“Twice.”
“What?”
“It’s a long story.”
“James, I can’t-”
“It’s Skip.”
“Skip, I will honor your offer.”
“Really?” I was stunned.
“Really. You’ve put yourself on the line. If you find the gold, you get one million dollars.”
There was the catch. Pretend she’d misunderstood. But hey, one million was still a heck of a lot better than the previous deal.
“With all respect, Mrs. Trueblood, it was two million dollars.”
“Whatever.”
From behind me I felt a hand on my arm. Turning, I saw Big D with a disgusted look on his face.
“You let people track through the blood here on this concrete?” Officer Danny Mayfair said with an accusing tone.
“I didn’t exactly let anyone do anything. I don’t remember being in charge of this crime scene.”
“We need to talk.”
And for the second time in two days I was interviewed by the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department. This time it was more informal. I even knew the officer’s nickname and how he got it.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“It’s called deacidification.” Kathy Ebert sat at her desk, piled high with papers and books, and the three of us were hanging on every word.
“And you do it here?”
“We do. On older books. Antiquarian collectors do it. There used to be a lot of acid in paper and, just like the piece you’ve got there, it turns yellow and crinkly over time. So the idea is to preserve the paper. We can stop the acid from doing any more damage with Bookkeeper Deacidification Spray.”
“But we need to open it without destroying the-”
“Bookkeeper Solution is a nonaqueous, liquid phase process that uses magnesium oxide.”
“A nonaqueous what?”
“Not important, Mr. Moore. Once we fix the letter, we’ll use Bookkeeper. Right now we want to open your letter without, as you said, destroying it.”
“And how do we do that?”
“We’re going to treat it like a cigar. Put it in a humidor.”
We watched as she pulled out a wet sponge, opened a box of Baggies, and put the sponge and our folded paper in one of the plastic bags.
“We expose the paper to as much humidity as possible. Then, tomorrow-”
“Tomorrow?” The three of us said it almost together. And we all three sounded disappointed. We had work to do and the letter was crucial to our investigation. We were hoping for today. She assured us she couldn’t hurry the process.
“It’s going to take about twenty-four hours. Minimum. Then, we’ll try to unfold it. We’ll apply some blotter paper to give it more moisture, loosen the fibers.”
“And when you open it tomorrow?”
“Some of it will break. It’s inevitable, considering the condition it’s in. That’s when we go to plan B.”
“And that is?” Even Em was impatient.
“Japanese tissue.”
“More moisture?”
“No,” Kathy said. “This transparent tissue is lightly coated with an adhesive, like Elmer’s Glue. It’s actually a polyvinyl adhesive coating. We put the letter back together like a jigsaw puzzle. Then we place the strips of Japanese tissue over the broken areas, like tape. When we apply a warm iron, the strips literally melt into the paper and almost seamlessly hold the letter together.”
James, Em, and I sat back in awe. Kathy beamed.
“We do it here from time to time.”
“And we can read whatever is on the paper?”
“If all goes well, it should read as well as when it was written.”
“This is great. So, you won’t open it until we’re here right?”
“It’s safe. I’ll wait until we’re all assembled tomorrow.”
I looked at James. If someone else read the information on that paper before we did, they might just go find the precious yellow metal themselves. But I figured we could trust Kathy. We had to trust someone. And if you couldn’t trust a librarian, who could you trust?
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The restaurant was old, made of wood and stucco and painted green. Bentley’s Raw Bar was upstairs and it was all dark wood and small tables. The bar was well stocked, and as we walked by the cute barmaid smiled. At James.
“Debit card is going down fast.” We pulled out chairs and sat down.
“Yeah, but Skip, since we found that letter, I think the lady is going to open up her pocketbook.”
I’d held it in until I felt certain we’d have access to our letter. But I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“James, Em, this morning, after the shooting, Mrs. T. agreed that if we find the gold, we get two million dollars.”
They were stunned.
“This is no joke?”
“No joke. I don’t have it in writing, but verbally she agreed. Two million, my friend. Two million, Em.”
James kept shaking his head. “Two million. Oh, my God. Two million.”
The smile on his face went from ear to ear.
“We’re still a long way from that precious metal, pard, but damn. If we just keep moving in the right direction.”
We ordered appetizers that were surprisingly good. Gator tail, crabmeat balls, and escargot cappricio. Being the gourmet of the group, James was in his element. He still had dreams of being executive chef at some fancy restaurant. A million bucks could do a lot to advance his career.
“Buy our own place, Skip. Just like we talked about in college.”
Em smiled. She tolerated us. Our fantasies.
“A million bucks doesn’t go as far as it used to.” Running her daddy’s construction business, I figured she would know.
“Let me change the subject for a moment, guys. I’ve been thinking about these guys Malhotra and O’Neill.”
“What about them?”
“Do they know that you’ve been digging on Dr. Malhotra’s property?”
We’d been surprised they didn’t know about it the first time.
“I don’t think so.”
“Do they know about the gold? Were they aware you knew where the map or whatever’s in that box was? Is that why they were taking you away at gunpoint? Is that it?”
James washed down a gator bite with his draft. “I don’t think they had a clue what we were up to.”
“So why were O’Neill and the other guy so fired up to take you two away? They basically suggested they had some vigilante justice planned for you. That line about no cops being involved? I seriously think they were going to kill you. There had to be a reason.”
