The Portrait of Amélie

Gwen

We had called our supervisors at MoMa again and they gave us the go for Kansas. We changed our flight to go to Kansas instead of New York. We took a cab to LAX and we didn't have to wait long. A three-hour flight later we landed in Kansas. It was still daytime so we found directions to the library. It was a five-minute walk from the Garden City Town Square and we made it just in time.

We stepped up the towering coffee-tinted building that said Garden City Library and ran up the stairs to go inside. Stanley told us to go inside and find a leather journal. He didn't tell us what was in it or why we needed it but we took the risk. We walked inside and found a couple of shelves with the title, 'Historical' right near the front. I searched down one side and Gwen walked down the other. I found exactly what I was looking for. It was an ancient-looking notebook that was leather and had a dusty, crumpled brown cover. I took it and concealed it in my backpack. I motioned to Scarlett and we started walking out quickly.

"Are y'all getting anything?" asked the librarian.

"Uhh no, we are just looking around," I said.

"Y'all should get somethin'," she intensely replied.

"Ummm, we don't want to check out a book, we just wanted to... uh... have some quiet," I replied. I could see that Scarlett was slowly inching away from me out of the corner of my eye.

"Well, then y'all should get out because you are causing a ruckus!" The librarian yelled.

Wide-eyed and shaking our heads we raced out the door.

"Geez you're a terrible liar," Scarlett said to me as we skipped down the stairs.

"Okay sorry, I can't help it. But I got the notebook so let's get out of here."
I pulled out the notebook and began to read it. In black ink, the entry read: 'May 24th, 1920, I have just sold a beautiful painting that was created by Jacques Reese to a buyer in Nebraska and I'm on my way back to Mississippi. I have just gotten on a train and I'm halfway through Oklahoma. The buyer has a shop in Louisiana where he will be selling the painting for a high price.

The ink was faded and the handwriting was hard to make out. Someone had clearly planted it there. It was definitely someone's personal property. I handed it to Scarlett and she flipped through it, intensely reading.

A bit later, she said, "Okay I think I got something."

"What?"

"The guy who wrote this is named Andrew Murray. He sold it to a guy named Theodore Nichols, he was a famous art collector in the 20s. Now I say we catch a train to Nebraska, and I do some research on this Nichols guy. We're getting somewhere," She explained.

I sat and stared at her. She stared back. In unison, we got up and left the shop.

We were in Nebraska by dawn. On the train, Scarlett had discovered through an art blog that Theodore Nichols died in 1952 of a heart attack. He had one living relative. Richard Nichols. He was also an art collector and inherited his grandfather's gallery.

We were in Franklin where the gallery was located and found a hotel. In the morning, after a solid 6 hours of sleep, we went downstairs and asked the man at the front desk for a phone book.

We found what we were looking for. There was something odd about the number. We headed to our hotel room and called the number. It wasn't the area code for Franklin. It was the personal number of Richard Nichols. There was also a number for the art gallery which we had ready as a backup.

I called the number and put it on speaker.

"Hello?" said a voice that I could tell the person was trying to disguise.

"Hi, we're looking for a Mr. Nichols?"

"Why exactly?" He replied.

"We need to talk to him about a missing item that was sold at his gallery and then transferred to a museum."

"Ok. Meet me in Barnard Kansas. I think I might have what you are looking for Gwen and Scarlett."

And then he hung up. Questions filled our brains, but silence filled the hotel room. 

Author Note:

Hellooo. This part was a little late but I hope you enjoy it. If you like it please vote on it (or not if you don't want to) It would mean a lot to me.