch and leaned a hip into the hitching post rail. It was cold and he crossed his arms for warmth.

A moment later, the billy-goat man came out. He didn’t wear a coat and he swayed from side to side as he spoke.

“I knew Vern Dunnegan, too,” the man said. He was referring to the game warden who had preceded Joe in the district years before. “Vern used to look at things a different way than you. He was a good guy. You ran him off.”

“Actually, I didn’t,” Joe said. “He resigned on his own. But what is it you wanted to tell me? Who are you?”

“Quinton Thirster. I’ve been around here a long time.”

Joe had heard of him. He’d been a notorious deer and elk poacher who had spent time in prison. Thirster was infamous in the valley for cutting a Jeep in half with a chainsaw after a divorce settlement with his ex-wife.

“Dick invited me out there once and we ate scrambled eggs and calves’ brains on Nazi plates,” Thirster said. He wriggled his fingers around in the air as if tracing an oval.

“Little swastikas all around the rim of the plate. It was crazier than hell.”

“You’re not kidding, are you?” Joe said.

“I even looked through the album,” Thirster said. “I don’t remember much about it, except there was some photos of old Hitler himself. I can’t remember the name of the guy who owned it. Some Nazi big shot.”