“Danny did what?” Bess stared at Nancy, her eyes round in disbelief.
“I’m sure I saw him steal something from the library,” Nancy insisted as she zipped up her old faded jeans. The three friends were in their second-floor room, changing into old clothes before their first raku class. Overlooking a flowery meadow and a gray weathered barn, the room was quaint, with yellow floral wallpaper, ruffled curtains, and three twin beds. Bess had playfully taped each of the workshop name tags to the headboard of each bed.
George looked up from tying her sneakers, her face mirroring Bess’s skepticism. “Nancy, why would he bother stealing anything? He’s a resident here and free to use the library.”
Nancy tugged a brush through her hair. “I know what I saw, and maybe there’s a simple explanation for his stuffing papers inside his shirt.”
“Like he didn’t have a knapsack with him,” Bess suggested.
Nancy asked herself if she was jumping to conclusions. Her gut instinct said no. “It’s just something about that guy that bothers me,” she admitted lamely.
As the girls closed the door to their room, they remembered there was no lock. All of the rooms had only old-fashioned metal latches.
Their residence, called Meadow House, was just a short walk down the blacktop to the pottery studios. The road sloped down slightly toward the river. The main studio was a long building, only a few years old but designed to fit in with the architecture of the village. It had a sloping roof, many windows, and a broad entrance, with barnlike double doors that stood open to the light breeze.
Through a window Nancy caught a glimpse of the back of Theresa’s head. She was seated at a potter’s wheel with her back to the door. Students were gathered around her, and she looked engrossed in her job. Nancy knew she’d have to wait for lunch to talk to her.
Several outbuildings flanked the pottery studio. An open-sided shed stood on the side of the building farthest from the river and the trees. A brick chimney rose from the top of its tin roof. Sheltered by the roof, a large brick kiln stood on the concrete floor. The arched door of the kiln was open. As they drew near, Nancy could see it was empty, and the bricks lining the interior were lustrous and shiny.
Danny was standing in front of the kiln, talking to a few workshop participants. The rest of the class was gathered around a card table set up on the grass beneath the shade of some trees, talking to Danny’s assistant, Tom. Three long tables also hugged the shade of the trees and the overhang of the pottery studio roof. A few potter’s wheels had been moved into the yard, and a couple of women wearing workshop name tags were already at the wheels. Nancy, Bess, and George headed for the group at the card table.
“Ah, here they are, our last three stragglers,” Tom said with a welcoming grin. After asking them about their previous experience with clay, Tom assigned them to an appropriate group: Nancy and George found themselves at the novice table, while Bess joined the intermediate students. Danny started out with the novices, while Tom and Karen attended to the other students.
Danny pulled an old barrel up to the head of the table and straddled it. After they had all introduced themselves, he put the book at one end of the table. Little yellow Post-its flagged some of the pages. “You all might want to check out this book while we pass around workshop handouts. There are some wonderful examples of ancient Japanese tea bowls—mugs without handles,” he explained. “You’re going to concentrate on making small tea bowls for this workshop.” He tapped the stack of handouts on the table to straighten them out. “Everybody please take a set of these handouts. I copied material from sources in the library. Most of it is just general information, and for you beginners, the glaze recipes on the last two pages probably won’t be much use to you unless you continue working with clay.”
Grinning, Danny continued, “Don’t let all the technical info scare you off. But do read the historical background.”
As the handouts reached Nancy and George, George took one and nudged Nancy’s knee under the table. “See, that’s all he was doing,” she whispered. “Pulling together this stuff.”
“Probably,” Nancy admitted softly. But if George was right, why would Danny try to hide the papers in his shirt?
Before Nancy could give it another thought, Danny passed out balls of clay and demonstrated how to make simple pots by pinching out the ball of clay into a round tea bowl. He went around and helped the students get started, then left to talk to the intermediate and advanced groups.
Nancy was surprised at how quickly she got the hang of forming little pots. The process of pinching the clay took a lot of concentration, but it had a calming effect, and took Nancy’s mind off Danny. By lunch break she had finished three small tea bowls—all fairly even, and to her eye actually attractive.
“Isn’t this great?” Bess enthused as the three girls headed back up the road toward the farmhouse in which the dining area and communal kitchens were located. “I learned how to make some really cool-looking plates and tiles. Tell me, don’t you just love all this?”
George readily agreed as they sauntered up the road. “I’ve already read some of Danny’s material, and it is really amazing to learn how the high temperature of a kiln transforms the clay from basically mud to something that could last forever.”
“What’s wrong?” Bess asked as she noticed Nancy poking around in her bag.
“It’s no big deal,” Nancy replied. “I left my sunglasses in our room. I’ll run over to Meadow House and get them and catch up with you in a few minutes.”
Nancy doubled back to Meadow House. She jogged up the stairs and pushed open the door to her room. There was a faint whiff of jasmine in the air. Nancy sniffed, trying to remember where she’d smelled it recently. Before she could recall, she noticed a note pinned to her pillow.
She opened it and read aloud to herself, “‘Sorry I couldn’t talk to you this morning during the workshop, but there were too many people around. Meet me tonight during the after-dinner bonfire. I’ll be behind the pottery studio, near the woodshed. Come alone. Don’t let anyone see you. Thanks, T.’”
“T—” Nancy murmured, and then nodded. The scent of jasmine. Theresa had been wearing jasmine perfume on Sunday. The note was from Theresa, of course. And, of course, Nancy wouldn’t miss meeting her tonight for the world, if for no other reason than to find out why she was acting so mysterious.
Hugging the shadows that evening, Nancy crept along the side of the pottery studio, her head bent low. From behind her she could hear the voices of the crowd gathered around the bonfire. Melinda and one of the other apprentices had pulled out guitars and were leading the group in a round of well-known folk songs. It was with some reluctance that Nancy had slipped away from the campfire. As she rounded the corner of the pottery studio, she studied the layout of the nearby sheds.
“Theresa?” she called softly, carefully peeking in through a back window. The studio seemed empty. An uncovered mound of white clay sat on a potter’s wheel just to the left of the window. A towel and apron were thrown over the seat of a chair in front of the wheel. Three unglazed bowls, their white clay still gleaming with moisture, were on a table next to the wheel. Whoever had been working inside obviously intended to return quickly. Nancy ducked away from the window, trying to distinguish the various shadowy outbuildings and sheds. “Theresa?” she called again, a little louder.
“Nancy?” Theresa responded softly, then joined Nancy beside the studio building. “I’m so glad you came.”
“Is anyone in there?” Nancy asked, indicating the studio.
Theresa shook her head. “I was. I had to get working on an order I took at the festival. Everyone else is at the bonfire—the weekly Wednesday ritual. It’s part of Ellie May’s rah-rah scene,” Theresa added, a faint edge to her voice.
“So what’s happening, Theresa?” Nancy asked. “Why didn’t you finish your e-mail to me the other night—the way it broke off midsentence was really weird.”
“Sorry. But my roommate walked in and I didn’t want her—or anyone—to see what I was about to write,” Theresa said apologetically.
“But you never returned my calls, either. I was getting worried. Did you get my messages?”
Theresa held up one finger. “Message—singular.” She shook her head. “Messages seem to disappear from the bulletin board. But I didn’t return the one call because I’ve been swamped. Also, problems with the computer-operated kilns cropped up the next day because of that big storm Sunday.”
Nancy nodded. “Yes. I heard about it. In fact, when I phoned you after you cut off your e-mail someone answered the phone, but then it went dead.” Then Nancy remembered the scream, but before she could ask about it, Theresa drew her closer.
“Nancy, I don’t want to get interrupted again. Why I needed to talk to you was this.” Theresa took Nancy’s hand and dropped in it what felt like a small bowl. “Careful, the edges are sharp. I didn’t want to file them in case I found more pieces, and in case they’re evidence.”
“Evidence?” Crouching close to the ground, Nancy held the bowl in the patch of light from the window. It was a beautifully shaped, heavy-walled pottery tea bowl—more like half a tea bowl. The outside had a pale glaze, though Nancy couldn’t make out the exact color in the dim light. Several dark strokes of paint or glaze decorated one side of the bowl. To Nancy the paint strokes looked like some sort of Japanese or Chinese writing. “Evidence of what, Theresa?”
Theresa didn’t answer directly. Hunkering down next to Nancy, she propped her elbows on her knees. “I went for a swim in the river about ten days ago to get away from, well, the scene here.”
Nancy tried to read Theresa’s face in the dark. From the few hints Theresa had just dropped, plus Jonathan’s and Danny’s jealous reactions to her, Nancy was pretty sure Theresa was having a hard time socially in the village.
Theresa sighed, then went on in a more businesslike tone. “I came across a pile of pottery shards, where the weeds are thick along the riverbank. I guess I was curious about how they got there, since it’s a good half-mile walk from the studios. So I tied them in my towel and took them back to the village. That night I washed them off and was pretty shocked by what I’d found. Check out the cracks in the glaze surface, and the way it looks very worn.” Theresa ran her finger down the pot’s surface, tracing a fine web of lines. “I couldn’t believe it. This looks like a very valuable seventeenth-century raku pot.”
“That old?” With awe, Nancy fingered the pot fragment in her hand. “Here? How?”
“My thoughts exactly. It didn’t make sense. So I glued them together carefully. Don’t look worried—I used a special glue that can be dissolved with the proper solvent and won’t injure the shards.”
“Who would throw something like this in the river?”
“No one, intentionally. Not if it’s the real thing,” Theresa said. “Sometimes pieces turn up and no one alive knows how valuable they are. There is that possibility …” Theresa’s voice trailed off.
“I hear a big but in your voice,” Nancy said, sitting back on her heels.
Theresa smiled wanly. “A very big but, Nancy. I’m now sure the pot is a fake. A counterfeit raku piece—a masterful copy, but still a copy. I’m almost sure of that!”
Nancy eyeballed the pot again, then told Theresa about her investigations on the Internet.
“I’ve heard about that,” Theresa told her. “And the problem is even bigger than just raku pots. All types of Asian ceramics—Korean, Chinese, Japanese—are being counterfeited, and beautifully, I might add. It takes a real expert to tell the difference between the fakes and the real thing.”
“What in the world motivates someone who can make such a good fake to turn to counterfeiting?” Nancy wondered.
“Money, what else?” Theresa answered.
“It just seems like cheating yourself,” Nancy said. “As well as all the people who pay incredible money for fakes.”
“This is a serious problem, and it is considered a major crime,” Theresa said. “It’s fraud, and whoever’s doing this can be facing serious jail time.”
Nancy cautiously asked, “Do you have any idea who could be doing it?”
Slowly Theresa nodded. “Yeah, I have my suspicions. Danny could have made this raku piece. He’s pretty good at Chinese and Japanese calligraphy, like the kind used here. But he couldn’t possibly pull off the other ceramic fakes featured online. They are too refined—more than one potter must be involved, and I have a good idea who—”
A movement at the corner of her eye made Nancy look up. She clamped a hand over Theresa’s mouth and pointed behind the potter. Light pouring out of the studio’s side windows cast a skinny shadow against the wall of a shed. Nancy couldn’t tell if it belonged to a man or a woman. She signaled for Theresa to keep quiet.
Half holding her breath, Nancy crept beneath the back window of the studio before straightening up. Motioning again for Theresa to freeze, she edged toward the corner of the building. Bracing herself with one hand against the clapboards, she peered around the side in time to see a lanky figure melt into the shadows between a woodpile and the kiln shed.