Catherine and the Hidden Treasure

By Chris T. Larsen

In 1941, Catherine Sorensen is a receptionist at the New York accounting firm where her father works. She feels great about her life. Jobs like hers are hard to come by for young women as the Great Depression lingers on. Catherine wants to be professional, but then, she meets the son of one of the firms wealthiest clients.

Robert Collins is dashingly handsome and charming. She falls for him immediately but is sure she will never see him again. Furthermore, their relationship is doomed due to their different social classes. Imagine Catherines surprise when Robert shows up at her house a few days later, and they fall in love.

Before they can get married, Robert must serve overseas in World War II. During his absence, he has given Catherine a puzzle. Somewhere, he hid $20,000 that will be theirs to share as husband and wife. She is supposed to find it before his return, but what turns into a game becomes a refining fire that shapes the rest of Catherines life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jun 27, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491736937

Chris T. Larsen

Chris T. Larsen completed a thirty-year civilian career as an analyst for the U.S. Air Force in April of 2012. He is now a CPA. Chris and his wife, Debbie, have three children, four grandchildren, and live in Layton, Utah. He is also the author of Real Love.

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Copyright © 2010, 2014 .

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Certain characters in this work are historical figures, and certain events portrayed did take place. However, this is a work of fiction. All of the other characters, names, and events as well as all places, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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ISBN: 978-1-4917-3691-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-3692-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-3693-7 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014910270

iUniverse rev. date: 06/13/2014

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 1

Mother, are you really sure you’re up to going with us this year? my fifty-five-year-old daughter, Linda, asked me as she stood just inside my apartment door. She was flanked by her twin sons, my grandsons, both in their late twenties. I know you really can’t see that well, and we will be walking quite a bit, she went on. Don’t you think it might be too hard on you?

Now, no more of that, I replied as I pulled on my long wool coat and then hat and gloves. I wouldn’t miss this for the world, and no one is going to talk me out of it.

All right, Linda sighed with a relenting smile. If you’re game, so are we. Guys, each of you take one of Grandma’s arms, and let’s be on our way. And off we went.

I’ve always believed New York City is the most enchanting place in the world at Christmastime. I will readily acknowledge, however, that I may be a little partial. During my eighty years of life, there have been only perhaps five Christmases that I haven’t seen the city festively adorned in endless strands of colorful lights, draped like scintillating diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and sapphires across a grand and gracious lady’s neck and chest. Oh, how many times I have delighted in the splendor of an evening on the town in New York just before Christmas. I’ve never grown weary of it in the slightest.

Of course I knew that my city yuletide rendezvous this year wouldn’t be quite the visual feast it had been in the past. I had tripped on my apartment stairs a few months earlier, fallen forward, and struck my head on the hard tile floor at the bottom. The result was that, though I did have days when I could recognize familiar faces, see colors, and find my way around without too much trouble, there were others when everything that emitted light had a blurry halo around it, and double, or just dim, shadowy vision was my visual state for the day. And the problem wasn’t correctible for me, because it was brain circuitry that had been damaged rather than my eyes. Fortunately, I was having one of my better seeing days when my night on the town arrived. But even if I hadn’t been, I would have still gone. As soon as Linda invited me a few days earlier, I had set out my hat and gloves, eagerly awaiting a joyful experience with my dearest loved ones.

Our first stop was to bask in the majesty of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center. Then came a horse-drawn carriage ride through Central Park, driven by a bright-eyed, fair-skinned woman with pitch-black hair, wearing a long woolen coat and an English bowler hat. Her long braid reached all the way to her leather seat and seemed as much an essential part of her appearance as her horse’s tail did of his. I’d discovered long ago that my senses were never more alive than when being regally carried through the New York holiday frenzy to the rhythm of a magnificent Clydesdale’s hooves clopping against the pavement.

Our next stop was Macy’s department store, where we purchased a few last-minute gifts and enjoyed a charming display of Santa’s elves in varying stages of toy production. After that, we were off to Rossini’s for hot cocoa and glazed donuts. There, I truly had the chance to enjoy my beloved, corn-silk-blond grandsons, one a planner for the city and the other a tax accountant. But it was finally time for an old woman to kiss her precious posterity good night and call it an evening—well, almost time.

As we were wrapping up such a delightful outing, I hoped that I wasn’t imposing too much on Linda and her boys by asking if they would indulge me with just a bit more of their time. I wanted to stop at Grand Central Station for a few minutes before we returned to my apartment. Perhaps they thought it a mite odd that after they helped me to a bench, I asked if I could have ten minutes alone there. But whether they thought it odd or not, they graciously obliged me. Then, as soon as I was by myself, I looked up in the direction of the big clock that had hung overhead years earlier, and I turned back the hands of time nearly seventy years to a bright day at this very place.

It was June 1, 1945—three weeks after President Harry Truman and England’s Winston Churchill had declared V-day, or Victory Day, to signify the end of World War II in Europe. The scene at the train station that day was one of ineffable jubilation. Hundreds of happy young soldiers streamed out of train coaches and into the arms of sweethearts and families after years of longing and fearful separation. I’m sure you’ve seen that famous picture from the cover of Life magazine where the sailor is kissing a nurse in the middle of Park Avenue with thousands of people celebrating around them. A similar scene was taking place that June day at the train station. It was also the reason I was there—to celebrate the arrival of a dearly beloved young soldier who was returning safely from war. But before I go on, please allow me to share a bit about myself and what led to my being at the train station that day.

My name is Catherine Sorensen, and I was born August 3, 1924. Both of my parents were of Scandinavian ancestry. My father wanted to name me Katrina, a common Danish name, but my mother was concerned that it would be mispronounced or make people think we were more European than American. The result of their negotiations was that my name would be Catherine. I came into the world the younger sister of one other child, Oliver, nicknamed Olly and three years my elder. My mother was a stay-at-home mom as most moms were in those days, while my father, a young and aspiring stockbroker, rode the train into Manhattan each day from our home on Staten Island.

There were a lot of good things that happened during my childhood. The year I was born, Zenith put the first fully-assembled portable radio onto the market. By the time I turned three in 1927, America’s favorite pastime was listening to the radio. That was also the year Charles Lindberg made the first transatlantic flight and the first talkie movie was released—The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson. The year I turned four, the Fleer company invented and started selling bubblegum. But even more significant, the stock market was returning nearly 50 percent annually to investors. This caused an investing frenzy, leading many people to take out loans to purchase stock since the borrowing rate was far below the average market return. Of course my father, being a broker, was in the thick of the investing and also a participant, though with some constraint. He was quite conservative by nature.

A few good things happened in 1929. The yo-yo was invented, and I nearly wore out the string on mine in a week, though I never got really good at it. Also that year, we listened to the radio as Babe Ruth hit his five hundredth home run. Not a bad year—that is, until October. Then life suddenly changed dramatically for so many.

Black Tuesday came—the day the stock market lost over a quarter of its value in one day. That day my father, along with many others, saw the value of their investments drop through the floor while still holding loans on the money they had invested. This commenced the Great Depression. Within a few months, my father had quit his job as a broker and fortunately found employment as an accountant with Myers and Goldberg of Manhattan. As a five-year-old, I didn’t really have a clue what the Depression was all about, but I did become aware of its effects as it continued over the next ten years. It was a difficult, sad time for our country, with soup lines and record unemployment. But let’s not rehash all that. During my life, I’ve learned it’s not good to look very far back. I wouldn’t even be looking back on my life now if I wasn’t sure you would be intrigued by it—by the mystery of it—the one incredible mystery of it. I’ll go on.

I turned eight in 1932 and was particularly happy about three things that came on the market that year and found their way into our home: Fritos corn chips, Skippy peanut butter, and Three Musketeers candy bars. The next year three other things happened that I enjoyed. The first drive-in movie theater opened, my mom bought our first box of a new product called Ritz Crackers, and a new soda pop came out that became a favorite among children, 7 Up. My childhood was fairly normal—measles, chicken pox, schoolgirl crushes, comic books, and cartoons were all integral parts of my world. Yes, through my early years many good things happened to me, though I must admit that none of them quite compared to what took place a few months before I turned seventeen.

My father had arranged employment for me as a receptionist at Myers and Goldberg, and I really loved the professional aura of an accounting firm. Reluctantly, I must admit that having such a prestigious job at that age made me a bit too big for my britches. Still, I never got too uppity before the reality would return that even my father wasn’t much more than a servant to the wealthy. We were never well-to-do, though we were comfortable. However, some of my father’s clients would have giggled if someone had referred to them as simply well-to-do. Some of them could have held money bonfires and hardly missed what went up in smoke. On one particular day, one of my father’s clients in that category strolled in and captured my attention. Well, actually, it wasn’t the client that overtook me so, but who was with him.

You must be Mr. Collins, I said as I greeted a man who seemed to radiate affluence in both dress and grooming. He was accompanied by a handsome younger male who appeared to be perhaps a little older than myself. I had never seen them before, but a Mr. Collins was scheduled for the three o’clock appointment with my father.

That would be me, and this is my son, Robert, the man offered cordially, removing his fedora and holding it in front of him in a gentlemanly fashion.

As I smiled at them, I was so happy that I just happened to be wearing my favorite dress that day: a navy-blue one, mid-calf length, with a white, lacy lapel. It set off my shoulder-length, honey-brown hair and seemed to fit my petite five-foot-four figure as if it had been tailored for me.

It’s a pleasure to meet you, I said before pressing the intercom button and announcing, Mr. Sorensen, Mr. Collins is here to see you. I then ushered them into my father’s office where they shook hands, and I left the room.

It was professional protocol not to refer to my father as Dad at the office. It was also similar protocol for me not to make eye contact with the clients as I left the room. But though my face was turned toward the door, I couldn’t keep my eyes from wandering in the direction of Mr. Collinses’s son, Robert. I was silently overjoyed to find that his eyes were following me out of the room. Perhaps I should have been embarrassed by his catching me looking at him, but I wasn’t. He was that handsome. It was worth the risk.

Robert Collins was of average height, about five foot nine, but little else seemed average about him. He had dark-brown, naturally wavy hair that made me think he could have been the model for Michelangelo’s David. He also had a strong, angular jaw and a nose so straight I was sure you could lay a ruler on it without even a tiny gap. But though he had many attractive features, the most intriguing of them were his eyes. It wasn’t so much their color, bluish-green, as it was that they were so alive and intelligent yet serene at the same time. He had the most attractive eyes I had ever seen.

As I returned to my desk, I kept the image of his face frozen in my mind and repeated over and over that he was the handsomest guy I had ever met. Of course I’d seen thousands of faces in my life and many of them handsome, so I had to stop and ask myself just why I found this one so unusually attractive.

Then I suddenly remembered how my grandma said she loved my grandpa’s face so much because it reminded her of her own face. She had a theory that people who belong together through divine providence often have similar features. She said it’s as if each person is subconsciously searching for the opposite gender version of their own face, like a bookend seeking its perfect complement. When I thought of that, I quietly slipped into the ladies’ room and, finding it empty, carefully examined my face in the mirror. Not really to my surprise, I could see that my nose, jaw, cheekbones, and even mouth were similar in shape to Mr. Collinses’s son, albeit in feminine version. Immediately I started thinking that we surely must be meant to be together. And then I laughed to myself.

What was I thinking? I had just met a guy and in fact really hadn’t even met him—hadn’t heard him speak one word—and yet my girlish imagination had us already standing before a preacher. How ridiculous! I told myself. What an imagination! And how had I even considered such a foolish notion knowing that extremely rich people tended to date only others of similar social refinement? So the odds that he would even speak to me were about as great as getting hit by a stray snowball in July. Having thus come to my senses, I went back to work, though I couldn’t help but let one parting thought about him pass through my mind. What a great-looking guy!

After spending about forty-five minutes with my father, Mr. Collins tipped his hat to me on the way out, and his son’s eyes again fixed on me as he passed my desk. I glanced at him for a split second but then stared at my appointment book so as not to appear forward or flirtatious. I had been taught that nothing drove a gentleman away faster than an aggressive female. But then I worried that he might mistake my properness as indifference. Then, once again, I came to my senses and acknowledged that I most likely would never see Mr. Collinses’s son again and any further thought about him was a waste of time. Good-bye, I said under my breath as I directed my father’s next client to his office.

The next evening around six thirty, I was sitting on my front-porch swing relaxing with our Scottish terrier, Rusty, curled up on my lap. Suddenly a brand-spanking-new, glossy, black 1940 Ford Coupe pulled up in front of the house. I had only seen a picture of one before and was very impressed with it. But I was absolutely stunned when I saw who climbed out of it—Robert Collins.

Uh, hello, I greeted him as I arose quickly, letting Rusty hop to the ground and straightening my dress and hair all in one swift motion. I think my father is in the living room. I’ll go get him for you, I said, rapidly turning about and heading toward the door.

Wait, he said.

I turned around to find myself fully basking in those radiant eyes of his.

I didn’t come to see your father … I came to see you … if that’s okay?

You came to see me? I asked, pointing to myself. I was actually suspicious that my imagination might be overriding his real words and inserting the words I would love to hear him say.

Yes, you, Catherine. He nodded as he offered a confident smile. May I sit down? he asked as he stepped up onto the porch and toward an old metal chair that had much of its paint worn off the seat and more than a little rust on it.

Oh, don’t sit there, I blurted frantically. At least not until I go get a towel to put on it so you don’t get your trousers dirty. But before I could leave, he was leaning back in the chair and resting his feet up on the porch railing.

No, this is fine, he said contentedly. It’s quite comfortable.

Oh, well, if you say so, I replied, sitting down on the two-seat swing that faced his chair and tucking my legs up under me. So is there something I can do for you? I asked, doing my best to sound calm while my heart raced as if I’d just been startled by the sudden appearance of a loose tiger.

Not really, he said, alternating glances between me and our elm tree that stood twice as high as our house.

A rope hung from one of the tree’s sturdy branches, holding a retired tractor tire that had been converted into a swing. I looked at it for a second and remembered how I used to wind it up really tight and then spin around until I was sick to my stomach. I almost had the same dizzy feeling now just looking at it.

I just … Well, when I saw you at your father’s office yesterday, I thought you were very pretty and hoped that you might be interested in getting to know me, Robert explained. So when we were leaving, I asked your father who you were, and he told me you were his daughter. Then I asked if it would be all right if I called on you, and he said it would be fine. Didn’t he mention it to you? He raised an eyebrow as he scratched behind an ear.

No, he didn’t. I shook my head. But that’s all right. I’m just glad you came by. Would you care for some lemonade? I asked, feeling I would settle down a bit if I could get up and move around.

That would be nice. He nodded politely as his smile melted my insides.

And it was nice. It was as I had thought it might be that day in the office. Within a very short time, I had the feeling that all of our pieces might just fit together perfectly—that he was the one for me and I the one for him. All my thoughts while examining my face in the office bathroom mirror hadn’t been so nutty after all. We really were a great match.

From that day on, my life became a happy fairy tale with Robert Collins as my handsome prince. And I soon learned that my prince was not your typical rich