There was a monstrously French gilt instrument, another black-lacquered, and one of walnut. “The Bechstein has the nicest tone,” she said, indicating the walnut instrument.
Stone sat down and played a few chords, then struck individual keys high and low. “Very nice. Needs a tuning.”
“That can be done immediately.”
They walked back into the first room, and Stone picked a few objets d’art and a pair of mahogany wastebaskets.
“I think that will do,” Stone said. “I’ll need your eye to style the room, too, and I’ll need you to take away what’s there. You can sell it or junk it.”
“Where is all this going?”
“Couple of hundred yards down the street, there are a pair of oak doors guarding a mews. In the mews house, please.”
He looked at his watch. He gave her the street number. “How long?”
“By four o’clock,” she said.
“How much for everything?” he asked.
She sat down at a desk and began flicking through her notes, tapping numbers into a computer. “I’ll give you a bulk discount,” she said, and named a number.
“Done,” he said.
“Shall I call the piano tuner?”
“Please.” He gave her his business card and wrote down his cell number. “I’ll be waiting,” he said.
“Not for long,” she replied, accepting his AmEx card.
47
Stone stood in the mews and shook Chey Stefan’s hand. “I want to thank you for doing such a beautiful job, and for doing it so quickly.”
“It was my pleasure,” Chey said, “and I thank you for your business.” She got into the moving van containing the former living room furnishings and drove away. The guards closed the big doors behind her.
Stone walked into his new living room and looked around. The furniture, the pictures, the books, and the fresh flowers Chey had brought as a gift made the place feel as if he had always lived there. He sat down at the newly tuned Bechstein grand and began to play an old Irving Berlin song, “All Alone,” that he particularly loved.
“Freeze,” someone behind him said.
He froze. Someone had got past the guards.
“Who are you,” she asked, “and what have you done with Stone Barrington?”
Stone turned slowly to find Holly in a firing stance, a handgun held in front of her with both hands. “Welcome home,” he said.
Holly lowered the gun slowly. “What the hell is going on here? This place is completely different from the one I left this morning.”
“Nicer, isn’t it?”
She looked around. “Well, yes, it’s a lot nicer.”
“I just rearranged the furniture.”
“You did a lot more than that. There wasn’t a grand piano in this room when I left.”
“By rearranged, I meant that I moved the old furniture out and the new furniture in.”
Holly came and sat next to him on the piano bench. “Another thing,” she said, “how did you learn to play the piano in a single day?”