Free Faux Reel (Imogene Museum Mystery #5) by Jerusha Jones Page A

basement, I’ve been adding as much as I can.
    But the only database Rupert uses is his own brain and a wall full of four-drawer filing cabinets in his office. When Rupert said we ’d dig through the files, what he really meant is first we’d spelunk through his clutter, then we’d try to figure out his filing system, then maybe we’d start sorting through files. Mentally, I rearranged my calendar for the rest of the week to allow for the time this process would take.
    Technically, Rupert would qualify as a hoarder. The problem is the haphazard mounds that have swallowed his office furniture include everything from letters to Meriwether Lewis signed by Thomas Jefferson to the crust of yesterday ’s tuna sandwich. I can’t just order a dumpster parked beneath his second-floor windows and start tossing his junk overboard because too much of it is of historical or artistic value. Most of what’s in his office is his personal collection, but he’s also the inheritor and — until I came along — keeper of the Imogene’s records.
    The best thing I could do was try to prod Rupert ’s memory while we were bushwhacking a trail toward the filing cabinets.
    “ Was Cosmo your uncle?” I called as I stacked a couple boxes.
    “ No.” Rupert’s voice was muffled by the object he was wrestling — was it a cowhide? His upper half was hidden by something hairy and floppy. He was struggling to tuck its irregular edges into a neat roll.
    “ What is that?” I asked.
    “ Commemorative calfskin from the 1911 Pendleton Roundup. Cosmo was my dad’s cousin, somewhat removed, not sure how far.”
    “ Literally or figuratively removed?”
    “ Both. He was from the California branch, but the family moved here soon after he was born. Raised here, but lit out for the big city — New York first then Los Angeles, if I remember correctly — as soon as he could. This is not first-hand knowledge, mind you, but Cosmo was the source of many back-of-the-hand stories in my family. Adults regularly rolled their eyes and commented on his troubles in terms us kids weren’t supposed to understand.”
    “ He ever come back to visit?” I shifted a pile of yellowed newspapers onto a packing crate.
    “ Whenever he needed money. Hence the eye-rolling.”
    “ Did he get what he wanted?” I quickly flipped through the newspapers. The Paris Peace Accords dominated the headlines.
    “ Probably. He was a smooth talker. Always up to some scheme or other.”
    “ But he had plenty of funds if he could donate so much along with the painting. $85,000 was a lot forty years ago — it’s a lot now.”
    “ Maybe one of his rackets paid out.” Rupert grunted as he rolled a smooth, oblong piece of driftwood the shape of a giant pickle out of the way. He balanced a bulging expandable file folder on top of the chunk of wood and brushed his hands together as if it was a great accomplishment.
    I wrinkled my nose but refrained from asking what Rupert ’s plans for the log had been. Instead, I ducked back to my task — a shoebox that had split and spilled its postcard collection. “Cosmo doesn’t seem like the philanthropic type.”
    “ Nope,” Rupert huffed. “I do remember Dad’s astonishment at the donation. But Cosmo had borrowed enough money from the family over the years, maybe he considered it a form of repayment.”
    “ Did you — or your father — get the impression Cosmo was wrapping up loose ends with the donation?”
    “ Couldn’t tell you. I was away at college then. I knew the museum would be my responsibility one day, but you know—” Rupert stopped to grin around the unlit Swisher Sweets cherry cigar he’d clamped between his teeth as fortitude against our monumental task. “I might have had other things on my mind at the time. If I remember correctly, her name was Ruby.” He frowned and scratched his ear. “Or was that Celeste?”
    I bent quickly and rummaged in a crate of paper mache dragon masks to hide my surprise —