Mad About You

structurally sound seemed like the bright spot of the day until Ladden reached the bottom of the report. The inspector had noted with an asterisk that considering the results of interviews with surrounding retailers, he doubted that an earthquake had actually occurred. Meanwhile, his agent had called the state seismology department.
    "Filing a false claim will get you in a heap of trouble, son," Saul said sternly over the phone. "Come on, Ladden, don't try to pull the wool over my eyes with some fake quake—it's too damn easy to trace." Then the man's voice softened. "If you're in trouble, busting up your place isn't the way to handle it. I'm sure your uncle Ernie would float you a loan."
    "I'm telling you, it was an earthquake," Ladden said through clenched teeth.
    "Then why doesn't the seismology department have a record of it, and why did no one else feel it?"
    "I don't know," Ladden said. "Wait—there was someone else, a homeless man who wandered in from the street."
    "Do you know this man?"
    Ladden sighed in frustration. "No, and even if I could find him, he acted senile."
    "I see," Saul said dubiously. "Well, I'm telling you, the claim will be denied if you insist on turning in this cockamamie story about an earthquake."
    "Are you saying you want me to lie?" Ladden asked, his voice rising in anger.
    "Look, son, you haven't filed a claim in fifteen years and you always pay your premiums on time. I'm trying to help you out. Think hard about what really happened and call me tomorrow."
    Ladden listened to the dial tone for a few seconds, then raised the phone over his head, ready to fling it against the wall. But he stopped there—he couldn't afford to buy a new phone. He set the instrument gently on the table, then mouthed every curse word he knew, and made up a few of his own.
    Glancing at his watch, his spirits lifted a notch. Jasmine would be back within an hour, and he had made progress in the cleanup. Of course, he noted in one of the few unbroken mirrors, he was now wearing most of the store's grime. He banged his hat on his leg, stirring up another dust cloud, then trudged back through the storeroom toward his shower. He'd promised to stop by the family tavern to help celebrate a cousin's birthday, so he needed to be presentable, he reasoned. Cleaning up didn't have anything to do with Jasmine coming back.
    He showered quickly and pulled on the only spare clothes he had at the shop—worn jeans and a dark red flannel shirt that was missing a button, and low-heeled black boots. With his pocketknife, he dug dirt from beneath his fingernails until they stung, then scrubbed his knuckles raw with an old toothbrush. He needed a haircut, he concluded as he fought to tame the dark curls that seemed determined to flip up around his ears and collar. Rubbing his whisker-shadowed chin, he longed for a razor, but his makeshift toiletries bag was not so obliging. It did, however, furnish a travel-size bottle of musky cologne that had been popular a decade ago. He unscrewed the lid and took a whiff. Not bad, he decided, and splashed on a few drops. But, when he surveyed the results of his labor in the tarnished mirror, his shoulders dropped. Jasmine Crowne would never be interested in someone like him.
    On his way back through the storeroom, he paused to admire the rug and wave the remaining butterflies toward an open window. Then he scratched his temple. He could have sworn he'd left the rug draped over those old trunks, and now it lay a few feet away, stretched smoothly across the massive table he was holding for Jasmine. Oh well, he'd moved everything in the store at least once today. It must have slipped his mind.
    The front showroom looked brighter and shinier, although a little bare to his eyes. At least he'd found the lid to the copper lamp Jasmine had become so enamored of. He lifted the piece from the counter, impressed at how well it had turned out. Even the dents seemed less noticeable in the lustrous glow of the restored finish. The etchings on the side were in some kind of foreign language—probably the family's name, he mused. Or a recipe for disaster. He'd certainly had enough trouble since he brought the lamp home—and that rug. Then a thought struck him. Was it possible the copper lamp and the rug had originated from the same household?
    He grabbed a scrap of paper and copied the letters and symbols on the lamp in case the woman who came to value the rug would find the information useful. He had just