“Life in a Newport mansion,” Seymour cut in. “Poor him. I could think of worse things—like the life of a mailman.”
“Loneliness haunts rich and poor alike. Nobody is immune.” Sadie’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“No, Seymour is right,” said Brainert. “At least Eugene Phelps inherited his family’s money. But like Poe, he married late in life to a very young bride. Unfortunately for Phelps, she died of tuberculosis five years later and he never remarried.”
“And Poe?” Linda asked.
“The pattern for Poe’s life began early and never changed. He became defined by loneliness and alienation, and a hopeless quest for love and acceptance. But Poe was doomed to forever be an outcast. His poetry and prose were sometimes controversial, and in his literary criticism, Poe attacked the leading lights of his day, which didn’t make him popular. In a way, Poe was his own worst enemy.” Brainert shook his head. “But saddest of all, the women in Poe’s life always died, leaving him alone and loveless. After losing his stepmother, Poe married a teenaged cousin when he was twenty-seven. But Virginia Clemm was weak and sickly and hovered near death for many years. Eventually she died of consumption, just like Poe’s mother.”
“How tragic.” Linda sighed.
“Yes,” Brainert said. “Though loss and mourning ultimately fueled Poe’s art and led to the composition of his greatest works, eventually tragedy—and alcohol—took their toll.”
During Brainert’s recounting of Poe’s difficult life, I saw Sadie become more and more emotional.
“How did it end?” Linda asked.
“In his final few years, Poe became a pathetic figure,” Brainert continued. “Though his writings made him famous, there was little joy and less financial gain in this recognition. Poe wandered the country from Baltimore to Philadelphia and through the Antebellum South, desperately courting a number of women, simply because he could not cope with life alone.”
Sadie jumped to her feet. Tears she’d been trying to hold back spilled onto her cheeks. She fled the room without a word.
For a moment, everyone sat in an uncomfortable silence. “My aunt is still getting over the loss of her friend Peter,” I explained. “I’d better go see if she’s okay—”
“Let me, Pen.”
Before I could even rise, Bud Napp was on his feet and heading for the doorway. I wasn’t surprised. Ever since he’d lost his wife to cancer, Bud had been a good customer of Buy the Book. “Turns out, good reading’s good company in the lonely hours,” he’d once told us.
He got started by working through his wife’s old pile of Agatha Christies. Soon, Sadie was suggesting some newer authors (although Miss Marple still remains his all-time favorite), and the two seniors had struck up a friendship. Lately, they’d been seeing each other outside the bookstore, for the occasional dinner or drive to Providence.
“So where do we go from here?” Seymour asked after Bud left. “If there was a treasure, it’s gone up in smoke. And we hit a dead end, anyway.”
“Not necessarily,” said Brainert with the hint of a smile.
“What have you got, Brainiac?” Seymour demanded.
“Turns out there was a bundle of papers packed away with the Phelps editions—papers belonging to Miles Milton Chesley, the grandfather of Sadie’s friend Peter Chesley.”
I’d forgotten all about those papers, and the fact that Sadie gave them to Brainert to peruse.
“According to his letters, Miles Chesley bought each volume as they were published, mostly because he was obsessed with finding the treasure,” Brainert explained.
“Did he solve any of the riddles?” Fiona asked.
“Only the first one, pointing to the Mystic library,” Brainert replied. “The same one Dr. Conte solved.” His grin reappeared. “But I solved another.”
“Explain, oh great one,” Seymour urged.
Brainert nodded. “Ever see those tiny numbers and letters tucked near the fold of a hardcover? Those are signature marks and they exist to tell the bookbinder in what order the leaves should be bound. Well, in the Phelps books, there is a signature mark on the title page of each volume.”
“The title page?” I said. “That makes no sense.”
“Exactly! The title page is page five in the front matter of each volume, far too soon for a new leaf—since leaves are typically sixteen to twenty pages. That’s when I realized the marks were bogus.”
“That’s why you had Sadie copy the title pages for you!” I cried.
Brainert nodded. “I used a magnifying glass to examine the tiny letters and realized they were not the initials of the book titles, as is customary. These letters appeared to be random, and one of the volumes had a tiny mark that looked like a stray period. But when I examined it closely, I found it resembled a bug! So, of course, I applied the cryptogram that Edgar Allan Poe invented for his classic detective story, “The Gold Bug,” to those random letters in the title page signature marks, and I decoded the phrase ‘This is indeed Life itself.’”
Seymour scowled. “And this means?”
“It’s from a Poe story,” Brainert said. “A very important passage found in—”
We were interrupted by a pounding noise. Someone was knocking on the store’s front door. The CLOSED sign was posted and the store lights dimmed, so I wondered who it could be. The pounding began again, followed by the buzz of the night doorbell.
“I’d better get that. I don’t want Sadie to be bothered.” I rose and moved through the darkened bookstore to the front door. On the way, I saw flashing red lights rippling through the windows. Quindicott and Rhode Island State Police cars lined the curb. When I opened the door, a blast of frigid night air washed over me, and I shivered as three dark silhouettes stepped forward.
I saw the big, heavyset form of Chief Ciders, a scowl on his face. At his side, Eddie Franzetti shifted uncomfortably. I recognized the tallest of the three, a broad shouldered, bull-necked man in a gray Statie uniform and Smokey the Bear hat. This time it wasn’t the cold that made me shiver, but the stone cold eyes of Detective Lieutenant Roger Marsh of the Rhode Island State Police.
“You’re Mrs. McClure? Penelope Thornton-McClure?” Marsh asked, deadpan.
“You know I am,” I replied.
I heard a sound behind me. Brainert and Seymour had followed me out of the meeting. Marsh saw them, too.
“Step outside, please, Mrs. McClure.”
I figured he wanted to ask me questions, and wanted privacy to do it.
Suddenly Jack’s shout filled my head. Don’t do it, Penelope!
His warning came too late. I stepped across the threshold, pulling the door closed behind me. Suddenly Officer Bull McCoy stepped out of the shadows. His strong hands grabbed my arms, pulled them behind me. I heard a click, felt icy metal bracelets on my wrists. I tried to pull my arms free, but I’d been handcuffed before I realized it.
“Penelope Thornton-McClure, you are under arrest for grand larceny,” said Detective Marsh in a voice like doom. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…”
I hardly heard the rest of his spiel. When Marsh asked me if I understood the charges and my rights, I stared at the man in shock.
“You’re charging me with grand larceny?” I repeated.