![]() The insurance recovery business has been slow lately, but I didn’t mind. It gave me time to indulge in other hobbies. The payout from the recovery of the Third Sister had put me in a new tax bracket, which hurt every April. But even that, I didn’t mind. Winters here in Virginia were mild, at least compared to most of the country, but it was too cold for me. I’d spent most of the winter season bouncing around in Texas and Florida, even as far west as Arizona. Upon returning to my Virginia ranch in mid-spring, I found a new Jaguar parked in the driveway, taking advantage of the shade from a giant oak. I had to laugh. Even when driving a rental, he went in style. As I got out and opened the boot of my Mark II, I recognized the figure coming up the driveway. Simon Reynolds had traveled from his cushy air condition office in LA to find me. His ever-present glasses looked like they were ready to slide off his nose, and what little hair he had was windblown in all directions. He didn’t care or notice. Simon’s blue suit hung baggy on his frame, his tie loosened, and his white shirt unbuttoned to let air in. “Where the hell have you been?” He glared at me, breathing heavily in the afternoon sun. “And Hello to you. Simon, you know I take off during the winter and disconnect completely. As to where I was,” I picked up a large leather carry bag and headed for the front door. “I was in Texas, Florida, and Arizona. Where it’s warm in the winter. You know how I hate cold.” By now, I’d opened the front door and let us in. He followed me inside, and I tossed my bag in the neatest empty corner. I’d deal with it later. “Okay, Simon, what’s so important?” I motioned for him to sit in the living room. He sat on the couch and plopped an old leather briefcase onto the coffee table. As he opened the case, the spring latches made a loud clicking noise in the still room. He rummaged through the numerous files inside, pulled one out, and handed it to me. “Rodney Longwood owns some hotels in Phoenix and a vast parcel of land that he inherited from a shirttail aunt a few years ago. He allowed archeologists from a California university to come in and do a dig site on his property last year. They found some interesting and rare stuff—pottery and the like. One of the clay pots found was rare and worth a fortune. We have insurance on his personal property and wrote riders for the items they found. I leafed through the file. “Okey. What’s that got to do with me?” Simon leaned forward, his tie dangling over the coffee table and jacket hunched on his shoulders. “Longwood loaned it to a collector in England.” He pulled a photo from the folder, an image of an old castle. “What does a Native American pot have to do with a castle in England?” “From the story I got, they have a remarkably similar pot, with the same marking and type of clay. Longwood loaned it to the archeologist on the English site to compare.” Simon paused, shifting nervously. “And now it’s missing.” “Stolen from an old English Castile where it never should have been in the first place. How much insurance?” “A million dollars.” “And if I don’t find the pot intact you have to pay Longwood?” Simon swallowed hard and nodded. We sat in silence while I read his report more closely. “Okay, I get it, at least most of it. They wanted to directly compare the two pots side by side, something impossible to do properly over video. Longwood ships his pot to them using a secure courier to transport it to the castle in England where they had a lab to examine artifacts found on the estate grounds.” Simon nodded. “Yes, the castle has been guarded by a private security firm since they opened the grounds to an archelogy team. They had problems with vandals and protesters who didn’t like them digging up the grounds around the Castle. The tightened security stopped most of it, but I understand they still get the occasional prowler and vandal, but not like before.” “Everyone connected with the castle and the dig has been vetted?” “Twice over, once by the local police and surrounding agencies and by the Home Office. They’re clean.” I scoffed. “Someone slipped through, and I’m guessing someone inside the dig or castle.” Simon sighed. “Likely.” “The security company vetted?” Simon answered yes as I flipped through the papers and found the files detailing the security firm. They all looked good, as far as I could tell. No names jumped out at me. I took that as a good sign. I was lucky last year to find the third painting of a set of three. I also knew having a place to start had helped. But there was no obvious place to start here, at least not from what I read in the files. I would know more when I got there and talked to people. The question of my fee was next. I knew how Simon hated to part with his company’s hard-earned money. “The pot is insured for?” “The whole collection of about a dozen pots and other pieces of pottery and fragments are estimated to be over a million dollars, considering their rarity and how pristine some of them are. Individually, it’s hard to tell. A good auction with people who know their stuff, the pot in question could easily get half a million.” “Speaking of which, where is the rest of the collection?” “Safely locked up in a bank vault in Phoenix.” “You’ve seen it there?” “Yes, I oversaw transport and placement of the items in the vault.” “I want $250,000 if I recover the pot in one piece, but I need a $10,000 retainer as a base price for my time and effort regardless of the pot condition if found or if not recovered.” I grinned. “Plus, expenses.” Simon leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes for a minute, He knew damned well I was expensive, but he knew that most of the time, I saved them money in the long run. “Okay, $10,000 flat fee for your time, pluses expenses, $250,000 if you find the pot, and maybe a bonus if it is quick and the pot’s undamaged.” We shook hands, and he pulled out a contract and filled in the necessary numbers. Simon made a call, and within a few minutes, ten grand was sitting in my account. We shook hands at the door, and Simon headed back to LA. ~~~ The flight to London would have been boring, but I had all the paperwork and files to read on both dig sites and the personnel at the castle. There was a lot to digest and remember. Troubling was a report that some hacked into the company’s cyber unit and accessed files concerning items found at the dig. The ID of one of the cyber techs was stolen and used to access the unit and the computer system. I concentrated on the castle, the staff, the dig teams, and security. None of the names stood out to me as potential suspects. I would be able to get a better idea of who was who. Then, I turned my attention to the photos from the castle dig site and the original photos from the insurance company. After examining the metadata and the images, I determined that things were not what they appeared. By the time I arrived in London, I had emailed Simon on his private email deductions with instructions to check who had access to the pictures and the files in general at the insurance company. Lord Edmonds of the manor house had offered to send a limo for me, but I declined. I always rented a car. The rolling countryside flew by quickly as I glided along the winding back roads, making occasional stops for tractors, sheep, or lorries with a wide load. The sun was low in the sky when I pulled in behind a Bently limo, parked on a sandstone driveway flanked by large, perfectly mowed lawns with neatly trimmed edges. The castle stood over us like a set from an old movie. Its flanking turrets were bookends of a sizeable blocky building. I lost count of the windows that looked down on the main driveway and lawn. Stone abutments served as railing for the five steps leading to the ornate front door. I barely took all of this in before the front door opened, and an older gentleman came down the steps. As he approached me, I noticed his casual but elegant clothing, his expertly cut gray hair, and the etched lines on his face. He offered his hand, and I took it instinctively. “I’m Lord Edmonds, but you may call me Charles.” “Peter Malloy, but you can call me Pete.” He noted my car, a new Mercedes. “The insurance investigator occupation pays quite well, I see?” “It can with the right cases, but I’ve also seen it go bust.” The front door opened, causing us to turn and look up at the steps. The lord’s face lit up at the sight of the woman standing on the landing. “Pete, this is my wife, Angela, Lady Angela Edmonds. Darling, this is Peter Malloy, the insurance investigator we’ve been expecting.” As she came down the steps and over to meet me, I noticed she was petite and thin, contrasting with the tall, robust lord of the manor. She held her hand, and her grip was firm but not enthusiastic. She didn’t seem happy to see me. But she never indicated it directly. She looked at her husband. “Charles, dinner is ready.” “I am certain our guest is hungry as well.” “Now you mention it, I could eat.” I followed them up the steps through the front entry. Inside was a large foyer with a high ceiling, several doors flanking the side walls, and a large stairway leading to the floors above. I noticed several marble statues and busts on tall, thin pedestals standing between the many doorways. A coat of arms hung high over one door. “I’m afraid it’s potluck today. The staff are off this week for a wedding. Our butler is marrying my wife’s lady-in-waiting, very ‘Downton Abby.’ We’ve had to fend for ourselves all week.” He grinned at his joke and led me through the house to a dining area next to the kitchen. Bread and a selection of hams, cheeses, other lunch meats, and plates of fresh fruits and vegetables sat on the rustic wooden table. We sat the lord at the head of the table, Angela to his right. I took the seat beside him. “Help yourself. We decided not to cook tonight as it is so hot.” He took bread slices from a basket and passed it to me. I did likewise, and before I knew it, I had one of the best sandwiches I’d had in a long time. We washed our food down with lager. During the meal, Edmonds asked me questions about the case, while Angela didn’t say much other than ask me to pass something. I couldn’t decide if it was her customary manner or if she was just being cold to me. Time will tell. I washed down the last of my ham sandwich with the last of my lager and decided to get to business. “I’d like to see the Vault Room, where the Longwood Pot was when stolen.” He half-coughed, and his expression became serious as he sensed my change in tone. “Come. It’s this way.” We rose, leaving Angela to clear the table, and walked through the main corridor to the opposite side of the manor. We stopped before a large, paneled door with an antique lock. He pulled a set of keys from his pocket and fumbled a little until he found the key that fit the lock. The key turned quickly, and the door swung open into the room. The windowless room looked like a scene from a movie set. The ceilings were tall and supported by three stone and one wood-paneled wall. Several suits of armor, displays of swords, and a couple of glass cases with some small pieces in them stood along the walls, highlighted by downlights. Two coats of arms hung on either side of the room. The main attraction was the three large safes that stood on a raised stone dais. The center safe was much larger than the two flanking it, and none were small. Edmonds went directly to the center vault, pulled out a second, larger set of keys from his pockets, and opened it. The large door swung out and hung over the edge of the platform. “It was here.” He pointed to an empty spot in the middle of the safe. I looked over the safe. There are no signs of tampering or forced opening. The only way in was with the key. “What else in here?” “A few family papers and this box contains my more valuable watches. This case has Agatha’s favorite jewelry. The wooden boxes on the lower shelf contain other pieces they found on the dig here.” “The pot was here?” I pointed to the same empty spot he’d indicated. He nodded yes. “It was too big to fit with the others, so we put it in a separate, larger box.” “Close it up,” I instructed, standing back while he closed the door. It swung easily and quietly. There was only one way in and out of the windowless room. I took my time examining the displays. At the paneled section on the right side, I noted several pictures which I assumed were of past lords of the manor. I studied the panels carefully and eventually found what I was looking for—a tiny crack in a panel edge. You’d never notice if you didn’t look closely and in the right light. I didn’t say a word. I told him I had seen all I needed, and we exited the room, and he locked the door. “What’s next to this room?” “My office.” He unlocked his office door. The room was smaller than the Vault Room but still spacious. I noticed the paneled section on the wall behind his desk, which was on the same wall as the Vault Room. “You don’t carry both sets of keys all the time?” “No, I only carry the door set. The vault keys remain in my safe.” He pulled them from his pocket and handed them to me. There was nothing special about them. Both sets were old and well-used, but the keys for the vault itself were much larger and heavier. I noticed a safe built into the shelves on the far wall opposite his desk. I watched as he punched the numbers to open the safe and put the safe keys back in, mentally noting the numbers. Bookshelves and cabinets filled with electronics, a small pair of speakers, and a flat-screen television lined the walls. He locked the office, and I followed him to the main hall. “The dig site?” I purposely didn’t use his title, and it appeared he was put off by my not being impressed with his title. That lasted for about thirty seconds when I first met him. “Oh yes, this way, please.” He led me through the house, down a corridor past several well-appointed rooms with areas cordoned off with fancy velvet ropes. Rooms open as part of the public tours conducted there regularly. Large French doors opened onto a large stone patio that ran most of the length of the main section of the castle. Several sets of outdoor tables and chairs, each with an umbrella, and side tables for the extras one invariably needed when dining alfresco. The dig roped off with heavy rope strung on metal fence posts, and it took up a smaller section of lawn than I expected—a grid pattern created by sting marked off the interior of the excavated site. Canopies covered the dig site from the English rain, and a couple of covered work areas sat alongside. Under one were tables filled with flat frames and other tools of the trade—a couple of laptops and a makeshift photo booth set up on a third table. A cool breeze ruffled the leaves on the trees nearby and made the papers on the tables flutter. A well-worn safari jacket moved around the dig site. Edmonds coughed slightly, and a floppy hat popped up from the hole. The man wearing the jacket was Devon Rogers, the lead archeologist, who had secured funding and permission for the dig. He was short, under the floppy hat he wore bald, and his clothes looked like he’d slept in them for the last several days. He climbed out of the pit and shuffled over to the tent we were under. “Devon, please meet Pete Malloy from the insurance company about the Longwood pot.” Sticking out a dirty hand, he grinned through several days’ worth of beard. “Glad to know ya, Pete. So, they decided to finally send someone to see what happened to that dammed pot.” It was more a statement than a question. I ignored it. I shook his and confirmed I was here about the Longwood pot. By now, the other two had joined us in the tent, and Deven made the introductions. Ginger Bown had arrived two weeks ago, after the pot went missing, having completed her dissertation and awaiting oral finals for her doctorate at the university. She was tall and skinny, with long black hair tied in a loose ponytail behind her head. Even through her loose-fitting t-shirt shirt, I could tell she had been working hard for a while. Her jeans had holes in the knees and wear marks from tool belts riding on them. “What another stupid suit here to tell us what we already know? Trudging all over the site. We just found some Roman artifacts. We don’t need you here.” I told her I was just here to confirm what Lord Edmonds had reported and, if necessary, recommend that the insurance company pay. She snarled. “Yeah, right,” and returned to the dig hole. Larry Perkins was the last person in the tent with Devon, Edmond, and me. Larry came forward and shook my hand, not saying anything other than a grunt hello. Devon explained. “Larry is a local student from the university here for the summer. He helps out, carries dirt, cleans up, and generally does whatever we need him to do. He is supposed to be learning how to work a dig.” I noted Larry’s long hair, well-worn, and dirty cowboy boots. They aren’t something you see very often in the middle of England. But I turned my attention to Devon. “Professor Rogers, I have some questions for you.” “He waved a hand in front of his face. “Stop all that professor crap. Out here, I’m just Devon—in the classroom, professor.” “Okay, Devon. I still need you and the others to answer some questions.” I spent the next forty-five minutes asking them questions. I also took pictures of the dig sites and where they found the original pot. Eventually, I let them get back to work. Lord and Lady Edmonds went into town on business, leaving me alone. While they were gone, I popped the lock on his office door. Once inside I played with the combination on his safe. It didn’t take me long to figure out the last number I forgot. Once the safe opened, I grabbed the vault keys. Twenty minutes later, I knew exactly how the pot had been stolen from the main vault and had a pretty good idea of where it might be and who was behind it. But I needed more information. Back in my room, I wrote out what I suspected had happened and then emailed Simon and Lanna, my personal assistant. Officially, she did administrative work I hated doing, running errands and updating files when needed, but she was also my right-hand gal for researching. I tasked them to find more information about the professor and the college student, Larry Perkins. While I requested information on Gina, she seemed harmless. The Professor and the kid were the two I was most interested in. Particularly if the kid had been to California about the time the files were stolen from the company and if he had been around the assistant who had her ID compromised. Also of interest was whether either of them was in Arizona when the Longwood Pot was found or soon after. I tasked Lana with finding out if any of them had photo and video editing experience, officially or not. I also needed to know if Larry and Devon had crossed paths before the dig. It was late evening when I received replies from Simon and Lanna. It was time to rewrite my notes before tomorrow. ~~~ I rose early, and after a quick breakfast in the kitchen and a chat with Lord Edmonds, I asked him to have everyone meet in the vault room. Promptly at nine in the morning, Edmonds let everyone into the vault room, but I waited out of sight. I decided to let them stew for a few minutes. I could hear them talking, puzzled as to why I summoned them. When I figured they’d had enough time to wonder, I entered the Vault Room. Not expecting movement from the left side of the room, they all turned to see me step into the room from a panel that appeared to be part of the wall. I stood there, a file folder in my hand, and let them ponder how I got there. I noticed a slight glance between Devon and Larry before they looked shocked. “Good morning, everyone. You likely wonder why you are here and where I came from.” No one spoke, just nodded yes. I walked into the middle of the room, leaving the panel open. “As you know, a priceless artifact found in Arizona has disappeared. Supposedly from here.” More nodding, but no one had found anything to say. However, I noticed Devon glancing at the right vault. “The artifact did disappear from here, but it didn’t go far.” Larry and Devon exchanged another glance. “Let’s find the Longwood Pot, as it’s called. Then I’ll get into the mechanics of how it was stolen and why.” I pulled the keys that opened the vaults themselves from my pocket. Edmonds shot me a questioning look, but I ignored him. Standing in front of the vault, I looked at it carefully. “Lord Edmonds, when was the last time either of these archive vaults have been opened?” He joined me. I pointed to the vault on the right, where the accumulated dust had been partially wiped from the handle. I then pointed to the handle on the left, covered with undisturbed dust. “Oh, I don’t know, at least six months ago.” “You don’t open these vaults often?” No, they’re used mainly for storage and archiving family records and some documents for the castle.” “So, generally speaking, you have no reason to get into them very often.” “No. We mostly use the center vault for things we want to get regularly.” “Such as?’ “As I told you, I have several very valuable watches, and Agatha likes to keep certain pieces of jewelry here that she wears often. The rest is at the bank.” “I see. What if I were to tell you, I think we’ll find the Longwood Pot in the right vault?” His eyes widened. He was catching on. “Let’s open it and find out.” I slipped the key into the lock and turned it, listening to the lock mechanism creak as the big door released. Swinging it open, we stepped back so everyone could see. On the middle shelf, on top of a stack of papers, sat the wooden box that held the pot. “Wow and oh shit,” and various other comments to that effect echoed about the room. I looked directly at Devon and Larry. Both had paled before regaining their composure. Carefully sliding the box from the shelf, I carried it to a nearby display cabinet, and everyone watched as I opened it. Wrapped in protective padding sat the Longwood Pot, rumored to be at least five hundred years old and worth a small fortune. “But how? I have the keys to the door.” Edmonds pointed to the opened panel for the first time and looked at me questionably. I nodded yes. “Let me explain how the thief did it, then we’ll get to who and why.” Edmonds went back to his chair. I leaned against the display case next to the pot. “It’s well known that Lord Edmonds carries the keys for the door with him pretty much all the time.” “When it’s not on me, they’re locked in the safe in my office.” “Correct. These keys came from there, too?” I held up the keys to the vaults. Edmonds nodded yes. “You need to rearrange the display cabinets in your office. I got the combination yesterday while you opened the safe to get the safe keys. Anyone standing in the right spot can see the reflection of the keypad in the glass. You need a better lock on the door, too. It didn’t take much to get it open.” I carefully watched Devon and Larry’s reactions as I continued. “Okay, I’m in your office, and I have the vault keys but not the door keys.” Everyone turned to look at the open panel again. “Being a history buff and knowing the history of this castle and the area, you would know about Priest Holes—small places were built into walls to hide the priest when the army or someone else came looking for them.” Everyone nodded, and I looked toward Lord Edmonds. “You didn’t know you had one in your office?” “It never occurred to me to look.” Edmonds countered. “No, it wouldn’t, but because of the way the stone walls are configured and the way the halls and rooms are set up, it was the perfect place to put one. Let me guess, it wasn’t always your office?” No, it had been a storage room for ages before we redid things a few years back.” “Also, making it perfect for a priest hole. Back then, there were no lights, and no one would look too closely at the old storage room.” “I just added electricity and lights, the safe, and the furnishing.” “They did a good job hiding it here, but only if you’re not looking for it. Which I was. I noticed a crack in the panel that shouldn’t be there yesterday. So, while you were out, I came down and looked. Sure enough, in your office, that panel next to your desk opened up too easily. It should have squeaked and not wanted to move, but once I figured it out, it swung open.” “So…” Edmonds stuttered. “Someone else’s found it, cleaned it up, and then went to work on the other side.” I nodded. “Correct. They cut a small door into the panel and added some hinges to make it work and a catch to close it. When the time was right, they just came through like I did.’ I noticed Devon and Larry looking uncomfortable in their chairs and glancing at each other. “Okay, that’s how it was done, but who?’ Edmonds asked, looking around the room. “That’s going to take a little more explaining. It all started two years ago when the Longwood Pot was found. It was a big deal. There was a lot of press coverage, which made national and international news. My company handles the insurance for Rodney Longwood, his hotels, and other properties. We insured it for a quarter of a million dollars. A hefty sum for an old clay pot.” I paused for effect. “At that time, Professor Devon Rogers was in dire straits. He knew his future as a professor would not be long if he didn’t fulfill his tenure. You were required to submit five peer-reviewed papers in a year, which you hadn’t done. Not to mention, your teaching performance was less than great.” I looked right at him. He looked down at his lap and played with the edges of the safari coat. I glanced around the room and slightly shifted my position against the display cabinet. “Anyway, I digress. The Longwood pot came out, and you saw dollar signs, which may be a chance to redeem your career. Suppose you found a pot identical to it, a place that should never have it. It would be big news and national attention and perhaps save your career, or as a last resort, you could get your hands on it, sell it, and make enough to live on for the rest of your life. To hell with teaching.” Deven didn’t look up. I continued, “You met Larry Perkins somewhere during your travels in the States and got back in contact with him. But for this to work, you needed Larry to do some things stateside. The first order of business was finding out where the pot was. It was in a local museum in Arizona. Then you needed good pictures of the pot. The ones online weren’t good enough. So, you realized if it was insured, they would have good pictures. Once you figured out what company had the insurance for it. You researched and found our offices and, eventually, our cyber unit. You sent Larry in to befriend a girl who works there. Over time, you got her confidence and eventually her credentials and access to our system. Once you had that, it was easy to download and copy the entire file and pictures of the pot and disappear from her life.” I paused for effect and glanced at my notes, which I’d laid on the corner next to me. Everyone stared at Larry, who looked at Devan and squirmed in his chair. “You now had the pictures of the pot, but you needed a place to “find it.” To that end, Devon, you convinced the university to fund one more dig for you. You found a nice castle out of the way and talked the Lord into letting you do a dig on a back property. Probably gave him some bullshit about past finds in the area or something about the water table. Either way, you got him roped into it.” “You knew the only to get the pot out of the museum was to find the second one, as it were, so you set work making up some pictures with the real pot in them, making it look like it had been found here. They didn’t have to be perfect. They would only be seen online and then taken down.” I had everyone’s attention. “With a hubbub over the second pot, the museum had no choice but to send its pot over for direct comparison. Of course, by then, you made sure to have your pot sent somewhere for authentication or testing. So that when the real pot came, there wasn’t a pot to which to directly compare. You strung everyone along, saying it would be back soon. As expected, the Longwood pot was put in the vault here.” I pointed to the main center vault. “It didn’t take much to figure out they never get into the side vaults very often. You knew you’d be suspects, so you couldn’t have it found in your belongings. The next best thing was to hide it where you could get it later after everything died down.” I crossed my arms and stared at Devon and Larry. I had already called the local police, and they were waiting for me to finish before they arrested Devon Rogers and Larry Perkins for theft. Larry was also charged with cybercrimes back in the States. Epilogue The Longwood Pot was returned to the Arizona Museum by secure courier as soon as it was processed as evidence against Devon and Larry. Meanwhile, Ginger Bown, who had known nothing about the pot or its theft, continued with the dig. The university supported keeping the dig going after she uncovered artifacts from the Roman era in Britain. The university was so impressed with her work that they put her in charge despite not yet receiving her doctorate. Lord and Lady Edmonds benefited from the whole thing with a renewed interest in their castle and a significant growth in the number of tourists visiting the castle every weekend. It took me a week to settle everything with the insurance company and local authorities before I could fly back to the States. ~~~ We were back at my ranch in Virginia. Simon had flown in to give me the rest of the money owed me and stayed for a few days. My PA, Lana, who lived nearby, joined us for a fancy dinner I had catered for the occasion. Simon raised his glass to me. “Here’s to the king of finding lost or stolen items.” We both grinned a little as we drank. “And saving you about a quarter of a million dollars,” I added. “Yeah, and that too.” I sat up and looked directly at Simon and Lana. Raising my glass, I toasted them. “Without your hard work here, I couldn’t have put the pieces together. Thank you.” After everyone left, I sat back in my favorite leather chair, sipped a hundred-year-old bourbon, and put a record on. I fell asleep in my chair to the sounds of Miles Davis. ![]() My footsteps echoed in the empty hall as I walked through the school. If I listened closely, I could hear the sounds of students and teachers rushing through the corridors. The bang of a locker door would punctuate the roar of talking and the yelling of the students as they tried to navigate the halls and learn about life. It had been decades since I’d been here—four to be exact. Leaning against the door frame of one of the classrooms, I looked at the wall covered with blackboards and scribbles from the last class, never erased. The enormous world map hanging from the many pull-down rolls that lined the ceiling along the far wall caught my attention. I wandered through the maze of desk chairs to face the map. Decades ago, the world was my oyster. I could do anything and go anywhere when I was seventeen—but the intervening years had shown me the harsh truth. Sighing heavily, I turned and headed back to the hall and down the corridor to the large gym on the opposite side of the school. The news of the fortieth reunion had reached me several months ago. At first, I refused even to entertain the idea of going. They would all be strangers to me, and I doubt any of them remember Robert Pike—my name or face. At this point in my life, I had the time and money to go but not the desire. That is until I saw the RSVP list online. She was going to be there, Tammy Porter. She was the one girl I remembered from those days. We had been close during the last couple of years of school. There had been talk of us getting married. However, she decided to become a teacher, taking her to college in another state. After graduating, we kept in touch for a while, but our lives eventually drifted apart. After graduating from the local junior college, I joined the police force. A close friend died from a gunshot, and rumor had it that members of the Strong family, who held a monopoly on business in town, both legal and illegal, were responsible. I decided to be the hero to take them down, but I quickly learned what the police chief already knew. It was impossible to break the Strong family's control over the community. Witness imitation, lack of evidence in some cases, and the fact that they weren’t afraid to attack law enforcement or even kill them was insurmountable. Several officers died, and no one could prove they died at the order of the Strongs. Eventually, I moved on to the State Police. Over the years, I kept tabs on the goings on in my hometown. I knew Casey ran the Stone family business now, and things were just as bad as when his old man ran things. I’d heard he married a local gal sometime after I left, but I never knew who she was. I took my time reaching the gym as memories surfaced as I walked along the corridor. It seemed there was always some senior who did something stupid and got himself killed or hurt every year. The year I graduated, the death had not been a student but the murder and rape of a teacher. The teacher, Mrs. Jean Haily, a distant cousin, had been well-liked by all the kids. At least half the guys in her classes had crushes on her. When she turned up dead and raped in the women’s restroom at the local park, the crime shocked the town. Suspicion had naturally fallen on the students in her class. The police questioned them extensively, and their alibies were checked and double-checked. No one seemed to have a gaping hole in their whereabouts the night of the attack. I had been in the park with Tammy that evening. We had a picnic and discussed her attending college and what she wanted to do. We stayed way later than either of us had planned. It was almost dark when we finally packed up and left. Summer flew by. Tammy went off to college, and I attended junior college and then on to law enforcement training. The police never discovered Mrs. Haily’s murderer and marked her case, with few leads and little physical evidence, closed/unsolved and forgotten. I never forgot it because Mrs. Haily was a relative. Granted, she was a distant cousin, and very few people knew she was related to me, but she was family, and she was dead. I carried that in the back of my mind all those years. As I neared the gym, I remembered how happy I'd been with Tammy before we went our separate ways. That was motivation enough to come, but seeing Casey Strong’s name on the list reminded me of something I’d forgotten. That's when I decided to go to the reunion. The committee had converted the gym into a dance hall of sorts. Banners proclaiming the class of 1984 and various other images of our school years hung on the walls. Dressed in one of my best suits, I looked out of place among the other casually dressed people. But then, I had always been out of place, even in the right place. A mix of music genres from the time blared from the PA system, and I could barely hear anyone talking. Along one wall were some tables with stacks of yearbooks and pictures donated to the cause. I sorted through the photos without recognizing any of them. With a plastic cup filled with punch in one hand and a name tag hanging from my jacket pocket, I stood next to the table and tried to scan the room, looking for anyone I even thought I knew. I took a swallow of the punch and shuddered. There was more than juice in the bowl. The echoing of too loud music against the wood panel walls and stacked bleachers combined with strobe lights hanging in the middle of the gym were disorienting and only compounded the feeling of not fitting in and my desire to go running from the school and hide in the car. Then, I spotted Tammy standing on the other side of the room. At this distance, her name tag was only a tiny square on her ample chest. I decided to stay. Tossing what was left of the cup in the nearest trash bin, I worked my way over to her side of the room. She was talking to a woman, and they appeared to be having a deep conversation, so I kept my distance and watched them. Tammy was tall and generously proportioned in all directions. I remembered her as being on the large side even back then, but I never thought about it much. Even today, a person's size doesn’t matter much to me if I like them. The woman she was talking with was a direct contrast to Tammy. She was short and thin with bobbed hair and a tight-fitting dress that hugged her curves. Of the two, I preferred Tammy’s proportions to Skinny Lady. I couldn’t see her nametag, so I didn’t know if she was a classmate or the spouse of a classmate. I played with the old textbooks on the table where I stood, pretending to read the pages I could barely see in the haphazard light. Eventually, Skinny Lady kissed her on the cheek and hurried off to meet someone she saw across the room. That told me they knew each other and had a history. Then Tammy turned toward me. Her face lit up with recognition. “Robbie!?” She shouted over the music, and I nodded yes. She pulled me into a giant hug that almost buried my face into her shoulder, and my back squeezed tight as she welcomed me back into her life. Eventually, she let me go, and I could breathe again. We talked briefly about the weather, how we got here, and whether we were married. Did we have kids, all the usual questions? Yes, she was married, and he was around here somewhere, but she hadn't seen him in a while. That didn’t surprise me. It was impossible to tell who you were talking to until you were on top of them. I told her I had never married. My job took up my life, but I was retiring soon and considering returning home. As will happen, we quickly ran out of things to talk about and stood silently for a couple of minutes. I almost wished I still had that horrible drink in my hand. At least I’d have something to do while we each tried not to say something either would regret. “So, Tammy, how long have you been married?” I knew she’d told me a few minutes ago, but I’d already forgotten and couldn’t think of anything else. “Thirty-one years. It's been good, but….” She hesitated ever so slightly, and I almost asked what the problem was when it presented itself in the form of her husband, Casey Stone. He came up behind her wrapping his arms around her waist and practically squeezing her boobs in front of me. “So, last I heard of you, Robbie boy, you left the local police and disappeared. We placed a few bets on whether our class cop would show.” I could smell the alcohol from where I stood. He’d already had too much to drink. “Yeah, I decided I needed to settle an old score.” What motivated me to come more than seeing Tammy was what I remembered. “Forty years later?” He breathed over her shoulder and showed no signs of letting go of Tammy. “Yeah, forty years later, some things still need settling.” I looked him straight in the eye and didn’t blink. He knew what I was talking about. He coughed, sending a spray of phlegm over her shoulder directly at me. Fortunately, I was too far away for it to hit me, but I caught the odor of his booze breath. He was as drunk as I’d ever seen him. I knew he always liked the bottle, even back in high school. He’d been arrested and ticketed for drunk driving often but always managed to get by with a fine or a suspended license for a while. It helped that the Stones were one of the more influential families in the county. They owned most of the major businesses and employed half of the county. No one, even the police, was in a hurry to do what they should have done all those years ago. Now, forty years later, it was time to face his reckoning. If what I remembered was right, I would see that he did, and if I could help Tammy in the process, all the better. “Okay, Casey, let's get this done.” I motioned for the doors behind us. He let go of Tammy and glared at me. She looked at me, and I knew she realized what I was about to do. That was her chance to stop me, and she didn’t. She gave me a slight nod and walked away. I pointed to the doors, and Casey, drunk and not thinking straight, headed for the set of double doors. I was pretty sure he thought he could take me. I followed him into the hallway, reached into my pocket, and hit the voice recorder button on my phone. I directed him to an empty classroom near the gym and leaned against the teacher's desk, facing him. “Mrs. Haily, Jean Haily. You remember her?” He looked at me blankly for a second. “No.” He paused. “Oh yeah, she was the teacher that was killed the year we graduated.” I nodded yes. “Do you remember where she was found and what had been done to her?” “No. What's this got to do with me?” He fidgeted with a pencil some kid had left on a desk near him. “What was that car your old man got you that year?” I changed tactics midstream. He thought for a minute. “Oh yeah, the red Corvette?” I nodded yes. “You were the only kid in school with a new car, much less a car like that. Everyone in town knew that car.” I let it sink in for a second. “So what? I had a fancy car. My old man could afford it.” “The only new Corvette in the county. Your dad drove an older model.” I stood up. “Mrs. Haily was found in the park—raped and murdered. Everyone in town knew you had a thing for her. What happened? Did you try to pick her up, and when she wouldn’t put out, you took her anyway and killed her? “ “No, that never happened. Yeah, I had the hots for her. So did most of the guys in the school at the time. That don’t mean anything.” “You remember where you were?” “Come on, that was forty years ago! How am I supposed to remember what I was doing back then?” “Let me refresh your memory. According to the statement you gave the police, you were at a party over at Lonnie’s Burke's place.” “Yeah, so? If I said I was there, I was there. He always had good booze.” “The police checked your alibi, and you were there alright, but no one could remember seeing you there all night.” “Yeah, so? So what? I got bored or had my fill of his hooch and left to sleep it off somewhere. I drank a lot back then.” I scoffed. “You still drink a lot. I can smell you from here. See, the thing is, there were people in the park that night who saw a car leaving the area where a park worker found her body the next morning. They didn’t say anything because their folks worked for one of your old man’s businesses, and they were scared of what could happen if they did. So, they kept quiet.” “This matters now because?” I saw the panic in his eyes as he realized where I was going with it. “Because they recognized the car. It was the only new foreign car in town. And the only new foreign car in town then was your red 1984 Corvette Ragtop. Your car was seen there.” “I wasn’t there.” He backed up, trying to put distance between us. “Casey Stone, I’m arresting you on suspicion of the rape and murder of Jean Haily in nineteen eighty-four.” Suddenly, he was sober. “What do you mean? You can’t arrest me. You don’t have any authority here.” I showed him my badge. “State Police Detective Captain and I got Haily’s case reopened based on new eyewitness testimony.” Casey turned white as I pulled him around, put the cuffs on him, and read him his rights. ~~~ I sat in the integration room across from Casey Strong and his lawyer an hour later. He’d been processed, photographed, and fingerprinted, and his Corvette, which he kept, had been impounded. “You see, Casey, I wasn’t the only one in the park that night. In addition to three guys who had seen the car but refused to tell out of fear, I was there, and Tammy was there—with me.” He had sobered up. At least enough, he started to understand where he was and why. “Tammy was there? With You?” I nodded yes. “We were having a picnic and got to talking. It was late when we finally left, and we saw your car leave the park that evening. We were talking about her going to college. She didn’t want to stay around. I was trying to help her think through what she wanted to do. To be honest, I was trying to get her to stay. We were sitting at one of the picnic tables talking when we saw a red sports car leave the restroom building and pass right by us. She said she thought it looked like your car. The next day, Jean Haily’s body was found in the women's restroom. Someone raped and murdered her.” He squirmed in his seat. “We didn’t put it together until later when we heard the time it was supposed to have happened. Tammy and I talked about saying something, but she knew what would happen if we did. Your old man would make it impossible for her family to run their lumber business. She said she wouldn’t back me up if I told the police. So, we kept quiet. She went to college, as you know, and came back, met you again, and by then, she’d buried the incident in her mind, forgetting about it. As did the rest of the county eventually.” I picked up the file, opening it to a photo of my cousin. “I never forgot it. I became a cop, and when I started working for the county, I investigated your family. When the reunion triggered my memory of seeing your car at the murder scene, I went to my superiors and the local police. I discovered they were already putting a case together to arrest you and your family. Detectives are right now serving warrants on your businesses. Charges are pending for your brothers, which concern your racketeering and other enterprises. You, however, are being charged with the rape and murder of Jean Haily." ~~~ This was my last big case. Six months later, I retired from the force and returned home. Tamny divorced Casey soon after he’d been convicted, and we picked up where we left our relationship in high school. She admitted she married Casey only to protect her father’s business and that she had never stopped loving me. A year later, we married. I found peace. After having a long and fulfilling career as a detective and retiring, I was now married to my high school sweetheart, and more importantly, my cousin had the justice she deserved. She could rest in peace as well. ![]() A lazy breeze wandered through the street. Plants and flowers barely moved, and the pink umbrellas strung up between the buildings for shade fluttered peaceable in the summer air. I sat at the end of the empty street at a small round table and sipped a latte. The crema had long since given up its shape and blended into the coffee. The last two days were a whirlwind of travel. First, two planes across the states, a third to London, a train ride to Paris, and a drive to Chanaz. I sipped my coffee and thought how much better the coffee was here than in Paris, London, or New York. I was tired, and the cool breeze tempted me to forget why I was in France in the first place. Signing heavily, I gulped the remains of my cold coffee and laid some money on the table, nestling it under the saucer so the wind wouldn’t carry it away before the waiter could collect it. I know tipping is not expected in France, but I didn’t care. He earned a nice tip. The open windows on my rented Jaguar let the fresh in as I headed out of town for my destination. The engine’s roar echoed over the countryside as I sped along the winding country roads. Tracking her down had become a travelogue—first New York, London, and Paris. I was on her tail but didn’t know if she possessed the picture. While technically, I held a private investigator license, I worked for insurance companies and investigated claims. It seems they don’t like paying large cash settlements on missing works of art or other valuable items. If possible, I get hired to find and recover the items and, in the worst-case scenario, prove the claim was legitimate or fraudulent. Too many missing items are traced back to the owner or their accomplices. I get a finder’s fee of at least ten percent of the value of the recovered items. It's cheaper for them to pay me, to try to find it, than to have to pay out an insured sum. I hadn’t done too badly. The vintage jaguar in my Virginia estate had been bought and paid for by a stolen diamond I recovered from a fence in Spain last year. The trip across the pond had been financed by Executive Life & Causality Insurance Company out of California. They had insured an extensive collection of paintings, some of which had been stolen. Most of the paintings had been recovered after it was discovered that a con woman had convinced the rightful owner she feared they were copies and she would get them authenticated by an expert she knew. The ruse had been elaborate and skillfully done, convincing the seventy-two-year-old owner that her family's inheritance may not be worth what she thought it was. I needed to track down the last missing painting, The Third Sister, as charged by my employer. ~~~ Simon Reynolds was a slight, bald man who always wore large spectacles and a navy suit no matter how hot. The only thing he hated more than not being impeccably dressed was paying out money on claims. When his in-house investigators couldn’t locate the last of the paintings and the most valuable, he contacted me. I took the redeye from DC, and by nine a.m. the following morning, I sat in Simon’s office in Los Angeles. Simon waited, leaning against the desk with his hands in his pockets and chomping on an unlit cigar as I read through the file. “Well? Can you find her?” I looked from the pile of paper in my lap. “Yeah, I think so. But…” I let it hang there. The next part was money. How much was he willing to spend on me, and how much would he bankroll to get it back? There was no question Simon knew, as I did, who the culprit was. The only question was how badly he wanted her and the painting. I know her. Gloria Smith, as she calls herself, most of the time. It's a nice, unassuming name and easy to forget. Her real name is Gemma Snyder, and she’s a handful. She’s been tied to a couple of deaths but has never been charged. She likes to travel in all the fancy circles and hobnob with the rich and famous, but she’d steal your coat right off you in a blizzard if given a chance. I’d caught up with her in New York several years ago on another case, and she’d barely gotten away, but not before tipping her hand. Catching Gloria Smith was going to be expensive. I leaned back in the chair. “What’s your offer?” “The painting’s insured for two million dollars. Your ten percent is two hundred thousand.” “Plus expenses.” I reminded him. He glared at me over his thick glasses. “Plus expenses.” He conceded. “And I want receipts.” “You’ll get as many as I can, but I will expect you to trust me if I do not have a receipt.” He knew damn well how it was in the field. Sometimes, you can’t use a card, and there is no receipt. Simon glared at me and grunted. “It’s a deal.” Simon gave me the details of how Gloria had conned his client out of the picture and what she suspected she would do with it. It turned out the picture was part of a three-picture set painted in the 1800s called the Three Sisters because it was three paintings of three nuns in the church who had served for many decades and were now considered holy by the faithful. One picture was in a museum in Rome. The second picture was in the Vatican as one of its prized paintings. The third one was sold to a private art collector in France and then sold at auction to another private collector, the current owner's father. He died at ninety-eight, and his seventy-two-year-old spinster daughter inherited the collection. I spent the rest of the morning calling art dealers I knew would be likely to come across this kind of painting. A couple said they heard rumors that Gloria was making the rounds with a painting she wanted to sell, but no one had seen it yet. One dealer said that she was in New York and had what appeared to be a package that matched the size of the painting he was seeking. I informed Simon what I had learned and headed for the airport six hours after landing in California. I catnapped on the plane, landing in the evening and heading for the same hotel where Gloria had been seen. I was determined that this time would be different. I had only spotted her in New York a couple of times. The closest was when she escaped by jumping onto a subway train, leaving me standing on the platform. But I had done my homework since then, studied surveillance photos of her, and better understood how she worked. The early morning sun worked its way through the narrow blinds that shielded its occupants from the reality of New York City life, but it was enough to wake me up earlier than I wanted to. Once up and moving, I threw my go bag over my shoulder and headed to the lobby in search of Liquid Life, which I call coffee and sustenance. A thick rug covered the floor, and opulent wall coverings added to the quiet elegance and money atmosphere. Most people in the lobby were checking in, but one person at the checkout counter caught my eye. Her topcoat was not as stylish as the other women present, and her hair gave the casual appearance that she had just rolled out of bed. Her designer pocketbook oozed with the feel of money, but what interested me was the enormous satchel slung over her shoulder. It was well-worn, expensive leather, and, more importantly, big enough to hold the missing sister painting. Would she be brazen enough to carry a priceless painting around in an open carry-all? Spotting a magazine stand on the side near where they were checking out, I worked my way over to it and pretended to look at stupid mass-market tabloids and glossy magazines while I pulled a photo of Gloria up on my phone. No doubt, it was her. I fought the urge to confront her right then and there, but that wouldn’t have been smart if the picture wasn’t in the satchel, as I suspected. I’d look like an idiot, and my hand would have been played. No, I had to be patient and wait for the right time to catch her with the picture and, ideally, who purchased it. I had planned to have a quick coffee and bagel before deciding what to do. However, that wasn’t an option anymore. I’d found her and needed to keep her in sight as long as possible. I positioned myself near the doors, hoping to overhear where she was going if she hailed a cab. If I had to leave, I’d have to settle with the hotel or have Simon do it. He wouldn’t be happy either way. Several cabs lined up on the street in front of the hotel when she went out. I was close behind, all but holding the door for her. She headed for the first cab in the row without any fanfare, just opened the back door, tossed her bag in, and plopped herself in beside her bag. I hurried to the cab directly behind as her cab was pulled into traffic. The cabbie glanced in the mirror and automatically said, “Where to, man?” I fished out a hundred-dollar bill, shoving it across the seat towards him. “Follow that cab.” He grabbed the bill. “Which one?” I pointed to the cab she had gotten into, now stuck in traffic at the light. He jockeyed in and out of traffic to keep close to her cab. “What’s the deal?” “Old girlfriend. Owes me money.” We almost lost her several times, but the cabbie earned that hundred dollars. Eventually, we went south to the Belt Parkway, past Coney Island, to JFK Airport. We kept her insight using the cab number despite the sea of traffic and a hundred or more cabs that all looked alike. I emailed Simon from my phone and updated him on the hotel and where I was heading. He wouldn’t be happy with the expense account bills that would be showing up. He dropped her off at International Departures, and I jumped out and handed the cabbie another hundred-dollar bill. I pushed my way to the counter to be second in line and heard her book a flight on the next plane to London. Fortunately, I had my passport and other papers with me. I always kept my go bag with me when on the job being a Boy Scout in another life. When my turn came up a minute later, I booked the same flight. The flight didn’t depart for another hour, so she headed for the VIP lounge. I followed at a distance. I watched where she settled down and headed for the free food. Coffee and two bagels and cream cheese in hand, I positioned myself where she wouldn’t see me, but I could see her, the restrooms, and the entrance. The call for boarding came about twenty minutes later, quicker than I expected. There were about a dozen people scattered about the VIP lounge who rose and headed to the gate. I hung back a bit so I wasn’t too close to Gloria, letting another couple go ahead of me. Once onboard, I stowed my go bag in an overhead bin and took my seat two rows behind her, thankfully. Gloria had stowed her small suitcase overhead, but the satchel sat on the floor before her, taking up most of her foot room. I settled in my seat, buckled up, and waited for takeoff. ~~~ The following seven and a half hours were the longest and most boring hours I’d spent in recent memory. The drone of the engines in the background was mind-numbing, and the muffled footsteps of the flight attendants on the carpet and the low voices of their talking were annoying. The noise-canceling headphones I’d packed in my go-bag helped a lot, but nothing could fight off the tiredness of not having enough sleep in the last two days. Gloria seemed to nap the entire trip, besides lunch and a trip to the bathroom, taking the satchel. It was dark when we landed at Heathrow, and I kept Gloria in sight as we left the jetway and entered customs. We got lucky as British Customs was less crowded than usual, and I managed to clear customs first and waited in the corridor heading to the exit where cabs waited. I texted Simon that I had arrived, snapped a photo of her as she walked past, and sent it to him. He texted back, I was right. The large satchel, portfolio size, could hold the painting. She grabbed a cab, and I cut in front of a rather angry couple and took the one behind her. Playing follow that cab wasn’t any easier in evening London traffic than it had been back in New York City during morning rush hour. We arrived at the St Pancras railway station, its tower and clock dominating the corner of Euston Road and Pancras Road. She paid for the cab, and I grabbed my go bag and rushed to follow. Inside, she headed for the ticket counter. I kept her in sight while she booked a ticket for the next train—destination Paris, France. It was nearing midnight in London, but neither of us had eaten since the VIP lounge and lousy plane food. I wasn't unhappy when she headed toward a restaurant next to the train station. The sleek modern lines, clean pink walls, and heart-themed corner booth were too much for me after a long day on a plane, but I couldn't let Gloria out of sight. She found a booth, and I sat behind her again and ordered. Hopefully, she wouldn’t notice me as the same man in New York City this morning. The Eurostar to Paris left the station at one a.m. I sat two rows behind her on the opposite side of the car, where I could see her, and decided I could risk a catnapping. She wasn’t going anywhere while we were in the Chunnel. I put my phone in silent mode and set the alarm for one hour. We’d been in France by then. We arrived at the Gare Du Nord station on the north side of Paris at three-thirty. Thankfully, the station was somewhat deserted. Following her was not too difficult, but I needed help. I couldn’t stay away forever. I decided to risk making contact with her. I picked my moment to bump into her. I managed to be beside her when she asked a porter where she could stay for the night. He recommended the St Pancras Hotel as it was close to the station. “Oh, that sounds interesting. I’ve never stayed at a fancy hotel before.” I piped in, pretending to overhear the conversation. She looked at me for a second. “Uh. Do I know you?” She gave me a questioning look. “Sorry, I was getting off the train and thinking I needed to find a place to stay for the night. I heard you ask the porter about the hotel, and… sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.” I fumbled with my go bag, shoved a hand in my pocket, and looked at the floor like I was sorry I’d spoken to a beautiful lady without asking first. The porter pointed in the general direction of the exit to the hotel and left, leaving me standing next to Gloria. “Hi, I’m Robert, Robbie. You can call me Rob, Robbie, or anything, and I’ll answer it.” I stuck out my hand from my pocket. “Gloria, and you're right, the hotel sounds nice. I’m beat. I’ve been going since six this morning, and my feet are killing me.” She shook my hand and quickly picked up her leather bag again. “Shall we?” I motioned for the exits and the thinning crowds. She nodded yes, and I walked out of the lobby with my quarry next to me, carrying what I hoped was The Third Sister. Outside, the cool air and streetlights seemed surreal after spending most of the day in a plane cabin or a train car. The streets were mostly deserted in the wee hours of the morning. We quickly found the hotel with its imposing stone façade. The young man behind the counter was entirely too chipper for this hour of night. As neither of us had reservations, checking in took longer. As I had no luggage other than my go-to bag and she only had one suitcase, I tipped the bellhop and told him I’d take the lady’s luggage upstairs. Before we parted, I asked if she would join me for breakfast, and she said she would meet me in the lobby at nine a.m. Once inside my room, I emailed Simon, explaining exactly what had happened in the last twenty-four hours. I then contacted a local private detective, sent him a photo of Gloria, and arranged for him to have one of his operatives keep an eye on the hotel so Gloria didn’t get away. Then I took the hottest shower I could stand to wash the grime from traveling halfway around the world at record speed. The sun shone through the glass doors, making the lobby brighter than I remembered last night. The din of electric lights couldn’t replace the enthusiasm the natural sun gave in the late morning. Gloria was standing next to the counter when I found her. She’d already settled her bill and was waiting for me. I noticed the leather tote was in her hand while her other bag was on the floor. “Ready for breakfast?” I grinned as I plopped my go bag next to hers and turned my attention to the clerk behind the counter. “I’ll go get us a table in the restaurant.” She collected her bag and headed for the fancy restaurant on the other side of the lobby. I watched her for a second and turned back to the clerk. It took a few minutes to settle my bill and get a receipt for the room. Simon would want that receipt if I wanted to get reimbursed for it. I shoved the papers into my jacket pocket and headed for the restaurant. Sliding into the booth across from her, I noticed the leather tote on the bench beside her while her other bag was casually sitting on the floor. Two cups of coffee sat on the table, and I thanked her for the coffee. The server came, and we ordered. I let her lead the conversation, hoping I’d better understand what she was planning. I told her I was over on a last-minute trip for work, but I had time to kill before meeting a client and reporting to my boss. Which strictly speaking was true. I’d always heard the French countryside was so peaceful that I needed to escape the city. She said she was meeting a client in a little village tomorrow in the south of France. I noticed she was vague about who the client was and why, but I didn’t push it. I’d been equally ambiguous about my work, only saying I had a meeting to attend at some point but not specifying where or when. I was waiting for the client to get back to me, and I didn’t expect to hear from them soon, so I had time on my hands for a while. Whether she bought my lame excuse or not, I couldn’t tell, but I went along with her story, noticing she kept the old leather tote right with her all the time. As we ate, we discussed various options. I told her I was thinking about going over to Switzerland but hadn’t made up my mind. But at any rate, I was tired of trains and airplanes, and driving sounded good to me. She said she planned to take the train to meet a friend in Chanaz on the Savière Canal, south of Paris. She wasn’t sure of the exact place and time yet. She was still waiting to hear from her friend. Right on time, as we finished our coffee, my phone rang as I had arranged it. I quickly answered and made a show of sliding off the booth and walking towards the men's room. I didn't go far, just out of her sight. Coming back to the booth, I grabbed my jacket and bag. “Listen, Gloria, I’ve got to go. My Boss called, and they want to meet this morning. I’m afraid I can’t drive you. I’m going to get a car and get going. It was good meeting you, and I hope you enjoy your stay here in France and meeting your friend.” I threw some money on the table and left. Simon had called me as I requested to give me the opening to leave Gloria. I hurried to the concierge, who Simon said had the rental car papers for me to sign and the keys and that it was parked as requested across the street. Gloria exited the hotel and took a cab. Midday traffic was light, so following her cab was relatively easy. The cab stopped at another train station. According to the reference I looked up on my phone, The Paris Gare de Lyon handles trains going south of Paris, which fits in with what she said at lunch about heading toward Chanaz. I followed her into the station and waited long enough to see her board the train to Chanaz. Back in the Jag, I punched in the data on the GPS and headed south along the Seine River before turning right, then crossed the river and headed out of town. She had an eleven-hour train ride. I had a five-hour drive. I would arrive in plenty of time, hoping she didn’t disembark somewhere else along the line. After a leisurely and enjoyable drive through the beautiful French countryside, stopping once for coffee, I arrived in Chanaz. I located the train station and found a place to park along the canal. I stretched my legs, found a bistro for a quick bite, and then returned to the train station, parked, and took a much needed nap. The train arrived right on time. It didn’t take her long to appear out front of the station, two bags in hand. This was one time I was glad the Jag looked like every other car on the road. My old MK IV would have been quickly noticed and remembered. She barely glanced up and down the street before heading straight for a car rental place down the street. A few minutes later, she pulled out a new Mercedes convertible. I’ll say that for her, she was going in style. It had occurred to me on the way down that after all of this if she never had the picture or had already gotten rid of it, I would look pretty stupid. I had a lot riding on Gloria and that old leather satchel. I wondered why she would go to all this trouble and travel halfway around the world to sell a picture. The obvious answer was the buyer couldn’t come to the States for some reason. Who over here could afford such a painting or would want a religious relic and couldn’t travel? There were two obvious answers to why they couldn’t travel to the States. One being legal, if they came over, they’d be arrested for some reason. The second was that they physically couldn’t for health reasons, making the possibilities more interesting. When Gloria drove to the main area of town and stopped at a cafe for dinner, I sent Simon an email asking him about possible collectors in France or Switzerland who couldn’t come to the States for some reason. Meanwhile, I had to keep an eye on Gloria and try to figure out what her next move was. I debated what to do. I couldn’t keep following her around forever and couldn’t show up again after saying I was attending an important meeting in Paris. The best I could do was keep tabs on her until tomorrow morning and pop up again with a story. After dinner, she walked to a quaint bed and breakfast. I hung back and waited for her to come out. A few minutes later, she reappeared and moved her car to a parking place near the B&B. A glance told me there was no room at the Inn. It would be impossible to come in and blend in. I noted precisely where she was and found another Inn nearby. I was displeased by the idea of not being close to her, but it couldn’t be helped. The best I could do was be sure I was up early in the morning and hope she didn’t disappear before then. The morning fog lifted off the distant mountains when I parked the Jag near Gloria's Inn. Last night, Simon got back to me about possible collectors in the area who fit the request I’d made. He mentioned one name, Axel Berger, a French technologist who made a fortune in the early dot.com days. These days, he collects art the way I collect old socks. The only problem is he has raised flags in international circles for not being too particular about where he gets his art and has been suspected of selling stolen art to unsuspecting collectors. Simon had given me his details and sent a picture of Axel in the return email overnight. I was waiting outside the B&B door shortly after seven a.m. when it opened, and Gloria stepped out to the early morning sun. I had to admit that she looked pretty good in the light top and short skirt, and she still carried the leather tote and her other bag. She backed out, and I followed her at a distance until she parked at an open café. I pulled over where I could still see her. A few minutes later, she sat at a little round table out front with a coffee and food—time to become reacquainted. I circled the block and parked in sight of the café. Exiting the car, I pasted a big surprise grin as I approached her table. “It is you! I drove past and thought I saw you out of the corner of my eye, but I wasn’t sure. How did you wind up out here?” I stood across from her, half leaning on the chair. She seemed surprised to see me again. “What? Oh, I’m meeting someone down here later today. I thought you were in Paris. Please sit down.” She motioned for me to sit in the chair I was leaning against. I quickly parked myself in the chair and eyed her coffee. “Oh, would you like some coffee?” I nodded yes, and she waved the waitress over and ordered more coffee for both of us. “Anything else?” I ordered a croissant and an orange juice to go with my coffee. I told her my meeting in Paris had gone quicker than I figured it would, and being I still had the car for several more days, I thought I’d drive about the countryside and explore for a few days while I had the chance. I tried to gently push her as to what she was doing down in Chanaz. Her friend was to meet her later that afternoon, but she didn’t say when. Gloria gulped down the last of her coffee, paid her bill, got up, and with a quick, “Gotta go. Nice seeing you again,” headed down the block without saying another word. Now, that was a brush-off. I finished my coffee and then walked to my car to wait. She wasn’t going anywhere I didn't know about. Earlier this morning, while still dark, I’d placed a tracking bug under her car. As I sat there, the week's events replayed in my mind. It occurred to me I was tired, not just from traveling but from chasing down other people's art and lost valuables. The information Simon sent me about Axel Breger showed that he rarely left his estate, and visitors were few and far between. One would be hard-pressed to get onto the estate except for a few trusted employees and friends. It was also well-known that his art collection was dubious. Some of his paintings were believed to be forgeries, and a few were probably stolen. If I were right, Gloria would have a rare opportunity to see his collection firsthand. A small part of me envied her. Only because if what I suspected was true, the chance to catch an arrogant SOB with stolen art would make my week, possibly even my year. The purr of her Mercedes engine echoed over the chatter from the village, waking me from my daydreams of glory. I followed her car at a pace that kept me near her but out of her sight. I let myself enjoy the ride as much as I could. Stone walls boarded the cliff side of the road heading south out of Chanaz. The road had been cut into the side of a mountain, and the trees and undergrowth grew up to the road's edge. There were tourist lookouts along the way, and I wanted to stop and enjoy the view, but whether she had the Third Sister or not, I needed to finish this. The tracking app on my phone told me she had stopped in a village not far ahead. I was familiar with the village as I had stopped here for coffee on my way to Chanaz. Her Mercedes was parked in front of an ancient stone castle that offered tours. A second car was parked next to hers, and I recognized the familiar shape of the Land Rover Defender. I parked a few empty spaces away from their vehicles. I rolled down my windows and listened to the sound of trees blowing, and the occasional sound of a bird would catch my attention. I made a couple of quick phone calls before looking for them. When done, I quietly closed my car door, stretched, glanced inside her car, and saw only her travel bag. The satchel was not there. I didn’t expect it to be. A well-worn path led to the far side of the main wall and into the village. They probably took that path. I followed it, too. I continued along the narrow alley until it spilled into a larger street lined with buildings. In front of one structure, Gloria sat with Axel Berger at a small round table under a canopy of pink umbrellas, sharing a bottle of wine. The same restaurant I had stopped in on the way from Paris. I stood in the shadows some distance away from them, not visible to them. Leaning against the stone wall, I watched them for a few minutes. Axel had a large leather case on the ground next to his chair. The well-worn satchel Gloria carried halfway around the world sat next to her. They were in deep conversation, neither paying any attention to their surroundings. I debated what to do. Legally, I didn’t have any authority. Even stateside, my authority was questionable, but it was even more so here. But when did that ever stop me? I ambled over like I was at home in my living room. “That wouldn’t be the Third Sister, would it?” They looked up. Gloria’s face went white for a second, and then she composed herself. Axel looked up and started to say something but stopped in mid-speak. I was standing on the other side of the small table, looking down at them. The Third Sister was propped on the table leg between them—an attempt to keep it out of sight. “Robby?” She found her voice and started to pick up the painting. I was quicker and reached it first, taking it away from her. Turning slightly towards Axel, I ignored Gloria. “This is a stolen painting. Ms. Smith, or whatever name she calls herself today, conned it out of its rightful owner. How much were you going to give her for it?” Axel looked back and forth between us. Clearing his throat several times, he took a large gulp of wine. “I… I suspected as much. Which is why I was going to contact the authorities as soon as I took possession of it.” He tried to sound sincere but failed. “Robby, you can have a cut of the profit.” Gloria had found her voice. “You don’t get it, do you? Stealing other people's stuff is a big no-no. You can go to jail for it. You should go to jail just for breaking an old woman's heart. I made some calls on the way over this morning. It seems you are well known to the local branch of the National Police. They were very excited to hear you were back in France. As for you, Axel, the authorities have questions for you, too. So, let's have a toast to the Third Sister.” I lifted her glass just as the first police officer appeared from around the corner. Within minutes, a dozen police officers surrounded the pair of art thieves and arrested them. I sat and sipped the remains of her lovely burgundy under the pink umbrellas while the police took them away. Epilogue I had seen the pictures of the Third Sister that the insurance company had on file. But the sister looking up at me in the sun brought the picture to life, and she became real again. Then, I understood why people needed paintings like this and why they were so valuable. The Third Sister was reunited with the other two paintings after being authenticated by several experts. Mrs. Edwards, the owner, loaned the Third Sister painting to the Vatican, as did the private museum in Rome, so all three paintings would be displayed together. Gloria and Axel were charged with possession of stolen goods. He was also charged with knowingly attempting to buy stolen property. It was enough to get them a search warrant for his estate, where they found several missing paintings and an extensive collection of other illegal artifacts stolen from various private collections worldwide. I found my way back to Virginia. Simon sent me a check for $250,000, including the bonus from the insurance company and my expenses. Sitting in my leather chair, sipping a fine chardonnay and munching on pizza, I considered the adventures of the week before. Gloria was now out of circulation. Axel discovered that money couldn’t buy his way out of a long list of charges, including theft and various financial charges concerning his creative bookkeeping. It was nerve-wracking, but there was also an element of fun to it. I couldn’t wait until the next time. ![]() Spanky Arnold was a nasty piece of work. I’d run into him a couple of times, leaving me wanting to take a long hot shower. As a PI, I often dealt with the underbelly of the City of Angels. But Spanky was in a league of his own. The cops had been trying to put his ass in jail since the war ended several years ago. It was my search for a missing witness that had brought me to a lonely parking lot in the early hours of the morning to meet an informant named Larry, who claimed to have info for me. “So, you’re St. James, eh?” I nodded at the small figure partially hidden in the shadow. “Heard you were a Big Deal or something.” “Something.” I agreed coldly. The sounds of a distant train reached us, mixing with the sounds of an awakening city. “You got the information?” I pushed. “Cash?” I nodded, reaching into my trench coat but not taking my hand out just yet. It could quickly move from the stack of bills to my revolver. The sister of a hooker Spanky had allegedly killed hired me to find her other sister, who had witnessed the killing. There were a couple of problems finding her. Spanky knew about her and was looking for her, and she was drunk most of the time. Her sister told me she’d been on a binge for the last week and was likely sleeping it off in some dump. I had a list of her usual flops, but all I’d gotten was a run-around. She’d been here, there, everywhere except where I was. Eventually, I found someone who had just seen her, but he was hiding from Spanky too. He cost me a C-note, which, if he were smart, he’d used to leave town that night. For almost the entire week, I sensed someone was following me. I saw a familiar coat disappear into the darkness several times. At two in the morning, the dim light from a broken chandelier that hung haphazardly in the lobby barely reached the floor and about halfway to the walls, bathing the space in eerie shadows. Stale beer, cigarette smoke, and other smells I cared not to think about stung my nose. The elevator was a do-it-yourself affair. Sliding the safety cage closed, I punched the button for the fourth floor and listened while the motors groaned and came to life, with the gears and pullies working harder than they should. Somehow, it got me to the fourth floor without dropping me in a pile of steel and cable at the bottom of the shaft. The stench from the lobby followed me on the elevator. I tried to forget about it and keep on task. Room 403 was on the front side of the building. The door was old and weathered, the kind that could stop a shotgun pellet, but it’d never stop my thirty-eight. From the peppered plaster on the wall beside the door, I could tell it had already stopped some pellets in its day. I put my ear to the door. All was quiet from the inside, so I tried the knob. It opened on my turn. Shit. She hadn’t bothered to lock the door. I stepped to one side, slid my forty-five from its shoulder holster, and waited. Nothing. No shout of indignation or scream of passion, only silence. Shit. Light from the streetlamps shone through the window. The blinking neon sign from the building across the street showed me all I needed to see— Debbie Malone passed out on the bed. Her slow regular breathing made her small breasts swell up and down as she slept. Occasionally she’d half snore or snort as she flung an arm to and fro. Other than that, she could have been dead—she might be soon. Leaning against the door frame, I considered what to do. Leaving her here was tempting, but I’d spend a week trying to find her, and dodging Spanky’s boys was a chore. I knew what I had to do. Sighing heavily, I picked her up by the arms and managed to half haul and half walk her to the elevator. Balancing her between me and the wall, I opened the cage and maneuvered her into the elevator. Not sure which was worse, the stench wafting up the elevator shaft or from Malone, who I figured hadn’t had a shower in a few days. Some days I hated this job. She was a bit more awake but not very cooperative by the time I got her to the Packard and plopped her into the backseat. Slamming the door behind her, I hoped she didn’t puke on the backseat on the way to the bar. Brenda met me at the back door. “You found her?” I nodded, then kissed her hello. It took both of us to get her inside and into the room that we kept for such emergencies. It was comforting to be in the bar, a familiar, safe place. The feel of Brenda in my arms was equally comforting as I kissed her again. I nursed a beer while I told her about meeting the man in the parking lot and the five twenties I’d given him for the location of Debbie Malone. There was no point in trying to wake her up yet. One of us had to stay with her in case she woke up. I knew Brenda could handle her, but I volunteered to babysit her till morning. Brenda headed back to our place at three in the morning. I got comfortable in my office, caught up on paperwork, and generally kept busy and awake in case she rose from the dead in the bunk room. At about five in the morning, there was a quiet knock on the back door. I opened it and let my best friend, who I had called, inside and secured the door behind him. I pointed to the sleeping lady lying in the bunk room, then headed into my office, and I updated him on how I found Debbie. He then told me what he knew. The sun was peeking through the bar’s front windows when I heard noises coming from the back room. I stood in the doorway while she tried to sit and not fall back over. The smell of her booze and bodily fluid reached me several feet away from her. I saw the puke look coming on and quickly moved to the side, pointing her towards the bathroom. She passed me quickly. I sipped my coffee while the sounds of Debbie trying to return to the human race echoed through the bar. My friend stayed hidden in my office since e I’d conveniently left the door closed. Eventually, she came out looking slightly better than she went in, but still not steady on her feet. The stench from a week’s worth of booze seeped from her at close range. I kept my distance and pointed her toward a chair at a table near the bar. I poured her a cup of coffee and slid into the chair across the table from her. I reached under the table, ensuring the shotgun I had placed there was within reach. I pushed the coffee across the table, and she snarled. “Who the hell are you? And where am I?” “And good morning to you too. I’m James St. James.” “Who the hell is James St. James?” “The PI your sister hired to find you and save your drunk ass before Spanky and his boys find you.” “Mary? That goody-two-shoes? Tell her to go to hell.” “Word is you saw him ice a dame last week. That dame was your other sister.” “Yeah, so? I’m not talking.” “You almost talked to the cops once already. That’s enough for Spanky, and you know it. He doesn’t like loose ends, especially drunk ones. Drink up.” She sipped the coffee and looked at me over the top of the cup. I couldn’t tell if it was a good look or a get-dead look. I assumed it was a drop-dead look. Either way, it takes a lot more than a look by a half-drunk dame to do me in. Debbie slouched, one arm on the table, the other slung over the back of the chair, the coffee cup in front of her. I didn’t offer food because I knew it wouldn’t stay down yet. But I was hungry. Getting up, I headed for the kitchen. Come back a few minutes later with more coffee and toast. Resuming my seat across from her, I tried my toast. “What, none for me?” “Oh, you can have some when I think it’ll stay down. Meanwhile, sit and think about last week. What do you remember?” She played with her cup and sipped some more. “Hell, I don’t know. I was pretty out of it.” I nodded for her to go on. “Spanky and your sister?” I prompted. ‘Yeah, that. He always had a couple of hookers with him. Stupid Cherri thought he loved her. Hell, I tried to her that he always had the bitches around. She was just the latest in the line, and he’d toss her like the rest of them. She got mad at me and told me to get lost.” That was Spanky. Heard he liked to use and abuse the girls he pimped out, then left them on the street. “Tell me what happened to Cherri.” “Yeah, right.” She slumped back into the chair. It was down on Tenth street. One of those all-night dinners, you know? I’d been working for Izzy Lee, and I was tired, busy night, and needed food. I didn’t know she’d be there. She just glared at me when I walked in. I just thought what a bratty bitch she was.” I nodded, munching more toast. “Some guy came in, headed right to Spanky, yelling that he owed him for the girls. They were his girls, and he wanted his cut off their take. Something like that, I was pretty far away, but I got the gist of it. You know Spanky.” “Not personally.” But I knew the type. “Next thing I see, he’s pulled his gun from that fancy leather holster and waved it at the girls. He swore and told the other guy that he would just as soon shoot them than pay him for them again. The next thing, I heard a loud crack that kinda echoed off the walls. I tried not to scream when I realized it was Cherri that dropped to the floor. The other gal was gone in a second.” She took another slug of coffee. I noticed her hands shaking. “What then?” “The other guy is looking down Spanky’s barrel, and I hauled ass out of there. The guy comes out, running down past me into the night, Spanky on his heels. Then Spanky sees me in the streetlight and realized I’d seen the whole thing, and I panicked. I managed to hide, but the cops came and found me hiding. Yeah, I almost told them Spanky did the girl. I didn’t tell them she was my sister...” Debbie’s voice tailed off. “You ducked out when a cop got called away, and you’ve been running and drinking ever since then.” I finished. She nodded. The front door rattled and then swung open. I grabbed the shogun from the table and pulled Debbie behind the bar next to me. By now, the front door was hanging open, and Spanky Arnold, accompanied by two thugs, stood with the morning sun behind him, glaring at me with a shotgun in his hands. I leveled my shotgun at him. Neither of us said anything for a second. “Spanky.” “St. James.” “You’re later than I figured.” “Yeah, that idiot Larry wouldn’t talk for a while, But eventually, he told me about the hotel.” “Is he still talking?” “Hell, no, he’s feeding the fish in the bay right now.” Spanky grinned. “You did good, St. James. You found her when my guys couldn’t.” Spanky nodded towards Debbie and grinned. “I figured it was one of your boys following me this week.” I wanted him to know I Knew they were following me the whole time. “So now you’re just going kill her and let me go?” “Hell no, I’m going to kill both of you.” “I see you have to have help killing anything more than one woman.” Spanky worked his way into the room with his two men now on either side of him. “Why don’t we even the odds a bit there, Spanky?” He looked at me, puzzled for a second. “Now, how could you even these odds?” “Bob.” My friend, Bob, stepped from behind the kitchen door into the bar, his gold shield hung from his jacket pocket, holding a shotgun. “Spanky, meet my buddy, Detective Bob Crane,” I announced. “You heard him?” “Yeah, we found Larry floating in the bay a little while ago. Somebody broke most of his bones.” Bob confirmed what Spanky had bragged. Spanky aimed his shotgun at Debbie. “You’ll be dead before she hits the floor,” I told him. Spanky spun to his right and lunged at me. I stepped to my left and buried the barrel of my shotgun in his gut. At the same instant, Bob rushed the thugs and pushed them back against the far wall with his shogun. “Let’s keep this fair.” Bob shifted around so he could see both the thugs and me. Spanky doubled over, holding his stomach. He swung at me when he straightened up, his face red with anger and pain. I was too slow, and his fist caught me in the jaw, knocking me back against the bar. I felt warm blood trickle down my face from a cut above my left eye. The shotguns clattered on the floor as he regained his balance and shifted around to hit me again. I stood up and was ready for him. I didn’t wait for him to lead. Stepping close, I could smell the stale beer on him as I buried my fist into his gut again. I followed with another fist to his face, connected with his jaw, and turned his head sideways as he fell against the chairs and table. Something glinted in the sun. Spanky stood up, a switchblade in his hand, and pointed at me. “I’m gonna cut your balls off and feed them to you.” He grinned manically. I didn’t wait. I rushed him again and pushed the knife hand to the side while landing two more blows into his gut. Then I twisted his knife hand and twisted it hard to the opposite way it wanted to go, forcing him to drop the knife. At the same time, I pushed him away from me. We circled each other, the knife lying on the floor between us like a prize waiting for capture. I got close to it, but instead of reaching for it, I kicked it back under the bar out of reach. By now, both of us were breathing hard. My eyes watered from the sweat and blood from the fall against the bar. My hands hurt, and my fingers stopped working after the first punch. I’d forgotten hard it was to fight. Spanky was slowing down a little, but I had to keep on him and not let him get his second wind. He lunged at me, head down. I shifted to the side and caught his head in a headlock, holding him bent over. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I squeezed just enough so he couldn’t move. I released him and pushed him away. He dropped to the floor, half out of it. I was panting and sweating. “Had enough?” Spanky shook his head no and started to get up. All my weight bore down on him as I kicked him in the face, breaking his jaw. I lunged on top of him and buried my fist into his gut again, then rolled him over and caught the handcuffs Bob tossed me. I snapped them on his wrists and stood up. My breathing was jagged as Bob moved around to cover everyone with his shotgun. The LA police charged Spanky Arnold with the murders of Cherri and Larry and a host of other related charges. His thugs quickly started talking, backing up Debbie’s version of events. Brenda and I decided to help Debbie start over again. We helped her get dried out and arranged for her to reunite with her sister, Mary. Hopefully, we got a murderer and a mixed-up gal off the streets. Just another morning in LA. ![]() I turned off on a side street, cut across town, and barely got there before they did. Pulling into the drive and getting out, I popped the trunk and pulled out the pump shotgun and lever-action rifle. By the time they arrived, I had the long guns on the hood next to me and my forty-five in my hand. The Caddy pulled in first, followed at an angle by the sedan. This time he didn’t wait for the door to be opened. He wore a black fedora pulled down low over his face. Approaching me, he looked puzzled. “Victor Simpson.” I greeted him. Victor stopped where he stood. ‘You have me at a disadvantage, Mr..?” “St. James, James St. James, and if you’re looking for Lew Potter, he’s unavailable. He did, however, tell me about your proposal this afternoon. Upon further discussion, we’ve decided that I would be handling things from now on.” I pulled a folded paper from inside my jacket. “This is a bill of sale. He sold me the entire business, lock stock, and barrel. I now own Lew’s Auto Sales and Salvage and all its holding. So, any ideas you have about dealing with Mr. Potter are null and void. You have to deal with me now.” My gun never moved an inch from his chest. Victor stood still. I could see the wheels in his mind turning. He hadn’t expected to be met by someone else, much less someone armed to the teeth. “About that deal, it was just an idea. I thought he could help me with is all. I can get someone else to do it.” “You do that, Victor.” Victor turned on his heels and headed back to the Cadillac. His goons backed up slowly and got back in the cars. The sedan backed out, and the caddy backed out. I didn’t move a muscle. Once they were out of sight, I breathed again. I’d bluffed them once and bought myself some time, but I knew his type. I’d just slapped him with a white glove and challenged him. I called his bluff. He had to back it up. Earlier that morning, Lew called, asking me to come to the salvage yard to discuss photos he’d received by mail the day before. The photos, taken through his living room window, showed him with a young girl that wasn’t his wife. He told me the gal showed up asking to use the phone because she was stranded. When he took her to the phone, she had thrown her arms around him and kissed him to thank him. There is no doubt that Victor fabricated the scene to put Lew in a compromising position. Lew told me that Victor visited Lew’s shop in the afternoon and asked him to fake new titles for cars with changed VINs and make them legal again so that they could move the stolen vehicles. Cash was offered and refused, and Lew told him he’d already showed his wife the pictures, so good luck trying to blackmail him. Angry, Victor left, saying he’d be back. When I arrived and got the lowdown, I told Lew to close up shop and leave town with his wife but had him sell me the business for a dollar before they left. Once I got them out of harm’s way, I made some calls from a payphone to learn more about Victor. Then I called Brenda at the bar. “Hi, Hun, Walt there yet?” “Sure,” I heard her hand the phone to Walt. ‘Listen, The case from this morning just got ugly. I need you to watch the guy’s lot and make sure it doesn’t burn down overnight. I’m going to check out this Victor Simpson and rattle his cage some more and see what else he’s up to.” “Okay, I’m on it.” He handed the phone be back to Brenda. “I should be back in time to help close up. Be Careful. This guy knows who I am.” Brenda told me she had the shotgun under the bar and not to worry. I went back to Lew’s shop and waited for Walt. Ten minutes later, Walt’s black Mercury sedan slid into view. I fired up the Packard, took off in the other direction, and headed to Lew’s house. I swung by the home address Lew had given me. The drapes were closed, but the hairs on the back of my neck were at attention. Something was wrong. I’d had the same feeling back in the war and had learned to pay attention to it. I checked the address he’d given me. I was in the right place. I headed up the driveway and noticed his car was still in the garage—he hadn’t left. I headed to the back door and found it wide open. My blood ran cold. Nudging the door with my pistol barrel, I peeked in. Lew and his wife were still there. Dead. Blood splattered over the wall, where Lew had slipped down the wall after a shotgun blast, fired at close range, had torn through him, cutting his insides up into ribbons. His wife was lying next to a suitcase, its tweed fabric already soaked with her blood. “Shit!” was all I uttered. Lew hired me to protect them, and I failed. Careful not to touch anything, I left the place as I’d found it and headed for the dinner I had passed on the way and used the payphone there to call my friend Bob, an LA detective. I reported finding Lew and his wife dead and gave him the address. He said he be right over, but before he hung up, Bob gave me what information he had on Victor that I had called him about earlier. Bob said Victor Simpson was a wanna-be tough guy who wasn’t as tough as he thought. He only kept any muscle working for him because he paid well, but it was a mystery where he got the money. He was known to deal in stolen cars, but no charges had stuck to him. Bob gave me a couple of addresses where they thought Victor hung out, and before I hung up, I told him about Victor’s visit to Lew the day before and my run-in with him. The first address took me to the seedier side of town. It was a garage and looked like Lew’s place, except rundown with overgrown weeds. The main yard gate had padlocked with a heavy chain, and for a minute, I considered getting the bolt cutters from the trunk and going in anyway, but the office door looked easier to open. I popped the excuse of a lock on the door and slipped in. A top of a small desk, pushed against one wall was covered in papers. I rifled through those and checked the filing cabinet but found nothing of interest. I entered the back office—probably Victor’s. The desk was a mess of papers, but I lucked out searching through the drawers. Buried in a bottom drawer of the desk, I found a listing of cars—makes models and old VINs with the new VINs beside them. I figured it was a list of the vehicles for Lew to create titles. There were too many numbers to copy, and I didn’t dare take the list. I jotted down the first five numbers in my notebook and stashed the list where I found it. I needed to find the cars attached to the VINs and catch Victor with them, but I had no idea where he had stashed the cars. The sun was beginning to work its way towards the horizon. I eased the Packard out of the driveway, heading towards the other address Bob had given me. There had to be at least fifty cars on that list, requiring considerable space to store them. A warehouse would be ideal, but the address was an abandoned salvage yard and not a warehouse. I got out to look around, finding most of the windows broken in and the locks rusted and covered in grime. I wasn’t climbing over broken glass, so I drove around to the side to see if there was another door. The doors were chained shut, and the weeds were so tall, I couldn’t get to the door without a machete. I was no closer to Victor or his stolen cars, and the sun had disappeared, and streetlights replaced the sunlight. It was getting late. I needed to get back to the bar. Twenty minutes later, I pulled into the alley behind the bar, unblocked the backdoor, and stepped inside the storeroom. My office was on one side, and Brenda’s on the other, with another small storeroom and freezer behind the kitchen. Brenda was behind the bar serving beer to a regular when I joined her. “Yo, St. James, you finely made it.” was the greeting I got from a regular customer. I nodded yes and started helping Brenda behind the bar. After we closed, I told her about finding Lew and his wife dead. ~~~ Early the next morning, I drove to Lew’s Salvage Yard to relive Walt. He said it had been quiet, and no one had been around. While he headed home to sleep, I knew I couldn’t keep a twenty-four-hour watch on the place and still deal with Victor. I still wasn’t sure what he’d do, but it would be violent. I fished out the card he’d left for Lew from my pocket. There was a phone number. I headed back to the bar and called the number. “Victor?” “Yeah. Who’s this? How’d you get this number.?” “It’s St. James. We met yesterday at Lew’s.” “Yeah, I remember. What do you want?” “Lew told me about the cash, but he didn’t say how much there was.” “Twenty Grand. You want it?” “Maybe. Lew might not have been interested in your deal, but I could be.” I let my words trail off. I didn’t let on that I knew Lew was dead. “Yesterday, you told me to get lost.” Yeah, I know, but I just found out I need some serious cash right away. I know some people who can move your cars.” “What about Lew?” “What about Lew? I own the business now.” “So, it’s like that?” “Yeah, it’s like that. Hate to do it to Lew, but I need the cash fast.” “All right, The deals are the same, You get me new titles and make my cars clean again, and the twenty grand is yours. “Fifty.” “Fifty?” Victor’s voice raised an octave. “Yeah, at least that much. If I do this, I need enough to disappear for good, and frankly, Lew needs some for his trouble. I want to see the cars before I start creating the paperwork.” “You’ll see ‘em when I deliver them for the new paperwork.” Not good enough. I want to know what I’m risking my neck for and screwing Lew over.” “Yeah, right.” He was quiet for a minute. “All right, You can see them. You got a number?” I gave him the number for the third line to the bar. We only used it for my undercover work. “I’ll call you later today.” After he hung up, I called Bob, filled in him on my findings at the first yard, and gave him the VINs I copied. Then I told him about my deal with Victor. He wasn’t happy about my arranging the meeting but agreed it was better than doing nothing. He told me they had found witnesses that put Victor and his cronies at Lew’s house. I spent the rest of the morning working around the bar and catching up on paperwork in my office. About noon, the third line rang. I picked up the receiver. “Yeah?” “St. James?” It was Victor. “Yeah, you got the cars?” “Yeah, I have them at one of my lots. You can come see them for yourself.” “Where and what time? And the fifty grand?” “Hell no, I’m not giving you fifty grand upfront.” “Twenty upfront, rest when I’m done.” “Yeah. That’s fine. I’ll bring the twenty.” “That’s assuming I take the job. If the cars are all junk, I’m not doing it, no matter how bad I need the money.” “They’re all good.” He told me where and when and hung up. I called Bob, giving him the information. ~~~ I arrived at the lot early. Not sure what I’d find, I didn’t get too close. I spotted an old church that overlooked the lot. I decided I wanted a vantage point to get the lay of the land. I pushed in a side door of the abandoned church and climbed up the winding staircase inside the bell tower. It was dusty and full of cobwebs, but I could see the car lot from the top of the tower quite well. I noticed tracks in the soggy ground from a big rig, probably a car carrier that transported the cars here. A movement at the far end of the street caught my attention. Recognizing Victor’s Cadillac, I hurried down the circular stairs to my car. I stood by the Packard with my hand near my revolver as the Cadillac pulled up. Victor got out and slammed the door. The resounding thud echoed through the empty street. Victor was still wearing his hat low over his eyes, and the coat he wore looked expensive even from a distance. Up close, he oozed money, and I knew he liked everyone to know he had money. Two goons got out of a second car. “Well?” “Wells are deep. Let’s see the cars. You got a list?” He pulled the paper I’d seen yesterday from inside his pocket. I took it and read it over. Victor played with his hat while I took my time reading the list. Most of it was for show. I wanted him to stew as much as I could. “Okay, looks good. Let’s see if the cars match the list.” He led me to the main gate. One of his goons ran ahead and unlocked the padlock and chain, and swung the gate open as we approached it. I saw nearly 50 cars enclosed in a tall privacy fence.” I walked past the cars, looked at each VIN, and checked it against new ones on the list. Bob had confirmed the first five VINs I had given him were stolen vehicles. They were here. “Let’s see the money.” Victor grunted, and the other goon appeared with the same briefcase from Lew’s place. The goon unceremoniously slammed the case onto the hood of a 1949 Mercedes-Benz 170S. The two-door convertible was in excellent shape and would get a good price on the black market. “Careful!” Victor growled at his henchman, who muttered “sorry” as he opened the case. Inside was the stack of bills that Lew had described. “Twenty grand as we agreed.” I nodded and glanced at the open gate. Reaching under my jacket, I extracted my revolver. “I’ve got a new deal for you, Victor, I don’t shoot you, and you go to jail for grand theft and attempted blackmail and murder.” As Victor reached for his gun under his fancy coat, a voice yelled out, “Don’t even think about it. Pull the gun out slowly with two fingers and lay it on the money.” “What the hell?” was all Victor could get out. Bob and several uniformed officers emerged through the gate. Victor turned red as he realized I’d set him up. His goons, who had drawn their weapons, carefully laid their guns on the grounds—dissuaded by the officers’ shotguns. Bob twisted Victor’s arm behind his back and cuffed him. “I’m arresting you for the murder of Lew Potter and his wife. We have several witnesses placing you and them,” Bob pointed to the two goons, who were now in cuffs, “at the Potter house before their deaths.” I spent the next day giving an official statement to Bob. A week later, Brenda and I attended the Potter’s funerals. That night I sat in the bar drinking a beer. Brenda sat down next to me and kissed me on the cheek. I returned the kiss. “Damn.” “Look, Jim, you did the right thing and the best you could. You tried to help him, but….” “Victor was one step ahead of me.” “Jim, put it behind you. Victor’s going to jail, and tomorrow a new case will walk in, and you’ll do your best for them. “ Brenda kissed me again, and I slipped my arms around her. She was right. The next time that door opened, it could be a new case. I took a drink of my beer, and as I sat the mug down, I heard the bell on the entrance door tinkle. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Wonder if that’s my next case. ![]() Lance Cardiff tossed a picture onto the table in front of me. It was of me skating. He then added several more photos of me, one of a woman skating by herself, followed by a dozen more of us skating together or sitting at a park bench adjusting our skates. I glanced at them and back to him. “So?” “Mr. Tate, you met with Veronica Smith, and she passed you information.” “I used to skate a lot back then. I was young, and it was fun. As for her, what’s her name? I sat at a lot of benches and fixed my skates a lot. I would expect that I sat next to a lot of people over the years.” I had spent time in New York City right after I got back from Vietnam back in nineteen sixty-eight. Back then, I skated a lot. I’d met Veronica in Nam, and she’d been transferred to the states with her boss not long after I got here. She had contacted me and arranged the meeting. I had retired from the spook business decades ago. But then, one never completely retires from anything—especially from the company as the CIA was known. I did remember the meeting, but I wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction of admitting it. Besides, it was all water under the bridge, and nothing could be gained from digging it up now. “You must have been bored or had a lot of extra manpower to follow me around,” I noted as I glanced through the pictures again. The photos were from the same spot, the bench, but she faced a different direction than me. I knew a data sheet accompanied the photos and logged every frame, time, and location. “Ok, I’m tired and bored. I’m leaving.” I shifted around in my chair to stand up. “Whoa, you can’t just leave like that. We have questions for you.” Cardiff’s face flushed pink. By now, I was standing and getting my jacket. “Look, you’re not charging me with anything. I’m not going to sit here and try to remember something that happened thirty or forty years ago to appease a bunch of kids who weren’t even born when someone took these pictures. I have important things to do. Like watching reruns of Hawaii Five-O.” The door slammed behind me as I left. Outside I hailed a cab and watched my back as it took me to the address I’d given it. I’d done it. I buffaloed them and got out of there without admitting anything, but it wouldn’t last. I remembered the meeting with Veronica and the information she’d passed me in the glove she laid between us while we fixed our skates. I still had it, and it was time to use it. Several hours later, I was in my second safe house. Having taken great pains to make sure I wasn’t followed or bugged. I retrieved the information from the place I’d hidden it decades ago. The small microfilm roll of pictures would cause a lot of people a lot of trouble. At the time, I had decided not to use it and allow things to progress as they were, but I knew the truth would come out eventually. I didn’t think it would take this long. It was time. Veronica had gotten pictures of our government’s involvement in war crimes in Vietnam. As a private secretary for several high-ranking government officials, her job gave her access to information that she’d sworn she’d never reveal. She had always kept her non-disclosure agreement, except for one set of pictures she processed and a copy of them. I had that copy. Now, thirty-two years later, they wanted it. I wondered why they wanted to dredge this up after decades. The war was almost forgotten, and most vets were close to retirement or retired, as were the government officials involved with the war. There was no one it could hurt anymore. Veronica died a few years ago and had no family. Why not just let it stay buried along with the rest of the state’s secrets? Someone was digging up the past for a reason. Back at my place, I considered what to do with the microfilm. Burning it was an option, but they would never believe it was gone. Lance Cardiff, the spook that interviewed me, seemed sure he had me. Those pictures didn’t prove anything, and I told him as much. The surveillance didn’t surprise me. What was rattling around in the back of my mind was who were they watching, Veronica or me? At this point, it almost didn’t matter. She was gone. I wasn’t far from it. But why the interest in a forgotten war or incident buried decades ago? Pulling out my old microfilm reader, I examined the pictures one more time. Time had changed nothing. The images remained as horrifying as they had been at the time. The black and white pictures clearly showed the terror and desperation of the civilians slaughtered in the small village. I didn’t recognize the village. I’d been in Vietnam in ’68 but never left the bases. My assignment to find a mole within base command was over quickly. I discovered the mole and handed him over to the military. I never knew what happened after that and didn’t want to know. This was different. Veronica had copied a report on a village that a squad of rogue soldiers had destroyed. No one talked about it or the soldiers in question. It went away except for the pictures copied on microfilm she’d smuggled to me. I never knew what to do with them. So, I hid the microfilm and tried to forget the entire incident. But now, someone knew about the pictures and what they revealed and wanted them. The question was, what do they show? It was time to find out. I scanned the roll of film into the computer and enlarged the images. The pictures were grainy, and blown up on a large monitor didn’t help, but with the software I used, I was able to sharpen and clarify them. Then I understood. One of the soldiers shown firing his M16 into the crowd of children was a face I knew. I’d known him for decades. Charles Winston McGraw’s service record was exemplary, not a blemish on it. He’d served with distinction in a dozen campaigns during his career, and I was involved in many of them. He retired as a three-star general and still held sway over significant policymakers, and his next challenge was to run as a governor of his home state. A position he had a good chance of winning, given his background and current standing with the public. An excellent chance unless the public learned of his involvement in a rogue operation that killed innocent civilians. It would destroy his reputation and political career before it began. The disgrace would follow him to his grave. How he knew about the pictures or Veronica, I didn’t know. I saved the files to a thumb drive and put the original film back in the safe. I nursed a large tumbler of rye whisky as I considered what to do with the pictures. Going directly to him and asking if he was behind the Fed goons that interrogated me was out of the question. As much as I wanted to hear his side, experience had taught me never to let your opponent know how much you know. I decided the best approach was to tell him I heard he was running for governor, and offer my help, perhaps for security issues. I called, and he agreed to meet me the following day. I didn’t sleep at all that night. The images of the atrocities in the village kept coming back into my mind. What could the general say that would explain them and his actions? I knew I couldn’t ask him directly without revealing that I had seen the pictures. I wasn’t sure how to angle to it without tipping him off. *** I remained unsure how to approach the subject with him as I pulled into the restaurant where we chose to meet. I decided to do what I always did, not say much, and let the other person talk. At almost sixty years old, Ret. General Charles McGraw still looked the part. He’d been retired now for several years, and despite being a civilian from what I heard, he preferred to be called general. Because of that, I knew I could get him to relive his not-so-glory days at some point. I only needed to prod him. Pushing the thought aside, I greeted him with the usual comments and small talk. Over the next hour, I led the conversation from his early career and his time in Vietnam and how he’d risen through the ranks, eventually coming out as a captain. He regaled me with stories of his days “in country,” as they called it back then. At one point, I asked him about rumors of rogue operations that had killed innocent civilians. He looked at me and, for a second, turned white, but as a good liar and leader, he quickly regained his composure. “Yes, there had been operations that had gone wrong, but they were all documented and personal responsibility dealt with.” I let it slide and moved on to his later career and aspirations for being the governor. In the middle of a question about his ideas for governor, I asked if he had nightmares about his time in Vietnam. He stopped mid-sentence and gave me a funny look. “Nightmares? That was thirty years ago. Why should I still think about that?” He sipped his coffee and shifted in his seat. “I just wondered, is all. I know some people have nightmares until their dying day.” I watched his face, trying to read him. “Yeah, I did some pretty bad stuff in the name of war and saw even worse, but I locked all that away a long time ago.” “Hmmm.” I thought for a minute. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he snapped. “I know I still have nightmares from what I’ve seen…” I let that thought trail off. Which, strictly speaking, wasn’t true. I had had some bad dreams from some of the operations I’d been on over the years, but nothing approaching what I hinted at him having. He sat up straight, holding his coffee mug in his hands. Steam rising from the mug clouded his eyes for a second, but he didn’t comment. I continued. “Just curious is all. Being governor is a lot of stress, and I wouldn’t want past stresses to come back and haunt you.” I watched his eyes widen and decided to switch gears quickly to rattle him. “Hey, you remember the old gang. Whatever happened to them?” Changing the subject quickly. “Huh? What are you talking about, Tate?” “You know the ops crew—Leon, Brent, and Veronica?” Technically she wasn’t part of it, just a glorified secretary, but I knew better, and so did he. “Hell, I don’t know or care.” I let it slide. Leon was alive and working in corporate security. As for Brent, he was killed in a firefight during a mission for the company a few years ago. I knew what the official report said and what happened. The general was cool. He never blinked when I mentioned Veronica or rogue missions or Vietnam. So, I tried a new tact. “Have you heard about section 21? They’re going through all the old files, checking for mislabeled files or what they can declassify. I heard they were working on your old section from back in the day.” “So?” McGraw grunted. “Just wondering what they may find, is all. I know my section’s pretty clean…” “I cleaned up my messes.” “I’m sure you did. Funny, a company man, you might know him. Lance summoned me to meet with him the other day. He asked me about some files they found.” “What files?” “Not sure. They didn’t say. You know how spooks are. They assume you know what they’re talking about, so they give no details. Something about a missing village. They seemed to think pictures were floating around of a massacre, but they never really said as much. Just hinted like I was supposed to know, which I don’t.” “You were there too.” “Yeah, but never off the base where I was assigned.” I was there towards the end in ’sixty-eight, and McGraw had acquired lieutenant’s bars by then and was already angling for captain’s bars. I was familiar with McGraw’s record, having read it earlier in the morning before the meeting. “What’s this about? Don’t bullshit me, Tate. What’s going on?” He’d lost his patience with me. “All right, here’s the deal. When Lance Cardiff hauled me in the other day, he showed me some pictures—boring pictures of people skating. “Yeah, so.” “I did some checking. He works for you, not directly, but for people you know very well. My question is this, General McGraw. Why are you interested in people skating thirty years ago?” I leaned back and waited. McGraw rolled his coffee mug on the table as his eyes shifted around the room. He lowered his voice and leaned forward. I leaned in to meet him halfway across the table. “Look, Bobby, I’ve known you for years. Decades even. We’ve always been straight with each other.” The truth was I hadn’t seen him in years and hadn’t missed him. I said nothing. “They say there was a village where a lot of people died, and there are pictures.” I put words in Lance’s mouth. “Yeah, there probably is. So what? It’s too late to fix it now.” “What if someone in the pictures later becomes a public figure…” I let it trail off as well, then took a breath. “Phi Dinh Loc sound familiar? Of course not. It’s not here anymore.” He turned white. “There’s a picture of you, a young lieutenant, shooting into a crowd of children.” “There can’t be.” He gulped for air. “I wasn’t there.” “You were, and you know somehow that Veronica smuggled a copy to me. How did you know about her?” For once in his life, I suspected, Ret. General McGraw was at a loss for words. He stared at the tabletop then raised his eyes. “Bobby, you have to understand.” “I don’t care. I wasn’t involved. If it weren’t for the pictures…” “The pictures, can I have them?” “What do you think, McGraw? No. They’re safe unless you don’t call off Lance and his spook brigade.” He nodded. “Done.” “And today, within the next hour, you’ll announce your withdrawal from the governor’s race and public life. If I ever see or hear from you again, those pictures go straight to the press.” I stood and walked away but decided I needed to give him one more piece of advice. Turning around, I walked back to the table. Leaning down, I glared at him. “One more thing. If I ever so much as feel like I’m being watched or stalked, you’ll be dead in twenty-four hours.” I left Retired General Charles McGraw sitting alone at the table. His face drained of color. Never mess with a retired company man. ![]() A Night In L. A. a James St.James Story By the time I finished another cup of coffee, the pills and caffeine had begun to work. My head had stopped pounding enough so I could sort of move without the room spinning. I did remember the girl—long black hair, kind of skinny. She was friendly, offered to buy me a drink. That was all I remembered, a fuzzy picture of her smiling and a beer set in front of me. Something else came to me. She made a nod to her right. There was no one there except the waiter, a kid barely old enough to drink. Then something else came to me. She’d pushed a mug toward me. The pounding in my head wasn’t from the beer but the Mickey I’d been given. I’d heard they could leave a hell of a headache. They were right. She’d made sure I drank the beer with the Mickey in it. No wonder I didn’t remember anything, but knowing all this didn’t get me out of the jam I was in. No one would believe me anyway. Hell, I didn’t believe me. I checked my holster. My gun was still there. At least she didn’t take it. I pulled it from my holster and dropped the magazine. Eight rounds. A full mag. Good. I checked my spare mag. It was missing a bullet. Seven rounds. I froze. It was all clear to me. There was a body somewhere with my bullet in it. I usually carry a spare magazine with me. Whoever replaced the magazine with the fresh mag knew it would appear I hadn’t fired any bullets. It wouldn’t be until they looked closer that they would find a slug missing. I considered what to do. Not carrying that gun was a good start. So, it and the magazines went into the safe. I slid a different pistol into the holster when the door rattled with a loud knock. I spun the lock on the safe and left my office. “Coming.” The front door rattled in the frame. “Yeah, what do you want?” Los Angeles Detective Lindsay plowed his way into the room as I stepped out of his way. He stopped in the middle of the room, chomped on a cigar, and eyed me. “St. James, where’ve you been since last night?” I thought fast. “I met a client at the Long Arm Bar on Seventh street.” “Yeah, right, a pretty one?” Lindsay insinuated. “I didn’t notice. I was working. What do you care anyway?” Although I had a pretty good idea. I glanced at Brenda leaning against the kitchen door frame where the remains of last night's spaghetti still sat on the table. I’d left in a hurry. “We found a body with one of your bullets in it.” “How do you know it’s mine?” “Ballistics matched it with the slug we recovered from your gun after last year’s shoot-out.” “Who’d I kill today?” Lindsay pulled his notebook from his coat pocket, flipped pages, muttering to himself as he tried to read his writing. “Raymond Chambers. You know him?” “Yeah, sorta. He tried to hire me months ago to do some work for him. I turned him down.” “My, you’re noble all of a sudden.” Lindsay sneered. “I didn’t like the guy. He was mean, arrogant, and an asshole. So, I turned him down on the spot.” “And came back to kill him.” “After six months? Get real. Even you don’t believe that.” “I believe your bullet is in him. That is all that matters.” I did meet with Chambers but left him in mid-martini. Who would have seen me there? Branda went into the office and returned with my appointment book. “Here. He met Chambers at the bar and then left. He noted the time. If he’d accepted the case, we would track the hours he worked.” She shoved the book in front of Lindsay. He grabbed it and pawed through the pages. When the detective closed the book, Brenda snatched it from him and said she would return it to the office. With a glance at me, she left. “See? I didn’t see him again after that.” I reminded him as I tried to think of who else I'd seen that morning. Larry Pine. Yeah, he was there at a table not far from us. I passed him as I left. He had no love for Chambers or me. He’d had a couple of dames with him, but then he usually had a dame or two with him. But Lindsay was right. Why wait six months? I leaned against the table nearest me, both to hide the safe and help keep me upright. Lindsay’s barging in here hadn’t helped my head any. I took a long swallow of half-cold coffee to buy myself some time to think. Lindsay fiddled with the notebook in his hands and acted like he was looking for something in one of the back pages of it. “When did Chambers eat my bullet?” Lindsay glared. “About midnight as far as the doc can figure for now. And eat is right. You shoved the barrel of the gun in his mouth and blew half his head off. It was a god-awful mess.” I’d seen what a forty-five can do at close range. The bullets are big and slow, but they plow through bone like a battering ram. I didn’t need any more descriptions. “Where’d you find the bullet?” “In the wall behind what’s left of his head. It hit a stud, or it’d kept going.” “Look, it wasn’t me. Here.” I pulled the pistol from the holster and handed it to him. Lindsay dropped the mag and smelled the barrel. “Mmm, it’s clean.” “Yeah, I keep ‘em clean. Hasn’t been fired in ages.” That was true. He handed it back to me. I slid the mag back in and dropped it back into its holster and waited. “So?” “So. You never answered my question. Where were you last night?” “I told you, I met a dame down at the Long Arm Bar. She wanted to hire me.” “To do what?” “Find her boyfriend. At least that’s what she said.” “And?” I thought for a minute. “I told her no. I didn’t believe her. Her story didn’t add up, and she had too much cash on her.” I made that part up. We never got that far before I had the beer with the Mickey in it, but Lindsay wouldn’t believe me, so I didn’t try to tell him—yet. “This girl, she have a name?” I fumbled around on the table next to me and found the notes I made when she called. “Yeah, Lori something or other, I couldn’t understand what she said. It was over the phone.” Again, I was making part of the story up as I went along. “So, this Lori calls you, and you go running to her?” “Well, no, I told her I was busy, and couldn’t meet her right away, so we met later at the bar.” “What time?” I glanced at the small clock on the far side of the room and tried to remember. “'Round ten-ish, I think.” “Okay, for now. Find this Lori and get her to back your story.” With that, Lindsay left, not bothering to close the door. I stared at the open door, cold coffee in my hand, and wondered what had just happened. Shit. I was in trouble. Brenda came into the living room and kissed me on the cheek. “I know you didn't do it.'' “Thanks, hun.” I pulled her closer and gave her a proper kiss. Releasing Brenda, I slid the bolt home to lock the door. I didn’t need any more uninvited guests. As a PI, I often worked on the wrong side of town and Lori from last night was definitely from that side. Right now, I needed to find out more about the Chamber killing. An eyewitness would seal the deal and get me in the slammer for a long time. I needed to find them too. After taking more headache pills with my cold coffee, I grabbed my old sports coat and headed out. My car was an old Ford with mostly rust and gumption holding it together, but it always started. ~~~ I considered some options, one being that Lori probably left town right after I passed out, but I headed for the Long Arm Bar anyway. Hopefully, someone would remember me being there last night and who she was. I expected the bar to be closed, but I knocked anyway. I heard noises inside, so I banged louder. “Yeah, what do you want?” The muffled voice sounded aggravated. “I need to talk to you.” The door cracked open, and a short skinny bald man peered out at me. “What’s so important?” I pulled my ID from my pocket and showed it to him. “PI—big wow.” He didn’t move the door. “You were working here last night?” “No. I decided to sleep here just for the hell of it. Yeah, I was here, so what?” “I was here last night. You remember seeing me here? About ten-ish?” “Why should I remember you? The place was packed. I don’t even remember crashing in the back room.” That I understood, a busy night is a long night, and it all runs together. “Look, I need to see if anyone remembered me here last night. I met a girl...” “Good for you.” ‘Not that kind of girl. She was supposed to be a client. Tall, skinny, long black hair?” “Shit, that describes half the dames here.” I decided to stop being polite. I leaned against the door, pushing it open a little more. I remembered the kid, the waiter. “Look, I’ve had a bad night and morning. I’m not in the mood for your games. I was here last night. A tall skinny kid, barely legal age, served me the beer. You got a kid like that working here?” I shifted my weight a bit to show my holster enough that the butt of my pistol was visible. “Yeah, a new kid, just started a couple of days ago. Benny, I think his name is.” I pushed the door open further, and he stepped back to let me pass. Standing in the doorway, I looked around and spotted the back corner booth where I’d been. I walked over. “I was in this booth. Benny served me a beer. Where did he come from?” “Hell, he served a lot of beers last night.” “Yeah, I know.” He followed me to the booth and stood off to one side as I slid in and looked around. Trying to remember as much as I could, but most of it was a blur. “You want something to drink?” “Coffee?” “Yeah, I got that.” He disappeared, leaving me to try to remember more about Benny or Lori. He returned with two cups of coffee. I nodded at the seat across from me, and he sat down. “You never said where Benny came from,” I sniped. “Oh yeah, sorry, He walked in off the street looking for a job, had an ID that said he was over eighteen. I was short a bar hand, so I hired him.” I sipped the coffee. “What time’s he coming in today?” “About four, to help open up.” “He won’t be back.” “Huh?” I let it lie. “You got paper on him?” “Yeah,” “Get it.” He slid out of the booth and returned with an employment record for one Benny Long. I copied all the information on it and handed it back to him. “What do you mean he won’t be back?” I didn’t answer him. He’d find out soon enough. Thanking him for the coffee and information, I left. I figured the address was fake, but I had to check it out anyway. The address was on the far side of town. It took me a while to get there. Pulling in the driveway, I noticed the lawns were unkempt, and the entire street appeared abandoned except for a couple of houses. Cars and remains of cars sat in the driveways and lawns were half-buried in weeds. I loosened the pistol in its holster as I got out of the Ford and focused on the address listed on Benny’s employment record. I eased onto the half-rotted porch, and a familiar aroma greeted me. Great, he was probably as high as a kite by now. Listening at the door, I slid my pistol from its holster and dropped the safety. After a couple of deep breaths, I banged on the door. “Benny!” I yelled over the radio blaring inside. I heard a scuffling noise, and the radio stopped. I banged on the door so hard that it shook the window next to it. “Benny! Open up, or I’m coming in!” The door screeched as it slowly opened, revealing Benny wearing only a set of undershorts. I ignored his lack of clothes and pushed the door the rest of the way open and led with the pistol as I barged in. Lori was on the bed in the corner, covered up only by a sheet. That I didn’t expect. I motioned for Benny to sit on the bed. He stumbled to the bed and sat down. “I’m assuming you know me.” They nodded yes. There was no point in lecturing them, so I cut to the chase. “Who hired you to frame me last night?” They looked at each other, and I continued. “Come on, you two didn’t cook this up all by yourselves. Someone put you up to it. Once done with you, you’ll end up as Chambers did. Think, man!” I half-shouted to cut through the fog that was their brains. They were too out of it to comprehend anything, so I ignored them and searched the room. A table held a pile of weed and other drug stuff on it. I didn’t touch it at all. A dresser sat in the corner. In the bottom drawer, I found a pile of bills. Chambers paid them enough to keep them high for quite a while. Along with the cash was a slip of paper with a name and phone number. I copied it down. Benny and Lori remained on the bed, half-naked as I closed the door. Five minutes from now, they would forget I was there. The name on the paper was familiar—Larry Pine. He was at the club when I met Chambers and ran drugs and hookers for the last couple of years. I’d run into him a couple of times, and when he sent his goons after me, I beat the crap out of his men. Pine didn’t like me at all because I couldn’t be bullied or bought. As for Chambers, I knew his reputation for being mean as hell, and while technically most of his operations were legal, he did put up a good public front. I knew better. I’d cleaned up after a couple of his messes. He’d tried to hire me as a bodyguard six months ago. I don’t usually do that work, and while money was tight, it wasn’t so tight that I wanted to be around him. Word was Pine was trying to move in on Chambers’s operations, likely prompting a mob war. He knew I would be all over him if he started a war, and framing me would get me out of his hair—all the better for him. Larry Pine’s base of operations was downtown. I parked in front of the commercial building where he had his headquarters. Shoppers wandered in and out of the shops along the tree-lined street, shadows cast by the late morning LA sun. They were unaware that Larry Pine operated a gambling, loansharking, and prostitution business three floors above them. An operation I was about to shut down. I opened the trunk on the Ford and pulled the shotgun from the rack. I fed twelve-gauge slugs into the bottom loading gate, pumping the slide and chambering a round. I glanced around as I slammed the lid down on the trunk. No one paid any attention. I glanced behind me as I heard a car pull up. I’d made a call for backup and to protect myself. A man exited the car and walked toward me. “Ready?” I nodded yes, and we went inside the building and took an elevator to the third floor. A hard kick opened the door to Pine’s office and surprised the two guards carrying shotguns. I swung my shotgun to the right, catching the first one on the left shoulder, snapping bone, pushing him against the wall. His gun hit the floor as I kicked it away. Another kick with my boot and his face turned red as blood poured from his nose and mouth and he lost consciousness. The second guard tried to raise his gun, but I shoved my barrel into his stomach so hard he lost his breath and stumbled back into the hall. Leveling my shotgun at him, I mouthed for him to be quiet. He nodded and dropped his gun. My partner tugged the guard’s tie off, used it to tie his hands behind him, and hung his hands over the fire hose wheel in the hallway. I motioned to my accomplice to follow me down the hall toward Larry Pine’s office. We stood on either side of the door, listening as the sound of laughter filtered through the door. I nodded and leaned in to kick the door open. The door banged against the wall behind it as we stepped inside. A glance around the living room told me we had been right about the drugs. I ignored the girls sitting on the couch. The guard inside tried to charge me, but my shotgun bucked in my hands, and a slug found its way into his gut, sending him falling back to the nearest lounge chair, dead. The girls screamed and fled to the other side of the room. Larry sat at a small table digging into a heaping plate of spaghetti. He knocked over a glass of wine as we burst into the room. He said something but my ears were still ringing from the shotgun blast. I got the gist of it—Larry was not happy. I ordered him to stand up, and he did so without a fight. Detective Lindsay pushed Pine into the hallway, yanked his hands behind him, and cuffed him, informing him he was under arrest for the murder of Raymond Chambers and attempting to frame me. Officers took Chambers away, and Lindsay turned toward me. “I was sure you were guilty, but after you called, I had Benny and Lori picked up, and recovered the cash and the note you found. That convinced me you were telling the truth, and they admitted they drugged you and gave Pine your gun. Pine returned it after he killed Chambers, and Benny drove your car home. Lori followed and picked him up.” “Thanks, Lindsay.” As he walked away, he called out, “Until next time, St. James. Watch yourself.” I always do. ![]() A frigid wind blew through the street as I sat watching the line of old sheds along Canal Street. One of them was a dead drop. I waited patiently, sitting in a car as old as the sheds, trying to blend in, in the rough part of town. I watched a man drop a soda can carefully into the bushes in front of the shed with the blue door—a standard drop method. When a blue Mercedes pulled up, I was happy my patience had paid off. Russell Long exited the car and retrieved the soda can. Russell wasn’t careful. He pulled the can from its hiding place and returned to the car without a glance around. If he’d looked, he would have seen his old partner watching him. I am retired now, but I could still play with the big boys if I had to, especially when the big boys were careless. Word reached me from anonymous sources that there was a shoot-to-kill order out on me. I expected that. What worried me and lured me back into the country was the word that my former bosses had questioned my mentor and old friend LeAnne Talbot about my retirement and my whereabouts. We had expected that too. However, they had taken it to a new level. Informal questions had become formal, and the government, my former bosses, charged her with treason for aiding and abetting the enemy. I let my mind briefly wander back over the years as I followed Russell’s car from the dead to the living side of town. We worked together for the Company for over ten years, and both of us had done things we hated in the name of national security. He was now the agent in charge at this station. I’d worked with him in the “Good Ole Days” when it was fun to be a spy, but I also knew Russell’s dark side. The part he kept hidden from the world. I’d seen him go dark and dangerous more times than I cared to remember. The last time was in Russia seven years ago, and it almost cost us our careers and lives. We were undercover working on a construction site near the Kremlin, planting bugs to intercept messages from inside the compound. Our cover as construction workers gave us access to the grounds. But a Russian general’s daughter who worked at the Kremlin had caught Russell’s eye. She drove past the construction site daily, and he became obsessed with her. He stayed after work one night and followed her back to the general’s estate. I trailed him. He cornered her there, and when she refused his advances, he became crazed. What he did not know was that I saw and videotaped his crime. I should have reported him to our superiors, but the political climate was too volatile, and if our cover were blown, all hell would have broken loose. So, I hid the video where no one could find it. The authorities questioned us as we were on her daily route, but our construction worker covers held. I always suspected the Russians didn’t believe us, but they had no proof. The official report said she’d been raped and strangled by an unknown person. The Russian police had no solid leads and no suspects other than the construction crews working in the area, and there had been no arrest. The Company station director removed us from the country, and we returned to the states. A year had passed since I abruptly retired from the Company, or more precisely, fled from the Company and disappeared. I had decided that I couldn’t do the work anymore, but one does not retire from this job and disappear completely, but that is what I did. My former employers had issued “shoot to kill” orders, but I had to come. The black ops prisons that former operatives disappeared into and never heard from again were common knowledge. We couldn’t tell secrets if there was no one to tell. However, I kept a few trusted contacts, and the rumors were that LeAnne was scheduled to vanish. She knew too much, and they wanted her out of circulation so that she couldn’t talk to anyone. The people who wanted me dead retained her to question her before she was sent to a black ops prison because they suspected she knew where I was. LeAnne had helped me disappear but did not know where I had fled. I followed Russell’s Mercedes until he got to the area of town where there was extensive CTV. I dropped back and let him go because I knew where he was going, and I didn’t want to be recognized. I spent the next couple of days outside the city to finalize my plans to rescue LeAnne. I had retrieved the information I had hidden and set certain wheels in motion, which would happen regardless of my success. Then I rested and waited. I watched the comings and goings from my vantage point outside of the city, never daring to enter until now. My contact reported that Russell was alone with LeAnne at the covert location. The trek took longer as I avoided the security cameras around the city. The skills they taught me to keep the country safe served me well to keep myself out of the kind of jail they denied exists. They held her in a black ops house that I knew well. As I neared the house, I realized this was my last chance to back out, but I couldn’t. I owed her. Russell opened the door as I stepped on the porch. “I never expected to see you again.” “You wouldn’t now, would you?” “How did you find me?” “I hung out at the sheds in Lower Town. You always hated to find new drop locations. Followed you until I was sure you were headed for this ops house. I heard you had LeAnne and plan to transfer her to a federal prison tomorrow. A prison she will never walk out of, will she?” He scoffed. “You can’t stop it. Besides, we have what we want now—you.” “Not going to happen, Russell, because LeAnne and I are walking out of here right now.” Russell pulled his gun from its holster and aimed it at me. “You know I can’t let you do that.” I smiled. “Yes, you can, and you will.” I pulled a manila envelope from inside my jacket. “In here are the details of the Russian mission nine years ago—pictures, names, dates, and video of what happened when the general’s daughter died. It proves you raped and strangled her. We all know the official version and that they bought it. Barely. This will put you where you want to send LeAnne.” “I can just shoot you.” He stuck the gun barrel against my chest. “Within five minutes of my death, a copy of this report will go to your superiors and every major news outlet in the world, starting with the Russian press. How long do you think you’d last?” He started to respond, but I dangled the package in front of him. He crossed the room and unlocked a door. “Get out here.” LeAnne timidly entered the room and ran to me. “Thank you. I hoped you would come.” Russell was still holding the gun on me. “Give me the file.” “Sure.” I raised my arm as if to toss it to him, but instead, in one quick move, I sent an uppercut to his jaw, and he was out cold. I dropped the envelope onto his body and grabbed LeAnne’s hand. As we hurried from the house, she asked why I had given Russell the information. “No, there was only blank paper in the envelope. I mailed the real report to his superiors. Russell will pay for what he did.” ~~~ The drive out of town seemed to take longer than it did. For an experienced operative, I jumped at every sudden move that any vehicle in my sight made. By the time Russell woke up, the files I’d sent from an anonymous, untraceable email account would be landing on his director’s desk, along with the ones I sent to various news agencies. LeAnne disappearing would be the least of his worries. Eventually, the Company would get around to LeAnne and me. Russell would tell them I was there, but we would be long gone before they came looking for us. The only way to truly disappear was to die, and that is what LeAnne and I did. I’d faked bodies before, but I never thought I’d be faking my own. A raid on a cadaver farm provided the bodies, and the staged car wreck burned the bodies beyond recognition. I planted our DNA at the scene, so there was just enough material left to prove it was us. Six months later, while sitting in a beach cabana with LeAnne, I read the local newspaper. On the back page buried under the local island news about the cockfight ring that had just been broken up was a small piece about a former US spy charged in the rape and murder of a Russian General’s daughter more than nine years ago. As for LeAnne and I, we settled down to a quiet beach bum life. No black ops prisons for us. But I never stopped looking over my shoulder. ![]() The key for the door to vault eighteen had been missing for centuries. It was the last of the old vault rooms in the castle anyone had explored. The solid wood planks and steel reinforcements had made forcing the door impossible, and no one tried despite the legend that there was a fortune in treasure behind the door. A whispered legend of crown jewels his family had kept safe for the monarchy. A nobleman named Lord Jonathon Rice ordered the castle built upon his marriage to Lady Willmont sometime during the late sixteen hundreds. As the current Lord Rice, the Fifth Earl of Riceland, I inherited the castle decades ago. When I first inherited the estate, I eagerly explored the castle. A handyman had found a stash of keys buried behind debris and farm equipment in an old barn. After discovering some of the keys opened the vaults, I was confident I would find the long-lost treasure. As confident as I could be with no proof the treasure existed. Over the years, I had the vaults opened and explored, only to find wine or foodstuffs such as honey that were long past use. Among the finds were some valuable pieces of armor, but the vaults held nothing of real value for the most part. Although with only one vault left to explore, I gave up. The odds of that vault containing the legendary treasure were unlikely. I concentrated on the repair and upkeep, which proved more expensive than I could afford. While the sheep herd and sale of raw wool helped some, lack of adequate funds forced me to put off much-needed repairs and cut staff. There was a real danger that I would have to sign the estate over to the government for back taxes or open the estate to the public for tours. Opening the estate to visitors wasn’t entirely a bad arrangement as doing so would provide the resources for restoration. Support from the government was available for upkeep and staff, at least concerning the public tours. However, it was an idea that I loathed. If I could, I wanted to keep Rice castle private as long as possible, but each year the prospects looked dimmer and dimmer. So I fought back the debtors as best I could to try and find funds to keep the estate going. In my quest, I became obsessed with the possibility that perhaps the treasure the family legend spoke of was in vault eighteen, the only vault we couldn’t open. There were precisely three thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven books dating back to the seventeenth century in the library. A few were valuable enough that they were on loan to libraries and museums, but most were ordinary books from over the years. Each volume was removed from the shelves, cataloged, and inventoried in the search for the Vault Eighteen key but found no reference. I was aware that the likelihood of finding anything of value there was slim and none, but there was little to lose, so I created a plan to open the vault. After the door was open and if I found nothing, I would start the sale of the estate to the government. *** The night before we attempted to force the vault door, I went to the dark-paneled library and poured myself a drink from the small bar. As I wandered to my favorite leather chair next to the fireplace and began to sit, I noticed a small gap in a section of paneling that filled the space between the bookcases, one I had never noticed. I used the library as my office, and yet, as many hours as I had spent there, I never saw that crack. Tumbler in hand, I examined the crack in the paneling. The gap did not look fresh as if someone had recently tried to pry it open. The edges were aged as the other wood was from decades of exposure. Gently I placed a fingertip against the edge and pressed lightly. The panel seemed to move ever so slightly. What? Wiggling my finger into the crack, I pushed with a bit more effort. The panel slid open a bit more, and my skin prickled as I kept pressing, and a tall narrow opening revealed itself. I grabbed a torch from a cabinet and bent to examine the hole more closely. There were no tool marks to indicate someone cut the gap in the panel. It had to be original. There were several more of the panels in the frames of the shelves. I tested each, discovering they didn’t move. Only the one panel slid just enough to reveal a small hiding spot. I shined my flashlight into the hole and thought I saw a glint in the reflection that seemed to go back to the back wall of the shelves. Yes—there was something in there. A key? Poking around in my desk drawers, I found an old T-square ruler. I slid a chair next to the shelves and sat, where I would be at eye level with the gap. Light from the flashlight revealed there was something metallic in there. “Okay, here it goes.” I jiggled the ruler around and managed to get the crossed end over the object, and started gently easing it forward toward me. I dropped the torch as the object fell to the floor. Key eighteen lay bathed in torchlight. I sank back into the chair and stared at the floor, not moving. My eyes wandered from the key on the floor to the small compartment hidden in the bookcase. How no one had noticed the crack for all these years was a surprise. I realized I wasn’t breathing and forced myself to inhale and exhale until my breathing and pulse returned to normal, and started to think again. I looked over the key in the light of my ancient desk lamp. Comparing it with the other keys, it was indeed one of the original keys from the collection. But this was the missing key. It was late, but I couldn’t wait. Grabbing the torch, I hurried through the halls until I reached the door to the dungeon stairs. I paused, my heart pounding. All hinged on what was in that vault. The catacombs were dank, and the narrow torch beam was swallowed in the darkness. I made my way to vault eighteen. The heavy wood and steel-clad door seemed more ominous than before. Holding my breath, I inserted the key. It wouldn’t budge. I tried and tried, but I couldn’t get the key to turn. After frustrating myself and fearful that I would break the key, I decided to wait for morning. I would call a locksmith to open the lock. I didn’t sleep well that night. *** At seven a.m. the following day, I called a locksmith from the nearest town, and he arrived by eight o’clock. He was angry at my insistence that he come immediately but happy for the extra money I paid him to get there. I was only hoping I wasn’t spending my dwindling funds on a lost cause. He examined the lock and the key, cleaning out the door lock of dirt and debris from years of nonuse. He filed rough edges from the key and liberally oiled both. He handed me the key, and I inserted it in the lock. I wiggled the key, feeling the pressure in my fingertips. I held my breath as the resistance gave way and, with a metallic click, the door unlocked. I thanked the locksmith and dismissed him. I was going to see what was in that chamber without other prying eyes. Alone, it took all of my might to swing the door, with its rusted hinges, open. The smell of three-hundred-year-old stale air hit me, and I gagged. Stepping back to let the room air out, I swung the flashlight around the interior. I waited for a few minutes then stepped into the room. The smell of centuries-old stale air was oppressive, but I could breathe. The room was larger than the other vaults had been, and there were no windows in the room—the only light coming from my torch. Centuries of family lore hinted at a treasure worth a fortune. Stories told of a valuable find by Lord Jonathon Rice during the seventeen hundreds. Now three hundred years later, I was standing in vault eighteen to discover if the legend was real. There was only one thing in the chamber—a table in the center of the room with a wooden casket sitting on top. It dawned on me to take pictures, so I pulled my mobile from my pocket and took a flash photo. The amount of dust settled on the casket obscured the top, and I brushed it away only to sneeze and gag for a few minutes until I could get my breath. Once the dust settled a bit, I took more photos. The box’s lid contained a burled wood inlay and a pattern in what shone like gold-embedded wood. I recognized that pattern as I had seen it many times before in the house. It was the family coat of arms. Running my fingers along the top, I realized there were no latches. I tried to raise the cover, but it was too tight. I searched my pocket for the small knife I always carried, and I slid it around the seam until the lid loosened. My heart pounded in my chest, my fingers trembling as I touched the lid. I was about to see if the stories of the family hiding a set of crown jewels were true. What if there was a second set? Was the original Lord Rice charged with keeping a reserve set of jewels, a way of keeping them safe from those who would overthrow a king? Or was the legend a fairy tale like Peter Pan or St. Nicholas? I had my answer when I lifted the lid. The narrow beam of light from my torch shone on a large purple velvet bag, drawn shut with a gold cord—a wax seal with the royal crest securing the cord’s knot. *** I rushed upstairs carrying the casket and yelled for my wife. Lady Dinah came running into the library. “What is going on?” “I found the key to vault eighteen. I couldn’t get the lock open last night, so I called a locksmith and,” he removed the cover, “look.” She peered into the box, and the color drained from her face. “Oh my, that is the royal crest. You found that in the vault?” “Yes.” My wife breathed quietly as I gently lifted it from the box. Someone slid the box out from under the bag as I lifted it. “I think so, hon.” I could barely breathe as I set it down. “We shouldn’t open it. You should call James. He will know what to do.” I agreed and placed the call to James Marsan, our attorney, who decided it was best to have someone from the government present. They arrived at three in the afternoon. My wife and I escorted our attorney and three representatives from the government and the Queen to the library, where the box sat on the stately family library table. As soon as the Queen’s representative saw the royal crest on the wax seal, he smiled. “We have known that in the seventeen hundreds, the then monarch commissioned a duplicate set of the crown jewels, St. Edward’s Crown and the Sovereign's Orb, out of fear that if the monarchy were overthrown, the rightful heir would be king or queen by possessing these crown jewels. It may have been a foolish thought, but if that velvet bag contains those two items, it would be the greatest find in English history.” After documenting the bag, the crown’s representative instructed me to cut through the cord, leaving the wax seal intact. Carefully, I pulled the bag away from the contents. Before us sat the duplicate crown and orb, the Crown Jewels. To say that our lives changed forever at that moment is an understatement. Due to public interest, the government placed the estate on the historical places registry and funded all renovations. As the true Crown Jewels were secure, safely tucked in the Tower of London, these jewels were on display for all to see—for a fee, of course. To my surprise, I found that I have enjoyed escorting strangers through the estate, especially to my favorite stops, the library and vault eighteen. However, I found my deepest satisfaction when the visitors entered the parlor where the jewels are displayed. As they viewed the crown and orb for the first time, their eyes widened in awe— just as mine did. Thank goodness, I found that key. |
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