“This where the bullet went through?”
I nodded.
“Damn. Gonna have to patch and paint.” Apparently no sympathy for the intended victims.
He shook his head in disgust and walked back out.
“You could have been killed, Em.”
“Back at you, Skip. We survived.”
“You need to go back to Miami. This is definitely not a safe place.”
“What? And leave you two guys on your own? Come on. The reason I came down was because I got the note saying someone wanted to kill you. You need me for protection.”
She pointed her index finger at me, then poked it in my chest.
“Look, I may have screwed up on the surveillance thing, but give me credit, boyfriend, I’ve pulled my weight.”
She had. No question.
James walked in behind Mrs. T.
“Boys, I think it’s time we go home. Someone is serious about stopping this investigation.” Mrs. T. appeared shaken.
As two sheriff’s deputies paraded into the room, I pulled Mrs. T. aside.
“Mrs. Trueblood, I’ve got some really good news.”
She looked skeptical. “I’d say we could use some right now.”
“We found a metal box near the foundation of the Coral Belle. Inside is a piece of paper. It’s old, it’s brittle, and it’s all folded up, so we’re taking it to the library tomorrow to see how we can open it and make it readable.”
Her mouth hung open as surprise flooded her face and all of a sudden I had the feeling that she never really expected us to find anything. And we’d pretty much expected that we would.
Ushering her out onto the walkway we walked around the bloodstains and I touched her shoulder.
“Did you hear me, ma’am?”
“Yes. Yes. You really found something? I mean, what else could it be? It’s in the right spot, and you said it’s old and-” She looked up into my eyes. “You still want to go through with this?”
“We are this much closer to finding the gold.”
“You almost got killed tonight. I can’t in good conscience ask you to stay on my account.”
“What about the dead guy?”
She looked away from me and down at the pool.
“Obviously Mr. Weezle and Mr. Markim weren’t in my employ at the time of Mr. Weezle’s death.” She still seemed rather cold about his death. “But you,” she said, “you and your friend, someone tried to kill you.”
“Twice.”
“What?”
“It’s a long story.”
“James, I can’t-”
“It’s Skip.”
“Skip, I will honor your offer.”
“Really?” I was stunned.
“Really. You’ve put yourself on the line. If you find the gold, you get one million dollars.”
There was the catch. Pretend she’d misunderstood. But hey, one million was still a heck of a lot better than the previous deal.
“With all respect, Mrs. Trueblood, it was two million dollars.”
“Whatever.”
From behind me I felt a hand on my arm. Turning, I saw Big D with a disgusted look on his face.
“You let people track through the blood here on this concrete?” Officer Danny Mayfair said with an accusing tone.
“I didn’t exactly let anyone do anything. I don’t remember being in charge of this crime scene.”
“We need to talk.”
And for the second time in two days I was interviewed by the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department. This time it was more informal. I even knew the officer’s nickname and how he got it.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“It’s called deacidification.” Kathy Ebert sat at her desk, piled high with papers and books, and the three of us were hanging on every word.
“And you do it here?”
“We do. On older books. Antiquarian collectors do it. There used to be a lot of acid in paper and, just like the piece you’ve got there, it turns yellow and crinkly over time. So the idea is to preserve the paper. We can stop the acid from doing any more damage with Bookkeeper Deacidification Spray.”
“But we need to open it without destroying the-”
“Bookkeeper Solution is a nonaqueous, liquid phase process that uses magnesium oxide.”
“A nonaqueous what?”
“Not important, Mr. Moore. Once we fix the letter, we’ll use Bookkeeper. Right now we want to open your letter without, as you said, destroying it.”
“And how do we do that?”
“We’re going to treat it like a cigar. Put it in a humidor.”
We watched as she pulled out a wet sponge, opened a box of Baggies, and put the sponge and our folded paper in one of the plastic bags.
“We expose the paper to as much humidity as possible. Then, tomorrow-”
“Tomorrow?” The three of us said it almost together. And we all three sounded disappointed. We had work to do and the letter was crucial to our investigation. We were hoping for today. She assured us she couldn’t hurry the process.
“It’s going to take about twenty-four hours. Minimum. Then, we’ll try to unfold it. We’ll apply some blotter paper to give it more moisture, loosen the fibers.”
“And when you open it tomorrow?”
“Some of it will break. It’s inevitable, considering the condition it’s in. That’s when we go to plan B.”
“And that is?” Even Em was impatient.
“Japanese tissue.”
“More moisture?”
“No,” Kathy said. “This transparent tissue is lightly coated with an adhesive, like Elmer’s Glue. It’s actually a polyvinyl adhesive coating. We put the letter back together like a jigsaw puzzle. Then we place the strips of Japanese tissue over the broken areas, like tape. When we apply a warm iron, the strips literally melt into the paper and almost seamlessly hold the letter together.”
James, Em, and I sat back in awe. Kathy beamed.
“We do it here from time to time.”
“And we can read whatever is on the paper?”
“If all goes well, it should read as well as when it was written.”
“This is great. So, you won’t open it until we’re here right?”
“It’s safe. I’ll wait until we’re all assembled tomorrow.”
I looked at James. If someone else read the information on that paper before we did, they might just go find the precious yellow metal themselves. But I figured we could trust Kathy. We had to trust someone. And if you couldn’t trust a librarian, who could you trust?
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The restaurant was old, made of wood and stucco and painted green. Bentley’s Raw Bar was upstairs and it was all dark wood and small tables. The bar was well stocked, and as we walked by the cute barmaid smiled. At James.
“Debit card is going down fast.” We pulled out chairs and sat down.
“Yeah, but Skip, since we found that letter, I think the lady is going to open up her pocketbook.”
I’d held it in until I felt certain we’d have access to our letter. But I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“James, Em, this morning, after the shooting, Mrs. T. agreed that if we find the gold, we get two million dollars.”
They were stunned.
“This is no joke?”
“No joke. I don’t have it in writing, but verbally she agreed. Two million, my friend. Two million, Em.”
James kept shaking his head. “Two million. Oh, my God. Two million.”
The smile on his face went from ear to ear.
“We’re still a long way from that precious metal, pard, but damn. If we just keep moving in the right direction.”
We ordered appetizers that were surprisingly good. Gator tail, crabmeat balls, and escargot cappricio. Being the gourmet of the group, James was in his element. He still had dreams of being executive chef at some fancy restaurant. A million bucks could do a lot to advance his career.
“Buy our own place, Skip. Just like we talked about in college.”
Em smiled. She tolerated us. Our fantasies.
“A million bucks doesn’t go as far as it used to.” Running her daddy’s construction business, I figured she would know.
“Let me change the subject for a moment, guys. I’ve been thinking about these guys Malhotra and O’Neill.”