“Be careful,” he muttered. “You’ll slice your hand off.”
I eyed him. “Will you relax? A scalpel is a girl’s best friend.”
“I’d heard it was diamonds,” he murmured, but was silent after that as he watched me pull back the thin, hand-painted paper that kept the leather turn-ins in place.
Endless minutes later, the leather edge was exposed from top to bottom. Now I began the systematic scraping back of the leather from the boards. Once I’d peeled the leather off the inside cover, I could see the layers of cotton batting the original binder had used to create the padding.
Padded book covers were a popular binding style in the nineteenth century, but they weren’t in favor much anymore, thank goodness. It was time-consuming and tricky to get the batting to lie smoothly and evenly between the leather and the boards. These days, when padding was called for, some bookbinders used sheets of synthetic foam rubber, the half-life of which was still undetermined.
I was careful to keep the batting in place as I peeled away the leather. Otherwise, this would be one hellish job of reconstruction.
Despite the anxiety of the search, I took a moment to revel in the lovely scents that arose as the book revealed itself to me. Aged leather, musty vellum, old secrets, beauty. Had it known treachery? Did it suffer pain? Did a book remember? Did it feel the knife? Did my work destroy or revive? Some of both, I supposed.
“Do you see anything?” Derek asked, stirring me from my deep thoughts. “Can you feel any sort of foreign object stuck in there?”
“Not yet. I have a ways to go.” I could feel his impatience again, and I couldn’t blame him. I was in a hurry to get answers, too, but I knew I had to take care and do it right. I continued peeling, but after a while, I knew it was useless. Nothing was hidden in the batting. I’d been fairly certain of it even before I started, because the seams of the endpapers looked undamaged and unaltered. But that wasn’t necessarily definitive. A reputable bookbinder could’ve done the job, opened up the book, hidden the item, rebound the book, and made it look pristine.
“What about the spine?” he asked. “They might’ve tucked it inside there.”
“That’s where I’m going next.”
To get to the spine, I used the scalpel to slice along the inner joint. It wasn’t quite as painstaking as the earlier task, and within minutes the inner spine was separated from the text block.
“Nothing.” He slid off the stool and walked back and forth with his arms folded across his chest. “Now what?”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, love. But it’s frustrating. I was hoping the book held the key.”
“I still have to check inside the back cover.”
“Right. Of course. Let’s do it.”
I repeated the process, but twenty minutes later, we’d arrived at the same outcome. There was nothing hidden inside the Kama Sutra covers that even vaguely resembled a flash drive of any size.
I stared at the sections of book laid out on my table. “Could it be affixed to one of the pages or is it too thick?”
“Too thick,” he muttered.
“That’s what I figured, but thought I’d better ask, just in case.”
Since the pieces of the book were spread out anyway, I tore off a sheet of butcher paper from the roll I kept on the counter and laid it on my worktable. I placed the book’s pieces on the paper to help establish the “map” that would be invaluable in putting the book back together. I drew boxes around the spine and bits of leather, boxes around the threads and text block, then wrote names, notes, and details inside the boxes so I wouldn’t forget or lose track of anything. Finally, I took more photos of individual items as well as one big picture of the entire tabletop.
I hadn’t bothered removing old glue from the inner spine or the boards. That was something I could do once I was alone and back to my day-to-day work. But I pulled out my woodblock press and left it on the worktable in anticipation of really going to work on this book.
Because I was curious, I grabbed my magnifying glass to examine the diamonds that made up the peacock’s crest on top of his head.
As I’d already determined, there was no way I could remove them and return them to their original state. Each gem was wrapped in a thin band of gold, then inset into the leather. I would simply remove as much dirt as I could by rubbing everything with a lightly dampened cloth.
“May I see?” Derek said.
“Sure.” I handed him the magnifying glass and watched as he studied the cover up close.
“It’s a beautiful book,” he said after a moment. “I hope our search hasn’t caused extra work for you.”
“Not really. I wanted to check the batting for mold, so I would’ve done this anyway.” There was nothing else we could do, so I covered everything with a soft white cloth and put my camera away.
As we left the workroom, Derek said, “What time are the cleaners due at Robin’s tomorrow?”
“Not until after lunch, around twelve thirty.”
“Good. That’ll give us a chance to do one more search of her rooms tomorrow morning.”
“Us?”
“Yes. After that, we might take a drive over to Alex’s apartment and see what we can find.”
“We?” I held back a smile.
He turned. “Am I to believe you’re not interested in going with me?”
“Absolutely not. I’m just a little astounded that you would include me without my insisting.”
“Darling, we’re partners,” he said, wrapping his arm around me as we strolled into the kitchen. “I wouldn’t dream of breaking the law without you by my side.”
I brought candy corn for sustenance.
Derek called his office to let them know he wouldn’t be coming in at all that day. Since he didn’t have meetings to attend or pending crises to deal with, he wanted to spend time trying to clear up Robin’s mess. I assured him I would be eternally grateful for his help and he let me know he’d hold me to that promise.
So on the off chance that Alex actually had hidden the flash drive somewhere inside Robin’s place, we were going to spend the next two hours searching through every nook and cranny possible. First, Derek gave me some pointers on the fine art of covert searching; then he set me loose in the second bedroom, which Robin used as a sculpture studio. She normally locked this room, because it held her treasured sculptures, so it hadn’t been trashed like the others. I knew where she kept the key, so I unlocked and opened the door, thankful that no blood had been tracked inside.
Standing in the doorway, I tried to figure out the best place to start. The bookshelves along one wall were jammed with art books held upright by clay molds of human hands and feet, a cow skull, jars of old paintbrushes. The top shelf was home to more than twenty clamps and a heavy-duty pair of cable cutters.
One long table held sculptures in various stages of completion. Most were heads or busts, but there were also a few torsos. Male and female, all life-size. There were more paintbrushes of every size and shape, many of them standing upright in glass jars filled with clear liquid. Coffee cans held rulers and dozens of tools for carving, shaping, and cutting. A mallet hung from a hook off the side of the table. Everything was splotched with dried liquid clay in shades of beige or sage or gray. Under the table were stacks of rags and ten or twelve plastic buckets of different sizes.
Abstract pen-and-ink drawings were tacked on the wall. Streaked wood pallets were piled precariously next to four large wrapped chunks of clay in a corner. In another corner were her potter’s wheel and a sturdy stool. On a pedestal in the middle of the room was a wonderful, life-size sculpture of a dancing goddess.
I’d been in here countless times, but I was struck anew by the odd beauty of all the assembled bits of junk. From any angle, there was a compelling still-life portrait. How in the world was I supposed to find something so tiny in the midst of all this? I decided to get started and see how far I got.
“Are you sure it’s a flash drive we’re looking for?” I asked as we drove away from Robin’s house two hours later.
Derek gave me a sideways glance. “I’m sure.”
“Just checking. Because if it’s not a flash drive, I’m going to be very annoyed with your informant.”
