A Christmas Present

I don't usually go to garage sales. Not my thing at all. But this Saturday I was staying with a friend who was a garage sale devotee. So there I was, wandering around some strangers' uninspiring outer-suburban garage, when I spied it. It was a sculpture, made of old rusty metal, pieces of flat iron welded to odd shapes like bicycle tyres and pieces of nondescript agricultural equipment. It had the kind of outward form of a figure, about eight feet tall with a head that could best be described as avian. There was only one word to describe it, hideous. Pieces of rusty iron welded together and trying but failing to imitate a statue. Standing in the corner looking at it I thought about my mother-in-law. Victoria was one of those society women, full of pretensions to an upper class lifestyle. And I had never measured up to the sort of daughter in law that her precious son deserved. Everything from my cooking skills to my family's professional status were reasons for criticism. I hated her, passionately but secretly. So as I looked at it a plan began to formulate in my head.
"How much for the rusted iron thing in the corner", I asked the garage owner.
"It belonged to my mother," he replied. "She though very highly of it. I could not let it go for under, say, ten dollars."
"Ha!" I sneered. "It's all rusty. And I bet the dump will only give you about five for the metal. And it will cost you to take it there. I'll give you $5, not a penny more."
"Done!" was his response, "provided you get it out of here today."
My friends very kindly brought the metal heap to my home in their trailer, and left me with it standing upright in the corner of my garage. I hurried upstairs and in no time was googling away looking for something that looked a bit like my heap of welded metal. It took a while, but eventually I found a sculptor who did welded metal statues. I studied his signature then printed a copy of it out. Armed with this paper I went back to the garage. Geoffrey, my husband, being off on his usual golfing Saturday, he was not around as I rummaged through his tools. I finally found an engraver, and with more skill than I had expected I forged the signature on the sculpture at eye level, where it could not be missed. By the time Geoffrey came home that evening, the statue was already wrapped in bubble wrap with an outer coating of Christmas paper. I told Geoffrey it was our Christmas present for his mother. Something extra special. In his usual lazy way he accepted this. To him it just meant that he would not have to worry about a present for his mother, again, this Christmas.
Come Christmas Eve, Geoffrey complained as he struggled to get the present into the station wagon. In the end it hung over the back of the car with a red handkerchief hanging off it.
"I hope it's worth all this trouble," Geoffrey grunted as he worked at getting it out of the car.
"Oh, it is," I smiled sweetly as he wheeled it on a trolley to the back garden. "Put it there in the centre of the patio. Victoria can come outside to unwrap it."
And that she did, at ten o'clock on Christmas day morning.
"Oh," she cooed breathlessly. "Oh. Thank you Geoffrey. It's magnificent."
She walked around it lovingly trailing her fingers along the rusted metal curves. She looked at my forged signature. "It's a Devi! How could you have afforded it?"
I looked at Geoffrey. His mouth hung open as he looked at the rusting monstrosity. Shutting it hastily, "Nothing is too good for my mother," he said, without a trace of irony in his voice.
"But a Devi! Why it must be worth at least $40,000." She was hugging him now.
"Nothing is too much," he said, echoing what he had said before.
I just stayed out of it all together, enjoying my moment of triumph. "There" to Victoria's pretentiousness. "There" to Geoffrey's laziness. Christmas had a glow to it that I had not experienced for many years. The food tasted better, the wine was more delectable. At the end of the day I floated home on a cloud of euphoria.
Boxing Day was Victoria's traditional soiree, a languid luncheon with copious quantities of champagne, turned on for her snobby friends. We were among about forty invitees. Most of them stayed indoors, but some came out from time to time to admire the statue. I stood around it, enjoying their ridiculous pretend art conversations about the chunk of rusted iron. One man, an elderly, mild looking fellow with a little goatee walked around the statue several times, looking at it closely. He caught my eye and came over to me.
"What do you think of Victoria's new statue?" I asked, looking as innocent as a new born babe.
"Yes, well," he said looking me in the eye. "I've seen a few Devi sculptures in my time."
I gulped, waiting for the punchline, that Victoria had been fooled.
"It's funny," he went on, "but this is the first one of his sculptures I've ever seen that he has signed twice." He indicated my forgery, and a second identical signature near the base. "Must be one of his greatest works. Perhaps he was so proud of it he wanted to be sure we would not miss his name. Usually he just signs down near the base. But see here he has written his name where no-one could miss it. This one must be worth at least $50,000. What a generous son Victoria has."